Weird Experience With Sigil Magic

[Mythopoeika]

I had heard that you could summon demons like Asmodeus to learn arts such as geomancy. I don't know why I chose to try and summon him in particular, maybe because I recognized the name.

Why did you want Asmodeus to learn geomancy? Why not just learn it yourself?

 

[Anonymous]

I don't know. I guess I just wanted to see a demon.

 

[tastyintestines]

I can come over, if ya want.


Hav'nt messed with sigils, must read more, I usually focus on the subject, task, etc, must read more.

 

[giantrobot1]

FuManChu - excellent post there. I might borrow that technique for revision/memorisation - it sounds very useful.

Reminds me of certain mnemonic tricks, like using the 'word' SOHCAHTOA to remember how to do your trig. calculations.

 

[kitsunegari]

3 years ago, I read all about sigil magic and tried it - nothing worked and it felt to me that I had several months of bad luck........coincidence ? :?:

 

[razorblimp]

I agree. A sigil is like a seed planted in your subconcious mind. It will either grow, or it won't, but it's impossible to turn your dreams into nightmares unless you want it to.

Mel White wrote an article about protective circles, parts of which I've found invaluable, some of which I find relevant to sigils and magick in general:

Psychologists and psychics alike view the mind's structure as a three-part entity: The ego (that which you think of as yourself), the superego (the "higher self") and the Id (the child within). The Id is, in a sense, a computer. Like most computers, it operates on the "garbage in-garbage out" principle. There's an old superstition "as you name something, so will it become." Tell yourself that you're very unlucky and your id will obligingly give you bad days by enhancing any negatives in your environment. Tell yourself that you are clumsy, and your id-computer will obligingly arrange for you to break a leg while stepping off the sidewalk. The bad news is that the Id can't make a judgment as to whether or not this is a good idea. It only knows that it's received these "instructions" and must carry them out. The good news is that you can actually program/reprogram this portion of your mind.

if you are interested, the article can be found here, but don't take it as gospel: http://www.paganlibrary.com/introductor ... es_why.php

 

[giantrobot1]

Here's a question I've thought of, for those with some experience with sigil creation:

I've often heard that you should create positive statements, since this is the kind of thing that the unconscious mind 'hears' the best, such as "I will revise daily before my exams", for example. Negative ones may not work as well, or even have any negative words such as 'not' ignored, therefore causing the opposite effect to the one desired.

But how can you best create a positive statement where the desired effect can only be really stated as a negative, such as "I will not do ABC"?

 

[_Lizard23_]

Either postulate a positive opposite, so that 'I will not be a lazy git' becomes 'I will be active and enthusiastic', or formulate it as 'I will be free from laziness/smoking/fantasising constantly about men with long untidy beards' etc are the methods I've usually seen described.

But really I'm a bit uncertain on the whole subject ... it seems unlikely to me that the subconscious mind or whatever your chosen paradigm suggests you are communicating with is lacking merely on this one grammatical point. It seems more likely that concentration on a 'negative' concept subverts the process ... as dieters fail because they think so much about food for example.
Basically I'm not entirely sure that sigilisation as we are discussing it here is the best method of ridding yourself of things, being better at attracting new ones. As a simple method of thought-form creation it can be seen as a way of creating a partly independent entity representing a desire sending it out to get whatever it is.
If you are wanting to get rid of something you might be better off projecting an independent form which represents the thing itself and banishing it

 

[giantrobot1]

But really I'm a bit uncertain on the whole subject ... it seems unlikely to me that the subconscious mind or whatever your chosen paradigm suggests you are communicating with is lacking merely on this one grammatical point. It seems more likely that concentration on a 'negative' concept subverts the process ... as dieters fail because they think so much about food for example.

Thanks for the advice. I think you have something there about 'focussing on the negative'.

I have had success with sigils for getting rid of negative elements I wanted out of my life, but...

If you are wanting to get rid of something you might be better off projecting an independent form which represents the thing itself and banishing it

This sounds really interesting, and on the surface it seems like it would be very effective indeed. Any more details you'd be able to share?

 

[_Lizard23_]

Giant Robot - for example the IOB (Identify, Objectify, Banish) technique which appears in Donald Michael Kraig's Modern Magick consits of pretty much exactly of what Fu describes above, in a ritual framework.

You will find a great deal of debate as to the validity and wisdom of such a practice, but you'll find that about just about anything in magic(k) - some people seem to really get off on issuing dire warnings about the consequences of dabbling with dark forces/your own head and what constitutes true spiritual advancement and all that kind of stuff - but I have used a similar method with some success. As far as behaviours go, though, it would definitely seem to be more productive to concentrate on developing new, more desireable ones, or ideally looking at root causes, rather than just trying to shift old ones - you can run out of new vices fairly quickly that way, which, though it's great fun of course, often doesn't help much in the long term.

 

[Anonymous]

forgive the novice but...

Why is rigorously intensive self examination necessary before embarking on practical magic? Just that Phil Hine suggests that magical practice is more important that reading and theory. Surely doing something is the best way to learn? Especially an essentially creative art like magic (i could be reading this wrong of course) You don't have to read loads and loads of theory and do loads of self examination before you start to play the guitar, or paint, or draw? Why is magic so different?

 

[razorblimp]

Re: forgive the novice but...

Why is rigorously intensive self examination necessary before embarking on practical magic? Just that Phil Hine suggests that magical practice is more important that reading and theory. Surely doing something is the best way to learn? Especially an essentially creative art like magic (i could be reading this wrong of course) You don't have to read loads and loads of theory and do loads of self examination before you start to play the guitar, or paint, or draw? Why is magic so different?

It's not, but to get the best from it you will have to discover why you want to do it in the first place and to do that, it's best to look into yourself, as different techniques of magick work better with different moods and personalities. It can be confusing when you get contradictory statements in books and there are other practitioners who say is has to be done a certain way, but if you have half an instinct, listen to what it says. I personally can't stand a lot of Wiccan or Thelemic groups who will do exactly the same thing every new moon because that's the way it's been done for years. It smacks too much of institution and ritual for the sake of it.

Magickally, it's alright to read about it for a while, but in my opinion there's nothing better than doing. Start with something small, dip your toe in the water, see if it fucks up or not then do something else. It's no good having potential energy, when it can be put to a positive use. I've gotten what I need out of Magick for the moment and am giving it a rest, but some of the seeds I've sown through it are still showing results, something that wouldn't have happened if I'd just sat down and read about it.

 

[Twin_Star]

The point being that a rigorously intensive self examination is NECESSARY, before even the most basic stages of magickal practise are engaged in.

The Greeks didn't carve "Gnothi Seauton" on the Temple of Apollo for the fun of it

 

[razorblimp]

Well put.

Indeed, insofar as one must turn one's attention inwards to first eliminate self imposed obstructions, then

ξέρte tον eχθρό saς

might be just as relevant.

Now you are just showing off, what does that mean?

 

[Twin_Star]

Love your enemy?
*says TMS, translatum.com tempered with wild guessing*

 

[James_H]

If you want to be a great painter, you have to know a lot about paint, how it mixes, how it blends, how it changes colour as it dries...

A bit O/T, but to extend yr metaphor tentatively - do magicians have to be inspired in the same way a painter has to be inspired, in order to be good rather than just technically proficient?

 

[shah_aoul]

As a long time magick-guy and user of sigils here's my two cents. Sigilisation is an incredibly simple and quick technique, but on it's own is not enough. Austin Osman Spare was a big fan of sigilisation, but as with most things, he wasn't the first. Norse vitkis used sigils (or rune-binds) by combining runes that embody the magickal intent into a single sigil. The key to successful sigil working as advanced by magicians including Peter Carroll, Frater U.D., and AOS, is the task of slipping the sigil (intent and all) past Chronzon (the psychic censor) into the subconscious, where according to Spare, all power and possiblities exist. Thus, once you have generated your sigil you need to charge it by entering a state of gnosis wherein the conscious mind is distracted from the statement of intent that underlies the sigil. Once the sigil is implanted into the subconscious, it must then be forgotten and never remembered (this is why keeping a magickal diary is handy). If the sigil is recalled and associated with the statement of the intent, the conscious mind then effectively deactivates the working. The theory is a little more complex than that, but that's the brief version. For further insight, read "Practical Sigil Magic" by Frater U.D or "Liber Null & Psychonaut" by Peter J. Carroll.

Servitors, or thought forms are constructed along the same lines but may be regarded as external mini-magickal workings or artificial spirits. This is heavily based on the Tibetan concept of the tulpa. The idea being for example, that you could create a servitor for protective purposes, to ward of magickal attacks, find out information etc.

Sigil magick, like all forms of magickal is highly unreliable. As I've said elsewhere, I think it was Pete Carroll who said that a one in three success rate for magickal workings is pretty darn good. Anyone who claims that 100% of their spells work is probably suffering from magusitis.

 

[mossy_sloth]

ξέρte tον eχθρό saς

just an aside in the interest of language...

shouldn't your noun there be in the accusative form to match the article?

 

[mossy_sloth]

With regard to the Greek, no.

why not?

 

[mossy_sloth]

can't argue with that I guess.

 

[shah_aoul]

Well, I thought that with this being a discussion of magickal practice that it would be clear my opinion that sigilisation as an isolated technique wasn't enough, would refer to magickal success. Obviously not. As for it being considered in isolation, I do believe that I did qualify the usage of sigils that I was writing about with the sentences on gnosis. If my usage of the term gnosis in this context is unfamiliar to people, then they only have to ask for an explanation.

 

[shah_aoul]

Magickal success would naturally be whether or not your working actually worked. Of course, I realise that we can all learn from mistakes and failures, so I don't discount the value in that, but when you intend for example, to throw a dart at a bullseye but you get a double twenty you might well learn from your mistake to shift your stance, or adjust the force of your throw, but is it a success? I'm not judging anyone, people can judge themselves anyway they want, it's just in my experience, when people set out to achieve a result, their success is usually measured by the achievement of that intended result.

And this - "Really. Considering the use of sigils is what happens after you've finished reading about what other people think, not simply repeating it." - care to elaborate?

 

[shah_aoul]

I don't think that the notion of success as I put it is unhelpful at all. There are countless examples in every day life where success lies in achieving a result. People don't take driving lessons so that can make the constant effort of driving around with an instructor - they take lessons so they can learn to drive on their own. Many individuals take college and university courses in order to achieve a result - that is where the success lies for most students in educational institution. (That is, the ones who are actually there to learn.) I'm sure that telling some kid who has just failed or underachieved in their A' levels isn't going to be consoled for not getting into University by being told "there, there, at least you put in constant effort".

I don't believe that I have made any assumption that anyone else here is less-read on a subject than myself. If you are referring to my earlier comment that if anyone wanted to know more about gnosis in that particular context then they could simply ask. Yes, I could have provided a link, but because I don't assume that anyone here is less-read on a subject than I, I also don't assume that they are unable to use a search engine or a dictionary. I did provide some examples in the form of book titles.

As for evangelising? Are you trying to say that I was evangelising?

 

[shah_aoul]

Well, I don't know that the ultimate aim of a degree course is to produce an original piece of work in the form of a thesis or dissertation. Perhaps that might have been true once upon a time, but not so these days. That might be the goal of a select few students at undergraduate level, but the ability to really progress scholarship in an area is generally only available to postgraduate studies. Broadly speaking, at undergrad level students don't really have the opportunity to make any significant contribution to scholarship beyond the assimilation and regurgitation of existing theories, of course, this is open to criticism as this is not applicable to some areas of scholarship.

Taking the career of a scholar as a yard-stick, their (arbitrarilly, and provisionally decided upon at the time, or relatively argued retrospectively) success or failure in school is frequently of little or no interest compared to their own subsequent work.

I don't know about this - if you want to be an academic then you need to succeed to get the grades to move upwards through the educational system. Of course, there are exceptions to this, such as mature student entries into University. I agree that the situation is more relaxed with regard to art.

I would have thought that provision of a couple of useful book titles would have been enough. I don't know of any online sources that provide the same information to the same degree. But that doesn't mean it's not out there, and if people want to look for info, I'm confident that they are probably more than able to use a search engine. I really don't see this as an issue.

Consistent advocation? May be. But am I preaching? No, i don't think so. What I have done is come into a public space, and exercised my right to post my opinion on a subject. People were asking about sigils - chaos magick makes extensive use of sigils, ergo - it would seem a pretty good place to start. Chaos magick texts tend not to be written in an overly complex style, they are accesible (following the notion of democraticising magick as advanced by Crowley), therefore, for they are a good source of information.

 

[mossy_sloth]

Pointing towards useful sources of information is my point, it might have been illuminating to point to other sources of information as well, and comment upon the distinctive differences between them. Providing a summary is essentially superfluous. My point being that I - for one - welcome the opportunity to read your opinion, not a third party's.

That reads like a comment on a student's essay.

*waiting with bated breath for the next round*

 

[mossy_sloth]

call me thick, but what's your point?

 

[shah_aoul]

Hmm, not all courses, especially undergrad courses culminate in a final piece of work. There might be a dissertation component but it is generally in conjunction with other modules that might be assessed by exam or coursework. Many university tasks require the students to display understanding of underlying theories/practices related to the topic, not necessarily posit their own unique view. Personal views, which, it must be added must be supported by credible evidence, may be made at Masters and Doctorate level. On the accusation of plagiarism - for a student to be guilty of plagiarism they must copy verbatim the words of another without sourcing them, or copy the essential theories of another without sourcing them.

So academics are not scholars as well? Although, I don't disagree that learning and mastery of a discipline are exclusively the province of academics.

The books that I pointed out are not useful sources of information? Yes, I could have provide a comprehensive list of relevant URLs and texts, but again, I would expect the learned people of this board to be able to find information on their own, but the information that was provided was for any individuals who may not be overly familiar with the topic. Whilst you have already admonished me for the assumption that people here are less-well read than I, I would respond that there will be people who are very familar and those that aren't. For those already familiar, they can skip my posts - I'm not forcing anyone to read them. For those unfamiliar the summaries that you say are superfluous may well be useful for those looking for further information, as might the book details I provided.

 

[shah_aoul]

Oh, sorry are we back talking about magick again I agree, I personally wouldn't advocate a formal syllabus. A friend of mine has recently joined the OTO (through nepotism). Now, he evangelises - I swear if he asks me one more time if I'd be interested in signing up . . . !

I suspect that degree programs have changed somewhat over the years. I can't speak for the US, but education is becoming more and more business oriented. Bums on seats = funding. How do you get more bums on seats? Lower the standard. The result? A society with an existing employment problem that becomes saturated with a bunch of unemployd graduates. This might be a bit cynical though, but i'm sure you get my point.

FYI, I'm not actually a chaos magician, well I am, sometimes. If I'd known you were, I might have written all my posts in V-Prime *L*. Well, that's not bad, that must have been at least two or three pages of ranting and arguing. Fair dues.

 

[shah_aoul]

erm . . . how about the price of fish?

I'm just curious as to where you are based. The reason I ask is that whenever I've chatted with American "occultists" (for want of a better general term) I've found a real different outlook compared to the British and (some) European approach.

 

[Anonymous]

And on the note of sigil magic, I gave it a try and something is afoot. I have been in a job I don't particularly like for almost the last 4 years without hope of finding something else that remotely pays well or is worth while in applying to. I formulated a sigil and left it under something at work I then saw a job advert for something I can actually do that paid appropriately so I applied and didn't hear back for a while. Then I thought I should destroy the sigil with a bit of fire and really send it out there, I soon after got an interview which went well and am waiting for the outcome at the moment. All that said I can definately conclude with 100% certainty that they work Well I still have to wait and see, but I think there might be something in it, maybe just a little.