The Art that makes Life a Myth
The last two posts have been a discussion of mythology and symbol, and how we can employ them in crisis management and problem solving.
This is an excellent jumping off point for the real power house of esoteric thought and practice, ritual.
We are all familiar with rituals. Weddings, funerals, Baptisms, Proms, Christmas, Easter, Halloween and the Forth of July are all cultural rituals that we are literally so accustom to that most people might not even realize that they represent the firmament that our lives revolve around. These events are where families connect, unions are cemented, news shared, achievements celebrated, traditions established and memories created.
If advertising has taught us nothing else, it has taught us that these rituals represent an opportunity to express the ideal. The perfect dress, or costume, or dish, or song will transform an event into the living embodiment of that ideal. While this is an exploitation of the drive to create a life that reflects our inner values (and the marketing of that drive for financial gain) these impulses exist to be exploited, and we can learn some effective means of doing so.
All that advertising is accurate in so far as the trappings of ritual have the ability to promote it’s efficacy. This is because the attention to detail we put into those trappings taps into the real driving force, the thing that the trappings represent: Intention.
Intention – Framing the Mythic Narrative
The intention behind a ritual act is the story that provides context for that action. It is what transforms the idea of blowing shit up for fun into a celebration of Liberty on the Forth of July! It is perhaps more difficult to convince your friends and family that it is a good day, in the middle of the driest part of the year, to blow shit up. But present the narrative that you are doing so in commemoration of an act of rebellion against tyranny, and it is suddenly a picnic with explosions, and everyone wants to be there!
That’s fine, you say, but that is hardly magick!
Except it is. It is an action undertaken to inculcate a specific type of consciousness, under specific circumstances, during a particular time of day at a particular time of the year. There is nothing more or less magickal in the history of mankind than that, as it is the same technology at work during a Christian Communion, a Wedding, or the Invocation of the Holy Guardian Angel.
A set of actions undertaken in a specific context in order to create a specific state of awareness, that is ritual.
So, the question becomes, how can you use this to your advantage? Great question! First you need to learn to control it!
Banishing
Once you start to work with symbols, you are going to awaken certain motives or complexes within your conscious mind that have been resting in your unconscious, where they have likely been wreaking havoc. This is a perfectly natural part of the process, that is nevertheless problematic, as they can rear their heads at inopportune moments. If only there were a way to shut them off!
Enter the banishing.
Simply speaking, a banishing is a ritual that creates a space or circle in which to work. It is a barrier against outside influence. And it is the cornerstone of any beginning practice.
You can employ it in daily practice to set up a sacred space for meditation. You can employ it before a job interview to quiet your racing mind. You can learn to do it in your sleep and literally confront nightmares with it. It is a simple, powerful and effective tool.
Rather than recreate a full course of study here, I am going to recommend several books that will be useful for a beginner if this is something you would like to explore. After all, this blog is little more than an overview tinged with personal observations, not a fully fleshed out course of study.
The first would be “Magick in Theory and Practice” by Aleister Crowley. Like the names says, it is a comprehensive guide to the Art. It also contains a few intentional blinds that a careful reading of the footnotes should clarify, but it can be difficult to interpret for beginners, especially if you are working without the benefit of guidance.
With that in mind, I find The Magick of Aleister Crowley by Lon Milo DuQuette much more approachable, containing many practical instructions for doing the work on your own.
The Magick of Aleister Crowley
Lastly, because this is still a theater blog, how about we premiere a clip of the Ritual of the Pentagram from The Rite of Saturn? The video clip was edited by Bob Jones, the audio provided by Christian Ballard, while the scene features Ryan Holsather, Melissa Holm, Josh Kibbey, Daniel Christensen and Richard Cardone. The group adaptation was conceived by director Melissa Holm and developed by the ensemble.
The Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram is a standard Banishing, although this version employs Invoking Earth Pentagrams. (If you want to know what that means, maybe pick up one or both of the books I suggested.)