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Come to find out, the Gordon who writes Rune Soup is not the same Gordon that I thought it was. He tells me my description of him is still oddly accurate. It’s a weird wide web we write on.

Rune Soup,* a chaos magic blog written by a certifiable lunatic with a good heart, has an interesting article on Wealth Magic today. I particularly like that he’s advancing Jason’s theories about wealth magic, which I’ve found helpful myself. 

Gordon hit on something that resonates with my own pet project regarding wealth magic for the last year. He says:

Move your focus from ‘money’ to ‘earning power’.

Like old banana breath in the clip above, I feel like I’ve “reached the top and had to stop, and that’s what’s been bothering me.” I’ve got money magic down. I can conjure five-digit windfalls with the wave of a wand, or at least by lighting a candle and muttering under my breath near my favorite spirit pot.** That’s not bad, really, but I never seem to get enough all at once to make a useful fortune. In the time between windfalls, I rack up enough debt to eat away whatever I conjure for myself.***

A while ago, Fr. S.L. and I had a series of conversations about the nature of wealth and why money magic isn’t getting me where I want to be. He showed me the true definition of wealth, and that, along with Jason’s  theory (summarized on Gordon’s post) has reshaped the way I think about prosperity magic.

What do we really want when we ask for wealth or money? I propose that most of us really want power. We want the power to do what we want, whenever we want, without the stress of bills. We want to live off the interest of our total holdings, and live well. We don’t want our actions ruled by the bills.

The solution we see most obviously in our culture is more money, but maybe we’re aiming at the wrong target. When I read Gordon’s quote above about moving the focus to earning power, it was like hearing a bell chime in the distance. He’s talking about the power to earn more money, but it resonated with me as “doing the magic to acquire power.”

When I read through the descriptions of the spirits of the Lemegeton’s Goetia, I used to see the spirits that bestow temporal dignities as being for social climbers and politicians. But the more I think about it, while the wealthy do tend to have power, the powerful also tend to have a lot of wealth. The spirits are good at bestowing windfalls, but the size of the windfall I’d need to have the power to be free from the chains of my debts is much larger than I’ve seen the spirits deliver. And while they’re great at getting me more revenue streams and higher incomes, I don’t want to have to be more tied to a computer to maintain what I have. As many people teach, you’ve got to give the spirits a way to manifest the money. The common denominator I’ve seen in my wealth magic manifestation is work; TANSTAAFL.

As many of you know, I’m a bullshit artiste. One of my core tenets is that bullshit makes the flowers grow, and that’s beautiful. My bullshit isn’t false, it’s just fun. I try to use my gift of BSery to make the world a better place, inspire people to do more with what they have, to get over their hangups and achieve their highest potential. I believe magic is the best way to do that for magicians.****

Over the years, I’ve often dreamed of using the BS gift God gave me to get rich. I usually dream of being a Megachurch pastor who gets out before everything falls to shit, or by writing something like the Secret that gets wildly popular and makes me rich.  I’ve also considered politics, mostly for the health benefits for life that you get after serving two terms.

But lately I’ve been thinking that maybe the best way to use this gift is to provide a manifestation path for rites to get dignities, places, and favor of friends and foes, or in other words, to gain temporal power. Being subtle in the art of ass kissery in the workplace has already gotten me onto other projects and is getting the attention of the upper level executives at work. A well-timed rite might just give me the boost I need to land permanently in a position of power there.

With power comes wealth. The execs make a lot more than the cattle in the cube farms. It comes with more responsibility too, but they get more vacation time to compensate. I figure it’s at least worth a shot.

I still need to do a lot of Work on my spending habits, of course, and I plan to do so through the spirits of Jupiter. Tzadqiel tried to teach me to budget properly before, but would I listen? Of course not. Once I’ve mastered that, and at the same time earned more power, I figure the wealth will come naturally.

But I have a sneaking suspicion it’s still going to take a lot of work.

* I’ve known Gordo for years, intermittently, and he’s a good egg, but he used to be … unstable. But I’ll say this for him, he may be crazy sometimes, but he’s 100% sincere. And his madness could even be the divine kind, the kind that people get afflicted with on purpose for the greater good. Or he’s nuts. Definitely one of the two.

** I deposited a five-figure check into my account yesterday, in fact, and it’s pretty much spent before it posts. Spent on refurnishing the house that caught on fire to get me the money I conjured. Sigh.

*** That’s because I don’t  spend wisely. That’s all about to change because I plan to make money my slave, as Jason teaches in his prosperity intensive.

**** I am a member of the tautology club because I am a member of the tautology club.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/04/hubble-20th-anniversary/

Thus he spake, and once more into the cup in which he had previously mingled the soul of the universe he poured the remains of the elements, and mingled them in much the same manner; they were not, however, pure as before, but diluted to the second and third degree. And having made it he divided the whole mixture into souls equal in number to the stars, and assigned each soul to a star; and having there placed them as in a chariot, he showed them the nature of the universe, and declared to them the laws of destiny…

Having a difficult time communicating finer points of your philosophy this week? I am. It’s frustrating, annoying as shit, as they say. But, being the awesome magician that I am, I figured out that Mercury must have gone retrograde. The issues with Balthazar last week made me wonder, in passing, if Mercury was retrograde, but I never bothered to check. Sure enough, it went retro Sunday.

My pattern, as I’ve noted before on the blog over the years, is that around two weeks before Mercury goes retro, communications go haywire in my sphere of manifestation. People don’t understand me as well, I don’t understand others as well, and I get into more online debates that turn out to be a big hoo-hurrah over a minor misunderstanding of intent, language, or both.

While it’s nice to be able to count on some things being consistent in life, I’d like to know why it has to be things like this.

So, in the interest of avoiding the Theunielim, I’m just gonna give up trying to clarify myself.

But Mercury Retrogrades aren’t supposed to be that big of a deal, in traditional astrology. It’s a minor negative at best. The modern astrological world has exaggerated the impact of Mercury Retrograde a lot, according to Chris Warnock.

I am personally of the opinion that the reason Mercury Retrograde’s effects are so predictable in regards to my own life have to do with where Mercury is in my natal chart, and the profession I’m in. Being a writer, even the otherwise insignificant effects of Mercury going retrograde are magnified in my sphere. With Mercury in the 8th House, and in Gemini to boot, I’m pretty much doomed to misunderstandings relative to occult conversations whenever Mercury starts slowing. It’s the period of the slowing that affects me the most, it seems.

I’m just guessing, I’m no astrological pro. I’d love to hear some feedback from someone smarter than I about whether I’ll be doomed for life or not.

This past weekend, I got hit with a wave of sadness, a deep and sorrowful sadness that made me want to just sit down and cry. Being the self-aware magician that I am, I quickly realized there was absolutely no reason for feeling that way. I had slept really well the night before, I had been doing chores that make me feel good, like I’m fulfilling my roles and responsibilities as a man, and there hasn’t been anything going on in my life that would leave me depressed.

Random mood swings are one of the things I’ve learned are usually caused by a spiritual attack. Especially random feelings of anxiety or depression. Most spiritual attacks, in my experience, are caused by wandering nepheshim,* the shades of the dead. These spirits are supposed to fade away around 6 weeks after the body of a person dies. Some of them learn to survive on the extreme emotions of other humans, and they learn to trigger these extreme emotions in their vicitms, floating around causing depression or anxiety.

Note that I am NOT saying all depression or anxiety is caused by a spirit. Most of us have valid and real reasons to feel depressed and frightened at times in our lives. I’m talking about feelings that come out of nowhere when we should be happy, or were happy just a second ago.

What happens is a wandering Nephesh does whatever it does to attack. You feel a wave of fear, anxiety, or nostalgia about something that makes no sense in your current context. Your mind will likely go looking for some “subconscious” reason for the feeling and chances are good it will find something plausible; this is a trap. You will justify your feelings of sadness, pin it on some real event that legitimately makes you feel sad, and the false sense of sadness has now been replaced with a real source of pain in your life. By your own brain. And then you’re generating real depression, or fear, or whatever, and the spirit gets to feed.

Now, people die every day. I figure there are a few hundred fading nephesh per square mile, especially around graveyards, hospitals, and the cities where people die in accidents, gun fights, stabbings, etc. In old neighborhoods there are more of them, and the longer a place has been around, the more nephesh gather that figure out ways to survive.

So when the wave of random bad feelings hit me, I quickly analyzed whether or not it was legit, and finding no ready reason for the feeling, I started to banish.

Since I have publicly aired my opinion of the LBRP (pronounced “Elburp”), you can bet I didn’t use that. Instead, I went with something more in keeping with my own context. There are echoes of the Elburp in the rite I did, but only because I’m working from the same traditional sources as the Golden Dawn, but with a different overall intent and cosmology.

I was in my bedroom in the basement. I’ve found that basements seem to have more nepheshim, must be a chthonic thing. I sat down on my bed, and closed my eyes. I called out to my HGA, and pictured myself within my Altar Glyph, standing in the center, surrounded by the Four Princes of the Angles of the World, and the Seven Intelligences of the Planets. Beneath me were the bound Demonic Kings, hostile in the Elements, and above me was my HGA. Looking up far enough, I caught a glimpse of the Source pouring down like a fountain through the spheres in a long chain tha ended with my own manifestation.

This reminded me of my “Race and Value,” that is, my divine heritage and my position within the framework of eternity. Reclaiming this relationship is the cornerstone of Neo-Platonic philosophy, according to my understanding of Plotinus’ Enneads.

Next, I said aloud, in a low voice, “Nephesh, be gone now in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. [HGA name], remove this offending spirit. Michael, Raphael, Uriel, Gabriel, consecrate this ground for our defense; let no wandering shade or spirit of ill intent pass within this home.”

I then called on the Archangels of the Seven Planetary Spheres to consecrate the home and keep it cleansed and safe as well. I called them by name alone and kept the charge pretty simple: “By the powers of the Seven Spheres, I consecrate this house for our defense.”

The air in the room cleared noticeably, and the feelings of sadness dissipated. I noticed a marked improvement of the general tone of our familial interactions from that moment, and I was reminded forcefully that I hadn’t done any cleansing or banishing in the temporary house since moving in. (My altar is in storage, along with my Holy Water and Sage.)

So if you were wondering what I do to banish or cleanse on the fly, that’s about it. It’s short and sweet, and it works wonders.

*Quick refresher: humans have four (or five) “souls,” the Guf, which is the Mortal Body, the Nephesh, the Ruach, which is the Immortal Mind, and the Neschemah, which is the Immortal Spark of God (and some say the Chiah, the Life Force, or Breath of God, similar but not equal to Prana). The Nephesh is the soul that handles the amygdala response to events, and runs the autonomous nervous system of the body. It’s the emotional memory soul, it’s your cellular memory that remembers to form scar tissue where you were cut when you were 10 even 26 years later, it’s the survivalist, the main maintainer of our daily existence. This soul is also Mortal, like the Guf-body. It survives by feeding on the processes of your physical body, but when your body dies, it begins to starve to death. It takes 6 weeks to die and return to the ashes of Sheol, give or take, and it’s this part of the soul that sticks around after you’ve died, popping up in the passenger car seat when your loved ones are sitting at red lights thinking about how much they miss you. It feeds on extreme emotions, like grief, panic, rage, or ecstatic bliss. This soul can be kept “alive” by making regular offerings, like libations or burning incense and candles to your ancestors. Most of them just die, but some seem to feed off of geomagnetic forces, or become vampire spirits. They seldom remember much about the lives they lived, but they can generally recall the moments of their lives that were traumatic, or were extremely emotional. That’s why “ghosts” are seen walking the places they’ve died, or where they were murdered or whatever. They’re reliving their emotional memories, and are usually kept alive by some “energy” source they’ve managed to adapt to feed on.

In case you wondered why I rarely post links to Patrick Dunn’s blog posts, since he’s one of my very best and longest-held friends in the world, it’s because since May of 2009, I haven’t received ONE SINGLE update from his blog. Apparently something happened back then to the feed or something, and I just sort of assumed he hadn’t blogged in a while. I hadn’t realized how long of a while it was until Lavanah helpfully posted a link to his blog on hers today.

So, for anyone ELSE out there who used to enjoy the sporadic posts from the author of Postmodern Magic and another book with a longer title (which is no longer sitting behind my head for quick reference like it was before the fire) but haven’t seen anything from the good professor in a freaking year, please use the following link:

http://pomomagic.wordpress.com/

Kenaz has an excellent post called “The Sacred Responsibility of Cursing” on his blog today. You should read it.

I have often struggled with whether or not to curse people, especially since I’m all Christian and “Turn the other cheek” was a freaking commandment by Jesus. Not to mention the times when I really wanted to curse someone and a vision of Christ appeared to stop me. Well, it happened once, anyway. That kind of put me off cursing for a long time.

But after a lot of Work with Sammael of Mars, and a lot of contemplation of Giburah, the Wrath of God, and Pachad, the Fear of God, I came to a similar conclusion about the role of cursing as a magician. Gardeners have to prune trees to get them to produce fruit abundantly. You pull weeds that choke out the things you want to grow. The First Commandment given to mankind in the Bible was to Tend the Garden, and sometimes that means chopping off the talking snake’s head before it gets alone time with your wife.

Personally, my biggest problem with cursing is that once I feel justified, I’d start cursing everyone who pissed me off. I’m not an even-tempered kind of guy, even after doing a lot of Martial Work. I’m better than I was years ago, but I’m not someone I’d trust to keep a hand gun in the glove box. My kids need me out of jail, not locked away because some idiot cut me off in traffic. In the moment of my rage, I would feel perfectly justified calling up every spirit I know and sending them against whoever rubbed me the wrong way.

What keeps me from that temptation is a phrase I learned from an Israeli lawyer-magician who did a lot of work with the Lwa in his youth. “May the spirits judge between us,” he said, referencing how he cursed people when he felt it was appropriate. It cleared things up for me a lot. By saying that, you’re basically putting your own ass on the line. The ritual I use for cursin, if I ever find it necessary, is:

• Divination – If it looks bad for me to curse the person, I wait. Chances are good that I’m just angry and it will go away.
• Preparation – I put my case for cursing together, and weigh out whether I would feel comfortable saying “Here’s why I think they deserve to be cursed, judge between us and may the curse fall on me if I’m out of God’s Will.” If I can’t say that without getting nervous, the ritual is off.
• Never curse angry. In your anger, do not sin, the Bible says. It’s really good advice, even for pagans. It doesn’t say don’t get angry, it just says not to sin while you’re angry. Cursing, in my opinion, is best done cold, not hot.
• Oration to Source – Thou hast cleansed me with Hyssop, Oh Lord, thou hast cleansed me and washed me whiter than new-fallen snow. 
• Conjuration of spirit – Saturn and Mars spirits are my favorites for this kind of thing, they’re all malefic, but Mercury and Venus have been known to be of use.
• Justification for curse – I make my case before God and the Spirit, go over the details that led to this decision, and specifically call out the things that pushed this matter to the point that required magical retribution.
• Call for Justice – “May God the Source and [Spirit Name] judge between us.”
• Protection – “Let no harm befall any member of my family, mentally, physically, or spiritually as a result of this rite.”
• Closing – “As you came in peace, so go in power, and return to me should I call you by name, blah blah blah, World Without End, Amen.”

If I can go through with that in good conscience with no fear, it’s a go. If there is some level of Fear, I turn the rite into a Solar ritual for enlightenment and clarification, because I’m never scared to ask the Spirits to judge between me and the other guy and enlighten whoever has their head up their ass. Sometimes it’s both me and the “victim,” and plus lux never hurt anyone.

To those who have decided I’m a fit recipient for their tithe, may all the Ideals of prosperity, wealth, and abundance that ever formed in the Mind of God be made manifest in your physical sphere, may each of the Seven Intelligences bless your ways and means in your endeavors, and may the Four Princes of the Corners of the Earth keep you in safety, health, and peace. But mostly money. Lots and lots of money.

And for those who would like to receive the blessings that come from tithing, but think giving it to a blogger mage is just kinda weird, I suggest Scott Rassbach’s Church Fund (he’s got a donate button and an address on the right of the blog), or Joe’s Wiccan Carcer Via prison ministry.

These are two organizations who are definitely doing God’s (or Gods’) work on Earth.

For those who would LOVE to give money to me personally, knowing that I’m just going to spend it on whatever I want to and that I’m not a 501C3 non-profit organization, fully aware that I’m just some guy who loves to type, feel free to email your gifts to me using paypal (I finally fixed it).

One of the things I used to love to say was, “My God ain’t short on cash,” quoting U2 because everyone knows spiritual truths are to be found primarily in pop music lyrics. But the tithe isn’t for God, it’s for the giver. Yeah, your God ain’t short on cash, he’s the source of cash, and everything else. You give him some in his honor, and he pours it back to you. I didn’t make the rules, I just know they work.

Oh, for those who want to test the tithe theory who happen to be of the Druidic persuasion, Gwynt posted recently that he’s had some financial hardships.

Hell, I don’t know anyone who couldn’t use a little extra cash. Take your pick from whomever, and as long as you give it to them in honor of God, the source of all things, it counts.

Quick ritual for those who tithe:

Candle magic, yay!

Hold a candle in your hand with the wick facing away from you. Starting at the wick end, rub oil on it towards you while reading Proverbs 3:9-10: 

Honour the Lord with thy substance, and
with the firstfruits of all thine increase: So shall thy barns
be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new
wine.  

Pick a color from your tradition that symbolizes prosperity to you. I’d go with Gold for the Sun, or Green for Venus. Golden dawn folk can try to find a blue candle flecked with yellow to match their Princess Scale (Asiyah) for Jupiter, and good luck on finding that one. If money is green to you and that’s what you want, go for green.

I use Abramelin Oil for everything. I love it. Olive oil will do, but luck, money drawing, or prosperity oils from hoodoo and other such places will work too. Devi’s got more than good advice available on her web site, if you’re running low on such things.

Light the candle on your altar, and say something like, “Oh Lord who is the Source of all things, accept my offering and my thanks for pouring out your blessing upon me and my house. Amen.”

If you haven’t tithed, don’t do the ritual. Find another proverb or something.

Sorry for the politics, but I’m annoyed. The commie left and the fascist right are both reporting like they’re covering Jerry Springer specials. I’m concerned that the media is creating a powder keg of fear and paranoia on both sides of the aisle, and that we’re going to end up in either a civil war in the worst case scenario, or “just” more homegrown terrorists blowing up whatever whenever*.

Extremist fanatical rhetoric, the glamorizing of the nuts on both sides by the media is making people scared of “the other side.” It’s got to stop. The media needs to go back to being boring and stop trying to make politics popular by turning it into a reality TV show, complete with all the drama that comes from dysfunctional human beings.

There is no radical Center, so we don’t get the press, but damnit, most people in America are not liberal atheists or fundamentalist Christian conservative evangelicals. Most people are nominal Christians who go to church on Easter and maybe Christmas, try to keep up with the Jones’s, and take their kids to soccer practice while gossiping about the local school moms and dads. They want good jobs that pay well, affordable health care, and a way to get out and have fun on the weekends. They might think we occultniks are weird, but as long as we aren’t stealing babies or sacrificing their family pets, they don’t really notice us much.

Fuck you Fox and MSNBC. Fuck you Hannity, and Olbermann. Go away.

*And don’t tell me the liberals don’t go forming militias when they feel all radical, it wasn’t that long ago that the Weather Underground were bombing the police. How different are they from the Christian Militia that wanted to start a war by assassinating police at a police officer’s funeral?

Really quick, I just wanted to point out that a conversation with an Archangel on its own is not sufficient to provide the “same” results as years of training and instruction from human teachers all by itself. You’ll still have a lot of Work to do, but it begins with the conversation with the Archangel. It’s not them that have to do the Great Work, it’s us. The process of integrating and mastering the powers the Archangels trigger in your sphere can take every bit as long as it takes to train and study within an Order or established tradition.

And in my experience, the Archangels don’t provide the training in the conversations, much. They might teach you a technique on the fly, or tell you to put an offering in a specific place for them or whichever spirit you’re Working with, but most of the time when I ask a spirit for training in something, what I get is a series of coincidental, synchronistic revelations of information that’s already been revealed and recorded. Things pop out in passages I’ve already read in Agrippa that I didn’t see before, or things make sense in a way they didn’t previously. It’s not like I’m conjuring Professor Dunn to explain in detail the Mysteries of Postmodern Magic.

At a high level, the work required to integrate the lessons comes after the conjuration when you’re relying on spirits for training and initiation, while in more organized approaches, the work and study comes first and then leads to the conjurations. Or maybe even in organized approaches, it’s conjuration, initiation, study and practice, more conjuration.

Wherever the work comes, it’s still a lot of work. My way isn’t any easier to do things, it’s every bit as hard or even harder than Working in groups. There are still risks, but they aren’t the same kinds of risks.