In this post, I'm sharing three magick hacks, or psychotechnological tools that I wish I knew when I started on this journey. Take what's useful and leave what's not.
First, I should give my perspective of alchemy or magick since the words themselves mean many different things to different people.
Recently, I've been watching the lectures of John Vervaeke, a scientist who does not believe in magic or spirits. When discussing the role of shamans he used the word psychotechnology.
Oversimplified description...Humans have evolved to where we are now by using tools. Obviously, these computers are tools, but even the clothes we wear are tools to improve social interaction. People like shamans have also been apart of human evolutionary history, why? He suggested the shamans used psychotechnology, tools for our mind. Perception enhancing practices like fasting, meditating in a cave, and psychedelics, to name a few, are all ways to expand our mind to think outside the box. Also, shamans were healers before modern medicine, did it work?
The placebo effect is real.
A 2014 study led by Professor Ted Kaptchuk, of Harvard-affiliated Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and published in Science Translational Medicine found that the placebo was 50% as effective as the real drug even when the test subjects knew it was a placebo. source
I could go deep into this but to get straight to the point, magick, to me in one degree, is a mental tool to help me become my best self, for myself and others. Basically, humans are cyborgs with our use of machines (tools). I use magick like a cyborg mentally putting on a augmented reality helmet to see the world as intelligent and talking/interacting to/with me so that i may better walk through life. To expand my perception of myself and others to better empathize.
It doesn't matter what god or gods or goddesses or aliens or gaia or consciousness or synapses in the brain you are communicating with, it works.
i must clarify that my intention with that statement is not to discredit anyone's faith or practice. I'm just saying psychotechnology is and can be used with any faith or practice.
WHEW!!! this is gong to be longer than expected... is it too late to shorten to one magic hack??
Hack #1
Thinking – the talking of the soul with itself. – Plato
I'm sure everyone's heard or read a million quotes on the power of positive thinking. From The Secret to Hill's Think and Grow Rich, does it work? Not my debate, I'm just here for magick hacks!
This one is easy and I wish i was doing it sooner. Use your mantras, positive affirmations, wishes, prayers and spells as some of your passwords. I mean really, how many times a day do you have to type and remember your passwords?? Us3 th3se t0 h3!p m@k3 th3 p@ssw0rd 5tr0ng. Obviously, it's still better to use fancy secure computer generated passwords for financial stuff, but still good for all that non-essential stuff.
Hack #2
“Proper visualization by the exercise of concentration and willpower enables us to materialize thoughts, not only as dreams or visions in the mental realm but also as experiences in the material realm.” Paramahansa Yogananda
I always struggled with visualization and instead connected better with, for example when wanting something, meditating on what it/I would feel like rather than look like.
Story time! One time, in my younger days, meditating while on a psychedelic something strange occurred (imagine that lol). With my eyes closed, and in the usual blackness, appeared a basketball 🏀! For those of you who can vividly visualize just skip this, cause for me this was new! It appeared in HD quality as real as if my eyes were open! I immediately thought, what else can i visualize and in an instant i was soaring above a forest, better than any virtual reality or IMAX theater. Clearer than my dreams, I could see everything!
When describing the experience to friends I realized some could do this all the time! I felt so cheated! Upon research I concluded that I must have aphantasia and that the vivid visuals I saw were just due to the psychedelics...until
I learned about Image Streaming from a photography based youtube video! It's actually a technique devised to improve IQ, so there is double benefit to this. I highly recommend checking the video linked above because after using this visualization hack, I realized i don't have aphantasia. After time I have begun to see images, not in full color yet, but white and in detail for brief periods of time. It's working! Creepily the first images that started to appear for me were eyes! 😨
Hack #3
Anything can be used as an oracle.
Some years ago this book caught my eye and I bought it immediately. It's a lot of fun and my tarot deck for a long time was just some Route 66 playing cards because of it. An example of various things being used as an oracle could be asking a question and flipping through radio stations. Heck, i even think tiktok is an oracle of sorts (didn't tiktok almost get bought by a company called Oracle...hmmm)
I eventually lost interest because I wasn't interested in "fortune telling". I didn't even know who Lon Milo DuQuette was! Now I have begun reading his book on the Thoth Tarot and beginning to see tarot and other "ordinary oracles" as more than telling the future. It's psychotech! Pulling a tarot card, watching the birds, catching a fraction of someone's conversation all can be used to enhance your perception of yourself and the world around you. To me, it's more of a, how does this card make me feel?, rather than what's going to happen.
Pulling a death card this morning didn't frighten me. It made me feel a certain way. Like an old negative part of me falling away making room for some new art or journey. This in turn enhanced my whole day and opened my mind to unlocking doors that i may not have seen if i didn't pull that card. maybe it was about writing this long ass post and almost being done! 😂
In conclusion
I'll leave you with this mind blowing recent interview with Lon Milo DuQuette. I have it starting past all the freemason talk and going into the juicy stuff. Enjoy and thanks for reading. Questions and criticism always open. I'm learning, I don't know. :)
Also, Hermetic Hive is a new and growing community! Your posts on #tarot, #astrology, #magic, #philosophy, and other related esoteric topics are welcome here :)
And As a new MOD I want to say my posts and opinions do not represent the community as a whole.
My Previous Alchemy Posts:
Danger: Alchemy 23-002 - Magick?
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