Introduction - now what?

New Magician Help & Introductions
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First off, hi there! Newbie here, looking for advice, looking to bring more magick into my life.

Many years ago I read a book titled ‘advanced magick for beginners’ by alan chapman - from that I went and read some of the books he advised as good foundational reading… But things just tapered off and I never really practiced.

During Covid lock down over here in the UK I ended up being at home on a furlough of sorts. Browsing on the internet I went down a wormhole and ended up reading about the west memphis 3, which led me to Damien Echols and his book titled ‘high magick’

This was over a year ago. For the past year I’ve carried out a daily practice of the LBR as outlined by Damien (but always drawing the energy down) - and about 4 to 5 times a week I will also perform the middle pillar… And throw in a sprinkle of breathing exercises here and there too.

And this is it - I’m not really performing any magic as such. But I’d like to, I’m just not sure where to go from here…

What do I get from it so far? Well, I just kind of like doing the rituals - they’re almost meditative (especially the middle pillar)…

Yeah some weird stuff’s happened I suppose but I’ve not really attributed any of this to what I’ve been doing. About 6 months ago, the center of my forehead was buzzing - and I do link this to doing the qabalistic cross I perform before the LBR - this is when it would buzz like crazy, it felt like someone was pressing their thumb into my forehead so much so that the first time (i was alone in the semi-dark in my garage) I got pretty scared by it… But it only went on for about 3 weeks.

Oh… I’m pretty much a skeptic btw… Hmmmm, I guess that might not be the best description - I think I’m coming into magick with a bit of that mindset though…

I’m interested though - and that’s why I’m here. Would love to here some thoughts on what next steps I should possibly take in regards to expanding my magickal capabilities…

I’m kind of interested in astral projection - I’ve done this twice before… I just can’t get back there for some reason…

Oh what else… Married guy, wife, kids, mortgage. I’m masquerading as an engineer but I’m really a songwriter…

Cheers

Bernie

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Welcome @bernie.sensation

I’ve edited your title so members will know that you have met our rule regarding introductions.

What are you interested in?

My advice would be to start developing your psychic senses, and practicing skills like scrying,

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Welcome to the forum.

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IMO:

  1. identify your goals, because the purpose of magick is primarily to effect changes and get real results - everything else is mysticism, which is fine and valid, but “Magick is the science and art of causing change to occur in conformity with the Will” per Crowley, and one doesn’t need to be a fanboy of his to recognise that about defines it :thinking:

  2. having identified your goals, consider any past supernatural or psychic experiences, including those you may have written off at the time, any interests in specific spirits or traditions prior to this, and whether they lead to the possibility that there is a form of magick which might suit you best - also consider your basic temperament, skills, likes & dislikes etc

  3. having done that, explore the possible routes to your result which play to your strengths, and preferences.

For example if you badly want to improve your health and were nutty about pyramids & history as a child, Egyptian magick or pyramid work focusing on healing would be useful, whereas a scattershot apporoach opening sigils, chanting mantras, or trying to increase psychic senses in the abstract might not be as interesting.

That’s just an outline and I realise the whole field is very large and confusing, especially the seeming paradoxes. If you read this to begin with, as a kind of manual of metaphysics, that should help you avoid a lot of initial confusion, especially as to what’s “real” in terms of spirits and so on: The Kybalion PDF, archived link (we don’t trade PDFs on here as a general rule but this one is okay, the text is out of copyright and the edition was given for download from the site that created it).

I also just sent you a PM with some info in on how to use the forum, and find useful stuff. :+1:

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Stop it my bookmarks are too full😂

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OMG @dagar same here I have a folder in my bookmarks bar called BALG and I added this to it just now and then scrolled now and saw your comment :rofl:

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First off thanks for the replies, much appreciated…

If I’m totally honest, I stumbled upon this site through a post titled, ‘I give up on magick’

Now I’m not saying that I’m giving up, I mean… I’ve barely started. However I’m at a point in my life where everything is pretty… hectic – I’m a firm believer of what you put in, is what you get out. It’s like anything, you don’t suddenly learn to play a musical instrument overnight, it takes time, patience, effort, love – and thus a commitment to magick is time consuming.

But that’s OK if it turns out to be worth it…

I feel like I’ve been putting in the work somewhat - laying the groundwork so to speak. Damien’s book (which I rate) – it’s a lot of practice really, there seems to be a lot of foundational work – starting by spending a month or so on daily breathing exercises, then onto the middle pillar, TQC, and LBR – and just going through the process of learning and experiencing these exercises. Now with me being a bit of a skeptic, I wanted to do the book justice, to follow it how it was laid out, to give it a fair shot - and that’s fine, I wasn’t looking for a quick fix anyway, I knew it would take time… But eventually it has brought me to here and now.

You see, in the book – Damien doesn’t go into much detail about the magick rituals that are performed during the LBR – or if he did it was lost on me. He does explain sigils, tarot, etc. - but after going through the LBR, after you’ve gone through drawing the Pentagrams, invoking the arch-angels, when you’ve made your sacred space, the instruction is simply to perform your magickal act – and I’m left wondering what the magickal act is…

It may appear from my first post that I don’t have a direction of where I want to go with magick - but really I was just doing the groundwork laid out in the book. I previously mentioned about life being busy – my work life balance is just… out of balance. So if anything this is something that I hope to address - and I’m just wondering if magick can effect change in this.

Because I think this is what I’m setting out to achieve. Writing music is my passion, when I’m writing and I’m in that space, it’s the only time the world makes perfect sense to me – and I hope to bring some more time in my life to enjoy that. It’s not like I’m looking for fame – I mean sure writing for a living would be pretty awesome – but it’s generally just all about writing for the enjoyment of it all… And finding that precious time to do it.

So, apologies there btw. I didn’t want to waffle on too much about my own personal goals. But to summarize, I’ve been practicing those rituals daily for over a good solid year now. I do have a direction to it all – I just don’t know where to take it next. I do like the energy model of magick that Damien puts forward. My questions from this are… And some of these may sound pretty rudimentary - but bare with me, I am a total noob after all.

Is performing the LBR and creating a space necessary before you do any magickal work?

What magickal work is performed at this moment?

Is it just some sort of affirmation - Is it energizing water and charging it with a command – is it charging sigils?
Can these things be performed without performing an LBR?
Is there something else performed during this time?

Any recommended books on this, that focus on this type of magick - given that all I’m trying to do is get slightly better control over my life? I think I just need to understand what goes on within the LBR so that I can progress.

Cheers

Bernie

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Generally, yes, even if the act of creating that space is simply taking a few moment to meditate and clear your thoughts.

Before engaging in any magical act, it is essential to be able to settle the mind and withdraw it from everyday concerns. When you are performing a ritual, for example, you don’t want to be thinking about what you’re going to have for dinner. Creating a space, whether through breathing, the LBRP, or meditation, is a way of separating you from the mundane, and placing you in a magical state of mind.

Any kind of magick.

The rituals Echols teaches are from the Golden Dawn system, and in that system, once your magical space is established through the LBRP, you can then proceed to perform whatever act of magick you desire, whether that is evoking a spirit, opening a magical square, working on your scrying vision, rising on the planes, anything.

It could be. You decide what you want to do.

Yes, but think of doing the LBRP as clearing the clutter off your table so you have room to do your work unhindered. It helps to prevent any disturbances from outside and gets you get into the necessary state of mind.

As I said, you can do anything you want.

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@DarkestKnight,

Thank you very much for taking the time to answer my questions…

And this does help me somewhat - I say somewhat because you also make it sound kind of arbitrary… And I suppose this is one of the things that has been bothering me.

For example - If I want to get rid of my boss - do I write her name on a piece of cheese with a glitter pen, chew it up and then spit it out of a fifth floor window…

Or do I perform some well documented, tried and tested elaborate ceremonial act straight out of a grimoire…

Does it matter which - as long as I decide whatever act I do is equal to the result I want to achieve…

Interesting. Writing this is out made me wonder if my last year of practice was all because I wanted to answer this question… Perhaps… But it was probably because I wanted to see if it works… I’m still digging…

Thanks again for the help!!!

Bernie

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It depends entirely on the system that you practice. I’m a ceremonial magician at heart, so I like rituals such as the LBRP and use them in my practice, but there are many different ways to do magick, some of which can seem quite simplistic in comparison to the LBRP, but that are still effective for their adherents.

The Chaos Magick paradigm, for example, proves that intention and belief are what matter in 90% of all magick. If you can invest an action with enough belief, then anything can theoretically become an act of magick (there are exceptions, however, to how far intention can override other elements within a ritual).

However, nothing is really arbitrary because each system generally has a reason for why things are done in the way they are, that is related to its foundational theory or framework. That’s why you will find many contradictions between systems. For example, in Western culture, black is used to symbolize death and mourning, but in China, the colour white is, and their magick reflects that.

I highly recommend picking up Jason Miller’s book The Elements of Spellcrafting. I think it will answer many of your questions.

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I will give it a read.

And once again, thank you!