"Describe 'Void'" they said.
I truly can't. I can only tell you what I know.
I know that I consider myself summoned from outside my self-that-knows-stuff, and that my life's work consists of answering this summons.
I know that wherever I explore to answer that summons, I find that the self-that-knows-stuff has to put up with not getting any data.
I know that lacking input, my brain suggests patterns of meaning, creates where necessary. I dismiss the results as inventions.
I know that whatever I can put a name to, I created myself. God, Tao, Chaos, Void, Anon, Nothingness: all invented concepts, not the real thing.
I know that after I've dismissed the meanings and the things which try to give form to the summons, nothing remains, not even a sense of 'me'. We can call this 'Void' if we like, but it doesn't matter.
SYSTEM
Look outside. The mundane, boring so-called 'Real world' functions as our reality check. If we can make our subjective insights meaningful to others we avoid insanity and fulfil our mythic quest, so to speak. I have had many beliefs which we categorise as spiritual, religious or mystical.
I never saw the point of eclectic idea-shopping, as common sense points out that every system of thought necessarily clashes with the others. While I have held contradictory ideas (and probably still do), I found no useful answers in pick'n'mix philosophy. Nor in trying to impose an all-embracing over-belief to squeeze the many parts into one explanation. I do not believe that beyond our subjective systems we might find an Objective Truth against which we may measure our development and our illusion. Travelling many paths has taught me to accept NONE as authoritative. I accept no path as more important than the people who made it up. (and somebody made up each and every path we know)
So against what external standard can we evaluate ourselves and avoid disappearing up our own arses? What else can we do to explore this question sensibly. We can ABANDON THE SEARCH FOR SYSTEM. We don't actually need a complete, coherent system of thought in order to function. For further head-banging on this point, read some Ludwig Wittgenstein.
In brief, then: Humans came first. We invent systems of explanation. I consider that makes us more important than systems. Humans evolve as a social species. We function sanely and find meaning in our lives, not in isolation, but as part of the larger group. In this World-wide Web, we find the larger group large indeed.
COLOURS OF MAGIC
Concepts like the "colours of magic" function as beliefs to structure our magical activities. I recognise only one metabelief, namely that we treat beliefs (including constructive rubbish about the colours of magic) as expendable tools in the pursuit of our goals.
So these goals? If I asked that question I'd get swamped with all kinds of metaphysical shit (at least, that's what happens when I ask myselfs). And the metaphysical shit would merely reflect the beliefs, not metabelief, of those offering them.
So what else? I bring it down to values, by which I mean those single words or short phrases which describe to each of us individually what we consider most important. And I recognise four basic values in my magic: effectiveness, by which I mean it's gotta do what I want it to; efficiency, by which I mean I want it done faster, more directly, and with less wasted effort; excellence, by which I mean the lifelong process of improvement; and entertainment, by which I mean I want to enjoy what I'm doing. And if that means putting on a few unnecessary bells and whistles, well why not?
It seems that we all have our own lists of core values, which determine which belief structures or working patterns we accept and reject. It seems to me as though our core values give us our sense of direction and our beliefs put the machine into gear.
We will accept no beliefs that clash with our core values.
GOING PUBLIC
I have had some out-of-closet experiences as an occultist, but I've gained from very few of them.
I have found with magic as I had with hypnosis, that people with little to do with these often hold these two ideas simultaneously:
1) "It doesn't exist"
AND...
2) "It's dangerous"
I just couldn't give a shit enough to disillusion such people, and anyway, who appointed me their eye-opener? Furthermore, you guys who pointed out that out-of-closet occultists get discriminated against even in this day and age, Ding! Dong! that was the top answer, folks! *Ker-ching!* Had it myself.
Also, I notice that out-of-closet occultists attract wankers like light attracts moths. If you've got something, you'll be crawling with questionable people who want some: psychic vampires, glamour victims and other wannabes. Who needs that?
Finally, I claim to know how my folks would feel if I stepped out of the magic closet. Why upset them? They tolerate enough of my weirdness already and I long since outgrew my rebellious streak.
THE TRUTH OF OTHERS
I've studied Ericksonian hypnosis as part of NLP training. In practice I've found that people I've had in trance, whatever they believe, whether it's reincarnation, angels, a spiritualist 'other world' or whatever, have happenings in trance which fit their own beliefs.
I don't believe in any of that stuff, yet I've successfully guided people through trances of past lives, visions of dead folks or mythical beings, even led them into the void which I myself experience as valid. Anything goes, it seems. I don't pass judgment on the 'truth' of what they report, since I don't believe in 'truth' anyway. I just have to let them do their own thing.
One danger I've come across involves so-called 'false memory'. Because the neural structures of memory do not differ from those of imagination, a careless interviewer, therapist or hypnotisT can 'install' memories of things which never happened, or insert stuff into the subject's experience. You know, 'How many gray aliens did you see before they took you up in their vessel?' kind of stuff. (tranced-out person never mentioned aliens until thaT point) Sometimes that blatant. The guy who allegedly discovered the epidemic of Multiple Personality Disorder would approach any new client and just say stuff like 'I want to talk to Susan. *smacks client on head* Susan! Come out!'
Sheee-it.
"Perfect" memory. I consider it more accurate to speak of "more detailed" memory, as the details might be inaccurate, having been installed by the interviewer or simply supplied from generic memories. You can instruct someone to remember out of trance what they "recovered" whilst in it. However, if you're dealing with repressed trauma I'd advise to leave it be. The mind conveniently forgets such things as a protective device for the person, and if you remove that protection by making them remember whatever-it-was, shit could fly.
Anything you can do within a formally-induced trance you can get outside one also. And as far as I can tell, "anything" means anything. Positive hallucination ("I could have sworn I saw it there"), negative hallucination ("I looked everywhere for it and it was looking at me all the time!"), amnesia ("now where was I?") etc all show up in our ordinary experience, in informal altered states of consciousness. Read up on Ericksonian hypnosis, for example, and you'll find stuff like this.
Recall of past experiences depends on a number of factors, which include these: having satisfactorily experienced it in the first place, having no unconscious reason to conveniently forget, and some sort of cue for recall. The first means that if you weren't paying attention at the time and didn't actually take in any detail, you cannot recall much more. Some learning strategies, such as Photoreading, get around this by expanding the attention to 'peripheral' rather than focussed attention. The second means that if unconsciously you believe that you should repress a given memory, such as that of a trauma, then the unconscious mind will 'resist' attempts to recall the memory. The third means that since the mind selects for stuff it deems relevant, memories deemed less relevant may require more ingenuity to recall than the life-and-death issues.
A quick note on mass hypnosis. Easy: you only need a mass stimulus, like a moustachioed dictator on a podium or a bright thing with pictures and sounds in the corner of a room.
