Unverified Personal Gnosis: The Benefits and the Dangers Part 1 of 7

What is 'unverified personal gnosis'? This is a phrase for deriving magical techniques and spiritual information from spirits, intuition, and other non-linear sources. Many of the readers out there might know this as channeling (and from the more spirit-model minded folks that's as good as any term).

Let me state three things right off the bat.
1) When used correctly, unverified personal gnosis is extremely powerful.
2) Spirits, including parts of ourselves, can and do lie.
3) We, the perceivers of that non-linear sources of information, often misinterpret the message, or more correctly, that message must integrate and bubble up through our subconscious mind. Meaning that although there is the general belief that you can separate the messenger from the message, this is not really how mind works or how the interaction with the subconscious works in my opinion. (I will justify this claim a little later).

There are multiple questions that one must ask. There are more questions that one could ask, but I will answer these to be illustrative.
1) How do I know that the spirit in question, is actually that spirit?
2) Why does that even matter?
3) How do I know that the information is credible, and by what metric do I determine this?
4) How much of the information that I am getting is a filtered set of responses from my own subconscious mind that may be influenced by parts of myself that are not helpful?
5) How do I know that the ritual or procedure will work?

How do I know the spirit in question, is actually that spirit, and does it matter if you have the actual spirit?

In some ways, you can never be sure, but who cares!!! Results and Accuracy trump all.

“Who cares about Old Information”.

It would seem from a chaos magical perspective and many people's thinking, that the battle cry is to ignore old information. The idea being that all older traditions, or previous knowledge is irrelevant as compared to the magicians interpretation and methods. This approach almost certainly leads to a tremendous use of non verified personal gnosis of different sorts. There is much power in this, but even chaos magicians have a pretty standardized set of techniques that across the board they tend to use. AKA, we fail at being cultureless in many cases. There are a set of techniques that might be core even to that cultureless culture.

This pattern is often repeated in neo-pagan, new age, and spirituality in general. The mantra is often "well this feels good", or "if it feels right is right". The question that I usually ask is, did it work? Many times there is a glaring mismatch between what feels good and what gets results. That is the first problem.

The tendency is to strongly value personal experience over previous or other forms of information, training, or experience. Being someone who actually LIKES learning from other people and one of the view people involved in chaos magic at all who have initiations in the states, there are a couple reasons for that. I like in person trainings (mostly because the information transference is so much higher). Although recently I started a larger discussion on using versus withholding information as a means to incorporate value into that information, I very much agree that more information is better when not being the devil's advocate. Essentially, the problem with using only what feels right, is when it feels right with no results, or hidden gotchas. Other people's experience provides expectations and constraints on an interaction with a spirit. Its a way of developing and maintaining limits, and because things that are established spirits have a history, we can use other people's experience as a guideline towards working with a particular spirit. Along with the experience, comes a particular set of expectations from the spirit, a certain vibe including how it looks, feels and even its personality.

Some traditional religions, will go so far as to say, that most people who do not get that formally trained are working with trickster spirits who do not have their best interest at heart when they do this. This is a level of fear to steer people towards initiation or paying money. Ideally, one take on initiations from a spirit model is to connect you to a set of spirits or energies, and then deepen that connection to the point, you can have near absolute faith, because the set of expectations and vibe is so established that you would know what it feels like instantly and have a personal experience of that entity. Certainly, I have seen people pick out the names and seals of Goetic spirits and do what feels great with little understanding of the system at all, only to have it blow up in their face. Sure, you don't always need the tools of a particular system, but at least understand why you don't need the tools. It is possible, that while you do not know the expectations, that there are external ones that a spirit might apply to you. Consider yourself warned, do your homework first even if there may be no ultimate truth.

The question is actually a loaded one that I selected for myself. In some ways, I talk about this in Hands On Chaos Magic. Really near the end of the book, I present some different ways to look at spirits. The system itself that you are working with determines a lot of the methods for verifying whether or not something is what it actually says. That said, the more information you have about the original context of the spirit is crucial. Stories and myths give you a set of information that implies not only a personality, but a vibration. If you really study the stories, and meditate on them for a spirit, you can gain an understanding of the general vibration that a spirit can have. When you start working with that vibe however, it still can be different from other people who work with the same spirit. Why? Even if you do the research, your projection of the spirit is necessarily influenced by your experience of the spirit. Usually the research only establishes a general set of information so people who are working with the same spirit can recognize similar patterns. There may or may not be an actual spirit, but there is usually an associated set of characteristics and information, and there is you... as well as a third component of what we call "a spirit", which is our interaction with what we perceive as that spirit.
That interaction is so critical that I devote 4 chapters in Hands On Chaos Magic to working with and developing relationships with spirits and concepts. The first- the quality of the interaction, is how much does the spirit get results? When you apply what they are telling you, how many results do you get? This is a level of applied rationality even skepticism. Can the information be verified? Does the channeled work get results? Should you trust a spirit who is just coming to you with critical information that first time you hear it with no context (I will actually cover this question in part 6)? Is that common sense? Assume you will get results, but double check them.

It is very hard to get a historical sense of accuracy when you do not have a history. Having gone to many spiritualist churches, this is often what they do in the training. They test their information and they get to see if it is valid with the person who is asking to pick up on the psychic vibrations (Last time I went, I was 9/10 and the 10/10 is was a relatively debatable point ) or communicate with their guides to get an accurate view of what was going on. Spiritualists will use guides that give them the information, but many of the spiritualists I have talked to will state that you have to keep testing the spirits accuracy. Essentially, the information you receive from a spirit is based on the accuracy and results that the spirit has gotten in the past. The beautiful thing about this, is that if you have a historical sense of accuracy, or results, you can measure the worthiness of your personal relationship with even spirits not in any books such as personal guides, proto-human constructs from the astral planes, stray spirits from different realms, and any other combination thereof.

Spiritualists and Practitioners of 'Hands On Chaos Magic' both agree with familiars, servitors, or guides, it may not be needed to involve a full ritual. Merely by thinking about the spirit may be enough. Well from NLP, we certain recognize that you can create an anchor that will cause you to vibrate in line with the spirit and communicate quickly. Why would you develop such a close relationship with something that could not get results or gave you inaccurate information? Just like a person in the real world, there is a period where you are building trust.

The flip side of this and the payoff, is you have a guide, or spirit which GETS accurate information or strong results consistently is extraordinarily valuable for the magician. The expectation is that it will get that set of results or accurate information and that expectation is well supported by evidence.

Feelings however are easily manipulated and somewhat problematic in the sense that the “active spirit” or part of yourself can influence the way you are feeling. If the metric is solely how it feels, this leaves a person extremely vulnerable, and it may not be the entities fault. Simply put if you just want to feel good, you will call the entity in question and feel good. No other expectation is built into the experience and thus no other pathways of results or accuracy will manifest. Despite a stated intention, the subconscious gets a different message and thus provides “a good feeling”. No more or less is expected. In this, it may not be the spirits fault at all, but how our minds interact with spiritual forces. Essentially, this becomes a function of the relationship with the spirit itself, not necessarily always the spirit. Although sometimes, the spirit is, quite simply, lying to you. It happens.

This is kind of like mental cocaine. It feels great but goes nowhere. This necessitates the development of something like what Dave Lee calls the Observer Self. Although I explicitly do not state the observer self, multiple exercises in Hands On Chaos Magic develop the ability to have an emotion, and yet reserve part of yourself to put a check on that emotional response. This is the idea of the Observer Self, the self that observes the reactions you are having and can provide a higher or meta level direction to change the direction of the reaction. Simply going into a situation willing to experience whatever, and detach from the experience after the fact will help with that perspective. You can have the most ecstatic experience of your life while channeling a spirit, god, angel, etc... but if, at first, that experience does not come with a set of external verifications, it needs to be considered in a context after the fact that includes distance. Sometimes, having an truly ecstatic experience is exactly what you need for your own development, but a lot of times, we have to ask the question- "how am I different as a result of the unverified personal gnosis? Is this something I want? Is this a good change?" I have read that many magicians refuse to keep a journal. The purpose of the journal is not only to keep historical records but really to record changes in ones states of mind, at least in part. When you change, even your writing will change and you can look at that. Also, after a internal change, you can ask yourself on a hour by hour, or even minute by minute basis. "Am I more as a result of this experience, have I changed closer to the person I really am?"

Context is King
Mediums might take issue with some of the things I am saying, and yet, a lot of the mediumship training from the spiritualists and others actually involves a process like this. Many psychics and mediums build in some mental structures to deal with the problem of trust in messages. They have a “good message” and “bad message” vibe. Most of the time, before you ever meet a real psychic, they have multitude of bruises where they have to learn this.

The determination of “good” and “bad” message depends a lot on contexts. First, even a talented psychic or medium will tend to pick up messages in line with their current state of mind if they have not mastered meditation or cleansing. I have heard more than a few psychics say that they do not do trance or fast clearing (Not real psychics/mediums- real ones will often see and agree with my argument when they will talk to me).

But then you give them this thought experiment. Hypnotize them. Tell them in hypnosis that time is slowing down greatly. Then have them go through the process of mediumship while in that time slowed down. Sure enough there is some stage very quickly where the light flows over them, or they find their own genius, or they align to their soul. All of these are a form of clearing their mind and going into a trance. Usually, they just have set up a set of anchors, or naturally have the neural pathways, that this happens fast and they come out fast. Anyone can build these. The techniques are very accessibly described in 'Hands On Chaos Magic'. Just use an anchor to a spirit in 'Hands On Chaos Magic' repeatedly and see what happens when you start doing that more and more..

Most non-linear messages have a certain vibe. If you work with spirits a lot, and have built up great rapport through what I mention above, and have done the homework so that you know what spirit is what, you might be able to say this message has this vibe. It still has to bubble up from the subconscious. If you have a lot of trust in that spirit, or part of your own mind (spirits actually being easier to work with in this case), the validity of the message is based upon the trust reaction. As I stated, if the system is based solely on emotional reaction, there is a lot of room for problems. Now, I have seen a few tendencies out in the general populace.

1) 80% of the time, the emotional reaction technique might even be good with people who have experience with this (and that is because they have internalized a procedure to differentiate between “good” “bad” the messages coming in), but that 20% of the time is the killer. It's where things can go terribly wrong on occasion. AN EXAMPLE: A psychic/medium states something along the lines of "Oh I feel like you should break up with your husband/wife." When they think about it, something about the energy in the husband/wife reminds them of something their past, they want to avoid but isn't really about the situation you are in. This happens more often than people would like to believe, since ultimately, again the message has to bubble up through the subconscious mind of the diviner using unverified personal gnosis, meaning it can be influenced by the interactions of that persons subconscious mind (we'll talk about this in part 4). If your emotions are compromised, the message is compromised or will be giving a different way that relays a different set of information.
2) When some people start out, they will channel everything to get answers to every possible situation. What is really going on, is a externalization of their life so they have the illusion of being more in touch. It's a sort of addiction, because it feels good. It allows the person to remove personal responsibility from themselves and place it on the messenger. “Oh things are bad because the spirit gave me bad advice”. However, except in very specific instances, I doubt the spirits will care what color shoes you wear. Again, it feels great, but in a way it's similar to other addictions that actually drain the power of the channeler, because it removes your agency.

A well trusted connection might still have mistakes, but usually you understand the “vibe” and what perspective that vibe would have. AKA you have an understanding of the spirit or part of yourself, and understand that based on the context of that where the spirit is coming from. The good or bad switch method when your model provides less context. If a trusted spirit gives you some information, and it is certainly some information that it might have, it is going to be first colored by the set of information and vibe you associate from it, as well as your reaction to the vibe.

For instance, if Papa Legba, a trickster sometimes with some paths, comes to me with popcorn in hand, and says "let me know how this works out for you, I am going to sit and watch", well I am going to pause a little (and that doesn't mean he is saying don't do it, sometimes he does just watch while I am doing non-Vodou rituals and then often I will have dreams where he is like "Watching you is the best entertainment, although try this and this next time"). Now dreams are very much a non-verified gnosis. The value of those dreams depends a lot on how much I trust this spirit. It could be that I try what he is saying and it works a lot better. The popcorn and watching can be a contextual warning if certain mannerisms are there, but that comes from the interaction and my understanding and trust in that interaction.

Overestimating Success
We want to believe. We want to have the supernatural. We want to have something more and beautiful reality is far more fluid. Expecting success often brings success, but the flip side is overestimating success when there is limited success has the opposite effect. The impact of this comes when you are working with a spirit that occasionally does get results. So it gets a success, and the person is overjoyed. It gives you an accurate picture. The next time, it doesn't produce as good of results. In fact, in some cases, it only produces accurate reads one out 6 times, but each time we get so over-ecstatic with the one time it did get an accurate read that we overlook the five times it didn't on average. This happens because many of us want to believe, and it's wonderful to do so, but to overlook failures means that we are ignoring needed feedback towards getting more accurate and trustworthy information. Remember, it's not always that the spirit is lying to us, or that the visions are wrong, often it is us and a process of fine tuning the relationship from our side of the equation.

How can 'Hands On Chaos Magic' Help.
Besides placing the unverified gnosis into a historical construct, I actually give a few methods of improving the connections between you and the spirits you are conversing with. Equally, some methods contained in the book will help you develop better intuition and scrying.

Step one: Learn to relax and meditate. Your surface thoughts will influence any attempt to get information through unverified means. The first few chapters of 'Hands On Chaos Magic' go over this.

Step Two: Control and manipulate your own emotions. Be the master of your emotions.
Chapter 14, is particular good, but all the energy exercises will help.

Step Three: Treat channeling as a full ritual. Chapter 5 will help you clarify the information through dedicated sensory manipulation. Chapter 25 will directly help with conversations and invocations needed to help them occur. Give the channeling the full pomp of a ritual. This helps at first to remove the surface thoughts and give force you into a different mindset.

Part 2 of 7, The Impact of connection on the subconscious mind

Part 1 of 7 Finito.