A Fourth Key to Magic - or the Order of Unlearning

In a recent series of posts I shared 3 Keys to Magic which I consider both help- and powerful in creating a living magic approach: Intention, Technique and Awareness.

You won't believe what happened since then! Some strange events made me the owner of the collected manuscripts of a secret occult order. It seems so arcane that not even Wikipedia knows it. I studied their documents and came to the conclusion that I had forgotten an essential point in my recent posts, a fourth Key to Magic. So for the first time in history let me openly share the secrets of this unknown order with you - and unveil a fourth Key to Magic...

Let me start by saying that the Order seems to have ceased to exist by now. I could not find any more recent documents since 1970. Before then, however, its members seem to have worked as a community of magicians living siltently among us, unrecognized, unspoken of, truly bringing the fundamental principles of magic to life: to know, to want, to dare, to be silent. The name of the Order changed multiple times over the decades, yet 'The Order of Unlearning' appears most often written by hand on top of the manuscripts. From all the pages I revisited here are the few key facts I could extract: Access to the Order was granted on personal recommendation of several members only and its structure followed the Scottish rite of 33 masonic degrees. What seems strange, though, is that every new member joined as 33° Inspector General straight away?

Even more astonishing was the discovery that the Order of Unlearning didn't had any teachings... Rather than requiring members to learn new things, it required them to forget. I know this sounds rather suspicious. So let me quote directly from their manifesto:

"(...) All the disinformation we were exposed to during childhood, teenage years, college and work life make each one of us a 33° Inspector General of bullshit. What we need is not more knowledge, but less. The map we need is not the treasure map to secret libraries, but the road sign to the next waste dump. All our ideas about science, objectivity, economy, growth and consumption - we take the oath to forget it all. We will leave it to the crows of the trash dump and leave the places of knowledge light as a feather.

Sister, Brother, your mind is a Palimpsest, a vellum that has been used over and over again. Layers of text over layers of text, all on one skin... That is what your mind is. You will never be truly free of all the things that were written upon you. But you can make each letter fade, one by one, until the ink becomes to light to be read. This is the process of Unlearning, the goal of Unknowing. (...)" 

So, on joining the Order members started all the way at the top - and the entire work within the Order was about climbing down the stairs of the huge pyramid they found
themselves thrown on top. The first grades (33° - 29°) seem to have been the most sensitive ones. Many new joiners - once they realized the true height of the pyramid they were on top - immediately retreated again into a deep state of bullshitting. Others just threw themselves down from the tip of the pyramid and died. These difficulties seemed to have helped to keep the number of members small over the decades - and the Order itself arcane... 

Even though the Order of Unlearning didn't had any teachings, it seems they did conduct initiations. Each initiation was planned to make life a little more simple, carve away another layer of thought and theory and ideas. From all the documents I deciphered this rite of an early initiation seems best to illustrate this principle:

During a normal work day a woman enters your open plan office. She steps out of the elevator and looks completely normal, average dress, average hair, a little plain-Jane yet with a nice teint. She walks through the office and seems to be looking for something. Then she comes over to your cube, coffee cup in her hands. As you get up she approaches you, puts down her coffee on your desk, takes your head in her hands and starts to kiss you. As her lips touch yours, as her tongue touches yours, you realize this is the moment you have been waiting for all your lifetime - being caught in the present moment unintentionally, not holding on to anything, not requesting anything, but finding a space that opens once you forget... The woman tastes like coffee, her fingers touch your neck, your hair, her lips stroke yours. For a moment things around you vanish into void and disappear. For a short moment you cease to exist and give way to something new that takes your place instead: It's the intense feeling on your lips, it's is the strange taste in your mouth... For a moment you have lost your mind and come to your senses.

Then the woman lets go abruptly. She puts down an envelope on your desk and picks up her coffee cup. As you grab the envelope the woman already disappears into the elevator at the other side of the room... Inside you find an invoice over 666$ on your name. On the back of it you see a scribbled note:  "You could have had this cheaper, stupid. Any day of your life."

Essentially the Order of Unlearning teaches one thing only, the fourth Key to Magic. This is what it says: "All wise men forget." 

Here is the complete diagram of the Four Keys to Magic:

In case you want to practice your magic in the spirit of the Order today you got to dig deep. There is a lot of bullshit out there. But maybe you'll find the currents and follow the stream that already fed the teachings of Rah Omir Quintscher and Franz Bardon:

"If you set out to learn how to learn, then first and foremost learn how to forget. Of the twelve tasks of Hercules the first was to clean the stables of king Augias which he achieved by redirecting a river and allowing it to wash through the stable. Your consciousness, disciplie, is very similar to Augias' stable - full of falsities, prejudices and illusions - into which you need to direct a river or stream - Lethe, the stream of forgetfulness - to sweep away all of them. But do believe me: achieving this will be a true Herculean task as much more difficult than learning is forgetting."

Dr.Mussallam, Der Adept, p.85

3 Keys to Magic - or why opening our eyes is easy

Again, here is a quick overview of the model we are discussing. Parts one and two of this small series deal with the first two angels of 'Intention' and 'Technique' within the triangle of Magic. The missing link of magical balance is called Awareness. Let's take a look at this final angle together and see what we can take from it...

3) Communication or Awareness

In consultancy language this is the angle referred to as Communication. What this means for a consultant is: Whatever you are trying to achieve and however smart you figured out how to get to the place marked 'X' on your map - you need to inspire other people to join you on this trip. Wherever you are planning to go, the journey needs to have meaning for everybody whom you want to take along. The longer or the more burdensome your journey, the more true this statement is. Simply put: As a consultant you are only as good as your impact is on other people. Nothing is achieved on your own and everything through other people. Trust, engagement, humility and openness in your communication are the silver bullets in the business. They are what differentiates a consultant who is great in designing neat concepts from a someone who actually impacts the bottom line. Little is achieved until you have inspired other people to make this their journey, rather than following you or someone else without belief. 

So what does this mean in a magical context? 

The key lies in the aspect of relation and engagement. In the ability to establish rapport, encounter other people as diverse beings, with diverse biographies, skills and dreams - who all need to find meaning (or at least sufficient personal benefit) in the journey you are suggesting to undertake. When we work with spirits we need to do exactly the same thing: Understand their way of being. We need to be aware that they have a biography just like we do, that they that they have certain skills, personality structures and intricate relationships to other entities. In a nutshell: Its our own level of Awareness that determines if we can create true encounter with the spirits.

Let me make sure we are all getting on the same page here and quote a passage from Martin Buber. There is so much we can learn from his philosophy of dialogue - for interactions with humans and spirits alike. This example strikes me particularly fitting in this context:

I consider a tree. 

I can look on it as a picture: stiff column in a shock of light, or splash of green shot with delicate blue and silver of the background.

I can perceive it as movement: flowing veins on clinging, pressing pith, suck of the roots, breathing of the leaves, ceaseless commerce, with earth and air - and the obscure growth itself.

I can classify it in a species and study it as a type in its structure and mode of life.

I can subdue its actual presence and form so sternly that I recognize it only as an expression of law - of the laws in accordance with which a constant opposition of forces is continually adjusted, or of those in accordance with which the component substances mingle and separate.

I can dissipate it and perpetuate it in number, in pure numerical relation.

In all this the tree remains my object, occupies space and time, and has its nature and constitution.

It can, however, also come about, if I have both will and and grace, that in considering the tree I become bound up in relation to it. The tree is now no longer It. I have been seized by the power of exclusiveness.

To effect this it is not necessary for me to give up any of the ways in which I consider the tree. There is nothing from which I would have to turn my eyes away in order to see, and no knowledge that I would have to forget. Rather is everything, picture and movement, species and type, law and number, indivisibly united in this event.

Everything belonging to the tree is in this: its form and structure, its colours and chemical composition, its intercourse with the elements and with the stars, are all present in a single whole.

The tree is no impression, no play of my imagination, no value depending on my mood; but it is bodied over against me and has to do with me, as I with it - only in a different way.

Let no attempt be made to sap the strength from the meaning of relation: relation is mutual.

(Martin Buber, I and Thou, p.7-8)

I guess, we do not need to know the entire biography of a spirit before we reach out to encounter it. We do not need to remember or forget anything in order to relate. We only need to create the right awareness - awareness of the simple fact that the spirit we try to commune with "is no impression, no play of my imagination, no value depending on my mood; but it is bodied over against me and has to do with me, as I with it - only in a different way."

So while complete knowledge of the spirit's skills, personality (i.e. energy) structure or relationships to other spirits is helpful to create awareness it is certainly not required. Actually, often this knowledge is only gained through the actual process of encountering the spirit - and even then it can take years of engagement and relationship. However, being aware of the things we do not know yet is essential. Spiritual beings - especially the more powerful ones - are just as complex beings as we are; often times even more so. That is why knowing what you don't know, avoiding tempting pre-conclusions, and keeping an open mind to engage, explore and understand who is 'bodied over against you' are keys to creating powerful magical Awareness.

At the end of the day it comes down to one thing: Your very own (astral) senses are the fine line between abstract theory and personal experience, between knowledge from books and authentic personal learnings, between thought and expression. A devoted heart (Intention) and the most elaborate Techniques alone won't get you anywhere unless you can actually judge and evalute the impact of your magical actions for yourself. You need to be able to see with your own eyes, hear with your own ears and taste with your own lips... 

Personally I find it quite ironic that it took me more than a decade to realize that awareness of my own astral senses is the most simple angle to accomplish - way easier than intent or technique. It only takes a single step. Because we are all born with highly skilled and agile astral senses. We are born - and we are instantly 'in touch'. Unfortunately we are agile unlearners of all the astral skills we brought with us - and quickly forget the wonderful gifts we were given. Our astral ears still hear, our astral hands still grab and stroke - but we become blind to it. And what keeps us blind is our belief that opening our eyes is hard... 

But the last angle of the triangle of art is simply called Awareness and not 'try hard'. It's so much more a form of letting go than reaching out for something new... It's all there, all present and open in front of us. The gift is with us. We have all senses, fully developed to perceive things for what they are. May it be spirits, humans or trees - all living encounters waiting to be made. 

A spirit staring patiently back at us -
waiting for us to open our eyes.

3 Keys to Magic - or even in magic it takes two to tango

Here is a quick recap of the model we are discussing and applying for a more balanced approach to magic:

The first angle of 'Strategy or Intent' has been covered in the previous post. Let's see what we can learn from the second angle of 'Structure or Technique'...

2) Structure or Technique

Structure in consultancy language refers to the nuts and bolts, the essential equipment you rely on while traveling all the way of your journey. It's meaning is best illustrated by a few examples: For Columbus the (infra-)structure of his journey was his fleet of ships as well as the crew, for a consultant this is the IT infrastructure or a specific division in an organization, for a pilot it is the plane and for a rally driver it is the car. For a magician it is no different: we rely upon our equipment just like every adventurer does - and maybe even more so these days: Some of us spend a lifetime perfecting the ritual structures we work upon, perfecting the set of paraphernalia and ritual tools that allow us to direct the forces summoned and to travel the spiritual roads leading into the dark ahead of us. As a magician during the times of rediscovery of the Grimoires (i.e. today) it's easy to become obsessed with structure as a mean to its own end. It's easy to mistake the map for the territory, to start eating the menu instead of the meal and forget that the only use of a vessel for Columbus was to traverse an unknown sea. Once he reached the shores it was left behind...

Maybe we can learn something from a time that isn't so long ago? Here is what Christopher Bray had to say about this at the high noon of Chaos Magic in the 1980s: 

"Magicians have always believed that ritual is a springboard to Gnosis yet in light of recent developments the idea that magical method can lead the consciousness of the magician up into and through Gnosis in a controlled way is seen to be a fallacy. The magician cannot willfully and with certainty expect to create the state of Gnosis purely through intellectual considerations of his magical method, he can only prepare a jumping off spot from which he must throw himself into Infinitude."

(Christopher Bray, Spare, Sorcery and Chaos Magic, in: AOS Collected Works, 1986)

Let's paint it black and white: For a freemason there are few things more exciting than deciphering an old emblem of the art, for an alchemist there are few things more exhilarating than setting up his new athanor and for a magician there are few things more absorbing than creating sigils, inks, papyri, incenses, chalk circles, Etz Chiim anologue crowns and swords and daggers and silver cups and banners of the four celestial regions... You get it? If not, my wife hit it on the head years ago with a short dinner remark. I had just invested several days to create ritual paraphernalia for a planned rite when she said over dinner: 'You know, I really love you - but you are such a boy with all your bricolage and DIY toys." While I obviously protested like any good magician would, it still got me thinking... I wondered why working on ritual structures had almost become synonymous for me with a distinct mistrust against nature's ability to support my magic organically. Or in other words: Why was so much DIY needed to commune with spirits that had never used a Dremel in their eternal lives themselves?

I guess - especially for male magicians - it's easy to fail to see that we are surrounded by am organic network of living forces, that we are essentially embedded into it and continuously interact with it. This type of organic structure is optimized for our use already - may it be on a physical, astral or mental level. Like it or not, with regards to Structure we are pretty well equipped since birth - and it doesn't need a lot of reinventing to put it into practice. What it does need is appropriate application. 

Let's make this real simple: In order to call someone we have never spoken to before we do not need to reinvent the telephone, including network systems, oversea cabling and international prefixes. We simply need to pick up the phone and - most of all - which number to dial.

Let's go one step further and apply this idea to an example taken from magical practice: You invoked an elementary ruler, let's say of the element of fire and you need to banish his influence after concluding the spiritual contact. An approach that is potentially overloaded with structure would apply lengthy ritual formulas for departures, leverage the ritual dagger, make use of cleansing incenses as well as the ritual act of extinguishing the temple lights. This is a perfectly fine approach and it has worked for hundreds or even thousands of years. My point is, sometimes tradition has maintained the most complex approaches in books and Grimoires - because they were just too hard to remember by heart. That doesn't mean, however, that the simply techniques don't work just as well; they were simply taken for granted and thus not recorded in books. In this particular case try this: Open the temple door, consciously walk over the threshold, leave your ritual persona behind and close the door from the other side. Done.

The real question to avoid an overload of structure and thus cripple your approach to an organic and living form of magic is: Are you clear about how the forces you strive to interact with interact with yourself and your environment? Doing magic unfortunately is only kicked off by adequate structures - once these are established or internalized it becomes a living interaction. And just as in any other interaction you aren't doing magic to someone or something but you are doing magic to each other. Wether the goal of your magic is yourself, your environment or a certain spirit - it always takes two to tango.

Let's not get trapped in the illusion that the person who makes a phone call is more "powerful" than the person who answers it. Any phone call takes two - otherwise it's just an attempted call without any impact or a voice message left in the dark of the abyss... So if any real magic is a living interaction, then we just found a simple rule for the second triangle of the art: Structure always needs to serve the living. Just take a look at nature and you will find the same principle applied in abundance. Any seemingly dead structure in nature has a purpose for the living - any fallen tree, any rock or snow crystal. Structure in itself is nothing but a house to be inhabited by the living. If the house has become something like a maze - a place of isolation and withdrawal rather than encounter and communion - we need to understand its purpose and how it supports our goals. If it doesn't - let's tear down the maze and create a space for living and breathing interactions.

With regards to the banishing example above: the goal is to establish a threshold between the forces you worked with and your everyday personality to which you are returning after the rite. So why not simply using your temple door as the physical manifestation of this threshold - and close it behind you - instead of cumbersome banishing rituals. You can use the more traditional approach or invent your own one. Yet both of them require you to experience and evaluate the direct and authentic impact of your magical actions for yourself.

So maybe this is the second key we found: Whenever ritual structure starts to obstruct rather than construct, it's time to destruct. 

(to be continued - read next part here)

An example of efficient ritual structure: the head of the deceased
family member was cut off and integrated into the head of this
life-size puppet. Once it had decayed into its components in the main
tent of the tribe it was buried next to the body of the ancestor.
Through this ritual approach a proper rite of passage and
time for transition was ensured.

Three Keys to Magic - or why the f*** did this insight take so long?

During my early days at work I learned about a simple model to design and implement change projects. This model sprang to my mind recently while in meditation. I had received a request from a reader on how to contact the Olympic Spirits outside of rituals and it seems my subconscious clearly wanted me to revisit this model while pondering about my answer. Until that day I had never thought of the model in magical terms... Well, stupid me!

It's now over two weeks since I came across this initial idea. Since then it turned out that this spark thrown out by my subconscious lit a fire in my little mind on how to better balance my approach on doing magic. Most importantly maybe, on how to break free from the invisible cage I had created around myself: an approach to magic that overly relies on ritual structure to achieve gnosis and communion with spirits. An approach that is willing to sacrifice aliveness on the altar of control and rational consciousness. An approach that had become blind for boundaries that I had accepted as reality. Finally, an approach that almost got me trapped in the invisible cage of ritual tradition, dead letters, empty repetition and the male desire to dominate... 

Actually it turned out that a slightly adjusted version of this model could be the closest thing to an exist door from this invisible cage I have ever come across. Meditating over the application of this model in magical terms allowed me to spot three basic principles - or for lack of a better word, keys. Keys to balancing ones approach to magic in a sustainable and mature way. Something the magical tradition I grew up in didn't provide me with. So it's an insight on my end that is really long overdue... 

Without further ado let's get down to the nitty gritty. Here is what I found, split into three bite-sized postings. 

Three Keys to Magic #1

Here is the simple consultancy model that is often used for designing and implementing change processes. It was this model that my subconscious threw out while I meditated on the question how to establish contact with spirits - without getting caught in the limiting trap of overlying on ritual structure.

When my mentor shared this model with me years ago he mentioned that it is these three aspects only that need consideration if one wants to bring a new vision to life: 

1. You need to know the territory and your way through it,
2. you need to offer support to everyone who hasn't taken this journey before and 
3. you need to engage with everyone affected and make them own the change as their very own journey. 

The model doesn't replace the vision itself, i.e. knowing where you want to go. But it helps planning the journey once the goal is set. Once you have found the place marked 'X' on the treasure map - the model is your best friend to understand how to get there.

Now, applying this model to magic requires some adaption. While the basic concept holds true the language is different in a magical context. So here is a translation of the model into a magical paradigm:

I think there are some interesting insights hidden if we explore what this model can do for us to balance our approach to magic. First I will explain the meaning of each angle in the original consultancy model and than transfer its application to doing magic.

1) Strategy or Intention

Strategy in consultantcy language is the roadmap, it is what describes the territory as well as the road that you have chosen through it. It is the best approximation to the challenges and required resources of the journey ahead of you. Intention as used in this context is much more than the desire to do something. Intention here is the full awareness of, the willingness and commitment to give everything it takes to achieve your goal. This type of intent emerges from a deep state of mental synthesis, a coherent conscious and subconscious understanding of the paradigm you are working in, of the way forces affect each other and how change is brought forth in the language and perspective of the particular tradition you chose to work in. 

Only once we have achieved such a fundamental understanding of the coherence, history and personal impact of the forces we are working with are we ready to speak with intent. Only then can we enter the (inner) temple and utter our will - without having our subconscious and a busload of entities laughing back at us. This is the first step: creating a coherent state of intent - knowing and accepting the path, the costs and the duration of your journey. We have to understand the details of the map before we can chose the path to get to the place marked 'X'.

I guess it also makes sense to point out that sometimes - if we explore territory few people have been to before - we cannot know the exact path and the costs or time it will take to reach our goal. If we have set our mind to embark on such a particular journey it is necessary to accept the unknown risks: to be willing to invest whatever it takes and to immerse yourself with full commitment. In situations like these we need to reach towards the purest from of intent, of unconditional devotion. Unconditional devotion to our work thus becomes a principle requirement for many spiritual journeys. Unfortunately, in real life devotion is often misunderstood as a quality, as an expected result to be gained from spiritual exercise. Yet, devotion is a decision taken in your heart, it is the beginning of the journey, not the end.

Also, this makes it obvious why you don't want to work in several different paradigms or in multiple ritual cycles at once... Your heart can only be devoted to one thing at a time. Once you embark on a journey you have to make sure you stay devoted throughout the entire trip. Or else you will walk of the ship in open sea, assuming you made it to the shore already while drowning in open water.

I guess the reason why this element of any magical approach is easily overlooked is that it is of purely subjective basis. Wether true intent or a state of devotion has been achieved successfully or not - no one except for yourself will see and notice. There are no artifacts, no outside evidence, no objective metrics about the state of your intent. You won't find mentioning of it in any grimoire - or will you? 

What about the long winded passages many of us have skipped while scouting for more effective ritual approaches, the old-fashioned introductions we find in many ancient magical source texts and prayers? What if the veils and doors in front of the sanctum were more important than what is kept inside, or of equal importance at least? What if the stages of purification in advance of our rites, the long-winded statements of intent and purity of heart, what if all these elements were there for a reason? Which is to set in motion a subconscious process of changing the state of our hearts. So maybe these sections really are what they seem to be: Simple, pure expressions of the most important precondition to achieving gnosis or ritual communion - the decision made in your heart of unconditional devotion to your work.

My old teacher kept on reminding me since the days of my first ritual: "Any successful rite is accomplished before it was even begun." I guess, only now I understand what he meant. Conducting a successful ritual is nothing but the headstone to an undertaking whose most important aspects have been accomplished beforehand. The ritual is very much needed, it is an essential moment of giving birth to a new idea, a form or spiritual creation. But it is exactly that: the final moment of birth which was preceded by many months of pregnancy. The entire body of new born, all its physical, astral and mental elements have fully taken shape by the time it is born. 

So this is the first key to magic - accessing a state of clear and unconditional intent.   

(to be continued - read next part here)

A caravan of spirits in a museum -
walking with clear intent...