Not arrival or departure - just status check
Posted: Wed May 25, 2016 12:18 am
I've still got a pulse.
If anyone might wonder why my posts have decreased considerably in the last several months, possibly even a year or so, things are a bit on the chill.
I think when I first came here, and really when I first joined most places, I was really bank-rolling a lot of my motivation off of all I'd read. The dangerous thing about talking about the books you've read, especially when you've really been on a binge with that, is you can hit the ground sounding like a pro (it's really borrowed authority), people might buy into to it which could be to your advantage or detriment all depending on whether your spiritual evolution is in line with your degree of book learning.
I'm not sure where things are at right now - just that I do feel like I'm almost back to a materialism of sorts, still believe that there's a quantum aspect of life but that it's so fiercely red-taped over that, as Manly P Hall often put it, most people will never experience any sort of opening in this life even if they put in that much due diligence from womb to tomb - ie. it apparently takes many lifetimes of intense work to have an opening that actually stays open rather than blowing open wide in crisis and constricting just as tightly as before once the crisis has passed. My intellect might be wide awake but I can't help but wonder if most other things are still quite asleep and that may be for the foreseeable future. The biggest hurt with that one I suppose is I really wanted to try and help my generation shake off the materialist mandate of hopelessness, if I'm not able to break through I've essentially just got a religion. A religion of course is hardly a thing worth sharing.
On one hand I'm accepting a humbling which, to be fair, I couldn't have known was coming (you give things your best faith shot and if it happens great - if not you couldn't have known unless you tried), on the other I'm doing a little bit of token reading - picking at Bill Gray's Magic Ritual Methods. Still studying with AMORC and BOTA, just had my second temple initiation this past Sunday with the former and should be able to initiate up through 6th this year (already in that degree). Also I'm taking a short and perhaps well-earned break in BOTA between Supersensory and Tarot Interpretation. I am wondering however what my path forward might be. I'd definitely stick with the western mystery tradition and monographs, the ceremonial magic however is something I'm less sure of - ie. if it turns out that my system just isn't energetically ready for it (ie. that it would be a drain on motivational resource with no returns in sight) I might have to put it on a shelf until or unless I come to a point where I feel my body coming on line in some unusual ways and in a stable manner. I'd like to think that I'll know when I'm ready for it, and part of reading Bill's work is just to get a feel for the building blocks of what the real stuff is about (which as far as I can tell he's one of the best if not the best author I've read so far on deconstructing what the ceremonial path looks like). As of right now though I read this stuff and it still feels like the kind of thing that would glance off the contours and limits of my nervous system at present - I like it, I like reading about it, but something in my makeup more fundamental than my conscious will is rather stubborn, knotted up (or it simply feels like an animal nervous system buckling under the pressure and not gaining from it because it would have no in-road), and from what I'm experiencing having a wealth of exercises seems to just tire me out through tasking more than bring any sort of noticeable change.
Probably what my way forward will amount to is this - aside from my order work and monographs, after my One Year Manual traverse is through, I'll probably try bringing myself back to whatever exercise I think will give me the most bang for the buck and simply make that my daily exercise - ie. simply and compact. That could be daily pranayama, triple-cypher, maybe occasional middle pillar - I'm not sure, s'pose I'll see when I get there.
Anyway I figured I should say hi, and things are slow enough this week I thought it might be a good time to be a bit social and stop back in for a second. Hope that wasn't too long winded - good seeing you all again!
If anyone might wonder why my posts have decreased considerably in the last several months, possibly even a year or so, things are a bit on the chill.
I think when I first came here, and really when I first joined most places, I was really bank-rolling a lot of my motivation off of all I'd read. The dangerous thing about talking about the books you've read, especially when you've really been on a binge with that, is you can hit the ground sounding like a pro (it's really borrowed authority), people might buy into to it which could be to your advantage or detriment all depending on whether your spiritual evolution is in line with your degree of book learning.
I'm not sure where things are at right now - just that I do feel like I'm almost back to a materialism of sorts, still believe that there's a quantum aspect of life but that it's so fiercely red-taped over that, as Manly P Hall often put it, most people will never experience any sort of opening in this life even if they put in that much due diligence from womb to tomb - ie. it apparently takes many lifetimes of intense work to have an opening that actually stays open rather than blowing open wide in crisis and constricting just as tightly as before once the crisis has passed. My intellect might be wide awake but I can't help but wonder if most other things are still quite asleep and that may be for the foreseeable future. The biggest hurt with that one I suppose is I really wanted to try and help my generation shake off the materialist mandate of hopelessness, if I'm not able to break through I've essentially just got a religion. A religion of course is hardly a thing worth sharing.
On one hand I'm accepting a humbling which, to be fair, I couldn't have known was coming (you give things your best faith shot and if it happens great - if not you couldn't have known unless you tried), on the other I'm doing a little bit of token reading - picking at Bill Gray's Magic Ritual Methods. Still studying with AMORC and BOTA, just had my second temple initiation this past Sunday with the former and should be able to initiate up through 6th this year (already in that degree). Also I'm taking a short and perhaps well-earned break in BOTA between Supersensory and Tarot Interpretation. I am wondering however what my path forward might be. I'd definitely stick with the western mystery tradition and monographs, the ceremonial magic however is something I'm less sure of - ie. if it turns out that my system just isn't energetically ready for it (ie. that it would be a drain on motivational resource with no returns in sight) I might have to put it on a shelf until or unless I come to a point where I feel my body coming on line in some unusual ways and in a stable manner. I'd like to think that I'll know when I'm ready for it, and part of reading Bill's work is just to get a feel for the building blocks of what the real stuff is about (which as far as I can tell he's one of the best if not the best author I've read so far on deconstructing what the ceremonial path looks like). As of right now though I read this stuff and it still feels like the kind of thing that would glance off the contours and limits of my nervous system at present - I like it, I like reading about it, but something in my makeup more fundamental than my conscious will is rather stubborn, knotted up (or it simply feels like an animal nervous system buckling under the pressure and not gaining from it because it would have no in-road), and from what I'm experiencing having a wealth of exercises seems to just tire me out through tasking more than bring any sort of noticeable change.
Probably what my way forward will amount to is this - aside from my order work and monographs, after my One Year Manual traverse is through, I'll probably try bringing myself back to whatever exercise I think will give me the most bang for the buck and simply make that my daily exercise - ie. simply and compact. That could be daily pranayama, triple-cypher, maybe occasional middle pillar - I'm not sure, s'pose I'll see when I get there.
Anyway I figured I should say hi, and things are slow enough this week I thought it might be a good time to be a bit social and stop back in for a second. Hope that wasn't too long winded - good seeing you all again!