Where the Work Comes

Really quick, I just wanted to point out that a conversation with an Archangel on its own is not sufficient to provide the "same" results as years of training and instruction from human teachers all by itself. You'll still have a lot of Work to do, but it begins with the conversation with the Archangel. It's not them that have to do the Great Work, it's us. The process of integrating and mastering the powers the Archangels trigger in your sphere can take every bit as long as it takes to train and study within an Order or established tradition.

And in my experience, the Archangels don't provide the training in the conversations, much. They might teach you a technique on the fly, or tell you to put an offering in a specific place for them or whichever spirit you're Working with, but most of the time when I ask a spirit for training in something, what I get is a series of coincidental, synchronistic revelations of information that's already been revealed and recorded. Things pop out in passages I've already read in Agrippa that I didn't see before, or things make sense in a way they didn't previously. It's not like I'm conjuring Professor Dunn to explain in detail the Mysteries of Postmodern Magic.

At a high level, the work required to integrate the lessons comes after the conjuration when you're relying on spirits for training and initiation, while in more organized approaches, the work and study comes first and then leads to the conjurations. Or maybe even in organized approaches, it's conjuration, initiation, study and practice, more conjuration.

Wherever the work comes, it's still a lot of work. My way isn't any easier to do things, it's every bit as hard or even harder than Working in groups. There are still risks, but they aren't the same kinds of risks.