Listen, folks, one of the things I hope to always deliver to you in these missives is one thing because it’s the only thing I can offer; honesty.

If I don’t offer you that, then I have no business being anywhere near your life in any way.

In my last article, I talked about how I stumbled backwards into my altar setup and how it worked through my evolving practice. It’s a moment that, for me, I’m simply documenting as it is. The magick worked if not in subtle ways. Was it what I intended or sought on my own? No, but when you ask for help, you’re going to get it.

Sometimes you may not always recognize it and, as the last article showed very clearly, for me…it really is the little things.

So, now we have to talk about the 14-Ton Mastodon in the room: What about those days where you don’t feel the presence of your gods?

Well, the way I figure it there, Mr. or Mrs. Oh-So-Important, is that it’s a big damn universe and there are probably multiple of them but this is a helpful thing to keep in mind. Sit down, get your favorite beverage, take a breath and relax. Read when ready.

“THE ALL is MIND; The Universe is Mental.”

-The Kybalion.
First Principle of Hermeticism

Talk about a banger. You look at that and think “Wulfgar, have you lost your fuckin’ mind? Are you going full Manson on us and now you’re gonna grow a wild fringe do and start ranting about how you go for walks in the desert every morning?”

Well yeah. …okay, no. No no no no no. Hold on. Let me explain this.

I’ve already done that. I’ve done it with you and there are a hard core cluster among you that read every word and some of you skip the emails and come read them on the web but I want to focus on a specific for a moment; The Nocturneverse.

For those of you who don’t know, The Nocturneverse is a dark horror/fantasy series that’s grounded in our very real world. It centers around vampire rock star, Draven Nocturne on his retirement tour and the things underneath it all you wouldn’t expect to happen to someone in rock n’ roll.

Draven Nocturne (real name: Daniel Novak) can get on that stage, rock crowds, seduce women, feed from a host of different people without killing them (groupies…great cover) and I know what his songs are, how he plays them, how he sings them, I know that he doesn’t stay a rocker forever and I know what he does next. I know what he’ll do for the next several centuries and I know what he’s thinking at any given time.

I know that because I created him. Draven Nocturne, though there’s some part of me in him, can never claim to be me and if he faced that crowd in Detroit after blowing their heads off with the performance he gives, after giving it all to the fans and then he takes the mic, swings the guitar behind him, looks at the crowd and goes, “Ladies and gentlemen…I have met our God…his name is Raven Wulfgar…I…Am Raven Wulfgar.” That man is going to make an entire crowd of 80k people walk the hell out of that venue and leave him and his band on stage alone.

Because he’s not me.

Apply that. You’ve been told your entire life about how powerful Divinity is, how you have a spark of it within you, dozens and dozens of books on the subject but you’ve just never been able to make it click, right? The reality, once this one principle is grasped is that we exist in the mind of our Source. The visitations we receive from deity are that deity’s attempt to reach us through an aspect of itself, something we can understand, comprehend, sit with and move on.

The second thing you should probably understand doesn’t come from academic or spiritual texts.

“It's a great big universe
And we're all really puny
We're just tiny little specks
About the size of Mickey Rooney
It's big and black and inky
And we are small and dinky
It's a big universe and we're not”
-Yakko Warner “It’s A Great Big Universe” from The Animaniacs

Seems silly doesn’t it? Something from a kids cartoon that I still watch to this day because it’s hysterical and full of humor you will recognize as an adult more so than when you were a kid.

But on the surface, yes. If you watch the video and listen to the song, you get something you probably didn’t have before: Perspective.

It’s big and dark and inky…and we’re all small and dinky. Yep.

Look, peeps, it’s a process. Some days you’re going to step out of your door feeling like you’re on holy fire and you pity any moron standing in your path. You’ve got purpose on that day, you’re moving while answering to something higher, you were really feeling it at your personal shrine today. Nothing is going to keep you down, out or even knock you from that position today.

Then there are days where it’s worry about this, worry about that, are you running late? What about lunch? You don’t feel presence at all. You did that ritual at the altar, shrine or space and felt absolutely zippo.

Worse, you’re ready to give up. You have notebooks of results, intense experiences, subtle experiences, you know what this is supposed to do and…nothing.

It’s not that Divinity abandoned you. It’s not that at all. Look at what might be cluttering your signal between you and Divinity. You’re out there chasing experiences but that’s not the work, not by any stretch.

Now, we come to another principle of Hermeticism, The Law of Polarity.

Everything has polarity. Batteries, Magnets. The two extreme ends do what they do within each of us. Every emotion has an opposite but they’re not exactly opposites. They exist on the same exact spectrum.

Inside that spectrum…you. You deal with those extremes all the time. The drive-thru got your order wrong, yeah, you’re not happy about that.

Question…how do you choose to deal with that. Certainly screaming at the people who are making your food is a Mensa-level choice. Just because they have to serve…does not mean they must like you. Let’s keep that in mind.

If we choose to go back through and just tell them, “Hi there, I was just here and had to come back through and my order was incorrect.” and you calmly, rationally tell them what’s going on, act as though it didn’t bother you, the inconvenience was hardly anything and you’re just there to correct the order, often you’ll find that things smooth out as quickly as they were wrinkled, taking your anger into the realm of satisfaction.

People, I don’t need to tell you that that little mundane scenario I just gave you is an actual magickal formulae. You’re not waving implements or chanting the names of runes to get it done. You’re interacting and changing the current reality into a new reality in accordance with your True Will/Ghost/Holy Guardian Angel/Whatever the hell you wanna call it. That’s what actual magick looks like.

The gods haven’t abandoned you. Your magick will work but you now have to integrate your practice or at least parts of it into your daily life. Into all the boring shit that comes with living, paying bills, working, the grind, the struggle if you’re going through one…aren’t we all? All of that needs your attention.

Being willing to understand that (hence, why MindCraft is so important) and being willing to implement some kind of self-mastery, that’s where actual magick lives and, take it from a guy who struggles with that kind of thing daily, it’s not easy but it is possible.

Most would call these crises of Faith but they’re not crises and certainly not of faith. It’s a problem with the ego getting in the way.

The shadow tells you, “It ain’t workin’ hoss. Where are the gods? Thought they were supposed to be here all big and bad and guiding this work… I don’t see ‘em. Don’t hear ‘em. Face facts, we been standin’ ‘round wavin’ a damn knife around that ain’t worth the boot knife status it has like a damn idiot. I guess we’re gonna keep bullshittin’ ourselves though!”

Okay, that’s what mine sounds like. Meanwhile you can’t hear anything because it’s talking like a petulant teenager armed with nothing but sarcasm. Identify that pattern, spot it and tell it to sit the hell down while you do the actual work. Note the events. Note the triggers. Note why it pisses you off or sticks with you and then note what you did instead and how many of your discipline wins stack up. Eventually, it gets that you aren’t listening to its little tantrums and your signal is open again.

If you’re picture and audio are a bit fuzzy or you’re not getting either, try adjusting your antenna…you have static somewhere in the line. Clear that and you’ll be back in business.

Magnusson, Out.