Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

Midnight is almost here, and so it's time to launch a new Magic Monday. Ask me anything about occultism, and with certain exceptions noted below, any question received by midnight Monday Eastern time will get an answer. Please note:  Any question or comment received after that point will not get an answer, and in fact will just be deleted.  If you're in a hurry, or suspect you may be the 341,928th person to ask a question, please check out the very rough version 1.2 of The Magic Monday FAQ here. 

Also: I will not be putting through or answering any more questions about practicing magic around children. I've answered those in simple declarative sentences in the FAQ. If you read the FAQ and don't think your question has been answered, read it again. If that doesn't help, consider remedial reading classes; yes, it really is as simple and straightforward as the FAQ says.  And further:  I've decided that questions about getting goodies from spirits are also permanently off topic here. The point of occultism is to develop your own capacities, not to try to bully or wheedle other beings into doing things for you. I've discussed this in a post on my blog.

The image? I field a lot of questions about my books these days, so I've decided to do little capsule summaries of them here, one per week.  This was my sixtieth published book, the second volume of the sprawling study course in Druidical occultism I assembled from fragments, scraps, and a lot of William Walker Atkinson's more obscure writings, as chronicled in the intro to last week's Magic Monday. The Lesser Mysteries comprise four grades, the Greater Mysteries three more, finishing up with the grade of Gwyddon Rhydd or Free Loremaster, which brings with it the right to teach the system. There's a modest but significant number of Free Loremasters running around these days, and some of them do in fact teach; most students of the Dolmen Arch, however, simply learn it from the two books. One way or another, if you're interested, you can find copies for sale here in the US and at your favorite online or brick-and-mortar bookseller elsewhere.

Buy Me A Coffee

Ko-Fi

I've had several people ask about tipping me for answers here, and though I certainly don't require that I won't turn it down. You can use either of the links above to access my online tip jar; Buymeacoffee is good for small tips, Ko-Fi is better for larger ones. (I used to use PayPal but they developed an allergy to free speech, so I've developed an allergy to them.) If you're interested in political and economic astrology, or simply prefer to use a subscription service to support your favorite authors, you can find my Patreon page here and my SubscribeStar page here. 

 

I've also had quite a few people over the years ask me where they should buy my books, and here's the answer. Bookshop.org is an alternative online bookstore that supports local bookstores and authors, which a certain gargantuan corporation doesn't, and I have a shop there, which you can check out here. Please consider patronizing it if you'd like to purchase any of my books online.

And don't forget to look up your Pangalactic New Age Soul Signature at CosmicOom.com.

With that said, have at it!

***This Magic Monday is now closed, and no more comments will be put through. See you all next week!***

Comments

Sounds of the Universe Exercise

[(Anonymous)]

I believe you've wrote before on this blog that, although definitely belonging to the psychotic end of the New Thought spectrum, H.J. Gardener published a lot of valuable exercises, mostly of Rosicrucian origin. One of those is the Sound of Universe exercise (described in detail on pp.22-23 of Streamline Minds and in multiple of his other monographs, the short version is closing your eyes, plugging your ears by gently pressing on the bit of cartilage in front of ear canal and focusing on the "white noise" in your right ear), which I've been trying out in the last few weeks. Do you happen to know where it came from and what it is originally supposed to do? So far in my experience it works as a relaxation technique, and, for me at least, it seems to work better than conventional progressive muscle relaxation methods.

Re: Sounds of the Universe Exercise

[ecosophia]

Harry Gardener was an odd mix of excellent technique and really bad prophecy. I haven't been able to trace the sources of his techiques, but I don't think he invented them. Ni, I don't know the origins or original purpose of the Sound of the Universe exercise -- I wish I did.

Re: Sounds of the Universe Exercise

[(Anonymous)]

Thanks for sharing this today. I happen to be wearing earplugs and preparing for bed, and struggling badly with locked up muscles. The effect of focusing on the sound within the right ear in this way opened up the locked up muscle group on the left side.

Again, my thanks. Many best wishes.

Re: Sounds of the Universe Exercise

[(Anonymous)]

This sounds like a type of pranayama technique.

Clearing Bad Energy from Neglected Space

[(Anonymous)]

JMG - This is a follow up to a question I asked several months ago. Over the past several years, my home office has fallen into a terrible state for various reasons. I have neglected doing any cleaning of it (dusting, vacuuming, etc), and it has become the storage location for anything that doesn't have an obvious location elsewhere in the house. I spend a lot of time in there, as I work from home and perform my job in there. It's also the room in the house that is purely mine (all my books, music, art collection, etc. are in there).

Over this time, I have felt a major shift in energy in the room. The last time I overhauled it, it was almost a dream room for me. Very clean and tidy, with all my books and art. Over the course of the deterioration, it has felt heavy, full of dread, and I've had a sense of parasitic type entities in there feeding off the grossness (disorderliness, dust, cobwebs, etc.).

I have spent the past two weeks overhauling it - cleaning thoroughly, discarding things I don't want, incorporating new books, art, music into their proper places. I have two questions.

1. Going-forward, is there anything additional I should do to shift the energy and clear out anything unwanted?

2. On the 3rd day of this overhaul process, I developed a terrible sciatic pain on my right side. I have never had this issue before. I can't think of anything physical that would have caused it, though I do lift weights (so can't rule that out). The pain has been severe. I know some physical therapy and have been able to do some routines that improve things for 2-4 hours at a time until it returns, at which point I do another routine, etc.

I found some things online (unknown credibility) indicating that sciatica is esoterically related to imbalances and in particular: "The right side of the body is the masculine half, relating to yang energy. This is the energy of taking action, getting things done, thinking rationally, and emotions like anger and frustration."

I have found that it has tended to trigger worse when I encounter a particularly difficult part of the office overhaul (extra messy area or some complicated set of dependencies). Do you have any thoughts about this? Could it be emotionally self-inflicted? Could it be an attack from the parasitic entities I have sensed in the room in the past?

Thanks for your help.

Re: Clearing Bad Energy from Neglected Space

[ecosophia]

1) The first thing you need to do is figure out where the negative energy came from. Journaling is one good way to do that. Ask yourself where the negativity came from, and then let yourself write down whatever comes out. Do not censor or edit at all. What you get may not be literally true but it will lead you to understanding.

2) The same rule applies here, though making sure you get extravagant amounts of rest and sleep is also important. Nerve issues such as sciatica very often have emotional origins -- and you have to find and experience the emotions to release them.

Re: Clearing Bad Energy from Neglected Space

[(Anonymous)]

Kimberly just said she has a book on Sacred Homemaking. Maybe she can give some tips, she posts frequently here.

Fortune cards from RPGs

[(Anonymous)]

I'm getting interesting results from predictions with a deck of cards from a role-playing game: in this case, the Fortune deck from the game Everway. It's not the only prophecy deck from an RPG out there: Pathfinder has the Harrow Deck, which is also Tarot-derived.

Do you have any experience with this or know anyone who has? Thank you for your time.

Re: Fortune cards from RPGs

[ecosophia]

I don't, but thank you for the data point.

[linden_matryoshka]

Hello John,
In the first chapters of Learning Ritual Magic you mentioned Opening and Closing and reminded readers not to forget to do them before and after LBRP and Meditation, but in later chapters, you stopped mentioning Opening and Closing. Should one continue doing them?
Thank you and good night,
Inna

[ecosophia]

Yes, all the way through that book.