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What do these three things have in common? I’m still not quite clear on that.

I received Francis Breakspear’s new book, If It Was Easy, Everyone Would Be Doing It! a few months ago, read a few pages, then got caught up in other things. I recently picked it up again, and so far it’s as direct and funny as his first book, Kaostar!,as expected.

Also as in Kaostar!, essays appear from Kate Hoolu and someone called “Dave Evans” (a pseudonym if I ever heard one).

I’ve just finished reading a two-essay interlude by Kate Hoolu, the first, titled “Stereotyping”, deals with issues of race and culture, and the second, “That behaviour is not normal! But how do you prove it?”, discusses mental health. It’s unusual to see these topics addressed in books ostensibly about practical magick, to say the least. Continue reading »

Most “definitions” of magick fail define it concretely, they suggest more than they reveal, which seems to be in keeping with the glamour that’s been cast over the term.

Of course, one of the most enduring summations is Crowley’s often paraphrased:

“Magick is the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will.”

On the Magick index page for SpiralNature.com I’ve collected a bunch of quotes attempting to pin down what we mean when we say “magick”. The quality varies significantly and demonstrates a wide range of (mis?)understandings regarding what we mean by the term.

What’s your definition of magick? If you were explaining it to someone unfamiliar with it, how would you describe it?

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Kara is a second generation chaote hailing from just north of Portland, OR. She’s been published in Konton, Key23, participated in the Infictive Hyperwiki and Occulterati podcast, and now graces us with her presence here on Plutonica.net as our first guest blogger.

This is Part II of a two part post, click here for Part I.

Philios can inform and expand True Love for the self and vice versa, Philios pointed inwardly informs and expands True Will, which in turn, informs and expands the Great Work, which necessarily flows back into Love and Will. In this cosmology, Love, True Will and the Great Work are all tied in together, flow into one another, expand and strengthen one another. (The symbol for recycling comes to mind here.)

So what is True Will and how does one discover this deepest of motivations? I believe that the answer lies in the subconscious mind, the background signal of the soul, so to speak. Instinct or what we often call intuition is at the very heart of this knowing. Intuition is that little voice in your gut that tells you whether something feels right or wrong at a basic level. If you use it as you would a pendulum to gage your feelings about situations and people and courses of action, I believe it will never steer you in the wrong direction. I believe that the human instinct is infinitely more advanced and elegant than we would usually care to imagine. It seems like an animal thing and we like to forget that we too are animals with keen senses.

“Its inherent Strength is perfected, if it is turned into Earth.”

This line from the Emerald Tablet, that most treasured code of alchemists, effectively sums up how I feel about the natural progression of intuition. As you use intuition, it grows in strength exponentially. You come to understand it, trust it and rely on it. I believe that when you continue in this direction, the intuition becomes tempered with logic, experience and resolve. If and when this enlightened intuition becomes personified, one attains Knowledge of and Conversation with the Holy Guardian Angel. The HGA is your deepest need and motivation given voice and utilized as a guiding force and motivator, broadcasting the True Will. This voice can be so powerful that it may seem alien and external, and it has been known by many other names: Higher Self, Spirit Guide, Gwo Bon Anj, even God. And it can be fierce, it can be terrifying. Continue reading »

Kara is a second generation chaote hailing from just north of Portland, OR. She’s been published in Konton, Key23, participated in the Infictive Hyperwiki and Occulterati podcast, and now graces us with her presence here on Plutonica.net as our first guest blogger.

This is Part I of a two part post, see tomorrow’s post for Part II.

I do not believe in sin as typically described by the various sects of the world’s major religions. In my heart, there are two kinds of sin: sins against humanity (abuses of human rights) and sins against yourself. It is with the latter that the following missive is primarily concerned, heavily informed by Thelema, New Age philosophies and Modern Satanism.

A sin against yourself is something that only you can judge. You sin against yourself every time you do something that goes directly against your True Will. When you do not live up to your honest potential, when what you do holds you back instead of propelling you forth, even if that thing is refusing to forgive yourself for past mishaps, I believe you are sinning against yourself. (It should be noted that I do not feel this applies to normal, natural, healthy periods of stagnation, contemplation and plateau states.)

I used to think that the concept of True Will was malarkey. No one I spoke with could tell me what True Will was or how to discover it. I kept asking and wondering what kind of person doesn’t know what he or she really wants in life? But then I took a good look at the society around me, and I saw that we tie ourselves into secret knots all the time, constantly confusing ourselves about what we want and what is best. Continue reading »

A decidedly odd subject: Otherkin are humans who believe some aspect of themselves to be wolves, foxes, or even fae, dragons and other fantastic creatures. This differs from totemism where a connection has been forged with an external entity, instead, Otherkin identify the “Other” as some part of their being.

Otherkin are rarely taken seriously outside their subculture. UrbanDictionary.com offers some twenty definitions, but one will suffice to sum up the general sentiment: Continue reading »