Outer imagery is different, the 'recipe' of magick as a system of self-transformation is largely the same throughout all cultures and time periods; with the only notable detail being that not unlike technology, what cultures do with magick evolves as cultures become more advanced and complex.
So one of the ways to determine if an occultist is serious or not is if he has an answer to the question of "what is magick" that is systemic, that involves a process of self-transformation (Change), and that is not just given a non-definition or something relativistic like "it's whatever you feel it is".
Saying "oh you can't really answer a question like this" is probably only true if you personally can't answer it due to a lack of investigation or experience. And/or if you're involvement in magick is really a type of LARPing or fantasy-based wishful-thinking.
Wiccans, for example, tend to treat magick (along with their entire religion) as one big D&D LARP. They want to pretend they're powerful wizards in some fantasy world and try to convince themselves that any day now they'll be casting 'fly' or 'fireball'; while at the same time thinking that spells can just be whatever they like at the time, because 'you can't know stuff, man'.
New Agers treat magick like it was a mix of "the power of positive thinking" and a Victorian reverse-lovecraft story, full of ascended masters and atlanteans and the galactic high council all watching over them and that you can just make 'anything' happen if you can only think of enough white-light brightly enough.
These people then balk at defining magick or what magick is and is not capable of because a realistic definition of what it can do would ruin the fantasy novel that's going on in their heads.
Which is crazy to me, because what it can do, if you actually apply yourself to it, is pretty freaking awesome.
RPGPundit
(originally posted April 13, 2016, on theRPGsite)
What is meant by "self-transformation"? How is the system applied? It would be great to have some examples. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteWell now, this would require a lot of explanation. But in the basic sense, the discovery of all legitimate esoteric schools is that humanity does not see or interact with reality. They see and interact with a projection they've superimposed on reality. This also applies, first and foremost, to their understanding of themselves.
DeleteSo, their idea of self is an illusion, and their idea of the world is an illusion. And this means that one is also trapped in a state of disunion, of separation, from the rest of existence; operating as an island of ego lost in one's own little fantasy.
The magical process is in essence the process of gradually breaking down that 'base metal', that patchwork-quilt of a personality superimposed on yourself by yourself via all kinds of social and personal influences, and discovering the 'gold' of what is real; so you can then achieve Union with All.
Hilarious, as always.
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