The Magical Lifestyle

Some thoughts on the Magician's lifestyle.

Psychic Pain

The Qliphoth have the ability to conceal Light. When the Initiate is brought to the vicinity of The Profane, he will experience fear, loathing, mental pain, and choking. Psychoanalytically, the matter is that of Ego drives. The Profane are oral-fixated or anal-fixated personalities who are conscious through complexes. The complexes in modern psychiatry correspond to what the Hermetics term as Chaos Spirits. Like Spirit possession, a neurotic/pathological character has whole chunks of life that he spends semi-conscious. The Shadow is active and in control. The other property of Spirit possession is strong transference. As the weak ego of the Profane surrenders to the Initiate, he also gains access to the Id of the Initiate. He can direct the libido of the Initiate to his own complex by such intense Unconscious Hatred. This mechanism of shooting away the ego into the psyche of someone else is 'Projection'. The bigger ego, like that of an Initiate, easier it is to shoot away the smaller-underdeveloped ego. As a result, the Initiate sucks up traumatic affect from the environment, which is the source of pain. 

Breaking-up Projection

The Initiate can, as a starting point, focus on the Joy of doing 'nothing'. The projective trauma becomes more intense if the aspirant scrambles to maintain control. If the repulsive person is around, there might be temptation to rebuff them openly. This is very risky as it may cause a social upheaval given the fact that the majority of the Society are controlled by Chaos. Hence, maintaining distance requires much tact and should not be rushed. The way boundaries work is to be firm and to avoid social pitfalls. There can be a lot of pity play by persons from specific social groups that they manipulate to gain access to the Initiates. The Spiritual refuse of humanity can appear in all forms. 

Friends in High Places

There is a certain type of Chaos personality that is completely under control of the Serpent. These persons have lost all humanity, or more accurately, have never gained it. They are the dominant Chieftains who win in everything they do. They have infinite energy. They assure that all the Chaos Souls suffer without end. The power-hungry pathological types gather in a pyramid structure beneath them. They are not nauseating to the Initiate, because they do not need Projection. They never mock, deceive or slander the Initiate. Actually, they are very jealous of their Evil and don't let anyone use abuse to reach their level of inhumanity. The Initiate would benefit from the presence of such a power figure who has both charisma and authority. In most societies, such men exist naturally, dispersed throughout the strata of community. They lead a hierarchy of abuse, but this abuse stops at Baal's organized life of virtue. Baal and the Elementals, YHWH and His Archangels, or Demiurgos and The Archons... The lower Evil (demons) are stopped by their Masters in the hierarchy from carrying out Projective Attacks on virtuous persons. It is worth noting that they may allow temporary promotion of the lesser Demons for punitive purposes, but at the end, they always discharge the Parvenu demons from their positions.  

Jacob wrestling an Angel (an Archon?) (source: https://matthewvanm.com/2020/08/03/the-thin-place-of-liminality/)

Object Relations

The Elemental life overseen by Baal is the life of dynamic object relations. It is the attraction-repulsion regime with democratic principles. I suspect that Freud was an Initiate, probably of the Practicus (3=8) grade. It is no wonder that he does not attribute anything to Object Relations in his theories, as the common man governed by Baal is invisible to Initiates. Love and friendship is not allowed to Initiates, and one can scarcely see any mention of social life, family, or love in Freudian psychoanalysis. One is born with a certain amount of Narcissistic libido and rises in the planes according to the action of this libido on the Ego. In this regard, Narcissism is like Helium that lifts the Soul according to the Spiritual assignment. 

Playing God

Now, the Initiate is excluded from Baal drama, also threatened by Qliphoth, and is clueless about his place in the Universe. Everything emotional is taken from him. He understands loneliness of the Chaos types are totally different from his. He is a blaring Light to the face of Gods. He cannot totally reject his Self, as the Spirit is still too bright for mundane life. Then, he has to carry the thirst of his Soul like a shackle. Divine Consciousness requires an exile from the Astral life. It is the end of dreams, desires, coincidence and Providence. Now, the Spirit should take Satisfaction in playing God. The Spirit should make the Law. The Law is a whole set of Emotions that will be printed on the World by controlling the Elements. Fire, Water, Air, Earth... The Law cannot be established until all the Elements are brought under control. All the Spirits seek the same Law and they are never in disagreement. Lesser Spirits apply the Law partially. Giving up the torment of the Soul in the hands of Baal, the aspirant chooses to project Divine Light onto Earth, live according to True Desires and inspire them around him. He shall be led by Devotion and be rewarded with Deep Satisfaction. 

British magician Aleister Crowley claimed to a Revelation of The Law to himself. As the Spirits are always in agreement, declaring and revealing The Law are one and the same thing. Also, reaching the Spiritual Attainment level is more important than putting the Law in writing. (source: https://www.otago.ac.nz/english-linguistics/english/ lowry/content/11_mysticism/ d_people/d_crowley.html)

Make Them Do Things

For the Adept (5=6) the time for reconciliation is forever up. Going through the Enlightenment of the Philosophus grade (4=7), he has no further expectation to participate in the Elemental drama. Step by step he was carried upwards by the winds of Spirit. Now, he can finally grieve the so-called 'loss' and face the World properly. The days of the Soul, that intricate machine governed by the Elementals that belies the Spirit, is over. The Soul of the Chaos Adept is a total instrument of the Serpent. The Soul of the White Adept is non-existent. He is, finally, Spirit in body. Now, every Spirit aspires to possess the body to do Spiritual things. The Will of the Spirit can only be known through Satisfaction, sometimes in the oddest things. Nevertheless, this is the only outlet for the Spirit to manifest. Baal used tricks to conceal Consciousness, so that he can have a body. The Adept replicates his Wish, that is concealed even from Himself in his surroundings. The Will of the Spirit is neither a mission nor a transformation. Its only property is authenticity. While the common men ride the tides of Baal with reaction responses, The Adept wants what he wants deeply and absolutely.  

I have already mentioned before that Free Will is a misconception. One needs to only shed the Soul to start reigning over the so-called 'Free Will'. This will also invite the Adversary to one's life. The lack of a consistent resource on Magic has made Initiates target of regressive/fixated Chaos personalities. The only mind that can withstand Magic is Chaos mind. As the number of Initiates increase, more Chaos minds spawn to preserve the mundane equilibrium. The Adept, or the Free Spirit consumes infinite amounts of resource with very little concern. The Chaos Megalomaniac is a lamentable existence which craves to increase physical opportunities with great passion. Those with acceptable qualities are given Souls by Baal. Now, most of these common men either lack Spirit or their Spirit is too comfortable inside the illusion. Those that are free from birth are the Builders of 777. It is worth noting that there is no protection for these Builders from Chaos, except for Prudence. One should observe the mechanical and imbecile fecundity of Chaos and hide his Genius from it. Faced with Chaos, the aspirant should go silent, seek a peaceful distance, and never let out his feelings. Chaos is attracted to Light, but has no ways of appreciating it. There is a whole literature about 'Narcissistic abuse', 'Lovebombing', etc. that is based on a Chaos personality entering the life of an aspirant who has not yet given up on The Illusion. The Megalomaniac despises Object Relations but understands how important it is to aspirants in the Initiatic Path. Hence, they can act based on the cues they get from the Initiate to reconcile them with the World. However, the play gets boring and tiring over time and they give up. They go back to their Megalomania and fear of attachment. By way of this, the aspirant understands he is not going to get that coveted place in the drama. Of course, many Spirits not trained in the Spiritual Lore get utterly desperate, blame themselves, and cling to the hope of control over their destiny. 

Now, the Soul can be revived by Chaos with the only prospect of ultimately crashing a wall. The more viable option is to tuck it away in a casket. One should forget all his desires, and only then he is ready for Magic. If there is no desire, how come there is Satisfaction in Magic? The satisfaction in Magic is just like any other Satisfaction and subjectively it is desirable. From outside, it may not look like an achievement. If the Soul is revived through Black Magicians, the aspirant gets many desires with no prospects of fulfillment. In contrast, Magical satisfaction is not cathartic like other satisfactions, but static and structural. It is the upgrading of Virtue to Super-Virtue according to the Magical Will. 

Conclusion

The aspirant is both cursed and blessed. He is too big to fit in with Baal's playthings. He has to go through grief, maybe several times. His blessings do not appear until he has given up The Soul. The curse leads the aspirant to give up egotistic values like pride, status, entitlement, etc. After that, a chasm in the sky will open and he will attain his true position in the World. The danger which awaits him is the 'thirst for life'. The Hermetic principle states 'As above so below', which applies to Truth in every layer, like a fractal. In the mundane life, embracing Chaos with its offerings is akin to the Spirit incarnating in life. From the purity of Heaven, the Spirit chose to shroud itself in Chaos to experience Ecstasy. The Philosophus (4=7) commits the mental picture of Spiritual concepts to defend his Will (fire, wand) against sentimentality, recklessness, and anger. Anger is an unanswered question, and it fades away with Understanding. The Adept carefully steers in life until he finds the Divine Satisfaction that will bring him partially back to his discarnate state.