My Work with Vine

Recently I worked with Vine (pronounced Vinea - long a). He's another of the goetia that focuses on space/time magic. In the Goetia, the description of him is that he appears in the from of lion, riding a black horse, beating a viper. His functions include discovering things hidden, witches, wizards, and things in the past, present, and to come. He is also apparently a builder and can cause sea storms. You can see his seal, above, which I recently painted, as part of the work I did with him. When I first contacted Vine, I did an invocation, where I memorized his sigil and then chanted his name. The chant was set up where I'd mentally say his name thrice, then whisper it thrice, then say it louder thrice, and so on and so forth. I did about three iterations where I mentally said his name and brought it up to a shot and then back again to mentally saying the name and building up to the shout. On the third time, the sigil disappeared and in its place he appeared in the classic form ascribed to him in the Goetia. I asked him how he could work with me, especially as related to space/time magic.

Vine discovers and aligns hidden possibilities in other people with the magician he works with. In other words, He draws other people to the magician by aligning their probabilities with the magician so that they are more likely to encounter the magician. It's an interesting and unusual approach to time magic because it's not directly focused on the magician, but rather is indirect and focuses more on setting up opportunities for the magician through the people s/he meets.

I started working with Vine in mid March and so I've had some time to work with him and see if this particular take on time magic works. It appears like it is working because I've had a higher number of people show up in my life with opportunities that were beneficial for all involved. When I work with Vine, I make it very clear that I want to connect with people, where the connection will be beneficial for all involved. I prefer such interactions because everyone wins and because it allows for the cultivation of long term relationships. In my particular case, I've noticed that a number of business opportunities came into fruition involving people I just met, and I also noticed I was able to make some good connections in the occult community, both in terms of magical practice and publishing. What stands out to me in both cases, is that the numbers have been higher than usual and the connections have sought me out as opposed to me needing to do anything. In my system of space/time magic, Vine fits in as a guardian of time as it relates making temporal connections between people.

Spirit Cord Experiments

Since I took R. J. Stewart's class on the Spirit Cord, I've started reading his book on the topic and I've continued doing my own magical work with it.  Some interesting experiences have happened as I've worked with the cord. I've integrated my work with it into my daily practice, as part of my experimentation, but I've also worked with it in relationship to entity/spirits work and dream work and in each instance have found it quite useful. The spirit cord also has some applications for space/time magic, which I think will be useful in my continued work with that area of magic.

Daily Work - I've integrated the cord into my daily work, with a specific purpose in mind. When I do my daily meditations I wear the cord and I send part of the meditation into the cord, for the cord to remember. Specifically I send part of my altered state of consciousness into the cord, so that when I do the meditation the next time, I can call upon the remembered state of being to slip more easily and quickly into that state as I do the daily work. Each time I've done this I found that it has been quicker and easier to enter into specific states of awareness and consciousness associated with the daily work I do. I've done some of the daily work without the cord and noted that it doesn't come as quickly, taking the usual amount of time it would have prior to me using the cord.

Entity/Spirit Work - One of the ways the cord can be worked with involves utilizing it to make a stronger connection with spirit guides you are working with. I recently did some with a couple of entities and as part of that work I incorporated the bonding ritual that is used with the cord. I've found that doing so does seem to add an a dimension of connection because the cord essentially "remembers" the relationships you've forged with other beings. When I wear the cord in the midst of doing magical work with a given entity, I draw on the memory of the connection as well as the actual work I'm currently doing to re-connect with the entity and I've felt a stronger connection as a result.

Dream Work - I've taken to wearing the cord every other night when I sleep. I do one night on and one night for several reasons. First I want to determine if there is an actual difference in sleep and dream work experiences when I wear it vs when I don't wear it and secondly if there is such a difference I also want to consider the need for deep sleep vs dream work, as dream work doesn't necessarily provide as full a night of sleep as the body might need. So far, what I've discovered is when I wear the cord at night I have very vivid dreams and I can recall the dreams in the morning, whereas when I don't wear the cord, I don't typically remember the dreams or remember very little.

Space/Time Magic Work - The spirit cord operates on the principle of connection, but also of memory. Both principles are integrally tied to time and space. Memory is fairly obvious, in that the cord is used to remember states of being, entities, etc., but the connection principle also applies because is used to connect, to measure one distance from another, or one time to another. The cord also serves to establish continuity and keeps that continuity alive through its use and memory aspects. An interesting exercise that Stewart includes in the book is to attach the cord to a peg in the ground and then try to move with it. What you'll find is that you can move toward or away from the peg (which could be considered linear time) or you can move in a circle around the peg, which is a rhythmic and perhaps non-linear version of time. He actually suggests doing this in relationship to understanding time.

I'm still reading the book and working through the exercises, but I find that this practice has already enriched my ongoing work immeasurably. There's a lot I'm getting from doing this work as it relates to my own interests, but also doing the work as part of a magical tradition that I am integrating into my life. I look forward to sharing more as I continue to do the work and experiment with it.

The Role of Timing in Space/Time Magic

I'm reading When: The Art of Perfect Timing by Stuart Albert. It's an intriguing book that explores the concept of timing and how it applies to the business world. He identifies 6 different types of timing that can be applied to business or life. Each of these types of timing can be applied to space/time magic as well, provided we understand them and how they can be used in magical work. The concept of timing is important in magic because when we do a working we don't always want it to manifest right away, or we want it to manifest it right away and in order to do that we need the timing to be applied in order to align the variables favorably and manifest the possibility into reality.

The first type of timing is: Sequence. I wrote about sequence in Magical Identity as a useful tool that allows your linear perspective of time to accept non-linear possibilities. Sequence simply demonstrates the temporal order of events, but what's important to note about sequence is that it can be changed and rearranged provided you create consistency in your sequence which allows the linear consciousness of your min to accept the new sequence. Sequence examines the order, interval and duration and location, and helps you consider these variables in your space/time workings. Knowing where and when you need to be somewhere or where and when something needs to occur is important in the timing of your working. Similarly understanding how long a given action in the sequence occurs can helpful for considering variables that can either change that action or change the length of time needed for it to be accomplished.

The second type of timing is: Temporal Punctuation and borrows from the grammatical aspects of language. If you consider punctuation in English for example, you know that a comma, colon, and period each signify different temporal actions. This awareness of punctuation can be applied to the timing of your workings. For example if you want to pause the timing for an event to occur, apply a comma to the working. If you want a specific list of actions to occur, use both the colon and the comma. If you want something to come to full stop, apply the period.

The third type of timing is: Interval and Duration. The intervals are used to measure time and actions within time. A application of them to space time magic asks how long until or how much time. Duration is the overall time needed for the working to occur and it can be useful to situate the intervals in the duration in order to factor in what needs to occur when in order to move a possibility into reality.

The fourth type of timing is: Rate. Rate examines how the environment changes in relationship to temporal events. The rate of speed for a given event can be effected by multiple variables and unless we understand those variables we may not fully see the whole picture as to why an event is unfolding slowly or quickly. We may even make assumptions about a series of events related to the speed with which they unfold, without recognizing that other variables are having an effect on the speed. Magically speaking we can influence the rate of a given event by understanding how to slow it down or speed it up as needed.

The fifth type of timing is: Shape. The shape of a temporal event is rarely a straight line, though we often fool ourselves into believing it is. If you examine the processes of a given organization you'll see the principle of shape in action in the form of bottle necks or in organizational bureaucracy. For space/time magicians, shape can be quite useful because it provides us a way to think about time which captures some of the hidden possibilities and realities of it. We step out of linear time and recognize how time isn't a straight line, but instead is often curved and effected by other variables that we didn't consider. Shape also helps us understand time in terms of changes. For example a helix shape is a cyclical shape that nonetheless shows a progression in time...useful for charting where we are in a cycle as well as what is changing in that cycle.

The sixth type of timing is: Polyphony. Polyphony is the comprehension and application of all the other types of timing simultaneously. I also think of it as polychronic time, which is the experience of multiple events and possibilities of time occurring in one space. Polyphony adds a vertical element to timing that allows us to more fully explore the possibilities and integrate them into reality. Polyphony allows us to understand how different temporal events overlap each other and provides us a way to explore and integrate variables into our magical working by charting where they are in relation to the possibility we want to manifest and the reality we want to manifest it in. Polyphony teaches us how to comprehend multiple possibilities in a given space and choose which ones are most favorable for our desired outcomes.

I feel that to one degree or another I use these various aspects of timing in my own magical work. I find that when you apply timing to magic, it makes the magical work more precise and focused. Instead of just doing a working and leaving it to the universe to manifest it, you set up the parameters for when it'll manifest and this consequently holds you more accountable to making the magic work, because you know that if certain things don't occur within your timing, you need to go back and figure out where n your process you mucked things up.

My work with Glasolya-Labolas

I recently started working with Glasolya-Labolas, a Goetic Daimon of Time, but also of diplomacy. He contacted me initially, or rather his name stood out to me and I decided to work with him and see what I could learn. In my tradition of space/time Magic he is the guardian of Memory and a guide to working with retroactive magic. He also can be a protective spirit and can help you find opportunities to connect with allies and even help you make diplomatic overtures to your enemies. I've recently had the opportunity to experience all of these aspects of working with him and I'm quite impressed with his abilities.

As a time Daimon, he is able to help you mask or unmask opportunities, as well as discover possibilities in your memories that can be used to influence opportunities in the present or future. In my particular case, I chose to work with him in terms of masking my own temporal presence at an event, so that while I was there, I nonetheless found that my interactions with several people were limited, which was something I wanted due to my relationship with those people. It occurs to me that I could've also worked with him to change certain past aspects of my relationships with those people, but I wasn't really inclined to, as I didn't desire to have a relationship of any sort beyond a neutral one with those people.

As a diplomat, Glasolya-Labolas was quite helpful in engineering opportunities to meet with people who could become allies. I had opportunities to chat with several people that were influential in their own ways and develop relationships with them that would be beneficial for all involved. I was also able to make connections with people who organized the event and get to know them. And I felt that Glasolya-Labolas helped me know when to be social in general, so that I got to know various people at the event and make a good impression with them. Whenever I felt an intuition to do something social, I trusted it and followed it where I needed to go. And each time I connected with people that I needed to meet.

I would definitely recommend working with Glasolya-Labolas and intend to continue working with him myself. I feel there's a lot I have yet to discover with him, but thus far I'm impressed with what he's shared with me and how he's worked with me. He's quite a helpful ally to have on your side.

Memory and Retroactive Magic

Lately I've been doing some work some new space/time magic entities. One of the ones I'm working with, which I'll discuss in more depth in another post is the Goetic Daimon Glasolya-Labolas. One of the topics we've focused on is memory and retroactive magic. The concept of retroactive magic is that you do a magical act that effects a past event in such a way that it changes the present and the possibilities you have access to in the present. I also think of retroactive magic as doing magic in the present to effect a past event. To illustrate both concepts, let me share two examples from my own practice. My first example involves doing magical work to change a present behavior by going into past memories and changing the behavior in those past memories. I have found that if you want to change a behavior in the present, it becomes much easier when you change it in the past. What I do is do a pathworking exercise where I revisit specific memories and re-live those memories, but change the actions and behavior I did in those memories to ones I find to be more desirable. This consequently enables me to change the behavior in the present, because I've built a past where the desired behavior was already being performed.

The second example involved doing a magical work with a group that was in the U.K. I did the working several days after the group did their working (but before they reported in) and sent my magical working back in time so that even though I was doing the working in the present it was contributing to the working in the past. When I checked in with the group from the U.K. they reported strongly feeling my presence on the day they did their ritual, which indicated to me that my present working had effectively reached back to the past.

I've used retroactive magic to also discover possibilities in my present that I initially didn't were available due to past choices. When I felt that way, I'd do a ritual working to change the past choice, or at least change the outcome of that past choice and then I would discover new possibilities that were more favorable to me.

In my meditations with Glasolya-Labolas, he has suggested that time is not fixed and that memories aren't set, but only seem to be set because of the linear perspective we apply to time. If we were to instead consider that time isn't fixed and that within a given memory there are also other possible experiences, we could access those experiences and work with them to change the experience of the present we are in. It's an intriguing idea to experiment with, and although I feel I've done that to some degree via retroactive magic, I'm going to work more closely with Glasolya-Labolas to explore what his approach is and how it might fit or challenge my own understanding of retroactive magic and memory work.

Space/Time Entity Research

I'm currently working on the space/time magic correspondence course and I recently finished writing the lesson on space/time magic deities and entities. What fascinates me is that there are some deities and entities that help with space/time work, even in traditional spiritualities and practices. However, what I've also noted is that what a given entity focuses on is typically either time OR space, but not both together. This is important to understand because there is a conflation of space and time that occurs, where they are treated as one and the same, when in fact, they really aren't. While space and time obviously intersect, what each does and represents is distinct. When working with a deity or entity, understanding this distinction can be essential in order to effectively develop the relationship.

What I'm curious about, and where I hope readers of this blog will help, is discovering what space/time deities and entities you work with and how you work with them. I've listed ones such as Fotamecus and Ceronitis, as well as more traditional ones such as mahakala and the goetic Daemons who help with time, but if possible, I'd love it people could share in the comments what deities and entities they work with, when it comes to space/time magic work.

Temporal Awareness in Space/Time Magic

I'm reading When: The Art of Perfect Timing. It's an intriguing book that explores the mechanics of temporal design and explores how they can be applied to events. One of the concepts explored is synchronous risk, which examines how present and future use of a given space impact each other and either reduce or raise risk. I found this concept interesting because of how it could be applied to explore multiple possibilities occurring in a given space, as well as how risk could be applied to assess the likelihood of a possibility manifesting into reality. The author also points something out about our awareness of time: "We miss timing issues, or make wrong decisions about them, not simply because our world is complex and uncertain, but because the way we describe the world and the tasks we must accomplish omit the kinds of facts we need. I call these fragmentary descriptions time impoverished because they fail to include all the sequences, rates, shapes, punctuation marks, intervals, leads, lags overlaps, and other time-related characteristics that are part of the temporal structure of everything that happens, every action that is taken, every plan that is implemented." I think he has a point.

Our awareness of time is mainly linear, and it is a limited awareness of time, focused more on experiencing time as a seamless flow of events as opposed to really perceiving and exploring it as distinct units. It is true that we have units of time such as minutes or hours, but the kind of awareness the author is examining has more to do with how events overlap and effect each other and I think this is a subtle distinction that many people miss out on. As the author points out the timing of a given event can be significant because of how people perceive it. Ironically people won't necessarily examine the timing of the event, so much as the event itself. But the timing is significant because of how it influences perception and how it helps to manifest a given possibility into reality. When we pay attention to the timing we recognize that it informs the very actions we take.

In my own magical work, I pay a lot of attention to the timing of when a given possibility should manifest. If it manifests too soon or too late then it hasn't really performed what I needed it to perform. The timing is significant because it plays a role in the effectiveness of the desired result getting me what I want. So when I do a magical working, I factor the timing of the result into the working so that I not only manifest a given result, but also achieve it exactly when I need it and not a moment sooner or later than that. The way that I writing timing into the magical working involves understanding the event I want to manifest and placing it into context within the rest of my life. I ask myself where the event fits into my life and then plan it accordingly and what I find is that the magical working is much more effective because everything is timed and planned for.

The author notes that people are able to think of the distant past or future without having to imagine the path through time  that would be needed to get to that moment in the past of future. This is an advantage in one sense because we can conceive of distinct events and probabilities as singular moments in and of themselves, but the disadvantage is that we may not factor in the sequences and other temporal dynamics that would lead up to the distinct moment. When planning the timing of a working, I find it helpful to explore the distinct path that leads up to it. I want to know what would need to occur to make a given event manifest. By being aware of the temporal sequences and spatial changes that could occur, I can plan for variables and enable my magical working to incorporate them into the manifestation of the desired possibility.

The timing in magical work is partially so important because you want to build momentum behind the manifestation of your desired possibility. The more momentum you build through proper timing, the easier it is to manifest the possibility at the right time and space. When I want to manifest a result, part of the timing work I do involves setting up specific moments that build off each other to help manifest the possibility. By factoring in the elements of timing I can get enough ommph behind the working to make it happen when I want it to, but with all the momentum of the universe behind it.

Some Musings on 0 and 1

Dyslexicon 8, which features an article I wrote on my work with the spider goddess of time is now available. Check it out! Speaking of time magic, the other day I began thinking about 0 and 1 which I associate with possibility and reality respectively in a similar manner which builds off the existing associations. 0 = transformation while 1 = manifestation.

In 0 there is endless possibilities and with that comes transformation. Transformation is integral to possibility, and could be argued to also be what bridges possibility and reality. For possibility to become reality, transformation needs to occur. Transformation is part of change. When we change something we are transforming it, connecting it with possibility in order to determine what it could be and how it could manifest.

In 1 there is focused and shaped action, which in turn creates reality. Action is a form of manifestation, which is fueled by transformation. Transformation provides the drive for possibility to turn into reality manifestation. Manifestation is the reduction of possibility into a reality of your choice. Manifestation is an expression of transformation that moves the chaos of endless possibility into the order of constructed reality.

Reality is a construct, a thin veneer of order that provides some level of stability to possibility, which nonetheless can be undone by the manifestation of other possibilities into reality. At the same time reality is only malleable to a point. There is consensus experience of reality that provides the baseline by which we experience reality that provides enough limitations to provide a specific type of experience. The more real a possibility becomes the more it conforms to the limitations of reality, which providing some variation on those same limitations.

0 and 1 are numbers with associations applied to them. The associations are only as meaningful as you allow them to be. What makes them useful is you apply those associations to your experiences of 0 and 1 as spiritual forces and make meaningful contact with something the speaks to the experience you are having...or if you practically use them to create change in your life. The practical application is the key...There's no reality without application.

Update on the latest space/time magic experiment

I was recently interviewed on Disinfo about some of my current space/time magic work. In that interview I shared some of my ideas about how movement and stillness can play a role in space/time work.  I want to share some more information here on my continued modification of the space/time web tool I've been using. I've continued using the memory box, which is a tool  developed for working with space and time as a web, though I'll also note that with this experiment I've been doing some of it as a purely meditative, mental experience of that same construct. The reason I've chosen to do the latter action is because I feel that while a tool is useful, it serves mainly as a way of providing structure, which once you get that structure, makes the tool obsolete.

My focus in this experiment has been integrating stillness and movement into the technique. I feel that both of these elements are intrinsic to our experiences of space and time and as such can be useful for space/time magic we are working on. I've integrated stillness in as a means capturing a snapshot of a given space, wile also discovering the possibilities that exist in imaginary time around that space. Time, which is the flow of activity through a given space, and what is used to actually change the space is aided by movement, which is used to move a possibility into space as a form of reality. Movement allows for the assumption of form, which is used to define what is occurring in a given space.

I've been using these modifications on a couple of situations in my life, and I don't have results yet, because these situations are long term, but what I've been doing is going to the section in the web that represents the space of the given situation and then going into a place of stillness, which I use to examine the space and discover the possibilities around it. The possibilities I don't want are popped, and their essence is put int the possibility I do want to manifest in order to provide it momentum. Movement is used to place the possibility into the space, while time is used to activate the possibility as a reality of the space that moves the person to a new space, which becomes the new reality.

That's what I'm currently working on. I'm still tweaking the new version of this technique, especially as it applies to the concepts of movement and stillness, but I think I'm onto something, and if nothing else its giving me a project to work on, which is always fun. I'll report further as I continue to work with stillness and movement in the context of space/time magic.

Some Thoughts on Possibilities, Space, and Time

Two of the current books I'm reading are the Dimensional Structure of Consciousness by Samuel Avery and Wonders of the Natural Mind by Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche. In Avery's book he explores the definition of consciousness, arguing that everything, material or otherwise, is a manifestation of conscious experience, and that dimensions are internal structures of consciousness used to organize the various experiences we have. It's an interesting definition of consciousness and I see some merit for it, though I question the concept of conscious experience, as it seems to create a solipsistic perspective of the world. He argues that space and time are dimensions, which doesn't fall that far outside current conceptions of space and time. In the midst of all this, he also discusses images, which he defines as a concept, thought, thing, feeling or object, and which he argues are the sole content of consciousness. He goes onto explain that conscious activity is a constant arrangement of images into other images, but he doesn't really explain how that activity factors into dimensions, though I suspect he'd argue that the manipulation of images allows the person to access and work different dimensional structures of consciousness.

In Tenzin's book the author takes a more novel approach to space, arguing that space isn't limited to external or internal space, but rather that space is defined by the objects or forms in it. In other words, the forms define the parameters of space, as opposed to space, in and of itself. He also notes the distinctions we create are really attachments to defining space, but not experiencing it. Space is always present, always something that we are apart of, and yet also something that we try to quantify.

What I find fascinating about both books and the perspectives contained within them is how the authors approach a concept such as space. I'm more inclined to agree with Tenzin's perspective, and I find that if anything Avery's perspective is too caught up in trying to define the concepts without providing practical examples that illustrate what he is trying to define. Nonetheless I see value in utilizing the concepts of both books in my own work with space/time magic. Fundamentally when you deal with concepts such as space and time, what you are really dealing with is trying to place them into context within your life. It's as if by defining them we suddenly have a sense of control over them.

There is something to be said for defining a concept, but also something to be said for simply experiencing it. When I wander into a room, I am intimately aware of how the space of the room is defined by the objects within the room, but I am also aware of the space in and of itself. The space is potential waiting for action to occur, which seems to really happen when time is applied to that space. The application of time occurs through a fairly subjective filter, namely our sense of consciousness motivating us to do something, to act. Does time even exist if no one exists is to comprehend it? And this is where I could see time as a dimension of consciousness used to explain, categorize, and organize experiences that occur in space, but also used to turn possibilities into reality by providing a projection and action in which to achieve that projection.

Books like the ones I mentioned above, and my own for that matter, are useful in providing ideas about space and time and how to work with them, but I think that ultimately to really experience space and time is to simply work with them as elements of our lives. We experience space and time everyday, in the living of our lives, but if we want to work with space and time, we need to consciously apply ourselves to working with the experience of space and time so that we can discover more than just the surface level exposure most people typically get. That means we actively work with the experience and perception of space and time, defining it, but also playing with those definitions, because we recognize that any experience is ultimately subjective. Yes everyone experiences a 24 hour day, but 24 hours is a subjective unit used to describe the rotation of the Earth around the sun. 24 hours just gives a sense of control and direction, a rhythmic and cyclical experience to quantify our lives. When you recognize its subjective, then you don't take space, time, or anything else for granted, because you recognize that when such subjectivity is passed off as objectivity, someone else is benefiting from your believe in the objectivity of space and time. You experience that benefit when you go to work for someone else and exchange a subjective sense of time for money that quantifies what that unit of time is worth. Test everything that is qualified as objective, because objectivity is more of an illusion than anything else.

A Cycle of Stillness and Movement

The blood of life and death anoints me as I surge in like the incoming ocean tide connecting you and I in an embrace of the Earth and Ocean. I flow out like the outgoing ocean tide but never so far out that we lose contact. I am poised, still, silent for a moment, held back but still touching then I surge in again penetrating the deepness of your red caves allowing the salt of my life to mingle with the power of your blood My waves roll over your fertile lands and then when I can go no further, I hold for a moment, still, silent, intense in this embrace and flow back out withdrawing, but never completely separated. I surge back in, movement incarnate and then stop, stillness profound. 0 and 1 Stillness and Movement Space and Time The rhythmic interaction between us is the mysteries of movement and stillness, space and time The mingling of us is possibility manifesting into reality through the plunging of the athame into the cauldron of creation. You and I become one, become zero, become one again. We are all things and none, reality and possibility merging into a confluence. I surge in and I withdraw, but I am never completely apart from you. You and I are a rhythm, a cycle, a dance of space and time, stillness and movement. You and I are 0 and 1. The doors of perception and possibility open to us and our cycle brings us to the heart of the universe the tao of stillness and movement each feeding into the other, an eternal cycle of possibility and reality that you and I play a small part in.

Movement, Stillness, and the Web of Space/Time

In Magical Identity I shared a technique I use for working with Space and Time, which is is the web if Space and Time. In this model the web is comprised of elements of space and time conjunctively connecting to manifest possibilities into reality. The strands of the web are elements of Time, while the nodes where the strands intersect each other are elements of Space. The strands of time represent possibilities and actions. I think of them as verbs. The nodes of space represent people, places, events, and things, nouns. I'm always open to improving on my techniques and my work with the element of movement gave me an insight in this technique that could be useful for developing it further.

While the strands of time denote possibilities and actions, it occurs to me that movement (and as I write this Stillness) are intrinsic elements of space and time that are not overtly recognized but that nonetheless play a role in our experience of space and time. I don't think of movement and stillness as being one and the same as time and space. And my experiences of both movement and stillness seem to bear this out. If anything it feels like stillness and movement act upon and are acted upon by space and time. For example, you might be tempted to associate stillness with space, but I'd argue that stillness isn't space. Stillness is a form of presence and awareness. It's potential and in some ways that makes it more related to time, but it isn't time either. It's a state of experience and being that can allow you to become aware of and experience space and time in different ways. When I do my practice of Zhine meditation, I am working with stillness and one of the experiences it can provide is an awareness of space and time that is different than what is experienced during the everyday experience of life. With Stillness, when I am focusing my awareness on myself and a particular object, I experience not just the object as it is, but also the possibilities for that object. I experience the space of the object, as well as the time of the object. You also might be inclined to associate movement with time, and certainly experience of time can be that of a sense one moment passing into another, but again you can also experience time via stillness.

So all that said, what I'm really interested in is how I can factor stillness and movement into the work I do with the web of space and time. I don't want to associate stillness or movement with specific aspects of the web, and I don't think I need to, but I think working with them could allow me to enhance the technique as well as integrate these elements into my life. I decided to pull out my memory box, which is the physical representation of the web and when I worked with it this time, I approached the work in terms of movement. What did I need to move to put everything into the right space and maximize the right potential of time needed. Movement wasn't just about working with the strands of time, but rather working with the web as a whole, in terms of positioning the web and the respective nodes and time strands into an alignment that would be useful for better realizing the activation of a possibility into a reality. I didn't integrate stillness into this work, so when I experiment with it again, I'll work with both stillness and movement and see how they fit together with space and time.

What I've shared above is rough and I'll work on refining it, but I'm excited to be working on something new, or in this case a variation of something else I developed.

Book Review: The Slow Fix by Carl Honore

In this book the author explores the value of the slow fix, which involves learning how to solve problems from a process perspective instead of just trying to use a quick fix. The author explores a variety of elements that are integral to the slow fix process and uses case studies to demonstrate how those elements work together to bring about useful solutions to problems. I got a lot of value from this book by applying its principles to my business and my clients. I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to improve how problems are solved in general and in their organization, because what you will learn is how to examine your problem solving processes and introduce the right elements of the slow fix to help you improve on what you are already doing.

Some Thoughts on Temporal Pacing

On the way down to Pantheacon, I drove down the 101 along the Oregon Coast. It's a beautiful, beautiful drive, but as I kept driving to where we were going to say for the night, I got to reflecting how my drive was in one sense a journey into the unknown, because I didn't know when I would get to our destination for the night. There was this sense of anticipation, but also a subtle tension of wondering when will we get there. I actually feel the same way when I play a video game for the first time. I don't know how long the game will actually be. I am playing it and heading toward an unknown destination and I won't know the journey, how long the game will take, until I reach the final credits. The same is true with a ritual or technique you learn. The first time is a journey into the unknown, heightened by the factor of time.

Once you driven the route or played the game or done the ritual once, the unknown is changed. It becomes known, partially by your experience of it, but partially because you can also fit it into a temporal pace. You know how long it will take, when you'll be where doing what. You know the time of it and that changes the experience because you have a different sense of where you are and what you are doing. It is simultaneously an experience where some of the unknown is gone, and yet what is known is still an illusion, because what you know is now based on expectation and recognition, which can be misleading.

And there's something to be noted about how time is conceptualized according to distance. We talk about distance in terms of hours traveled, but by the same token, time is also conceptualized by the distance driven. When I reach that spot, I'll know I've spent X amount of time driving. The same even applies to reading a book or playing a game. Whether we realize it or not we use our previous experience as an indicator of how much time is passed, yet again this is misleading, because the sense of time passed is based on your experience of distance traveled, game played, etc, and yet different people can have different experiences of time doing those same activities.

This is only important in the sense that we should never just buy-in to our experiences of life...or the elements that define life, such as time, or space. The experience is subjective and unless we question it and explore it, we run the risk of missing out on the unknown. We take the known for granted and yet what is known is an experience...not the reality.

Book Review: Thinking through the Body by Richard Schusterman

This was an intriguing book that explored the discipline of Somaaesthetics, or the aesthetics of the body. The author discussed the aesthetics in relationship to style, architecture, Japanese Noh theatre, muscle memory, to name just a few of the topics. The book is a dense, academic read, but well worth the effort as it explores the body through a variety of mediums. I found myself thinking about and experiencing my body with new perspectives as a result of reading this book. I'd recommend it if you are interested in developing a better relationship with your body, or want to learn more about this niche academic discipline.

Round 1 of the Space/Time Magic Weekend intensive starts in March!

On March 30th, my first Weekend intensive for Space/Time Magic will start at 10am, and will end on March 31st at 4pm. In the time between, participants who take this class will learn about Space/Time magic, specifically the system of magic and tradition I've created around this topic. This class will include material I've never published, as well as teaching participants how to customize concepts from my books Space/Time Magic and Magical Identity. I'm offering an early bird special for this class. If you sign up by March 10th, you will only pay 180 to take this class. If you sign up after the 10th, you'll pay 220 for the class. This is an in-person class, based in Portland, OR, which means we will meet in person for the training. When you take the class you will get the following:

• A detailed exploration of the elements of space and time and how they apply to magic.
• Introduction to the dual-deck system of Tarot reading and how it can be used for space/time enchantments.
• How to apply retroactive magic to create the right circumstances of space and time.
• Space/Time Magic techniques that you can use to achieve practical results.
• How to use retroactive magic to make changes in your behavior.
• Space/Time Meditation practices that you can use to connect with alternate versions of yourself as well as your past and future selves.
• Connection with Space/Time Inner Contacts who will guide you in your continued work with the Space/Time Magic System.
• Unpublished material that is specific for the class.

Want to know more about the class or how to sign up? Contact me.

Some Thoughts on Timing and Magic

The most recent lesson from the strategic sorcery discusses timing and magic. It's focus on timing has more to do with the time of day or planetary cycle or moon cycle than how I approach timing. I've never found traditional timing in magic to be all that relevant or necessary to magical work. When people say to wait for a waning or waxing moon to do a type of magic, I say do it regardless of when the moon is waxing or waning. If you're doing it right, it should work anyway. When someone says to wait for a specific day or time of day to do a type of magic I say that they are over thinking it and that if you're doing it right, it ought to work without having to factor those kinds of conditions. I look at that kind of timing as a window dressing of magic. In other words, its not essential to performing successful magic.

Now I get that this traditional kind of timing has been used for a long time in magical work and that some magicians can arguably point to how using such timing has helped them pull off some successful magic, because they've been able to harness sympathetic energy/forces to enhance the momentum of their magical work. It might even be argued that doing magical work at the wrong time of day increases resistance to the realization of that work. I just don't buy it as a principle of magic and the reason is that I've never found that not adhering to traditional timing to be a bad thing or to stop the effectiveness of my magical work. It seems at best to be an optional aspect of magic, and at worst to be a holdover of more traditional perspectives that obscure the underlying principles of magic. The question boils down to this: Can you consistently get a result regardless of when you do a magical working? If the answer is yes, then is this kind of timing necessary to magical work.

Now when I think of timing and magic, I think of how to time it just right so that the result comes when you need it. Timing for me is more about working with time as a whole, specifically in terms of getting things to happen at just the right time and place. I want a result to occur at a specific moment of time or when a specific condition is fulfilled. That kind of timing is precises, oriented on the understanding that the alignment of specific circumstances calls for specific responses to keep everything running smoothly. Timing as it applies to events and to opportunity is what interests me, because its opportunity which is important to magic. Opportunity defines magic to the extent that in the application of practical magic we are looking for specific opportunities. Timing plays a role in the achievement of those opportunities because for an opportunity to become more than potential you need to be at the right space and time. So when I do practical work, I always factor in timing and space. When and where do I need an opportunity to occur so that I can capitalize on it. Think about that in your own magical work and you'll find it to be very relevant to the manifestation of possibility into reality.

Into Time and Space

After I finished my emptiness ritual and had cleansed myself of the paint, I moved right into the ritual to accept time as the new element. I put on the bracelet of elephant hair, and the elephant necklace and put before me the painting to elephant. I asked elephant if elephant would allow me to enter the gates of time and was told yes. Then I evoked Purson and Thiede as my guides through the silver web of time and space. I did an exercises of putting increments of time into each other until the increments become meaningless.

I opened the memory box, which is my gateway to the silver web and put both my hands on its sides. And I traveled along the silver web until I came to the center, where the Spider Goddess of Time awaited me. She held up the book of her mysteries and said, "It's good you have this back, now paint what I show you."

I pulled out my paintbrush and waters color and painted a web of time. Just one colors, lots of silver-gray...I asked her...was this really it? And she told me that my perceptions of time were too limited by human made standards of time. That what I painted wasn't even so much a symbol as a way of relating to time and space, a way of moving past the linear perceptions and measurements that mark time by human standards. She told me that this year would be a move away from the mystical path I've been on, back to more of a focus on magic, but also a focus on changing those limited perceptions on time...that all the material she'd put in my path the last couple of months was partial prep work for the workings ahead.

And with that, she stopped my hand, looked at my work and said, "Start with this and see what it teaches you."

Then I closed the gate to the silver web of time and gave my thanks to Thiede, Purson, and Elephant...and to her, the spider goddess of time. And so that's the beginning into the element of time.

Are you a Traditionalist?

A reader asked me yesterday, after I posted my review of Evola's book on Buddhism, if I agreed with Evola's  traditionalist views in other areas, because I liked Evola's work. When I posted the review to Amazon, I'd noticed traditionalism come up as a possible tag, first time I ever came across the word actually. Let me just say that assuming I'm anything based on what I read is at best an erroneous assumption. It's true I like Julius Evola's writing. And if we were to research Julius the person, we would find out he was a fascist and I guess a traditionalist as well (maybe they are even one and the same!). But I'm not interested in Evola's political beliefs and don't find them relevant to my practice. Nor, really, am I concerned with labeling his spiritual practices or my own as traditionalist.

In fact, I'm not really interesting in trying to label my own practices either. The most I've ever done is to label myself as an experimental magician, an even that label is one I rely on less these days. What's really important afterall is not the label, but rather what one is actually doing.

So for me, Evola's writing, which I like because he's a good scholar and offers some intriguing perspectives on what he writes about, whether it's Buddhism or Tantra, or Hermeticism, or an article on time magic, is important because I find it relevant to my spiritual practice. Frex, the book on Buddhism offered some useful insights into early Buddhist texts and practices, and proved helpful in my emptiness working.

But even though I like his works, it shouldn't be assumed that I'm a traditionalist or anything else that Evola was. I am, after all, not Julius Evola (last I checked). Nor because I've read Edward Hall and liked his work, should it be assumed I hold to his political beliefs or his approach to anthropology or anything else. Liking someone's writing doesn't mean you agree with all of it or that you hold the same beliefs as someone.

But really what I'm saying is this: Labels are at best an illusion crafted to provide us and others the security (a false one) of being able to say this person is this or that. But what if I'm not?

I read what I read because I find it important to cultivate an awareness of a wide variety of perspectives and beliefs so that I can see how those perspectives inform my spiritual and indeed, overall life. So am I a traditionalist? Likely not.

But I am me...and I do enjoy learning and applying what I learn toward living a better life. I hope you do as well.

Review of The Silent Language by Edward T. Hall

In this book, Hall explores the intricacies of time and space from a cultural studies perspective. Although this book is a bit dated, the information is still very relevant, and what Hell offers is an examination of how much our perception of time influences our cultural and everyday interactions. For example, learning just how tightly time is wound for Americans as opposed to other cultures is quite insightful to the workaholicism that pervades American culture. Hall touches on some aspects of space as well, though you'll find more of his thoughts on it, in the hidden dimension. What I most enjoyed about this book is an exploration of time from a social science perspective as opposed to a hard science perspective.  I definitely recommend it to anyone interested in understanding concepts of space and time.

5 out of 5 stars

Time Magic: Purson

When I got home on Sunday from Fall Eq, one of the first things I did was go back to my ritual room and get started on the next painting for the time magic ritual I'll be doing in October. This time, the painting was for Purson, one of the Goetic Daimons of Time, and one I've been working with closely for some time. Purson is one of two guides for time, in my paradigm. The horn he blows in a symbol of sound and its relationship to sound, in terms of tuning potentialities into actual realities. Purson, as a guide, provides safe passage on the silver web of time, and can act as an intermediary for the magician, when the magician wishes to work with the Spider Goddess of time. As an interesting aside, Purson stabilizes time, while the other guide stabilizes space. Below is the painting I created as a Seal for Purson.

Time Magic: Work with Elephant

I'm prepping to switch from the Element of Emptiness to the Element of Time. My work with the element of Time will likely be quite different from that of the previous workings. I'm working with a lot of entities, and already have been given a diagram of sorts that shows the positioning of each entity. Last night I did my first working, which was to Elephant as the gatekeeper of time. Elephant guards the gates of time, acting as a guardian for those who would work with time, but also as a guardian of time itself. I would consider him a tester of a person's understanding of time. His lesson is to teach those who would work with time about the integral role of space in defining our understanding of time, specifically in terms of distance and how we use spatial measurements to process the motion of time.

I'll be working with him for the rest of this week, as part of the prep work for switching over to Time in October. Below is the painting I created last night with his guidance. The background colors are purposely done somewhat faded, so that the symbol stands out further.

Space/Time Tarot/Deity experiments

I decided to do some space/time work with tarot cards after finishing A Brief hirstory of Time by Oryelle Defenstrate-Bascule. In his book he'd explain some of his own space/time tarot techniques and it reminded me of some of my experiments with space/time tarot, which I'd done a year or so back. As good as any reason to break out the cards and do some further experimentation as well as deal with a few gnawing situations in my life. As Oryelle points out and I have pointed out as well, tarot isn't just for divination. It's also for conjuration. A reading provides you more than a glimpse of the future...it also provides you an opportunity to manipulate the possibilities presented to you. I used the voyager deck to create a magical circle and an evocation triangle. The magical circle and triangle is based off the book Portable Tarot by Donald Tyson, but the technique described here is an extension of his concepts into my own style and experimentation of magic. Here's what it looks like (Note you can also click the link to see the full picture):

The aces are in the center. They form the elemental foundation. On top of them is the card, which represents my current self. My presence is the Hanged Man. The outer circle is the trumps cards used to create the magical circle or tarot temple or whatever else you want to call it.The row of cards above are trump influences I am relying on. All of them were appropriate as gateways and power providers.

The summoning Triangle is the Priestess, the Fool, and Space/Time. Normally the Hanged man would be part of the Triangle, but I replaced him with the Priestess card, thinking it appropriate, plus the Hanged man is the presence of me. The Master of Worlds is the Future self I picked for myself. I thought of going to the usual card, the Woman of Crystals aka the Gaurdian, but I realized that didn't feel right, so I randomly stirred the voyager cards until my hand came to that card, which said I am the future of you. I realize now that the Guardian card is no longer representative of me. She was the guardian of my lies, illusions, and delusions which Babalon stripped away from me this last year. The presence of the Hanged Man is that which stares into the emptiness of zero seeking answers while submitting to the suffering necessary for achieving those answers. That suffering, for me, is really the emptiness work and the work with my past, with the roots of all that has haunted me in this life. The Master of Worlds is also the Master of time, but to master anything, you have to submit to it first, surrender to the flow in order to understand the force and manifest a movement that goes in sync with others. The master has surrendered to the emptiness and so understood it. He is me after this year is finished, or at least a possible variant of me.

I did the activation of the circle as well as the invocation of the future self into my present self, asking him to guide my hands for the reading I was going to do. I evoked the spider goddess of time, Purson demon of time, and Thiede the Dehar of space/time. I also evoked Xah my Personal Daemon and fox spirit and guide. Each of these beings are essential to my mythology of time. I wanted their presence and guidance in the working I was doing, because I wasn't just doing a divinatory reading, but actually a conjuration across the silver web of time. Below is a picture of me meditating with the forces that I'm working with:

I felt my older self lay his hands into mine and I shuffled my Alchemy deck and created a reading specific to circumstances in my life, both present circumstances, but also seeking for the person(s) who are part of a very specific magical working in my life that is yet to come, which this emptiness working and the love working has been a prelude to. Below is the cards pulled for the alchemy deck (Note you can also click the link to see the entire picture):

You can see most of the cards, though one got caught in the glare of the light. The Three in One, in the center, are present situations in my life. The two cards above and below the three card spread are current potential factors I can use that also involve what it is I'm seeking for. The card to the left is the past, and aptly reflects who I was. The cards to the right is an action to take as well as the desired reality. This not justr a reading...it is actually a specific working, a conjuration of reality, which utilizes the principles of the cards to manifest specific goals. The last time I did this type of working, was for Leisa Refalo's Podcast on Tarot and the magical working I did has come to fruition and continued to manifest since then. I mention that because I want to emphasize the dynamic nature of this working. It isn't a divination...It it a conjuration of potential that is manifested into reality. It does provide necessary information for how the conjuration will manifest, while also aligning the realities into one. It's also a kind of retroactive magic, because I'm using my future self to guide my presence in manifesting this potential into specific reality.

After I did this reading, I then spent some time working with the spider goddess of time in particular. I asked her to show me how to weave webs of potential into reality. I put my hands together as if in prayer, but as I looked at my hands, I felt the Astral fingers of each hand go through the other hand, so that I held my physical fingers in prayer, but held my astral fingers in a kind of V and used both sets of hands to weave the silver strands of time into reality. She guided my weaving and as I looked into those hands, I began to see a flickering of images that represented different potential realities. I started weaving the images into the silver webs and then cast the webs into reality. The webs of time would take the images of the possible future and meld them into reality. Below is a picture of the prayer pose I was doing. Obviously you can't see the astral fingers, but it gives you an idea of what I was doing on a physical level:

When I finished with the meditation, I thinked each deity of time and then thanked my future self. I recorded the cards and the specifics of the reading in my personal journal and then undid the temple, releasing the silver webs into reality. I'll be experimenting with this technique in more depth and there will likely be an article about it in the future, but I also wanted to show a work in progress as it were as well as how I do some of my space/time magic work. This post will likely end up in my book on identity and magic, as a lot of my research and experimentation is involving a lot of space/time work. This is a small example of that work.

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Review of A Brief Hirstory of Time by Oryelle Defenstrate-Bascule

For any chronomancer out there, this book is a must read. Not only will it put you in touch with the Spider Goddess of Time, but it also demonstrates experimental magic at its finest. Oryelle presents some very intriguing concepts and ideas about time magic. I found it hard to put this book down as I was enthralled by his ideas, as well as noticing some intriguing synchronicities in our work (which isn't surprising as this seems to be common amongst Space/Time magicians), most notably the silver strands of time. Oyrelle artfully blends poetry and art into a discourse on space/time magic which is revolutionary for what it offers, namely a non-linear perspective on time as well as methods for practicing some potent space/time magic. I'll definitely be utilizing some of this techniques and experimenting with them, because I know the process described within the book works. I've already started working with the spider goddess of time and she is a very real presence. I highly recommend this book. You will get a lot out of it and also be supporting and artist and magician in his work.

5 out of 5 silver webs of time.