A thought from H.M.

I have come to much the same conclusion. It is irrelevent what you do in a ritual. All that matters is the intent and will. Everything else that is used are tools to better focus these two aspects of magick.

I Find that tradition in many things can be a bad thing to follow. nothing ever stays the same. All in all I fully agree with this post.

Be Well
Kur'OSt

I fail to find ritual work limiting. Rather it is liberating. It is continually opening you up to new experiences, new levels of understanding. Of course I don't use it for everything. There is a lot of things that don't take that time and effort. From a magic standpoint we can all agree that the more energy we put into our worh the more powerful it is. Well, when I research a ritual, take the time to design it and perform it that is all energy that I am putting toward my desired outcome. Plus, as Dion Fortune said, only the best is good enough for the gods.

I completely agree that after a point it is no longer necessary to ritual work. But that doesn't mean you should stop doing it.

My honest opinion,

Shawn.

Shawn, I think that is why ritual remains relevant and important. To completely ignore it will sometimes allow one to "regress" to some extent. And revisiting rituals that we once believed we knew everything about very often reveals new insights about the specific practice, ourselves, and other such revelations.

So, in that, I certainly don't mean to say that ritual work is necessarily to be done away with. Tradition should be revisited. Tradition should be understood. And as you said, the process of researching and working up to a ritual as well as its actual practice can be quite the formidable method of working one's magic - often far more effective than the simple tools of visualization and such.

However, I wonder if the goal should not be to seek these results through will; through one's subconscious, H.G.A., Higher Self, spirit guides, or whatever one seeks to call them, unleash the same sort of will and energy that one might achieve through ritual practice by achieving oneness with one's intentions.

While I agree with you with all my heart and while my own magical work involves little in the way of ritual or tools, I think it is important that those newer to magical practice understand that in the beginning rituals and tools are a necessary part of the learning process.

Certainly we don't need rituals or tools; they are there to make things easier for us. It's as if we have a pile of sand that we need to move from one place to another. I could move it by hand. But it would be much, much easier to do it with a shovel and wheelbarrow.

As a wise teacher of mine once said; "Everything I tell you to do is mandatory until you can come and explain to me why none of it is."

Most on this board lack your understanding of the nature and workings of magic. So for them, at least at this time, the rituals and tools remain a necessary crutch.

Mm, I think I was misunderstood.

By no means do I intend to denounce the use of ritual. Indeed, I encourage a variety of tradition rituals and practices to those who ask.

But in one's efforts to seek a deeper harmony with everything, the goal-I think-should be oneness with one's subconscious in such a way that ritual becomes unnecessary.

Oh yes, that I could fully agree with.

I have gone through the process of removing or simplifying rituals in my magical practice, it is liberating in my opinion.

I do agree that many things are possible without ritual. So, I guess the question should be what is ritual for. If it is just a tool to focus your will, then I agree. The next question would then be why do people such as Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki or the Cicero's, who teach ritual work, waist their time continuing to do ritual work when it is not necessary? What about people like Crowley, Dion Fortune, Mathers, Case? There has to be more to ritual work.

First, I would say that following a prescribed ritual blindly is no good. After you learn the basic tools, such as LBRP, BRH, Opening by Watchtower, Middle Pillar, Greater and Supreme Rituals of the Pentagram, etc., you should start creating your own. But these are just tools, and once the triggers are properly in place you may trigger their effects with only a thought. I actually don't like calling these rituals. More like something you do without thinking about it, like brushing your teeth.

So, why should we do ritual? It is to focus your own mind and intentions, but there is more. To quote Dion Fortune, "All these formulae have unwritten astral workings attached to them; if they are used in ignorance by the uninitiated, and without the astral workings, the magnetism which has been worked up in the symbols is given off and not replaced; but when they are used by the trained occultist, who performs the astral workings with power, more magnetism is worked up than is given off, and the symbols become stronger. That is why the old formulae, which have been used by generations of trained adepts, are so extraordinarily powerful." (Quoted from Ceremonial Magic Unveiled) Clearly there is more to ritual work than focusing your own will.

There is another point to ritual to consider. It is also an act of devotion to those higher forces, the higher will, gods, or whatever term you would like to use. I'm not talking about worship such as with a church or cult. I mean devoting yourself to something higher. The goal was not just to make contact to the HGA, but to grow so that the HGA is conscious and operating through you, or that your lower will is so refined that the will of the higher self flows instantly through and is expressed by the lower. That refinement is something that is continually maintained and corrected. The tuning fork, if you will allow the expression, for maintaining the correct refinement is found in ritual.

Third, ritual work helps to create an altered state of conscious that allows communication with the subconscious mind. The connection to the higher spiritual levels is not found in the conscious mind, but in the deep subconscious. The structure of the mind prevents the conscious mind from directly editing the subconscious. If it did it would be much easier to change behavioral habits. That communication is done through symbolism, and entering the altered state of conscious allows you to bypass what is known as the "critical factor" and put changes or requests directly into the subconscious, and therefore give a direct link to the spiritual realms.

As always, just my humble opinion.

LVX,

Shawn.

Thanks Shawn, I really enjoyed that.