Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

It's a little after midnight, so here we go with a new Magic Monday. The picture is of Victoria Woodhull, 19th century occultist, alternative healer, spiritualist, feminist, and the first woman to run for president of the US, in 1872 -- no, women didn't have the vote yet, but that didn't stop her from trying. She and her sister Tennessee Claflin also ran the first women-owned brokerage firm on Wall Street and published a newspaper. Yes, the history of American occultism is full of colorful figures like her... 

Ask me anything about occultism and I'll do my best to answer it. Any question received by midnight Monday Eastern time will get an answer, though it may be Tuesday sometime before I get to them all. If you're in a hurry, or suspect you may be the 143,916th person to ask a question, please check out the very rough version 1.0 of The Magic Monday FAQ here.

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 the button below to access my online tip jar.

With that said, have at it!

***This Magic Monday is now closed to new questions. See you next week!***

***Ahem. I just had someone try to put through a brand new question an hour after I marked this closed. The question was deleted. I do have to put time into other things, you know! "See you next week" means please save your questions until then...***

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you for Magic Monday!

I have four unrelated questions:

1) I did the exercise in lesson 5 of the Order of Essenes, and found the ring moved as I desired. What is happening there?

2) I had an odd thought about US politics, and I’d like to know if it sounds plausible to you. It’s based on an observation: lots of Democrats and Republicans seem more interested in fighting the other party than anything else, and the words those parties are named after have meanings. “Democracy”, as used in the US, typically refers to the ability of everyone to make their voice heard, and “republic”, in the US system, typically refers to the Constituional Republic, and so it’s a rules based system.

What I find striking is that so many Republicans seem to go out of their way to find clever and creative ways to exclude people, and meanwhile the Democrats seem happy to devise all sorts of clever ways to change the rules, and have recently descended into what looks like mob rule: in other words, what “democarcy” without being part of a “republic” looks like.

What I wonder is if this is occuring because the parties are focused on fighting each other, and so they’re rejecting the other, and thus at some deep level rejecting the idea which the other party was named for. Does this make sense, and do things like this happen?

3) I’ve recently taken some whole systems thinking to my internet use: the problem was that it was too easy to access it. I fixed that by deleting my web-browser and forcing myself to reinstall it before any use. This cut about a third of my use right away, but also, about half the time when I go to use the internet I find myself deciding it’s not worth while between when I start to install the browser and when I get to use it.

Given I’ve seen various discussions of the need to keep a unified will, is there a risk here of dividing my will, and if so, how do I avoid it?

4) Magic Monday starts at midnight, meaning it starts before sunrise, the start of the astrological day, so is it astrologically Magic Sunday?

[ecosophia]

1) Wait and see -- it'll be discussed in a later lesson!

2) Of course things like that happen. The name you choose for a party, a project, or anything else can have a powerful influence on how it turns out, because the connotations of the name shape how you and others experience it.

3) That's a very straightforward use of will. Remember that most of the actions you do are habit rather than will, and so using a delaying tactic like that to short-circuit the habit and make sure you actually will to go on line is a nice trick.

4) Depends on where you are at the moment the post goes up. Here in East Providence, it was the hour of Saturn on the day of the Sun, but the Sun was already up over Europe at that moment...

Visualisation

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG,

About a month ago I posted about the difficulty I have been having doing the exercise in Mouni Sadhu's Concentration where you have to visualise the pin.

I am still unable to do the visualisation. I have been experimenting with different variations on the exercise to try and make progress eg. trying to visualise basic shapes and colours such as a red square or a yellow circle. I've had no luck with these either. This is quite frustrating as I had been making solid progress with the exercises.

As I was reflecting on the exercise, I recalled that I am able to do other kinds of exercises that seem to imply visualisation. For example, the exercise in LRM where you ask the student to recall a familiar path from everyday life eg. walking to the local shop, and bring it to mind. I have no trouble with this exercise. Similarly, I have no problem with imagining made up scenarios.

So, I'm wondering, would you draw a distinction between these kinds of "visualisations" and Sadhu's pin exercise or are they the same thing? Does it make any difference whether one visualises from memory, from imagination, or from the mental plane directly?

On a slightly different note, when I do Sadhu's exercise I find myself trying to use my eyes to "see" the pin. Is this likely to be a problem? It seems from Sadhu's language that the end goal is to actually be able to see something as if you did see it with your own eyes. But obviously visualisation can't actually be using the eyes.

Grateful for any response you can give which might help me to get over this hurdle.

Simon.

Re: Visualisation

[ecosophia]

Some people have a much easier time with visualization than others, and some people can't visualize at all. Have you had better luck with the exercise of concentrating on sound?

CGD temperature tables

[packshaud]

I am having some issues with the temperature tables in the CGD book.

1) Honey is mentioned as "warm & dry 2°". I am assuming it is "hot & dry 2°".

2) Here in Brazil there are two kinds of unprocessed sugar (both made from sugarcane): one that looks like small quartz crystals, and one that is a brown powder (Wikipedia tells me the name in English is brown sugar). I am assuming that "unprocessed" is the "crystalline" variety (here it is sold as opposed to refined sugar).

3) Camphor is mentioned in Herbs as "cold & moist 3°" and as "hot & dry 3°" in Other. Why?

4) Keep a diet only with the foods mentioned in the tables would be troublesome. Is there a place where expanded tables can be obtained?

Re: CGD temperature tables

[ecosophia]

1) Yes, "hot" and "warm" are equivalent terms in the old temperature system.

2) Yes. Brown sugar is one degree moister.

3) The listing in "Herbs" is a typo.

4) If you can find books on the Unani or Unani Tibb system of healing, that's a version of the same thing which is still practiced in parts of the Middle East and in India. Other than that, how's your Latin? There's quite a bit on this subject that hasn't been translated ye out of medieval and Renaissance sources.

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG,

Hope you’re well! I am currently in the process of reading Greg Shaw’s book on Iamblichus and Theurgy. It is a fascinating, albeit tremendously challenging read, but I’m enjoying slogging through it. My primary difficulty is having just slightly more than no familiarity with Greek philosophy beyond the absolute basics as it related to Christian theology (I have an m.div., but the one philosophy course I took that I hoped would acquaint me with the foundations did nothing of the sort).

What would be some good intro level texts on Platonic and Neoplatonic philosophy (or whatever else in addition you think would be helpful)? While I am piecing things together bit by bit, Shaw clearly assumes the reader is familiar with many of the terms and concepts, not to mention a familiarity with Greek, French, and German. Fortunately excitement covers a multitude of difficulties, but ignorance is a bit intractable.

Thanks,
David

[ecosophia]

Okay, the best place to start with Platonism is with Plato himself. At minimum, the Meno and the Republic will give you a basic sense of his approach. Then go on to John Dillon's The Middle Platonists, and then to any decent book on Plotinus -- I'm fond of Rist's Plotinus: The Road to Reality, but there are a lot of good surveys of his thought. Follow that up with some dippings into The Enneads themselves. Next, Iamblichus' On the Mysteries, and finally, Proclus' The Elements of Theology.

[(Anonymous)]

Hello JMG!

1) The exercise of "solar etheric charging" from your book "Paths of Wisdom" is basically the "solar nwyfre exercise" from the Druidry handbook. Would it make sense to practice "lunar etheric charging" when one is already doing the "telluric nwyfre exercise"?

2) I don't want to make you angry by bringing up this old chestnut, but I'll ask anyway:
Concerning children and magic... when you write "If your children are under the age of three, basic magical practices such as the Sphere of Protection[...] are fine, but don’t do them in any place where your children spend much of their time." Do you mean "place" as in "room" or as in "house"?

3) To follow up on a question from last week: How could one discern between a feeling of dread that is caused by a premonition and dread that is caused by residual past life trauma?

Thank you again for your time and always good advice!

[ecosophia]

1) If you're practicing the Druid work, focus on the polarity between sun and earth. If you're doing the Cabalistic work, focus on the polarity between sun and moon.

2) As in "room."

3) That takes practice and effort. Regular meditation and divination will develop the necessary skills.

Dealing constructively with unintended acid trip

[(Anonymous)]

Hey JMG, "a friend..." had an unintended acid trip at a party the other day. It thankfully turned out to be a positive experience for him, despite not being the safest environment. He isn't going to do it again (first time doing it) but he had a very profound experience that was personally meaningful to him. How could he best turn this into a constructive experience.
Mediating on the themes and images seems like a good idea.

Re: meditation on themes of accidental acid trip

[(Anonymous)]

My comment got posted without me completely finishing it, sorry!

Any tips for preventing issues from the trip, and using what happened constructively?

Re: meditation on themes of accidental acid trip

[ecosophia]

Have him get plenty of rest and make sure he's up on his B vitamins. Other than that, yes, meditating on the themes and images would be a good idea.

[(Anonymous)]

Hi, I was hoping you'd be kind enough to aid me in the interpretation of a geomantic chart that I recently cast. The question was 'would the result of letting out my property of the address:... be what I hope it would be'.

I got:
1 fortuna minor
2 tristitia
3 fortuna minor
4 cauda draconis
5 puella
6 puella
7 tristitia
8 rubeus
9 puer
10 albus
11 populus
12 acquisitio

RW via
judge amissio
LW acquisitio
Reconciler conjunctio

Am I right in taking the 4th house as the significator of the quested rather than the eighth? In which case there's a straight forward conjunction, and fortuna minor as my significator is positive, though cauda in the fourth one would think not. Letting out the property would involve me moving out, and I've lived there for quite a while now - I don't know if cauda could perhaps be a comment on this. Should I pay any attention to tristitia in the 7th house moving to the 2nd in conjunction with my significator and also aspecting the 4th?

Which brings me to the main thing that troubled me, the judge amissio. I usually only interpret the court secondarily to the house chart, but this judge at first to me seemed to me like a straight no. As certainly a large part of whether of whether the letting out would be satisfactory to me is if it works out financially.

I've come to think more that amissio perhaps speaks to letting go of the past - the time I've been living there (when I've had some rather difficult times), and an improval of health on leaving. My plan behind letting out has been to move town as well as property. Do you have any thoughts on this, am I reading into this just what I want to see?

The reconciler conjunctio, doesn't really illuminate the seeming contradiction between the house chart and judge to me either.

Many thanks in advance for any thoughts or comments you may have

[ecosophia]

The house of the quesited is the fourth, because it deals with real estate -- I'm not sure why you thought it might be the eighth. (Did you inherit it, or does it belong to a spouse?) The answer to your question is yes, leaving the house (Cauda Draconis, the symbol of endings and departures) will be what you want it to be (Fortuna Minor in the first, springing to the 3rd). Amissio is favorable for any situation involving loss or letting go, and this is a question about letting go of a property, so I'm not sure why you see it as a negative figure. Quite the contrary -- look at the witnesses. The right witness suggests that you've had a long road to walk (in at least one sense) to get to this situation, and the left witness suggests that letting go of this property will enable you to get something better. The role of Tristitia simply suggests to me that you'll feel sad about leaving a familiar place.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm working through the first lesson of LRM, and I have a few questions:

1) Why is it that I feel more tense after finishing the relaxation exercises? They seem to help, because I end up feeling better during the day, but right after is a pain. Literally.

2) When doing the standing exercise, I find my arms start to swing back and forth, without any effort on my part. I find any effort to make them stop causes me to promptly lose my balance. Do you have any idea why?

3) I'm doing the daily recollection and noticing a few time wasting/counter-productive habits. I don't want to tackle them all at once, but what's the best process for going about it?

I've come up with journaling to see why I have the habit and then coming up with alternatives to meet whatever need they fill, but doing that for all the habits I want to change seems like it would be breathtakingly long, and tedious, so is there something else I could do to break these bad habits faster?

[ecosophia]

1) That's because you're becoming aware of tensions in your body that you didn't notice previously. This is a very common experience!

2) Good. You're starting to become aware of some of the other unconscious muscular patterns in your body. Keep with it, and those will relax too.

3) Don't do anything at all. Simply become aware of them. Awareness is the universal solvent of the alchemists; as you become increasingly aware of the habits, they'll start to dissolve. Don't try to force the process -- let it happen, instead of making it happen, and the results will be much better.

[(Anonymous)]

I've been mulling over a seeming contradiction, and I'd like to know if I'm on the right track. It's to do with two things: the first is that you've said that we have to learn to be able to take on physical bodies, then etheric bodies, then astral bodies, then mental bodies, then spiritual bodies. The second is that all things start on the spiritual plane, and then descend down to the physical level, or stop before that.

What I've come up with is that everything that has a physical presence has an etheric, astral, mental, and spiritual presence, but that the bodies are the part of us which stops at each level. So the physical body stops at the physical plane, the etheric body isn't just the etheric support for the physical body but includes elements which stop there (thus why it can detach), same with the astral body, and the mental and spiritual bodies we will develop later.

Do you think this is on the right track, or do you think I'm making a mistake here somewhere?

[ecosophia]

You've basically got the right idea. The descent from spirit to matter is involution; the return from matter to spirit is evolution. Your soul, at the beginning of its incarnationary journey, starts out as part of a stream of formless soul-stuff that descends from spirit into matter -- that is, gradually focuses its awareness down from its normal free state into a state of intense focus on material being. Once all the way down in the world of matter, you start building bodies one at a time, starting gfrom matter, and those bodies are your ladder back up. So you leave spirit as a non-individualized part of a current, and return to spirit as a wholly individualized being capable of embodiment and action on every plane of being.

Banishing Ritual

[miles_l]

Are there any banishing rituals other than the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram?

In searching all I can find are variations of the LBRP. What alternatives are available?

Which then made me curious. What was used for banishing before the Golden Dawn's LBRP was released?

Re: Banishing Ritual

[ecosophia]

1) Quite a few of them. You can find one very effective one, the Sphere of Protection, in posts on this Dreamwidth journal starting here.

3) The LBRP evolved out of a ritual called the Calling of the Four, which Eliphas Levi gives; where Levi got it is an interesting question. Before then occultists had to use somewhat clumsier methods of banishing, involving either incense and holy water or extensive prayers.

Magic in a foreign language

[(Anonymous)]

Hello JMG,

I plan to start an occult practice in a few years once my children grow up (yes, I've read the FAQ). However I am not a native English speaker, hence my questions:

Does it matter whether someone performs a ritual in a foreign language, or in their native language?

Generally speaking, how does one go about translating a ritual to another language?

Thanks,
faluc

Re: Magic in a foreign language

[ecosophia]

Rituals are translated all the time. The key is that you leave the names and words of power untranslated, but translate the rest. For example, if you're translating the Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram, you leave all the names and the Hebrew words in the Cabalistic Cross untranslated, but replace the English words with the language of your choice. (In Latin, for example, the calling of the archangels would begin "Ante me, Raphael, retro me, Gabriel," and so on.)

[(Anonymous)]

1. Are there any good replacements for candles in rituals that are durable
and don't involve using up and re-buying a new item regularly, and that
are suitable for use where burning stuff isn't a good idea?

I'd never much liked crystals and found the culture around them too new age
for my liking, but maybe they would be suitable?


2. About visualisations of, or enounters with gods. (Not as strong as the ones some people have mentioned on this blog.)
a. If you keep getting mental images of a deity appearing during a ritual and you know the origins of that imagery, how much notice should you still take of it as an indication of that deity? (Examples I've experienced have been from pop culture, ads, illustrations from old mythology books, and statues either made to be of that deity or not.)
b. You seem to be in favour of sticking to one system in most cases. But what about this? I have mixed-nationality recent heritage and for me it just feels right invoking gods from more than one pantheon. I always have a sense of something missing or incomplete otherwise. (For me this usually means deities with similar roles from different pantheons at the same time.)
c. Where is it possible to read about people's experiences with pagan gods?
Are there any forum threads, other blogs, books about this? Or do most people prefer to keep these experiences private?

[ecosophia]

1) The flame isn't just decorative. Have you considered oil lamps?

2a) Most of the imagery in your mind got there from some source you encountered in the material world; beings on the inner planes can use those images just as much as any other.

2b) If that's what feels appropriate to you, by all means do that. When I talk about sticking to a single system, I'm talking primarily about systems of magical training. I recommend using a single pantheon in your magical work, but you can certainly invoke all the deities you want the rest of the time.

2c) I think there are forums out there, but it's never been something I've pursued. Anyone else?

A dryad and a pentagram

[sea_spray]

Hi JMG

I would like to share an experience I had recently. I felt like sharing it as a thank you to you JMG for helping me get to the stage that I can have such awesome experiences.
I’m curious if anyone else has had similar experiences.

I had a powerful interaction with what I think is known as a dryad. Two friends and I went to a local spring as we were hoping to explore the non-physical aspects of the world and I had read in your books that the teluric current comes through springs very strongly. To physical eyes it’s been nicely landscaped to with wooden down to the water’s edge. One of my friends is psychically sensitive and I think empathic, while the other is curious and feels drawn to explore but has not experienced much.

After some time sitting quietly with our feet in the water i could see in my minds eye a blue and white female form standing on the water in front of me, and similar figures in front of my two friends. My more psychic friend could feel an intense sadness, and that the spring had been much more beautiful. She said that she felt that the spirit had saved what she could after the landscaping had taken place and that it had almost killed the spring. I could see the scene in my minds eye or workmen doing the landscaping carelessly desecrating the spring, and the screams of the dryad trying to save what she could.

I felt that it should be a sacred place. When people walked or biked along the path which passed the spring, with a section of board walk over the waters of the spring itself, we all felt a surge of anger, resentment and sadness at them.

I felt a need to bless the spring so, between interruptions I did a sphere of protection. It was one of the most powerful I have ever done even though I was directing all the energy to flow out and fill the spring. When I got to the spirit below I felt like it would be a big one, it felt like opening a volcano! My friend who hasn’t experienced much felt it too and told me later that his reaction was something like “Oh frack its real! Oh frack it’s real!”. Afterwards I felt full to bursting with energy and ended up giving most of that to the spring too because it felt like a bit too much

It felt like the dryad was very grateful and didn’t want us to go. I left with a feeling of sadness because that place could be so much more for all people, physical and non-physical, human and everything else.

Is there anything else you can recommend for helping the dryad?

Here’s the spring in question:
https://christchurchwalks.wordpress.com/playgrounds/styx-river-esplanade-reserve-redwood-springs/

I also have a question about the banishing pentagram described in Dion Fortunes book physic self defence book as a powerful tool against non-human spiritual threats

Based on my interwebing it looks like an invoking earth pentagram. Is this the correct interpretation?

Does tracing it starting at the other points invoke the power of, or banish with the help of, other elements respectively in a similar manor to what’s done in the sphere of protection?

Thank you for all your help

Re: A dryad and a pentagram

[(Anonymous)]

I found Yellowstone very interesting this year. Most of the features seemed to appreciate the admiration/worship of people. There was one, Excelsior Geyser, however, that seemed very angry, though I had the impression he was more angry at the feature up the boardwalk-Grand Prismatic Spring-attracting the humans than at the humans. I would be completely unsurprised to hear of a death near there, or of something happening that diminishes the beauty of Grand Prismatic.

Old Faithful, however, gave the impression of being exhausted but determined to continue doing his duty.

In general, we had a good trip, saw several unpredictable geysers erupt and lots of wildlife. The overall Yellowstone Caldera appears to me to like pilgrimages and appreciate the attention, but of course expects a certain amount of human death as his just tribute. He could be a problem with that expectation in a largely depopulated future West.
BoysMom

[(Anonymous)]

Is there any exercise to align your ego with your Higher Self? I already do the SoP.

I have transiting Uranus hitting my sun, mars and mercury in the 9th house. What is the most constructive way to deal with this? I know what the textbook definition is but was wondering how best to deal with the disruptiveness of this?

Thanks

[ecosophia]

Depends on how Uranus is placed in your natal chart and how it's dignified. For me, when Uranus is affecting my chart -- it is right now, for example -- the best way to deal with it is to be weird. Uranus is the planet of eccentricity and weirdness; if you want to channel his influence in constructive ways, choose something bizarre to do, and do it.

[(Anonymous)]

Victoria Woodhull was also a member of the First International and her entire branch ended up being kicked out by Marx for the crimes of anarchism, feminism, and spiritualism. :)

[ecosophia]

The horrors! Now imagine how different our history would have been if they'd succeeded in kicking Marx out...

[(Anonymous)]

Can you offer an opinion about the phenomenon of certain strains of Asian meditation making inroads with certain groups of Western intellectuals, the latter of which are ostensibly dedicated to a purely materialist view of existence? What's going on there?

[ecosophia]

It's quite simple, First, it's been fashionable for a long time in the Western world to circulate a bowdlerized version of Buddhism, stripped of its spiritual dimensions, as a rationalist faux-religion. (There was a big fad for that in the 1970s, for example, and it's become popular again in recent years.) Second, if you take certain kinds of Buddhist meditation (such as mindfulness meditation), yank them out of context, and strip them of their spiritual dimension, you get a tolerably effective non-chemical tranquilizer. So rationalists who feel stressed out can take up one of these watered-down meditation practices instead of popping a pill, and still cling to their ideology of choice.

July 4th Divinations?

[gbejm]

As a question for the broader community here, did anyone else do any divination on July 4th for the course of the United States? If so, perhaps this comment thread could be a place to gather them and compare notes.

I wrote up the details in a Dreamwidth post here, but the quick summary I came up with for the next year was:

* the major media will get even more ridiculous, but audiences will increasingly ignore the hysterics and focus on day-to-day life
* Congressional Democrats will continue their political fights with Trump, but they'll end up getting walloped thoroughly enough that the federal bureaucracies finally fall in line behind the president
* on other fronts, we'll be muddling along as usual

No signs of wars, major economic shifts, etc.

Re: July 4th Divinations?

[ecosophia]

Thanks for this! I didn't, but that's because I've been relying on astrological ingress charts of late; a birthday divination for a country ought to work well.

ancestor scrying safety

[(Anonymous)]

Dear JMG,

at the moment I am reading a book on navigating relationships with ancestor spirits.

The author proposes a series of exercises to cultivate one's relationship with the ancestors,
in most cases these are variations of scrying in the spirit vision.

Before I set out to do this I'd like your opinion on the safety of the process:

1) He proposes establishing a sacred space and ritual intent, calling in supportive guides and asking them to establish a layer of protection
2) turning the attention to each of the principal directions, imagining the line of ancestors into the far past, getting an impression of them, clearing heavy energies and turning to next direction (father's father in the east, father's mother in the west and so on...)
3) then, with cleared personal energy, closing off any pathways of curiosity,
and bringing back attention to present, making notes of what happened (I'll suggest meditating on it, too)

Later (scrying?)exercises in the book build up on this. The final aim is to make contact with a benevolent ancesrtal guide who is willing to help the troubled dead further down the lineages.

Is it safe to do this, are there any precautions that should be taken?

Concerning my skill level: I'm working with the Druid Magic Handbook and am not yet finished with learning the full Sphere of Protection. I'm absolutely willing to wait until I have mastered this or further techniques from the DMG before trying the ancestor thing, if it helps. I think for example it would be a good idea to open a grove for this working, but I'm not there yet.

Thank you, as always for giving people the chance to ask these kind of questions!

Re: ancestor scrying safety

[ecosophia]

I'd definitely recommend waiting until you've got the SoP down cold and can open and close a grove from memory, without using a cheat sheet, before trying this. Once you have that level of skill, though, and can banish unhelpful energies effectively, you should be able to do the kind of work discussed in the book in relative safety.

[(Anonymous)]

Dear JMG,

1. I bought the Druidry Handbook to supplement my beginnings with the work as described in the DMH. In the Handbook, a technique for receptive meditation is included, which you describe is closer to certain Asian meditation practices. Is the main difference between say meditation in Buddhism and receptive meditation in Druidry that the focus in the latter is on listening closely to nature?

2. You described some time back the concept of ego inflation. Could I trouble you to elaborate what that means? Is it a danger to beginners in Druid magic?

Thanks as always!

[ecosophia]

1) Yes. The important thing is that you're not just emptying your mind -- you're filling it with something else -- in this case, your perceptions of nature.

2) Ego inflation is a danger to everyone, and it's especially risky for the novice mage. Basically, it's what happens when you convince yourself that you're bigger and stronger and more important than you are. Your ego inflates like a balloon -- thus the name -- and you talk yourself into believing that you're immensely powerful and the world has to do whatever you tell it. What makes this dangerous, of course, is that if you've had self-confidence problems, the early stages of ego inflation can actually improve things for you, because you have the confidence to succeed. The problem is that you end up turning into an insufferable jerk, and discover the hard way that overblown self-confidence will not get you what you want. The best way to avoid ego inflation is to remember that you are no more important, special, or powerful than any other beginning mage, and that the universe does not know that you're here and will not miss you when you're gone.

[grandswamperman]

It seems like you could write a book called Forgotten Figures of American Occultism! I'd buy it. ;)

[ecosophia]

I have some projects to get out of the way first, but when those are done I plan on starting work on an occult history of the United States from colonial times to 1979. It should be fun.

earthquake

[(Anonymous)]

Hello John Michael,

I wanted to ask regarding practice of DMH/SoP and earth based natural phenomena.

Living in Southern California we have experienced two quite unsettling and powerful earthquakes recently. To ask you, please, your thoughts on whether these are understood to be from 'Earth', or 'Spirit Below'.

Also to ask if theres any specific guidance that comes to mind in how they should be addressed through practice, a Grove ceremony, etc.

Fwiw, while they were sufficiently far away to have not caused material damage, the raw power was apparent and our passive participation was all too clear. Sobering and awe inducing.

Thank you

Re: earthquake

[ecosophia]

1) Those are Earth, rather than Spirit Below. Spirit Below is the life force that moves through the land.

2) I don't know that anybody's worked this out. Druidry evolved in a part of the world that gets very few earthquakes! Prayer and divination might be useful sources for guidance here.

Knee pain

[(Anonymous)]

JMG yesterday I was blessing our house with Holy water using the traditional catholic rite. When I was was making the Holy water my knee really hurt then after I was done it passed. Do you think that was anything I should worry/ pay attention to? Thanks as always.

Re: Knee pain

[ecosophia]

Good question. Have you prayed for guidance about it? Saying the rosary with that intention might be a good way to do that.

Knee pain

[(Anonymous)]

JMG I forgot to mention that I have no trouble with my knees I some times have hip pain from life but not knee trouble.

Pregnant Women

[(Anonymous)]

Not to beat a dead horse but does the prohibition of the SOP in child play areas apply to rooms that pregnant women sleep in?

Re: Pregnant Women

[ecosophia]

Nope. As long as the child is still inside the womb, it's shielded by the mother's etheric and astral bodies. The mother shouldn't be practicing magic -- she's busy with one of the supreme magical rituals, the evocation of a living soul into physical form, and should not let any other working interfere with that -- but if someone else does the SoP in the area, it'll help protect her as well as the child.