So as some of you may know, my next solo work is focusing on the concept of identity and how it fits into magic. It's rather fitting then that the last year and 3/4ths has been focused on changing my own identity in a variety of different contexts from my relationships with lovers and friends, to my relationship with my self, and how I've chosen to engage in meaningful activities that allow me to fully live, as opposed to just getting by. To me, success in magic is driven far more by a targeted proactive approach toward manifesting the kind of person you want to be, and much less toward obtaining specific results for specific situations. At one time, for most of my magical career it was the latter paradigm that I was focused on. It was a reactive approach I took, and I sometimes didn't understand why I needed to do it so much.
I think that as a person consciously changes his/her identity and figures out what s/he wants, the less there is a need for reactive acts of magic. Magic becomes a process, as opposed to an act. It becomes a way of life as opposed to a tool used to handle a situation. It becomes a conscious agreement with the universe about the pathv a person is taking through the universe, and becomes less of a stumbling around in the dark.
Of course that's my take on magic, in large part generated by very specific and targeted changes in my life, lifestyle choices, and overall focus. The change in my identity has so far been one of the most involved experiments I've done and has pretty much involved challenging every single assumption I've held about not only magic but all the other facets of my life. The uprooting it's caused in my life has been significant and yet that significance is based far more in taking such a proactive approach to identity, by recognizing what no longer worked and actively focusing on changing it, while discovering what definitely works and enhancing it.
When I finally get around to writing my next solo book, it will be interesting to see what I do with it...but I'm in no hurry on this one. I've already got so much going on and it's far more exciting to be living it.
