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I couldn't decide where to put this, and it may not get read here, but we'll see how we do.

I have a "student" whom I have initiated into the ways of the occult sciences.
He's a very intelligent individual, and though he may not know magick, I look up to him more than anything. He offers me a lot of assistance in many fields of technical science. He's also a decent bit older than me, yet he looks up to me as though I were some type of almighty wizard, sometimes. It's actually kind of humbling, because I've never had that kind of respect.

I've given him a decent list of books that I have personally worked through, as well as a ton of personal advice, and we've spent hours upon hours talking about all manners of things. I've also passed on my best ritual to him for him to practice.

I truly feel karmically responsible for him. A lot of my "teaching" is really just offering him guidance in his day-to-day life. I'm more like a therapist than some mystical teacher.

The list of books I've given him are as follows:
Books marked with a * were given with the knowledge that they are to be the main focus, and are most important out of the reading list.

Theory:
Kybalion - Three Initiates
Book of Ceremonial Magic - A. E. Waite

Practice:
*Fundamental Development - Shinichi / Aaron Wolfe

Mix:
*Initiation into Hermetics - Franz Bardon
*The Science of Breath - (Don't remember the author)
*A Short Course in Scrying - (Benjamin Rowe?)
The Psycopaths's Bible for the Extreme Individual - (Don't remember author. Added as supplementary material, to be read leisurely.)


He's working through the above books, starting with IIH and the theory books, at his own pace.
First of all, I'm wondering what else I should add to this list?
I know I wanted Corpus Hermeticum and The 7 Hermetic Letters added, but I haven't finished understanding those books enough to feel comfortable adding them yet.
I've read so much over the years, I'm not really sure what else is needed to gain a full understanding of the concepts to be learnt.

I've also given him copies of the text notes that will be going into my grimoire, once it's ready to be made in physical form. This includes a bunch of random recipes for various homemade kitchen and cooking things, as well as several correspondences lists (lists for Chakras, planets, zodiac, sefirah, elements, entheogens, letters, numbers, colors, and musical notes. (There is/will be at least one page for each 'thing'. ie. air, Taurus, Kether, blue, 2, each will have it's own page somewhere in the book.) )

What else should I pass on to him? What else should I try and teach him?
He hasn't shown any particular calling, and he has such an interestingly unique personality, I can't really pin down any one "path" for him to pursue. He has many options open to him. He and I will not be performing the same mission in life, that much if for sure.
I've mostly been attempting to help him learn ways he can simply be happy, and I seem to have offered a decent bit of help to him. I'm really not sure what else to offer with magick. That's the only thing I use to try and sell it to people. "I can teach you how to learn to be happy." He's the first one to take me up on the offer.



Anything you guys can offer me would be greatly appreciated. I took him on because life demanded it of me, and he was ready, willing, and in a terrible place, open to a lot of negative influence with little knowledge to protect himself. He was born with some powerful gifts. In fact, his initiation started by him telling me of the things he used to "hallucinate" when he was younger, and I told him some of my theories on the matter. He actually thought I was just making fun of him, but I was, in reality, completely serious. It only took a little while before he realized that I was speaking from experience, and become seriously intrigued. I took him on so I can become a student. (Remember that old axiom, "I thought I was teaching them, but it was they who were teaching me?" [bad Engrish is bad] It applies.)

Thank you for any posts you guys can offer.

http://www.occultforum.org/forum/viewto ... =4&t=38890

http://www.listchallenges.com/top-75-bo ... the-occult

Desecrated wrote:http://www.listchallenges.com/top-75-bo ... the-occult

I got 4 stars, 14 out of 75 books.

I've read a lot of books that aren't listed here, and most of the books that *are* here, I've chosen not to read fully, for one reason or another. Not everything in that list is entirely useful. And honestly, there could probably be a list of about 10 or less books that are all you need. I feel like I've gotten a pretty good start as it is.

The basics are universal. I don't need to explain 300 different ways to cast a spell, I just need to teach you how spells work. You can make your own method. Bardon does well enough at this for me that I don't even need to come up with any new ideas.

There is never going to be a list that is universally useful to everyone, but I think it gives a pretty broad view of magick and contains most of the classic books that we can benefit from reading.
But yes, there are a couple of books there that I don't have and a couple of ones that I might not even get, and one or two that I'm missing. But hey. It's a start.

Haelos wrote:Theory:
Kybalion - Three Initiates
Book of Ceremonial Magic - A. E. Waite

Practice:
*Fundamental Development - Shinichi / Aaron Wolfe

Mix:
*Initiation into Hermetics - Franz Bardon
*The Science of Breath - (Don't remember the author)
*A Short Course in Scrying - (Benjamin Rowe?)
The Psycopaths's Bible for the Extreme Individual - (Don't remember author. Added as supplementary material, to be read leisurely.)

Great list of books. I am not familiar with the Kybalion myself, but I constantly see it, going to read it soon.
*The Science of Breath - Yogi Ramacharaka
*A Short Course in Scrying - Benjamin Rowe - yes

Haelos wrote:What else should I pass on to him? What else should I try and teach him?
He hasn't shown any particular calling, and he has such an interestingly unique personality, I can't really pin down any one "path" for him to pursue. He has many options open to him. He and I will not be performing the same mission in life, that much if for sure.
I've mostly been attempting to help him learn ways he can simply be happy, and I seem to have offered a decent bit of help to him. I'm really not sure what else to offer with magick. That's the only thing I use to try and sell it to people. "I can teach you how to learn to be happy." He's the first one to take me up on the offer.

I would say him to concentrate on doing Shinichi's FD, meanwhile reading, at least, one book from different paradigms and see what resonates within him the most. Then go with that path.

I always find it difficult to recommend books. Because the books that I like the best, are usually books that I agree with nearly 50% of the time.
So if 50% if the most I generally agree with a book, and many far less than that... its hard to recommend books to others because recommending comes with an understood feeling of endorsement for at least a large majority of the content.

I blame books. An ideal is easy to recommend or endorse, 300 pages of ideas is not. It's like those law bills that congress passes around with tons of unrelated baggage tacked onto them, so as to pass into law some things which would not by themselves be approved.

In that sense, recommending books with hundreds of pages of ideas just feels really dogmatic to me. But I'm very allergic to dogma, so maybe that's my hangup. Then again, I have good reasons for my allergy.


I'm a sucker for online quizzes though, I've read 15 of 75 books that link. It struck me as a collection rather slanted towards western esoteric tradition. And western eso isn't my main focus at all. But that is fine, a list's author is kind of the god of their list. If I were making my own western esoteric reading list though, I'd include more from carol, frater ud, hine, crowley... but what western esoteric inclinations I do have, are pretty modern.

I believe that an idea is an idea, and that a book is the argument for or against that idea. Being that it is a discussion, there is room to question the ideas validity. If I make a blanket statement of knowledge and choose not to support it with an argument, then it is up to the reader to decide for themselves without my influence whether it is true or not. So far it would seem to me that there are very few (if any) ideas that cannot be argued against. The point is to find something that fits and to follow it along until you find that you disagree, in which case you will find something more agreeable.

I am on your side when it comes to books. I dont want to spend my days arguing against someone elses idea, id rather discover my own first, and then argue.