Izabael's Magickal Discussion
Hello,
My name is Izabael. Some of you may be familiar with the demon of that name. I am her current High Priestess if you allow me the somewhat pompous appellation.
In my blog, which is not always about magickal subjects, I am going to be doing a series of blogs related to magick. I thought some of you here might find it interesting or have things to contribute.
I'm writing to a less hardcore and more mainstream audience than you guys here, so don't kill me for some of the oversimplifications. I tried my best to reach a happy middle ground as far as having a scholarly vs. conversational tone.
This first one is probably way too simple for you guys here, but my next one will be a little more challenging. There's probably still even typos in it since it's pretty fresh and I haven't tweaked it completely.
In case any one is wondering why I'm doing these: It's because I have to. It's part of my magickal training. Magister Pamphage will kick my ass if don't.
Also I have a feeling some people might want this in Chaos Magick or somewhere else. I'd like a to make a case for it here as I've been Thelemically trained, but know very little about Chaos Magick even if some of the ideas seem like they are good fit there.
xoxo,
Izabael
Izabael's Magickal Discussions Vol I: A Simple Evocation
Some people are confused about how to evoke (or invoke) Izabael the genie. Even though the FAQ is pretty exhaustive, I thought I would run through a simple example of an evocation. This will be the first part of a series of small, but relatively easy instructional blogs on practical magick.
THE DEFINITIONS:
evocation -- The act of summoning a spirit into a mirror, crystal ball, or into our mind's eye. Any time a demon is summoned to any sort of manifestation it is an evocation, so long as it's not into another human being. That would instead be an:
invocation – The act of summoning a spirit into oneself or another willing participant.
genie – a hidden aspect of our subconscious that functions like a real spirit or daemon when called upon.
sigil – The specific symbol for contacting any single genie. It is the truest representation of a spirit's nature even more so than its name.
THE THEORY:
So how does genie invocation/evocation work? There is no 100% common acceptance of how or why spirits, demons, and genies work. The traditional thought process was that they were fallen angels and therefore had an external validity separate from the human invoking/evoking them.
This way of thinking seems a bit outdated, and I find more modern magicians feel that genies are aspects of our subconscious, similar to Jungian archetypes, and if you put energy into building up the connection between your conscious mind and these subconscious "entities" one is rewarded with inspiration, thoughts, ideas and even spontaneous "accidents" that lead us to our most desired goals.
I personally go so far as to say that genies only affect the material plane through the intermediary of humans. This makes quite a lot of sense if one thinks it through, so let's go into this in a little more detail:
I think to most rational human beings the thought of demons running around with the ability to move objects, slam doors, and steal gold and the like is pretty absurd. So how can I claim to be a rational human being and still believe wholeheartedly in the power of genies?
I have found through experience that:
a) Our subconscious is vastly more powerful than most people give it credit for,
b) Most human minds are far weaker and susceptible to foreign influence than most people would like to admit.
This can be most easily illustrated through the power of media and advertising. Say what you will about advertising and commercials, the billions of dollars spent on it each year attest to the fact that it works and that humans are *easily* swayed by immaterial influences.
"Advertising" has no soul or physical body any more than a spirit or genie, and yet it affects millions, perhaps billions of humans every single day. It is ideas, colors, sounds, and music, twisted by media "black magicians" into a commercial or advertisement which then stirs our emotions and moves our heart, and once our heart is moved, we are only too willing to do the physical work of opening our purse (or wallet) and dishing out our hard-earned money because these incorporeal "demons" of media have persuaded us to do so.
Genies work in a somewhat similar fashion. They are like "balls" of experience in the subconscious that have been found over the centuries to respond to the use of certain sigils. These sigils are like a trigger, or perhaps a better analogy is a doorway, into communication with these very specific aspects of our subconscious. The more we communicate with these aspects, the easier the communication becomes and the more energy flows from us to them and vice versa. The changes they make are not physical, but psychological, and we ourselves carry out the tiny changes, which results in a butterfly effect that ultimately manifests our deepest desire. In other words, sensitive dependence upon initial conditions is what genies excel at exploiting.
That then is a nutshell of how genies work. So how do we meet Izabael?
THE PRACTICE:
Let's run through a very simple *evocation* (as opposed to an invocation which is a much more powerful and more intimate way of summoning Izabael.)
I will explain this method, not because it is the best or most powerful method, but because it is the simplest and easiest and should not frighten even the most timid of magickal students. For the more adventurous, I refer to the aforementioned FAQ.
Clear your mind. Take a bath, or go for a long walk. Whatever works best for you. If you know how to "Banish," or otherwise ceremonially clear your space, then now is the time to do it.
Take some pen and paper and start drawing Izabael. Try to memorize her, but if you can't it doesn't matter. Draw her, doodle her, let her ideas branch out into other "doodlings" perhaps unrelated. Be open to stray impulses while you work with her sigil. Be open to stray thoughts. Be open to the experience. You can close your eyes and try to see her, or hear her, or for the truly kinesthetic, you might even feel her presence. You can alternate doodling with chanting her name, or dancing to an unheard song, or whatever else you find appropriate. There are no rules. You can ask her questions and quietly wait for her response in whatever way you feel you can connect with her. Izabael speaks with symbols, and so called "accidental occurrences."
For your first time don't expect too much. She may only come across like a vague feeling. Don't shrug it off; instead just assume that "vague" feeling is Izabael trying to make contact.
Belief alters reality. Don't be afraid to "fake it till you make it." A big part of magick, and success in life in general, is just believing what you want is possible and to start assuming it already. You may call it placebo, but if it gets the ball rolling, then so much the better. Sooner or later, as it was with me when I first met Izabael, you get to the point where the accidental occurrences stack up higher than could reasonably be possible, and your results are so fantastic and perfectly suited to your true desires that you have no choice but to consider Izabael just as real as the girl next door--but after an entirely different manner.
When you are done working with Izabael you can invite her to stay in your presence or you can ask her to leave. Either way is fine. Just do what you are comfortable with. When you are ready, you can always contact her again. Sooner or later she will start giving you clues on how to better work with her.
So much of working with magick is just breaking away from worn out patterns of thinking. Reality is not only the material plane. A key to powerful magick is trying to reconnect with the subtler realms. Many of us can probably still remember when as very young children those realms were a lot closer than they are now.
If you get nothing else out of my writings, I hope you at least get that you should never, ever take what someone else has told you is impossible as the way it has to be. Never let anyone impose limitations on YOUR reality. Expand your belief system and your joy will expand right along with it.
Hail Nuith,
Izabael
P.S. In the next Discussion I will be getting a little more technical and I will discuss the Ego's place in magick. This will include a discussion of the Abyss, and will also help shed some light on what Izabael's relationship is to our personality and why she is a much more "fool-proof" spirit to work with than those of the traditional Goetia. It will also help to answer a common question I get, "Where does your personality end and where does Izabael the spirit's begin?"
P.P.S. I also find the idea of Memes germane to this conversation, but it was just too complicated for the scope of my blog. I mention it here for those so inclined to further research in these matters:
The term "meme" (IPA: /mi?m/, rhyming with "theme". Commonly pronounced in the US as /m?m/, rhyming with "gem"), coined in 1976[1] by the biologist Richard Dawkins, refers to a "unit of cultural information" which can propagate from one mind to another in a manner analogous to genes (i.e., the units of genetic information).
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