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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.
I got into practicing magic because I had lots of questions I wanted to ask and I couldn’t get answers to those questions from the people around me or the spiritual text I had access to at the time. What the magic books I read showed me is that there were many more books out there to read that might have answers and even if there wasn’t an answer, the books usually opened up fruitful lines of inquiry. To this day I feel the same with every book I read.
Most importantly what I learned is that it’s not enough to read a book. You have to work the book, which means you have to be willing to do the exercises in a book, and not just once or twice, but multiple times, until you really get the essence of what is being shared. You only get that essence when you turn what you read into experiences that you learn from, because you’ve embodied them in your magical practice.
My first major experiment happened when I was 18. I choose to take the ritual workings I had done with elemental spirits and make a significant change. I offered up my blood in exchange for their essence. It was an intuitive decision, something that came to me about how I could cultivate a closer relationship with the elemental spirits. I hadn’t read anything about doing this in a book, but the foundation of my practice indicated that my experiment could be feasible, so I went through with the experiment and found that it worked. It was a valuable experience because it taught me to question what I know, in favor of discovering what I could learn, but I couldn’t have done that experiment if I hadn’t already practiced magic for a couple years.
Some people want to experiment with magic right out the gate, but my advice to those people would be to spend some time learning the fundamentals of how magic works. Read a variety of books and work through the exercises, but keep a question sheet on hand in case questions come up that you want to explore. And keep doing the work, and having the necessary experiences you need, because once you have that experience you’ll be able to start experimenting with magic. The foundation you build in your initial magical practice will take you a long way, and help you come up with the questions and ideas that lead you toward genuine experimentation.
At the same time, I would also urge you not to wait too long to experiment. A couple of years really isn’t a long time in the grand scheme of things, but waiting much longer than that can cause you to get stuck in what other people have done. At a certain point you just have to take a risk and challenge what you’ve done in favor of discovering what you can do. Doing the same work over and over again may feel safe, but it dulls your ingenuity and causes you to miss out on experiences that would take you further and open the door to personalizing your magical work.
The discipline of magic, like any other discipline, requires a commitment on the part of the practitioner. The truly dedicated practitioner will put the time in to learn the fundamentals of magic, but also begin to question and challenge what they’ve learned, in order to discover what really works. It will not simply be a matter of trying manifest results or have divine communion with a spirit. Rather those things will give way to a sense of wonder and discovery that occurs because you want to deepen your relationship with magic, itself. Such a deepening relationship occurs when you begin to experiment with magic, because you have the necessary knowledge and experience to begin asking the questions that can only be answered by you.
