Nightmare

Now your nightmare comes to life...



Ok, so this is a fun song and all, but the lyrics aren't exactly 100% accurate. However, it's still pretty cool. When I dropped demon magic, I found all kinds of stuff touched on in the lyrics of this song just sort of went away. Borderline personality disorders, mental illness afflictions and such just faded. Even a learning disability my daughter had evaporated into nothing, and she's doing great in school this year, with no particular changes in how we do things at home.

Money is coming in and actually staying in for a change. No major catastrophes are leaving us all broke every time we get a windfall.

And I'm over a lot of personal issues that plagued me for years. A friend commented that I'm calmer than ever, even though I've managed to retain my wit. Personally, I don't know how witty I am, but as long as I'm not getting less witty, I'm happy. I was a little concerned about that, since Bune had made me more eloquent. I was afraid I'd end up less loquacious, or dull.

I do write less on the blog, but that's because most of my attention and writing is going into courses these days.

Anyway, I thought the song was fitting. One of the things about demon magic is that people heavily into it are living nightmare existences, one drama or crisis after another, all the time... and they think it's normal. It's not! Life doesn't have to be shit, all the time. Into each life a little shit must fall, don't get me wrong, but it's not supposed to be all the time, every month, year after year.

Now, some magicians seem to be able to work with demons with either no problems, or they're at least adequately prepared to accept the consequences. Hey, if that's you, more power to you. Awesome.

For the rest of us, if you're sick of the drama, but you're hooked on the power and apparent control of your life the demon magic brings, the RO Guide to Demon Magic Recovery is for you. It provides a way to get clean, and to replace the perks of being a magician that you've grown accustomed to with better allies and sources of power. Cleaner stuff. The "good" stuff.

Recent conversations on Evocational Magic had me reviewing my position on demons this week. I mean, I'm kind of the poster child for the guy who gets into demon magic, has bad shit happen, and then goes all anti-demon as a result. There are lots of explanations about why that happens online, and when I was into demon magic, I even wrote a few myself. My take was people weren't initiated enough, or something.

After carefully re-evaluating my position, I've come to the conclusion that demon magic still sucks, but I've clarified my use of the term "demon." Demons are any spirit who is designed to bring destruction or delusion. Focalor, who sinks ships and brings disease, is clearly a demon. Maybe every spirit listed in the Lemegeton's Goetia is not necessarily a demon, but I think enough of them are to make it a poor resource for finding spirit allies. Instead, I advocate working with the Planetary Governors/Intelligences directly, the "Winds," the Princes of the Spirits, and the Genii Loci. I recommend creating your own list of spirits the old fashioned way, finding them, getting their details, and recording their contact information in a Spirit Book.

Be a Goes magician practicing Goety by all means! After all, that wouldn't be an inappropriate description of my own Work, from certain perspectives. But avoid any spirit whose primary role in existence is the manufacture and maintenance of suffering. Putting them to work for you is effective, but it comes with a price. For most of us, anyway.