Archangel Khamael picture copyright 2019 Taylor Ellwood
10-22-2019 I am creating a drawing of the archangel Khamael for this month’s work with Mars/Geburah and of course Khamael. I’m also watching one of my favorite movies, A Beautiful Mind, which is a biopic of sorts about John Nash, the eccentric mathematician. I like the movie because I can identify with the character, both in terms of his awkwardness with people and the unusual perspectives he used with his mathematic work. And I can appreciate his struggles, because of my own, though mine aren’t the same as his. I know what its like to be on the edge, to flirt with madness as you pursue genius, as you pursue the distinctive ideas that matter, going against the grain of conventional ideas to discover the potential that lies within the unconventional. I also know what its like to let my own arrogance delude me, and the subsequent fall that can happen with such delusions. At some point in the movie, his roommate tells him that his problem isn’t in the room he’s in, but in the world out there, that he has to discover the problem that other people have. It’s advice I resonate with. It’s what lead me to explore magic from a process perspective, because the problem I’ve found again and again is that magic isn’t approachable from an esoteric perspective. What point is there to practice magic if the work is harder than it has to be?
And I know the doubt all too well that one feels when what you’re trying to pursue doesn’t seem to work or come together. It’s taken me a long time to find what works, to discover the path forward. It’s involved failing and falling, and then climbing back up because I won’t give up on my ideas, on my work, and on the magic. It’s required discipline as well, finding the routines that work and sticking with them even when in the moment there has been despair. Now I am the phoenix rising from my own ashes, and from the hard earned and learned experiences that will always ground me by reminding me to stay humble, while pushing me to continue exploring the edge and embracing the unconventional.
10-23-2019 I made the switch to Khamael/Mars/Geburah after creating the Khamael drawing. With this switch the planetary energy feels rigid, disciplined, but also the kind of feeling you get where you recognize that feeling of focus and clarity. Sometimes you need discipline to do great things.
10-27-2019 The other night Khamael visited me and I basically was judged over the course of my adult life. Every major decision I made, the relationships I was in, all of this was paraded before me in detail and everything was examined with a critical eye. It reminded me of the Sword of Shannara, which shows you the truth about yourself, dispelling all illusions and delusions you tell yourself. In the same way Khamael did the same for me. And as hard as it was to face, I’ve faced it before, so I accepted the experience for the gift it is. We must be willing to face ourselves if we are to grow.
10-28-2019 Something I’ve noticed with this month’s work is that Khamael feels a bit more removed than the elemental archangels. RJ did mention that the sphere of Art is designed so that the archangels from higher up in the Tree of Life are mediated through the elemental archangels, so this would make sense, but its fascinating to observe.
11-2-2019. Saw the Joker movie again. The performance of the actor fascinates me. The way he presents the Joker’s character…and just how on the fringe the Joker is, even before he becomes the Joker. As I watched the movie tonight, I paid close attention the face and eyes of the actor and how he gradually transformed into the Joker. It occurs to me that the Joker is also a good representative of judgement and severity…for in his laugh is the judgement of the outcast on all of society. What’s fascinating is seeing the Joker remade by ongoing protests where people are wearing the Joker face paint to represent their own discontent with society.
11-5-2019 Working with the energy of Mars/Geburah/Khamael has been interesting because I had a situation come up where I had to basically make a change in my plans for early December. It’s not a bad thing per se, but it requires me to exercise judgement and make the best possible decision for all involved. And I think that’s a hidden aspect of judgement. We have to evaluate our choices and use our best judgement to come to a decision that makes a situation work out the way we need it to.
11-9-2019 Part of the process of working with Khamael is that I’m really getting to explore my judgement up close when it comes to making decisions in my life. It makes me reflect again on the fact that I can be simultaneously a very calculating and impulsive person. I’ve gradually learned to balance both aspects of myself when it comes to my decision making process, but sometimes I still struggle and this month has intimately brought that to the fore, with a couple different situations where I’ve had to examine my judgement as its happening and really take it apart and see what is and what isn’t working. Such is the nature of this work that you really begin to see yourself in many different ways that might otherwise go ignored.
11-10-2019 Sometimes I feel like I have been passed by in the occult community. I see conferences where I was once invited and now its just crickets. It’s a hard feeling to sit with, when you feel that you’re irrelevant. I saw one today where the presenter had promised he’d have me back, but I guess that promise was forgotten. Yet, I ultimately have no one to blame but myself. I made the choice to call out the dubious practices I saw in the conference scene and as a result I blacklisted myself. So what do I do with this feeling?
I turn it into the fire that fuels my work. I take these moments I turn them into hammer blows that refine the alchemy of my soul and my magic and my writing. And I keep my promise to myself that I will no longer try to fit into the larger occult community, but do what I know works best and make my own way out into the world and find my own community and give my best to the people who do appreciate me, who do value my work. And I will show all of those people who have scorned me how wrong they were to do it, when I become more successful because I’ve taken the unconventional paths and found opportunities by doing it. And how fitting really, that I have this experience this month, because it is a disciplining moment for me, a reminder that I must stay true to myself and my work and my community. Nothing else matters, including the recognition of a community that has never fully embraced me.
Tonight when I did the Sphere of Art working and was meditating on Mars/Geburah/Khamael, an energy passed into my fingers and hands. It was a creative pulse and I was told it was something that would inspire my writing and magic even further. In a way it felt as if it was a response to what I’d been feeling earlier, a way to balance the scales in my favor.
11-11-2019 Tonight when I was doing the Sphere of Art work, I felt Khamael touch my hands once again and I felt another tingling sensation, another blending of the essence of Mars and Geburah with my hands. And what conveyed that this was a further part of the work, a further preparation for work I’ll be doing down the line. I am reminded that when a person is blessed the expectation is they will do something with the blessing and in the last day or so I have felt more inspired with my writing than ever before and the ideas come even quicker. At the same time, I also feel the power of iteration. I was reading the Slight Edge and he was talking about the power of time and how if you keep doing something it becomes inevitable and I felt Khamael chime in and say this is part of the power of Geburah, the inevitable judgement is also the inevitable realization if you allow it to be. Yes…I’ll definitely do that.
11-12-2019 I shared with my mentor the work I’ve been doing with the Sphere of Art and he mentioned that many of the practices were preparation for the purifying fire of Khamael. That’s an interesting insight for me and it made a couple things click together. And once again tonight during the meditation Khamael came and this time touched not just my hands, but also my body. I once again feel this sense of clarity and focus, this flame of being.
I also had an interesting realization myself. I’m reading a book called the Soul Forge which is a story about how a magician is shaped by magic. I realize now its no coincidence that I’m reading it.
11-14-2019 Kat observed that Khamael had touched me 3 times and felt that might be significant. I’m inclined to agree. Since then I’ve felt his presence nearby, but the work has focused on the alchemical substances and working with the energy of Geburah and Mars, which has felt like a streaming energy going into my hands and body.
11-19-2019 The last few days have days of just doing the work and planting the seeds. Those days aren’t easy because there isn’t the ready result, but I think they are the most vital because they allow us to really focus in on just doing the work for the sake of doing it. It is so easy to get caught up in the result, but the experience is what is essential and it will not always be obvious but it will challenge you to grow.
11-21-2019 Khamael asked me to come up with a chant for him for the new book and to dedicate the book to him, so I’m going to do that because I’ve felt his presence throughout the writing of the book, guiding me and also making it very clear that my path is about the writing moreso than anything else.
Mars - Picture copyright Taylor Ellwood 2019