Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

Midnight is upon us 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 1.3 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 seventy-ninth published book, and those readers who have been following this journal for more than a few years already know a fair amount about it. It's a practical manual of political and economic astrology or, to use the traditional term, mundane astrology. Its intention is to teach people how to cast and interpret charts to predict the future of any country they desire. It's only been out for a little while, but initial feedback suggests that it does the job tolerably well. Interested? You can get a copy here if you're in the United States and via your favorite online or brick-and-mortar bookshop elsewhere. 

(I'm almost out of books to summarize here -- I have one more book that's been published since this came out, and two more that might be out in time. I have some amusing ideas about what else to do once I've finished the whole sequence -- but all in good time.)

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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 again when I return from hiatus in mid-June!***

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Not the OP, but this is interesting. I have a data point here. There’s a member of my husband’s family who has Borderline Personality Disorder and is prone to outbursts, dramatic behavior, periods of substance abuse, and generally shallow and catty behavior. All that said, she’s also the family scapegoat/maid, and I have some empathy for her because I see how the others denigrate her and undermine her and use her, and how she always comes running back for more, especially from her “golden child” sibling. Meanwhile they gossip about her and put her down constantly.

The family professes embarrassment about her dysfunctional behavior, but also they never hold her to any kind of accountability.

Anyway, she has directed outbursts at me several times over the years, and I always forgave her and moved on. But most recently, last year, she yelled at me out of the blue over something absolutely innocuous, in front of my children. She then proceeded to have a full on tantrum and skip a holiday dinner while we waited for her. My children were frightened.

She later apologized (in a low effort way) but that was the final straw for me, and while I pray for her healing (she’s always asking for prayers), I no longer give her any energy or attention, and my children and I don’t see her. This is totally different from how the rest of the family acts about her (complaining about her to everyone but never expecting anything better from her, while also exploiting her labor).

I was a bit surprised by the rest of the family’s reaction to my change in behavior towards their scapegoat. They completely disengaged from me! None of them reach out or talk to me anymore beyond the bare minimum (like birthdays), it’s like my husband and I, and our children, don’t really exist. This came about without any direct discussion or confrontation or anything. It’s eerie.

None of it made sense to me until you described what happens when you disconnect from the family egregor. I think that’s what is happening here.

[ecosophia]

Yes. Most dysfunctional families have one member who serves as scapegoat, though it's not always in the same way as in your example, and uses the same combination of overt rejection and covert encouragement and exploitation to keep the scapegoat in their place. That's essential, because such families always have some other problem that they're hiding, and to stop projecting all their dysfunction onto the scapegoat is to make the other members go into a half-conscious or subconscious panic at the thought that the secret problem will be revealed. Since you broke the rule, yeah, you got put outside very fast.

[(Anonymous)]

Wow. Interesting. You just unlocked another clue for me. I’m fairly certain the family patriarch—her stepfather/adoptive father (she is the only non-biological child of his in the family)—is a serial adulterer. He was caught once years ago, but there are many obvious clues that he never stopped cheating.

The family NEVER discusses this. It’s absolutely off limits to even insinuate it or refer back to the episode he was caught in.

He’s a prominent religious leader/pastor/business owner in the community, so any revelations about infidelity would have major repercussions for the family reputation and income.

Wow. I never connected this to her role before…

Thank you!

[ecosophia]

An absolutely typical situation. Alfred Adler wrote about this, and so did Gregory Bateson.

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you! Off to research now…