I'm really just thinking out loud (or online, I should say) and I'm sure this is nothing new for anyone here, but it struck me more clearly than in the past tonight.

There are so many different magical systems out there. Folk magic, Hoodoo, European witchcraft and then of course the many different types that utilize a religious system such as Voodoo, Santeria, Catholicism, Wicca, etc. When you observe and study them you realize that, as a magical system, they all work. Use any one of them and you can successfully manifest your desires. So, if it's not the system, what is it? It's the individual. But, I already knew that. If it's the individual, if the magic is in the practitioner, why utilize one system over another? Why does Hoodoo work better for one person than folk magic? Or Wicca based magic over Santeria magic? Or Native American magic? Why does a person need to use ANY system if the magic is in the person?

I think the answer to that lies in the subconscious. The ritual takes you to an altered state of consciousness which is where the magic happens. It's where you change the course of events, move the energy around and get it flowing the way you want it to. So, the ritual has to touch that part of your mind. If you could access that part of your mind without the ritual then you wouldn't need anything but your mind. Since we are all different, it would make sense that different rituals will be needed for different people. Which is why there is so much variance even within specific traditions.

Just some thoughts.

I agree with you about it being the subconscious. I weave several beliefs together to work with my own views, and have never had any issues. And always, ALWAYS with respect.

Some people are certainly drawn to specific ones, either from interest, cultural history, past lives, dreams, and spirit guides. Its worked that way with me.

At a certain point, one finds they don't need all of the ritual and hoopla that goes with it, though it can certainly help as a focus tool.

Just like within shamanism, one doesn't need the various drugs and hallucinagens. It's all in the mind!

I hear that. Magic works (in my view) no matter what type of magic it is, because they all contain ritual (at least at first) any movement or behavior that is out of the ordinary (the weirder the better) makes a direct hit on the second attention (the one we use in dreaming) Thought itself is the foundation, not only of magic, but also, well, everything. Or at least it's one of the foundations. Remember, before anything can exist here, in needs to exist up here (taps head) first.

One doesn't not need the drugs either though.

Yeah, I knew that about magic being withing the person, but I couldn't understand why I always felt a pull towards one system of magic over another.

I have never found much use for Wiccan circle casting. I am much more effective using straight folk magic or Hoodoo. It just works for me which means those "actions" are what my subconscious needs to do the magic.

So, that begs the question....are there really particular plants that can be used to assist in certain magics or is it just that the plants, in general, lend their energy to spell. We know certain plants really are good for healing certain physical ailments and you can't use a substitute herb for a physical ailment. But, what about magic? Does it matter which herb you use? I think it does....but I'm not sure why. Unless the same rules apply to physical healing as to magic. The plant has a particular energy. So, a plant that would be used to drive something away should not be used to draw something in. I think I answered my own question.

Hi Ruth,

I've thought long and hard about these issues of specific systems and beliefs. I've realized that it is indeed up to the individual what to actually believe in terms of archetypal rituals, etc.

However, there does seem to be some ground rules that are common to all magickal systems, and that basically boils down to "ritual" or "consistency". In fact, that's truly the root of the very word "religion". To do something "religiously" simply means to do it with dedication, devotion and consistency.

As far as the subconscious goes, all that's important there is that the practitioner actually has some 'faith' or 'belief' in what it is they are practicing. This is one reason why mainstream dogmatic religions have indeed become mainstream. If a person is brought up to belief that certain religious practices have merit then it's a whole lot easier for them to have "faith" in that, than it is to just have faith in doing their own thing.

Deepak Chopra, and Christopher Penczak (two of my personally favorite gurus), have both made it perfectly clear that the archetypal represtations of spiritual essence are not what's important. Only TWO things are important,... Consistency (i.e. ritual), and Faith (i.e. a genuine belief that what you are doing will influence or invoke a higher power).

That's really all that's required.

Having said that, both of these gurus have also stated that there is some benefit to archetypal systems that have been used by the masses. This is because these archetypes have been practiced by many conscious minds and have therefore been embedded in the cosmic mind (or God if you want). So the idea is that more widely practiced rituals should be more responsive.

Deepak talks about using ancient Vedic mantras when meditating on the Vedic sutras. The idea being that litterally millions of people have chanted these mantras over the ages. He says you can make up your own mantra and you'll gain benefit from that, but why not go with something that already has an established resonance with the cosmic mind? Of course, it doesn't need to be a Vedic mantra, any mantra (or chant or incantation) from any long lasting cultural ritual will work.

Like you I'm attracted to certain rituals and cultural systems over others. I tend to be pulled to the Celtic traditions, possibly because I have genetic roots to Wales.

By the way, I would hardly call circle casting a "Wiccan" tradition. Witches and shamans have been casting circles for over 50,000 years. And that practice seems to have arisen independently in many diffent widely-seperated cultures. This suggests that circle casting has it's roots in the cosmic consciouness and is not merely an invention or whim of humans.

I'm personally totally drawn to circle casting. It's become the focal point of all my rituals.

You're right and I apologize for phrasing it that way. It's not Wiccan and it is used by MANY as a very effective and beautiful ritual. I, personally, find Catholic ritual to be the most beneficial for me and one could say that doesn't make any sense at all.

I was probably a Catholic nun or something in another life and that's why I like it so much. Who knows. Who cares? Right? As long as it works for me.

Thanks for your input here, James. I've missed you.

And, this is what bothers me sometimes. I tend to be a bit OCD about my magic and want to know WHY I'm doing ever little step. And, then I get caught up in the fact that I need to have faith in a particular ritual, all the while knowing that it's not the ritual, but the faith.

However, my best and most effective magic is performed when I use my gut instinct about how to do my ritual and it doesn't always make sense to me logically. It just feels right. I need to stop worrying about why I have faith in a particular ritual or why it works for me and just use it.

Well said!

I think Celtic links are fairly common, both because of cultural pasts - Celtic covers a wide area of Europe, and the tons of information out there. There's far less infomation on say, Slavic pagan practices.

I know my core beliefs as a shamanic practioner reflect my cultural Celtic history of Scots-Manx, though I am also drawn to Australian Aboriginal beliefs, and some of the North and South American views as well. For me it's where the animals lead me, if that makes any sense. Since Horse plays strongly as an ally, all things horse-related in all cultures and deities call to me. Another is the Snake/Ouroboros as there is Jormungand the World Serpent, Rainbow Serpent of Aboriginal beliefs, the Feathered Serpent of South American beliefs, etc.

I can certainly understand tapping into the vibrational buildup of chants already in existance. Though the inotnation might be more important, so if you are good at combinging new and old, it can be rather interesting.

Ruth, have you read Anam Cara by John O'Donohue? He was an Irish Catholic priest who writes from a point of Celtic Christianity. I thoroughly enjoy all his books as he gets the beauty of Celtic paganism, and Catholicism and how they have weaved together over the years. Really beautiful mystical writings.

No, I've never heard of him but I'd be interested in reading his work. Thank you!

He's written several other books, all as enjoyable and spiritually profound. Eternal Echoes: Celtic Reflections on Our Yearning to Belong, Beauty: The Invisible Embrace - Rediscovering the True Sources or Compassion, Serenity and Hope, and a couple of books of blessings. All with a good Irish themed spirituality. :-)

I can't imagine why anyone would think that it wouldn't make any sense. Catholicism has been around for over two millennia and is still widely practiced my millions of people.

I often find myself feeling like I'm a Catholic priest during rituals. I have extremely elaborate circle ceremonies. Probably way over-kill. But that's the way I do everything.

I have 5 altars set up. And they are all quite elaborate. One is the main altar at the center of the circle. The other four are the four quarters. Before I cast a circle I bath and put on my priest robe. Of course it looks more like something Merlin would wear than a priest but it's still a robe. Then I walk widdershins with a censer hanging on a chain to smudge away unwanted vibrations. It's just like how the Catholic priests do with their incense. Then I change censers and incesnce and do it again deosil, this time lighting a candle on each quarter altar. As if that isn't enough, I repeat the process with Holy Water. This is a small circle though inside my house so it's not a lot of walking.

Then I cast the circle thrice. The first time with a large Chakra Wand for the Great Spirit, or Holy Spirit, or the Spirit of Yin and Yang (as I prefer to think of it). I have a non-personal relationshiop with the Great Spirit (i.e. I don't personify the Great Spirit, I think of the Great Spirit in a deeper mystical sense that transcends human form).

Then after casting with the Chakra Wand I cast again with the God Athame. And then finally with the Goddess Athame. With each casting I "bow" toward each of the three candles on the main alter with the wand or athame in hand. Of course, these "bows" become gentle "bobs" and everytime I do it, it just reminds me of the movements that many Catholic priests appear to be doing at their altars.

This may sound like a lot of casting, but in truth it goes pretty quick. I have a different set of incantations that I say with each casting. These incantations are designed to address both the spirit that I am currently casting with as well as the qualities and spirits associated with each of the four quarters as I cast the circle.

For example, for me, I make the following associations:

East: Air, Hod, Yetzirah, and Gorias
South: Fire, Yesod, Atziluth, and Finias
East: Water, Netzach, Briah, and Murias
North: Stone, Malkuth, Assiah, and Falias

The first in each list is the elements (stone, or crystal, = Earth). The second in each list are the consciousnesses of the elemental gods. The third in each list is the manifestation spirit associated with each elemental force. The last in each list is the name of the Faery City associated with these domains.

There's actually a lot more associations going on too, but I'm not about to write a book here.

As complicated as all this may sound it actually goes quite quickly and smoothly in practice. The thing like about this system that I have adopted (or designed from various mythologies) is that it puts me in touch with a whole lot of different cosmic consciousnesses at once. And I can navigate between them or appeal to whichever ones are needed at the moment. Often times I feel like I'm at a group meeting with the gods and they seem to often collaborate as a team to help bring to fruition the things I desire to manifest.

Many people may see this as a polythesitic spirituality. But for me, it's not really polytheistic at all. I view all of these consciousnesses as a facet of the Great Spirit of Yin and Yang. The God and Goddess are simply a manifestation of my own imagination that provides a cerebral vehicle through which the Great Spirit can more easily communicate with me.

The same thing is true of all the elemental spiritual forms. They are the consciounesses of those forms. Thus the best way to communicate with an elemental force is to become as closely aligned with the consciosness of that form as possible. This seemingly complex circle ritual opens up all those avenues of communication.

Also, since I light candles on the various altars for these spiritual consciousnesses to inhabit during the ritual it makes it far easier to see which ones are attempting to communicate. I never really thought about it, but I guess to an outside observer it would appear that I'm going around talking to candles.

I always perform my rituals in private so no one has ever witnessed this as an observer (other than than the Great Spirit, of course)

Well, it's past my bedtime, so I'm going to bed. This sure turned out to be ramble.

And you're afraid that people are going to think that you're nuts?

Trust me, compared to me they'll certify you to be as sane as a saint.

what's walking widdershins?

Widdershins is to walk the circle counterclockwise. Deosil is to walk the circle clockwise.

I find you completely sane and I always appreciate when you share your knowledge with me.

Ruth,

Well, for whatever it's worth, you played a major role in helping me to discover the truths in this ritual religious system. From having read your posts in the General Religions Forum I felt that you had established your sanity and it was because of this I put great merit in the books that you had recommended.

I had been studying the religions of Eastern Mysticism, specifically the various forms of Buddhism. I found modern Zen Buddhism to be nothing more than a glorified system of atheism (at least as presented by many people). However, I found the more ancient forms of Buddhism to be more spiritually oriented. Theravada Buddhism was the original form created by Siddhartha Gutama. While interesting, it seemed to also be lacking in areas. A slightly more modern version of Buddhism called Mahayana Buddhism seemed far more spiritual to me. This is the form of Buddhism that Jesus may have learned about. It focused on the concept of the bodhisattva, and even demanded that it's practitioners swear an oath to become a bodhisattva before being permitted to become a monk. I find it quite interesting that Jesus was indeed the ultimate bodhisattva.

In any case, even though I found Mahayana Buddhism to be attractive in many ways, it still seemed to be lacking that direct connection with spirit (as least in my mind). However the Mahayana Buddhism of India also became entangled with Taoism from China. From that arose a new form of Buddhism called Tantric Buddhism. The concept of sacred circles also came into the picture. This of course lead me directly to pure Taoism which has its roots in Shamanism. Shamanism finally struck a cord with me and I found something that I could genuinely identify with.

I hope all this isn't boring you, I'll get to witchcraft eventually, I promise.

In the meantime, I was very lucky to stumble onto the teachings of the great guru Deepak Chopra. I've purchased many of this lectures on video including a 7-hour actual course on spiritual enlightenment. One of the things that Deepak clarified for me is the concept of "archetypes". Archetypes (as it applies to these spiritual traditions) is simply the mythological vehicle through which an individual soul creates a means of communiqué with the cosmic consciousness (or God if you like). Deepak's view is far from atheistic and clearly based on a belief in a higher divine consciousness.

Even so, there was an element missing from this practice. Although, perhaps I shouldn't say that it was 'missing', it was there, it just wasn't well-defined, and they reason was that this element can't be well-defined in general because it must necessarily be a personal choice. At that element is, of course, the choice of archetypal communiqué.

This was the part where my childhood religion had failed me miserably. As you well know, I was born and raised as a Christian. However, the archetype for that religion had been grossly tainted for me, partly due to the mythology itself (demanding that every has already fallen from grace and is in the dog house with God). And the whole thesis of the religion was the need to repent and to shun the material world as being the domain of Satan. Not to mention the fact, that the only way to get back into grace with this horrible God was to confess that you're guilty of forcing him to have his son Jesus nailed to a pole to pay for your disgusting worthless behavior. The whole religion was just focused on guilt, shame, and the shunning of the material world with belongs to some evil demon named Satin. It's just a horrible archetype to be used as a means of communiqué with the divine mind. (at least from my point of view).

None the less, that religion is still considered to be a valid religious "archetype". And many people have been brainwashed to believe that if you don't accept it you'll be shunned by the supreme consciousness and cast into a place of eternal damnation. It's just not my cup of tea and never truly worked for me at all.

However, Deepak had mentioned other archetypes such as Greek Mythology, American Indian Traditions, and other traditions from northern Europe (I don't think he wanted to mention witchcraft specifically due to the mainstream rejection of these religious practices as nothing more than ignorant fairytales at best, or the work of that nasty Satan at worst).

In any case, I realized that I needed a vehicle of communiqué with the cosmic consciousness. Ironically that's what Mahayana (from Mahayana Buddhism) means "The Great Vehicle".

So anyway, I had always been interested in witchcraft traditions, as well as faery folklore. But in, in truth, I had difficulty in seeing either of them as "valid genuine religions". No doubt due to my history of having been raised in a society that basically teaches that such things are worthless fairytales at best, or the work of Satan at worst.

In any case, when you introduced me to the book by Scott Cunningham, and then utliamate to the books of Christopher Penczak all that changed. I realized that people do take these traditions seriously, and that they have cultural merit in the cosmic scheme of things. And I also realized that not only are they not the work of any "Satan" but in truth such an evil demon would be the antithesis of any genuinely all-powerful supreme being anyway. In other words, I have now come to the profound realization that it was Christianity all along that is the utterly absurd fairytale that has no merit, not the other way around.

So now I have accepted various Celtic Traditions as having great merit. I have no problem integrating various archetypes together. So I have combined the various Gods and Goddesses of the witchcraft traditions along with the faery lore. I simple prefer to hang out with the fairies instead of the angels. They are both mythological creatures that have wings and fly. But the fairies are far more inviting to me. I hang out with groups of them at a time in my shamanism journey. They are more child-like than the angels and far more fun to be around.

So I've incorporated the faery legends into my spiritual archetype seamlessly. They work right in very easily because of the four faery cities of Falias, Gorias, Finias, and Murias that are associated with the four points of the compass. They are my "angles".

Learning about how to accept archetypes and incorporate them successfully as a vehicle of communiqué with the cosmic consciousness was the major key that really broke things wide open for me.

Ok, this was another widly expanded ramble. But the point I originally wanted to make was that my respect for you sanity was what caused me to go ahead and order over $100 worth of witchcraft books by Christopher Penczak, and trust me, it was the best $100 I ever spent! Of course I probably spent as much on Chopra videos too. But they too were well worth the price! Chopra and Penczak are basically saying the same things. They are just coming at it from two different cultural directions.

So now my spiritual rituals are a combination of traditions from various spiritualities, including witchcraft, the concept of the Moon Goddess, the Sun God, the Faery Teachings, along with some elements of ancient aspects of Buddhism and Taoism, also some magickal teachings from Egypt and the Qabalah (with a Celtic twist). Even Jesus is included in my spiritual archetype. I see him as having been a victim of the very religion that preaches in his name. He was a great bodhisattva who paid a high price to help others find their way.

Well, I better go do something productive today.

Thanks for starting a thread on a topic I can relate to.

Systems of magick (or spiritual communiqué) is important. I personally feel that the most important aspect of it is that you find something that truly works for you. And don't worry about having to defend it to anyone else. It's between you and your creator. No one else even needs to know about it, unless you decide to share it with people who are genuinely interested.

Just ignore the naysayers. Let them deal with their spirituality, and you deal with yours. You don't need to justify yourself to anyone other than the cosmic consciousness that you are reaching out to. And the mere fact that you're reaching out says volumes.

I'll get back on this Sunday night when I have a lot of free time. I enjoyed reading it, and it deserves a good going over, not a quickie. LOL!

First of all, I'm glad to hear I come off as sane in the threads.

Second, I'm honored to have been the means by which god/goddess showed you your true path. It feels good to be used as a messenger by them. They have rewarded me ten fold in that I now learn so much from you. I may not have a lot to say about your posts but that's only because when you are done, there's not much left to say.

It's all true and you do an excellent job of putting it into words. I really hope you keep all these writings of yours. You need to publish your Book of Shadows.

Thank you and you're right. I think my problem originally was that I was so excited about what I had found that I wanted to share it with everyone. For years I would tell people about this "thing" I had found and their reactions were not always pleasant. Even from people in the Pagan community. "You're not doing it right" was often heard.

I have learned and am still learning to just keep it to myself and "ignore the naysayers".

Okay, so in the end, all I can say is "Well said Abra!" Enjoyed reading your comments, and found them to be very thought-provoking.