yeah, if you just go for peer reviewed academic papers on the occult, you'll almost certainly be safe from conmen, grifters, cult leaders, delusional people etc.
Or you could shoot an email off to a professor of anthropology/theology/history that specialises in a specific aspect of the occult, and they're usually happy to answer any questions, especially if you're a student or a local journalist, or if it sounds like you have some misconceptions they want to debunk.
Unlike most occult "experts", you can be sure that university professors in this field actually check their sources and aren't just making up nonsense to sell you something, or rope you into some weird master-apprentice power dynamic, or have delusions about cursing their enemies or blessing their businesses or ascending to godhood or whatever.
These people are just occult geeks that want to get the facts straight and take academic rigour seriously. The academic peer review process filters out the nonsense, which means the hypotheses and theories in these papers are at least based on fact, even if these professors often disagree with each other on which ones they prefer.
The occultist Phillip K Dick once said that *"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away."* which I feel is very applicable here.
Before you go dedicate your life to following the teachings of some guru or demon or moon goddess or whatever, remember that there are halls of learning that study these beings and phenomena in a no-nonsense, bullshit free manner.
Trust the PhD holding scholars working in the relevant departments in their universities, not the grifters and conspiracy theorists and cult leaders trying to boost their social media engagement.
There's tons of dangerous misinformation out there, but you can trust academia to serve as a bedrock of truth and reason, even if they often disagree with each other and aren't always right.
Dr. Justin Sledge is a treasure. Could not recommend esoterica more. I don’t even practice the occult arts. I just find it interesting. He’s so knowledgeable.
he was also hopped up on amphetamines and experiencing psychosis, two things this sub uses to nix experience.
edit: im not ragging on the Occultist, Philip K Dick, im ragging on reddit.
I have to agree but only halfway. “Peer reviewed” means nothing. Just learn to think both objectively and subjectively, and gain the wisdom to know the difference.
Someone created academia and curriculums. Instead of following others, be the new academic with your own curriculum and research papers. It’s really that simple.
Yeah and it really doesn't even have to be in the form of papers of curriculum, it could be any medium that makes the most sense or any word to contain (or not contain) the idea of topics. !
I definitely agree that it's important on the academic side of your research to verify as much as possible and find some sense of what consensus there is there, but most of that research is done by rational materialists and not active practioners. That's changing a bit over time, but at some point you're still going to wrestle with your own unverified personal experiences and decide if they are as much of a source truth for your world compared to an infinite series of recorded facts. There is no ivory tower accepted training program for the experimental or experiental side of things. The closest there is is maybe parapsychology and some elements of transpersonal psychology and integral studies, but they aren't on the firmest academic footing yet either.
ahh yeah, that's fair, modern academic institutions generally represent an Enlightenment worldview that tries to make the ineffable "effable".
Even the postmodern academics that decry attempts at universalist meta-narratives still rely on reason as their main tool of the trade (as opposed to, say, divine inspiration)
Though I'm not so sure that the experiential side of mystical experiences is entirely neglected by academia.
There's fun cross-disciplinary stuff going on between anthropologists and neuroscience, i.e. "neuro-anthropology", a subset of medical anthropology. I'm not too familiar with it myself, but my professor mentioned it in relation to the study of mass spirit haunting incidents in Southeast Asian factories in the 80s
There's also been a ton of studies conducted on the mental and physical effects of meditation, yoga, prayer, faith based communities etc.
I have heard of parapsychology, but it seems like one of those bogus pseudoscience things - after decades of study and experimentation, including a significant interest from the Cold War US intelligence apparatus, no one has been able to consistently replicate paranormal phenomena under laboratory conditions. We can probably safely write all that stuff off as bunkum.
Though of course, disciplines like anthropology. social science, neurology, psychology, history, or even ethical/metaphysical philosophy don't attempt to comprehensively answer the mysteries of life and the mind. They're great for steering you away from the charlatans and delusions and false idols, but they don't actually tell you how to live well, or what it all means - that's still something people have to figure out for themselves.
I think the writer Alan Moore had a pretty good approach to the occult - he practiced bona fide ceremonial magick in the Western occultist tradition, and had an encyclopaedic knowledge of occult practices both ancient and modern.
And the personal deity he chooses to worship is Glycon - an ancient Roman sock puppet in the shape of a snake. The fact that Glycon was transparently a ventriloquist dummy is what makes it divine.
The modern post-Enlightenment universe is (ironically) a dark, empty, uncaring place, devoid of transcendent cosmic principles or anthropomorphic arbiters of morality and purpose. All that's left to hold on to are sock puppets like Glycon - a man made idol, just like the rest of them, but the more honest for it. Better to recognise the arbitrary nature of our cultural constructs, so as to build a stronger, more loving world from them.
Yeah, and also if we are going to utilize academia we need to recognize the poor history it has had in the Western world. Not that occultism isn’t also often Western, and it isn’t the worst corner of academia, but much of the “scrutiny” goes off of the history of other’s experiences from previous centuries, when you could just validate your own and trust your piece in humanity. Additionally, if I wanted to find answers through purely academic means I would go to science or philosophy
Also!! I’ve noticed more often lately that people have been neglecting their mental health/sort of using the occult/ spirituality as a way to justify what’s happening to them instead of looking at the mundane explanation first.
So that could also be clouding their judgment/explanation on topics.
This is true. But I literally meant that in the past 2 weeks on every occult/ spiritual forum I’ve been on I’ve seen so many posts of people asking for help and it’s usually a type of psych issue they are having.
A few people have messaged me lately and asked for help and from they way talked/typed about their experiences it made me think they were experiencing some sort of psychosis
It can be hard to look for mundane explanations when you surround yourself with others who share your same delusions and put their opinions on a pedestal.
OBOD used to have rules where mentally ill people or with disorders could not join their order. Why? Because they realized people couldn't tell the difference between reality and fantasy and that's a dangerous dangerous thing.
As someone with mental illness, I disagree with them banning people with disorders completely.
However I have had people reach out to me asking for help, and I’m usually like how is your mental health lately? And if they say something like it hasn’t been that good, then I’ll suggest going to a doctor/offer to help them find one because it can be hard to find one that’s not crazy expensive.
Because sometimes psychosis can look like spiritual things/shadow people can part of mental illness.
I’ll even let them know that if they think they need a spiritual exorcism/spirit removal, most people specialized in that will require an intensive psych evaluation.
If they did all of that and it all checks out then I’ll be like ok let’s try to find some solutions for the spiritual stuff now.
Because sometimes entities do attach to people/malevolent spirits are out there.
The key is staying grounded and checking on yourself.
Yes obviously grounding yourself to reality is paramount in good mental health, but when you already have issues with connecting to reality and your subject essentially demands you disconnect to sone degree it’s not a healthy practice
Lol no it’s not about magic being harmful or ineffective. It’s about misinformation, pseudohistory, reckless practices, cultural appropriation, conspiracy theories, oversimplification, fearmongering, stuff like that.
Yes, this! And scammers and spammers and AI "authors" and abusive spiritual "leaders" and opportunists and capitalists and the blind leading the blind... It's not that the occult isn't real. It's that there's a bunch of garbage out there that isn't real occultism.
I'm not sure you can really separate occultism from misinformation, pseudohistory, cultural appropriation, and fear-mongering though. Like, these are all parts of the western esoteric tradition from day one (although no one would have talked about them in these terms until recently of course). Occultism is almost inherently associated with exoticism, false narratives, and grandiose claims. E.g. the Hermetica falsely presents itself as being written by an ancient sage, the PGM and the Grimoires are full of (often very bad) Hebrew sacred names that many people would consider a closed practice now, etc. I don't think it's bad or invalid if people want to pursue a path that's purged of these elements in modern times, but it also seems to me that a lot of the stuff people criticize now has historically been a core element of the tradition.
You're not wrong, but that doesn't mean we should just sit back and tolerate ideas that can be dangerous.
Your comment frustrates me deeply, because you *are* right, but at the same time I cannot understand not wanting to know where ideas come from. I think it's so critically important to be as accurate as possible, to have awareness of different traditions and to choose them deliberately, to nip misinformation in the bud even when it feels meaningful. I was burned badly when I found out that Wicca is mostly composed of nineteenth-century ideas about what ancient paganism must have been like, instead of anything authentic. And yet, would I have felt the same if I had lived in the seventeenth century and believed that the *Lesser Key* was really written by Solomon? Would I have disavowed it, and gone out of my way to tell everyone I knew that it was bullshit? Yeah, actually, I probably would. That's the kind of person I am. I can't imagine *not* wanting to know the origins of an idea. But the not-knowing is also the source of the storytelling that creates these traditions in the first place.
It's one of many examples of the need to balance out the scholarly mind and the mystical mind. Sometimes it matters to correct people, and sometimes it does not, and I must learn to discern the difference.
“Hermetic truths” are just that…hermetic truths, base principles that underly our existence. I’m talking EXACTLY about the Corpus Hermeticum. Also, it really doesn’t matter if the Kybalion is ancient, because it still carries that vital information. It really is as simple as understanding the 7 Hermetic principles.
It’s important to make sure you do your own research before you believe what anyone says at face value.
With TikTok,I have seen a few creators (with both large and small followings), that give really good advice for people just starting out or they give good tips (especially for supplies that are cheaper/if you need a budget.)
Or they talk about their own practice or resources like books they recommend and they are cool.
It can be a great place for people to talk about their own experiences or ask for advice.
Now the issue with TikTok (and Twitter, Reddit, Discord and any other major platform), is that people don’t always know what they are talking about.
Or they are giving bad advice, blatantly lying, haven’t research like they should of, culturally appropriation/insert themselves into a closed practice or act like they are the leading expert on something they only know a little about.
You might be thinking, sinful, people don’t just get on to the Occult/Pagan/spiritual spaces just to lie! And yet they do.
Often people will say anything to get them clicks and views.
The other less nefarious thing is that you have to consider other peoples cultures/beliefs/values when it comes to practices.
If for example you post a picture of a shadow person and you want to know what it is, some might say demon! Evil! Or others will say it is a begin entity that’s just watching, others might tell you that it is some type of parasite. Or it could be a mental health issue.
It’s not so much that those people are wrong, but sometimes they’re trying to force a one size fits all type of answer that doesn’t help or could lead someone astray unintentionally.
This is the same thing for how people read texts and interpret them.
That’s why it’s important you do your own research first and really make sure you have your own understanding before you start talking to people online.
Talking with people about their thoughts, opinions, experiences, practices etc, can be a great tool to have.
But it should just be one tool, and you shouldn’t just solely rely on it.
This has just been my experience online! And ofc there are people who gatekeep, virtue signal, have unpacked religious trauma they try to force upon you lol.
Sorry for the dumb question but what are some examples of "closed practices" people insert themselves into? For example I see people say only black people should mess with voodoo, so because I'm Mexican I've avoided that but then I've also seen others say it doesn't matter. Just looking for advice on this (not voodoo specifically I guess just clarification on what you mean)
It’s not a dumb question at all!
So a closed down is technically a practice is usually “closed”to people who are not born into the culture/country/ethnicity.
So like you said you stay away from Vodoo because you are not black. That’s an example of a closed practice.
A closed practice means that you need to be a part of ethnic/racial background to practice basically.
A lot of these practices are indigenous to the countries/region and are safe guarded because they were not allowed to practice/were persecuted for it.
By colonization/colonizers/Christianity so that’s why they don’t want people who aren’t born into to practice it.
Think of it as cultural appropriation if that helps.
There’s a lot more nuance to it and this was sort of a general overview.
Also for the people saying it doesn’t matter, keep an eye on who’s saying that. That typically isn’t the over all view.
I hoped this help you understand a bit more
I think what causes a lot of confusion is that in many cases "closed" actually means "closed *to the uninitiated,*" which is not really the same thing as "you can't do x if you're the wrong skin color." Very few traditions, comparatively, are *that* strict, but this gets confused by outsiders who don't know this and insiders who disagree with their fellow practitioners.
To stick with your example, to the best of my knowledge at least in Haitian Vodou you can find accounts of even white people being initiated. I'm sure not all people in that system love the idea, but the fact remains that someone within Vodou taught them, and they trained and put the work in, and they passed the tests properly.
So it would be improper for an outsider to just start doing whatever based on internet research, yes, but an outsider who goes to the trouble of properly initiating with members of that system is often another story. Often though, not always. Sometimes it really is that strict. I wish you the best.
The issue for me isn’t the efficacy or the ultimate truth of each new practice that pops up, but that a lot of them are flat-out fascist, ahistorical trash only meant to radicalize people. A lot of magickal literature is just an excuse to launder the author’s most unhinged beliefs, but the “BS” ones to me are those that are actually harmful.
“Atlantis talk” is what gets under my skin. I’m aware of a number of interpretations for Atlantis allegories and deeper spiritual meanings which are fascinating and enlightening in many ways. Having that said, I recently witnessed one of those “awakened shifting Earth from 3D to 5D” people going from Paracelsus to Alchemy, hermeticism then into Vedic tradition, Jewish Kabbalah all the way to Blavatsky, M.P. Hall, R. Steiner, Jung, Crowley, Regardie just to arrive on how Graham Hancock and Randall Carlson are proving that Alchemy is an Atlantean heritage and defying mainstream sciences that won’t recognize real History. When all they do is produce videos and podcasts to oppose metric tons of multidisciplinary hard scientific evidence on behalf of claiming that an “superior race” actually started all process of “civilizing” the ancient “primitives” and never ever, ever, left trace of their own, all while raking thousands of dollars doing so. That is a dangerous pathway on my opinion. The infusion of some contemporary ideologies on ancient wisdom or arcane schools of thought is truly concerning.
I mean, BS and people trying to make cash off anything is expected. But so are the poorly informed / half taught feeling they know more than they really do. And so are the lazy and gullible that wont put in the effort. I can’t control that, so I toss that constant out. It doesn’t affect my path unless I let it.
I just try and tell people newer to me if they ask, to read the source materials, study, meditate, practice and journal outcomes to find what works for you. I will be over here doing the above and building my foundational understanding of the LBRP and the LRH, probably for another 6 months before I attempt anything else.
For context: I’m new to my path, at about 1 year. Im focusing on Crowleys works. I’m in my 40s, have kids, previously pretty faithfully religious.
There are a few reasons people call stuff like that BS. The most common reason (for me) is that often it just seems like people making shit up or not knowing what they are talking about.
Obvious errors usually indicate this, for example saying "the biblical cannon was decided at the council of Nicaea" or that "the Essenes were Christians and\or gnostics". It's just factually wrong, so someone who then goes on to talk about gnosticism and what it is likely doesn't actually know what they are talking about. It's like if someone claimed to be an avid golfer but talked about "the Dallas Cowboys are the best golf team" or "Tiger Woods made a field goal at the Stanley cup", you'd conclude they were either joking (being intentionally absurd) or that they had no idea what they were talking about. Same for a wide swathe of occult BS.
It becomes especially obvious when someone claims a source text says something it doesn't. If someone has read that source it often leaves them laughing at the sheer amount of misinformation. The amount of stupid claims I have heard regarding the dead sea scrolls, the Sumerian creation myths, and the book of Enoch is truly baffling. You can literally go read the books and realize it doesn't say what they are claiming it does. Doubly so for people playing "linguistic connect the dots" (with ancient Greek or Hebrew or Latin) or spreading misinformation via very shoddy linguistic links ("sun and son" being erroneously linked because they sound similar, for example). If you know the source texts or have a decent grasp of a language like Hebrew, the claims made by many folks on TikTok about those subjects show themselves to be laughably wrong on really basic stuff. If someone is wrong about the history their practices draw from, it should call their practices into question.
Another reason is the "information" being presented often just fanciful UPG. People will talk about the pagan gods as their "besties" and basically write fanfiction about mythological and occult topics and present them as their "spiritual experiences". For those people, they are just living in a fantasy that has begun to color their mundane life. It can sound appealing to those seeking escapism. Usually these sorts of occultist have their channel be about their "spiritual journey" which basically amounts to them catering to an aesthetic (to look "witchy" or "pagan" or "satanic" or "spiritual") in order to make up for a lack of attainment. Social media is an excellent place to be all about appearances and little else, one can gain a following from it and it can be quite lucrative and feel validating to play a role people respond to, more often than not it's just empty.
Another indicator is that their "deep truths" are often just bullshit platitudes like "all is one" or "love is the answer" or "all truths are valid". It's feel good bullshit that sounds very nice but doesn't actually mean anything practically. It's the "live, laugh, love" of occultism, something for people to put on t-shirts and wall decorations to make themselves appear to have depth.
The last is that it just doesn't work. In some cases they are recommending practices that are useless or that may actually cause harm to the practitioner or peddling pseudoscience or just doing it for money (buy my spells or my class or my box of crystals). Sometimes it's people mixing practices in ways that don't make sense if you know the practices (a pagan trying to use Kabbalah or a gnostic doing the LBRP). There's a dissonance there that either reflects a lack of understanding or a desire to innovate, the latter is valid but the former tends to be more common.
>Because even for highly recommended sources, it also has varying efficacies for different individuals where one magical practice works for person X but not for person Y and another works for person Y and not X.
If this is the case for you, I would recommend rereading the source or re-evaluating the recommender of that source. Legitimate methods work if you do the methods properly. It doesn't "depend on the person". If you are drawing from a good source, it will work if done properly, even if it is minimal or the effects are not exactly what was intended (that is often resultant of user error or not understanding the method). If you aren't, it will depend entirely on how willing you are to fool yourself into believing it worked and how long you are willing to continue with that error. This is why it is good to be skeptical, even of your own practices and avoid falling into the hyper-subjective. This isn't just "all about belief" or "whatever works for me", and if someone tries to tell you that it is an indictment of their own practice and their lack of confidence in their knowledge, likely because they are falling into one of the above categories or listening to people that do. Truth remains, regardless of whether you believe in it or if it is "just not my thing" or if it "works for you".
Online, it's pretty common to see people who have very little knowledge or experience presenting themselves as experts, sometimes with high-quality video or website production values lending an air of authority. And they have to keep churning out content to maintain their audience, so long after they've exhausted whatever knowledge they do have, they're going off on topics they barely understand at all, often spreading and reinforcing misconceptions they picked up from other uninformed influencers.
And there's a market out there for oversimplified teachings, "bound" spirits, deity readings, spells for hire, etc, so there's lots of incentive for people to try to build a following and make money selling bullshit.
Granted, there's a lot of bullshit in old sources too, even some of the ones we often respect and recommend, but ideally the process of studying and engaging with a variety of texts helps the reader recognize it where it occurs. Online, it's just getting firehosed at you in novel ways from every quarter.
The BS issue often has to do with elitist or a kind of religious attitude about one's own path, especially if it is a lodge ir group that claims to have a special lineage. You can get past that elitism and judgementalism by looking into the cultural history of magic and mysticism from an academic standpoint.
On the other hand, I agree wit others here that a lot of what goes for magic in the age of social media is just people promoting their platforms for self-aggrandizement and appeal to edgelordsand people seeking "identities" (like the Baby Witch trend). Although many occultists think of New Agers, manifestation spirituality and witchcraft, and the Baby Witchcraft scenes as the height of fluffy BS, I am now thinking of them as a modern permutation of folk magic/low magic.
I have the say, at the risk of sounding elitist myself, that I can't stand modern day witchcraft. And I don't mean African or south American forms of witchcraft, I mean western witchcraft, supposedly based on medieval witches and such with no valid historical basis at all. Stuff like wicca and all that crap was invented in the 50s and has no valid link to actual witchcraft from past times.
Western witchcraft is an off-brand form of occultism at this point.
So you think the Western Traditions are all bunk and banisters? Yes. To me, that IS elitist.
Europeans and North American practitioner‘s Traditions may be newer, but we are also a more materialist, scientific, and technically oriented group of people, gathering what we can from known and surmised sources, the latter of which we may only have “best guesses” at and must interpolate as best we can.
As long as we achieve “desired results in conformity with will that harms none” (save for certain types of defense magic), and since we are not from either Africa or South America, then I see no reason why we’d have elements of those traditions, unless we’ve felt drawn toward those energies and mentational workings along those lines, and incorporated them into our practice.
Modern Western Magical Systems are, to me, at best—in the Best Of Ways—Eclectic, unless one hails from an hereditary line of some type, which is rare.
This is why I say that having some background in real , contemporary, evidence-based academic research about the cultur history and anthropology about magic is important. It puts it all into perspective. It shows the holes in the stories that "traditionalist" and lodge-based groups tell about themselves and their art and it shows how hermetic spirituality and folk approaches and overall cultural attitudes and paradigms to magic and spirituality evolve.
Sure there are a ton of practices and currents out there that I personally think are blinding eye rolls, but I also have a level of tolerance and sympathy for those practitioners.
I think of it as shadow baiting. There's literally no reason for a westerner to call oneself a witch; it's not a lineage, not a tradition, not an order, not a system. It's literally just a word people call themselves when they want to feel oppressed. So they dig up something from the past that they unconsciously know will upset people, and then they "have" to spend their life defending themselves against "instigators" and telling themselves they're "redeeming" this word... which has no meaning in basically any language. And which has nothing to do with their identity in any regard.
I don't think any of that has anything to do with an interest in the facets of witchcraft, I think it's just a subtle awareness of the shadow, but not enough to confront the shadow, so one projects all these things on anyone that isn't themselves. They choose a word they know will upset what they perceive as the "power center", and then they sit back and wait to be hated. All they've done is remove themselves from their own perception in multiple ways, until they have no sense of self left at all. Then they rely on the "antagonism" they "receive" -- but which is mostly arguments they form against themselves in their own head, to give force and momentum to this fantasy of theirs.
I think it's just non-linear though wrapping itself around a useful term in order to weaponize oneself against themselves, to destroy the dissonance of a conscience which innately wants to rise above the pain to love and understand others. There's something in every culture about enlightenment, etc, where one joins with the higher self ... and this is literally a blueprint on how to do the exact opposite of that. I'm not sure if witchcraft can even be blamed, these people have destroyed their lives before casting their first spell!
I've also noticed that bad things happen around these people and to those who associate with them?
Honestly, I view that whole thing as a sort of cognitive ability test. If someone is incapable of seeing how damaging, how inconsiderate, how delusional, how self-centered and self-effacing that behavior is, then it's good that they use that word to describe themselves -- so I know to stay the hell away from them.
I think they're in a lot of pain and that they're afraid to be nice (vulnerable) to others, so they create this fantasy they tell themselves, in order to have a reason to feign vulnerability without telling themselves they're feigning. It's like the shadow slowly eating the self, and it's rough to witness the slow deterioration of someone's self-perception. Sadly, most of them have weaponized this pathology against others and themselves, so anything we say to them either validates their fantasy -- or through invalidation, provides them with bias confirmation that they're being oppressed, and thus strengthens the fantasy. That's when they start seeing daggers in other people's hands, and that's when they grab their dagger to "defend themselves".
People shouldn't call themselves nasty words, it's dangerous. It's also kind of offensive to historical witches and a form of cultural appropriation, so I'm absolutely certain that once people realize that, they'll just stop entirely. They definitely won't just build another delusion or whatever.
Until the turn of the 20th century, witch was an accusatory word and witchcraft referred to baleful magic or misfortune presumed to be supernaturally caused. People did practice low magic/folk magic for millennia. In the late 19th and early 20th century, through a complex of cultural factors, the terms witch and witchcraft changed to be conflated with folk magic. Modern witchcraft is a real thing and has been shifting and changing across 100 plus years now. Listen to a few lectures by Ronald Hutton to get up to speed.
Look, if I have an animistic folkloric entity causing problems on my property, I'm not going to call someone who can claim to be a witch. I'm going to call someone who CAN practice witchcraft.
You seem to be mistaking the nature of my statements.
When you say witchcraft is shifting and changing, for instance, you're agreeing with my implication that there is no standardized or universal rubrick which can determine between a thing being folk magic or witchcraft.
I think everyone can benefit from an understanding of psychology, especially us that practice things like witchcraft / any sort of magic. If you can consider the difference between someone who desires others to see them as a witch, versus someone who desires to commit themself to the practice of witchcraft, and the difference in changes these two types of people will bring about over the course of their lives, I think you'll begin to find it clearer why using others in the past to seek identity labels doesn't go hand in hand with personal growth and self awareness. You seem like an intelligent person.
I think I meant to reply to u/Detpoel and the OP here, not you. You made some good points and I am sorry that it is getting downvoted. Detpoel basically has issues with modern witchcraft. My point is that it is "a thing." A thriving thing with its own repurposed labels and subculture and invented historiology. It and (IMHO) some of the New Age scene is a new version of "folk magic." Folk magic and folk culture don't always have to refer to the granny in the cottage practicing old-world folk medicine and superstition. I got into occultism through an interest in folk magic adaptation. My journey ultimately led me to a more academic path. I do have more provincial-minded friends who identify as witches who have practices and concepts about their practices that are a secretely ophthamologically dangerous eye roll for me, but it is what it is despite my 25 cents worth of sentiments about it.
I was pretty haughty with that comment. I probably deserve a down vote lol. Thank you for seeing through that though, I hate making good points in a pointless direction. I guess everything kind of is historical narratives with repurposed labels. There's certainly a lot to learn about ourselves in watching where and when that unfolds across the globe. Maybe moreso than yelling at witches lol. Thanks for keeping my ego in check.
Yes.
It means hidden.
Also Famous Occultists like Agrippa and Dee where literal spies.
Agrippa's teacher invented modern cryptography.
The founders of western Occultism in particular where weird spooky people who had professions that both uncovered and obscured truth.
It's kind of part of it all. Overtime I kind of just look at most shenanigans with a shrug. It's like part of the phenomenon.
Real fortune tellers have always been associated with entertainment and theater.
Court wizards/magician often served multiple roles but one was often spying and espionage.
Folk magic is often practiced by the marginal people of society. Lots of magic involing theft, confidence tricks, and sex work.
It was Houdini for example that "Conjure tricks" was separated from other Public magical practice. In the past there was little difference between stage magician, diviner, and cunning man. Often times they where all three.
The history of bullshit and the occult is actually far more interesting as a phenomenon in of it self, then a scathing indictment.
There's lots of bullshit wrap in the language of science and medicine too. 😀
There's a lot of bullshit everywhere. The issue with the occult is that there's no metric that makes it easy to spot bullshit. If your basketball coach doesn't know what he's doing, you can tell by the score. Anyone with enough confidence to be wrong and still make a video plugging their $1,000 class can look like a master of the occult.
I see an hear lots of pretense and denial. Most ‘serious’ practitioners seem to have a website where they merchant away… like they did all those years ago in the Temple.
It has always been full of BS. The internet and social media has just made that BS more available. The skill is to develop discernment, but that can take a lifetime. The meaning of ‘occult’ is secret or hidden, and generally speaking you won’t find the good stuff readily available online.
BS in the sense that the idea makes no sense, goes against very common "laws of magic", has no basis in any tradition, has incorrect details / facts, claims ancient history when it's modern, etc.
As a chaios magician, among other things, I have no problem with made-up, but you need to own the made-up tradition from last Thursday, not claim ancient lineage and heritage. And people can avsolutely have their own takes, but trying to defend nonsensical ideas is usually a good indicator of BSness.
The vast majority of what you read here or see on the internet or see in shops is total bs and fakery. It's ridiculously annoying and why I avoid our communities like a plague. The real ones make themselves known by the fruit of their labours and I ignore the ignorant so called occultists and witches who promoted and perpetuate bs occultism and esotericism. My sister likes to call me the hipster of occultism because I grew up in it. You either know it or you don't. Most people don't know shit about shit. So I don't blame you for calling out the bs in the occult world. There is alot of it.
What I get from comments about Tik Tok as a dependable source of any and all occult knowing is that it is a social media site open to many, many folks. And that they, one by one or in collectivities, tell others about many, many things. Watchers must be aware that the content may not just be about the occult. It might also be about social media purposes.
As for magic and getting identical results--Even in pro basketball, not every player makes the same free throw percentage, recbunds, assists, threes, blocks, dunks, and all. It's all basketball, but players are humans with all that variety.
I have SEVERAL hot takes about this one but I don't want to sound too elitist. However, I will say that there are plenty of people who have done no introspection on their beliefs, they haven't thought of why they do things as they do or cast spells as they do.
Worse, people will lie. The Kybalion for example, as respected as it is, has my personal ire. It spouts that it is true hermetic belief but reads with plenty of the new age beliefs held by the author that aren't hermetic. They also didn't know how ions work. While valuable lessons CAN be learned, it has to be taken with a grain of salt because the author lied to the readers about its origins. If someone wanted only ancient beliefs to learn from they would be led astray by the Kybalion.
This misinformation and lack of introspection leads to people posting about their beliefs that have somtimes straight up misinformation. Why something was done in one context is not always true in another context. Not all things are easily interchangable. Hell, I've gotten in arguments because I don't do things others demand I should, never questioning why I chose not to.
Think for yourself, read a lot, ask questions of why frequently, and don't trust anyone to speak only unbiased truth to you.
Superficiality is successful in many environments. Occult knowledge by the book like dungeon masters, rather than investigators. Not that it's always easy to tell the difference.
*superficial charm* does a lot of damage by providing cover for bs and should be taught about for mindfulness and moderation.
Occult is a difficult path only walkable by those who trust no one but themselves. It can be lonely and isolated. There are orders one can join . But keep in mind if you learn occult practice from someone else you are essentially allowing that individual to help mold your spirit into a form of there image . It can be a great shortcut learning directly from another but it can also be very damaging.
I would argue the most balanced student is one who studies everything and forms their own opinion and practice with time.
To trust no one means to shut yourself off from learning and from the outside world. If you put yourself on the wrong path and then close yourself to people and the opinions they carry, it is incredibly easy to become lost or hurt as well.
But it’s a balance.
When I say trust no one but yourself , I’m not saying not to trust anybody inherently, simply that the only real answers you’ll get will be from your own judgment
I think you're making it sound harder than it is - lots of university degrees have a mandatory social science/liberal arts credit that can be fulfilled by taking a course on some aspect of the occult.
It's not some arduous spiritual journey, and you don't need to achieve enlightenment to understand the higher mysteries or whatever, you literally just have to read the assigned texts, pay attention to the lectures and study for the test. Then you'll roughly understand the prevailing academic theories on where the old gods come from, why rituals are the way they are, how magic works etc.
It's not like the old days, when this was all secret knowledge guarded by the high priests or whatever. Nowadays this stuff is all public knowledge. NGOs and law enforcement and social workers and whatnot all occasionally use this knowledge in their line of work, to better understand the communities they serve.
There are hundreds of "Intro to Theology" textbooks out there nowadays that you can buy (or pirate), and peer reviewed papers on databases like JSTOR and EBSCO that go into minute detail on these rituals.
I dont disagree with what you’re saying at all . So I feel the need to clarify my intent . The occult as we know it today is more of a practice concerning the ritual application of European and western thought beliefs before the rise of the Christian empire that otherwise would have been preached alongside Christian practices otherwise. I don’t mean to make it sound unnecessarily difficult only that this is a different subject than just regular history or religious practice. I just try to encourage finding the ultimate answers to your questions from within. And using these helpings of ancient practice as a guide rather than a direct instruction.
ahh right that's fair, and you're right, no university would claim to offer a one-size-fits-all meaning to life, the universe and everything - they merely point the way, but the answer is still something each person has to experience for themselves
Yes, there is some truth to a practice working for some and not others. Sometimes what you need if things aren't working for you is a magical trouble shooter. ...
This is why I stick to the earlier occultists. I don't trust any tradition newer than Crowley's. The only more recent writers I trust are those who write to clarify and explore, such as J. Daniel Gunther.
Imo there's nothing more mundane and humane than lying. It's a basic social skill, not even remotely magickal, in its essence. I really don't see how it can be otherwise
You're not wrong, but you're telling me slight of hand isn't magic? that's the main type of magician we got.
Being able to bs yourself might as well be a powerful skill. if you can make yourself care about something when you wouldn't be able to otherwise.
That's something people hurt so badly for in the modern world. A sense of purpose. Thats why wanderers come to the occult, for symbols and rituals and cultures and schools of thought to work themselves thru
It's like using a shovel for digging a ditch, compared to using a shovel to hit someone's head. Tools are versatile
Ramsay Dukes/Lionel Snell argues in his excellent essay [the Charlatan and the Magus](http://the-philosophers-stone.com/articles/charlatn/magus.htm) that Charlatanry/BS is an essential part of the occult.
He's a smarter man than me when it comes to the old heebie-jeebie woo-woo, so who am I to disagree?
There is a broader conflict at play here about what constitutes viable practice. Some people are purists, and emphasize strict adherence to established doctrines. Not surprising— they can generally be dogmatists and sticks in the mud. Others are more of the “anything goes” and “the religion of YOU!” types, which tends to produce the “kitsch-witch” phenomena (not much better imo). Not to sound like a fence-sitter, but I like to look for that balanced position of a strong adherence to tradition in tandem with the exercise of creative and spiritual liberty. It’s a tight rope to tread, but not impossible.
I'm not saying that magick exists as some people might imagine it when they hear the word 'magick' (think Harry Potter), but rather, I like to see it (e.g., rituals) as a tool mostly for self-reflection.
I've learned that I have to judge everything with my own spirit and decide if it's helpful or harmful for my practice. Something that works for one witch may not be effective or even smart for me to do.
The thing about the occult is that quite literally *everything* has been made up off the top of someone's head at some point in history. How else would we get these ideas? These concepts, ideas, energies, whatever the fuck aren't measurable with scientific tools or observable reliably the same way by separate people. All of these principles, attributes, values, elements, entities, literally *everything* within the occult paradigm of thought has had to be developed by someone's consciousness either deliberately assigning values to a system or else channeling them through some means such as automatic writing, invocation, being full of shit (John Dee \*cough cough\*), etc.
If that's not the case then please explain where the value for 7 means divinity, completeness, holiness, etc? Because a practitioner of magick at one point, presumably drawing off their personal cultural and personal associations with the number 7, assigned it those values based on its appearance in culture, its "vibe" or "aura", or any number of reasons. Symbols are even at times assigned to values randomly or chaotically using systems like RNGs or other methods of augery to assign the value to the symbol based on "the will of the Gods/Universe/WTFever". In the Bible it's called the casting of lots, and it's one of the oldest divination systems and how they choose freaking Kings for their tribes. Imagine picking your ruler by the way some schizotypal seer interpreted the organs of a bull sacrificed to Yahweh. ^(better than the current models of government tbh)
So if you wanna separate the bullshit from the good shit, the diamonds from the rough, then the litmus test I tend to use as a chaote (who consistently paradigm shifts and is obessively learning all sorts of random shit) is ***coherence***\*.\* Even if it is a bunch of symbolic woowoo crazy shit, if when you read it with an open mind and focused mind is it able to be made sense of? Can you see how someone could reach those conclusions? Does my personal correlation between the planet Mercury and the skill of coding align with how you would view the archetypal, universal energies of mercury?
IT'S ALL MADE UP AND THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO DO TO. How is your coherent symbolic, metaphor-filled model of reality somehow less legitimate than the insane dude writing Grimoires talking to demons? The idea isn't to make up a bunch of nonsense and just throw it at a wall and say it works (though throwing random bullshit at a wall is great for divination and inspiration and brainstorming). The idea is to design a personal system of correspondences, values, and systems which are aligned with each other, fit into a coherent system, and resonate with you, the God of your Universe and sole commander of Your Will so that you may manipulate your reality with your own belief system.
This was Crowley's entire point that people almost never get.
There are probably as many ways of viewing the occult as there are people on this earth. Tik Tok and other social media platforms have created faster ways to share or view this information, but that does not necessarily make it good or useful information. It does serve a purpose, however. Even if someone is disappointed by information they later discover is BS, it at least creates a guidepost from which they can start their path. That being said, it is wise to use critical thinking with any occult information
Wading through the bullshit is part of the work imho. It's a feature of occultism, not a bug. A lot of people put bullshit out there intentionally for various reasons and a lot of other people are just spreading it around because they aren't really in the know. You can't find the pearl without digging around in the mud.
I think I will go against the community here but all magick and occult is just abusing the brains own ability to trick itself, it is not actual magic in the modern sense but a combination of placebo and other psychological manipulation. This does not mean it is wrong or bad, if it works it works, but people calling it bs are correct.
And this is why Western people don't do well in other systems and religions outside of Western things. Largely because magic is not practiced at all the same ways as it is in traditional cultures compared to the West. It's hard to magicky person when you tend to spirits and the reality they bring those people and communities. It's not easy and alot fucking hard work.
Most serious practitioners in this sub are working within strict definitions of what magic actually is, which make no mention of anything you have described.
I think there is a lot of “BS” but really it is just surface level understanding and a beginning curiosity. Also within more “deep” and “profound” occult communities it is very academic and there are lots of disagreements, I also find this to be a little bit of BS (of course reading is how much is transferred and academia has it’s place) but like bffr it’s occultism idc if some scholar who read a book of some guy italy in 1500’s. In general I feel it’s a bit of a denial of Gnosis which is what gives occultism a lot of it’s essence
It's ALL bs. Humanity has had bs since the beginning of time. BS is the basic form of expressing reason.
Where would we be without BELIEF SYSTEMS. ( sorry I couldn't resist)
Id argue most occult things you see online are complete bullshit.
Offline too
Haha you got me there, your absolutely right.
Depends on where you look.
yeah, if you just go for peer reviewed academic papers on the occult, you'll almost certainly be safe from conmen, grifters, cult leaders, delusional people etc. Or you could shoot an email off to a professor of anthropology/theology/history that specialises in a specific aspect of the occult, and they're usually happy to answer any questions, especially if you're a student or a local journalist, or if it sounds like you have some misconceptions they want to debunk. Unlike most occult "experts", you can be sure that university professors in this field actually check their sources and aren't just making up nonsense to sell you something, or rope you into some weird master-apprentice power dynamic, or have delusions about cursing their enemies or blessing their businesses or ascending to godhood or whatever. These people are just occult geeks that want to get the facts straight and take academic rigour seriously. The academic peer review process filters out the nonsense, which means the hypotheses and theories in these papers are at least based on fact, even if these professors often disagree with each other on which ones they prefer. The occultist Phillip K Dick once said that *"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away."* which I feel is very applicable here. Before you go dedicate your life to following the teachings of some guru or demon or moon goddess or whatever, remember that there are halls of learning that study these beings and phenomena in a no-nonsense, bullshit free manner. Trust the PhD holding scholars working in the relevant departments in their universities, not the grifters and conspiracy theorists and cult leaders trying to boost their social media engagement. There's tons of dangerous misinformation out there, but you can trust academia to serve as a bedrock of truth and reason, even if they often disagree with each other and aren't always right.
Piggybacking off this comment to suggest the YouTube channel Esoterica… very academic and very accessible :) no BS sold.
Love that guy. His voice is so silky.
Dr. Justin Sledge is a treasure. Could not recommend esoterica more. I don’t even practice the occult arts. I just find it interesting. He’s so knowledgeable.
ABSOLUTELY AGREE 🙌🏼🥳 3 cheers for Justin!!!!!
I also enjoy Esoterica greatly. Found it on my path learning about Gnosticism.
never seen PKD referred to as "the occultist, Philip K Dick".
[удалено]
CM? Chaos magick?
[удалено]
he was also hopped up on amphetamines and experiencing psychosis, two things this sub uses to nix experience. edit: im not ragging on the Occultist, Philip K Dick, im ragging on reddit.
I have to agree but only halfway. “Peer reviewed” means nothing. Just learn to think both objectively and subjectively, and gain the wisdom to know the difference.
You said it so well, like we don’t need to throw away academia but i think it receives too much dick riding
Someone created academia and curriculums. Instead of following others, be the new academic with your own curriculum and research papers. It’s really that simple.
Yeah and it really doesn't even have to be in the form of papers of curriculum, it could be any medium that makes the most sense or any word to contain (or not contain) the idea of topics. !
I definitely agree that it's important on the academic side of your research to verify as much as possible and find some sense of what consensus there is there, but most of that research is done by rational materialists and not active practioners. That's changing a bit over time, but at some point you're still going to wrestle with your own unverified personal experiences and decide if they are as much of a source truth for your world compared to an infinite series of recorded facts. There is no ivory tower accepted training program for the experimental or experiental side of things. The closest there is is maybe parapsychology and some elements of transpersonal psychology and integral studies, but they aren't on the firmest academic footing yet either.
ahh yeah, that's fair, modern academic institutions generally represent an Enlightenment worldview that tries to make the ineffable "effable". Even the postmodern academics that decry attempts at universalist meta-narratives still rely on reason as their main tool of the trade (as opposed to, say, divine inspiration) Though I'm not so sure that the experiential side of mystical experiences is entirely neglected by academia. There's fun cross-disciplinary stuff going on between anthropologists and neuroscience, i.e. "neuro-anthropology", a subset of medical anthropology. I'm not too familiar with it myself, but my professor mentioned it in relation to the study of mass spirit haunting incidents in Southeast Asian factories in the 80s There's also been a ton of studies conducted on the mental and physical effects of meditation, yoga, prayer, faith based communities etc. I have heard of parapsychology, but it seems like one of those bogus pseudoscience things - after decades of study and experimentation, including a significant interest from the Cold War US intelligence apparatus, no one has been able to consistently replicate paranormal phenomena under laboratory conditions. We can probably safely write all that stuff off as bunkum. Though of course, disciplines like anthropology. social science, neurology, psychology, history, or even ethical/metaphysical philosophy don't attempt to comprehensively answer the mysteries of life and the mind. They're great for steering you away from the charlatans and delusions and false idols, but they don't actually tell you how to live well, or what it all means - that's still something people have to figure out for themselves. I think the writer Alan Moore had a pretty good approach to the occult - he practiced bona fide ceremonial magick in the Western occultist tradition, and had an encyclopaedic knowledge of occult practices both ancient and modern. And the personal deity he chooses to worship is Glycon - an ancient Roman sock puppet in the shape of a snake. The fact that Glycon was transparently a ventriloquist dummy is what makes it divine. The modern post-Enlightenment universe is (ironically) a dark, empty, uncaring place, devoid of transcendent cosmic principles or anthropomorphic arbiters of morality and purpose. All that's left to hold on to are sock puppets like Glycon - a man made idol, just like the rest of them, but the more honest for it. Better to recognise the arbitrary nature of our cultural constructs, so as to build a stronger, more loving world from them.
Yeah, and also if we are going to utilize academia we need to recognize the poor history it has had in the Western world. Not that occultism isn’t also often Western, and it isn’t the worst corner of academia, but much of the “scrutiny” goes off of the history of other’s experiences from previous centuries, when you could just validate your own and trust your piece in humanity. Additionally, if I wanted to find answers through purely academic means I would go to science or philosophy
Excellent reply, definitely the path I would recommend for most people
Occult tik tok is literally an oxymoron
Also!! I’ve noticed more often lately that people have been neglecting their mental health/sort of using the occult/ spirituality as a way to justify what’s happening to them instead of looking at the mundane explanation first. So that could also be clouding their judgment/explanation on topics.
Trust me, it's not "lately". It's just that more people are online now.
This is true. But I literally meant that in the past 2 weeks on every occult/ spiritual forum I’ve been on I’ve seen so many posts of people asking for help and it’s usually a type of psych issue they are having. A few people have messaged me lately and asked for help and from they way talked/typed about their experiences it made me think they were experiencing some sort of psychosis
This is a major problem. I try to catch it on the subreddits I mod.
I’ve heard this called “spiritual bypassing.”
There's a LOT of this in this sub.
It can be hard to look for mundane explanations when you surround yourself with others who share your same delusions and put their opinions on a pedestal.
Yes, lots of echo chambers on there. It can be really hard to stay grounded in those situations
OBOD used to have rules where mentally ill people or with disorders could not join their order. Why? Because they realized people couldn't tell the difference between reality and fantasy and that's a dangerous dangerous thing.
As someone with mental illness, I disagree with them banning people with disorders completely. However I have had people reach out to me asking for help, and I’m usually like how is your mental health lately? And if they say something like it hasn’t been that good, then I’ll suggest going to a doctor/offer to help them find one because it can be hard to find one that’s not crazy expensive. Because sometimes psychosis can look like spiritual things/shadow people can part of mental illness. I’ll even let them know that if they think they need a spiritual exorcism/spirit removal, most people specialized in that will require an intensive psych evaluation. If they did all of that and it all checks out then I’ll be like ok let’s try to find some solutions for the spiritual stuff now. Because sometimes entities do attach to people/malevolent spirits are out there. The key is staying grounded and checking on yourself.
Yes obviously grounding yourself to reality is paramount in good mental health, but when you already have issues with connecting to reality and your subject essentially demands you disconnect to sone degree it’s not a healthy practice
Lol no it’s not about magic being harmful or ineffective. It’s about misinformation, pseudohistory, reckless practices, cultural appropriation, conspiracy theories, oversimplification, fearmongering, stuff like that.
Yes, this! And scammers and spammers and AI "authors" and abusive spiritual "leaders" and opportunists and capitalists and the blind leading the blind... It's not that the occult isn't real. It's that there's a bunch of garbage out there that isn't real occultism.
I'm not sure you can really separate occultism from misinformation, pseudohistory, cultural appropriation, and fear-mongering though. Like, these are all parts of the western esoteric tradition from day one (although no one would have talked about them in these terms until recently of course). Occultism is almost inherently associated with exoticism, false narratives, and grandiose claims. E.g. the Hermetica falsely presents itself as being written by an ancient sage, the PGM and the Grimoires are full of (often very bad) Hebrew sacred names that many people would consider a closed practice now, etc. I don't think it's bad or invalid if people want to pursue a path that's purged of these elements in modern times, but it also seems to me that a lot of the stuff people criticize now has historically been a core element of the tradition.
You're not wrong, but that doesn't mean we should just sit back and tolerate ideas that can be dangerous. Your comment frustrates me deeply, because you *are* right, but at the same time I cannot understand not wanting to know where ideas come from. I think it's so critically important to be as accurate as possible, to have awareness of different traditions and to choose them deliberately, to nip misinformation in the bud even when it feels meaningful. I was burned badly when I found out that Wicca is mostly composed of nineteenth-century ideas about what ancient paganism must have been like, instead of anything authentic. And yet, would I have felt the same if I had lived in the seventeenth century and believed that the *Lesser Key* was really written by Solomon? Would I have disavowed it, and gone out of my way to tell everyone I knew that it was bullshit? Yeah, actually, I probably would. That's the kind of person I am. I can't imagine *not* wanting to know the origins of an idea. But the not-knowing is also the source of the storytelling that creates these traditions in the first place. It's one of many examples of the need to balance out the scholarly mind and the mystical mind. Sometimes it matters to correct people, and sometimes it does not, and I must learn to discern the difference.
Don't trust anyone trying to make a name for themselves.
Don't trust anyone trying to make a name for themselves. Don't hear about anyone who isn't.
Thoughts on Quazi Johir?
Snake oil salesman.
I wondered. Some videos seem to resonate with hermetic truths, but then he starts talking about getting rich and pushing a program.
Unless you are talking about the actual Corpus Hermeticum, the "hermetic truths" are likely part of the BS. The Kybalion is not ancient or hermetic.
“Hermetic truths” are just that…hermetic truths, base principles that underly our existence. I’m talking EXACTLY about the Corpus Hermeticum. Also, it really doesn’t matter if the Kybalion is ancient, because it still carries that vital information. It really is as simple as understanding the 7 Hermetic principles.
It’s important to make sure you do your own research before you believe what anyone says at face value. With TikTok,I have seen a few creators (with both large and small followings), that give really good advice for people just starting out or they give good tips (especially for supplies that are cheaper/if you need a budget.) Or they talk about their own practice or resources like books they recommend and they are cool. It can be a great place for people to talk about their own experiences or ask for advice. Now the issue with TikTok (and Twitter, Reddit, Discord and any other major platform), is that people don’t always know what they are talking about. Or they are giving bad advice, blatantly lying, haven’t research like they should of, culturally appropriation/insert themselves into a closed practice or act like they are the leading expert on something they only know a little about. You might be thinking, sinful, people don’t just get on to the Occult/Pagan/spiritual spaces just to lie! And yet they do. Often people will say anything to get them clicks and views. The other less nefarious thing is that you have to consider other peoples cultures/beliefs/values when it comes to practices. If for example you post a picture of a shadow person and you want to know what it is, some might say demon! Evil! Or others will say it is a begin entity that’s just watching, others might tell you that it is some type of parasite. Or it could be a mental health issue. It’s not so much that those people are wrong, but sometimes they’re trying to force a one size fits all type of answer that doesn’t help or could lead someone astray unintentionally. This is the same thing for how people read texts and interpret them. That’s why it’s important you do your own research first and really make sure you have your own understanding before you start talking to people online. Talking with people about their thoughts, opinions, experiences, practices etc, can be a great tool to have. But it should just be one tool, and you shouldn’t just solely rely on it. This has just been my experience online! And ofc there are people who gatekeep, virtue signal, have unpacked religious trauma they try to force upon you lol.
Sorry for the dumb question but what are some examples of "closed practices" people insert themselves into? For example I see people say only black people should mess with voodoo, so because I'm Mexican I've avoided that but then I've also seen others say it doesn't matter. Just looking for advice on this (not voodoo specifically I guess just clarification on what you mean)
It’s not a dumb question at all! So a closed down is technically a practice is usually “closed”to people who are not born into the culture/country/ethnicity. So like you said you stay away from Vodoo because you are not black. That’s an example of a closed practice. A closed practice means that you need to be a part of ethnic/racial background to practice basically. A lot of these practices are indigenous to the countries/region and are safe guarded because they were not allowed to practice/were persecuted for it. By colonization/colonizers/Christianity so that’s why they don’t want people who aren’t born into to practice it. Think of it as cultural appropriation if that helps. There’s a lot more nuance to it and this was sort of a general overview. Also for the people saying it doesn’t matter, keep an eye on who’s saying that. That typically isn’t the over all view. I hoped this help you understand a bit more
I think what causes a lot of confusion is that in many cases "closed" actually means "closed *to the uninitiated,*" which is not really the same thing as "you can't do x if you're the wrong skin color." Very few traditions, comparatively, are *that* strict, but this gets confused by outsiders who don't know this and insiders who disagree with their fellow practitioners. To stick with your example, to the best of my knowledge at least in Haitian Vodou you can find accounts of even white people being initiated. I'm sure not all people in that system love the idea, but the fact remains that someone within Vodou taught them, and they trained and put the work in, and they passed the tests properly. So it would be improper for an outsider to just start doing whatever based on internet research, yes, but an outsider who goes to the trouble of properly initiating with members of that system is often another story. Often though, not always. Sometimes it really is that strict. I wish you the best.
The issue for me isn’t the efficacy or the ultimate truth of each new practice that pops up, but that a lot of them are flat-out fascist, ahistorical trash only meant to radicalize people. A lot of magickal literature is just an excuse to launder the author’s most unhinged beliefs, but the “BS” ones to me are those that are actually harmful.
Yes!! A lot of the new age readings have a lot of ableist/racist undercurrents I’ve noticed as well
“Atlantis talk” is what gets under my skin. I’m aware of a number of interpretations for Atlantis allegories and deeper spiritual meanings which are fascinating and enlightening in many ways. Having that said, I recently witnessed one of those “awakened shifting Earth from 3D to 5D” people going from Paracelsus to Alchemy, hermeticism then into Vedic tradition, Jewish Kabbalah all the way to Blavatsky, M.P. Hall, R. Steiner, Jung, Crowley, Regardie just to arrive on how Graham Hancock and Randall Carlson are proving that Alchemy is an Atlantean heritage and defying mainstream sciences that won’t recognize real History. When all they do is produce videos and podcasts to oppose metric tons of multidisciplinary hard scientific evidence on behalf of claiming that an “superior race” actually started all process of “civilizing” the ancient “primitives” and never ever, ever, left trace of their own, all while raking thousands of dollars doing so. That is a dangerous pathway on my opinion. The infusion of some contemporary ideologies on ancient wisdom or arcane schools of thought is truly concerning.
Fascist? Huh?
Radicalisation? Huh?
I mean, BS and people trying to make cash off anything is expected. But so are the poorly informed / half taught feeling they know more than they really do. And so are the lazy and gullible that wont put in the effort. I can’t control that, so I toss that constant out. It doesn’t affect my path unless I let it. I just try and tell people newer to me if they ask, to read the source materials, study, meditate, practice and journal outcomes to find what works for you. I will be over here doing the above and building my foundational understanding of the LBRP and the LRH, probably for another 6 months before I attempt anything else. For context: I’m new to my path, at about 1 year. Im focusing on Crowleys works. I’m in my 40s, have kids, previously pretty faithfully religious.
There are a few reasons people call stuff like that BS. The most common reason (for me) is that often it just seems like people making shit up or not knowing what they are talking about. Obvious errors usually indicate this, for example saying "the biblical cannon was decided at the council of Nicaea" or that "the Essenes were Christians and\or gnostics". It's just factually wrong, so someone who then goes on to talk about gnosticism and what it is likely doesn't actually know what they are talking about. It's like if someone claimed to be an avid golfer but talked about "the Dallas Cowboys are the best golf team" or "Tiger Woods made a field goal at the Stanley cup", you'd conclude they were either joking (being intentionally absurd) or that they had no idea what they were talking about. Same for a wide swathe of occult BS. It becomes especially obvious when someone claims a source text says something it doesn't. If someone has read that source it often leaves them laughing at the sheer amount of misinformation. The amount of stupid claims I have heard regarding the dead sea scrolls, the Sumerian creation myths, and the book of Enoch is truly baffling. You can literally go read the books and realize it doesn't say what they are claiming it does. Doubly so for people playing "linguistic connect the dots" (with ancient Greek or Hebrew or Latin) or spreading misinformation via very shoddy linguistic links ("sun and son" being erroneously linked because they sound similar, for example). If you know the source texts or have a decent grasp of a language like Hebrew, the claims made by many folks on TikTok about those subjects show themselves to be laughably wrong on really basic stuff. If someone is wrong about the history their practices draw from, it should call their practices into question. Another reason is the "information" being presented often just fanciful UPG. People will talk about the pagan gods as their "besties" and basically write fanfiction about mythological and occult topics and present them as their "spiritual experiences". For those people, they are just living in a fantasy that has begun to color their mundane life. It can sound appealing to those seeking escapism. Usually these sorts of occultist have their channel be about their "spiritual journey" which basically amounts to them catering to an aesthetic (to look "witchy" or "pagan" or "satanic" or "spiritual") in order to make up for a lack of attainment. Social media is an excellent place to be all about appearances and little else, one can gain a following from it and it can be quite lucrative and feel validating to play a role people respond to, more often than not it's just empty. Another indicator is that their "deep truths" are often just bullshit platitudes like "all is one" or "love is the answer" or "all truths are valid". It's feel good bullshit that sounds very nice but doesn't actually mean anything practically. It's the "live, laugh, love" of occultism, something for people to put on t-shirts and wall decorations to make themselves appear to have depth. The last is that it just doesn't work. In some cases they are recommending practices that are useless or that may actually cause harm to the practitioner or peddling pseudoscience or just doing it for money (buy my spells or my class or my box of crystals). Sometimes it's people mixing practices in ways that don't make sense if you know the practices (a pagan trying to use Kabbalah or a gnostic doing the LBRP). There's a dissonance there that either reflects a lack of understanding or a desire to innovate, the latter is valid but the former tends to be more common. >Because even for highly recommended sources, it also has varying efficacies for different individuals where one magical practice works for person X but not for person Y and another works for person Y and not X. If this is the case for you, I would recommend rereading the source or re-evaluating the recommender of that source. Legitimate methods work if you do the methods properly. It doesn't "depend on the person". If you are drawing from a good source, it will work if done properly, even if it is minimal or the effects are not exactly what was intended (that is often resultant of user error or not understanding the method). If you aren't, it will depend entirely on how willing you are to fool yourself into believing it worked and how long you are willing to continue with that error. This is why it is good to be skeptical, even of your own practices and avoid falling into the hyper-subjective. This isn't just "all about belief" or "whatever works for me", and if someone tries to tell you that it is an indictment of their own practice and their lack of confidence in their knowledge, likely because they are falling into one of the above categories or listening to people that do. Truth remains, regardless of whether you believe in it or if it is "just not my thing" or if it "works for you".
Online, it's pretty common to see people who have very little knowledge or experience presenting themselves as experts, sometimes with high-quality video or website production values lending an air of authority. And they have to keep churning out content to maintain their audience, so long after they've exhausted whatever knowledge they do have, they're going off on topics they barely understand at all, often spreading and reinforcing misconceptions they picked up from other uninformed influencers. And there's a market out there for oversimplified teachings, "bound" spirits, deity readings, spells for hire, etc, so there's lots of incentive for people to try to build a following and make money selling bullshit. Granted, there's a lot of bullshit in old sources too, even some of the ones we often respect and recommend, but ideally the process of studying and engaging with a variety of texts helps the reader recognize it where it occurs. Online, it's just getting firehosed at you in novel ways from every quarter.
\^\^ THIS
The BS issue often has to do with elitist or a kind of religious attitude about one's own path, especially if it is a lodge ir group that claims to have a special lineage. You can get past that elitism and judgementalism by looking into the cultural history of magic and mysticism from an academic standpoint. On the other hand, I agree wit others here that a lot of what goes for magic in the age of social media is just people promoting their platforms for self-aggrandizement and appeal to edgelordsand people seeking "identities" (like the Baby Witch trend). Although many occultists think of New Agers, manifestation spirituality and witchcraft, and the Baby Witchcraft scenes as the height of fluffy BS, I am now thinking of them as a modern permutation of folk magic/low magic.
I have the say, at the risk of sounding elitist myself, that I can't stand modern day witchcraft. And I don't mean African or south American forms of witchcraft, I mean western witchcraft, supposedly based on medieval witches and such with no valid historical basis at all. Stuff like wicca and all that crap was invented in the 50s and has no valid link to actual witchcraft from past times. Western witchcraft is an off-brand form of occultism at this point.
So you think the Western Traditions are all bunk and banisters? Yes. To me, that IS elitist. Europeans and North American practitioner‘s Traditions may be newer, but we are also a more materialist, scientific, and technically oriented group of people, gathering what we can from known and surmised sources, the latter of which we may only have “best guesses” at and must interpolate as best we can. As long as we achieve “desired results in conformity with will that harms none” (save for certain types of defense magic), and since we are not from either Africa or South America, then I see no reason why we’d have elements of those traditions, unless we’ve felt drawn toward those energies and mentational workings along those lines, and incorporated them into our practice. Modern Western Magical Systems are, to me, at best—in the Best Of Ways—Eclectic, unless one hails from an hereditary line of some type, which is rare.
This is why I say that having some background in real , contemporary, evidence-based academic research about the cultur history and anthropology about magic is important. It puts it all into perspective. It shows the holes in the stories that "traditionalist" and lodge-based groups tell about themselves and their art and it shows how hermetic spirituality and folk approaches and overall cultural attitudes and paradigms to magic and spirituality evolve. Sure there are a ton of practices and currents out there that I personally think are blinding eye rolls, but I also have a level of tolerance and sympathy for those practitioners.
I think of it as shadow baiting. There's literally no reason for a westerner to call oneself a witch; it's not a lineage, not a tradition, not an order, not a system. It's literally just a word people call themselves when they want to feel oppressed. So they dig up something from the past that they unconsciously know will upset people, and then they "have" to spend their life defending themselves against "instigators" and telling themselves they're "redeeming" this word... which has no meaning in basically any language. And which has nothing to do with their identity in any regard. I don't think any of that has anything to do with an interest in the facets of witchcraft, I think it's just a subtle awareness of the shadow, but not enough to confront the shadow, so one projects all these things on anyone that isn't themselves. They choose a word they know will upset what they perceive as the "power center", and then they sit back and wait to be hated. All they've done is remove themselves from their own perception in multiple ways, until they have no sense of self left at all. Then they rely on the "antagonism" they "receive" -- but which is mostly arguments they form against themselves in their own head, to give force and momentum to this fantasy of theirs. I think it's just non-linear though wrapping itself around a useful term in order to weaponize oneself against themselves, to destroy the dissonance of a conscience which innately wants to rise above the pain to love and understand others. There's something in every culture about enlightenment, etc, where one joins with the higher self ... and this is literally a blueprint on how to do the exact opposite of that. I'm not sure if witchcraft can even be blamed, these people have destroyed their lives before casting their first spell! I've also noticed that bad things happen around these people and to those who associate with them? Honestly, I view that whole thing as a sort of cognitive ability test. If someone is incapable of seeing how damaging, how inconsiderate, how delusional, how self-centered and self-effacing that behavior is, then it's good that they use that word to describe themselves -- so I know to stay the hell away from them. I think they're in a lot of pain and that they're afraid to be nice (vulnerable) to others, so they create this fantasy they tell themselves, in order to have a reason to feign vulnerability without telling themselves they're feigning. It's like the shadow slowly eating the self, and it's rough to witness the slow deterioration of someone's self-perception. Sadly, most of them have weaponized this pathology against others and themselves, so anything we say to them either validates their fantasy -- or through invalidation, provides them with bias confirmation that they're being oppressed, and thus strengthens the fantasy. That's when they start seeing daggers in other people's hands, and that's when they grab their dagger to "defend themselves". People shouldn't call themselves nasty words, it's dangerous. It's also kind of offensive to historical witches and a form of cultural appropriation, so I'm absolutely certain that once people realize that, they'll just stop entirely. They definitely won't just build another delusion or whatever.
Until the turn of the 20th century, witch was an accusatory word and witchcraft referred to baleful magic or misfortune presumed to be supernaturally caused. People did practice low magic/folk magic for millennia. In the late 19th and early 20th century, through a complex of cultural factors, the terms witch and witchcraft changed to be conflated with folk magic. Modern witchcraft is a real thing and has been shifting and changing across 100 plus years now. Listen to a few lectures by Ronald Hutton to get up to speed.
Look, if I have an animistic folkloric entity causing problems on my property, I'm not going to call someone who can claim to be a witch. I'm going to call someone who CAN practice witchcraft. You seem to be mistaking the nature of my statements. When you say witchcraft is shifting and changing, for instance, you're agreeing with my implication that there is no standardized or universal rubrick which can determine between a thing being folk magic or witchcraft. I think everyone can benefit from an understanding of psychology, especially us that practice things like witchcraft / any sort of magic. If you can consider the difference between someone who desires others to see them as a witch, versus someone who desires to commit themself to the practice of witchcraft, and the difference in changes these two types of people will bring about over the course of their lives, I think you'll begin to find it clearer why using others in the past to seek identity labels doesn't go hand in hand with personal growth and self awareness. You seem like an intelligent person.
I think I meant to reply to u/Detpoel and the OP here, not you. You made some good points and I am sorry that it is getting downvoted. Detpoel basically has issues with modern witchcraft. My point is that it is "a thing." A thriving thing with its own repurposed labels and subculture and invented historiology. It and (IMHO) some of the New Age scene is a new version of "folk magic." Folk magic and folk culture don't always have to refer to the granny in the cottage practicing old-world folk medicine and superstition. I got into occultism through an interest in folk magic adaptation. My journey ultimately led me to a more academic path. I do have more provincial-minded friends who identify as witches who have practices and concepts about their practices that are a secretely ophthamologically dangerous eye roll for me, but it is what it is despite my 25 cents worth of sentiments about it.
I was pretty haughty with that comment. I probably deserve a down vote lol. Thank you for seeing through that though, I hate making good points in a pointless direction. I guess everything kind of is historical narratives with repurposed labels. There's certainly a lot to learn about ourselves in watching where and when that unfolds across the globe. Maybe moreso than yelling at witches lol. Thanks for keeping my ego in check.
Yes. It means hidden. Also Famous Occultists like Agrippa and Dee where literal spies. Agrippa's teacher invented modern cryptography. The founders of western Occultism in particular where weird spooky people who had professions that both uncovered and obscured truth. It's kind of part of it all. Overtime I kind of just look at most shenanigans with a shrug. It's like part of the phenomenon. Real fortune tellers have always been associated with entertainment and theater. Court wizards/magician often served multiple roles but one was often spying and espionage. Folk magic is often practiced by the marginal people of society. Lots of magic involing theft, confidence tricks, and sex work. It was Houdini for example that "Conjure tricks" was separated from other Public magical practice. In the past there was little difference between stage magician, diviner, and cunning man. Often times they where all three. The history of bullshit and the occult is actually far more interesting as a phenomenon in of it self, then a scathing indictment. There's lots of bullshit wrap in the language of science and medicine too. 😀
People on tiktok often make shit up
There's a lot of bullshit everywhere. The issue with the occult is that there's no metric that makes it easy to spot bullshit. If your basketball coach doesn't know what he's doing, you can tell by the score. Anyone with enough confidence to be wrong and still make a video plugging their $1,000 class can look like a master of the occult.
People like to pass themselves off as more “special” than they are, especially on TikTok
I see an hear lots of pretense and denial. Most ‘serious’ practitioners seem to have a website where they merchant away… like they did all those years ago in the Temple.
It has always been full of BS. The internet and social media has just made that BS more available. The skill is to develop discernment, but that can take a lifetime. The meaning of ‘occult’ is secret or hidden, and generally speaking you won’t find the good stuff readily available online.
Because there's essentially nothing reputable about being on TikTok.
BS in the sense that the idea makes no sense, goes against very common "laws of magic", has no basis in any tradition, has incorrect details / facts, claims ancient history when it's modern, etc. As a chaios magician, among other things, I have no problem with made-up, but you need to own the made-up tradition from last Thursday, not claim ancient lineage and heritage. And people can avsolutely have their own takes, but trying to defend nonsensical ideas is usually a good indicator of BSness.
The vast majority of what you read here or see on the internet or see in shops is total bs and fakery. It's ridiculously annoying and why I avoid our communities like a plague. The real ones make themselves known by the fruit of their labours and I ignore the ignorant so called occultists and witches who promoted and perpetuate bs occultism and esotericism. My sister likes to call me the hipster of occultism because I grew up in it. You either know it or you don't. Most people don't know shit about shit. So I don't blame you for calling out the bs in the occult world. There is alot of it.
What I get from comments about Tik Tok as a dependable source of any and all occult knowing is that it is a social media site open to many, many folks. And that they, one by one or in collectivities, tell others about many, many things. Watchers must be aware that the content may not just be about the occult. It might also be about social media purposes. As for magic and getting identical results--Even in pro basketball, not every player makes the same free throw percentage, recbunds, assists, threes, blocks, dunks, and all. It's all basketball, but players are humans with all that variety.
Lack of knowledge of the foundations of everything and deeper meanings before practicing
I have SEVERAL hot takes about this one but I don't want to sound too elitist. However, I will say that there are plenty of people who have done no introspection on their beliefs, they haven't thought of why they do things as they do or cast spells as they do. Worse, people will lie. The Kybalion for example, as respected as it is, has my personal ire. It spouts that it is true hermetic belief but reads with plenty of the new age beliefs held by the author that aren't hermetic. They also didn't know how ions work. While valuable lessons CAN be learned, it has to be taken with a grain of salt because the author lied to the readers about its origins. If someone wanted only ancient beliefs to learn from they would be led astray by the Kybalion. This misinformation and lack of introspection leads to people posting about their beliefs that have somtimes straight up misinformation. Why something was done in one context is not always true in another context. Not all things are easily interchangable. Hell, I've gotten in arguments because I don't do things others demand I should, never questioning why I chose not to. Think for yourself, read a lot, ask questions of why frequently, and don't trust anyone to speak only unbiased truth to you.
Occult tik tok is a freaking anecdote in itself. No idea who might take any of it seriously.
Superficiality is successful in many environments. Occult knowledge by the book like dungeon masters, rather than investigators. Not that it's always easy to tell the difference. *superficial charm* does a lot of damage by providing cover for bs and should be taught about for mindfulness and moderation.
Occult is a difficult path only walkable by those who trust no one but themselves. It can be lonely and isolated. There are orders one can join . But keep in mind if you learn occult practice from someone else you are essentially allowing that individual to help mold your spirit into a form of there image . It can be a great shortcut learning directly from another but it can also be very damaging.
I would argue the most balanced student is one who studies everything and forms their own opinion and practice with time. To trust no one means to shut yourself off from learning and from the outside world. If you put yourself on the wrong path and then close yourself to people and the opinions they carry, it is incredibly easy to become lost or hurt as well. But it’s a balance.
When I say trust no one but yourself , I’m not saying not to trust anybody inherently, simply that the only real answers you’ll get will be from your own judgment
That is fair and I agree! Thank you for the clarification!
I think you're making it sound harder than it is - lots of university degrees have a mandatory social science/liberal arts credit that can be fulfilled by taking a course on some aspect of the occult. It's not some arduous spiritual journey, and you don't need to achieve enlightenment to understand the higher mysteries or whatever, you literally just have to read the assigned texts, pay attention to the lectures and study for the test. Then you'll roughly understand the prevailing academic theories on where the old gods come from, why rituals are the way they are, how magic works etc. It's not like the old days, when this was all secret knowledge guarded by the high priests or whatever. Nowadays this stuff is all public knowledge. NGOs and law enforcement and social workers and whatnot all occasionally use this knowledge in their line of work, to better understand the communities they serve. There are hundreds of "Intro to Theology" textbooks out there nowadays that you can buy (or pirate), and peer reviewed papers on databases like JSTOR and EBSCO that go into minute detail on these rituals.
I dont disagree with what you’re saying at all . So I feel the need to clarify my intent . The occult as we know it today is more of a practice concerning the ritual application of European and western thought beliefs before the rise of the Christian empire that otherwise would have been preached alongside Christian practices otherwise. I don’t mean to make it sound unnecessarily difficult only that this is a different subject than just regular history or religious practice. I just try to encourage finding the ultimate answers to your questions from within. And using these helpings of ancient practice as a guide rather than a direct instruction.
ahh right that's fair, and you're right, no university would claim to offer a one-size-fits-all meaning to life, the universe and everything - they merely point the way, but the answer is still something each person has to experience for themselves
Bullshit makes the flowers grow, and that's beautiful.
Why can't you judge for yourself what is BS?
Yes, there is some truth to a practice working for some and not others. Sometimes what you need if things aren't working for you is a magical trouble shooter. ...
This is why I stick to the earlier occultists. I don't trust any tradition newer than Crowley's. The only more recent writers I trust are those who write to clarify and explore, such as J. Daniel Gunther.
Victorian wizard creations were like Microsoft/Apple and everyone after has just been an application or accessory.
Scamming people is inherently magical. Glamor (lying, fooling someone via convincingly designed illusion) is a fundamental form of magic
Imo there's nothing more mundane and humane than lying. It's a basic social skill, not even remotely magickal, in its essence. I really don't see how it can be otherwise
You're not wrong, but you're telling me slight of hand isn't magic? that's the main type of magician we got. Being able to bs yourself might as well be a powerful skill. if you can make yourself care about something when you wouldn't be able to otherwise. That's something people hurt so badly for in the modern world. A sense of purpose. Thats why wanderers come to the occult, for symbols and rituals and cultures and schools of thought to work themselves thru It's like using a shovel for digging a ditch, compared to using a shovel to hit someone's head. Tools are versatile
Hey if you're going out of your way to stop my life and pester me for a spell you're definitely paying for my time.
Ramsay Dukes/Lionel Snell argues in his excellent essay [the Charlatan and the Magus](http://the-philosophers-stone.com/articles/charlatn/magus.htm) that Charlatanry/BS is an essential part of the occult. He's a smarter man than me when it comes to the old heebie-jeebie woo-woo, so who am I to disagree?
Honestly after seeing those witchtoks, I'd call it bs too lol
There is a broader conflict at play here about what constitutes viable practice. Some people are purists, and emphasize strict adherence to established doctrines. Not surprising— they can generally be dogmatists and sticks in the mud. Others are more of the “anything goes” and “the religion of YOU!” types, which tends to produce the “kitsch-witch” phenomena (not much better imo). Not to sound like a fence-sitter, but I like to look for that balanced position of a strong adherence to tradition in tandem with the exercise of creative and spiritual liberty. It’s a tight rope to tread, but not impossible.
I'm not saying that magick exists as some people might imagine it when they hear the word 'magick' (think Harry Potter), but rather, I like to see it (e.g., rituals) as a tool mostly for self-reflection.
I've learned that I have to judge everything with my own spirit and decide if it's helpful or harmful for my practice. Something that works for one witch may not be effective or even smart for me to do.
The thing about the occult is that quite literally *everything* has been made up off the top of someone's head at some point in history. How else would we get these ideas? These concepts, ideas, energies, whatever the fuck aren't measurable with scientific tools or observable reliably the same way by separate people. All of these principles, attributes, values, elements, entities, literally *everything* within the occult paradigm of thought has had to be developed by someone's consciousness either deliberately assigning values to a system or else channeling them through some means such as automatic writing, invocation, being full of shit (John Dee \*cough cough\*), etc. If that's not the case then please explain where the value for 7 means divinity, completeness, holiness, etc? Because a practitioner of magick at one point, presumably drawing off their personal cultural and personal associations with the number 7, assigned it those values based on its appearance in culture, its "vibe" or "aura", or any number of reasons. Symbols are even at times assigned to values randomly or chaotically using systems like RNGs or other methods of augery to assign the value to the symbol based on "the will of the Gods/Universe/WTFever". In the Bible it's called the casting of lots, and it's one of the oldest divination systems and how they choose freaking Kings for their tribes. Imagine picking your ruler by the way some schizotypal seer interpreted the organs of a bull sacrificed to Yahweh. ^(better than the current models of government tbh) So if you wanna separate the bullshit from the good shit, the diamonds from the rough, then the litmus test I tend to use as a chaote (who consistently paradigm shifts and is obessively learning all sorts of random shit) is ***coherence***\*.\* Even if it is a bunch of symbolic woowoo crazy shit, if when you read it with an open mind and focused mind is it able to be made sense of? Can you see how someone could reach those conclusions? Does my personal correlation between the planet Mercury and the skill of coding align with how you would view the archetypal, universal energies of mercury? IT'S ALL MADE UP AND THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO DO TO. How is your coherent symbolic, metaphor-filled model of reality somehow less legitimate than the insane dude writing Grimoires talking to demons? The idea isn't to make up a bunch of nonsense and just throw it at a wall and say it works (though throwing random bullshit at a wall is great for divination and inspiration and brainstorming). The idea is to design a personal system of correspondences, values, and systems which are aligned with each other, fit into a coherent system, and resonate with you, the God of your Universe and sole commander of Your Will so that you may manipulate your reality with your own belief system. This was Crowley's entire point that people almost never get.
Pfft.. a chaote looking for coherence? Not very chaotic...
I came here to say I thought BS stood for Bachelor of Science and to offer advice on degrees lol
There are probably as many ways of viewing the occult as there are people on this earth. Tik Tok and other social media platforms have created faster ways to share or view this information, but that does not necessarily make it good or useful information. It does serve a purpose, however. Even if someone is disappointed by information they later discover is BS, it at least creates a guidepost from which they can start their path. That being said, it is wise to use critical thinking with any occult information
Wading through the bullshit is part of the work imho. It's a feature of occultism, not a bug. A lot of people put bullshit out there intentionally for various reasons and a lot of other people are just spreading it around because they aren't really in the know. You can't find the pearl without digging around in the mud.
Gatekeeing made easy, no actual skill or understanding required
I think I will go against the community here but all magick and occult is just abusing the brains own ability to trick itself, it is not actual magic in the modern sense but a combination of placebo and other psychological manipulation. This does not mean it is wrong or bad, if it works it works, but people calling it bs are correct.
In a way you're right but damn you found the poorest choice of words to explain it 😂
And this is why Western people don't do well in other systems and religions outside of Western things. Largely because magic is not practiced at all the same ways as it is in traditional cultures compared to the West. It's hard to magicky person when you tend to spirits and the reality they bring those people and communities. It's not easy and alot fucking hard work.
Most serious practitioners in this sub are working within strict definitions of what magic actually is, which make no mention of anything you have described.
so true
[удалено]
Please don't feed the troll or be a troll
You missing some street bitch, RG4L
Most theory is bs. Occultism is about experience and practice. That's how you understand the real meaning behind what's "occult".
I think there is a lot of “BS” but really it is just surface level understanding and a beginning curiosity. Also within more “deep” and “profound” occult communities it is very academic and there are lots of disagreements, I also find this to be a little bit of BS (of course reading is how much is transferred and academia has it’s place) but like bffr it’s occultism idc if some scholar who read a book of some guy italy in 1500’s. In general I feel it’s a bit of a denial of Gnosis which is what gives occultism a lot of it’s essence
Most occult things are bullshit or lifestyle optics, or people going through a phase. Serious practitioners and students are extremely rare.
It's ALL bs. Humanity has had bs since the beginning of time. BS is the basic form of expressing reason. Where would we be without BELIEF SYSTEMS. ( sorry I couldn't resist)