HOME | CALENDAR FURTHER READING BOOKS | LINKS APPLICATION CONTACT | FAQ |
 |
|
The Examined Life By Frater M.O. | |
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. 
Tonight's episode is entitled, The Secrets of Magic... Exposed! No, I'm not talking about that television show that features a mysterious masked magician and several hot-pants clad assistants/strippers first performing illusions to amaze and astound, followed by how the illusion was accomplished. This is a different kind of illusion...There was a time in my life when I loved Vegas. I must have loved it a lot to blaze that mirage ridden desert road twenty times a year from my home in Los Angeles. There was something about all the glitter and flashing lights that made me think of fame and feel prosperity. Although I had an incredible amount of monetary success and came home justified for the trek it was impossible not to see the real Las Vegas. This is the Vegas of guys pulling out crumpled dollars from their shoes, mostly believing that if they could only get back in action they could win little Jimmy a new bicycle. I've watched elderly, bouffant haired women throwing the last of their paychecks, a coin at a time, at the hope of a better life. Faceless winners looking for a free-meal coupon or a free meal in a dumpster. It is odd how I never see the illusion that they are buying. I also never hear of their successes either. This is certainly not a condemnation of Vegas. It is the acknowledgment of the obvious illusion of what Vegas represents. Okay so I can see through the flickering lights illusion but there are so many others that just go by undetected. So I ask myself, what is true and what is not? Whose opinion do I take? Is it possible to live with faith? The scientific and analytical aspects of my mind need to be continuously challenged by having to reexamine my own foundation of my magical life. I actively have to think. As much as I hate to admit it, I love the editors at Skeptic magazine because they make me think. I have to be willing to be fully aware of both sides of the argument. Unfortunately it also seems that all forms of magic, magick, illusion and phenomenon are dumped in the same skeptics brew. It also doesn't help things when there is no shortage of charlatans being discovered at every turn. I certainly feel at a loss when there is no way of separating the morass easily to the novice. Most often I don't bother. But there have certainly been periods in my life of wanting to preach from the high mountains, offering my confessions of phenomenon and effecting change. Wow! Join this club and some really cool stuff will happen... just you wait. Ultimately I always end up stopping myself knowing that I would be asked to prove it. My sticky dilemma seems to reside mostly in someone else's sticky perception. I define magick as attaining consciousness of the intangible and effecting change through the act of Will. I define magical success as spiritual evolution, transformation, faith, acceptance and an unbiased alignment to the Universal order of things... all intangible things. How can I prove this when popular culture defines success by material attainments and verifiable factoids; how much dough is in your bank, how pretty is your wife, your car, career and to a lesser extent what does it say on your diploma, what degree have you attained. Perhaps most importantly, can we all agree on it? It has always fascinated me how external these successes are. The success determined by committee, outside of the confines of me. How frequently sadness and depressions are rooted in judging someone else's outsides and comparing them to our insides. Sadly it has taken a very long time for me to learn that my personal successes only come from within, because I carry the only vote that matters. In magick I have found success only when I agree that something has been altered. Sometimes that includes unexplainable phenomenon but it is not a requirement. I ask myself if this diatribe is nothing more than a cop out. After all I can't prove it. Perhaps, only the perceived tangible by committee can be taken as having value. Of course I have never actually seen a single atom like they talked about in science class. Maybe my intangible feelings of love towards my family and friends only carry importance if these feelings are validated by an impartial third party. Walking my path is unique just like everybody else's path. My insights to your path can only be as good as the communication between us. Magick then becomes a vehicle to help find and cultivate your individual path. Hence magick becomes the map but you must still make the journey. I believe in magick because I have worked at it and have found I am serene1 as a result. But if it turns out that I'm wrong and we all exist through happenstance, our actions are meaningless because there are no consequences and we all ultimately become worm food. Then it really doesn't matter. Except to say I had a lot of fun doing some pretty pointless rituals. On the other hand suppose Magick does have a place in our lives, creating a powerful direct link to the divine. Then what a noble existence life becomes! Love is the law, love under will. Frater M.O. 1My 1937 Webster's Collegiate Dictionary defines "serene" as shining with clear steady light. I couldn't resist including such a great definition. Pointed out to me by my buddy Peter who has the same dictionary. Questions, comments and hate mail are strongly encouraged. By the way these thoughts do not necessarily reflect the ideals of Cor Lucis as a whole or its members... but they might.
Copyright © COR LUCIS Website by: Anathema | |