Sphere of Protection and Eastern Exercises

[ecosophia]

A project that I'm currently working on for publication is a manual of occult theory and practice for the beginning and intermediate student. This isn't a book about magic -- it's occultism in the sense found in Manly P. Hall and The Kybalion, the quest for wisdom and revelation through study of occult lore and practice of meditation and certain other related disciplines. The one ritual that plays a central role in it is the Sphere of Protection -- and thereby hangs a tale. 

One of the things that was just beginning to happen back in the waning years of classical American occultism's golden age was that certain  Asian exercises were beginning to find a home in the occult repertory. That's a process that deserves to be restarted, because (for complex historical reasons) Europe and the European diaspora lost their subtle-body exercises a long time ago, while Asia kept the traditions going. Since occult training (as distinct from magical training) doesn't involve circulating energy through subtle centers in the body -- the thing that can produce messy results when you mix it with Asian ways of doing the same thing -- it should be possible to combine occult training with practice of some of the more widely available Eastern exercise systems. 

"Should be possible" is a shaky reed to lean on, though. Thus I'd like to ask for some help from my readers. 

I know a fair number of readers of mine have taken up the Sphere of Protection as a regular practice, using either The Druid Magic Handbook or my posts here on Dreamwidth as a guide. I know that some of you also practice eastern exercises or physical disciplines such as yoga. What I want to know is whether you've noticed any interaction at all between regular practice of the SoP and regular practice of Eastern movement arts, including but not limited to: 

• Aikido
• Hatha yoga
• Karate
• Shintaido
• Tai Chi Chih
• Taijiquan

I've been able to experiment with Shintaido and Tai Chi Chih myself. (For those who aren't familiar with these, Shintaido is a movement art derived from martial arts, which was devised by Hiroyuki Aoki in the 1960s -- link here -- and Tai Chi Chih is a set of energy exercises created by taijiquan teacher Justin Stone in the US in the 1970s -- link here. I ended up exploring both of these after my magical practices and my practice of one of the old, very qigong-heavy taijiquan styles interacted badly and messed up my health; Tai Chi Chih is my current daily movement exercise.)  Your experience may be different from mine, though, so if you've worked with either of these and the SoP, I'd be grateful for your comments -- and if you've done something else along with the SoP, please consider telling me all about it!

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Did the overemphasis on ceremonial magic (rather than balanced occultism) in classical Golden Dawn contribute to its fragmentation?

[ecosophia]

I think it was something much more specific. The Golden Dawn degree system was keyed to the Tree of Life, so that each initiation corresponds to one of the spheres. That was fine as long as it stayed within the part of the Tree that represents the realities that most human beings can experience -- the four lowest spheres. The Adeptus Minor ritual, though, was keyed to Tiphareth, which is a level of consciousness most of us achieve briefly once or twice in a life if we get there at all. (The experience of the Tiphareth level is what is usually called "enlightenment.") If you invoke the influences of a level of consciousness you can't reach or can't sustain, what you get is its unbalanced reflection lower down, and the unbalanced reflection of Tiphareth lower down is egomania.

So the GD ended up with an Inner Order full of people whose egos had been stimulated in a very unhealthy way, and explosions followed. Many of the post-Golden Dawn groups, such as Dion Fortune's Society of the Inner Light, kept the methods of training and practice but replaced the degree system with one that wasn't keyed to the Tree, and the result was they didn't have the same problems.

[(Anonymous)]

Some Rosicrucian orders which pre-date GD had the same degree system, based on the Tree of Life. How did they manage to neutralize the imbalances of tiphareth?