Hermetic Musings
You will find the Hermetic Arts in many places. You will find parts of it and its theories and philosophy and practice in all religions, philosophies and belief systems. It is not, like some may have you believe, because Hermes “stole” from all religions…it is because the basic precepts of Hermetics is what all religious systems are based on. In one form or another, in some way or another.
This is the main reason I actually study Hermetics. I was searching for the root of it all, of all belief systems, the core of Universal thought, creation and etc. And so far…Hermetics is where I am at, in/around the Zorastrian/Babylonian type period. …possibly older than that…but I am not sure. Some of the next texts I need to read are not found online and I cannot afford to get my hands on a copy or afford the trips to go to the libraries I need to go. Though that will be changing in the near future.
Anyway that all is somewhat besides the point I was going to make here. That point being is that magic is actually much different than the New Age feel good versions of “universal law”. I have been told many times (by New Agers) that what they do is the same as magic. I do not find this to be altogether correct and especially not across the board.
Self help new age spiritualism if it is even that, may help some people feel good and make everything nice and easy for them and even some of the magic/mystic concepts and philosophy may be present to some degree. But the depth of that degree is quite shallow compared to genuine magic and mysticism. To say that what they do and what I do are the same, is frankly an insult to me and it’s not because I have a large ego…it is because they don’t fully understand magical potential.
Actually, I think a lot of people that say they practice magic really have no idea of the depths they can get to with it..though they may have a tiny inkling.
The differences between New Age, “Think it and you will have it” types of concepts (the law of attraction schtuff) are:
The amount and “type” of energy or essence, power (depth/breadth) of concentration and the application of these two from a spiritual level.
Most Ceremonial Magic requires you place your request in akasha (assuming a spiritual being/joining to god, sending energy/request to a specific being)
Which sounds very similar…since that is the way it is expressed or explained simply.
What a magician does actually though in those “simple” steps is:
Concentrate on the operation until it has weight independent of your mind so that it may flow with force towards its objective on all planes, a magician also can see or comprehend every force, situation, resistance and obstacle that blocks the operation and can direct the force around those obstacles by also again see/comprehend all possible outcomes, giving the operation more strength and weight for its manifestation. This actually makes it so your operation is from wisdom and results in harmony (magical equilibrium)
A magician does not just wish and hope and pretend they have something they want, the direct it.
So we will address the three major differences:
Amount of energy: A wish is not power. A wish is a wish. I wish I were rich, I need money. A wish is actually a negative term. It is not something tangible. It is not an action. It has no input…it’s not a container, it is simply a hope. Hopes do not manifest, desire through energetic intent, concentration and a spiritual understanding….A SOLID spiritual understanding (or you may read: synthesis) does manifest.
By spiritual I do not necessarily mean religious. I’m not a religious person. Spiritual in Hermetics it is most often the universal understandings of flow and force, some describe it as knowledge of the hierarchy, or divine inspiration..divine knowledge. Some simply call it power.
I talk to angels. They listen to me. I have talked to entire legions at a time and they have always done what I asked. Why? Because at those moments I have the proper equilibrium of energy, concentration and divine weight or we can say I am in the correct spiritual alignment to do so.
So does this mean I just pick up the cosmic phone and dial up Remeil and people start spontaneously healing and a butt-load of cash is dumped on my front porch? Hardly. But things do get accomplished and it’s not a rare occurrence. People have been doing this and similar for eons.
Linus reminded me of something. He related a story about .. oh sure now I forget the guys name. But the idea is the same. One man could expel demons out of possessed people by uttering simple words, “Leave in the name of Christ” (or something like that). So another exorcist tried to use those simple words and the demon turned to him and says, “I know who Christ is, I know who the other guy is, but who are you?” And with that the demon possessed the man.
Perfect example of what I am trying to talk about here. If you are not in the correct state of balance with what you are working with, it not only will not work it actually could be dangerous. Possibly you would not be possessed, but any number of not great things could happen to a person because of the “backfire”.
Reminds me of a favorite phrase of mine, “Do not mettle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.”
Type of energy: Here I’m not getting into magnetic and electrical fluid and flows nor am I talking negative positive stuff here. I’m talking about raw primal energy. The stuff that creates. Dynamic, powerful, explosive and intense. Sovereign divine power seeking absolute control. The stuff that does not just hope around obstacles, it is the dynamic will and expansive power, with implacable dedication and electrifying conviction.
You could say that independence, strength, courage, conviction, faith, will, determination, dedication, self-reliance, self-mastery, uprightness, clarity, order, adaptability, practicality, planning, productivity, excitement, exhilaration, creativity, and vision are qualities that are present when this operates successfully.
Fantastic claims? Yes they are…but truer words could not be spoken.
This is where people will get all wiggly on me and start blasting away at how I must be an ego-maniac to be going on about power and control. Nej, quite the opposite. I’m just describing what it is and it is what it is and that is what it is. However, those who are ego driven and those who really are out for control and manipulation of others hardly ever get to this place. Though, there are some that have, I have met a few. They are no more powerful or influential as anyone else can be……but they do have harming intentions.
If ever in your life, you have glimpsed even for just one brief moment of a second the power of the divine…even the power of God…it is what I am describing. I’m not saying you are god or anything..I’m just saying…it’s some of that ultimate stuff that is there to learn how to touch and when you do…well…if you haven’t touched that yet…I’ll leave you to it.
Though.. in the hermetic art there is something you don’t always hear about in other systems…and that is this extenuating consciousness factor. We can say that black magicians have found a way around this and I’ll leave them out of the discussion.
What the ECF is is the forces of the universe…the fluids, that place you and your will in a sort of check. Again this is where the magical equilibrium comes into play.
The question the electrical fluid will ask you in terms of your faith and conviction is “Are you willing to work without using magic to attain what you want if we set a clear path before you?” You want money? Are you willing to work for it? Here is a job. Do you want love? Are you willing to first give the love you want to others? You want to succeed in life? Are you willing to prepare yourself so that you will be ready to seize the opportunity when it comes to you? The electrical likes to check up on just how much you really want what you are asking for.
Think of it as universal checks and balances. I know it sounds a little trite and to some probably sounds a bit “new agey”…but here is my experience summed up nicely:
Hermetics is the art of attaining a constant and consistent magic. One that you will not have to necessarily always do ceremony for, one that you will not always have to do supplication or prayer/meditation for. Once you get so far into Hermetics, it opens up ways of life that you do not have to take special time to do magic…it’s all magic. As the sentence above states, are you willing to work for what you want if we set a clear path.
When your path is cleared through your magic, any human work becomes easy, all the tasks to take you where you want to go are nothing. The Universe opens up for you. And…the best part, those around you are also affected similarly.
However this may sound…and feel free to comment on any of this…most of it I am just rambling anyway, as I feed my need for communication…but truly…when Hermetics is grasped, and understood as completely as possible by an individual…after they have gone through what it takes to be as balanced as possible…there opens a type of life that …as close as I can describe it..is completely divine.
I have had that life….I got sidetracked. And thank you to a special person I am back onto that life. The effects since I have become better and gotten back to my Hermetic life are quite remarkable. It is still a long road ahead, but the point is…there is now a road and it’s not as rough as it was.
Concentration
Some interesting things:
Billy Graham used to say “Don’t pray for more than a minute at a time.” Well that is Protestant Christianity.
I have also been chastised by Tibetan monks for practices in meditation lasting more than ten minutes. When I first started going through IIH I would find myself in meditation for hours at a time.
Even longer when I started working the spheres and vibrating elemental sigils. Six hours has been the longest I’ve spent with an elemental in the astral plane and that was with an Undine.
This is not about bragging…it is about concentration and hand in hand with that is patience. I have noticed something rather peculiar about the New Agers I have met. They are all extremely impatient and uptight people…oddly enough. Sure, a lot of them on the surface show this calm, peaceful demeanor…but underneath and if you spend a large amount of time with a good number of them…they are a pretty rowdy bunch as far as this type of stuff is concerned. It surprised me…and I do not surprise often.
Bardon teaches you how to hone your concentration skills in IIH…it’s extremely important for successful work. It also very much does take self strength and discipline and dedication. You learn a lot about yourself on the way.
And even if you don’t plan on toning spheres or spending time communing with elementals…it is still a good quality to have.
I often smile when I find a person who is so concentrative, so into what they are doing you can tell the entire world has disappeared for them except for what they are currently involved in. If they aren’t a magician…they would make a rather exceptional one, since that concentration comes so naturally.
Children naturally have good concentration skills. Watch one once, while they are playing…especially if they are investigating something. It’s wonderful to watch. Magical even.
This type of concentration is much different from those employed in the “think it, be it” crowd. They are still wishing, shallowly concentrating on that wish, pretending on that wish. Some might even be successful to a certain degree…but then what do they do if they get their wish? They stop thinking about it, stop concentrating on it.
Reminds me of sympathetic magic. Tie some knots in a green string while you repeat a get rich now mantra then bury it under a full moon with a piece of silver as an offering and you will probably find $50.00 in a few days. But then what? What happens when that stops working?
Sympathetic magic is well and fine and it does work…but really that is all the “think it, be it” crowd is doing. There is no depth here…they do not feel it in the core of their being, they do not know it, they hope it.
With Bardon you train your concentration on your five senses. Again, all five are important. Training all five senses enables you to use more of your brain when you concentrate. You learn to sit at least for ten minutes concentrating on each sense by itself without any distraction. It takes time. It takes motivation. This is quality control. You get the training you need and then it is much easier to do the work.
A friend of mine wrote:
“Why is concentration important? After all, there is a lot of energy in the universe. All you need to do is tap into it. Just open your heart with faith, say what you want, and imagine yourself as having it. It will come to you. What is with this magical training crap?
If you want justice, there are people who have made a life long commitment to injustice. If you want wealth, there are people who will try their hardest to steal and corrupt your soul as they offer you wealth. If you have good energy to give, there are negative people who devour good energy. They take it and turn it into something horrible. And if your thoughts are positive there are people who specialize in taking positive thoughts and turning them into discord.
Concentration enables your good energy and good intentions to cut through negativity the way a laser cuts through metal. Thought is like light that falls on your skin. It gives warmth and lights your way in the dark. Synchronize the wave lengths of light and you can create temperatures that cause nuclear fusion. It becomes a power of creation. You concentrate your thoughts and they overcome what opposes them.
Athletes know how to concentrate. Martial artists know how to concentrate. Actors know how to concentrate. They can cry just by thinking a thought.
I have met masters in the business world who takes years of experience and concentrate all that knowledge into one moment when they are looking for an answer to a problem. Nothing else in the world exists but the problem they are concentrating on. Their brains are that focused.”
Last thing.. the spiritual difference. The authority with which you ask.
“I know who Christ is, I know who the other guy is, but who are you?”
Of course, a simple prayer to God puts you in touch with the divine, right??
Prayer does not assume the stance of a spiritual being that initiates new things and takes full responsibility for his actions. Prayer does not enter a spiritual plane of awareness. It does not join itself to divinity. It does not incorporate the skills of someone who labors within the “Divine Workshop.” Heh.. I almost feel like Santa right about now.
The spiritual plane for Bardon is akasha. It is a timeless and spaceless state of awareness. Akasha is the plane of causes. It is from this level that everything that exists has been created and it is here that the world is supervised and maintained. This is where you place things with great will and intent and the other three planes do what is necessary to manifest it.
The new agers have developed that law of attraction movie…
You can send out great and wonderful energy to others and to your wish. You can visualize it. Dream it. Imagine real right now. But the world may exhibit incredible inertia and massive resistance to your wish. You make a wish but laid out before you is an emotional and mental tsunami, a tornado, a pyroclastic flow. It picks you up, it picks a car up, it picks a house up and tosses them around as if they are nothing at all.
Akasha is the first key and the gateway to all the mysteries–to relax so, to be calm, to open from within, to be so still, you reflect easily within yourself the being and the life of all that exists.
The akashic plane supersedes or suspends the laws of physics and law of attraction. In other words, you can create and place causes here that do not exist on the three lower planes. On the akashic plane you can create something out of nothing. There is no equal and opposite reaction on this level of creation. With skill, training, and inspiration you can create causes that nothing can oppose.
Newton in his physics did not know about akasha. Steven Hawking does know about it and puzzles over it finding it hard to comprehend.
For Bardon, entering akasha is simply practicing a combination of concentrations.
If you do the combination of concentrations, you are within everything, you are a part of everything, you are the source of everything, and you know the original purpose behind everything that exists. And so consequently you are sovereign over everything.
Tada!
With that, I leave you for now with a small poem written by my buddy Bill:
There is no vice I can not twist or bend
And make again into its opposite virtue
There is no compulsion or obsession I can not
So fill with light it becomes kind and bright
There is no ill will or malice I can not
Convert into chivalry or true nobility
There is no crunch or karmic bind, no evil intent or design
I can not refine within my mind
Into contentment and absolute satisfaction
