Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

Midnight is breathing down our necks 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 is my sixth-third published book, and you'll have a little trouble finding it right now, because its former publisher let it go out of print last year. The upsides are, first, that this gave me the chance to revise, expand, and improve it considerably; second, that I was able to give it the title I originally assigned it, Merlin's Wheel -- did you know that authors have no control over the titles and cover art of their books? -- and third, that I had it placed with a second publisher less than 24 hours after the old one let go of it.

The book -- well, it's a sequel of sorts to my earlier book The Celtic Golden Dawn, providing a set of eight seasonal ceremonies inspired by ancient mystery rites, celebrating the legendary life of Merlin around the cycle of the year as a system of spiritual self-initiation. The new version has been expanded so that it can also be practiced within the ritual system of the Golden Section Fellowship and its related traditions, including the Dolmen Arch system and the Fellowship of the Hermetic Rose. It'll be out later this year, and I'll make an announcement here and on my blog once it's available for preorder.

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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 further comments will be put through. See you next week!***

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

JMG,
For a few weeks now, I have been regularly praying everyday over the Ecosophian Prayer List that Quin manages and as I do so, I keep wondering if I have the proper effective attitude, etc. So today, I went over some of your various responses to Qs about prayer here on MM or Open Post that I have copied over the years and put together the following for use with Quin's prayer list:

Prayer is not about making one feel powerful. Prayer is about acknowledging that there are beings in the cosmos far greater than us.

Settle into a stable position, turn attention toward the deity or deities to pray to, and talk. Do it as though I have the chance to talk to a wise and powerful elder. Explain why I want to pray to the deity/deities, ask for the outcome.

Imagine energies of blessing, healing, and peace streaming out from me for the people of each prayer request.

At the end, acknowledge "Thy will be done" and thank the deity/deities for listening. (Don't grovel, don't flatter, don't whine.)

Then, at the end of the prayer session, and this is crucial, be silent for a while. Listen for any answers. We may not get any; an answer may be felt -- an emotional tone, say -- or words may surface in the mind; but it's at least as important to listen to deities as it is to speak to them.

Does this seem like an appropriate approach for the prayer list or prayer in general? Any modifications?

Thank you,

WILL1000

[ecosophia]

That's a very good way to do it. It's fairly close to the way I pray, if that's anything to go by.