Talk Gnosis, Tomorrow Night!

I've been invited to speak on Talk Gnosis tomorrow night. We'll be talking about the heavens, the entities therein, and the practical attainment of Gnosis that the adherents of various beliefs go through from different traditions. 

Looks like it may end up growing into a multi-part series on the Great Work, too. I can't wait to see where it ends up.

When: 

9:00 PM EDT, Saturday, March 30, 2013

Where: 

The program will air live on the GnosticNYC Google+ and YouTube channels, tune in wherever you'd like. 

Hangin' with Hermes

Last night we did a rite to Hermes in his hour on his day, and we didn't really ask for much of anything, besides deeper understanding and integration of the forces of his sphere in our lives. The seer saw a single image, nothing moving or pulsing, just a steady image that was full of power. There were no apparitions of angels or gods, there were no words of teaching, warning, admonition or praise.

There was simply the presence of the Intelligence and Deity of the Sphere of Mercury, radiating out into the room, into our spheres.

Today I am Mercurially recharged, focused on accomplishing tasks I've let fall to the back burner due to lack of time, energy, or interest. And boy, did I need it after that last retrograde. Words, logic, rhetoric, they flow again where before was a dry stream. It feels wonderful.

We don't always have to ask for things or events or effects or results from our invisible friends to receive exactly the things we need the most. Sometimes just hanging out with the gods is enough.

The rite is simple, the declaration of sacred space, the establishment of the light of the First Father, the consecration of the scrying medium, the conjuration of the planetary Intelligence, and the recitation of the planetary Orphic Hymn, and then simple rest and observation.

I can't recommend it enough.

Responsibility and Fault

Jason and I have talked offline about some of the concerns he has with me telling people that they are gods, and are in control of the manifestation of their realities. I didn't really appreciate some of his concerns until yesterday.

I had posted a "Don't Rape, Don't let Others Rape" post on FB for St. Paddy's day, and a friend posted about how teachings like The Secret end up convincing people that everything that happens to them is their own fault. "You got raped? Oh, that was because part of you consented, that is, you wanted to be raped. You were asking for it, and so therefore, your rape is your fault."

I nearly shat myself. All of a sudden, I understood part of what Jason's concern was when he said people do not literally create their own existence all the time, that they are not gods. We magnify everyfucking thing when we blame ourselves.

So let's get something straight about the core of Hermetic Doctrine:

1. We are all gods with the power to create and maintain our worlds. 
2. We all have the power to influence (if not fully control) every aspect of our existence through applied hermetic magic.
3. Through little fault of our own, we have forgotten this fact. In our amnesiac state, we view the world as an ongoing series of stimuli to which we react. In reality, it should be more like 50/50, where we are creating our world and leaving it room to throw us some curve balls so we can keep enjoying the game.
4. Hermetic Magic is how we remember:
1. Who we are
2. Why we're here
3. How to be gods
5. SHIT HAPPENS. And it's not your fault. Most of your life you responded and reacted. You still do. I still do. Do Hermetic magic like I do, and you'll create maybe 10% of the time and react the other 90% of the time. But if you create 10% of the time, the other 90% will be mostly positive. Mostly. But shit still happens that is not your fault. You're a creator god among 7 billion creator gods. The only thing that makes you even a little bit special is that you're interested in creating your world. You're still reacting to other people's stuff most of the time that is beyond your current sphere of control.

OK? You understand that, right? There's no blame in this creator-god stuff. There's only opportunity. Whatever happened, why-ever it happened, who cares, it doesn't really matter, honestly. What you've got to do today is a simple matter of who you are, what you want, and the resources you've got at your fingertips. That's it.

When you're happy, if you're interested, you can go back over the shit that makes you sad. You will have plenty of time, and the experience and perspective to understand it in the context of a joyful existence, after you get one. All the bad shit makes sense when you're happy. Get happy, and then worry about stuff. It'll be there to think about later if it's a big deal, and when you're slightly tipsy and just had a brilliant orgasm, your bad relationship choices in your 20s (and 30s) don't really seem to be that big of a deal.

Because they aren't. Shit happens. That's not your fault.

How you react to the shit, that's up to you, largely. What you do with what you have to work with. That is your kingdom. Manage that, take responsibility for that, and you'll soon see the things you control growing, and the things you don't just fading away. Seek first the kingdom. Seek first.

And again: It's not your fault that you fucked up when you didn't know any better. Try again and see how you do this time. If it's not perfect, try again. There's no blame in this shit. There's no fault. There's only FATE, and that is always what you do. Which is your choice, from what we can tell.

Jason just had an awesome idea...

Wow, Jason just had an awesome idea on FB. Someone asked how to get a fast $400, and Jason's suggestion was to offer to tutor four people in something they know well for $100 each.

Not bad. Friggin' brilliant, even. Check your skills and talents, determine what they're worth to someone looking for a specialist in what you're really good at, and sell it! Awesome!

I'm going to do it, and if you choose to, please feel free to advertise what you want to sell in the comments here along with some contact info for anyone interested in your services.

I would like to make a fast $1,200.

So, for $300, I'm offering to do one complete manifestation rite for any one thing you desire, for the first four people who can pass and agree to the guidelines:

1. If, after hearing your request, I think you are an idiot, we will be done and I will go on to the next one.
2. If your desire is reasonable, you agree that we will do a divination on the outcome of any magic performed on your behalf.
3. If, after divination, it looks like you won't get what you want, we pick something else that you actually can have, or figure out what we can do to get you to a point where you can have what you wanted.
4. You agree to take advantage of the material opportunities to manifest your desires when they arise.

If you are interested, and you have $300, please send me an email with the subject: Jason's Brilliant Idea.

Primas Res

You should know, my dearest brother, that the best and most noble gift that God has given to humanity in this world is knowledge. By knowledge we become acquainted with ancient things, and the causes of everything in the world, and what more immediate causes are causes of other things, and how one thing corresponds to another. By this we can know everything that is and why it is, and why one thing is raised above another in due order, and in what place exists the root and beginning of all the things of this world: that thing by which all things are dissolved, and through which everything new and old is made known. 

For this truly is the first, and it lacks nothing, nor does it need anything else except itself; it is the cause of all other things, and does not receive its qualities from another. It is not a material body, nor is it compounded of material bodies, nor is it mixed with anything other than itself, but rather is all things in itself. Therefore it may not be called anything except the One. 

Properly speaking, it is the sole truth and unique unity, and from it, anything united receives its unity. It is also the primal truth, and does not receive its truth from another; rather, everything receives truth from it.

The Picatrix, Book 1, Chapter 1

THAT THING.

That is the thing. That thing. That's what I'm after in my Work. I've sniffed it out through the ancient mysteries, and I've sniffed it out through the aethers. I've conjured spirits of the Celestial Heavens, and I've conjured dark entities who roam the darkest underworld, and they pointed me to the Way of the Primas Res, the Way of the First Things.

Call anything you can imagine, from cosmologies to deities to spirits to friends to your very own self  "It." It starts in darkness, as a light. The light grows and the darkness recedes, and its shape can be known. It reaches its potential, and the light fades, and the darkness grows, and it returns to the nothing it came from.

It passes through a non-existent veil, a membrane between the unmanifest and the manifest as it comes into being, it passes through again as it returns. There is a friction, a frission that is sexual and orgasmic as it passes through, penetrating deep into the womb of the Earth, the Mother of us all. It is sexual, orgasmic. Those are adjectives, metaphors. I'll make them similes so it's clear: It comes into being in a process that is like sex, in that it is a pleasurable, highly energized, wonderful insertion of the eternal into the temporal; It is made manifest in a moment of planting, of sowing that is like an orgasm, bursting outward all at once in radiance, leaving the awareness completely calm and centered and focused.

And like the sex act, after the orgasm, the participants can fall gently into sleep, deep enough to dream of the thing they have created, and what it means, and implies, and represents. We experience the situations, the results, the manifestations of that thing as It comes into being.

This experience of It is its consumption. Little by little it returns to the unmanifest, filtered through our senses, digested back through that membrane, moving from materia to memory, traveling down through our underworld rivers of forgetfulness and pools of remembrance. Father Time, Kronos, consumes his children, and the things that we have brought through his gate into manifestation return through his gate to the realms from which they sprang.

Our lives are manifestations of It, of that thing, that primum materia, primum mobil, the universal substrate that is the framework of everything and the universal solvent that flows through and around the substrate. And then through us It also manifests more of Itself. We are Light in Extension, extending more light yet again.

Think of Agrippa's Three Orders of the Elements, the pure essences, the first combinations thereof, and the near-infinite levels of possible mixtures you can imagine. The mother and father individually, the married unit, their offspring. The King and Queen, the Hermaphrodite, AZOTH. We purify the lens so the light within can be focused into the world at our fingertips.

Three realms, represented in your mind and thoughts and plans and ideas, and in your awareness of the moment and interaction between that inner world and all the senses of the flesh through which you perceive and interface with the events of your life, and in the material things and people outside your fingertips that you have brought into being. Through the three realms a ray of light streams and takes form in your mind, the world around you, and the mediative sensate realm that processes the flow of stuff through time through your skin. That light is manifest in all the things you create, sustain, nurture, and consume moment by moment, returning it all to the source, enriched with the joy of existence.

All of this stuff we do with magic, that's why we do it, and how we do it. That's what we do.

RHIP

Every time we turn up the heat on our lives magically, every time we try to go deeper and squeeze a little more of that true nectar of the gods out of the creation of the world around us, more crap bubbles to the surface to be skimmed off, or consumed and transformed in hotter fires, or lower heats over longer times. There are brutal sessions of self-awareness that reveal the parts of us that have to be maintained, endured, weighed, measured, consumed in fire, and replaced with something entirely new. There are internal transformations that have to take place, and extended rigorous magical exercises that build up spiritual muscles. There's a spiritual fitness that has to be achieved and maintained if you want to keep going deeper.

Verily, there is a lot of shit to go through to get any kind of attainment when it comes to magic.

And why do we do it?

Why do we go through it over and over again? I mean, once a magician can create the most desired and fundamental goals of the people of our culture, riches, hot sex, fine wines, expensive cigars, delicious gourmet meals, options to live in whatever climate they desire, why do we keep going deeper instead of enjoying the rewards?

The reason we don't stop is because the process of getting these skills, scenarios, things and abilities, that process of ascending to the heavens and returning in power to create the world... it is wonderful. It is an experience of exquisite pure distilled awesomeness. It is chilled liquid orgasm of the Intelligence, the Spirit, and the Body of the magician that hits in perfect harmony across the planes of existence and the realms of the manifest and the unmanifest allatonce.

And after experiencing that, the money, comfort, material luxury that we can manifest just doesn't mean as much as they used to. They're still nice, don't get me wrong. But when you have experienced something better, the absence of that "better" is noticeable, and makes you long more for the thing that was better.

It's like when you're alone doing magic and analyzing and recording the results, vs. when you're with your lover discussing the ritual you've just completed together, writing up notes in your spiritual journals, and running divinations to get clearer details on the results of the Work together. Yes, you can do it alone, but it's not as good. It's still good, but ...

It's not as good.

When you've had better, you want more of it. And the more you get, the more you can get. It's like exercise that way, the more you lift, the more you can lift.

Doing practical manifestation magic, getting what you want, it's all a big trick. It takes advantage of your desire to have a thing, to live a lifestyle, to own a car and a boat and have a hot lover, and it teaches you how to do so, and at the same time teaches you that those things, though really cool and pleasing, are nothing compared to what they can be with magic. The things you want become magical things that make sense in the life of a magician doing magic that works. The lifestyle you want becomes a magical lifestyle, where you use the charts and tables of the grimoires to make your daily teas as well as your astrologically timed talismans. The fast cars and boats teach you that it was the love of controlled movement through time and space that you were after the whole time. The hot lover reveals the steaming intercourse between the manifest and unmanifest united as One in which we are, all of us participating in every moment.

Your life, your kingdom, it just sort of realigns itself to contribute towards the Great Work, all the time, and you look for ways to squeeze more of that feeling, that action, that union and harmony out of your existence. You play with it in your intellect, in your emotions, in your flesh. You breathe it in, and let the friction of the winds become a smoldering coal that ignites a fire in your soul. You push that creative force through yourself on all the levels at once, and you change the world.

The more we do this, the more we can do it. A pure desire for the experience of the creation (and destruction) of the world, your world, and the things in it will keep you focused on the reasons we are here, and why what we do matters.

This pure desire is a Holy Hedonism.

So this is why we do it, we ecstatic Hermetics. We love creating and experiencing things. We are mad scientists curious and entertained by their own inventions. We are children at play with our Genius, for the joy of the playing together instead of the the joy of The Game* played.

So the real reason we keep going deeper is because the deeper we go, the more of this we can experience and enjoy. It keeps getting better, like a beautiful romance. The more we do, the more we can do. We learn to help ourselves, and when we have more than we can need, we have time to look up and notice there are others who don't have enough, and we can pass that on, and keep getting more for our own enjoyment.

Hm... how else to put it? That's it, but too ... passive, I think.

Rank hath its privileges.

It feels good to do magic. It feels good to be able to do magic. I've conjured spirits and broken curses and removed people from situations for clients, and it feels great to be able to do those things. I'm on a project now focused on some mutual personal Work that is great, and we can only do it because of all the Work we've done before. I love what we're learning, I love what we're doing, but more than that I love the doing of it.

We get to do things other people can't do, too. We can take for granted that the magic we do for our resources will work, and so we can focus on collecting and assembling the resources as we see fit. We're artists with infinite supplies, we just have to put in our orders. We've learned how to manifest things** and how those things fit together to make new things. We can help other people. We have established, well-used good healthy relationships with the forces of the celestial, terrestrial, and chthonic realms. We get to conjure spirits that can only be commanded by those with the power and skill to handle them.

It feels really good to be able to rest in the knowledge that your magic is, for the most part, really goddamned scary effective. To be able to take that for granted, not to disrespect it or denigrate it, or to forget its value, but not to have to actively worry and doubt the effectiveness of your rites because you've seen them work so many times before. 

This is where it starts

It starts with sweat.

A quick review:

1. You learn that you're a light that is an extension of a single light that extended itself inward and slowed down and then extended itself inside its own extensions, apparently for the sole purpose of creating and experiencing custom individualized microcosms of the world it created and experienced. 
2. You learn that Magic offers you advanced Creation Training.
3. You learn a technique, preferably something simple and effective, like Hermetics, where you just conjure spirits and start working on creating your world right away.
4. You grow in strength, wisdom, and experience, and you do more.
5. You enjoy the work of your hands, and the hands of your work.
6. Repeat steps 3-5, but deeper, or higher.
7. Profit.

But while it's simple, it's not easy. It's a lot like what you do when you get physically fit. You learn to consume healthy fuel, you improve your efficiency at processing these nutrients through training and exercise. You increase your strength to use your increasingly efficient consumption and expression of the forces of creation. And you feel super good when you're doing the exercises. 

It doesn't happen over night. I've been seriously at this Great Work think for about 8 years. It's only been the last year that things have gotten really good. That was my own damned fault, and hopefully you aren't as stupid as I am. If I'd been on my game, I could probably have wrapped this development cycle up in 3-5 years, easily. It still wouldn't have been over night. And I'd still be just scratching the surface of the next adventure, just like I am now.

It isn't going to be all fun all the time. I opened this post with that black stuff coming to the surface to be consumed. Seems like there's always some black stuff to be consumed when you're going for more and better out of life. The only times I'm not dealing with some bullshit is that blessed period where I've just finished dealing with some bullshit, and I get to see how I did. You deal with bullshit, and it purifies a part of you, and you're able to materialize the force that had been twisted into the bullshit issues without it being bullshit. It becomes a tool you can use to improve your life instead of a stumbling block that's ruining just everything.

But it can be a real bitch to go through. When you're done crying, get up, and go do some more magic. It feels ... good. And it gets better.

RHIP.

* Yeah, you just lost it.

** Take the idea to Saturn, conjure the Archangel, get it to add the Saturnine bits required for manifestation, thank him and move along to Jupiter, repeat down the Tree to the Moon where you leave it with Her to turn over to the Elemental Kings. You don't have to micromanage.

Getting Real Traction in the Work by Getting Your Desires

Ok, so yesterday's post focused more on the things I disagree with Frater Acher about than the things I agree with him about. That's totally not fair, because I do think he's awesome in his own way, and I want to make sure everyone knows I respect him and his path. It's just not for me... and I disagree that magicians should not focus on miracles and the manifestations thereof.

I think what he's doing is trying to get people to focus on expectation management. Too much focus on the materialization of the spirits can make you lose your perspective and mistake a vision obtained for a successful rite, and overly focusing on the physical stuff you get as the outcome can blind you to the real benefits of magic and this hermetic stuff we do.

I think that's what Acher is focusing on in his advice, the outcome. And he values the internal outcome the most, the changes to the inner man within the magician, because that's what brings the peace, the stoic contentedness that he believes is an enlightened state. He is totally right, too, it is the internal changes to you that matter most. The person you become as you do magic, the harmonization of your spheres, the learning who and what you are that make you capable of doing whatever it is that you're here to do... That's the real reason we do the magic to manifest the world, because the process changes us into who we are, it teaches us the things we have forgotten while incarnated. It makes us fully human, i.e. divine and in the flesh at the same time, in harmony. That's beautiful. And that is more important than the flashy magics, in the long run.

But here's the thing... I also think people should be happy. I believe happiness is a spiritual tool, an indicator that points directly back to their True Will, their Providence, their Fate, their Destiny, their Raison d'être. I don't think there's a better or more pleasant way to discover and apply your Will than to go after the manifestation of what you want. Nothing will make you happier than achieving harmony between the things you do and the things you want to do. When your life manifests your desires, your Will becomes obvious. You learn Who you are, and Why you are as you pursue the things you want. You develop the ability to discern what you "really" want when you manifest things that you thought you wanted and they don't make you happy. You learn the spiritual lessons that reveal what it is that really makes you happy underneath the physical situations, relationships, or material things.

The material manifestations... those are just physical representations of Ideas to magicians like me, Hermeticists who are at home in the cosmology of neoplatonism. They are the clumsiest forms of the Idea, and are furthest from their core source.

But we are also in physical bodies, and the physical interaction of "us" with the physical manifestation of the desired thing reveals a physical harmonic that is a manifestation of the interaction between my eternal spirit sourced in the Primum Mobile that manifests as light in extension for the joy of existence and the Idea that is manifested in the desired thing. Manifesting what you want physically is awesome.

It's also a major part of why we're here, all of us. The creation and manifestation of our worlds. There's a reason it makes us really thrilled and gives us supernatural perspective, elevated understanding, a rush of endorphins, and the divine madness of being a god. It is beautiful, on purpose, as a signpost that you are doing it right. 

So the problem a lot of people with spiritual inclinations have with this kind of ecstatic approach to finding spiritual attainment through the fulfillment of desires is that, quite simply, it is dangerous. I advocate focusing on pleasure because it can teach you about yourself. If you really apply your mind and your reason and your intellect and your constructive interest to the understanding of what makes you happy, if you go after your Genius and work with it to learn from your pleasures, you will succeed in awesome ways.

But if you let your desires master you, if you fall into the trap of just feeling the good feelings without applying yourself to understanding what the experience represents to you across the spectrum of the "worlds," physical, mental, spiritual, and how that impacts eternity, you're wasting your time. I tell people to go after what they want with the assumption firmly in place that you will do so under the umbrella, with the intent of "knowing thyself."

But I also have little doubt that you'll really be able to do any of the magic I recommend and end up on the wrong side of the left hand path. Yes, it's dangerous, but if you're regularly working with angels, spirits, and your HGA, you've got little to fear. They, and your own inner spirit that strives to be all that it intends to become, will ensure that even if you slip up a bit, you end up in the right place sooner or later.

So get started with the simple stuff. Conjure the spirits with the intent to get some money, or a new car, or a better relationship, or a career path. Look at your life, the things that you have, and the things that you do, and take a close look at how these things make you feel. Note the things about your life that bring you pleasure. Note the things that need to change in order to bring you pleasure.

Then determine the right spirits to conjure up who will bring you the desired results. Then conjure them. Then ask them to change your world. Then evaluate your results. Then determine if you're happy, and if so, why. If not, why not. Then decide what you want to do next, alter the existing outcome, or start something new. Then do more magic to get what you want, and see how you like it when you get it.

Repeat this, ad infinatum. Seek the Kingdom of God. Find it. Rule it. Let this process transform you from ignorance to understanding, from puny human to immortal god, from ignorance to transcendence (and back again). As you get the things you want, you'll be happy. As you see that you are powerful, you will become content. As you learn that the things aren't the fun, you will learn the mystery of why we're here, and the power of fun, and the experience of joy.

And you'll develop traction, spiritual muscles. You'll live a magical life that is filled with wonder, insight, and wisdom. You won't turn into an arrogant self-absorbed prick all the time, you'll know with each passed mile marker along the way that you are accomplishing your mission by keeping in motion, never stopping until you've been completely undone and put back together. You'll keep moving forward, onward and upward, you'll just keep swimming... I'm running out of trite cliches here, but give me a minute, they'll be back...

Traction. That's the key. You keep moving... like a shark.

The Power of Useful Bullshit

NLP is total bullshit. Its methods are bullshit methods, its science is bullshit science, and its anecdotes are bullshit. Just bullshit bullshit, pure and simple, bullshit.

Take a look at the core principles. Let me google that for you, because while there is a ton of overlap, everyone "teaching" NLP has something different to say about it, because it's basically ... bullshit. Not to overuse the word or anything, but there it is again. Take a look at three or four of the results, and scroll down to the principles parts. Read through a sample of it, and get a real good feel for what they're saying. Then do the following fucking fascinating experiment:

1. Write down what you can remember about the core principles of NLP. Most of the links have a bulleted list, and you'll remember a couple of them, and have a general sense of what you think the principles are; this is what NLP has come to mean to you based on your reading. Hurry along now, don't write a fucking essay, just summarize the top three things you remember. We've got a mission here, don't get bogged down on step one.
2. Read this article by Witchdoctor Joe.
3. Re-read what you've personally written down, each principle individually, and answer the next question about each:
4. Is it Kangaroo Magic? Is there anything in the principles that you've recalled that is absolutely true, something that can be applied across the board?
5. Now go back and re-read the principles of NLP, keeping in mind that question: Is it Kangaroo Magic?

I did this, and guess what? It's all bullshit. I couldn't believe it. None of the principles are really true at all, I can think of way too many personal experiences that prove that shit doesn't work that way in the real world. Each is also really appealing. It would be really fucking great if there were a simple set of rules that worked all the time that could be used to your advantage the way NLP tells you there are. Especially these principles, each one telling you that the universe is secretly working for your own personal happiness in every situation, if you only can figure out the secret code to take advantage of it... You too can unlock the fullness of existence in terms of sex, money, and immunity to the will and whim of any other human, because they're really little more than objects designed to fulfill your personal happiness, right? Everyone and everything exists to make you happy, if you just got it, got the secret, got... IT.

Do You Get It?*

And whatever the thing they tell you is "IT" is not IT at all. It's obviously not true. You can remember times that shit they say doesn't work. People are not always in a state of hypnosis. What one person can do, not everyone else can do. Confidence won't make you thin or attractive, it will just make you the ugly fat douchebag that nobody likes.

Bullshit.

But ... useful bullshit, eh?

Frater Acher recently wrote a book review that was more of a persuasive argument. He strongly recommended this book because it tones down your expectations from magic. It teaches you to settle for non-wonderful results, to not pursue the miracles of living magic. He recommends it to noobs and grimoire magicians especially, because he thinks noobs and grimoire magicians are too focused on the flash and power of immediate results. He thinks you get a more valuable return on your investment if you focus on the inner transformation of the magician.

He's continuing a recent theme. I noticed it when he started the reviews of Emil Stejnar's "Hermetic" magic works. His basic premise is that grimoire magi who focus on desires and results are fuckin' it up and robbing themselves of the true power of the Hermetic system. I'm paraphrasing.

As you can tell, I disagree. We discussed it a bit on FaceBook. I am all about ecstatic pursuit of the exciting and awesome manifestations of god, being gods, working with gods, creating and enjoying our worlds like gods, and earning the wisdom and knowledge of the gods through hands-on experience.

But both approaches, the one that glorifies awesome miraculous results-oriented magic vs. the kind that looks a lot like sitting and reading and thinking about magic more than doing it... both approaches are bullshit. I think his approach is more obviously bullshit than mine, because he himself has had the awesome amazing firework-type results that made him appreciate the long term inner changes within himself. And my approach is bullshit because the whole time you're going after the instant gratification, you're putting yourself through the exact same transformative fires that Acher's approach brings about, only with extra beautiful exciting dramatic beauty. And I like that. Other people ... they like quiet lives.

And that's ok.

In both of our pursuits of the Work, we use our beliefs that are, admittedly, bullshit. We take advantage of the usefulness of pretending like we are right for the moment, and it works for us. The universe really does reward ecstatics. It really does reward ascetics. It really does bring wisdom to philosophers. It rewards us with the same kinds of inner attitudes and insights and appreciations of life. It's useful bullshit. And it has the power to change everything.

But it's still bullshit, because it is not the actual way, the truth, or the life that either of us have. It's just a tool, a set of practices and beliefs and insights that happened to work for us. And we like them better because we came up with them ourselves. The same way you will, by reading our bullshit and using that to grow your own way.

I went through some experiences over the last few months that have changed me a lot. I found out some stuff that was really simple, and it's really good, and it makes everything feel wonderful. I'm going to start talking more about how to do this, how to experience it, and how to make your life as fun as mine has been.

It takes a bit of work, it takes some inner transformations, it takes some discipline, and setting aside your selfish safety to risk being honest with yourself about what you really want. It takes doing magic for instant results. It takes going to the highest heavens and returning in power to create and rule your world as a God-Emperor, a Sorceror-King. It takes going to the cracks of the Earth and finding the black secrets of the Universal Solvent. It takes casting your awareness into the Sun to see how everything is connected and working together in a cosmic orgasm of creation and experience and destruction all at the same time.

And it's a ton of fun, even the sore and achy muscles part.

But as useful as it is, please remember, it's bullshit.

Bullshit that can change your life.

* Oh, and just so you know, I am firmly in the "there is something to get, and I totally get it, but the it that I get is that there is no it to get, and you get to make up your own it as you go" circle, which tends to look a lot like very confused in the center of the graphic.