Daily Work  ( been a bad few days for this)

Thursday-=- On the road again, didn’t have time to do this

Friday -=-  At one set of parents house, yep on the road again GRRRRRRR

Saturday  -=- Did the most hard core awesome angelic healing of the heart ritual ever.

Sunday -=-  Easter, Family day

Monday -=-  Feed spirits  on the road again….

Traveling with munchkins definitely changes what you have time for, rebalancing and reworking things.

Fear, Culture and the pressure to not be yourself in Pagan

Pagan culture, not paganism, often uses religion as a means to project and cast people in a bad light when you do not conform to the culture’s stated behaviors.  This changes from group to group, and in most cases if you study the groups, what tends to have individuals enforce through gossip their own code of morality.  Yes, this is my opinion, but it has happened enough to enough people that

Recently, some people, even friends, were upset with me because a Vodou ritual I did involved alcohol.    Let me go further and state, when I do shamanic work, I would use enthogens to get to the state I need to.  If you know anything about Vodou, most Vodou rituals involve some drinking ( outside of Obatalla or Damballah ) , and there is a justified reason for this.    Alcohol destroys the psychic sensor, and lowers inhibitions especially in letting go of control.   AKA it makes pocession more possible.  This is not only metaphysical sound, it is culturally supported in Vodou as well as a across multiple cultures.  In fact the Greeks, would make a tincture of Datura and Alchohol to frenzy people, or other tinctures to do so.   The Celts and Northern people have Woad, and across multiple cultures,  the use of aids to trance states is essentially a well documented fact of pre-modern religions.    In a break from tradtional anthropologically correct and well-supported positions, modern paganism has mostly demonized that use.

The Cultural malaise of paganism, who preach openness and acceptance,  is usually far from accepting.  Vodou does in fact use Alcohol in a sacred way.  The critique of people being concerned that to easily will people claim, they were drunk not processed is in fact the protestant and consistent Christianized undercurrent of modern pagan culture.  Remember, the culture is not an individual so I am attacking a cultural set of behaviors not individuals so do not get offended.   Two machete’s in your rib cages and your not processed,  your merely drunk, hand in fire you don’t get hurt, etc.    This is not only extreme sillyness as far as what is possible when you are drunk ( and keep from being hurt ), its also an extreme projection of an ethical code that is essentially Protestant over a Religion that has none of the same assumptions.   Should all rituals be done kneeling or standing in Relevance to the divine?  Should most rituals, be so “holy”, that there is no energy ( that is mostly what happens).  Most of the pagan gods were not so uptight, so why are you? 

This is only the opinion of one said author who is a Chaos Magician.  The issue touches more on our demonized relationship with any altered chemical state and really any ecstatic state.   A few books, that will remain nameless, said this is the way it is, and the pagan culture bought that demonization hook line and sinker.  Anthropologically, those positions are wholly unsupported across most cultures.   Sacred enthnogen use is there including the ritualized use of alcohol.

Now, keep in mind, I do not drink very much at all usually.  One or two beers, and I act drunk, but that’s merely a conscious choice.  I can act drunk most of the time, its funny.

            Often times, it seems a game to discredit whoever people can, for any reason.  Even friends like to play this card behind your back.   This is no different then the moral games played in Church pews across America that uses moral piety as a litmus test  for “worth”.   We can see how that is working out for the Catholic church right now.  The problem is that the gods and goddesses of old definitely were not in sync with a traditional Protestant ethical code.  When did pagans accept that, the dying rituals of a faith that is antagonistic to their believes should be modeled in action?  When did paganism decided, it was Christianity 2.0.  In a lot of ways these group pressures are just another way of doing witchcraft of the mouth, or the tendency to just tear down for its own sake.

From a purely magical technique sense, any substance that alters brain chemistry can be used to induce a trance state when used properly.    Key word there is properly, not as a “recreational” thing which is different.   Cultural prohibitions be damned, results are key.  In Vodou, as I said, there is always a bit of rum.    People also do not realize, that pocessions with some things are taxing and painful affairs for some types of spirits.  They actually hurt the mind if you tense up mentally. 

For the people who feel similarly to this, I do have some words of wisdom. 

Stop Caring about what other people think.  It is not what they think that is the problem, but the acceptance of the projection.  Understand that is far more important, in my humble opinion, to be true to yourself then the norms that a group sets.  You may not be “completely” accepted by that group, but you can in fact move toward true empowerment by staying true to yourself.   In fact, you can take the energy of those projections through gossip, sigilize them into a thoughtform/servitor, and transform them, freeing yourself from the effects of those restrictions.  Yes, the details of how to go about doing this are in Hands-On Chaos Magic , my book ( although I don’t cover this specific example).   The trick is to merely conceive of the gossip, or witchcraft of the mouth as a energy that you can gather up, personify and then transform.  Skills you will need:  Energy Manipulation, Sigil Magic, Evocation, and Servitor Creation.  … and yes those all are in Hands On Chaos Magic.

The second phase of this, is to start to enchant for the people who will accept you as you and your styles of ritual to you.    I might do this by simply using the Solar intelligences to become the center of the universe, and then draw the people toward you.  This is exactly what I am working on now actually ( I will post it as I finish it), however one way to do this is to use magnets and sevitors ( Sevitor Training is in Hands-On Chaos Magic ).

That demon is the biggest demon of them all in most sub-cultures.   

No one will be happy with what you do all the time, but other people’s ability to tear you down is endless.  This seems worse or more poignant when a culture has professed to accept all beliefs ( which is not the truth).     This isn’t to say to ignore voices of concern of people you trust, but realize in the majority of cases within a group, that will not be the voices that throw moral issues at you.    Your friends will accept you as you are.  In most cases, it is a projection of what the people believe to be the right way.  The Alcohol is one example, but I am sure, you the readers can think about others, where the pressure of a group has stopped you from doing what you want to.

The pressure to conform at multiple levels is often overwhelming.  This goes along with the cults of personality that often from with pagan groups and I realize that in many cases, the additional pressure from society makes it worse.   Personally, part of learning and developing as a magician, is to develop anti-nominal tendencies.   Basically, you begin to resist the social projections of personal morality that try to infect and control your behavior.  Stand and be yourself and tell the people who cry “morality” to keep to themselves especially if no one is getting hurt.

Intially, I was going to write a long diatribe on why I didn’t give a rats ass what people thought, because I thought it would be humorous, however this blog I feel is more useful.

Be yourself, be true to our own moral code, and stand in your own magic and techniques even if it make a few others twitch.