Warning long post ahead…
Trigger warning: senitive readers are advised not to take offence with some of the examples of situations I’ll use in this post. Especially if you feel it applies to you. Also there are som cursewords here and there, I use them because sometimes they help to get the point across in the ways which a more polished language can’t.
If you want a summary of this post: be stubborn like as a mule in your magickal endavours; results will come but sometimes it takes a long fucking while before any real degree of success is had. Quit beating yourself up and get to work to better yourself.
I’ll preface this post with the following; this is not a how to guide. For that you may search the forum or use whatever material you have at your disposal for your development. Also your development may take longer or even be shorter than time frame I mention in the post.
The purpose of this post is to showcase common pitfalls for beginners and in what ways they get stuck at the areas of; Evocation; Divination; Soul travel; Invocation and spellcasting.
Casting your first spell/spells is, like many of us know, an incredibly exciting thing you do out of necessity or curiosity. The curiosity part usually goes hand in hand with wanting to just try magick, meaning you do it just to see if it works (at least that’s how it starts for most of us). You get busy with your spell/ritual and after the ritual or spell been concluded; the entity has been dismissed or the has been thrown into the ether. You’ll like be left with a feeling of doubt that eats away at your brain. Questions will tend to rise to the forefront of your mine like; “is this real?” and “will it [the spell/ritual] work?” Another example of the former is when they (the neophyte) begin scrying into fire or water. Initially frustration seeps into the mind of the budding magician whom has been chanting in a booming voice several incantations in barbarous tounges and before that have undergone intense study and followed every rule of a dark edgy trve grimoire, yet nothing seems to happen…they just sit there and observe a fire or flame dancing before their eyes. And for all intents and purposes, according to them, the Lord of Darkness hasn’t appeared in a blazing inferno to grant them their desired wish.
There’s a reason for that. The reason might be that; as has been talked about on this forum as well as in about every thread and book pertaining to spirit summoning or most magickal operations in general. Magick works much like a muscle and like strengthening the muscles of your body so must also the muscles of your spiritual body (energy centers, senses, etcetera) be strengthened as well.
Although it may seem obvious to most of you I’ll say it anyway: as a complete newbie with no family member ever had a tie into the field or has developed any skill, you are highly unlikely to just straight away see or hear or experience anything at first. The only exception is if you have a family member that’s a witch or sorcerer or the like or you may be a hereditary witch or a sorcerer. Another exception is if you have a partially developed sense by nature. In case any of the forrmer exceptions applies to you; that means you will likely have an easier time awakening powers and abillities relating to a certain forms of magick. Meaning some families might have naturally stronger developed intuition than others. Other families might be good at energy work, while some families may be really good at dream magick etcetera. That means you’ll likely be naturally good at developing a knack for these abillities if they run in the family so to speak. The other exception which may decrease your learning curve is if you are a freak of nature and thereby are naturally gifted and develop a skill anway without any aid whatsoever. An additional exception to the rule is if some of your spiritual mojo awaken after undergoing a trauma or after the use of psychadelics; which may include trauma or not but usually has the effect of awakening latent spiritual abillities. Or atleast help you become aware of them. Unless some of the former applies to you then its going to take a lot of time, hard work and dedication from you to develop some degree of skill in f.e scrying.
Without further ado, here’s what you can expect as newcommer to these arts when undergoing these common magickal operations.
What to expect in your Divination sessions;
For the first few months investing time in scrying initially you may see nothing or experience minor impressions. If you keep scrying; playing with the ouija board; using a pendulum; runes or traot card or whatever for more than two months. Then you might start to experience the impressions or sensations might become stronger. The smell of sulphur may become more intense as you astrally evoke an entity when scrying for it. Or you may taste ash/sugar/honey in your mouth. Your eyes may register a flash and entity seems to be standing before you or you may see orbs appearing spontaneously during or after performing magickal operation. You may hear near audible whispers seemingly coming from all around you; that up until this point will likely have been a “voiceless” voice communicating to you telepathically . After about half a year or more of undertaking various divination sessions your astral senses should have developed quite nicely. Meaning you may hear actual voices of an entity coming from all around you, whispers from an dismbodied voice in the corner of your room. You may also begin to see the flames taking the shape of a face of the entity you are calling and wish to learn from. One more thing, as one sense develop in some cases other astral senses might begin to develop alongside the first f.e. clairvoyance. Meaning if you can see something in front of you then your brain might translate the visuals into tactile sensations as well.
FYI - Different divination tools develop different things or rather different psychic senses. Motivation in magick but especially when it comes to divination; it is sometimes its better to move on to a tool that works better for you that you are drawn to. Thereby keeping you motivated. Regarding the most common tools you’ll likely encounter, like a pendulum, dowsing etcetera; are not that reliable but they start you off by making you tap in into you intuitive faculities. Which in turn opens up the doorway for everything else.
What to expect in your scrying sessions;
We have all been there as a new magician; you sit in your temple and you glare at the candle and your forehead wrinkles together and sweat starts dripping in your forehead, as you intensly stare at the flame you are waiting for Raphael or Mikael to step out of the flames. Or you may wait for the flames take the shape of the entitity you want to see. Or perhaps you are snooping at the beautiful Bella or handsome Anders whom you’ve admired for a while, as you want to test this exciting form of astral spying. However, it doesn’t to work. Then you‘ll likely either physically or mentally throw the candle or scrying bowl out of the window in frutsration and then exclaim: “screw this shit, magick isn’t real, its all just make believe…I am out.” Or more succintly; this a waste of time."
Well perhaps it’s not that you doing something wrong. However, it might be the way you go about it (the operation) that’s “wrong”. If you sit and scry looking into the candle flame, waiting for something to appear you haven’t set the intention propely of what you want to see. Meaning your intention is nothing. To paraphrase Koetting: if you scry into nothing you’ll also see nothing. If you fix that (setting your Intention) then you will usually run into another roadblock, which includes no images but mostly impressions of something. Or in the case of partially developed sense like clairgustence, the astral version of taste; you might taste something like honey or sulphur in the air. Then you should count your lucky stars as not many can do that. Impressions is the first step. These impressions may be intuitive or emotional changes that relates to the question you’ve asked. Whatever impressions you get from gazing at the candle record them.
Note: regarding the visuals- Satan will not step out of the flame and into your living room at the very first try proclaiming you as his new hierophant. It likely aren’t going to happen without some work on your part first. Spirits for newbies, me included at times with 6 years of experience (which isn’t a lot) tend to communicate with mostly internally at first. That is if you set your temple up in the right way for the operation. Something that should be mentioned it is if you can’t hear them (the spirits), then they’ll likely communicate with you through bangning noises, creaking floorboards, or things/ objects might be falling over for no apparent reason etc., this is to announce their prescence to you. If you can’t hear them you may instead notice the shift in the atmosphere of the room you’re using for this. Then you’ll know instinctively that you are not alone in there. That’s a sure sign of a spirit being in the room with you.
In case you don’t get any impressions or sensations at all, then it might be that your mindset is that this isn’t real. This means you are actively blocking yourself from experiencing anything. I’ll illustrate what I mean; in a quantum physics study that was conducted somewhere in the 1920’s-30’s, they sent beams of light through holes in a piece of cardboard onto a nearby wall. when the scientist directed the camera the beam
of light at the wall, the pattern on the wall changed shape and when the cameras was removed then the shape that appeared on the wall was another. Meaning the light had changed depending how the observation it changed. This applies here too, if you perecieve magick as something that not real then it will be exactly that, if you percieve magick as something that might be real, or you are open to the possibility of it, you may experience something different. Albeit in small doses at first (usually).
What to expect in your Invocation sessions;
The first invocation session may be very intense or incredibly underwhelming. Like in divination you may experience nothing the first time. Or if you are lucky you may feel as something enters your mouth, nose and ears or through your third eye chakra and then condensing into a small point and finally spreading out into every cell of your body. Invocation is in essence simply the act of taking an external force into yourself to either learn about it or to assume its power and essence.
Again, when undergoing this kind of operation if you are brand new not much may be experienced. Some common sensations you may feel can be that:
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your hands or feet buzz slightly or even a lot
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you may feel somethings up in terms of your emotional state.
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you can in some cases experience a lot of ativity in your temples, above your brow and top of your head (the areas of your higher chakras) a while after the workings or you may like I’ve said before, feel nothing.
For others they will feel as if they are almost getting crushed under the weight of the spiritual energy coursing through them. However, know that after an invocation the changes will happen to you usually without your knowledge and understanding at first. Or you may notice something going on on a more sublte level. However, depending on the entity you have invoked; the internal and external changes to your life can be drastic and very much in your face.
With the above in mind I should point out that if your invocation include sex magick elements, you can of course by all means see and experience spiritual sex in your mind and even feel it on a physical level. However, on your very first try unless you’ve done lots of work or are gifted, it likely will be a mostly visual or tactile experience.
After the invocation session the entity may make people or animals or random events that relate to it appear in your life. An article about a sacred animal to the enttity may appear in your news feed, or a seemingly random sequence of events might occur that seems unrelated, like various omens. Repeated numbers; your totem animal/s may apper in your life trying to tell you something. However, most common thing that you’ll likely experience is personality changes; changes in clothing, mannerisms, presentation of yourself etcetera. As well as emotional state, priorities overall outlook on life, etc.
All of the above generally applies but in varying intensity and degree. Also how these manifestations will appear, again, depends on the entity which have been invoked. But as a general rule of thumb. For your first three invocations you’ll likely experience emotional flux, spiritual pressure changes or reccuring dreams about the enetity that’s been summoned.
What to expect in your soultravel (astral travel) sessions;
You may sit there and you’ve meditated like a monk for about a month and learned to split your consciousness from your body by moving your astral double. Yet you can’t move an inch beyond your body. Here’s sort of the deal that usually becomes the cockblock of your astral excursions;
- Tensing up
- You are not going for a target you are just focusing on the getting out of body.
- Stress due to pressure.
- Frustrations
Here are a couple of examples to paraphrase Koetting; if your focus is to get out of the body you are going to end up in your body. You’ll therefore need to find a target near you or place one not too far off from you. Like the candle holder, your grandma’s fancy candelabra or your antisocial coffe cup, your sleeping cat or dogs on the couch nearby. As you focus on them you inhale through your nose preferably, and through visualization you imagine traveling towards them as you exhale. As you stand near your target, observe them for about five seconds initally, after five seconds has passed you inhale and you’re back. Usually what happens is that people feel as if they can feel their body but their mind is seemingly moving closer to the target, like you are partially trapped inside your body. Well that’s true, that happens initally as well as later. What at this stage differs you from the more seasoned practiioners is that they are able observe something longer and eventually as they observe something their mind lets go of the body, and instead it (the consciousness) is focused on what it experiences. The key here in many cases is thus: observe something long enough until it your focus isn’t your body anymore but what you are experiencing. The seasoned practioners may experience bilocating initially, like you, but the sensation quickly seizes for them as the travel somwehere far away and it will for you too.
A common pitfall is to feel that you can’t breath after you exhale before you exhale just say to yoruself in your mind: “I am just observing now.” and then exhale and let go of focusing on your breath. You will most likely feel a tightness in your heart and solar plexus area as you imagine yourself tearing away from your body, that’s a sign you are doing it right. When you get better at it you might exit from your third eye or crown chakra. Eventually if repeated enough you may not even feel the separation you’ll just be at your target or if you are traveling to another plane you’ll either get there straight away or experience the wormhole effect first before arriving there. Initially the experience may be very underwhelming when you stretch your wings and attempt to get there, as in: you feel as if you are only experiencing it in your imagination. Well that’s the thing magick is the use of your imagingation and your observation of it. Meaning if you observe something long enough in your imagined environment of your living room, you’ll come to experience it as real. And you are actually able to travel to it without moving an inch with your physical body yet you when you go and examine the angle from where you stood a moment ago in your spiritual body and its close or identical, then you must have one hell of a powerful imagination to be able to experience that.
Spellcasting;
They most joyous and common experience all newcommers either have- or will run into at the start of their unfolding. So you sit there with your photo and nail clippings of the intended lover and you feel this inense desire that you want their gratification or love in your life. You cats the spell according to some instruction or a forum, grimoire of some dude of the internet and then, feel this desperation for the person after the ritual and it doesn’t work. You try the spell again, same result. The process repeats for a few more workings until you burn the altar and take a piss on the ashes proclaiming this is horse dung. And you turn your attention to the internet and feel frustrated and vent and say something akin to; ZOMG! Like I dunno what I did wrong I followed the instructions to a T but it doesn’t work, what to do?! I really want me ex back!!! 
To which you recieve a seemingly, to you, sardonic reply that says something to the effect of:
Well, have you tried contacting this enetity, or have you used the magnifying glass and looked at all of these topics which relate to your question?
To which you read and may say or think: "NO! I DID NOT, THANK YOUUUU!” - and you look up the shit that the nice people on the forum suggested. You try that and the shit doesn’t work again. You vent again with added addition of saying; I’ve tried everything and searched the forum but it doesn’t help!
To which a tired forum member usually says;
“Well have you tried not lusting for results?” or " have you tried, working on yourself; or phrased like; have you tried wortking on your body mind, etc?"
To which you may think and even say something like;
“Nope and I mean it should work anyway right? Can someone give concrete instructions on how to do this?!”
Then the forum member/members tire, run away screeching over the hills into their backyard and do target practice. However before they run away they might slap their forehead in frustration and for a moment there’s silence and then more members of the community do a collective facepalm-
at the supposed ignorance of the newcommer.
If you feel like you have tried everything then this part is for you. Here’s usually the deal how much of your spellcasting works and how its blocked and thereby fall right over itself making a solid faceplant.
You channel an intent to cause on effect in your reality according to your will thereby altering fate (parahrased from Alestair Crowley). At least that’s the goal.
The problems arise when people forget the simple often overlooked thing with spellcasting; your body, mind and spirit all relates together. Meaning if you feel desperation, loneliness and in general like crap you are going to manifest that specific emotion into the ether. Thereby making it something that’s included in your perception and thus percieved as you and your life suck, you are lonely and there’s something missing from it; whatever feeling you want to insert here. A generalization might be good here, when casting the spell imagine that you already have what you want the money the girlfriend, the car, the whatever, the thing you want; it is already yours. If you do that and then cast the spell you are sending out your intention into the ether, projecting it onto the canvas of your perception which forms your reality, causing riplles and thereby changes in it; molding to your perception of it. The key afterwards is to forget about the spell being done at all. This likely has its basis in this simple thing; you don’t think twice about what you already have since its already yours and you take it for granted in your life. Use this concept to your advantdge, the guy is already yours and the spell has been cast, now you must either work on your body, mind or whatever, you are recommended to do that preferably before you cast the spell for maximazing your results. Then after the spell has been cast, in the case of a love spell you have to be near the target for an opportunity to present itself to innitiate and promote its effect.
Here comes the kicker part, love spells are short lived, meaning they are usually potent and hits hard but ebbs out quickly. The reason why is that you are imprinting your will on the targets mind, implanting feelings and desires which aren’t theirs to begin with. You may exploit it for a time but know what the person will resist and fight off the spell at some point and then it wears off. The way you go about the spell and what to do before, during and aferwards change depending on the spell that’s cast.
Another thing I got to include in the first round of this post is simply this. Your spells when it manifests may not manifest in the way you’d think. The manifestation rate of the spell varies, meaning some spells can work really fast whereas can take up to about a year to manifest. Another thing that’s important to add is that even though magick is technically a cheat code into the matrix that can make wonderful, next to even mircales occur at your whim. Remember that magick is:
a) not a quick fix;
b). if wanting to make impossible things happen like growing wings out of your back, throw the planet out of orbit, burn people into ash. Good luck with that, that will likely be nearly impossible to do due the limits of the physical plane.
With the above being said that doesn’t mean you can’t fly in your lucid dreams or in any of the spiritual planes of existence. It also doesn’t mean that throwing a fire ball at a building in the astral won’t have an effect on a building at all. However, with that being said you won’t perhaps see the building burn down before you straight away, but your astral fires may trigger a series of events that will in turn set the building on fire. Or as one user made happen lightning storms it can be done, just not right away he caused a lightning storm that took a few days to manifest but once it did, it was mighty powerful isn’t that so @AdamThoth ?
What to expect with your first Evocation attempts;
If you think Lucifer will beam down from above grab your hand swoop you away into the next dimension while swooning with joy for you may become at this stage in your development, somewhat dissappointed. That likely won’t happen. Evocation at least for in terms of initial experiences in your development; is best approached learning some divination basics first like scrying of fire, water, mirrors, crystals, etcetera. In case you struggle with that you can always begin by divning with tarot cards or runes and then expand into scrying when you feel comfortable with those divination tools. Once you can hear and start experiencing success with scrying you may enjoy the wonders of evocation, if not it will be a really shitty first experience. Why? Because you’ve just summoned Lucifer, Abbadon, Hekate, Lillith, Freyja or Eros into your temple they can see and hear you but you are deaf and blind to them. They may be screaming in your ear: “Hello…Helloooooo. HEY! Dipshit I am right here!” And you won’t know about up until you’ve developed a little further with your senses.
For success with these arts if you are unable to see anything the development of your intuition and clairaudience and clairsentience is a must. It will help the evocation process feel more real before it gets visual. If you can hear them, they can at least give some kind of instructions if you can feel them then you’ll know that they are there your intuition mgith be the frist gateway before the others are developed at all. Meaning it will help you know if something happened or not, listen to your gut.
If you have incense use that, if not recognizing that the spirit is there may help your mind open up enough to receieve some form of impression, which will lay the groundwork for further development and workings.
When evoking a spirit you may feel nothing but a buzzing in your hands and/or feet with varying degrees of intensity, which indicates that the spirit is there. The buzzing sensation may also include your third eye, crown, heart-and throat energy centers. You may see orbs or a voice may start saying something in your head, a voiceless voice that’s akin to the one you hear when reaing a book. Although the tempo may be different or the words you hear may be very different, etc. You may experience a faint smell of roses perhaps signaling the arrival of Aphrodite in your temple. But you will not however be pulled by your hair into your bed and humped by Asmodeus all night long on the first evocation session. But you may instead see Asmodeus in your minds eye with your eyes closed perhaps talking to you and after seeing him for a while until his presecence is clear then you may open your eyes and attempt to project his essence before. If this doesn’t happen work more on your scrying abillities and try again.
After about two months or so of evoking a lot you may see flashes of an entity appearing before your eyes seemingly part internal, part external. Eventually these flases of the entity that stands before you in your living room may develop to become more solid and seize flashing. And someday you may actually see Lucifer appear in your living room and speaking to you. With that being said I must add this visual process begings internally with your eyes closed let the image of the entity take shape inside your minds eye until its clear enough and imagine it standing in the living room, temple or whatever. Then when its as clear as you can make it then open your eyes and project the image of Lucifer or whomever before you. With enough reptition in due time you should begin to see something out of this world.
With all of this said I hope this helped.
All the best
. I am very eager to see your thought when you have the time.