TriumphantGeorge Compendium - Part 26

POST: I have a little bit of an emergency... Could use some perspective.

You are over-using and over-thinking, I think?

Possibly over thinking. Like, trying to hard to put meaning behind all of it.
Over use, though... Read what I pointed out to mysterymoth. I see no real difference between LBRP, prayer, chakra cleansing, etc., in so much as they both provide release of internal negative energy. I'm pretty sure that as long as it's not interfering with your everyday responsibilities, you can't really overuse LBRP.

Yeah, you're really searching for the meaning. As to LRBP, you just don't need it that much: a morning refresher, a calming in the evening, that's enough? But, hey, it depends a little on what system you're using. To me, it's just a "reset".

You sound like you've become a bit ungrounded. Do you do anything to keep your focus centred?

I do regular meditation which usually starts with some kind of banishing. I fluctuate between Chakra grounding and LBRP depending on what feels right at the time, and actually, up to this point, I was feeling pretty great about everything in general. That's part of why I was a bit startled by the dramatic shift in both external and internal environment for both me and my fiance. Do you do anything to keep you grounded that you wouldn't mind sharing? I'm always open to new ideas.

I don't do much: I do a lie-down-on-the-floor exercise twice a day, where I let go, expand out into the room, and "overwrite myself" with empty space. (I also then make sure my attention stays open and loosely centred either on my centreline - somewhat behind my eyes or lower abdomen - during the day.)

POST: the seemingly opposing view points in occultism

A1: all realities exist. you need to find the one that is relevant to you

Q1: I don't tend to believe this way. I think there is logical issues with it. If I have two view points that are saying total opposite things then one must be right and one must be either wrong or not totally correct. I believe there is an objective reality. So to say that you can have multiple realities is admitting that they are not actual realities. they might be subjective points of view but to be a reality it has to be anchored in objective truth.

A2: if your not willing to step outside of Aristotelian logic and apprehend paradox you wont get very far in occult studies.

Q2: If the many worlds interpretation of QM is correct, then we do live in a multiverse, all possible realities do exist and you navigate a field of infinite potential futures with each choice you make.
All worlds being equally real and populated in each moment with minds as real as your own.
Before you scoff and say it is nonsense, the majority of physicists believe in the many worlds interpretation even Hawking.
[http://www.physics.wustl.edu/alford/many_worlds_FAQ.html]
[http://www.quora.com/Why-do-60-of-theoretical-physicists-believe-in-the-many-worlds-theory]
It is not a fringe view.
David Deutsch of Oxford has shown that the math of the many worlds interpretation checks out, and agrees with our observations.
[https://web.archive.org/web/20071121085925/http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=paUniverse_sun14_parallel_universes&show_article=1&cat=0]
The Oxford team, led by Dr David Deutsch, showed mathematically that the bush-like branching structure created by the universe splitting into parallel versions of itself can explain the probabilistic nature of quantum outcomes.

I scoff and say "nonsense"! ;-)

Since we only live in one reality, this is effectively just story-making? If we never experience the branching, and only experience one sequence of choices, how does it help?

Except as a mathematical or diagrammatic 'aid' to describing or visualising probabilistic processes, but that doesn't correspond to there literally being multiple universes...surely?

Q2: correspond to there literally being multiple universes...surely?
The earth was the center of the universe not to long ago, there is only one universe and only one version of you observing it today.

I do take the point. However, the heliocentric alternative is something that could be tested and observed, there is no suggestion for how multiple-branching / many-world can be observed.

I'm all for alternative configurations / theories for the same data - having different 'stories' can provide real insight - but I don't think those two are in the same category, as I see it at the moment.

Q2: Here is Geordie Rose founder of D-Wave, maker of the first proven quantum computer.
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyUbWl8jPQU]
Skip to the 4 minute mark.
He comes out and says they believe the many worlds interpretation is correct, and they are sharing processor resources between these many worlds.

Thanks for that, will check it out when I get a moment.

Translation I have the attention span of a goldfish and will never watch it ever.

Right, just had a look: it's the David Deutsch quote.

Copenhagen interpretation, many-worlds view, they are reasonable attempts to account for - to provide a 'visualisation' for - the apparently probabilistic nature of quantum physics. However, there are alternatives: David Bohm's ideas, 'active information', extensions to the de Broglie pilot wave idea. In the end, as Bohr said: look, the maths works and is predictive, maybe you just have to put aside the notion that it's understandable. Many-worlds is just a placeholder for people who don't like the idea of a literal wavefunction collapsing into a single outcome.

Somewhat, much of this is a matter of taste.

Having said that, it's certainly fun to think about all this, and it can provide inspiration for things.

Q2: Since you aren't going to watch it here is a transcript I took the time to type up, not that you will be bothered to read it.
There is a quote on screen from David Deutsch
"Quantum computation ...will be the first technology that allows useful tasks to be performed in collaboration between parallel universes."
David Deutsch @ TED 2005
3:57-4:27
This quote is from a respectable scientist in fact one of the founders of this field that may look a little strange to you who don't follow theoretical physics, but there is a very clear prediction that our most successful theory of nature makes and that is there are an enormous number, mind-boggling large number of parallel realities as real as this one that have different consistent histories
4:44
Quantum mechanics makes a very specific prediction that all of those (parallel universes with different histories) are as real as the thing that you remember
4:55
But science has reached the point now where we can build machines that exploit those other worlds and quantum computers are perhaps the most exciting of all of these
12:07-14:00 imagine that there really are parallel realities out there and imagine that you have two that are exactly identical in every respect all the way out to the horizon as far as we can see down to last little atomic detail of every single thing with only one difference and that is the value of a little thing called a qubit on this chip (contraction of quantum bit) and that qubit is very much like a bit or a transistor in a conventional computer it has two distinct physical states which we call zero and one per bit in a conventional computer these are mutually exclusive that device is either one or the other and never anything else. In a quantum computer that device can be in the strange situation of where these two parallel universe have a nexus, a point in space where they overlap and when you increase the number of these devices, every time you add one of these qubits you double the number of the parallel universe you have access to until such time you get to a chip like this which is about 500 of these bits you have something like two to the five hundredth power of these guys living in that chip so the way I think about it is the shadows of these parallel worlds overlap with ours and if we are smart enough we can dive into them grab their resources and pull them back into ours to make an effect in our world now this may sound very odd to you and bizarre and in fact I am using language that a normal theoretical physicist probably wouldn't use, but this is what I am telling you is absolutely correct and in line with the way these things actually work.

Thanks for your effort, I appreciate it.

Seeing it earlier triggered a memory of a profile I'd read on Deutch a few years back. Tracked it down to here. You might find it a good read if you've not already seen it. It's pretty balanced; it's the New Yorker and so doesn't gave an agenda!

There's a good quote:

The strangeness of superposition is, as Deutsch explains it, simply “the phenomenon of physical variables having different values in different universes.” And entanglement, which so bothered Einstein and others, especially for its implication that particles could instantly communicate regardless of their distance in space or time, is also resolved. Information that seemed to travel faster than the speed of light and along no detectable pathway—spookily transmitted as if via E.S.P.—can, in Many Worlds theory, be understood to move differently. Information still spreads through direct contact—the “ordinary” way; it’s just that we need to adjust to that contact being via the tangencies of abutting universes. As a further bonus, in Many Worlds theory randomness goes away, too.

And this gets to the heart of it. The Many Worlds theory is a way to get back to determinism for people who don't like the 'randomness' and, most importantly, that a system can hold itself multiple states at once, and multiples of multiple states at once.

It provides a 'picture-able' approach to the problem, rather than being left with the raw maths. It's a cool way to imagine it, but it seems clumsy to think that it is really happening as described. Inelegant. Nothing wrong with that, but to take it literally is not I think useful. I suspect a better view will be invented eventually.

But if it works then that is fine. The history of physics is filled with ideas that worked, led to new insights, but were then discovered to be kinda-wrong of just 'useful fictions', and on we go (see Paul Feyerabend [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Method] for fun on that).

The problem with quantum mechanics is that the maths works but there are several different interpretations, all leading to the same result, so it's hard to distinguish between them, except by preference. Seemingly opposing views which, in terms of result, aren't really opposed. They all work.

I don't have a problem with 'multiple states' that collapse on observation, so Many Worlds just seems like a bit of fun. I quite like the idea that it's the whole environment that collapses the state. But there you go.

It's a great topic though.

Final quote:

An example of the agnostic view is given by Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker, who, while participating in a colloquium at Cambridge, denied that the Copenhagen interpretation asserted "What cannot be observed does not exist." He suggested instead that the Copenhagen interpretation follows the principle "What is observed certainly exists; about what is not observed we are still free to make suitable assumptions. We use that freedom to avoid paradoxes."

Q2: Thanks for your effort, I appreciate it.
You appreciate something you couldn't be bothered to read.
Right...

Um, I did read it, and then I took the time to respond thoughtfully.

Let me say: this isn't news to me. I studied this stuff. Did you read my response? The New Yorker article is pretty accessible to the non-scientist. The Many Worlds view is an interpretation. Amongst others. Most physicists just don't care much. Most don't agree.

There's not much to separate the idea of 'Many States, all of which contribute, only one of which you observe' from 'Many Worlds, all of which contribute, only one of which you live in'.

There are silly reasons to reject Many Worlds (this [https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/06/30/why-the-many-worlds-formulation-of-quantum-mechanics-is-probably-correct/] is a good article covering that), but when you examine it you find that the 'worlds' idea itself doesn't really make much of a difference to people's actually work in detail; really it's just 'states'. (But there's nothing wrong in that as such.)

You might find this interview interesting reading [deleted]. Just came across it. Both a physics and philosophical angle. Anyway, check it out.

Q2: The thing is George, Let's say we prove without a shadow of a doubt that there are parallel universes and they very weakly interact via gravity, and we enable communication between ours and another. No one would ever believe it even with proof. It takes an army and a revolution to change paradigms.

Point well made. Generally I am happy to go with usefulness of concepts while being aware that I am doing this. Of course, we are never at "the end of history" and recognising this is quite freeing.

For this, I think we can operate more directly, conceptually.

...

A1: so you are saying some of it is bullshit, whereas scientific research says all of it is all bullshit
you might have problems making progress with that view

Q3: I mean sure I am saying somethings are not true. Unless you expect me to believe everything I hear which is just silly. Scientific research has nothing to say about it they often are not capable of measuring anything or devising experiments to test claims of an occult or spiritual nature. Now as human beings they may be saying it's bullshit but that isn't really fair and not in the spirit of science. If they cannot measure it or test it they should say nothing until they can approach it experimentally or disprove it mathematically which they have not been able to do.

Q4: Scientific research has nothing to say about it
Yes sir it does.
they often are not capable of measuring anything or devising experiments to test claims of an occult or spiritual nature.
Sure they are. The entire point of me being here is to find people who want something real, and showing them the best scientific evidence to support it.
If they cannot measure it or test it
Of course they can and have.

One key thing: Many good results are "life results", as in they are personally meaningful but are one-offs and can be explained away as coincidences with a describable chain of events. Most useful magick - or I mean, the magick most people are seeking in the end - probably isn't of the psi / spontaneous materialisations / researchable kind. It all falls within the normal laws of physics.

Not many people seem to be deliberately pushing for something more than this.

Q4: One key thing: Many good results are "life results", as in they are personally meaningful but are one-offs and can be explained away as coincidences with a describable chain of events.
You are debating in a vacuum, as you don't now what it is I am referring to.
What I am referring to is something real you can quantify and objectively demonstrate.
Most useful magick - or I mean, the magick most people are seeking in the end - probably isn't
Drawing sigils, chanting incantations, performing rituals, making seals, making potions, visualization, all of that nonsense is make believe.
It is only useful as entertainment.
Not many people seem to be deliberately pushing for something more than this.
There are maybe 5 people on the entire internet that I am aware of pushing for something more.

This brushes most "magick" aside, as generally conceived and practiced, which is fine. It is impossible to test objectively, it is subjective experience by its nature.

What can we quantify and objectively demonstrate at present? Or what can we aim to in future?

If you can't test it objectively it is make believe nonsense or spiritual roleplaying. What I am talking about is something real you can demonstrate.

The problem is, we are reducing the scope of what is real to what is repeatable within very limited constraints. One-hit results, for instance, aren't testable by those methods. We can't say they aren't real, just that they don't fall within the parameters that allow us to examine the phenomena; they can't be proved by those methods. There are some things you can only test for yourself.

Lucid dreaming, for instance. Now there is lab work done with that, but for the longest time that was dismissed, because it is very much a subjective experience, and even now it is argued that it is an imagined state.

Let me be clear: The fact I'm saying that some phenomena might be excluded from this approach doesn't mean, a) That I believe all these things exist or are as described and, b) That I don't think efforts using those methods to explore phenomena that do fall within their scope should not be pursued to the fullest.

Anecdotes aren't evidence, but they are personal data.

Not something I discuss in pubic.

Oh, give me a hint. It'll make all the difference! :-)

Q4: The problem is, we are reducing the scope of what is real
It isn't so complicated. How many millions of people chase magick and occult bullshit daily? How many people are rich as a result of it?
That says plenty right there.
Sure there are plenty of famous authors, and maybe they make money selling bullshit to people who are willing to pay to read bullshit, but other than their fame among a group of sad delusional idiots they have nothing to show for their efforts.
Oh, give me a hint. It'll make all the difference! :-)
No.

Yeah, it's not "movie magick" and anyone expecting that is in for a shock, but who really pushes that idea except a few very populist Chopra-like authors anyway?

Most people who aren't fantasists and have experimented would say that it simply smooths the way via increased fortuitousness, sometimes absolutely ridiculously so. And that it's hard to tell the difference between chance and cause, but that the 'unlikeliness' and personally meaningful aspects of the experience make an impression, and seems repeatable as a phenomenon, but not controllable as a science.

No.

Aw, no fun! ;-)

Q4: imply smooths the way via increased fortuitousness, sometimes absolutely ridiculously so. And that it's hard to tell the difference between chance and cause, but that the 'unlikeliness' and personally meaningful aspects of the experience make an impression, and seems repeatable as a phenomenon, but not controllable as a science.
Translation, it's a game of spiritual roleplay and make believe.

The role-play is optional. It's simply intention and direction. But nobody should take anybody's word for these things - they have to experiment themselves, be brutally honest, and come to their own conclusions. It's a subjective experience, but also can be a shared subjective experience.

If I had to describe it, I'd say that - yes, basically magick as described isn't real - but the world does have a 'clumpiness' to it, and correlation and causation are muddled here. Someone's "ritual" doesn't cause anything, however the ritual and whatever-the-apparent-result both arise from the same place.

That sounded a bit 'woo', really what I'm getting at is that it can be seen as part of a single movement (see Wholeness and the Implicate Order or similar), so it's not surprising that events should arise in patterns - our actions and thoughts also being events - and that we might attribute direct causality where there is none. The unfolded events were enfolded together. This doesn't matter in terms of the apparent results, or their usefulness.

(This of course has implications for free will.)

But, y'know, I'm not really an advocate, I just find it interesting to think and explore, and a spot of experimentation does show some curious effects.

[QUOTE]

Wholeness and the Implicate Order:
Wholeness and the Implicate Order is a book by theoretical physicist David Bohm. It was originally published 1980 by Routledge, Great Britain.
The book is considered a basic reference for Bohm's concepts of undivided wholeness and of implicate and explicate orders, as well as of Bohm's rheomode. The book is cited, for example, by philosopher Steven M. Rosen in his book The Self-evolving Cosmos, by mathematician and theologian Kevin J. Sharpe in his book David Bohm's World, by theologian Joseph P. Farrell in Babylon's Banksters, and by theologian John C. Polkinghorne in his book One World.

[END OF QUOTE]

Drawing sigils on paper, performing rituals, chanting incantations, and all of the other nonsense.

Oh, I agree with you on that. None of those acts do anything. Any results are coincidental (in the literal sense of coinciding) and were not caused by those acts. There is some skew, but most ain't true. But one can obtain effects. Experimenting there and moving along is one way to make progress.

For all the millions of newagers, occultists, or whatever, the few who seem to make progress sure seem to keep their mouths shut about it.

Well, most people are just talk, they're enjoying "the thing of it". They're doing it wrong, or they're not really doing anything at all, and they're looking in the wrong direction anyway. But why does it continue? Because they get a taste of something, just enough.

Q4: You got my meaning, they aren't presenting any good evidence their practices are giving any results other than how they make them feel emotionally.
they're enjoying "the thing of it".
They are roleplaying, it is a game of spiritual make believe, it's purpose is spiritual entertainment.

Yeah, it's about the "zing" for many, and for most it's just a personal thing, Baader-Meinhof or not [https://www.damninteresting.com/the-baader-meinhof-phenomenon/]. That is not to dismiss it all, however. Baby and bathwater.

EDIT: I don't know that it's "spiritual entertainment" though, it's the excitement of there being a deeper reality, something 'more than is here', and the possibility of exerting control over what previously seemed uncontrollable.

Q4: EDIT: I don't know that it's "spiritual entertainment" though, it's the excitement of there being a deeper reality, something 'more than is here', and the possibility of exerting control over what previously seemed uncontrollable.
Obviously they aren't in a deeper reality, exerting control over the uncontrollable, etc. Otherwise they would be getting some results. Either that or they keep their mouths shut real well.
Either you get results you can display in a lab or you don't.
Either you have objective evidence to ground your beliefs in or you don't.
It's that simple.

This is the attraction though, for people.

But: The results that one can display in a lab are a particular subset of possible results, and probably not the result people into this are seeking. That's why people won't bite on the whole evidence thing. They're not interesting in affecting instruments and so on, or even localised control of themselves at all. They want that job interview to go successfully, that person to show up, that object they like to appear. Some are interested in pushing a bit further, bending things a little more, in a direct-reality way, but not many. The idea of that being possible has fallen away over time.

Meanwhile, you can do awareness training and direct influence work with much practice, but that's a different sort of effort, and not something most people would find an attractive way to spend their time. Not "wizardly" enough! :-)

Most people aren't really "here" much in the first place, and that's the place to start.

So I have heard no tales of anyone's magick affecting their lives any more than prayer.

Exactly right. There's a whole book on that technique, actually.

"You can do awareness training and direct influence work with much practice." Results there are none. None.

Those results are martial arts skills if so desired, the various benefits of Qigong, and a clarity of awareness without the usual perceptual boundaries. But that's all another thing. The only way to get real results is by direct presence and intention. This need not be local, however.

"There's a whole book on that technique, actually." Listen I could create a fake pantheon and teach it to ignorant children living in isolation...

Um, so that was a joke actually.

It's simple: You develop direct access to your extended underlying experience, you intend directly, you get results. You might need to clear a few things away beforehand if you've been messing around with other conceptual frameworks, but that's it. The mechanism or representation is irrelevant. There's no energy to play with, no servitors, no symbols, etc, other than as experiential crutches or routes. I've played with them all, and they're just additional forms.

Anyone promising a secret path or new knowledge is just adding to the layers of obfuscation.

Q4: Um, so that was a joke actually. It's simple: You develop direct access to your extended underlying experience, you intend directly, you get results. You might need to clear a few things away beforehand if you've been messing around with other conceptual frameworks, but that's it. The mechanism or representation is irrelevant. There's no energy to play with, no servitors, no symbols, etc, other than as experiential crutches or routes. I've played with them all, and they're just additional forms.
You make things way more complicated than necessary.
You listen to those people who get results and you ignore everyone who doesn't.
That simple.
You come back and lecture on why whatever method you think works, works when you have some evidence to back that up.
Anyone promising a secret path or new knowledge is just adding to the layers of obfuscation.
Unless they can offer good hard objective evidence they get some results...

You seem to be having an argument with someone who isn't having an argument with you. Your tone is well out of order and there's no excuse for it in a constructive exchange.

Nobody was lecturing you. I apologise if I came across that way, it was unintended, on re-reading it did sound preachy, but I was just summarising my position.

That is my technique and it works well within its parameters. It also appears to be the basis for other techniques when they work. If there are alternatives, I'm interested; I'm not bound to any one approach and don't identify with any technique. As far as I'm concerned, any discoveries and progress are all good.

To be honest you might be a nice guy, but I am not interested in your opinion unless you have some evidence that is convincing.

That's better. There's no excuse not to be civil. :-)

I'm not really interested in getting into evidence-exhange though, it's just a slog with little reward (in my experience) - just like most conversations about it eh.

There are already studies out there that cover the basic lab stuff, and anything more extended doesn't fit easily into a small study, is expensive to set up, and unpleasant to be involved in - so has to remain in the 'unproven' box as far as a global skeptic audience is concerned. (For now.)

My apologies. I am just burnt out from arguing with people non stop.
I guess you are just trying to have a civil discussion.

No worries. It's not always easy to have conversations on these topics and on these forums: people either don't want to listen, or they don't want to talk! :-)

Take it easy.

POST: Can we get a synchronicity thread going?

/r/sychronicities covers this but can descend into just 'hey, two things happened'. If we could have a thread that ups the quality - i.e. meaningful coincidences that seem like messages - then this could be worth having.

Not "I bought a red bicycle and now I see lots of red bicycles".

Q: At the risk of sounding like a jerk, those are some pretty tame "synchronicities" that I would tend to just call coincidences. To me, a synchronicity is when something happens that is meaningfully related to something relevant to your life (whether a dream, emotional situation, dilemma, etc.), and is so clearly significant that it almost feels like a message, of which the meaning is easily interpreted.
Example: While struggling with disease, a young man dreams that his hair has turned completely white (in Eastern cultures, white is the color of death). The next day he receives a surprise birthday gift: A white rabbit! Years later, the man succumbs to his disease, and just few hours after him, the rabbit dies too.

Yeah, they are meant to be personally meaningful coincidences rather than just coincidences, and sometimes things really ramp up at key moments.

For instance, when I was in a particularly tight spot I went for some coffee in a cafe and at the table opposite me two random guys started talking about the exact situation I was in, about a friend of theirs, and what he should do and what he should watch out for.

I'd made a few mistakes and ignored some synchronicities, and bit by bit the universe started screaming at me it seemed, giving me multiple escape options and advice. This eventually ended with having an absolute gravitational pull that I just had to meet a certain person at a certain place that night, or else.

POST: Solipsism... this thread needs to happen

Doesn't really matter. The sense in which "there is only you" isn't in the same sense that you would say "there is only cosmicprankster420", because "cosmicprankster420" is illusory (just a bunch of bodily sensations and thoughts floating in space) - a 'dream character', basically - as is everyone else (just images and touch sensations).

The real "you" is the awareness that experiences "cosmicprankster420" and it turns out that this awareness can't be divided; everything emerges from it and is of it. Everything you experience is an aspect of you. It's only in that sense that you are all there is.

Practically speaking then, that means you (the apparent individual) should treat everyone else as part of yourself. Which is a pretty good way to treat people anyway: with compassion. In fact, it might be a better worldview to have for behaviour.

(Being selfish is okay when it's the capital-S version of Self.)

POST: Is this legit?

Q1: This is from a documentary named "Verbotene Aufnahmen" and it was aired on the German TV-Channel "ARTE".
It is supposed to be fake and is on purpose filmed like that. A french guy directed the whole thing.
As a kid I really loved watching this documentary, because it was somehow mysterious and scary.
For everyone out there understanding German or French, watch it!
German Wiki:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verbotene_Aufnahmen
Original Title:
[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0258528/]
Full Video:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPupIkjspN8] - German
[http://youtu.be/5TOFD-pEIhg] - French

Q2: Thanks. For lack of not knowing german, what is it about?

Translation from the German wiki:

Forbidden photographs
Forbidden photographs (franz. Original title: Les of document interdits) short film series of the French director are Jean teddy Filippe.
Those altogether twelve films with a length between 4 and 13 minutes are in the style of amateur photographs and treat together all puzzling, amazing or inexplicable phenomena and things, for example humans supernatural Abilities. The films developed in the year 1989 and fictitiously, are to arouse the impression however that it concerns material, together-collected amateur photographs, which are commentated by a speaker documentarily and dramatisierend. The most different time epochs are processed, for example 1940er years, 1980er years.
The Erstausstrahlung on the German television took place via the transmitter arte. There some the Kurzfilme not as obvious falsification to recognize are, these of few persons as genuine are not regarded, what also the intention of the director was.
See also:
Mockumentary [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mockumentary], Pseudo documentation

So, it's a bit of fun really. As an early instance of the "fake found footage" genre, the films supposedly inspired the movies [REC], Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity. Good article here:

Filippe make no serious attempt to get us to believe his films are real, but simply launches freely into the pleasure of the hoax, tweaking and suggesting just enough, and taking joy in exploring and exploiting restraint rather than the overt excess that invades so many later “found footage” films. Some, like Siberia are in fact fairly dull, but even in that lies a certain charm, as though we’re watching a classified instructional film that makes to pretense at asking for our interest or offering sordid details; the ordinary looking “cyborg” getting his arm trapped in a window isn’t much of a story and Filippe knows that the trick is not trying to turn it into one.

And here is that particular show described:

Ghosts (8'33) : Guided by his mexican friend y, x goes hiking to be presented to " The Nameless Ones " , entities living in the desert and able to move instantely from one point to another.

POST: The question is not "Which god created the world?", it's "Which god created YOUR world?"

I created my world, including the character of "TriumphantGeorge", which I later confused myself with, forgetting that I was the whole world, and not just that named part of it. You are your God.

I'm having some trouble reconcing the ideas of "pride is bad" and "I am god".

Who says pride is bad? And who said "I am God" is something to be proud of? Are you proud of being a person? Or of being the gender you are? You can't be proud of facts!

You just use facts.

Pride is the greatest of the opposing forces within us. It causes our anger, jealousy, greed etc. but the way you explain it, I think I get how to view it.

Yes. Pride is bad in the sense that we can end up not doing things because it involves actions which are against who we think we are as a person. But we are not really that person, so that is to make decisions based on a "false self".

"I am God" is a way of pointing to your true nature, which cannot be prideful if you understand it properly.

I may just read too much fantasy, but when a prideful person achieves godhood, it never ends well. I'd rather get over myself before I put myself over everything.

Well, what saves you is: A prideful person never achieves the recognition of Godhood, because you have to get over yourself (your 'small self') in order to do this.

Seeing yourself as "everything", or an undivided part of "everything", means you have to let go of that individual sense.

There is a concept in the New Thought movement which sorta goes "Your image of God is what you become." Kinda similar to this. Personally, I can't choose one deity that created my world because it changes often. But today, a chthonic earth goddess of some sort feels appropo. Thanks for asking.

"The world is yourself pushed out", says Neville Goddard for instance.

POST: Are sigils with built-in time constraints doomed to fail?

A1: In my experience, Magic generally works in a way consistent with the thoughts of the caster. If you subconsciously expect time constraints to hinder the work, they will.
This seems to function with a feedback loop, the results tend to reinforce your thoughts about how Magic works/doesn't work.
The initial thoughts about how Magic should work usually originate with literature and film exposure, as well as the opinions of nurturing influences (parents, relatives, friends).
Preprogrammed and reinforced limitations can be overcome by study, analysis, and meditation. You must reprogram the subconscious by answering the question of "What beliefs do I have which cause me to think time constraints cause sigils to fail?" and deeply analyzing "What do I know about magic which indicates time constraints should not be a problem?"
For example, many people program themselves by adopting idioms/memes such as:
"No such thing as a free meal." "Everything happens in its own time." "Nothing in life is easy." "In due time."
And so their experiences will manifest consistent with the idioms they've programmed themselves to accept as true. If you believe everything happens in its own time, then you're swimming up a river when specifying a time because you don't actually believe you're capable of changing when things happen. So you have to ask questions like "Why do I think things happen in their own time? Who told me that and why did I adopt that statement as true? Who/What determines when something's time is?"
A person with a strong belief in scientific materialism will find that beliefs about a strictly causal universe interfere with temporal determination. If one believes the past determines the future, then things can only happen when a prior event leads causally towards a future event.

What a great response. It's also worth experimenting with 'impossible things' that aren't impossible - e.g. seeing with your eyes closed (see here [Darkroom Vision & Chef Hats & Dreams], it can be done because what you're seeing right now is a dream or constantly-updating-memory 'inspired by the senses', at best).

The idea being that visceral experiences that are counterintuitive can loosen the hold of constraints and open you up. Anything that can change your feeling from being "this is a solid, material place" to something a bit more flexible, will be helpful.

Also, check out Alan Chapman's Advanced Magick for Beginners, which pretty much encapsulated the "how this works is how I think this works" view of magick, especially sigils.

...

Q1: My theory is that sigils work the way the caster thinks. Like, if you were a sigil, how would you get your caster what they wanted? That's how it'll work.

Q2: Be careful about assuming that. You never know if you'll come into a lot of money because your dad got hit by a bus.

You can specify against that. That sort of thing only happens if you quietly don't want things to go nicely, think that there is a price to pay, etc.

"The harvest was indeed plentiful that year, because half of the population was killed by the plague. And the sharknado."

POST: Is a Creator necessary?

There is "God" and there is God - ?

• "God" is an entity who can be called upon, one of many.
• God is the universe itself, the conscious space in which all experience arises, and is made from. He is not an entity, he is first-cause, the larger Self from which your 'self' appears, and is a fragment. You have no power other than the power of God, for you are he and he is you. You are moved by his Will, which is your True Will, although you can equally intend from the perspective of your self, against this, to a limited extent.

/r/Pantheism much, yessss?

More idealism, I'd say: Consciousness is fundamental; everything, all content, is patterns in and of consciousness.

Rocks, having no complexity, are not self-conscious, but they are made of consciousness. Humans are also made of consciousness but, having complexity, are self-conscious because they can attend to concepts within themselves, including a concept of 'self'.

It seems like you could take your use of "consciousness" and swap it out for "energy." If you've got an explanation for why the universe would have to be conscious, I'd be interested to hear it.

No, they can't be swapped. If at some point you want to move from the start of the universe to a person that can be aware of things, and have 'self' awareness, consciousness has to "emerge" somewhere.

If the material of the universe is inherently conscious, then this isn't a problem. Note, this doesn't mean that everything is thinking! Rather, it means that a certain region is aware of the patterns within its boundary.

For instance, your nervous system is aware of the contents of your nervous system, including "thoughts" (shadow sensations), but cannot be aware of itself (as in, its own boundary). Self-consciousness for humans is: a feeling of being aware (this is inherent), and an awareness of a thought of oneself (which appears within the boundary).

The Metaphor of the Blanket

Imagine a blanket. The blanket is "aware". But laid out flat, there is just "openness", no structure, no content to be aware of. Now, the blanket folds itself, creases itself. The blanket is now aware of the structure within itself, relative to itself: one side of the fold relative to the other. It is in this sense that consciousness (or "awareness", to escape from some of the baggage attached to the c-word) is fundamental, and this is how it becomes "aware of" something, of content, formed from itself.

The brain is a very complex area of blanket (whose pattern border marks the limit of our personal experience), which is part of a larger blanket (the universe).

(An alternative metaphor is whirlpools in a stream: everything is made from water, whirlpools represents patterned regions such as brains which are aware of the structure within themselves.)

It seems to me that "emergent" consciousness as a result of complexity of the nervous system (in the same way that enzymes have emergent functionality as a result of their structure versus other assemblies of matter) is a lot easier to explain than consciousness as an inherent principle to the universe. From a purely material view, I can agree that the capacity for consciousness exists in the universe (in the same way that the capacity for television exists - the matter and energy that compose the universe make it possible), but I don't see it as an underlying force or inherent principle (like strong and weak nuclear, and all that jazz). Unfortunately, that's us drawing different conclusions from the same set of data, so I doubt either one is going to change the other's mind. That being said, that's far and away the best explanation I've seen of the idea and how it works, which I really appreciate (all the previous discussions I've had about it quickly descend into "because I said so" territory). Thanks!

I'm pretty open minded! The problem is, that the personal experience of consciousness is hard to reconcile with the "emergent" view. You end up with questions such as, where in the brain does consciousness begin and end, at what point does something get complex enough to be conscious, and so on. It's not an underlying force, or that sort of thing, but it needs to be a pre-existing property of some sort. Awareness is a better word than consciousness for this basic property though. I've not come up with anything better than this version of 'idealism + nonduality', so far.

Of course, these questions have been around for a long time!

Another way of thinking about it: Imagine that the blanket is made up from eyes. Laid flat, the eyes perceive nothing, the blanket is not aware of anything. The eyes are "aware", but not aware of anything. With the blanket having folds and creases, however, the eyes see the themselves; consciousness-of the pattern of the folds and self-consciousness can arise.

Yeah, I don't see this as being resolved any time soon. :-) Cheers.

...

That's quite nice. Quite a few folk - physicist David Bohm for instance with his quantum potential, implicate order, and active information - go for something akin to a mind-like and matter-like combination of aspects. My take is that you don't need the matter aspect (and who's heard a decent definition of matter lately?) if you re-introduce it as a self-referencing pattern of the mind aspect.

Rocks and the like aren't self-aware or conscious exactly but they have a relationship to their surroundings that's relatively static so they can function effectively as a kind of memory.

That's a nice way to put it. I'd say that rocks are "static memory" or rather - since they do change - very slowly-changing memory. We, on the other hand, are "dynamic" or very fast-unfolding memory.

Constantly unfolding, changing patterns in a background - everything is its own memory.

The fact that we're conscious is definitely a byproduct of the nature of the world around us. You might think this sounds like the materialist perspective.

I agree with that. Materialism and idealism are basically the same thing, with a new level inserted at the base: consciousness or awareness as the basic no-thing "non-stuff" from which things ("actual-stuff") arise as patterns. That's it. Basically, it introduces a mind-aspect by saying that the mind-aspect is the basic reality; a matter-aspect follows as patterns within the mind-aspect, which subsequently at an advanced level leads to patterns which are aware of their own content patterns.

1. There is a background (like water).
2. Things we experience are patterns arising and unfolding in that background (like ripples).

As always, the important point is that the background when undisturbed isn't conscious - which people use to mean conscious-of - it is consciousness. It is only conscious-of when there is a pattern within itself. Like a rock. Or a brain.

POST: How can I do this Magick stuff when I can’t visualize? | The Gates of Horn

This is spot on. Visualisation - and seeing - isn't about the location of the picture or the target, it's about where you see from: where you centre and rest your attention, where you 'look out from'.

Ignore the hosting website, but check out this article [http://www.reptilianagenda.com/brain/br121804d.shtml] on 'seeing from the core':

Another student called me the other day and said, “When I remember the quiet place inside my head, it really improves my vision.” It gives one a little sense of distance from the eyes, a sense of space, so that one can sit back, so to speak, and receive the images. This prevents the habit of straining. We are giving the eyes the opportunity to move freely and see, just as Bates said. Sometimes it’s the acuity that sharpens; sometimes it’s the visual field that expands and sometimes it’s the double images that resolve into one.

EDIT: I'd add that visualisation doesn't matter for magick though. It's really about located presence and intention, and the picturing aspect can be incidental to that. The important bit is to realise the difference between thinking-about and being-at.

POST: Dream magic question - how to?

Enter his dream directly?

• Relax and get ready for sleep.
• Wait for your body to release and enter a calm state.
• Wait for "the sparkles", which then turn into image fragments.
• At this point, decide that you are going to enter the dream of this person that night.
• Remain conscious as the fragments gradually coalesce into an environment.
• Mentally step into the dream environment.
• Go looking for him.

POST: Reading Robert Bruce's "Astral Dynamics" -- Why does he describe the astral plane(s) as nonphysical?

The vibrations thing can be confusing, but it's just a metaphor. Science itself is a bunch of metaphors, however they are specifically tied to particular observations, and have been felt out over time to find the best ones. You could also talk about "tuning into to levels", etc. Read the OBE/LD books (Robert Bruce, Robert Munroe, Oliver Fox, Robert Waggoner - all the Bobs!) for the reported experiences and the techniques. Reserve judgement on the "what it really means or how it really works" until you've had a chance to explore the phenomena yourself.

Metaphors don't mean much without the experience, and then they are obvious. That's why reading "non-dual" literature is so frustrating, for instance.

TL;DR: What are experiences made from? Experiencing. What are explanations made from? Thoughts. What are thoughts made from? They are made from thinking. What is thinking? An experience...

curious about your reading of the rest of chapman [http://www.reddit.com/r/OccultStudyGroup/comments/2mnogq/reading_group_advanced_magick_for_beginners_start/]

I'm in. I have read it and I often recommend it to people - and the shorter, snappier version (The Camel Rides Again) - but actually it's been awhile. I probably have quite a different way of seeing things now than I did at the time.

...

notfancy: You know the New Age penchant for misappropriating and mangling quantum mechanical concepts? Turns out the tradition goes back to the Victorian Spiritualists and Theosophists besotted with Maxwell's theories of radiation. The appropriation of ready-made, mostly opaque (or black-box) physical concepts works as generative metaphors to put into words concepts completely alien to the base or imported concept but having more or less isomorphous relations to one another.
For instance, as you increase geometrical dimensions you quickly find room for more and more strange and complicated mathematical objects, so in Theosophical parlance dimensions are organizing conceptual "planes" (another metaphor) vertically stacked in ascending order of abstraction, purity or rarefaction.
In the same way that electromagnetic waves of higher frequencies represent radio waves, microwaves, infrared, the visible colors from red to violet and so on and so forth, Theosophical "vibration" or "frequency" represent higher "colors" or "tonalities" (here the metaphor is Pythagorean and certainly of ancient coinage) in a harmonious ascending scale of some positive quality: "energy" properly as the abstract capacity to effect change, "evolution" (another appropriation, this time from Darwin), "consciousness", et cetera.
This unfortunately means that, as a newcomer to the field, you have two potentially difficult prerequisites to fulfill: one is learning the specific Theosophical, New Thought and/or New Age vocabulary used by the book, and two is keeping it all in a separate compartment from those concepts with the same name that you know from your Science education.
Edit: before you cry foul consider that usual Physical words like "energy", "current", "potential", "force", "quantum" are all metaphors. Not the denotations themselves, those are precise, but the denoting words were all appropriated from previous base meanings and coopted for specific new ones. Physics in particular and Science in general have no claim of exclusivity to their words.

I know it's been a while, but can you tell me what meaning is intended by metaphorical super-high frequency vibrations? Like, if scientific parlance is the vehicle, what is the actual nature of the tenor?

notfancy: Frequency of vibration is a scale to measure the evolution of the gross into the subtle, and in that respect it is a value judgement: low is bad, high is good, with the resulting metaphors of descent or fall and ascent or redemption and so on.

POST: You can't have anything you need.

[POST]

I've recently learned this myself. If i need something, i can't have it. Anyone know any books on this philosophy?

[END OF POST]

NeedPan: As you can see I need pan and have plenty!
Care to be more specific?
Do you mean what you must for you cannot easily obtain? Do you mean what you're looking for you won't find?
Sounds depressing

Q: Correct me if I am wrong, but I think what OP is saying is that when you say you "need" something, then the universe, kia, subconscious, whatever... it takes that as a statement of truth and manifests it into "reality". I think that you, NeedPan, are hinting at this idea, lust of result... again, correct me if I'm wrong.

NeedPan: yeah of course! that's really psychical of you because the words "lust of result" were spiraling in my head I just didn't bring it up in need of further clarification before citing Crowley but..
TIL that's part of the bedrock of (atleast) practical magick? No, it's also the bedrock of material/emotional/spiritual experience. The way that the human brain thinks it can accomplish something from a position of 'need/want'...
It's like the Inception part about life. It's the fact that we are experiencing what our subconscious expects us to. If we wish to alter the current status of our perceived reality we must begin to assume the state required. You can re-orient your thoughts and musing around the concept of being at-one with the energies you wish to merge with. The only way to do it is to do it.
So I ask OP: What would, or to take it a step father, what DOES it FEEL like to get what you need? That one day you knew you had exactly what you needed, didn't it feel great?
Very specific requests require very specific energies. Study the energy and merge!
Gods, Goddesses and archetypes I believe are part of the stepping stone to helping usher in the energy one might feel they've never before possessed. One good practice would be to find out who/what harbors what it is you need/want and attempt to invoke their vital energies while knowing you have inside you what it is you'll wish to experience materialized in the future.

If you go about deciding to want/need something, your wish is granted: you get to want/need it. If you decide you already have it, then you get that. Feeling is the secret, apparently. (Seriously: developing "feeling-awareness" is key to magick in general.)

People often do a sigil and say "I want to have a nice car". The sigil then gives them the experience of wanting, just as they requested! If they say "I will have a nice car", then that's different. Unfortunately, the default position people have is the feeling of "desire" which they refuse to let go of, or try to manipulate - even though letting go of desire is the only way for it to move location from here (the internal world) to there (the external).

EDIT: Assume the state, as /u/NeedPan says!

POST: They say practice magick every day

[POST]

==I don't know what to do besides performing rituals to manifest my will, aka mostly sigil magick. What other stuff is there for me to do in my garage/temple? ==

[END OF POST]

Explore the nature of your direct experience.

could you elaborate?

Of course.

Instead of thinking-about what's going on, actually direct your attention to your experience right now. For instance, close your eyes and listen to the sounds. Are you "here" where your body sensation are with the sound over "there" - or are you also beside the sound?

Further ones mentioned here [POST: Hell Zen.] and here [POST: You can't have anything you need.].

Basically, you want to spend some time realising directly that you are having a dream-like existence, with sensations floating in space and no central "you" doing the experiencing and doing. Also, do a daily releasing technique (basically, just lie on the floor and let go completely - of your thoughts, body and, most importantly, your "attention" - and let things unfold and unwind as they want). You'll find it really helps your work. Particularly, you'll probably find you stop wrestling with yourself so much, and it'll become a little clearer just is what's happening when you "do magick".

Q: Basically, you want to spend some time realising directly that you are having a dream-like existence, with sensations floating in space and no central "you"
I've done this all my life. I've always thought everything was connected when I was a kid. I thought if people tried hard enough, even without picking up body language, they could read people's thoughts directly. Or predict the outcome of one's actions. When I was in middle school, I thought this girl knew I liked her and I tried everything to get her to like me, but I became a victim of my own beliefs and told myself she didn't like me, when now it's pretty obvious she did. That was just one instance where I realized everything was connected, way before I read any hermetic or taoist texts or the tanakh/bible.
Later I knew that reality wasn't how we experience it when I learned about different waves of electro-magnetic energy, and also began to experiment with psychedelic drugs in highschool like pot, and learned about DMT and stuff, I realized that we're just a product of chemical reactions in our brain and it's up to our psyche to interpret them. It's funny ina way, our brain is an alchemical engine

Cool. I had much of the same thinking. So true about the belief-overly thing that happens. And thinking about interconnectedness...

But, do you experience this directly?

Right now, do you feel like you are a person who has a body in a room typing at a keyboard - or - do you feel that you are a vast space of conscious awareness in which various thoughts, sensations and perceptions arise?

It's not even about the brain, EM waves, whatever - those are just thoughts (although it's a good way to think about interconnectedness). This is about direct knowing. Literally experiencing it as real, right now.

I get what you mean, I should meditate and try to directly experience interconnectedness, any tips on stuff I should do? I like your concept that we are just a conscious awareness in which sensations and perceptions arise.

Well, there's nothing special to it. Try the links I pointed to, or check out Rupert Spira's books, Presence Vol I & II for some good guidance. And checkout the experiments at Douglas Harding's website. There's no action to be taken, it's really a letting go. It's like you been 'holding onto' thoughts or your body with your attention - and so releasing your attention you find you open out and discover the context in which that was arising.

Even just: Lie on the floor, let go, and decide that you are the space in the room. Just give up completely and say, "I am the background space of this room". And see what happens.

Mantras, prayers, affirmations, are just very indirect ways of tweaking background beliefs. If you were feeling determined, you could just constantly assert that this is a dream-like world and you are the dreamer, as you go about your day. Inserting/asserting that fact alone will make a big difference.

(Everyone always wants to "do" something, but in truth any physical or mental act is largely irrelevant. It's the decision + any accumulated habits-beliefs-expectations-memory traces, that is key. Being quiet and asserting without fighting is enough.)

Lucid dreaming is also a great way to experiment (check out Robbert Waggoner's book if you haven't already, and also this [http://www.dreamviews.com/dream-control/46571-infinite-universes-lucid-dreaming.html] interesting thread).

POST: Thoughts on narcissism? Thoughts on vanity?

I'll have a go with this...

Narcissism

A state of constant, extreme "self"-defence. A person's attention is focused on a small area of their experiential field: typically the thoughts that occur towards the rear of the head area. As a result, they are not really "in the world" and the world seems like a threat. Correspondingly, the world of thought and the self-concept (ego) seem very real. There is a grasping on to this concept and a near complete identification with it which means daily life is a constant struggle for survival. Actions are undertaken in defence of this concept; to keep the story alive. Feeling good = thinking good about oneself.

External achievements and relationships are not valued, because they are not "felt". The narcissist is disconnected from the world and his own bodily 'felt sense' and emotions.

The narcissist is an idea.

Furthermore, he is unaware of the existence of the things he is unaware of. The narcissist has no "sense of touch", while being unaware there is even such a thing. He builds theories about "hard and soft" without having the experience. He rationalises and explains - about relationships, about the world - but never knows or that he can know.

Vanity

Similar to narcissism. Identification with an image or thought, a mental construct but perhaps connected with some sensory aspects.

In both cases, the solution is to release one's focus of attention and expand it, direct it out into the world - the background space of awareness. In this way, the narcissist re-contextualises himself, reconnects to the ground of existence. He acquires direct knowledge.

EDIT: Added quotes to emphasise that I mean defence of the conceptual "self", one's self-image or internal story, which has become misidentified as one's real self or true essence, to an extreme level.

Defending yourself is not narcissistic . Speaking out against the Conservative government, or the abolition of the Canadian senate.. etc.. is not narcissistic . The people who warn you about narcissism are the same person who attack you.

I think you misunderstand - or I wasn't clear. I should have said "self"-defence. In other words, defending your concept of yourself, your internal story or self-image. This is different to defending your property or livelihood.

I will make that change.

Q: This is different to defending your property or livelihood.
Is it?

Within the context of OP's post, yes. But I know what you're getting at, Nefandi, and it would be exhausting.

Humility is overrated. Vanity has been given a bad rap. A peacock serves no greater good by hiding his feathers. Maybe we are here to be beautiful, prideful expressions of consciousness. My vanity has not been a hindrance to any of my relationships.

Thing is, a peacock is not enamoured with its own feathers; it is not vain.

But yeah, people should take care of themselves.

POST: Stupid question, but nagging me. If belief affects reality, do schizophrenics and narcissists have an advantage?

I don't think beliefs shape reality; but they do filter the "infinite gloop" of reality. More specifically: they filter the experience, but not the ability.

What does it mean to "do" something? It means: intending it and subsequently experiencing it. There is no actual "doing" involved at any point; there is only the "experience of doing". Given this, the narcissist and the schizophrenic don't have an advantage because they don't have the intention aspect under control.

The narcissist is vulnerable and self-deludes; he fantasises about status but does not intend results. He sees confirmation in existing situations through mild synchronicity but does not actively leverage them in a magickal way (I suggest).

The schizophrenic, meanwhile, is cracked wide open to an expanded experience. Again, he does not have intention under control. He is simply bombarded with extra information and massive alignments. His intensity means he is constantly willing and shifting his world. If he is lucky, he will learn to use some of it to his advantage. More likely, his lack of "formatting" will render him confused.

"Normal" people with magickal ambitions have enough trouble grasping the idea of will; these guys are further disadvantaged in that, just in opposite ways.

POST: Visualizing with your body as well as with your brain. The stretched third eye. (/r/occult/)

Well, isn't this just you noticing that all your experiences occur in the same "perceptual space"? I mean, the "head" you think you are thinking in now isn't your real head... it's just an area in your overall extended spatial experience in your mind.

The room around you is literally your mind, and you can "reach out" into it and visualise into it anywhere. If you "expand out" your attention into the space around you, you'll find you can be the whole room. Because this whole room is your imagination and anything you think in that space is your imagination.

I have a little metaphor I use to help remind me of this. (Note: in reality it's more like a "holographic conscious space" but the floor-pattern idea is quite, um, grounding and accessible.)

The Imagination Room

There is a vast room. The floor is transparent, and through it an infinitely bright light shines, completely filling the room with unchanging, unbounded white light.

Suddenly, patterns start to appear on the floor. These patterns filter the light. The patterns accumulate, layer upon layer intertwined, until instead of homogenous light filling the room, the light seems to be holographically redirected by the patterns into the shape of experiences, arranged in space, unfolding over time. Experiences which consist of sensations, perceptions and thoughts.

At the centre of the room there are bodily sensations, which you recognise as... you, your body. You decide to centre yourself in the upper part of that region, as if you were "looking out from" there, "being" that bodily experience.

At the moment you are simply experiencing, not doing anything. However you notice that every experience that arises slightly deepens the pattern corresponding to it, making it more stable, and more likely to appear again as the light is funnelled into that shape.

Now, you notice something else. If you create a thought, then the image will appear floating in the room - as an experience. Again, the corresponding pattern is deepened. Only this time, you are creating the experience and in effect creating a new habit in your world!

Even saying a word or a phrase triggers the corresponding associations, so it is not just the simple thought that leaves a deeper pattern, but the whole context of that thought, its history and relationships.

Now, as you walk around today, you will feel the ground beneath your feet - but you will know that under what appears to be the ground is actually the floor of the room, through which the light is shining, being shaped into the experience around you. And every thought or experience you have is shifting the pattern...

Q: Well, isn't this just you noticing that all your experiences occur in the same "perceptual space"? I mean, the "head" you think you are thinking in now isn't your real head... it's just an area in your overall extended spatial experience in your mind.
well of course it is, but i think what we need to realize is that our illusion is multi layered. Its not just being in an imaginary body or being an imaginary brain, its being an imaginary brain within and imaginary body, allocating all of it to one thing makes it much easier to work with.

Hmm, what I was getting at is that you don't experience a brain or a body at all, as such. You can just cut straight to noticing that what you really experience is body sensations, perceptions, thoughts and so on "floating in your consciousness space" - and all of those are literally thought/imagination/mind-stuff. You may occasionally think-about being-a-body or being-a-brain, but you never actually experience that.

(We're probably talking about exactly the same thing here, right?)

You're coming from a pure subjective idealism position.

Not really (although we do end up there). The only insight that's needed comes directly from the everyday notion of "an external world affecting the senses which the brain turns into a representation". This immediately means that the scene around you - if not its origins - is "in your mind" and you can direct your attention anyway.

In other words, the "standard model" alone leads to this. It's the error of thinking of ourselves in the 3rd-person (a body, with a brain in the head, which is us) which has led us to mistakenly configure ourselves to locate our "felt-location" in the head area. (A moment's pondering shows us that it's ridiculous though. Look inside someone else, and you don't find "their" location in the same way as you feel yourself to be located - etc.)

The next steps are what takes us to "advanced" level: realising that you can direct your attention outside your body boundary (since the sensory experience is all within mind) and then on to ponder whether there is such a thing as an "external world" (if we cannot ever experience it, is it not also just an idea in the mind), and then we get to at least idealism of a sort. All the other good stuff we've been playing with.

Under a physicalist model...

Everyday people don't have such a physicalist model, though. They have a half-hearted version of "I am a brain in a body". With a sort of naive realism hanging off that. Following through on that with "the experience I am having now is inside my brain" follows naturally from this, after a pause. From there it become reasonable that one can extend one's attention throughout the body-space - enough to allow yourself experience it. Most people haven't really thought about this at all (including fellow occultists and even lucid dreamers). They've just ended up with an assumption and don't pay to much attention to it.

I'm not jumping here to my own position - I'm simply pointing out that you can justify expanding your attention out, based on the everyday basic model of "experience is in the brain".

The problem is, if you start taking physicalism seriously enough to follow this implication, you'll also be taking its determinism seriously as well. Do you see my point?

I do, but you are thinking far more deeply that anyone normally does. Purely dealing with OP here, and having led people through this in conversation, you find you don't have to. They don't have deep convictions or a worldview - they have sketchy unexamined assumptions. Again, most people really don't have any idea about determinism and brain-states and so on. They really do just have the fluffy vague idea of "I am my brain, in my head" while promptly behaving as if they were directly seeing the world. The brain and head they are referring to are metaphorical. (Which of course they are, but not in the way they think. Although actually in the way they think. And so on.)

The simple addition of "this all must be in your brain/mind" is sufficient to allow people to get more benefit from including their body-space (for daily use and ease, for healing, and more besides). They are not really changing their "philosophical system", because they never had a philosophical system in the first place.

Of course, having made this small step which leads to experiential change, they are in a better place to explore such things if they so please.

Actually, I'll point out that my first reply I did on mobile and, a) It hadn't displayed the first part of OP and I didn't realise, b) I hadn't twigged it was cosmic, because that appears at the top too. Which is why I added a little response later.

I think of it as most people have a "bag of metaphors" rather than a philosophical system, which is why it tends to be incoherent, being unexamined - e.g. that the "we are our brains, run by chemicals" but that obviously we make choices and have free will, etc. People may ever assert that they are "machines or computers" but one second later they will state a belief contrary to that.

This is a good thing - that lack of coherence - because it means the errors can be easily overturned.

The reason I don't like calling it a "philosophical system" is because that implies some sort of coherence. And it doesn't match with people's actual experience of their thinking in this case.

They think past causes the present.

Always a trick. Since I'm lazy, I'm not going to cut-and-paste a metaphor I was discussing elsewhere, trying to show that there is just an ongoing (and effectively "dumb") pattern which evolves, including the part of the pattern which we might call "the past".

On Time and Metaphor

His [Alan Watts'] metaphor of "the ship and its wake" is excellent for capturing your true situation. From his book What is Zen?...

We think that the world is limited and explained by its past. We tend to think that what happened in the past determines what is going to happen next, and we do not see that it is exactly the other way around! What is always the source of the world is the present; the past doesn’t explain a thing. The past trails behind the present like the wake of a ship, and eventually disappears.
Now you would say that obviously when you see a ship crossing the ocean with the wake trailing behind it that the ship is the cause of the wake. But if you get into the state of mind that believes in causality as we do, you see that the wake is the cause of the ship! And that is surely making the tail wag the dog!
The point is this: You will never find the mystery of the creation of the world in the past. It never was created in the past. Because truly there is nothing else — and never was anything else — except the present! There never will be anything else except the present.
-- What is Zen?, Alan Watts

Now, this essentially means there isn't even really a "present" - rather, there is an "ongoing unfolding". A pattern which is evolving its shape, a bit like those video-feedback patterns you get when you point a camera at a screen showing its own image. If it's an old CRT screen with a bit of a smearing, then that captures the whole situation: the main pattern is slightly smeared as it goes with a slight after-image. This smearing, that after-image which forms part of the main image, is something we called the "past" or the "context".

Thing is, if that video image just suddenly changed dramatically and discontinuously - say, from circle-based imagery to square-based - then after a moment of tangled confusion all trace of the old circle-based imagery would be gone. All there would be, would be the square-based imagery and the square-based "smear".

In other words, our "world" always seems to be consistent as if there is a past causing it, one that is of the same structure as "the world". But in fact, the metaphor shows us that the present is either uncaused, or caused by something quite different to any image, or caused "by itself" - the "past" is simply a part of the present image, just of a different intensity to the rest of the image.

Any causal frameworks we read into the patterns are simply accidental regularities, in among the semi-randomness of feedback, which we have become fixated upon; after-images which keep being re-triggered so as never to fade completely. The patterns themselves have no such causal structure, it exists only in our interpretation...

EDIT: Did some minor editing on the last paragraph to mention the re-triggering for observed regularities. Obviously the "camera" and the "screen" and the "image" are all one, once you take this a step further, and the complexities lead to repeating stabilities, but the essence is there.

So what this means to me is, most beings are pragmatic, and will only start paying attention to something, examining it in detail, and learning to talk about it, if it somehow improves their day to day well-being.

This is a very good point. The clash between one's internal models and external situations needs to be quite severe before people are brought to reconsider things. Mostly they just avoid such situations (because they don't know how they could understand and adapt themselves).

This isn't due to a lack of intelligence, it's to do with the narrow education and information that is generally available. There is no "meta" level to the learning that people are put through.

For people who are liking physicalism and are getting good use out of it, they don't need to do anything more than go to work and have fun in the off time. Nothing in life will challenge their physicalism, so there is no practical demand to look very deeply into its implications.

Which leads to interesting conclusions: That those who are driven to investigate, dismantle, rediscover, are they always those who are disadvantaged in some way? Whether that is economically or psychologically, in some way jarring or at odds with the setup they were born into. In short, more "sensitive"?

If I didn't use words like "always" now and again, we'd struggle to find disagreements! :-)

I agree, but this might be intentional. [Lack of "meta" level to education.]

I do think this is intentional - or at least, unintentionally intentional. The education system is not really designed for free and frank inquiry, exploration into the nature of the world and oneself. It's far more a "shaping of people" to fit the predefined requirements of the economy (or aspects of the economy). Education is mostly training. And largely behavioural training at that; behavioural structuring, particularly around artificial notions of time and of "hierarchy" in the general sense.

It's actually quite disadvantageous to have many intelligent people, from a certain point of view. In fact, probably very few people who are in positions of influence are especially intelligence; it's more a matter of emotional management and "flexibility in the face of moral ambiguity".

POST: Spirit Possession on LSD.

I wouldn't take the content of your experience too literally. In my view, things like LSD simply loosen up your constraints and your experience becomes less logically structured, more associative. They are real as experiences, but they are not real in terms of there being some fundamental truth to them beyond that. All experiences are relative. This is true of everyday life as well as "unusual" experiences; they are all of the same type. They all arise in the mind, and reveal the patterning of the mind, rather than the patterning of some fictional "external" world beyond it.

For instance: The Patterning of Experience and related links.

Have you ever had a lucid dream? They can be more real than real. Sometimes they can last what seems like months, even years. Imagine if you had a lucid dream one night, but had never heard of lucid dreams. What would you make of it? ("I love lamp." [Repost: A Parallel Life / Awoken By A Lamp])

POST: What does r/occult think of r/dimensionaljumping

People here can greatly influence what goes on there. I feel like it is a very useful idea that needs to be taught by you folks.

The problem is, we can easily end up with just one big "magickal soup" with people exchanging the same received wisdom, all "educating" one another about how this-thing is "really" that-thing, and so on.

Although the origin of /r/dimensionaljumping was people playing around with mirror rituals, over time it's become something else: a place to explore the "nature of experiencing" for people who either don't have a background in that sort of thing, or want to approach it from a relatively clean slate in terms of language and metaphysics.

I think all of us tend to get distracted by the models and concepts from the past, perhaps reify them as being special, even though with their context unavailable their meaning is often now not clear - or perhaps seems incorrectly obvious. They get taken pseudo-literally. People spend time looking for "the secrets" when there really are none; you just have to experiment. So we just put that aside. At most, there's a highly abstract base model of "patterned meaning" of an apparently subjective perspective.

So for sure, the various exercises contributors come up with do allow people to recognise that "something is going on" and get some results, but the larger purpose is to question things more deeply without becoming attached to any one narrative. And that includes the idea of "dimensional jumping" itself, which isn't meant to be "how it works" - it's simply an example of an equivalent "pattern" one can adopt, a seed for thinking this stuff out. Eventually, one realises there is no "how it works", of course, and your concept of "you" gets updated accordingly. But just reading that doesn't really help anyone get it or apply it.

Anyway, all this is why the meat of things tends to happen in the discussions rather than in the posts. The mods keep their hands off, because it's all about the experimentation. Then every now and again someone shows up to say sarcastically, "nice one so you've discovered 'sigils' eh?" - to which the answer would be: so what is a sigil and how, exactly, does it work? And so on.

That's the rationale, anyway

POST: delivered from the lust of result

Maybe that's what the mind is, our infinite void where anything can be created.

Well, you've nailed that I think.

Our mind is the void in which everything appears, and is immediate creativity itself - if we detach and allow our accumulated patterns to settle and shift. If we are holding on to "parts of the dream", though, then our creativity is compromised by or funnelled through those parts.

Do you have a link to that Peter Carroll audio clip? Not heard of it before. Makes sense to me (we have a tendency to fill our creative 'First Cause' void with surrogates which we give our power to).

Not sure the name of it. You should find it in YouTube searching Peter Carroll chaos magic. The audio clip is also in the first episode of scrolls of thoth.
"Just as daylight obscures the stars, so does wkefulneswakefulness obscure the fact that we are still dreaming"

Thanks, will do that.

The stuff about creating a mental landscape is my favorite.

Sounds like my kind of thing - great.

I read Liber Null a long time ago, but have not much recollection. The only thing I have my doubts about: he was very much of the "magick is bending probabilities" view, was he not? I think that was a restriction he, in effect, imposed upon himself?

I think he was just living in the real world.
You can visualize flying, it doesn't mean you flew. Until someone proves they can do seemingly impossible things with magic, I'll have to submit that it is the world that imposes these restrictions, not Carroll.

For sure, I don't mean we can just do anything on a whim. I was more thinking that the idea of it being probabilities might be restrictive. I've been thinking more in terms of plausibilities - something that might actually be more flexible (and helps us get rid of worries about retro-causality, etc).

Of course, that's just more words really.

Doesn't that mean the same thing? Probability is a specific measurement of plausibility I believe.

The distinction for me would be:

• Probability implies that experience is bound by a separate external world with rules which are independent of us. What we experience is dictated by the "world's formatting".
• Plausibility implies that experience is bound by the stories about a hypothesised external world - what stories we find acceptable. The rules are part of us. What we experience is dictated by our "human formatting".

As an idea, I think the second version makes it easier to envisage how magick works as part of our minds. For instance, if you're playing with synchronicity, not only will you "notice" more of the object or pattern you have in mind, you will also encounter events which "come to you". Those events will seem to have their seeds in events that predate your intention.

Probabilities don't easily account for that. Plausibilities do so more easily (anything can happen so long as you've not yet observed something that means it shouldn't happen).

Sorry - that's probably (aha!) not very clear.

EDIT: This blog post [https://web.archive.org/web/20090915212504/https://pomomagic.wordpress.com/2009/08/01/why-cant-you-teleport/] was quite a nice - and honest - comment by someone wondering what the limits are.

I would see it as an accurate and a helpful thing to say that it's easier to change something with probability on your side.

Hmm, my feeling is that it doesn't say anything, other than "we can't do miracles", and doesn't help, because it doesn't suggest a particular approach. It's maybe more honest to call this plausibility than probability - since the probability (being a mathematical notion) implies a measurement and an adjustment, but it isn't actually measurable and the adjustment detectible. What we really mean is "seems unlikely"?

But we're just talking about a language preference here. Really, I was just wondering aloud whether choosing the concept of probability vs another might influence one's magick!

You are trying to apply what he said to synchronicity which has absolutely nothing to do with causing change.

Intentional synchronicity is exactly how we cause change (or one way). But I didn't preamble this, so fair enough! To be clearer what I mean by that: Focusing upon a particular conceptual pattern, results in that pattern subsequently appearing in external and internal experience. Something I've been playing with.

Just to begin: remember, I'm not disagreeing with you here, we're just exploring how best to discuss.

It's not saying only focus on mathematically accurate probabilities. You seem to have a very strict view of the word.

Peter Carroll was approaching it exactly that way in Liber Null, via his formulae, so that's the way I was interpreting it:

M = G x L(1-A)(1-R)
Pm = P - P x M 1/(1/-p)
All factors are between 0 and 1.
M equals the force of your magic. Which is dependent upon your G (Gnosis) and L (magical Link) multiplied by two negative factors. (Things working against you). Your conscious awareness of the desired result (1-A) and your subconscious resistance to doing magic (1-R) -i.e. "Mommy told me magick doesn't work."
In the other formula, P equals the chance the event you desire occurs by itself; (1/(1/-p)) equals the chance that the result you desire will not occur. Pm equals the combination of the Probability that the event will occur combined with your magical effort to make it occur.
[Most of these are unmeasurable, and it particularly seems difficult to measure the probability of an event - TG]

Surely by probability here we just mean "what we think will happen"? There's no way to measure it other than our own opinion. Which is basically "plausibility".

Yes focusing on things makes you notice them in life. That has absolutely nothing to do with using probability. That's where you seem to be tangled up.

It's a little more than noticing. Focusing on things "being a certain way" and then find them to be that certain way afterwards, is what magick is all about. Chaos Magick particularly, right?

Do you disagree with the notion that it's easier to go with the current?

But, for sure, the closer your desire corresponds to everyday experience, the less change you will have to create - because your everyday experience is by definition the default. Apparent "habits" of the world. But this issue is with ourselves, not with the world.

Anyway I definitely agree: We should use pre-established habits where possible, just because it's more efficient. Where I disagree is that what magick is, is "bending probabilities".

EDIT: An extra observation I'd make: absolutely everything works, if properly committed to. It doesn't matter what imaginary notions you adopt for the purpose, they will work to the extent you invest yourself in them, even temporarily.

Seeing a thing a certain way and it being that way has nothing to do with the probability thing. at least that's how I saw it.

The way I was viewing it was: Seeing things as governed by probability, means you are indirectly willing it to behave that way - as a general worldview? Adopting that outlook is a piece of magick all of its own. If you view magick as being about probabilities, then your magick will go along those lines. If you view it as being about energy, the same. And so on.

He's establishing realistic expectations rather than woo and fluff, however inspiring it may seem at the time.

Perfectly reasonable. I say: everyone must experiment for themselves to find out what is possible. One caution though: Your expectations in magick (about what is possible, about how it works) plays a large role in defining what you can do. It's not like science, where there's a "how it works" and you discover the rules and leverage them. There is nothing "behind" magick.

But that's not to say you'll be flying around the place by flapping your arms any time soon. It might well be possible, but you'll probably have to do an awful lot of work to establish that "habit".

There's an old story about a student coming to a master and saying "Finally, after 40 years of study I can walk across the river unaided!". To which the master says, "What a waste of a life, you could have saved a lot of time by paying a penny for the ferry like everyone else!"

Who knows what we could do if we dedicated ourselves to it? But: who really wants to do that?

I think he's just saying don't expect magic lottery winnings and that using magic to influence business may be a better idea more prone to success.

I think he is of that view. I personally think that magick can be far more direct than he suggests. It (that view) is just another metaphor, after all. But that sounds like I'm dissing his take - not at all. It's been very successful for lots of people, and the fact that people can easily get behind it - it makes sort of rational sense to them - is part of its power at a metaphor.

Hmm. See, I'm not disparaging Peter Carroll. I'm just wondering about how adopting a way of looking at things changes how we operate.

The laws of physics do not simply exist because we believe in it. Try to understand that our laws of physics were discovered, not enforced.

Ah, I'm not saying that believing things causes them. I'm saying that the "laws" of experience should be viewed as habits - ingrained patterns that have become established over time. So they are not how it really, really works in some deeper, given sense. Gravity, for instance, is a very ingrained habit of the universe.

(The word "law" in physics does not mean something that is laid down; it means something like "observed regularity".)

Where belief comes in, is that is dictates what directions we will apply our effort with full commitment. Carroll phrases it as "your subconscious resistance to doing magic". It's more that non-belief - or adopting a worldview which says something can't happen - has a negative effect.

You can't say anything is possible but you won't fly by flapping your arms.

Let's be clearer: Anything is possible in principle but it is up to people to find out what they can accomplish in practice. Certainly, my experience of flapping my arms into flight is quite... limited. Again, I am not claiming that believing makes things happen. I'm with Carroll in saying that non-belief gets in the way.

You don't think probability affects it? So your magic always works directly?

Magick always operates directly, yes. Let me lay it out, how I think it works:

• Over time, patterns become more and more established in the universe. You might call these "habits". This includes things like gravity, the structure of your body - the way things work by default.
• Magick is just everyday intention really. Intending something is the magick. Whenever we intend something, that intention always comes about in some form, funnelled through the current patterns. e.g. We intend to move go to the door, our bodies walk there; typically we don't teleport.
• In other words, the "habits" of the world imply the most likely routes that intention will manifest along, and restrict the types of manifestation. For instance, you will often see other aspects of your intention appear in images in daily life, dreams, conversations, symbolic representations, and then as an event. The restrictions aren't because things aren't possible, they are because deeper habits or channels exist.
• The difference between what we call "magick" and everyday intention is that in magick we realise the situation (that all intentions manifest, that laws are not actually fixed rules), and therefore intend things that are against common sense. The more directly we will this, the more focused the result.

In summary, what you are calling "probability" is just a way of saying something is unlikely. It isn't forbidden or impossible. But that's hardly helpful.

Either the world is your personal dream or it isnt.

I never understood the idea that just because the world is a dream, you should be able to just "flap your arms and fly". After all, can you just think of, say, a tree in absolute detail right now? Most people can't - but your imagination really is your personal dream. You can get better at it though. Meanwhile, in llucid dreams, people find they sometimes can't fly. Why not?

My answer: because as described above, manifestation is about implied patterns, not about direct creation.

This is just "a dream". But it is "a dream that". A dream that you are in this world, organised this way - in the same way as we can lucid dream a persistent realm. Different dreams have different levels of organisation, of habit. They all obey the basic rule (intention always manifests in some way) though.

What if, in a dream, you intended that there was gravity and that gravity was always unbreakable? If afterwards you couldn't fly, would you complain that it wasn't actually a dream after all?

Physics in dreams is never that consistent.

If you experiment with creating persistent realms (as described by Hyu in his post), then it is. When you just fall asleep and end up in a dream, then it tends to be somewhat breakable because you didn't intend any rules. You can experiment with this: In a lucid dream, create a door and go through it with the intention that you will enter a stable realm and you will. You'll discover its physics is not breakable just by "wanting" to fly, for instance, even though "hey! this is my dream!"

And that's because you created the dream with rules. You would first have to change the dreamworld to make it possible to fly, and then fly. Which you'll find is incredibly difficult.

I didn't impose gravity on myself, it was imposed on me.

Perhaps you created a persistent, rule-based realm - and then forgot you did it. If you want to fly just by flapping your arms, you are going to have to first make it possible to fly doing this. Then flap your arms.

I'm not saying it's easy to break such a fundamental rule. However, there are other things that are perhaps even more disturbing that are possible. Influencing the weather, for instance, seems to me more rule-breaking than flying - because in that case, you are affecting something that is not part of your body.

No probability doesn't just say things are unlikely.

Really? If it can't be quantified then it's really just "stuff you think might happen anyway, but is unlikely". But let's skip that - you're saying that (according to Carroll) it's easier to use magick to produce an effect which you already consider to be within the realms of possibility.

Certainly that's true.

In other words, we're dealing with something which might happen anyway, it's just that we are helping it out by giving it a push. For sure. That's certainly a valid approach, but I'd hate to think people were limiting themselves to what they thought "might happen anyway" when experimenting for investigative purposes.

If he was wrong, I think every magician would have won the lottery.

The "lottery winner" thing is interesting. Personally, I don't think I'd want to win the lottery. If you want to be wealthy, there are better ways. I would wonder whether anyone who could, would...?

For fun: if you wanted to win the lottery, using magick, how would you go about it?

Yes, perhaps all the rules were created and forgotten by me. Nothing in reality suggests it and you can in no way prove that these rules are breakable.

Well, the difficult part is actually to prove there are rules. We can only say: "my experience is consistent with the notion that there are rules". Unfalsifiability and all that.

But we're just exploring ideas here. What is the evidence that our common experience is how things have to be, and that they are a result of fixed rules? No evidence, other than the experience itself. If you manage to create a contrary experience, even once, then that idea of a rule-based reality - rather than a habit-based one - breaks down.

I say rules are effectively just strong habits.

You seem to take "I can do this" as proof that anything is possible.

For the purposes of discussion, here, we're talking about hypotheticals as much as anything else, right? You seem to be saying that whatever you haven't done is proof that it's im-possible. :-)

So - you bring up a good point about the rules of physics. Flapping my arms and flying would be a no-no, but pointing at the sky and the clouds disappearing would be okay - because we could say the second case was coincidence. It's borderline plausible but it is still plausible, right?

How far can we push it and still have it be okay, do you think? Is not directly experiencing it happening one ingredient which may help things? For instance, people driving somewhere and finding afterwards they've covered a 1hr journey in 30 minutes, that sort of thing.

He used the term "higher probability" which in no way implies or suggests anything more than a vague sense.

I think we got caught up here. I just suggested that "plausibility" was a better word for general use - mainly because while in cases such as the lottery we might be able to have a literal probability, but in most cases we just mean "seems more likely". Nothing more than that!

I am talking about the real lottery, not scratch of tickets.

Yeah, I had in mind the national lottery (or state lottery, or whatever, depending on your country). I've never really given this much thought, but I guess I'd do my usual thing of asserting it as fact which is a sort of effortless willing. However, this requires a genuine desire and a bit of committed confidence. (This is where my thinking comes from that you probably can't easily do this: most don't really want it, those that do won't be able to commit due to doubt or conflict.)

What other, more "plausible-probable" things would fall into the same general category?

Yes, those rules have been proven. Scientists didn't just write down "da laws of fisics" and that was that, these "rrules" are what we have after a long time of research.

I think you're getting hung up on something that we can't be disagreeing about.

People have over time seen "observed regularities" in nature. From there they have created descriptions (models) which help us talk about the world in terms of those regularities. The most basic of those we call "laws". The law is the repeated observation. A law is "a scientific generalization based on empirical observations of physical behavior". By definition, only the most common, recurring patterns are described by physics, and from there only the simplest descriptions can become "laws". These laws are an account of what we have seen, not a statement about how things work.

Which doesn't necessarily mean you'll be flapping and flying any time soon. But it also doesn't mean that the world is a rule-based mechanical place as a whole.

Forget coincidence, explain how cloudbursting breaks any law of physics.

Are you suggesting that cloudbursting by intention (rather than dumping chemicals on clouds from planes) can be described by the laws of physics?

I'm saying that not being able to just fly... is a pretty good indication that we are not living in a fantasy world where are beliefs become real.

Only you are saying that "beliefs become real". I am just suggesting that a lack of belief tends to make it unlikely you'll engage in any prolonged experimentation in that direction. And I still don't get why you would expect to be able to "just fly", any more than you'd expect to "just speak Hungarian".

It reminds me of people who oppose philosophical idealism because if everything is made from consciousness, why can't they just think objects into materialisation immediately! Which is as bad as saying, if I'm made of atoms why don't I have power over all the atoms in the world, since we're the same...

Considering that time is not a unit of measurement for distance, I would say you made up those numbers to convince yourself that you did magic.

Hmm. Surely you get the point I was making there? That making a journey in impossible time. If you've played around with this, you must have had such an experience?

But we don't have exact odds for the lottery. No equation accounts for the chance that a winning ticket gets destroyed.

Depends on the lottery. In the UK, you can work out the exact odds for a set of numbers corresponding to the randomly drawn numbers (see here [https://lottery.merseyworld.com/Info/Chances.html]). Not sure if the process is different elsewhere?

Again, I am not saying that believing in something makes it happen, or that not-believing makes something not-happen. What I am saying instead is:

We shouldn't assume that our everyday experience is the whole thing, and we shouldn't believe what other people say is impossible or possible - although it might provide inspiration. It's up to us to try things out.

I'm kind of relearning that life is a giant lie and how gleefull people are in selling that lie for free.

What kind of lie?

So we can only conclude that the universe seems to follow patterns when we have all these patterns down completely on paper?

It doesn't follow pattens. It is patterned. I'm saying it's not "rule-based and mechanical" but I'm not saying that it isn't patterned. In fact, I don't think humans can perceive anything that isn't patterned. In fact, my summary would be: "no pattern should be interpreted as being fixed and no description should be viewed as capturing a whole pattern".

This isn't controversial. This is exactly science's approach, right?

[On cloudbursting...] I said I don't see how it breaks the laws of physics. I never said that it could be used to explain it.

I agree. But many would say that it does break the laws of physics, in that it can't be accounted for and is therefore impossible. I don't believe lack of an explanation means something is impossible. And neither do you, it seems.

My point was that cloudbursting doesn't prove that anything is possible with your mind.

That can never be proved. If there's something you want to achieve, then you must experiment and see if it can't be done. If you can't, it's proof that... you didn't succeed. And maybe you never will, of course.

No, if the world is just our imagination, asking why we can't imagine something else is a valid fucking question.

It's not "just" our imagination. It's a particular imagining, right? We have imagined that we live on a planet with gravity and water and all sort of other cool stuff. I don't see why you expect to be able to wish stuff different without any effort.

Nobody ever ever has all the variables, yet we still call it probability. That's all my point wss, really. We never have all variables, even if they use really big numbers.

Right. That's true. So a theoretical probability then, based only on what we have included in our description or model. A bit like only including previous observations into a theory, and assuming that this is sufficient.

I get it now. People with enough money to not have real problems, so they play pretend, with everyone else's lives.

Well, there's something to that, certainly.

Hey, sorry, we totally got bogged down in that whole probability thing. My fault. I apologise.

Stop saying we can just change reality and only offering excuses as to why it never fucking works.

Y'know what? I've no idea how it works, not exactly anyway. That's the problem. Which means I also can't tell why things don't work. Things do change in unlikely ways. I don't think it's to do with belief or effort. When things happen, it's not about trying.

It definitely involves detachment and it definitely involves "will" via (optionally) imagination. And it always produces some sort of result, although sometimes it's just symbolic (like, encountering stuff about your desire but getting your actual desire).

Things do sorta work how you think they do. But I don't mean how you choose to think about them. I mean, how you think they do when you ask yourself how you think something works. (Sorry, that's not very well worded.) I guess that sounds like "belief" but that word is so misused now.

Really it's better to say that it's to do with your own patterning. That changing your own patterning (or "formatting") is the way to produce change, and the way to change your patterning is via will and imagination.

The occultist joins an order to learn magic and improve his life, they teach him to clear his mind so they can fill it.

I don't believe in any of that order stuff much. I think most organised occultism is pretty uninteresting or was about management. Meanwhile, people keep trying to look for explanations and reasons, and they get further away from understanding. Every new theory or technique is a step away from achieving anything.

I linked this earlier, but this blog entry on Why Can't We Teleport? is one of the most honest I've encountered (his book is pretty good actually). The problem isn't necessarily that we can't do things, it's that we don't know how to test whether we can do them or not?

It's not belief, it's not effort. I'd say it's "willed imagination without obstruction" but that's hardly a very useable description. Within that, the actual details don't seem to matter much. Which means testing possibility is an issue.

I think I am starting to see what you mean. Making assumptions of reality kind of limits what we choose to experiment with and how. Believing that we are made of complete solid matter would of course throw off any research into teleportation, just as whatever mistakes we have now likely prevent us from trying the right things or asking the right questions about certain phenomenon.

Right, you've said it much more clearly than I did, but that's what I was trying to get at.

Which might mean that the deepest, most subtle traps we find ourselves in are transparent to us - they might be things we don't even realise we are assuming!

But that's some stuff so deep that you have an actual danger of falling in and being trapped in the question.
Our sanity depends on our ability to trust our eyes and ears, two senses we consciously know are just collecting data that our brain turns into an artificial image.
Question all assumptions and you may end up not knowing what's real, or if anything is real, or if everything is real. Those thoughts are not the scary part, the scary part is how the mind sometimes copes with this deep uncertainty.

I agree: I think the basics should be largely left alone for everyday life. You don't want to destroy its fundamental continuity!

Extreme version: Some autistic children have a hard time trusting that the lessons they learned remain true without continually re-testing them - e.g. that the floor still supports their weight; that an object that goes out of sight will still be there later.

So I guess it's more assumptions about personal achievement on a more macro-scale. We don't want to be reformatting ourselves at too low a level. We don't want to have to manually handle all the details, after all.

So maybe those that must live in that world are the ones who have ready access to that creative space, but lack the raw "knowledge" needed to refine or carry it out completely on their own.
I guess I've never thought of autism in that way, interesting.

I think autism has much to teach us.

One of my ideas: that their attention is narrowed on the current sensory experience, and they have no felt-sense for the underlying facts of the world. The world has no baseline solidity for them; it's transient imagery and memory, without knowing. The "facts" don't stick or they are not aware of the place where the "facts" are stored! (Which I think is literally in the central "gut feeling" we have.)

In other words, they are an extreme. Unbalanced by one point of view, and that's technically true, but also superhuman in the sense that one or many aspects of themselves are cranked up to 10 while most of us are at 5.
In other words, the blind man is the top dog when the power goes out underground.
Maybe our society just sucks at understanding people and making certain roles available to people that are "not balanced" for normal life.

Right, nicely said. I think in other societies the autistic child and the schizophrenic and the epileptic (not equating those, just examples) would be considered as having a "connection" to a larger field of experience. Their relative lack of daily-life-handling would be allowed for, and their talents maximised.

The uniformity of western societies doesn't really allow for individuality of talent or perception. Roles are prearranged slots; society tries to mould its children into them but by assuming them to be identical and "formable".

Which, obviously, is quite a horrific approach. Not everyone takes to the "training".

POST: Chaos Magic and Forgetting

You don't need to forget, you just need to stop triggering the pattern of wanting/desiring. Nobody ever desired something they already had!

One view:

• Launching a sigil creates a pattern in time which leads to a future experience that is the one you desire. It becomes true now that this will happen then.
• Thinking that this is going to happen is okay, since it leaves the pattern intact or even strengthens it, streamlines it. Looking forward to something is not a problem.
• Thinking about maybes or other stuff or desiring overwrites the pattern with something diffuse to contrary.

In other words: know that it is done and then you can think whatever you want. Forgetting not required. Think of a "time landscape" that is always there, and is being updated every time you sigilise or think about the future with intention or expectation, direct or implied.

POST: Sigil and Law of Attraction Contradiction?

Okay, but... doesn't this whole thing depend on your world-view also? Even if the sigil is apparently shown only to "you", it's effectively shown to "the universe". The whole thing moves towards your goal, including your body.

The main thing about releasing is to let yourself be moved rather than staying in the "problem state".

The shooting metaphor doesn't work for magick, surely?

This is not so consensus bound; personal facts take priority. Sigils and LOA do not operate at that consensus level; they are effectively excuses for allowing things to happen "as if". The more you experiment, the clearer this gets. What you "imagine that" things are like is what counts.

However you think that it works,
That's how it works.

If you "imagine that" the world works according to the number of views an intention gets, that's what'll happen. If you "imagine that" forgetting your sigil is important, then even a brief recall or a glance might stop things right there - while those who don't care or haven't thought about it so deeply, won't have a problem.

An extra issue is that all the associations with a viewpoint also come into effect. If you "summon Hercules" to do your bidding, his great strength comes to your aid. However, Hercules had his issues in myth, and those will start to manifest too, even though you didn't explicitly consider them. This where it gets tricky and goes beyond what you thought you asked for.

I reckon it is impossible to fully specify or constrain things unless you create your own, clean metaphor/mechanism. (Or meta-metaphor.)

Really describing any action is describing Magick

I agree with this. The shift from one experience to another in alignment with "the format of one's mind", including intention, is a description that can be applied to everything.

While from your POV you may seem independent in everything you do the reality is that we all move with each-others blessing

I don't agree with the "simple sharing" model of reality though. As a "conscious perspective", all possible experiences are available enfolded within me. Similarly for you. However, this is not a straightforward dream. Sometimes we might think of reality as a shared dream with other people in a room, each of whom have contributed to the final, consensus decor. However, I reckon it's more accurate to say that those who have chosen the same decor, end up in the same room.

Finally, it's even more accurate to say: Whatever decor you choose, you will end up experiencing a room with that decor, plus versions/aspects of others who would choose that decor, as a version of yourself who would choose that decor.

the metaphor of shooting me in the face does work for magick

The above means that I can shoot you in the face (politely, of course) and have you die, while you dodge the bullet and live. Subsequently: Different rooms, different decor.

Fundamentally, this is because you are not a person, and neither is anyone else. The "being-a-person" sensation is just part of the present moment world-experience. You are in fact a perspective, attached to a viewport amongst infinite viewports, selected by the "filter" of belief, expectation, knowledge and intention.

TL;DR: Blessing not required.

..Yeah, I'm going to skip the gunplay for now. :-)
I've grown quite fond of you.

I say we don't need blessing because it's (implicitly) multidimensional enough in that everyone gets to have their experience. Not in the sense of actual spatially-extended universes though; only in the sense of filtered possible moments. But then, that's basically the ultimate blessing.

(The room is tesseract-shaped, and we are distributed clouds throughout it? Nah, too messy sounding.)

True connections with people occur when their filters correspond, as it were - they are literally "in the moment", together.

...I agree with what you say. The "filtering" I refer to is for what appears in the senses (image, sound, texture), via personal shaping and via accumulated patterns (the world), beneath or within this there is just the undivided one. So in that sense we are closer than objects can be, always.

At the fundamental level, everything is within us, and one step more and there's no "us" because even the perspective dissolves.

But if we are attending to the level of the senses, divided into time, then that connection is obscured except when the moment is shared, "when worlds collide".

...Hmm. I don't have a conception of God as external, but the DNA idea could maybe be translated into the idea of a "format" that implies which events will be experienced - via the personal God of imagination...

Loosely, I think of myself as a boundless aware space. (Everyone is this, simultaneously.) Within that, is dissolved all possible moments and experiences already created. My ongoing 1st-person sensory experience is simply my attention shifting across this eternal structure, in accordance with my intention and beliefs. Foolishly, I confuse "myself" with the content of the experience, when in fact I am the background in which it arises.

Gives us:

• Magick is changing the trajectory discontinuously in unlikely ways, by tuning into other moments via imagination. We are always doing this, but deliberate magick makes it more obvious because we are deliberately aware.
• God is the whole, the open attention in contrast to our usual narrowed, time-focused attention. God is not a being.
• When we say that God intervenes, we really just mean when outlier actions or events are selected which we didn't have a sensory experience of choosing prior to their appearing. The "feeling" that goes with this is the opening out of attention, to the background unity.

So all events are "archived" in the sense that they are all, permanently available for experiencing? Creation is already complete, you are just choosing which parts to check out!

Not sure how to join together the two ideas of God.

• By saying 'a god' I am just talking about an entity that has a greater range of data intake and influence

Right - I see that as just ourselves, the outer reaches of our attentional focus. We are always everywhere, we are just concentrating on somewhere in particular.

• Mostly I'm asking when this construct is animated; if in our life-time do you expect this will change your spirituality? Will you increase your own intelligence or try to keep a level of "purity"

I think this 'construct' is already animated. The construct is just the universe as it is. It's a case of doing or being this knowingly. 'Purity' would then be a choice to remain human-focused, ignorant of the larger information field (or whatever). I'm all for expansion - but as I said before, different people can do different things, and not necessarily interfere with the other.

...

I see, forget the sybmol, let it go. Is it worthwhile continuing with the desire, the FACT that it will happen?

...the FACT that it will happen?

This is exactly it. Ignore the evidence, know the fact. Everything else is theatre. All that matters is that you fully accept the fact that something is going to happen. All these methods are about sneakily inserting or adjusting facts-of-the-world. It all works this way, I think:

If you move your arm right now, you don't do it directly. You request/insert the experience into your timeline (you might say), the fact that "it is now true that my arm will move". The proximity in terms of space and time makes you think that you did it by more straightforward means.

In fact (heh), you simply don't have direct access to sensory experience at all; you adjust facts, and subsequent sensory experience arises spontaneously and consistently with those facts.

So it's about creating new facts-of-the-world by any means you like. Since acceptance of its truth is what matters, anything that implies it is a fact (e.g. getting excited, looking forward to it) can only help establish it. It's a bit like Erickson hypnosis in this way - thinking and doing things that assume the certainty of the wish fulfilled.

TL;DR: Creation of facts by acceptance and implication.

EDIT: Added more facts. ;-)

Off topic:
You made me think of this condition some people have called "Mirror Touch Synesthesia" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror-touch_synesthesia], basically what people observe on a daily basis are physical and mental feelings that they themselves 'feel'. This one woman explained how her ankles started to hurt painfully as she watched a women walk down the street in ankle pain. She felt her physical pain quite literally. Also, regarding empathy - they also experience mental states of the people they observe. Thus far, people afflicted with this condition are unable to control it and usually lose their sense of self when in public and often resort to a hermit lifestyle as they cannot deal with multiple sensations/feelings. There was a good discussion on this on NPR's Invisibilia podcast, the episode was on Entanglement.
Kind of makes you wonder what is really going on, what is real?

[QUOTE]

Synesthesia
Synesthesia (American English) or synaesthesia (British English) is a perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. People with synesthesia may experience colors when listening to music, see shapes when smelling certain scents, or perceive tastes when looking at words. People who report a lifelong history of such experiences are known as synesthetes. Awareness of synesthetic perceptions varies from person to person with the perception of synesthesia differing based on an individual's unique life experiences and the specific type of synesthesia that they have. In one common form of synesthesia, known as grapheme–color synesthesia or color–graphemic synesthesia, letters or numbers are perceived as inherently colored.

Mirror-touch synesthesia:
Mirror-touch synesthesia is a condition which causes individuals to experience the same sensation (such as touch) that another person feels. For example, if someone with this condition were to observe someone touching their cheek, they would feel the same sensation on their own cheek. Synesthesia, in general, is described as a condition in which a stimulus causes an individual to experience an additional sensation. Synesthesia is usually a developmental condition, however recent research has shown that mirror touch synesthesia can be acquired after sensory loss after amputation.

[END OF QUOTE]

That's really interesting, new on me!

One thought: that our personal boundaries are "imaginary", that at some point we create filters which give us a personal space. Without them, we are wide open to all information being leaked/broadcast. Perhaps this is what's going on. Normally, children learn they "aren't meant to" experience these things, and by implication don't, but these guys missed the memo.

I used to find being in open plan offices really difficult, even small ones. Just a constant sense of "exposure". Not vigilance or self-consciousness, just being too open. Over time, my awareness would contract further and tension would increase. My "little trick" to get around this was to feel-imagine a shell around me, a Faraday Cage for others' "presence". This imaginary "fact" was enough to make it better.

EDIT: I hear "sound effects" when I see movement, in real life or in gifs, etc. I only recently found out that this is a thing too.

POST: Is this more than coincidence and how can I test it

Imagining new facts into the world.

Your sensory experience is a 'mirage' floating within an aware space in which are dissolved the facts-of-the-world, all of which can be amended.

While detached from the present moment sensory experience, in a state of "absolute allowing" where we are happy for experience to shift without restriction, we imagine that something is true, and our subsequent sensory experience falls in line with the new fact.

Something like that, anyway.

POST: How can I use the occult to make me rich?

Q1: I've used the occult to make me rich, send me $500 and I'll tell you how you can do the same.

Q2: Pfft, don't listen t this guy, send me $499 and I'll tell you the truth.

Q3: Fuck that, send me $9.99 and I'll tell you how to BECOME A LIVING GOD.

Q4: Ignore them. If you think in hundreds, you won't go anywhere. $5.000 bill & we have a deal.

Adding more decimal places to $5 isn't going to get you rich any faster! You wanna use a comma, like this:

$5,000.00

Wealth is all about correct punctuation. Trust me; I know how to use a semi-colon.

POST: Origami as offerings.

Great idea. I'd like to see a whole new branch of the art called "Sacrificial Origami". Could be much fun had.

Love the name. Now how do I represent virgins with origami...

White paper, obviously. Might be tricky doing the fine detailing...

POST: How often do you use thought experiments in your day?

There's a book called Busting Loose from the Money Game (a later edition refers to it as the Business Game) which takes a similar approach.

It presents itself as a business book, but is really more of an 'occult/enlightenment' book in disguise. The main idea: When bad things happen, and you feel discomfort, treat them as "eggs" that are dissolved by using "The Process" to "reclaim your power": basically, welcoming them and sending gratitude/love. For instance, send gratitude for the bills you receive.

Eventually, you will have dissolved all the "cloud cover", and the "open sky" of conscious flow will be your experience from then on, in matters of money and more.

Someone has a summary of the main points here. [https://sundayupdate.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/key-points-from-busting-loose-from-the-money-game.pdf]

POST: How do you see entities?

There are many hallucinations that form within your vision, called phosphenes. When you close your eyes and see all sorts of splotches and colors, these are phosphenes: seeing lights without light actually entering the eye.
These are the clay from which you sculpt visualizations and, when you're asleep or in a hypnagogic state, dreams. It's hard to do at first, but after practice with your eyes closed, you'll be able to create phosphenes in accordance with imagination and/or memories. You'll almost swear that you saw outlines of a particular scene, even for just a moment.
After practicing with your eyes closed, you can try doing it with your eyes open, albeit in minimal lighting. Eventually you can use phosphenes to visualize anything in broad daylight.
Entities communicate with us and appear before us in the form of phosphenes, at least from my experience. When an entity makes itself known, you may notice discoloring, or just some sort of form that lies before you. You may not actually "see" it with your eyes, but rather you can sense its presence with the phosphenes, a kind of sight that I associate with the "Third Eye" vision.
If you're sensitive enough, you can probably interpret random flowings and distortions as spirits that are popping in and out of your field of view, though this is an ability that usually only belongs to shamans or channelers. Most people can see major entities they have called or are at least open to noticing. They are invisible to those who are not open to their existence.

Are these phosphenes (those "sparkles" that become "things") or are they random flickers of hypnagogic type imagery, do you think? Are they totally in the mind?

Q1: The little white sparkles are white blood cells moving around your eyes. Different story, but I haven't really tried to use those in visualization. Could be possible, but I don't think I want to mess around with my body's defense system.

Q2: Not OP, but I would describe my personal experiences as hypnogogic. I thank God there's a word for it, even if it's a word no one knows! (except here)
My visualisations are induced waking hypnogogia, as far as I can tell, and sometimes it's not induced. I just see... things.
Anyway, it explains my continued obsession with dream work.

Yeah, I was doubtful about this "phosphenes" lark. I think of the initial background stuff as random "mind noise", a sort of pure background creativity, which then coalesces into fragments and imagery - and worlds. And I think it's always present, waking or relaxing or sleeping. The stuff that dreams are made of...

But everyone seems to have a different way of describing it, so it's hard to pin down whether we're all having the same experience.

POST: ShowerThought on Visualization

[POST]

I wasn't really in the shower. Instead, I was in the car listening to NPR's "This American Life".
The show was about this blind guy who can ride a bike just like a seeing person. He basically uses echo location.
It got me to thinking about how, really, everything we see is constructed by the brain.
I take in information through my eyes and my brain constructs something to see. This blind guy, he takes in information through his ears and he seems to see just fine (really worth listening to the episode). He hikes and bikes and climbed trees just like if his eyes worked.
Anyway, I had this thought: what if I am blind and just don't know it?
I'm not really blind. I mean, I don't think so. But, for a moment I looked at the world around me and thought, wouldn't it be interesting to learn that, this whole time, my eyes didn't work?
I dunno, it gave me a different perspective on visualization.

[END OF POST]

Q: Your post does raise interesting questions about the nature of perception, but it's very important not to overstate the man's ability.
He is able to "see" yes. But he and the show's host make it out to be more akin to peripheral vision than traditional vision. None of the acuity, but still plenty functional and better than total darkness.
If this sort of thing gets you going, you'll also be interested in a device known as BrainPort
I'm also reminded of someone on this sub who claimed that while meditating deeply, they were suddenly able to see their surroundings without opening their eyes. I'm more skeptical of this claim, but I wouldn't rule it out completely, and it's definitely an interesting thought.

I think the seeing-through-eyelids thing might be related to the "Darkroom Vision" phenomenon. I've had it myself when very relaxed, with my attention (where I feel I'm "looking out from") rested near the middle of my head.

When you look at how your eyes work, then it becomes obvious that you are not really seeing with them. In fact, the attempt to "use your eyes" often leads to your vision narrowing and becoming less focused.

In fact, thinking in terms of senses is maybe a bad move generally. If you sit back, as it were, it seems far more like you are "receiving a world that appears in your mind". It might be 'inspired by information gleaned from your sensory apparatus' but that's just feeding you snippets of info, which trigger patterns in your mind which constitute the actual experience.

The "Darkroom Vision" phenomenon - check out some of the links - and some of the stuff discussed in Ian Watson's book You Are Dreaming highlights that our usual assumptions-of-convenience about perception are obviously wrong, and that we basically always "dream our experience", inspired or not by the senses.

POST: New to magickal practices; starting with meditation, trying to lucid dream, and sigils; just want to clarify something

It's all just making a decision, and letting your mind or the world go there by itself.

If you set a problem, and don't resist movement and change, it'll gradually turn into the solution by itself. What is a 'desire' if not a 'problem', a tension that is to be [re]solved? The decision you make is largely about making a commitment to not resist the flow towards your goal. A decision itself is therefore always an act of intent and will. Effectively:

"[This decision means] I will have a new car".

Although most people like to feel themselves "doing" something, so in effect offset the process by one level:

"[This decision means] drawing this picture means I will have a new car".

Magick as described is mostly just theatre in experience. We do it because the actual active core of magick - intention or will or allowing or whatever, the release to and commitment to the flow of the world - cannot be experienced as an action.

EDIT: That's not to say that this "theatre" isn't valuable or powerful. There are many reason why it can be beneficial, not least because ritual can give you a direct feeling of connection to "the source", consciousness, your true self, whatever - which helps commitment, resistance and faith somewhat.

POST: Your goals.

Basically, I don't like not being "in the know" when it comes to secrets, and the cosmos holds an awful lot of them. I want in.

Is the background whispering of the Cosmos making you paranoid? ;-)

Not paranoid: more like hungry, in a manner of speaking.

I was joking, but I know exactly what you mean!

Keep in mind though that the 'Cosmos' isn't a static thing filled with secrets and information, like a library or a science experiment; it's alive and responsive to you.

It tends to give you an answer when you have a question, to give you a landscape when you open a door - it makes up stories for you when you go looking for them. Problems turn into solutions, requests turn into responses, the seeker is given an ongoing adventure, to expect is to receive. It happens all by itself.

The 'secret of the Cosmos' isn't to be found in any of the specific experiences you'll have, of course. They're just dream-fun. The secret is how the Cosmos gives you those experiences at all!

He who knows, does not speak. He who speaks, does not know.

"..."

[question] magic is real. is psi real?

I suppose what I meant was, if it was possible, why isnt it more common? And what precisely have you learned to do? Telekinesis is like a blanket term and I'd like to know what you meant by that

Looks a bit like James Hydrick's dollar bill trick [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30o7_iy-O1g&t=18m20s]. Is the commencement of movement synchronised with your breathing?

Not saying that's the explanation or that it's intentional, but you need to be careful to exclude these possibilities in your experiments - both breath motion (very slight gaps under the container) and thermal changes (heat from hands or breath warming one side of the container slightly, resulting in air currents inside). With such a finely balanced object, very small changes could make a difference.

EDIT: This is a more general problem: magick always finds a way to give you the experience you truly ask for. But sometimes it can do it in an underhand way, if we're not careful.

Q: Not saying that's the explanation or that it's intentional, but you need to be careful to exclude these possibilities in your experiments - both breath motion (very slight gaps under the container) and thermal changes (heat from hands or breath warming one side of the container slightly, resulting in air currents inside). With such a finely balanced object, very small changes could make a difference.
Totally get what you're saying. I spent months checking and cross checking. I grew up being asked questions and being shown different ways in which physics works so I'm pretty familiar with countering those things. I did not allow myself to even accept the results until I was confident. This is something you'll have to learn on your own since videos never show what is going on within me. And yes, breathing is one of the many ways that you can synchronize energy flow. Not necessary but can be a very easy thing to fall into when you're first learning.
I should mention that I have spent hours staring at the wheel and have gotten very familiar with recognizing what is driven by the elements and what is driven by me. I can feel the energy move through my body and then pass out of my hands to make the object move. I've also tried blowing on the edges of the glass in all directions to verify there is no air flow happening. I have sat there with my hands directly on the glass and never once had the wheel move until I tried moving it. I've checked for static by rubbing my feet across the carpet, getting the wheel to follow my hand using the static and then discharging the energy by touching the energy saving bulb of the light on the stand only to have the wheel not move from static any longer before I start practicing. Something fun about static is that it can be manipulated.
If you try learning to do this I would recommend being patient and do lots of meditation.
This is a more general problem: magick always finds a way to give you the experience you truly ask for. But sometimes it can do it in an underhand way, if we're not careful.
I agree! Magick can definitely give what you want like that. The static was the original way that it started, then I was controlling air movement, and now it's directly related to my ability to move psi or chi. My only hope of showing this to folk is to inspire them to learn how and to help them to start developing spiritually. Come join us in /r/energy_work if you haven't yet and start discovering out what you can do.

Thanks, that was very informative! Sounds like a pretty thorough experimental approach.

Magick can definitely give what you want like that.

I guess (know) the trick is: specify the route. And you're right about really having to explore yourself. A couple of thoughts:

• Do you think this is related to, say, the "stretching out of presence" one can do to make contact with other people?
• Do you think this could be done eventually without a direct connection?
• Do you think that attempts to demonstrate this sort of thing with other people present, presents a problem? That the fact of an observer can cause difficulties? Perhaps because of the concentration required, perhaps due to "conceptual momentum" (the idea that being in the presence of conflicting beliefs is like a "counter-will").

I have duly subscribed! You might also be interested in checking out /r/Oneirosophy.

what I like to call consciousness, outside of our physical shell and having it interact with other things.

I call it "presence" to distinguish it from the background awareness that also gets called "consciousness" - Peter Ralston calls it "feeling-awareness" which is not a bad compromise actually. I might take issue with "physical shell" and "things" but that's a different thread!

So, implicitly, we all have a direct connection, even if our locations differ - eventually I might be able to render an effect at a greater distance...?

Our brains [I'd say minds] love patterns and it likes to make everything automatic.

It's all about the patterns, so true! Patterns, memory traces, automatic habits. The very stuff of the personal daydream! :-) I'd suggest that improving one's ability to create "out of the ordinary" effects depends precisely on softening these patterns, directly (addressing them specifically to dissolve them) or indirectly (repeated practice to wear them down).

Anyway, lots to explore! Thanks for giving me a new angle on this, something new to play with.

I still believe that everything is consciousness so I'm wondering how this can be accepted into or break my current view.

Everything is still "made of" consciousness - but just as sight, sound, touch are perceived as separate "modes" of consciousness, so "presence" is a mode. You might think of it as extended, subtle touch?

Going to write up another post soon which covers the other stuff, actually.

Quickly though: Try and actually find your body right now. Use your attention or "presence" to feel it out. You'll realise it's basically a big empty space, in a big empty space, with no solid boundary. Some people find the Douglas Harding experiments helpful, and you might like the one I describe here [Outside: The Dreaming Game] - in the middle.

Try 'em and feel free to PM me if they do/don't make sense!

Let me know when you have that post up if you happen to remember. I'd love to see what you write. Cheers mate!

Ah yeah, sounds like you're on it.

Will say though, that the experience you should eventually have is beyond just the body sensation - it should feel like those sensations are floating in empty background space, without there really being a "body" that connects if all together. That's what helps you realise that "you" are actually over there as well as over here - it's the difference between thinking that everything is consciousness, and actually experiencing it to be true. You are the background. (Check out this interview for Rupert Spira trying to get someone to get this.)

Will do. Cheers!

...

When you pick up a rock and throw it, you are not using mental power to do so.

You might ask though - if that's not mental power, what are you using to get your arm to move? What is the name for that and how does it work?

POST: How to start out.

"Meditate for at least 20 minuets every day. If you don't do this you are wasting your time in the long run". I see this pop up every day. thoughts?

Sort of?

• "Meditation" in its loosest sense, sure. Just lying on the floor for 2 x 10 minutes a day, letting your nervous system relax out and unwind, does the job.
• "Meditation" is the ongoing sense too: not "forcing" your mind or body as you go about your day, letting things unfold at their natural spontaneous pace.

Basically, if your "aware space" is cluttered up with "stuck thoughts and incomplete movements" then you're going to have a hard time perceiving how things are, where they are going, and find it difficult to tune into and direct things.

If you sort that out then you are inherently less scattered, and will find results naturally easy (easier!) to access. Actual ritual and action detail not necessarily mattering so much, since it becomes more about the decision of meaning (c.f. Alan Chapman, etc).

EDIT: You might find this recent post of mine of interest [Overwriting Yourself], or not.

POST: I'm going to start a business this year, but I know for a fact that a certain crazy person has a grudge against me, and he's really deep into the occult. I'm pretty sure he's tried to curse me before, and worried he might again.

A1: If there is truly someone out there actively working on doing you harm, then you're only validating it by worrying. You're doing most of the hexwork for him already. But, chances are, he's not. Your source of anxiety is opening the business, and you're looking about reasons for your anxiety. Be a wall. Don't worry. No one can touch your life. Plow on ahead with your plans. If someone truly had a grudge against you, then "the best revenge is a life well lived" So, just go and be successful, ok?
Edit: hey, my first gold, and it wasn't about something fucking stupid. Woo!

This x 10.

Just keep focused on what you're after; don't entertain ideas of others' influence. If you make your future certain in your own mind, no other can interrupt that. (And in the end, they are kinda you anyway: your own anxieties or self-destructive tendencies might manifest as "someone else hexing you".)

POST: Rationality in your practices?

Q:[Deleted]

Nice comment. Although we must add the special sauce of the conundrum: The concepts we adopt affect our experience of the world, of the objects and narrative we encounter. So it's difficult to be truly science-like objective with magick. Doing so can destroy the effect.

No need to make things more complicated than they need to be. Either you have objective evidence (with scientists present to rule out trickery), to support your systems do something, or you don't. Easy Peasy

Do upsetting memories make you feel sad?

No. What does make me sad though is that people who want something real wind up giving up on the search, because virtually everything everywhere is lies, disinformation, roleplay and make believe nonsense. Real practices are actively suppressed in this and other similar communities, in favor of practices that generate only subjective results. It's almost as if paid government shills are actively trying to bury real practices with disinformation, and discredit them. That does make me sad. It also makes me sad that out of a thousand spiritual seekers maybe one or two, understands why objective evidence is important, and why we should demand proof that systems actually do something. The rest think you can brew potions, and chant incantations, and draw sigils, and swing around an athame and it will have any meaningful effect at all. That does make me sad. It also makes me sad that the people who would most benefit from real practices are so burnt out fake spiritual bullshit, and make believe nonsense scams that pass for spirituality, that they wind up becoming raving Atheist skeptics. I can't really blame them, with all the lies, disinformation, scams, hoaxes, etc. It's sad though, no amount of evidence would ever be enough for them.

Well actually I was building on the objective evidence aspect - I can't objectively detect memories nor the feeling of sadness in other people, so they must be excluded from my model of the world - rather than the larger issue of delusion or misleading groups.

We've talked before I think, but my own investigations have led to the conclusion that, simply put, power is in plain sight - for all to see and utilise if so inclined.

You can't know for certain if someone is really sad, or giving a performance of being sad. You can know for certain if someone could demonstrate real abilities objectively to scientists or not. There is the difference friend.

Uh-huh, but magick's most important abilities are psychological... in one sense or another. That was my point - that for those things it's subjective evidence that matters, one proves to oneself. So we can't discount the value of those things, just because they are difficult to prove objectively. In fact, it can be baked in, that problem.

Of course, that's separate from real objective abilities. It just important to be clear there are two strands (at least), and being well versed in one doesn't mean one can be dismissive of the other (in terms of its value to other people). A lot of these subreddits are more for one type than the other.

Wow, I sound so even-handed there. I'm not really, normally! :-)

Let's cut the bullshit friend. Either there is good objective evidence to support your practices do something, or there isn't. I've met plenty of magick users, and all of them are dirt poor, drive 20 year old cars, live in their moms basement, are miserable failures at life, but boy their magick sure is strong. I ask them what has magick done for them, and they go off on all the subjective benefits. From an outsiders perspective the only metric of success they have achieved is keeping themselves spiritually entertained. You either want something REAL, something you can prove is real in the presence of scientists, or you don't.
It's that simple. There is no need to write a doctoral thesis on metaphysics to figure this one out, friend.

But... I love my Mom's basement! So comfortable in the dark, with my 1990's video games! :-)

Hey, as I said, we talked before.
S'all good, each to their own, and whatever they are satisfied with.

POST: What technique (s) do you use to focus your intent?

It's ages since I've done meditation formally. I've found that anything that moves/expands/dissolves localised attention is helpful; anything you 'let go to' that isn't thought-based.

If you are one for habitually being stuck in your head, exercise expands you into your body. If localised to your body, contact with the external environment expands you into that. Painting and drawing encourage you to "reach out" with your feeling-awareness towards the subject. Gradually, that persists, and the "information" stored at those locations (the oft-ignored rest of your body, beyond perhaps) produces insight occasionally.

Interesting that you did it with the lights off - one of the best ways I found to realise that I wasn't restricted to "here" was to ignore vision, and attend to where sounds or body sensations were - it's much easier to directly realise that they occur in a "large space of awareness" with eyes closed than with eyes open. Something to do with the persistence that images have in insisting they are "over there" rather than "in here".

Another sense was being exercised.

Can you try to describe that a bit more?

Reminds me of Luke Skywalker training while while blindfolded with against floating laser beam shooting robot orbs. Same idea. You have to anticipate what is going to happen before it happens. I do think it helped me to develop an almost predictive reflex. At the time I felt like it was magic. Maybe it is?

It sort of is! I recommend it all the time, but this book by Missy Vineyard is great on the subject of 'letting things happen' when catching balls and doing other tasks. Meanwhile, this book by Peter Ralston is good on the idea of feeling-awareness.

It's basically a sixth sense, that - the "feeling out" sense. You can do it deliberately when attending to things (exploring), but also you can get the benefits by letting go (responding).

I like the idea that, at its core, we are deciding to let the environment move us appropriately, rather than holding onto our separateness and trying to control reactions manually. It takes a bit of faith, though - because there's no knowing what your reaction is going to be, you just have to trust that it will be appropriate; it happens faster than information can travel consciously.

(I always wince when watching those get-hit-with-a-stick exercises! Where's the blooper reel for that stuff? Bet it's messy.)

The two books complement each other nicely. Also, I quite like Alan Watts on this "the environment moves you" thing:

[On letting go and living in the present, unprepared,] people immediately say, however, “Now wait a minute. That’s all very well, but I want to be sure that under such-and-such circumstances and in such-and-such eventualities I will be able to deal with it. It’s all very well to live in the present when I am sitting comfortably in a warm room reading this, or meditating, but what am I going to do if all hell breaks loose? What if there’s an earthquake, or if I get sick, or my best friends get sick, or some catastrophe happens? How will I deal with that? Don’t I have to prepare myself to deal with those things?”
“Shouldn’t I get into some sort of psychological training, so that when disasters come I won’t be thrown?”
That, you would ordinarily think, is the way to proceed — but it doesn’t work very well. It is much better to say, “sufficient unto the day is the trouble thereof,” and to trust yourself to react appropriately when the catastrophe happens. Whatever happens, you’ll probably have to improvise, and failure of nerve is really failure to trust yourself. You have a great endowment of brain, muscle, sensitivity, intelligence — trust it to react to circumstances as they arise.
Zen deals with this. Studying Zen will change the way you react to circumstances as they arise. Wait and see how you deal with whatever circumstances come your way, because the you that will deal with them will not be simply your conscious intelligence or conscious attention. In that moment it will be all of you, and that is beyond the control of the will, because the will is only a fragment having certain limited functions.
I know that this sounds impractical to some of you, or perhaps revolutionary, or perhaps not even possible, but it is simply living in the present. It requires a certain kind of poise: If you make exact plans to deal with the future and things don’t happen at all as you expected, you are apt to become thoroughly disappointed and disoriented. But if your plans are flexible and adaptable, and if you’re here when things happen, you always stay balanced.
As in movement or martial arts, keep your center of gravity between your feet, and don’t cross your feet, because the moment you do you are off balance. Stay always in the center position, and stay always here. Then it doesn’t matter which direction the attack comes from; it doesn’t matter what happens at all.
If you expect something to come in a certain way, you position yourself to get ready for it. If it comes another way, by the time you reposition your energy, it is too late. So stay in the center, and you will be ready to move in any direction.
-- What is Zen?, Alan Watts

And that's all my book references done for the day! :-)

Right on tack with my own experience! I was very into the Zen concept and the practicing thereof when I was a teenager. Fishing and spending as much time in the woods in silent openness as much as possible was my introduction to it long before I read about it. Actually, I was a little disappointed to find out what I was feeling and knew was already well known and ancient. But that was a typical teenage reaction. I'm not special anymore blah blah blah. Kind of funny now.
The fact you lead right into it gives me joy. I used to read Zen Koans and poetry when I felt off track and off my center and it would clear my mind and settle it for a while. What turmoil we put ourselves through!
Thanks again for the links and reminder. Bringing me back to myself, this whole thread.

Hey, your post reminding me to remind you helped me remind myself! :-)
Of course you are special; it's just that so is everyone else...

...

You should check out the Carlos Castaneda series.

Yes! His quote on intention really made everything clicked for me:

“To intend is to wish without wishing, to do without doing. There is no technique for intending. One intends through usage.”
–- Carlos Castaneda, The Art of Dreaming

Q: Wow, that takes me back. When I read the series back in my younger twenties, I kept a notebook of every good quote I read followed by whatever thoughts they inspired. Wish I had that notebook still! No idea what happened to it.

Same here! That quote is my favourite, because it really gets down to the fact that there's not one thing affecting another: you are 'first cause' and move yourself by yourself with yourself.

...I've had a bit of success re-acquiring notebooks for people lately, as a matter of fact...

Re-acquiring notebooks? What do you mean?

A converstation I was having elsewhere. Could still turn up, you know...

I think I need to get in the mindset to reread without trying to relive or recapture, to start where I'm at, ya know?

Yeah, sometimes a "reset' - or the acceptance of the reset - can be just the thing that's needed.

POST: Some shee folk i met in a lucid dream

TIL, lucid dreams are rare for me, and when I get them I tend to get a bit carried away. The last time I encountered an entity she was super scary but i stood firm and faced her down and broke her, this made me think that this is all i have to do, that because it's a dream i can't be harmed.

Yeah! In a dream, you are the dream and not the "character" you seem to be. So everything you encounter is a bit of you, the larger you. So there's always more to it than just, say, cool imagery and fun stuff to do. It's filled with meaning, to some greater or lesser extent.

Facing up to fears is classic fun.

So would you say that the characters that I encountered are manifestations of my own subconcious and therefor the names they gave me meaningless?

No, not meaningless. It's maybe better to put aside the notion of the subconscious, and instead say that - from the perspective of 'little you' - the 'universe' is talking to you, giving you messages or challenges to help you. The dream may be "all you", but the fact is you do identify with one part of it, one perspective. However, the rest of it all has meaning for you, because it is part of the 'big you'.

(Sorry, that wasn't very clear probably.)

EDIT: Keep in mind that "finyacluck" is just a dream character you are seeing through the eyes of, and 'finyacluck" is at the same level as any other dream character. It represents part of the whole that you are; it just so happens that you are attached to "finyacluck"'s perspective and so you confuse it with being "you".

Thank you for explaining, and apologies for my very basic, newbie questions, the only thing now that's on my mind is if anything I encounter whilst dreaming, given that I didn't try to contact it earlier, has the ability to interrupt my waking, day to day life?

Well, the changes you experience in a dream do overflow into waking life (because you have changed), but you don't need to worry about "beings" following you. If that is a concern, then simply perform some sort of banishing ritual that seems persuasive to you. Simply declaring is sufficient for this, until you feel comfortable.

And don't worry about "newbie" questions; none of this is obvious and it's all still under debate. That's why it's a personal exploration/journey of discovery!

POST: Question on sigil magic. Re: no harm...

Is the "poor guy" as real as you anyway...?

But, if you want to avoid the experience of getting a job because someone else was apparently fired, you just need to be more specific about what you request. Or intend more directly, directly into the 'external' world. Sigils and servitors tend to operate according to your own established habits - hence, no materialisations etc, plausible unfoldings only. So perhaps experiment with taking control of the situation "personally".

POST: What was the most Epic Fail you ever had from a spell that actually worked?

Good story. You should have kept going though. First attempt can give you the easy result (you dream of your desire, you see a drawing of what you want, or some other reality-joke played on you). It's saying: "Are you serious? Then commit!"

You were probably half-hearted in your intention.

Not to say you are going to wake up the next day on a mattress stuffed with money. In a beautiful house. With a beautiful wife. But you may ask yourself... [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvM6TxUnCDE]

My tendency is to end up seeing films which have scenes depicting what I want, or reading passages in books. I see it as a sign that I was "heard" and to keep pushing...

Q: In total agreement. This is how I (make every effort to, anyway) operate now. If I see something (a photo, an overheard conversation, etc.) that is representative of my own "heart's desire", I have gotten myself to a place where I can rejoice over that.
As in, if I want a trip to Europe - and a co-worker comes in and says she is unexpectedly able to travel to Europe, I rejoice (even if said co-worker may not be my favorite person). If I feel a twinge of envy, I... not so much "quell" it... but transform it, as best I can, into genuine gladness for the other person. I also see it as the Universe (ha - yes, sort of ME -) bringing my own wish a little bit closer to me, and still a little bit closer to me.... If a a bunch of people around you seem to be getting what you want, believe the Universe loves you and hears you and that the THING is being drawn closer to you, instead of that the Universe has played a joke on you and you should quit.
To me, the Monopoly houses & money by the bus stop sound like an amazing "yes!" sign. It's saying, "You're kind of vibrating to your house and your money. Here's some inspiration to help you along!"
ALTHO' "quitting", ie "dropping the seed into the ground" can be quite effective. "Quitting" is what brought the "bf" from my other story BACK after 2 years, so he could break my heart even more effectively by leaving again a year or so later!! (Moral: Discernment is needed. "Know thyself!" Just 'cause you wanted something desperately 2 years earlier doesn't mean you're obligated to say "yes" to it whenever it shows up. :)
"Dropping it" is easier to do with the little things, the "it would be nice but it's not urgent" things, like my chair. (I used Deepak Chopra's meditation to arrange that; I bought a worth-$300-or-more wing chair for $10, carried to my doorstep, no less.)
I also try extremely hard to stay positive and um... silent. For instance, IF I've recently failed to do this ("stay positive", that is) - today or any other day - I would not tell you about it here! :p

Hey, great response. There's also the fact that people don't dedicate themselves enough to this, don't really commit.

If you were told that, to get something you want - a complete change in your reality - you should lie down, let go, and simply strongly intend that for a day. Just assert that it is true already, without compromise. Would you do it? Basically, almost nobody would. This guy [POST: one way to get whatever i want] has the wrong intentions but the right dedication.

I also try extremely hard to stay positive and um... silent.

Yeah, it's a challenge. It helps, though, once you realise you don't need to be "thinking positive thoughts" all the time, so much as only intend positive things. It's about what you put yourself behind. If you remain detached usually, then no stray passing thing will get energised; if you spend your days being hyped up, then your dream will be all over the place.

Crowley said to use magick like this to fix sickness is deplorable.

I'd never heard that. Looking up quotes, the best I could find was:

Crime, folly, sickness and all phenomena must be contemplated with complete freedom from fear aversion or shame. Otherwise we shall fail to see accurately, and interpret intelligently; in which case we shall be unable to outwit and outfight them.
-- Appendix VI : A few principal rituals – Liber Reguli.

So, is it more that it is folly to ignore the message and learn from the sickness? That would make sense. In other words, forcing "feeling better" on top of the underlying cause, which has not been reached into and dissolved.

very good point! I'm not sure where I heard that then.
Also, could a sigil backfire if given a silly time frame, for example "By tomorrow"?

There's no reason it can't happen semi-instantly. For instance, a friend of mine was very sick, 10 minute gaps between "visits", and did the thing: "I wish I had a magic potion to cure me" (or similar). Later, he suddenly knew he had to go and buy a bottle of rum. He watches his timings, gets to the store and back again, downs the rum. Wakes up a few hours later, cured.

I feel that when the phrasings play tricks on us, it's really us being tricky with ourselves. Any slight lack of conviction or confidence on our part, and the wiggle room will be used to make it happen "off-centre".

In the story above, you've got to think that his 'larger self' was having a bit of fun, sending him on a journey outside for a distance was that going to need near-perfect timing, but was doable - just. He rose to the challenge, he gets his reward!

Meanwhile, you can skip phrasing altogether, by simply lying there and directly intending into a "feeling-state" of health. Basically, deleting/overwriting the (now temporary, historical) fact of illness. Become the larger you, and operate from there (outside > in), rather than being the small you, sending out wishes (inside > out).

This is fascinating! Any books on this technique of operating from the larger self?

You really need to feel it out for yourself - become aware of the larger background in which your experiences (thoughts, sensations, etc) arise and stand there as that, rather than as the mind or the body. Expand your presence into the world.

Neville Goddard's "summon the feeling of the wish fulfilled" technique, detailed here [http://www.thepowerofawareness.org/] for instance, is an approach. (Do a daily "update" of the universe each night to realign it with your desired version.) The feeling-awareness exploration of Peter Ralston is also helpful.

Mainly: experiment. If you 'send requests into the universe' then you are implicitly asking for the universe to do something on your behalf, as a separate entity. If you 'become' or 'recognise that you are the universe', then you are operating as first mover. (See Alan Chapman for how implicit assumptions affect work.)

Main final thought: This stuff, even the "direct" stuff, happens indirectly, in that you are operating at the "enfolded" level of experience, which subsequent "unfolded" objects and events will manifest in alignment with. You never really create that Ferrari, rather you update the "enfolded schema" of your world such that ownership of a Ferrari is part of it; subsequent sounds, images, feelings and sensations that arise in awareness will then unfold from that updated schema.

(Sorry, not sure that was very clear.)

EDIT: Remember that you are always your larger self. Sometimes you forget it and pretend to be a smaller self.

EDIT2: Another way to think of this is that each moment appears anew, unfolding based on the "enfolded schema", then disappears - and a new moment appears. The unfolded moment itself is transparent, it has no substance, and can't be altered. However, by updating the "enfolded schema" you have effectively "re-seeded the universe", updating its blueprint or script, so that subsequent moments will arise consistent with that modified architecture.

Q:[Deleted]

Good story.

I'm finding, the less specific you are the more you are vulnerable to your background beliefs of: a) what is possible, b) what you deserve.

If you secretly believe you don't deserve something, you'll set 'tests' for yourself so that you can 'prove' you are worthy. If you think that you must work hard for everything, then stressy-hurdle-jumping will be your world.

If you weren't willing to work for it, I wonder what would have happened.

...

Q: Wanted specifically "a large amount cash" to "appear in my lap." The next morning my friend called me who I haven't seen in 3 years asking if I could watch her relatively large pit bull, Cash.

You were lucky. Circumstances could have forced you into a life working at a strip-club, say, where indeed large amounts of cash would have "appeared in your lap" - when you were with your "special customers".

Tricky stuff, this.

Tricky, yes.
But could the pit bull Cash have been a symbol of the "real cash" to come? I mean, the very next morning, after 3 year absence. Hmmm. The You-niverse on the move.
(That is a funny story. I wonder if Res_hits did wind up pet-sitting and if Cash ever actually got up in his/her lap....)

Like other stories, often the first "comedy" response is a little tester. It's like "hey, I'm listening". So you should keep pushing on. Half-responses are perhaps a sign of half-hearted intention, as I said on another... oh, looks like I'm going there now > > >

Would't it have instead been a stripper being on his/her lap? I mean, if it was a good night for the stripper...

...hmm, so a life going to a strip club, and a girl called "Candy Cash" or similar sitting on their lap?

...

Q: What makes you think the occult isn't of the devil? Is there good and evil in the world? Did someone actually create this?

Al: Occult simply means hidden and the most famous Religions believe in a lot of supernatural stuff- better said- they have faith in supernatural things, but don't ask them if they want to be a part of it because it simply scares the shit out of them... as an Occultist you investigate this supernatural. So in a sense- most people in our current time that believe in God came about this through Judaism, even though the idea of God is older than Judaism. If there is God- then there must be Spirits- if there is a Heaven, then there is an afterlife. So- if you buy into the Abrahamic Mythological Trilogy then you accept Angels, Demons, Other Planes of Existence as FACT.
With that being said- God rewards and guides those who are aware of it's existence; even if people choose to view said God as a simple point of reference. From my own experience- God represents a Guidance System directed towards Goodness. It recognizes ones desires, wants and needs- it gives us those things when we ask for them as long as we are an active part of society- that way he (god or the universe) can work through the people of the world. Now... to answer your question- I don't think the magic that I've experienced in my life has anything to do with the devil. I think weakness, immaturity, arrogance are real human traits- I also feel that once we are in positions of power- we sell out and lose the plot along the way. The Higher Voice- God- The Higher Self- Guilty Conscious- Moral Compass- Virtue- it's always there and from what I've been able to research it's quite general. This inner goodness becomes a distant background intuition or telepathic voice after we slowly or rapidly give into the pleasures of life at the expense of others- including ourselves. I've certainly learned when dealing with the magic of this world- there is no one to blame but ourselves if things get out of hand. After a certain point in ones maturity- he or she becomes self-aware enough to trace back all the steps that made them 'fall'. Some choose to blame 'The Devil' for their own weaknesses. In Judaism- The Devil is simply there to tempt man. To see if man's intentions are pure enough to deserve honest power. Most men do not possess sufficient wisdom and knowledge to decode the archetypes and symbolism that permeates through himself and the world around them. Instead- they run into pit falls and point the fingers are others for their own mistakes in life. As I told another user- everything is sort of like a ladder- or an alphabet we have to go through in life. Some people simply get stuck in certain psychological patterns- and it's not always their fault either- our society simply doesn't support naturally provided protocols intelligently designed to upgrades ones perception of themselves and the world around them. We get caught in the mote- hurt ourselves and those around us- even when we claim to love them. It's not the Devil- a particular deity that is out to get you- it's simply Man having to deal with his own maturity- self-responsibility- integrity- awareness- ect. I mentioned about the Judaic Devil simply to show him as a mythological archetype- a symbol for a reoccurring stereotypical human trait. We can be weak- we can be ignorant- we can be assholes- ect- When we misbehave or become addicted to certain substances people claim to be possessed by demons. The demon is an archetype of an amplified negative thought pattern which has enslaved the person. There are ways to go about ridding a person of these psychological entrapment's- and once they realize that it was simply a thought pattern- their perception of what that thought pattern might change. Instead of continuing to believe it was some Devil- they might realize, it was simply themselves. Then you might ask... what about God? I think God is the Universe! It's everything you can observe objectively. However because we are a natural part of the objective Universe- God permeates within all things- planets, plants, animals and humans. We sense God in ourselves through our conscious. Is there good and evil? Yes absolutely.
List of Good things... Virtue, Wisdom, Knowledge, Community, Appreciation, Sharing, Love, Selflessness, Integrity. Bad things... Rape, Murder, Profiting from Ignorance and Suffering, Extortion, Blackmail. I believe we can truly rise as people- together and recognize that there are certain factions of the system which propel evil and because of this- there is a lot of suffering and natural born development of good and bad rebellion. Perhaps I went a little too over the top with my response- hope you were able to appreciate it. Thanks.
Sincerely. -Al

. . . God rewards and guides those who are aware of it's existence; even if people choose to view said God as a simple point of reference. From my own experience- God represents a Guidance System directed towards Goodness. It recognizes ones desires, wants and needs- it gives us those things when we ask for them as long as we are an active part of society- that way he (god or the universe) can work through the people of the world.

What a great way to put it - thanks for that thought-provoking reply. Interested in your "part of society / work through people" idea. Could you expand on that a bit?

Al: If you desire something- you must be willing to go into the world so that it may reach you. You gotta be willing to meet 'God' half way in a sense. Lets say- you are looking for a specific material possession or experience; it doesn't do you any good to lock yourself up in your home indefinitely. Desires are found out there in the community / society- through networks- friendships- relationships- ect. It usually happens through a domino effect of coincidences and before you know it you are in front of what you originally wanted. Watch the Jim Carry film- Yes Man. I am not saying to be unwise about the opportunities that come your way but we naturally tend to not go along with opportunities due to lack of trust and fear of the unknown. Also sometimes life simply gives you what you need instead of what you want. There is always a lesson to be learned- even if you are not able to achieve your goals or you do achieve your goals but then fuck up. Instead of becoming angry- take a moment and retrace all your steps; things should add up if your attention span is broad enough. Thanks. Sincerely. -Al

Nice. Thanks.

...

Q: Well, I told TriumphantGeorge I would leave these forums, for I am "divesting myself of my stories" (which is great; I love it,) but lo! here I am with a story. Altho'... I don't really wish to tell it in first person, so I'll use the "let's call her Jean" tactic, which I've never liked!
Okay - so, let's say we have Abby, Bonnie, and Cara (ABC). (These folks are all in their 40s, at the time.) Abby is deeply in love with her bf, who dumped Bonnie to be with her. Abby is shy and reserved. The bf is striking and has women falling all over him all the time. Bonnie is stridently persistent, and will walk right up and grab bf's arm and drag him off when he is with Abby. (note: bf is a player; he cannot help it) Soooo, Abby detests Bonnie, who is originally from another city (Boston) 500 miles away.
"Just for fun", having no idea what she's doing ('tho she should have, having "manifested" a beautiful chair easily, & other things,) Abby begins to indulge a fantasy in which Bonnie is packed up (safely) in a big box which is all taped up and shipped to Boston. Abby loves this little fantasy, and visualizes it over and over again, enjoying the idea of detestable Bonnie in a big box on a freight train, swept off to Boston. Haha! Harmless Fun!
Well, after a little while Abby's very best friend of 20 years, Cara, who has always been local, tells Abby that her (Cara's) husband has been transferred to... Boston!! A city they've never been to! A city that never crossed Cara or husband's mind! "Detestable" Bonnie is unaffected by fantasy, but Abby's best friend and constant hang out buddy is the one swept 500 miles away.
If the foundation of the idea is negative feeling (this even goes for depressed thoughts, irritability, self-pity, blame - all that) then even unintentional musings can have a surprising "boomerang" effect.
Oh, yeah - Abby and bf break up after a year, of course, but Cara stays in Boston, having the time of her life, for over 10 years.
(I be Abby, obviously. :) I could tell you a dozen of these kinds of stories. This one is the most amusing. I won't tell the sad ones.

Heh, good, glad you broke your decision.

So here's the thing, is the "boomerang effect" a law of the universe, or a law of your-self? Just as thinking you don't deserve something can mean you don't get it, or have to 'prove yourself' when others don't - so can you having the background belief that wishing bad things means you get it back atcha be the true cause of this?

If I did such a thing - and, being ruthless and not believing anything that isn't to my own benefit - would I have got shot of "Bonnie" and kept "Cara"?

POST: I think /r/DimensionalJumping is slowly moving toward occult practice, and they have no idea

I dunno - I reckon some of them are probably aware of the overall context, see it all as part of a larger picture. Or, y'know, whatever. :-)

Q1: Just a question. I want to try this technique, but I'm worried I'll fuck up my wording(or rather what I want). In this, it's important to know that I'm a virgin and someone without a romantic partner of any sort. I guess what I'm looking for might be romance or it might just be the chance to get laid for the first time, but at the end of the day I'm struggling to figure out how I want to word things. For the latter(a focus on romance) I was gonna try "Loveless" and "Romance" but I don't know if it'd work. Any advice on wording and such(since the instructions call for one word)

The reason it's one word is to encourage you to actually summon a "handle" to the situation, rather than simply write out a description, since in the latter case you'll might just get the extended pattern of the phrase, rather than something more specific to your situation (although that can be sufficient).

So what I'd do: take a moment and ponder each situation (the current one and the target one), and pause and "ask" for the word which best captured that, and let it come to you. Sit with it a "feel out" whether it feels right. That's the word to use, since it arises from and is an aspect of that state or pattern.

Q1: Thanks dude.

No worries - hope it's helpful.

POST: Dreams mingling with reality

It's simplest to view these things as synchronicity - by which I simply mean, part of a larger pattern that is "across time", regardless of the "3D moment" you are presently attending to. (I recommend Kirby Surprise's take on this if you are interested).

But generally:

• The apparent division between waking and dreaming is arbitrary - they are both just experiences you are having, sensory experiences arising in your "mind-space".
• The "patterning" of your mind-space affects all your experiences, no matter what the apparent context.

How it works:

• Experiences leave traces which in-form subsequent experiences.
• Thoughts are also experiences - in-form-ation which shapes subsequent experiences.
• The patterning which results, when obvious, is called "synchronicity".

TL;DR: What you are is an "open aware mind-space in which experiences arise". The formatting of that mind-space affects all your experiences - waking, dreaming or thoughts.

POST: What would you consider this in an occult terms?

[QUOTE FROM 'POST: Are you guys for real? (/r/DimensionalJumping/)']

Yeah this sub seems insane, to be honest. To someone who believes this stuff: why? I am genuinely curious to know what could convince you that people have the ability to move between "dimensions".

[END OF QUOTE]

Q1: Wishful thinking and a misunderstanding of visualization=>actualization.
Or just group insanity.

It's basically detachment + intention, by way of a metaphor, surely? Like pretty much everything on this subreddit.

Q1: When I was desperate and tried to brute-force my way into another reality, I did use a similar technique. I just wonder if the metaphor they are using inhibits their progress.

Yeah, I don't think there should be any progress maybe. It's a user-friendly bit of fun for experimenting, but with a path to go a little deeper for the curious. Most people shouldn't go deeper. But - there's the mirror technique listed, plus from the sidebar link there's the Neville Goddard approach and a Patterning approach. I actually attached myself as mod there to tidy it up a bit because it was getting popular but seemed a bit... "not a good idea" as it stood.

EDIT: By "any" progress I mean they shouldn't have anything too powerful.

Q1: Eesh. That sounds like my relationship with /r/howtonotgiveafuck. I became really drained trying to teach people the difference between nihilism and detachment.

Haha, now that sounds frustrating! :-)

Well, it's been kinda interesting the discussions that come up. Some folk just totally get the ideas (the larger ideas behind it) and they're the people who will end up checking out /r/occult and /r/oneirosophy.

I actually think there's a place for a narrowly-defined, one-hit type approach that everyone can do when in a spot, without needing to commit to a full world-view. I quite like the idea that something could evolve into that.

POST: magic ways to fall asleep, hypnosis, sigils

Just completely give up on yourself.

* * *

TG Comments: /r/Psychonaut/

POST: Why are you happy?

Q1: I used to answer "because I'm still alive!"
Now it is "just because".

So, are you saying you are no longer alive...?

Q1: Nope. I'm saying that I was never not alive.

And yet, whole lifetimes rise and fall within you...

POST: What is "it"

What is "is"?

What is what? :O

What what is, is is "is"! :-)

WHAAAT

IIIIISSSSSSS

POST: [deleted by user]

Instead of trying to totally let go or resist, just be indifferent of the outcome, let resistance and letting go balance each-other out.

To me, that's what letting go would be. You don't unclench a fist by doing the opposite - forcibly opening it - you do it by stopping clenching. So letting go isn't something you do; it's a cessation of holding on. Your approach of being indifferent - non-judgemental? non-attached? - sounds like a better way to refer to it. (You can't do being indifferent!)

POST: Is it possible to be enlightened, but retain carnal desires?

Q: from a buddhist perspective? no. this is not what people like to hear, but enlightenment is an incredibly rare and difficult state to attain and takes some serious dedication to grasp, and even then it is far from guaranteed. in order to be fully enlightened you need to completely drop all attachments and desires to transcend suffering. all of these are functions of the ego that must be overcome. however, this does not mean spiritual growth is pointless. as I said, a truly enlightened person is an incredibly rare phenomenon, but working towards it now can set you up for success in your future lifetimes. dont beat yourself up over not becoming enlightened in this lifetime, just stay on the path of mindfulness and grow at your own pace.
here is some more info on steps towards enlightenment:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_stages_of_enlightenment]

You make a good point, but the word "enlightenment" has become a bit of a vague word in common usage. You can directly realise the nature of your existence (maybe call that "awakening" or "seeing") but that doesn't necessarily you choose to be nonattached to the patterns that arise in experience; you might still choose to remain a "person", albeit one who's "living the dream". People who have genuinely chosen to drop it all, eradicate all accumulated memory traces, and cease accumulating new ones - as you describe - probably are very rare. Having "the answer" is all most people aspire to, I think.

...Or a mixture of the two, yes. You can "see how it is", and still choose to live your life while incorporating that. You have a new perspective - you don't have to delete your entire accumulated character. Directly experiencing the lack of boundaries alone will inform your actions from then on, for the better. Change will happen gradually by itself anyway, internal and external (being the same).

POST: [deleted by user]

Q1: Even new age became a fashion.
I noticed this and it is always going to happen. With anything. The vegetarian fad, gluten free fad, meditation fad, etc. These people are annoying because they have no real interest in said action but eventually it will actually serve them. They are essentially tricking themselves into being better healthier human beings. No matter what ideas spread as fads to the majority of the population, but you know these fads will actually stick and hopefully lay way for a better more peaceful society.

Q2: We're all victims of it. Enlightenment is the only fad that isn't a fad

I'm not even sure about that...

Q2: Well it's been talked about in books for thousands of years. Yet we're still trying to achieve it. Most of us. It's the most obvious thing in everything. It's what ties all things together, what everything has in common.

Aw, we'll get over it! ;-)

Well, it's consciousness. I suppose that's quite popular.

POST: Is there a term for what I sometimes do (sorry if this is a basic question) - explanation below.

I simply watch my brain thinking, worrying, and feeling emotions. I watch "it" thinking, worrying, and feeling emotions.

Sounds like you are stepping back from the location where most of your thoughts are - literally in the head area of your experiential space. Ego thoughts tends to be around the head area; more intuitive thoughts lower in the body and more global. If you expand your "feeling-awareness" out in into the room (open out your focus from narrow to diffuse) or shift the centre where you are "looking out from" (from your head to a more central position or lower) you can get this effect. (e.g. seeing from the core, as one example.)

The visualisation you're using is implicitly causing you to do this, I'd say. Really nice approach!

POST: Since everything is in our mind...

A1: Being at the center no matter where you are is equivalent to saying there is no center.
That's not true. If you are always in the center, then you are never moving at all. The rest of reality is what moves.

AesirAnatman, you are on fire today, shootin' down the daftness. This post is your ideal home! ;-)

if everything is in our respective minds, where are our minds, then?

Every... where?

POST: What do you believe in?

Not even "best guess" - more like "current best description", maybe? That puts the emphasis on utility rather than truth. You can then apply that to everything you think too, in fact. All is provisional-for-usefulness. I agree science is the best approach for examining what I'd generalise as "the observable regularities of experience". In other words, repeatable patterns that involve objects, which can be abstracted in terms of concepts and narrative. Ultimate truth, though, is that which is the "container" for all such observations and conceptualisations - so I'd suggest that although ultimate truth can be directly experienced, it cannot be described by a model, and so falls outwith science. Like the inner surface of a sphere, if conscious, could never see its shape or true nature - it would see only the contents of itself - but it might be able to feel-know its shape directly just by being itself. (Yeah, rubbish metaphor. It was that or the "blanket of eyes" one.)

POST: Some of the many mysteries of Duality (seeking good thoughts)

You can't start from ideas about an external universe, and then work your way towards a 'through-creates-your-reality' viewpoint. We must first just admit what you know, what you don't, what you cannot.

But once consciousness comes into play it starts creating difference through the use of forms and ideals. I mean when you look at a bed the first thing you think of is what it is, a bed.

Already it is "too late": The seeing of the "bed" occurs within mind, before you even have a thought. You don't "look at a bed then have a thought" - you just have the experience of "bed" and that experience as all bed-related meanings and feelings as a part of it. Thoughts and perceptions are made of the same stuff; they differ only in their location in your field of awareness. Forgot ideas about the world, about inside and outside. Start with what you have when you wake up.

• Darkness. A sense of space. Indistinct shapes. Light.
• Within the space, sounds.
• Within the space, patterns, images... no, objects.
• A sense of "location", a meaning-feeling of being "you".
• A sense of world, perhaps an arbitrary notion of "in here" and "out there", but do you ever experience such a division really? Or do you just think-about it?

It's like a dream-world or a game. What are you really, if you strip away the content of the world? When you invite the world back in, where does it appear?

Perception and meta-thought on it are inked intrinsically on the day-to-day basis but there is a key difference, one is you and the other is happening to you.

I don't see that difference. Which is "you" and which is "happening to you"? Surely both are true of both at once?

...the barrier between things melting but that's not the normal plane we inhabit.

But why not? That sense of separation is just a habit.

Seeing is believing but feel is real too.

Surely. All experience is 'real', and in the end thoughts and perceptions are the same "thing". Thinking about a table is different to perceiving a table, but they are essentially similar except for apparent persistence. However, thinking about consciousness doesn't work that way, because it cannot be conceived of. It is not a "thing".

Thoughts warp perception and the brain is a space of consciousness. But if thinking is key for seeing, what came first. Chicken/egg ect.

Perceptions (objects) are essentially stable thoughts. Neither came first; they are part of the same ongoing process. To be clear, deliberate forced thinking is not needed for seeing. What is required is that there are established patterns in the mind to be activated.