One of the questions that pops up from time to time in my inbox or on social media is the question of when someone should start experimenting with magic. In other words, when can you step off the beaten path and start exploring and experimenting and trying things out that don’t fit within conventional occultism. This is a good question to ask because when you experiment with magic that’s when you begin to really make what you practice your own work.

My answer may surprise many of you, but I didn’t start experimenting with magic until I had practiced magic for two years, and even my initial experiments were very low key. It really wasn’t until I had put in a good five years that I really began to experiment with magic. The reason why is simple: I didn’t know enough about magic to know what questions to ask or what experiments to come up with. The only way I get to the point that I could experiment with magic was to actually read the books, do the exercises in them and pay close attention to the resultant experiences. I also didn’t have teachers to talk with and was self-teaching myself magic, so that too contributed to me simultaneously taking my time, but also asking questions.