Haven’t posted for awhile, wondered what you think about the importance of planning in magick (a gestation period, if you like?). Whilst I know since the start of chaos magick it has become popular to do everything on the fly I have found recently that the pre-planning phase seems as important, maybe more so, than the actual charge during ritual (whatever form that takes). My current theory for this is due to the fact that the imagination operates on the astral, simply running through the planning phase in the mind’s eye can sometimes fire the magick off, if it is done with sufficient intent.
I’m working on two rituals at the moment and another thing I’ve noticed is my singular inability to arrange a time to complete the first, which may have led to this question.
Interested in any input.
Simply put, so far I’ve found that:
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planning that is about hardening intent and putting the universe “on notice” is good
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planning that has any element of setting up more and more elaborate conditions which create pass/fail binary “breakers” (like electrical circuit breakers) at each stage is detrimental.
I try to plan rituals a few days ahead of time at the least. This gives some time to think about what you’re doing and why. Additionally it doesn’t cause conflicts if you plan it out. I found that if you do more than 2 rituals a day (one at day and another at night), it’s more likely to cause conflicts in addition to making you more tired.
Totally spot on. I realise this is the difference between the two rituals I am planning. The first is firming up intent, the other I am making too complicated with too many built-in failsafes (the circuit breakers you describe).
Thanks for clarifying this.
I sort-of plan my rituals when they are bigger ones. I spend a few days working on conceptualizing them and how they will fulfill their goal, and pick a time and date, then I kinda throw the ritual itself together on the fly based on my conceptualizing of them. I’m a very intuitive practitioner though so it’s not the same as if I was a book-learned practitioner.
For me, planning a ritual is a sort of starting a ritual.
I set a date and prepare all I need. I noticed that I have magical dreams as soon as I start preparation. Quite often, I receive important messages and make a contact with spirits I want to work with.
Working on several rituals at the same time can be great if you know what are you doing. If you are not sure, can be confusing. Complexity is a major problem in our daily life, too, so I try to focus on one thing at the time. It works well for me.
Putting down experiences in your diary, I find very useful.
I will plan a ritual sometimes, because if it is a ritual I will need supplies and to have things I need on hand and within arms reach (ie. inside the circle!) I also depending upon the intent of the ritual, I may feel the need to make sure (if it is a spell that is really important) I may want to have it prewritten so I can just say it and focus all my intent as I am doing the working. Most often I do not write anything and just do it, but there have been a few occasions where I did write it… to keep my ass out of jail for instance. (don’t ask… but the spell worked and nothing was ever made of it) I think most things I do are not planned out and I am able to do it as it comes to me. But most of the time, magick is something from the heart (and gut) and I do not stick to one method.
I usally plan things out with most of my rituals. I find it helps in solidifying my intent. I try to keep things simple with the individual goals but i do turn into a bit of a mad scientist when figuring what energies will better work towards my goal.