Head For the Red

eBook Page Fixed

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 10:39:08 PST

Apparently, my eBook page was acting up and the PayPal buttons weren't working. After hacking into the code, I discovered some missing form fields. No idea how that happened. They were working fine up until a month or so ago.

But it's fixed. You can now order my stuff using both PayPal and Google Checkout, whichever you prefer.

If anyone runs into any problems purchasing eBooks, Red Work Courses, or any Applied Hermetics services, please let me know.

In my Lifetime

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 11:18:27 PST

In my lifetime, the Moon will be colonized.

This is awesome. Ever since I was a child reading Science Fiction genre books, I've been watching the hard truths of reality overcome the aspirations of countless humans who took it for granted that some day we would be living on the Moon. I'm almost 40 now, and after the 90s and the first decade of the 21st century, I'd about given up on it. The last 20 years have seen some of the biggest boom times of our history, and even with all that money, we weren't living on the Moon.

But at last, they're starting to make the strides necessary to get us off the planet. It's important to us as a species. The planet's a temporary home, at best. And I don't mean spiritually, though that's true enough.

I don't know how far we'll get. We've got a lot of issues as a species that need to be worked out. What good is spreading the hatred and violence we lavish on one another to the stars going to do the universe at large? And who says we're even smart enough to manage it?

The path of Hermetics that I follow leads to joining in the choirs of angels that live beyond the terrestrial sphere. It's all about taking my place in the brotherhood of trans-material entities who travel freely between the planets. I focus my efforts in the spiritual realms, but I'm proud of my human brothers and sisters who are taking it to the material plane as well.

It's All One Thing that Functions as if It were Lots of Things

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 12:19:43 PST

Today's post is inspired by the discussions on whether or not "it" is "all in your head" and stuff. Fr. SEA, Jason Miller, Patrick Dunn, and Eion Keith Boyle have weighed in, making various points from various perspectives. My name came up in Fr. SEA's comments, so I feel obliged to throw in my two cents' worth. The title sums up my position, everything below is just commentary on it.

The way I see it, it's all One big Thing, this existence we experience, and it all comes from One Source, and it's all still connected, and it can only be truly appreciated when you look at it as a whole.

But it all manifests as if it were independent. I am of God, but not God, even though I'm an extension of God. I experience my world as if I were separate from it, an object within a field of objects that all interact and are interdependent, but still with definable borders between "me" and "not me."

The various spiritual experiences and the meanings we discern from these experiences fall somewhere on the spectrum between "It's all One Thing" and "It's all separate things." Both ends of the spectrum are true and useful for various contexts, and where you're at consciously on that spectrum depends a lot on what you're dealing with.

If I'm focusing on Ascension and Theurgy, I tend to get more solipsistic. If I'm focusing on changing my world, I tend to focus more on the individuation of the All Thing. Most of the time, I'm practical about my life, and regardless of whether it's all in some big Universal Mind or not, I have to deal with the expressions of that Mind as if they weren't all the same thing.

But when I don't have to focus on the individuations of the All Thing, I can focus on how it's just a big beautiful process, that just goes on and on in awesomeness.

Spirits are as separate from me as I am from you. They are also as connected. Compassion, my least favorite of spiritual lessons, has taught me that what I do to and for myself impacts others, and that matters in the grand scheme of things. Wisdom has taught me that at the same time, I'm not personally responsible for your decisions or circumstances. I'm obligated to help where I can, and I'm obligated to not help where I cannot.

It's a balance. You move your awareness along the spectrum to deal with the context you're addressing. I don't expect to ever be "at one with the All Thing" any more (or less) than I am now. If that were the point, I wouldn't have ever manifested separately in the first place. As far as I can tell, I get to be separate for as long as separation exists, and no one's shared the scheduled date for the return to Cosmic Singularity with me.

Most of the time, it hasn't mattered much that it's all One Thing. That "truth" just helps me keep some things in perspective, some of the time. Other times, it just gets on my nerves.

Post Title Undetermined

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 09:19:14 PST

I don't have any kind of formal post in mind today, but these are some random thoughts passing through my mind about Teachers in general. Approaches to teaching, phases we go through, things we think about. Moods that come and go.

They're all things I've thought or felt at various times as a teacher, some more often than others. They're also things I see in my fellow teachers of occultism, and if you're a blogger, you're included in that category in my cosmogram.

Everybody's a Fucking Idiot but me, so send Me your Money!
Oh my GOD, this is AWESOME SHIT right here, you gotta fuckin' TRY it, like NOW! Hurry, you're just wasting time!
Fuck this shit. I quit.
To date, these are the things I've learned, but there's a lot more to go. I'll put it in words that work best for me, but you'll have to figure out the meaning in your own way, or discover a meaning behind the symbols that is better suited for where you're at in your life's context.
Oh my god, no one ever listens to me! I've been saying that shit for years, for fuck's sake. Jesus, people, catch the fuck up.
FUCK! I was wrong... still no refunds.
If you had only done the research, and the practical Work related to it, you wouldn't be arguing with me. Try it some time, and then you'll see that I'm right, or you'll at least be better qualified to argue with me.
Holy shit, I'm more enlightened than YOU!? Fuck.
Some shit works, some shit doesn't. The journey's not that great, and the destination is less pleasant than anticipated. And I'm pretty sure they made it that way on purpose just to keep you moving on.
No shit, Sherlock.
Oh my god, really? Really!? I need a drink.
Hey, this is stuff that helped me achieve a measure of happiness that I am currently enjoying. Hope it works for you as well as it works for me.
You're doing it wrong.
I will RULE TEH WORLDS!!! And you can rule yours too!
You did what? And it did what? Sweet! I gotta try that some time.
You're doing it right!
Now what?
Hmmm. That's interesting. Let me think about it.
I used to be an adventurer like you.

I think that about covers the moods and approaches I've been through since starting out in this teaching gig, not necessarily in any kind of chronological order. Ego, ambition, disappointment, excitement, the thrill of the hunt.

It's interesting how many of them are more about other people than about where I'm at and where I'm going. Relationships with other people are important, apparently. And I have an inclination to think I'm right that is usually justifiable, but maybe not as accurate as I'd like to think.

And there's an irritability that drives a lot of my Work, a certain Holy Dissatisfaction that keeps me moving onward and upward. That's neat. Should have gotten its own post, probably.

I don't think there's anything particularly wrong with feeling any of these ways at different times, except that first one, and most of us get past that before we really start becoming useful teachers. I cycle through most of the rest regularly.

I don't really know why I'm posting this. Usually when I write the random-thought posts, they sit in the draft bin for years before I get around to deleting them. But I think I'm posting this so you'll think about how teachers are, how they act, and remember that they're people of varied interests and moods, just like you. Learn from people, but take what they're saying with a grain of salt. Sometimes they're brilliant, other times they're assholes, and in the end it's all beautiful.

Until you take an arrow to the knee.

NYNY: Some Enchanted Evening

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 11:04:50 PST

I'm behind schedule on the New Year, New You Experiment.

The RO household is packed with four birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Eve between November 21 and January 25. It's the busiest two months of my year, and it physically, mentally, and especially financially kicks my ass every year.

This year has been as busy and tiring and costly as ever, but I've made it through son's birthday, Thanksgiving, daughter's birthday, Christmas, New Year's, and now my wife's birthday. Only one daughter's birthday left to go, and that's already planned and paid for, and I don't have to do nothin' else to support that.

Halleluiah!

So, as the bandwidth becomes available, I'm allocating it to my other projects. I'm still in the Clean Up phase in some things, specifically the courses. I've got client work backed up that I have to catch up on too. My wife helped me get the time to do a lot of course writing over the Christmas vacation, and one of my students helped with editing support (thanks Alex!), but I keep thinking "there's still a lot left to do before I'm ready to start focusing on the actual radical transformation through magic."

And that's my biggest hurdle. There's always something else to do before I can get started on something else.

So I'm changing the scope of the project. My new goals for this Experiment are:

Old Business - Finish it.
New Business - Start it.

With that in mind, here's my planned Enchanted Evening:

On a Mercury Day, in a Mercury Hour (tonight around 7:30), perform the Mercury Gate rite with the following statement of intent:

Raphael, Tiriel, Taphthartharath, thou spirits of Mercury ever flowing, encapsulators of Idea into Form, aid me in the accomplishment of the tasks at hand. Empower me, inspire me, bring me the eloquence to express clearly the Mysteries I have seen. Aid me in the completion of the Red Work series of Courses, and the completion of all outstanding Old Business. Let it flow cohesively into being from the Mind of God through me into the finished work projected into the minds of those called to receive the Hermetic revelations I've been granted. Let the right word be ever present, let no writer's block stand in my way. Grant the peace of mind that comes from all things being in their place accomplishing their function, that I may focus clearly on the tasks at hand. Bring the Old Business to conclusion quickly, completely, and to the satisfaction of all who read it.

Or something like that. Definitely along those lines. I'm not going to focus on New Business until the end of the Old Business is in sight. I keep finding more and more Old Business that I never finished, and that's got to end. If this doesn't do it, I may have to resort to Saturnine and Martial forces to get the work done.

Top Traffic Source: Piracy!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 07:06:20 PST

So, checking some blog stats, I found the number one search term that brings visitors to my site is this:

restitution ro rufus opus "restitution for piracy"

TROLOLOLOLOL!

Ok, you piratin' bitches, hope you landed here this time, so I can set you straight:

ALL CURSES ARE LIFTED.

There is no curse on anyone anywhere on the planet as a result of pirating my work, in any way, shape or form. You're forgiven.* I lifted the curse a year or more ago after adjusting my business perspective on the whole piracy thing. I still disapprove, but it generates buzz about my work, and that leads to more sales, so, whatever.

Point is, there is no curse on you if you pirated my stuff, ok? If your life sucks, it's not because you pirated my work, specifically, it's just because life sucks. So use that shit you pirated to make it a better place.

* You want to pay for your crimes? Send me an email and I'll send you a $50 invoice to absolve your conscience. Money's not required to lift the curse, but I love money, and if it makes you feel better to send me some, by all means, do so! And I'll even send you an official "No worries!" email absolving you of any subsequent pangs of guilt.

The Initiatory Work of the Traditional Grimoires

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 13:49:03 PST

When you go through the painstaking process of creating all the tools, talismans, implements, and Magic Circles of the traditional grimoires with the heart of the true magician, on fire and enflamed with the passion of your true Love, you go through one of the most rigorous and life changing initiations possible.

The creation of a real talisman, from raw metal to finished, engraved, consecrated talisman is a process of transformation that is Alchemical in every sense of the word. After you've made and consecrated a talisman, you've interacted with the Four Elemental Kingdoms in all three of their phases, you've spent an extended time in the presence of the spirit who works through the talisman, and that interaction as you and it worked together to create the finished thing and brought it into being in the material plane has forever changed the harmonics of your sphere. You've been tuned through the properties of spiritual resonance.

When someone like Mr. Ashen or Mr. Cecchetelli goes through the process of creating the tools for his Solomonic rites, he's going through that initiatory process of talisman creation at every stage of the preparation. His heart's aflame with the passion of his intent, and that intent blazes through the Spheres, a clarion call to the Spirits.

How many of these initiations do they go through to perform something like a conjuration from the Lemegeton's Goetia? How many times do they end up inscribing the Ten Names and Seals of the Intelligences of the Spheres? At least twice, for the lion's skin belt, and for the Magic Circle they stand within. You make a MAgic Circle full size, and it's incredible how you feel standing in the center as the paint dries. You feel the spirits aiding you as you write out their names, and if you're trying to do it without the right heart, the right attitude of reverence, they invariably smack you down and make you start again.

It's a Holy process.

A process of transformation.

If you're having a hard time seeing and hearing the spirits, take a few months and devote it to creating all the implements of the grimoire of your choice. The Almadel, the Arbatel, the Ars Paulina, the True Grimoire, the Art of Drawing Spirits into Crystals, Crossed Keys, the Order of the Black Powdered Octopus, The Greater Key of Solomon, Abramelin, Samekh, the exercises in Strategic Sorcery or Protection and Reversal Magic.

Do them well, do them honest, do them pure and true, or as true as you can, and it will start that process of change that leads to the visible and audible manifestation of spirits.

Unless you're spiritually blind and deaf. It's a condition that some people have, and it's nothing to be ashamed of, although it's certainly frustrating. If you've gone to all the work of putting together a straight, by-the book rite, and you've performed it at the appropriate astrological timing, and you've meant every word you've uttered, from the heart, and you're still not getting anything, and you've done it a lot more than once with zero results, don't despair. There are several grimoires that suggest working with a seer because the simple fact is this: Everyone doesn't see or hear spirits. That doesn't mean the magic doesn't work, it just means some folks are deaf and blind to the spirit world for whatever reason.

And who knows... it might be for a very good reason.

Transform this decayed form... to MUMRA! The EVER-LIVING!!!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:21:09 PST

As I prepare for tonight's Jupiter rite (3 minutes and counting), I can't get that Mumra thing out of my head.

Without the "Evil" part, and without nearly as much maniacal laughter afterwards, that's how I feel when I conjure up my HGA before doing the rites.

NYNY: Doing Something Nice... For Myself?

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 10:34:38 PST

Man...

I look at the writing prompt for the New Year New You Experiment this week, and I'm all... whoa, WTF, Deb? Do something nice for ME?

I can't even think of anything that would be nice to do for myself...

[pause to go re-read Deb's Prompt]

Ok, so I went back and re-read the list of things she suggests for pampering yourself, and I think I maybe might have possibly figured out what the problem is...

I already do all that stuff, whenever I want to.

* A salted caramel hot cocoa from Starbucks at a bookstore where you look at French Vogue and pretend you're part of GossipGirl

I got a Caramel Frappuccino last time I went to Target and just sat and drank it there in the store, browsing through the blogs on my phone, enjoying that I'm awesome amongst the awesomest friends and co-Workers.

* A bottle of Prosecco, bread, fruit, cheese and dried meats and your favorite book.

Literally had a plate of jalapeno jack, peperoni, and the fancy crackers (not the Ritz, the ones in the box that only have a single row that they sell above the cheeses) just two nights ago.

* An hour playing a video game you never have time for

Bitch, please! I've always got an hour for video games! That's how I stay sane! Dead Island is my current favorite, I just can't seem to get into MW3, and Skyrim takes some commitment.

* Going to a yoga class and then feel smug about the sundae you eat afterwards.

Heh, I don't go to yoga classes, but I DID buy myself a gallon of Rocky Road last time I was at the grocery store, and actually got a couple bowls before the kids murdered it.

* Buying yourself a small luxury item just because (flowers, cashmere socks, a favorite magazine, a new lipstick).

I bought myself a Sonic Screwdriver the week before Christmas, just because sonic screwdrivers are cool.

* A car ride in the countryside with your favorite music playing

I take the back roads home on the way home from work when I want that.

* A long bath

I prefer showers, the kind where you ever so slightly make it warmer a little at a time until you're standing in almost pure hot water, right where you know if you go a little further you'll end up all Two-Face:

And I did that Monday, for like an hour.

* A massage

My wife gave me a heavenly one last week.

* A pedicure (it's good for boys too, I assure you)

For real, I gave myself one last night before reading her list of suggestions. My son had gotten my wife one of those foot-callous remover things for Christmas, and I totally used it and trimmed my nails and rubbed my feet with balm.

* A mini marathon of your favorite trashy telly show with your favorite indulgence (smoking, drinking, junk food, etc.)

Spent a while last night watching Warehouse 13, Doctor Who (the Tom Baker episodes), and Torchwood on Netflix while eating a whole tub full of reheated roast beast with mashed potatoes and gravy.

So... yeah, I don't know if this counts or not.

On Visible Conjurations

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 12:48:26 PST

Fraters Ashen and Cecchetelli, two magicians who I respect highly as individuals and co-Workers in the divine sense, have recently posted their views regarding the visible appearance of spirits to magicians when performing grimoire magic. I do not disagree with any of their statements or conclusions, but I do have concerns about their emphasis on the visibility of spirits and the ability to clearly hear the spirits speak.

Mr. Ashen has made it clear that he doesn't believe your average guy walking down the street, peeking in through a window during a conjuration is going to see the spirits the magician sees during the rite. I'm pretty sure Mr. Cecchetelli would also agree that the things the magician "sees" during the ritual are not necessarily going to be seen by anyone else standing in the room with him.

Mr. Ashen presents a cogent theory about why this happens. If you don't have the framework to mentally process the presence of the spirit, you don't see it. He gives the following example:

An excellent story I heard from my anthropology class was about a researcher who went to investigate the powers of a shaman somewhere in the south Asian jungles. The shaman was curing an afflicted boy who's disease was caused by a local demon the village people said. .... During the exorcism, the tribes folk all saw the demon fly out of the boy and break a limb of a tree with its body as it left. The anthropologist was present, felt strong winds arise and witnessed the breaking limb but could not see the demon.... A great case study as I recall, the researcher was amazed and quite disturbed but didn't have the "aptitude" or mental language to see the spirit directly.. In the realm of hypnosis and mental/unconscious comprehension ... You see this a lot.

And this is why I'm concerned about the emphasis: if you don't have the 'aptitude' or mental language to see the spirit directly, you will not see it.

Most people simply do not have that aptitude when they begin practicing magic. Mr. Ashen talks about how his ability to "see" and "hear" the spirits grew over time. He didn't start out seeing and hearing spirits clearly. Mr. Cecchetelli also talks about how he had been doing magic for a while before he began to see and hear the spirits. No one, not even Lisiewski believes the spirits are going to be visible to everyone during a conjuration. There's too much evidence to the contrary in the grimoires themselves, and all through the historic source material of the grimoires, and in our personal experiences with the spirits. The spirits appear only to the magician conjuring them, or their scrying assistants.

The ability to see and hear the spirits comes, in my experience, after you've started contacting the spirits. The more time you spend with them, the more you become like them. As you reclaim your divine heritage and come to terms with your role in existence, you get the senses you need to be able to interact with your spiritual co-creators in the hierarchy of spirits that manifest the World. The Great Work transforms you from a lump of mostly flesh and bone with some basic urges to survive and a curiosity about this whole "magic" business into a consciously aware Creator and Maintainer of your existence, the half-god, half-human fulcrum between the manifest and unmanifest realms who ascends to the heavens and returns in power to create their world.

It's a process. You develop the skills to see and hear the spirits over time.

And until you do, you aren't going to be able to see anything, or hear anything. That doesn't mean your results aren't real. If you set your expectations at the outset of your conjuration endeavors at visible appearance and audible voices, you're going to fail. If you reject all your experiences that aren't in line with this expectation, you'll reject everything that happens that leads to the ability to see and hear the spirits.

I've talked to people who have performed the very strict requirements of the Lemegeton's Goetia, including the making of the lion skin belt, who have had visible and audible manifestations of the spirits. I've also talked to a few people who bought the lion skin and made the belt the way the grimoire says who experienced absolutely nothing. It's not the belt that makes the magician.

I've never made or used a lion skin belt. The system I use is based on the Art of Drawing Spirits into Crystals. I reduced the complexity to write up the Modern Angelic Grimoire and provide new magicians with everything they need to perform effective conjurations the same day they buy the book. I did so because it's most important to me to get more people doing magic.

When I perform conjurations, I use an even more modified adaptation of the Modern Angelic Grimoire. I use a cigar box that I've got wired up to light an LED after the current passes through a metal talisman placed across two electrodes poking up through The Box. The LED lights up my crystal ball, which rests on an bezel. The crystal ball sits in the center of the Table of Practice from the Modern Angelic Grimoire.

I'm so far removed in my practice from the original Art of Drawing Spirits into Crystals that I doubt whoever wrote it originally would be able to discern that I based my practice on that manuscript.

Yet I have used this method to conjure spirits across the spectrum of Hermetic spiritual hierarchies to visible and audible appearance. I have "actually witnessed the poundings on the wall, flashes of light, smells, moans, screams, voices, and visible appearance of a spirit," as Mr. Ashen puts it, even though my methodology is vastly different from his. I've felt that divine bliss Mr. Ashen attempts* to describe towards the end of his post.

But I will still tell my students that these phenomena do not matter, at least, at first. They are not required for successful magic, and poltergeist activity does not guarantee you'll get the things you're Working towards in your conjuration. What good is it to have a haunted house if you're not getting any Work done?

And I have yet to meet any magician who has experienced this stuff from the very beginning of their work, although I've met plenty of magicians who spent hundreds on lion skins and made their belts to specification who had as much to show for their efforts as someone who printed out a Table of Practice and a Lamen and used a coffee mug full of colored water to scry into.

Yet I also understand why he says, "To me, its a cop out, I smile yet feel sorry for the new magicians who settle for these words."

It does sell the whole experience short to say that this stuff "doesn't matter" at all. It is important, nothing transforms your perspective on what we're doing with magic quite like a visible and audible spirit manifesting in front of you. The idea that this stuff never happens, or should never be expected by the magician at best robs the student of the possibility of something cool, but at worst leaves them completely unprepared for when it actually happens. I personally believe that if you spend time conjuring spirits, sooner or later you will see and hear some weird shit.

And that's awesome.

If you want that kind of result, if you require that level of manifestation to overcome your doubts about the veracity of your practice, and these particular manifestations in your mind will serve to prove to your skeptical self that you really are experiencing the spirits and not just imagining things, then by all means, go for it. I would advise that you temper your expectations, and not take failure to see the visions or hear the voices right off the bat as a reason to give up. Keep at it, and sooner or later you will see enough to believe.

And frankly, the closer I've gotten to the actual instructions in the grimoires, the more manifestations I've seen. Mr. Ashen made me an ebony wand to the specifications given in the Art of Drawing Spirits into Crystals, and when I use it, the air is filled with power from the moment I pick it up, and the visions of the spirits in the crystals come through with more clarity than when I do not. It's like I don't have to try as hard to see what they're trying to show me.

But to me, the proof of your magical effectiveness is not found in the visions or sounds you hear during a rite. The proof is in the transformation of your life, and the consistency of your results over time.

* I say "attempts" only because it's precisely the kind of experience that can't be described accurately; Mr. Ashen does as good of a job at describing it as is humanly possible.

Happy New Year

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 10:04:20 PST

Well, still trying to finish up my clean up stuff with the NYNY Experiment. It's New Year's Eve, and I've got about 11 hours to do about 8 hours' worth of writing and rewriting. It can be done!

But I'm taking a break now to get a Happy New Year's post up because otherwise I'll forget, and I really wanted to wish you all the VERY BEST YEAR OF YOUR LIFE.

Personally.

Cosmic Currents Flowing Toward Increase

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 12:07:37 PST

In other news, having passed the Winter Solstice, the days are getting longer. PLVS LVX, I said in the last post, More Light. That's a good thing for those of us stuck in the cold bleak wintery regions of the planet*.

Jupiter went Direct today, or it will sometime if it hasn't yet. Months of retrograde are gone, and we can again tap into the current of his blessings and expansion and have it be without detriment. This is good.

And the Moon is now Waxing. The time of the Unmanifest passing into the Manifest realms is upon us.

In the darkest hours of the coldest season, the momentum of the world shifts, and slowly begins to flow in new directions.

This Thursday, in other words, is a really good time to start doing some Jupiter Manifestation magics. Also, it's a good time to start that whole "Getting in touch with your HGA consciously" thing.

Do magic.

Create your world.

Like a boss.

* This year, not so bad. Sunny and warm right up til Christmas, the worst part was just the rain. I can handle cold rain. Global Warming: Terrible catastrophe, may bring the END OF THE WORLD, but also may bring Texas like weather to Baltimore. Gotta look on the bright side of things, yo.

Happiest of Hermetic Holidays

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 10:08:11 PST

So I had a tearful Christmas night. I was listening to Oh Holy Night on the radio on the way home from looking at The Miracle on 34th Street here in Baltimore, and I started tearing up when it got to this part:

Long lay the world in sin and error pining
til he appeared
and the soul felt its worth
a thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices
for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn
Fall on your knees
Oh Hear the Angel voices,
Oh night divine
Oh night when Christ was born.

It was the "Hear, the Angel Voices" part at first. Because you know, I Work with them. They're awesome. They celebrated the night Christ was born, the choirs of the heavens filled the sky with the music of the spheres.

But the more I thought about it, the more the song made sense to me on a deeper level. Long lay the world in sin and error pining, til he appeared, and the soul felt its worth. It's the night the Logos took flesh to come down to the material world and show mankind once and for all there is no separation between Mankind and Godkind, that we are family, all twinkling manifestations of Light in Extension, and the darkness of the world cannot ever change that, no matter what we do.

I talk a lot about how the Enneads of Plotinus showed me how the point of the Neoplatonists was to reclaim the divine race of humanity, to discover its eternal value. That's the song's central theme. And I got it, that thrill of hope, and weary with the state of things in this world, I too rejoiced. Yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.

So we've made it through the darkest part of the year, and now the days will grow longer, and the Sun shall return to us again. Each day, there will be more light. PLVS LVX. More Light.

I don't know how you celebrated making it through the longest night this year. I do know a substantial number of you readers don't celebrate the birth of Christ as the most awesomest thing evar, and I understand the many reasons for that.

But however you celebrated this year, I hope it was beautiful.

Now, get ready, because here comes the Sun.

Crisis!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 10:28:59 PST

Frankincense prices are going to be going up. Stock up now.

Also, if you live in areas where it will grow, consider planting some trees now. They're in danger of being lost due to over-harvesting and global climate changes, and just bad farming techniques. I don't think my area is warm enough year round to support them, but I'm going to try to raise some here. Maybe I can build them a shelter, or keep them in a greenhouse in the winter or something. Maybe global warming will change the climate enough to make it a viable crop around here, who knows.

Magic, Magic, Everywhere!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 11:49:43 PST

So a friend posted something on FB about how great it is that pacifiers were invented, and I got one of those weird interests in it, and googled the history of pacifiers. I don't know why it sparked my interest, but I just sort of figured they've been around forever because most parents learn on their own in the first couple of weeks that if you put your finger in their mouths, they stop crying and fall asleep. I figured humans have been using them for 10,000 years in one form or another, and I wanted to see what a neolithic pacifier might have looked like.

It turns out the modern pacifier goes back to the 1600s, at least. And look at this:

In England in the 17th–19th centuries, a coral meant a teething toy made of coral, ivory or bone, often mounted in silver as the handle of a rattle.[1] A museum curator has suggested that these substances were used as "sympathetic magic"[2] and that the animal bone could symbolize animal strength to help the child cope with pain.
-Wikipedia

Magic. It's everywhere. Why the fuck would I give a shit about the history of the human pacifier? I dunno. Seemed interesting at the time. And I found magic in it.

This New Year, New You thing Deb's doing is important. Radical transformation of your life through applied magic. Magic's in the cracks and crevices of every aspect of existence because it's how the universe works.

And we have the privilege, the honor of being called to this, chosen to be magicians. Everyone doesn't get that calling. Everyone doesn't get shown the keys to the manifestation process of the universe. We're a specialized elect group among humanity. Shamans, priests, magicians. We stand as the fulcrum between the worlds Above and the worlds Below, we speak things into being, encapsulating the invisible inspirations and ideas into symbolic form that take on layers of existence as they come down the chain of manifestation into being.

That's my model, anyway, basically the water vapor cycle. Ascend, condense, fall, evaporate, repeat, but it's magic and not water.

Whatever model works for you, use it. Create your world.

Losing Weight, like Magic

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 19:23:17 PST

Eighth Sphere magic is really good for weight loss. Last year around this time, give or take a month, I was around 220, and by the end of winter I was back up to around 230. Spring hit and I lost some weight, and my wife went on a diet, and I lost some more. I made it down to 217, and then started creeping back up until a month or so ago.

Before Thanksgiving, I decided I wasn't going to get fat this winter. I weighed myself then, and I was at 226. It was getting colder, and I knew I wouldn't be doing much exercise, and the holidays were coming. So I did some magic, 8th Sphere style.

I went into myself and raised my metabolism, ever so slightly. I did it by meditating on it for a couple of minutes. Pictured the chain of manifestation from the Idea world of the Nous to the manifest corpulence, and just sort of raised the vibration of the body manifestation current a bit so it would result in a slightly higher metabolism. You wouldn't believe how very subtle the changes were. Sooooo subtle.

And then I just went about my business. I ate holiday food, ice cream and pie and more pie, and cookies and cakes and egg nog til I was sick once, and then I had a little more pie, because I like pie.

And this morning I'm looking in the mirror after showering, and I wasn't disgusted by my front proportions. As much. So I weighed myself at work,* and I'm down to 213. Two weeks ago I was at 216. Considering the millions of calories I ate, I've got to say, not bad.

Do I recommend it? No, it's dangerous. Taking conscious control over shit that's designed to be autonomous can lead to fucked up bullshit, like blown livers. I know how to fix anything I might fuck up, I go to Raphael of Mercury for shit I don't understand about health, and he takes care of me, or clients. So having a strong relationship with the Archangel of Mercury leaves me with the confidence to make those kind of adjustments, in really small amounts, but I don't advise it to anyone else.

But man, it's convenient.

Pie.

*I don't own a scale. If I need to know how much I weigh, I'll find one somewhere. If it's that important. Oh, and work has a scale for their Biggest Loser contest, which they cancelled because the Virginia office and the Baltimore office were getting really evil with each other in the competition.

Business Booster Reports

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 15:32:31 PST

I suspect a lot of my friends and colleagues secretly think I'm insane when it comes to the Business Booster rites.* I charge $1,200 for it. That's one thousand, two hundred dollars right there. Insane, right? Who's going to invest over a grand in magic?

Smart people. That's who.

I got this update today in my email:

Just wanted to update you on progress. So far my productivity increased, I estimate it's worth approximately 15,000 per year net income. I also just received word I will be receiving an additional 16,000 per year for some new areas of responsibility I will be taking on (requiring at most 4 hours of work per month). Overall [the Business Booster rite is] resulting in approximately a 15% increase in net annual income. So basically if a person is willing to work hard, and do the magic work, the business booster program is a no-brainer for wealth enhancement.

Your program has been great and I wish for others to tap into this financial method in these times of the tight economy.

15% increase in net income? So if he invested $1,200, and he's getting back $32,000, the Return on Investment (ROI=(Gain on investment-Cost of investment)/Cost of investment) the client saw is about 25:1. Not too shabby!

Now, not everyone has the same degree of success. My initial trial run test subject increased his business by a lot more, while another client in very different circumstances saw very little in the way of wealth, although they did manage to break even (which was also a huge increase, as he'd been losing money before the rite).

Another client brought me in at his business's inception, and he's still in the exploratory phase of launching the business. He hasn't seen any large windfalls, but his success rate has been consistently high. He's in FOREX trading, and with the volatility of the global economy, I understand his conservative approach. I'm saving up some money to invest with him when he gets things going, and then I'll be blessing the FUCK out of his work. Weekly.

But the people who have taken the rites seriously, done their part to draw down the powers and build on the foundation we lay down in the Saturn Rite have consistently seen really incredible increases in profit. 15-30% increases. In this economy.

You better believe I do this for myself. Cha-Ching!

And as word spreads among the business community (really slowly, because who's going to admit they use angels to improve their business over a martini power lunch?), and the clients start getting bigger and richer, I'll be able to charge more and more for this.

Heh.

Heh heh.

Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!

I love it when magic works like it's supposed to. Like in the deal.

* Probably for other things too, but that's a thousand other posts.

NYNY: Prompt 1 - Make Way!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 11:52:59 PST

GTFO the way, RO's coming!

That's how I figure the universe feels whenever I start getting organized.

The first prompt of the New Year, New You experiment is about Making Way, clearing out the old crap that stand in the way of whatever we've got planned.

I posted three of my major projects I'd like to tackle this year, and when I stilled my mind enough to really think about getting started on it, my mind just sort of shut down. See, I'm a busy guy. A very busy guy. Back in April I started doing major Jupiter rites on a regular basis, and the expansion and flow of blessings came right in. A lot. And brought a lot of work with it.

So I need to clear things out before I even have the space to think about starting anything new. The major things I've got to get done are finishing up the Red Work series of courses, and a ton of client work.

I don't have any house cleaning to do. I didn't get married so I could do house work, yo. All you magicians with dirty houses should get a wife.*

I do, however, have a ton of work to do on my car and house...

Actually, I have a ton of work that needs to be done on my car and house. There's a difference.

See, I'm not a mechanic or a handyman. I'm the unmechanic, the unhandyman. I tried to replace my broken window on my car last night and broke the door. So I have a broken window and a broken door now instead of just a broken window. I have holes in my walls from when I tried to fix the handrail on the steps. I have holes in my ceiling where the plaster fell down when I tried to fix the paint that had bubbled when my air conditioner's condensation pump blew a hose. I have holes in the plaster on the walls in my living room from trying to hang curtains.

I'm a writer, not Bob Villa. So I'm going to write some money-making stuff and pay someone else to do that shit. Know your strengths, know your weaknesses, and make your strengths support your weaknesses. For me, that's writing paid copy.

After I finish the Red Work series of courses, and the client work.

Clearing out my headspace is a bit more difficult. I've got stress from work, and stress from home. My day job is in a precarious position at the moment because America's Congress SUCKS MOTHERFUCKING DONKEY BALLS. My contract was cancelled because the automatic cuts that went into effect last time they couldn't set aside their differences and run the country impacted Medicare, and my job was to come up with a way to save $10.2 billion. We were making progress, but not quickly enough, so they canceled the project and told Obama they'd save the $10.2 billion somewhere else. So I need to do some magic on that, and get something lined up to pay the mortgage next year that's a little less sporadic than online occult sales.
My home-based stress is just your normal father-of-three crap. November 21 is my son's birthday, followed by Thanksgiving, my daughter's birthday December 12th, Christmas, my wife's birthday January 14, and my other daughter's birthday January 25th. I hate November through January. The stress has been known to overwhelm me.

But the solution to this problem is to catch up on the client work. For example, by doing the Hermetic Diagnoses for other people, I travel the seven spheres and spend hours in contemplation and meditation, communing with the spirits. That in and of itself is really good therapy, and it melts the stress. Other client work will further get me done with stuff.

So those are my plans for Making Way for the projects I have planned.

* Before the hate mail comes, my wife is awesome at that shit, and she likes to do it. She stays home to be with the kids and I do a ton of work to make the money, so she's fine with doing housekeeping. She's old school like that. No role stress there.

How to post links in comments

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 07:35:13 PST

With Deb's New Year New You thing going around, people are posting links in google's blogger comments that you can't click on.

I'm guilty of that. But I don't like to have to select the link, hit copy, go to the browser address bar, hit paste, then hit go when I could just click a link.

So here's how to post a link in a comment on blogger:

Type this:

<a href="

Then paste your link.

Then type this:

">

you'll have this:

<a href="http://link_address.com">

Or this:

<a href="www.link_address.com">

Now type the text that you want to link to the site. Like "My blog post participation."

then type this:

</a>

Altogether, you'll have:

<a href="http://link_address.com">My blog post participation.</a>

And it will look like this in the preview of your comment:

My blog post participation.

And then you can add "HTML Programmer" to your resume.

New Year, New You: I'm in!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 11:52:59 PST

Deb is acting on the prompts of her Genius again...

Duhn duhn duhn!

One thing I've learned is that when the Genius starts kicking a magician, interesting times are on the way.

So what's it all about? Basically it's all about doing magic like a motherfucking boss. Living as a magician. Using the powers that we've earned through our spiritual progression to make the world what we want it to be. Acting as if what we believe were really true. Here's how she put it in her post:

Get up, get up! Don't miss this moment. Create magics great and small, mundane and mystical. Find everything you've been looking for, mysteries revealed in every form of divination and song and when you fuck it up, when you are too tired to try, bring each other up from bloodied knees to get back up smiling. You are all made of stars and you have stardust in your veins. Do something about it.

Regular readers of my blog know that's what I'm all about, and it's how I live my life. I do magic for everything. I do magic on my kids to help them at school, I do magic on their teachers and administration, I enchant my local government and neighborhood businesses, I enchant the fuck out of my company, and there are literally no issues in my life that I have not done some kind of magic to influence at some point. My car runs on magic.

I started living this way a few years ago. Last year, I got a bit more organized, but I'm behind on several aspects of the projects I started. I have several major magical projects underway, including but not limited to:

Consciously Integrating the Forces and Lessons of the 8th Sphere
Continued Kingdom Management
Centers for Applied Hermetics

There are other less major things, but these are the largest things on my list. They're already in process, but I think they'll count for this project. I'll make the parts public that I can, and I'll be responding to her prompts as they arrive.

I'm really looking forward to seeing where this goes. It's not often I get a chance to participate in someone's Genius-prompted-excursion that doesn't involve dipping into the High Weirdness, and I feel really at home there.

So what are you up to? Ready to jump on in and do magic like a boss?

Opening the Book of Lambspring

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 23:37:00 PST

Plug Saturday continues! Though technically it's Sunday now here.

It is with great joy that I get to review the latest work by Fr. AIT, of Heavens within Earth and the Book of Coelius fame, founder and expounder of the Ordo Octopi Nigri Pulveri, true Priest of Kronos, and generally Good Egg.

He told me about The Opening of the Book of Lambspring before it was published, and I got an advanced copy and spent a few hours going through it with him, comparing notes and exploring the symbolism of the images. It was a good afternoon. It was one of those moments where we got to talking like old school Hermeticists. We didn't always agree, but we each had something really cool to bring to the table for discussion. If you've had a chance to talk shop with someone who's done as much Work as you have, you know what I mean. We were riffing off each other's insights as we harmonized with the Emblems and talked through what we saw.

But I'm probably getting ahead of myself. First, a bit about the Book of Lambspring. It's a series of alchemical images that reflect different phases of the Great Work pictorially. Each image captures the phase of the Work, but all in the language of the birds. The imagery that is meaningful if you're a fellow alchemist who understands the Ideas behind the forms they take. But there are few on the planet comfortable enough to claim to understand it, and fewer among those who have any right to make that claim.

Fr. AIT is among the ranks of those who know the language. He provides an analysis of each of these images, an interpretation as seen through the eyes of the Hermetic Magician. It's one of the most interesting pieces of occult information I've had the honor of working with this last year, in fact. Each image is a key to a phase of the Work. Each image is a gate as well, but more on that later.

Many of his interpretations are based on his personal experiences and training within the Golden Dawn Order to which he belongs. And he wrote during and after an incredible initiation based on the mythography of the "Great Rite," so there's a lot of emphasis on the holy sexuality of these images. He provides such broad hints at the mysteries of sex magic that anyone with an inclination towards deciphering the hidden meanings will find their way paved and easy, and won't have to jump sacred fences and score tech in back alleys the way I had to. Here's a hint: there's no jacking off over sigils involved.

I rarely mix sex and magic these days, though when I do, it sends out seismic waves that make the richter scale.* In our conversations about the meanings of the emblems, I tended to focus less on the sexual interpretations than he does, but that doesn't mean he's wrong in any of them. Everything he says about each emblem is true. I prefer the parts where he sticks to the straight "Hermetic Magic" interpretations, though I suspect he'd argue they aren't as separate as I like to think. And he might be right.

I found it incredibly useful to treat each Emblem as a Gate. I would turn each emblem into a small astral rite, passing within each, becoming a part of the image, and seeing what it meant from within. Most of my observations lined up perfectly with Fr. AIT's, and where there were differences, there was still harmony.

This book touches on the deeper mysteries of the Alchemical process, and what it means to magicians attempting the Great Work through magical practice. It's definitely on my list of things every magician should read at least once, though in all honesty you could spend a lifetime exploring each image, comparing experiences, and applying the lessons of each.

*That's hyperbole right there. That earthquake was a coincidence.

Deb's Having a Sale!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 17:41:01 PST

It's Plug Saturday!

Well, not yet, but it's about to be.

Deb's announced a sale over at Charmed I'm Sure. I ordered some stuff right away. Aurora's Mojo Hand Feeding Oil will be used ritually, often, and Britania's Basil Money Drawing Oil too, for other things. And the French Hussy candle for my wife. Fortunately she doesn't read the blog, she's too busy, so the surprise will keep. But yeah, she'll love it.

Support your local* bloggers this year! Keep the money where it's going to do the people you care about the most good.

If anyone has anything else they'd like plugged, let me know. I'm into supporting people I know and like instead of corporations who pay their CEOs 45 times their average employee's salary.

* Local being a metaphor, we're in your house entertaining and educating you, so that's local enough.

Microsoft Never Heard of Neuromancer?

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 11:03:37 PST

Microsoft is looking for help developing applications for the home computer using the Kinect. They have the hardware interface designed, but one article I read that I can't find now suggested that they needed help coming up with ways to use the Kinect as a human machine interface. So they're offering start ups support if they're going to be developing new ways to use the Kinect in the PC environment.

I would just like to say... Neuromancer much? Build the fucking deck! And a wet jack. We're already living in the dystopian corporate culture Gibson so bleakly predicted in Neuromancer, we might as well get the fucking tech that goes with it.

Thanks!

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 09:51:39 PST

Thanksgiving is about being thankful for all the things we have that are good in life. I've got a lot to be thankful for this year. You all are on my list of people I'm thankful for. Not only do you like me, you actually pay me to do magic for you or to teach you what I've learned! I love that. Thanks for making my life perfect.

My fellow occult bloggers, thank you for all your posts, the ones I love, the ones I hate, and the ones that piss me off the most, because they teach me so much. We have the richest community of magicians who all get along even when we don't. Totally fabulous getting to be alive with you all.

You know we're living through the kind of occult explosion the GD was part of in the last century, right? We're not in the desert of shit sources that people were in through the 1950s. We live in very exciting times. We are the Crowleys and Mathers and Regardies and Gurdjieffs and Blatavatskies of our age. Most of my close friends in the blogosphere are magicians who have far exceeded any of these in personal practice and wisdom. I really love you all, and I am humbled/honored/totally stoked/proud as fuck that I get to be a part of this family. Thanks for proving that human beings can be awesome.

And to Jove, I give thanks for all the health and necessary wealth we have received this year. May his blessings pour out on you and your families throughout the year. Next year, may we all be thankful we're millionaires.

Fama Fraternitas Fun

rufusopus@rufusopus.com — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 06:00:23 PST

One of my genuinely favorite Golden Dawn bloggers, Morgan Drake Eckstein, has been writing about his interpretation of the Fama Fraternitas as it applies to making money on the Great Work. He started with an analysis of the English translation that earned him some grief, and then he followed up with a post about the how he's been told the English translation is flawed, and he makes some observations about whether the modern Rosicrucian (RC) movement in English speaking countries* is flawed as a result.

The posts sparked my interest. I've always been interested in the subject of money for the Great Work, especially because I make money off the skills I've gathered in pursuit of the Great Work. I also love a good manuscript mystery. That's my favorite part of grimoire and Bible study, getting into the root languages and being an amateur archaeological word explorer, like a linguistic Indiana Jones. What I lack in training and experience, I make up for in enthusiasm.

Specifically, he dissects the first two of the six rules "the original brotherhood bound itself by." The first is one that gets quoted a lot, and the second he applies to his interpretation of the first to support his argument:

From the English Manuscript Morgan quoted:

First, That none of them should profess any other thing than to cure the sick, and that gratis.

Second, None of the posterity should be constrained to wear one certain kind of habit, but therein to follow the custom of the country.

Morgan masterfully reinterprets the first to mean that it's ok to be more than a pro bono doctor if you're a RC. He performed with the prowess of a professional Semantiad.** I'd have given him at least a 9.3 if it were an official competition.

Then the questions of the German manuscript's true meaning came up, and that's the part in the story where I showed up. I found this online version of the Gemran manuscript, and then I used Google Translate to render this result:

First No one should indulge in any occupation, to maintain as sick and do so in vain.

Thank you So Much, Google Tranlate! That's awesome.

So looking at that, I thought there was room for reinterpretation. You can pick apart the literal meaning of root words, add different endings on them and look at how the roots are used in other words, as Morgan did in his analysis, and with a little effort I can see how someone reading the German version could walk away with something different than the English version.

No one should indulge in any occupation? So no working for a living? Works for me!

To Maintain as sick and do so in vain? What the living fuck? I got nothing on that, and I needed better sources. So I googled "online German to English Translator" and ended up at PROMT-Online, pasted in the First Rule from the Fama, and it rendered this result:

Nobody should dedicate itself to another employment, than to maintain sick people namely completely free of charge.

Aha! Now we're getting somewhere. PROMT-Online has different intelligence driving it, and rendered something a little more comprehensible, and still used the same words. It makes sense! The English version was right all along.

The Fama's First rule is simply, "You shouldn't have any kind of job, or do any kind of work, except to heal the sick, and do it for free." I think it's literal, and stands alone. As such, I don't think Morgan's application of the Second Rule, though highly skilled, applies at all. But for the simple literal translation to work in practice, something's got to pay the fucking rent. We've got bills to pay and cats to feed, right?

I think there are two ways that would make this simple literal translation work. The first way it would work is if all Rosicrucians are independently wealthy. If they've done the Work and have been through the Chemical Wedding, they'll have the secret of the Philosopher's Stone, and they won't exactly need any money now, will they? The Philosopher's Stone turns lead into gold! All the gold they could ever need.

That's my preferred source of their independent wealth.

It could also, however, be that the RCs were a fraternity of the wealthy elite, a gentlemen's philanthropist club, like when Bill Gates and Warren Buffet had that private billionaire's club meeting and asked them to pledge to give away half their wealth either before they died or at their death. Still cool, but not as romantic to me as having the Philosopher's Stone as the source of independent wealth.

The second way a literal interpretation of the Fama's First rule would work is if they just didn't worry about it. In my youth, I was a big fan of the idea that the Universe will provide. "If you need it," I said, "it will come. If it's not there, you don't need it." Another favorite phrase was "The Universe doesn't give unfunded mandates." Or "If the Universe wants me to do that shit, it can goddamned well pay for it."

And yeah, U2's famous phrase, "My God isn't short on cash."

The RCs could have just been wandering hippies, living off the things God provides. That would be a pretty extreme lifestyle, completely and totally based on faith. They were, let's not forget, devout Christians. In recent conversations on ethics with Jason, we were discussing the Sermon on the Mount. Having just recently reread it, I couldn't help but be reminded of Matthew 6: 25-26:

25 Therefore I say unto you, be not anxious for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than the food, and the body than the raiment?
26 Behold the birds of the heaven, that they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not ye of much more value then they?

There's been a ton of debate in the Christian world about whether this should be literal or figurative, and I won't go into it here, but the fact is, some people live as if it's literal, and they do manage to survive, and at times, to thrive. I'm not as good with other religions, but I believe this basic spiritual truth manifests in many different traditions. Throw it all away and let God provide all your needs, according to His riches and glory. Go be an itinerant monk who wanders around helping people, penniless, but always able to somehow get by. Like Cain in Kung Fu.

It's a radical notion, and one better suited to the young without responsibilities to meet. I did it for a while, but honestly, it sucks. The universe did provide, but not at the quality to which I'd become accustomed. There are times now when I look back through the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia and think if I didn't have kids, I'd live that way now...

But the fact is I went hungry a lot, could barely sleep,*** and ate a lot of food loaded with extra salt peter at shelters. I joined up with a clan of old hippies on a commune in Texas for a while, and that sucked too. Communal living. I still shudder thinking about it. Everyone in your space all the time! Feh. Give me doors.

The fact is, I'm too materialistic to want to live that way myself. And there's my wife and kids. They deserve better, and I've got the skills, talent, and intelligence to be able to provide better. The Universe does indeed provide, but it provides nuts, berries, and meat that runs faster than you do, and if the weather's shit and there's no vegetables, you're going to die. And that's ok with the Universe. It's balanced, natural, and harmonious. Spiritually sublime.

Fuck. That. Shit.

So, my opinion is that the Fama's First Rule really means you shouldn't work for a living, you should only heal people, and you should do it for free if you're a Rosicrucian. It's a great rule, because for it to be true, some very powerful magic has to take place: either the you've got endless wealth at your fingertips, or you've got to be completely in harmony with the materialization process of the Universe.

And that's ONE of the reasons I don't consider myself a Rosicrucian. Like other Mystery traditions, I think it's got some cool stuff in it, but it's not a system I'd throw myself into completely. My studies and practices have a lot of shared truths with those of the Rosicrucian tradition, and I can use the images of RC to interpret my experiences in Hermetic Initiations, but that's because my tradition and theirs developed in the Hermetic current. They're a formalized facet of the current that is different than mine.

I think the First Rule is the goal, to perform magic until you no longer need to work a profession to make a living, and you can devote your time to healing the sick without charging anyone anything. I sometimes think I'm at a point where I could do that, but honestly, I'm afraid to try to live that way. There are too many people depending on me to take that large of a risk.

So I keep my job, and I sell magical services and consecrated talismans and lessons, and I try to get ahead enough to not have to work for a living so I can do this full time, free, without jeopardizing my kids' future. I'm making progress. I can see how it would be possible to conjure for a living, conjuring the things we need directly and then just having it sort of work in our favor, but it would take discipline I'm only just now developing. Maintenance. Strategy.

If I can find out how to just manifest the things we need consistently, I'm there. I'm all over it. Until then, I'm not an RC, though this research has me comparing the rest of the verses around Matthew 6:25-26 and comparing it to the rules of the Fama. Rule 2 is reflected in verse 28, for example. And Morgan said the RCs are forbidden from living beyond the time God gives them, and verse 27 says something about how worrying about it doesn't add a day to your life. Interesting parallels there.

* I'm including the United States, even though there is some debate from the UK about whether Americans speak English or not.

** Like an Olympiad, but more meaningful.

*** Little known fact, homeless people get very little sleep. That lifestyle is hard, and frightening, and highly stressful. You can't always trust the people you're with, and you can't afford to sleep deeply. It's high, high stress, all the time. And it's dirty as shit.