Chaos and Order

Building Blocks of Self

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  Interesting perspective.

  
   
  
   
  
   
  
  (%)     :P     ***

DEMIURGE

• The (golden) fish sign causes you to remember. Remember what?...Your celestial origins; this has to do with the DNA because the memory is located in the DNA...You remember your real nature...The Gnostic Gnosis: You are here in this world in a thrown condition, but are not of this world. -Philip K. Dick
  
  I dont like defining myself but closest to my magic is chaos and gnosticism. I like the idea that god(mythic god Demiurge) is evil because he created the world full of fear and suffering. I dont like the law of jungle and killing for food and fun. I believe humans have the power to be above nature and create a new world without suffering. Maybe Im just living in a fantasy world.

The Majikians Tarot.

• I just came across this website while I was checking out tarot cards.
  I asked Todd if it would be ok to post a link, as there looks to be some pretty interesting stuff on here.

  
  

  

  
  

  http://www.toddpendu.com/majikianstarot/

DMT The Spirit Molecule

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  I want to read the book so when I discovered this documentary I decided to watch it. It's very interesting. The subject is an exploration of the connection between DMT, the religious experience and mystical mind states. Similarly to the book this film ventures into alien abductions and other kinds of spirit contact. It makes me what to read the book even more!

Camping weekend in Fort Augustus

• We planned to start our camping weekend on Friday evening but we resigned because of a very heavy rain. Instead we stayed at home and watched Wild At Heart by David Lynch, followed by Witches of Eastwick. We took a bus to Fort Augustus early in the morning. The weather was nice and the top of the hills were covered in snow. After arriving we set up our tent and as soon as we finished it began raining. We had a stroll to Fort Augustus where we stopped for a lovely lunch. The little café by River Oich was serving delicious carrot and coriander soup. After the meal it was still raining so we stocked up on playing cards, fleece blankets, book of Scottish Myths and Legends and we snug up in our tent for the rest of the afternoon.
  
  In the evening we arranged an Open Circle meeting in Poachers pub. A jolly group of bikers was playing heavy metal and rock songs from the jukebox as three of us enjoyed a few pints and a friendly chat in the beer garden. It was a very nice evening. We talked a little about everything ranging from spirituality, magick, occult and religious institutions to music and answer machine messages.
  
  Sunday morning welcomed us with a wonderful dawn chorus and dry, windy weather. After breakfast we set out for a walk towards Corrieyairack Pass. It was hot enough to walk in a t-shirt and the air was filled with the smell of wild garlic growing everywhere on the side of the road. Sheep and Lambs were coming towards us and bleated loudly as we walked passed their pastures.
  

  

  
  We stopped on Ardachy Bridge to take few photos when we noticed an unusual sight. A small group of bats flying in midday over the river Tarff (The sighting has been added to The Big Bat Map). Soon after crossing the bridge we were stopped by an old man who recommended we go and see Culachy waterfall. The walk lead us along a narrow woodland path on the steep sides of River Tarff. We caught glimpses of the swirling and foaming waters of the river down below. Hunting birds circled in the sky and deer grazed on the pastures to our left.
  

  

  
  We arrived to the falls and decided to stop there for a cup of tea and a nibble. We both went down to the falls to refresh ourselves in its cold spray. Afterwards we continued along the glen for a while before returning the same way. We walked to Fort Augustus through lovely Kilchuimen Cemetery. On our way it began to rain. We came back to our tent and had a stir fry and noodles for dinner. Our second afternoon and evening was very similar to the first one. We read 'The Battle of Birds' and 'In the Kingdom of Seals', among a few other stories from the book. In the evening we met again in Open Circle for a couple of beers, this time in private.
  

  

  
  In the morning after breakfast we had a nice short walk to Borlum Bay. We watched sand martins and swifts flying above the calm waters of Loch Ness and dark, heavy clouds sweeping along the Great Glen. After this we packed our tent and returned to Inverness on a late morning bus. It was a very atmospheric and nice weekend spent in a good company. I also managed to make quite a few recordings for my Glen Faramach project. I will share them in here once they are available online.
  

  

altar

• I decided to make an altar after I saw illustration of "the octavo" wizard at the table with his instruments. I didnt know then it was called the altar. I just got a coffee table and placed on it my favorite mystical items. They are not fancy as the octavo ones are but they keep me mystified. I use the table to cast spells, write and draw. I "cast spells" if you want to call it that, only for the fun of it, not to get things in the real world. These spells are just mantras and sigils and I probably look funny sitting on the floor and chanting nonsense by the coffee table. This is just my altar magic, most of the time I just meditate.
  I never met someone interested in magic so I practice all alone. I would like to try group rituals. I think it would be weird doing it with strangers or people you barely know.

the octavo

• Are you more a fan of poetic writers like Kenneth Grant or science freaks like Peter Carroll? For me it depends on the mood. Sometimes Im inspired by fantasy and sometimes by science. Too bad I dont understand physics well enough to really read new Carroll. It would be cool if someone wrote something about "the octavo", or how to use the eight octavo spells in pure magic.

Chemical Serpents: Gold first edition now available.

• The waiting is over!

  
  

  

  
  Chemical Serpents Gold First Edition is now available.
  
  This full-colour hard-back collectors edition is something of a visual treat.  As Anton Channing follows the trail of the serpent through the world's religious, mystical and religious history and traditions, Janice Duke's stunning artwork illustrates the text throughout.
  
  The full colour interior of the Gold Edition boasts a 'solar' or warm colour scheme of red and gold throughout 116 full colour large format pages.  The large 20cm by 27cm pages give the art room to display its full glory.

Exmoor Beast

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  A short horror film made in 2009 around Lynton, Lynmouth, Minehead and in between. It was a strange experience and a great adventure. It is also the first film that Anton and I made together. It was filmed around Beltane and it seems appropriate to release it for Walpurgisnacht. The first scene includes the genuine Minehead Hobby Horse.

Glen Nevis and Penfro albums

• I just published my second album Penfro. This follows Glen Nevis. These albums are a part of  a bigger project that spans across 4 albums, 4 seasons and 4 different places. Just as Glen Nevis captures the spring so Penfro captures the summer, although in both those albums place is just as important as the time.
  
  Each recording was a deep meditation on the spirit of the place, its energy and quality. Editing helps to bring this quality to life by combining mono tracks into a stereo and adjusting the low and high frequencies to create a more realistic experience.
  
  The microphone picks up sound differently to our ear. The recorder doesn't have the amazing capacity of our brain to censor some sounds and amplify others. My editing does just this, it recreates the feeling of being in the place as I experienced it at the time. I do not censor the reality of these recordings and I intentionally leave the sounds of human activity in them. This reflects my attitude to humanity as an integral part of our environment and of nature.
  
  Enjoy listening to my records and feel free to use them in your magick and art. (They are all on CC Attribution 3.0 License).

The Superior Human?

• This 70 minutes long documentary explores the idea of humans as superior species to demonstrate the bias of such argument. It's humorous and light hearted although exploring some dark aspects of cruelty to animals. Some facts presented in it are surprising to me. For example that scientific establishment/world didn't acknowledge animal pain because of lack of evidence that animals have consciousness. The film also mentions inadequacy of our methods of measuring consciousness and intelligence in animals. This is something that I was thinking since a while.
  
  This film doesn't directly link to magic and other subject we may be discussing here on KIA but I think it is a nice contribution to a broader sense of connectedness and consciousness. It also reveals how our culture terribly limits our understanding of the world. This in itself relates to our understanding of magic and other phenomena that are difficult to prove by hard science. What this film makes me think of is that in future we will be equally revisiting our approaches to understanding of ourselves.
  
  I do realize that the documentary presents the arguments in a very simplistic manner. For example the shots of an elephant painting with its trunk gave me mixed feelings... I researched it and indeed the elephants are horribly mistreated before they learn to paint. (http://www.thelastelephants.com/   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0z5nUNYW7OI ) On the other hand I wonder how much time it would take for a human to learn some of the skills that animals have and if we would be willing to do so in other circumstance than under torture...  The situations like the one with elephants come from the fact that we do consider ourselves superior to them and have no remorse for inflicting pain on them.
  
  

music and magic

• Music today, especially metal, is full of magical lyrics. Is it because wizards are more talented than normal people, or their spells make them great and famous? For me magic is something spiritual and I find it hard to believe in magic that directly changes reality. Is there any evidence of it? Any experiments?
  
  http://youtu.be/2xfQqSY7gfw

Order? Membership?

• I've been thinking about some of the wording I used to describe KIA lately. The main wiki page said we were 'A decentralised order of sorcery'.  And other parts of the site talk about 'membership'.  Well, I don't think KIA has ever been an 'order', and their is no organisation which one might be a 'member' of so what is all this talk of 'order' and 'membership'?
  
  I've updated the main wiki page now to describe KIA as 'a decentralised network of sorcerers'.  It may not be the best phrase, but its better than 'order'.  I'm also thinking that the wording of 'membership' on other parts of the site may be replaced with the term 'participation'.  KIA doesn't seek 'members' but 'participants'.  We don't 'belong' to an egregore as its 'members'.  We participate in the egregore, as participants.  We each choose a level of participation with which we feel personally comfortable.  The word order gives the impression of an organisation.  The only order in KIA emerges from our collective participation.
  
  Having an account on this website does not really guarantee participation.  Indeed there are over 400 accounts on the website but only a small proportion actively participate in the egregore to my knowledge.  And some sorcerers that do participate, don't have accounts.
  
  So enough with the old aeon language! I think it gives totally the wrong impression... ;)~

Earth day forest stroll

• Our second strolling moot, again in Craig Phadrig forest, saw the same three of us participating as for the first strolling moot at the Spring Equinox.  This time we met for Earth day.  As we strolled through the forest, our discussion covered such subjects as a particularly lovely beech tree, contact with ghosts and ancestors, premonitions of death, strange dreams.
  
  
  
  This time instead of going up to the top to the Pictish hill fort, we circled round to the grass clearing above Balnafettack Crescent that offers a superb view of Inverness.  As we arrived there a rainbow appeared to rise from the faery hill of Tomnahurich.  We decided that Tomnahurich Hill might be a good location for a future strolling moot.

Scottish PF Conference 2013 - My account

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  Just got back from Edinburgh which we visited for the Scottish PF Conference 2013.  We were a bit slow getting up in the morning so we missed the talk by Rufus Harrington by the time we arrived, and we just about had time to sign in, get a programme of events and choose which of the next talks we wanted to attend.
  
  We decided to support Fiona Tinker, partly because she is fairly local, we met her at the Moray Moot the one time we managed to get to Elgin for it, and partly because the subject matter, "Seumus O'Sullivan: Bard to the Gods", sounded most inspirational.
  
  We knew nothing of Seumus or his poetry before the talk and so learned a great deal.  We learned that he was an Irish poet on the Dublin scene and contemporary and acquaintance of Yeats, with whom he did not always seem to get on.
  
  But perhaps most importantly, we got to hear some of Seumus' excellent poems and through them of Angus Og. A major deity of Scotland and Ireland, whose presence we have oft times felt in the forest's around Inverness and Loch Ness.  It was nice to learn his local name.  Inspired by the talk we also picked up Fiona's book, 'Pathworking through Poetry', which we look forward to reading soon.
  
  
  
  After a break for lunch we decided to attend the talk "Kali Ma and the Uttar Kaula Sects in India" by Avi Lago. He proved a vibrant and entertaining speaker and no less informative for that.  He explored his subject of the goddess Kali, both in India and her influence on European paganism and magick, with humour and respect for the subjects.
  
  The cross cultural nature of his talk reminded me of that of my own talks on serpents, and of my soon to be released second book 'Chemical Serpents'.
  
  Finally we opted for our third and final talk 'Art as a Journey' by Dronma. She shared with us her personal magical life journey through a slide show of her artwork. Each slide came with interesting life stories connecting to her magical, spiritual and psychic development through Buddhism and Celtic Paganism.
  
  We won nothing at the raffle, and decided to get our evening meal at the bar before the rush by ordering whilst everyone was doing the conference ritual.  We felt quite tired by the time the evening music was starting so decided to leave early.   All in all a good time and we look forward to attending more such events in the future.
  
   

Introduction to Octarine Magic

• The word 'Octarine' comes to us from Terry Pratchett's very first Diskworld novel, 'The colour of magic' published in 1983. Pratchett describes an eighth colour of the spectrum, invisible to all with the exception of magicians, witches, children and cats.  The idea that there exist realms and beings visible only to the psychically aware was not new of course, nor even that such things exist on a different part of the light spectrum to that humanly visible.  For example, back in 1970, in 'Operation Trojan Horse', the author John Keel describes his theory that ultraterrestrial beings become visible to us by entering and leaving the visible light spectrum as they pass through our dimension, appearing as ghosts, faeries, angels, aliens and UFOs.
  
  Pratchett was clever enough to give this magical portion of the light spectrum a name. This doesn't mean it actually exists as a scientifically measurable wavelength on the light spectrum of course, but this doesn't stop it from being a magically useful idea. The first magician to publish the idea of using the word in actual magic, to my knowledge, was Peter J Carroll in Liber Kaos, 1992 and as a result its popularity flourished in chaos magic circles.
  
  In the section on Octarine magic, Carroll describes the colours he sees in his most important visions, working with god-forms that closely correspond to the magician-self  for magical inspiration and illumination.  He also describes 'pure magic' as opposed to 'applied magic'.  By which he means development of magical philosophy, theory, symbol systems and languages as opposed to results magic of various kinds.  He also explains the 'self' that corresponds to the Octarine power, the magician-self, is the self that sees how the other selves relate to each other to form a single organism.  He also hints at the significance of the serpent power to octarine in a couple of places.  This is all good information to get the magician started on working with this power.
  
  In 'Kaos Hieroglyphica', 2003, I was perhaps over dismissive in my assessment of Carroll's chapter probably as I was to some extent imitating his own aloof writing style and mirroring it back to him.  I expanded Octarine magic in this book to include Auric magic, banishing rituals, initiation rituals and a correspondence to Timothy Leary's 'circuit VIII'.  All useful areas of exploration for Octarine magic.
  
   
  
   

Adventure Time!

Occupy the astral!!!

• An colourful fellow proposing an interesting project.
  
  
  
  Have you seen his videos? I just ran across them and they caught my attention.

Include a picture in your comment

• So you've seen others on the site include images in their comments and forum posts and would like to do the same, but how?  Follow these simple steps and you too can share images in the kiamagic.com discussions.
  

  Upload an Image

  
  The first thing you need to do is upload an image somewhere.  You can use a third party image hosting service if you wish, but you can also upload it right here on kiamagic.com.  We'll explore this latter approach in this tutorial.  It has many advantages.
  
  1. Click on the 'dashboard' link.
  
  2. Hover over 'Media' and click 'Add New'.
  
  
  
  3. Select the file from your computer and click the 'Upload' button.
  

  Get the File URL

  
  4. Once uploaded, you should see a list of files.  Your image should be at or near the top.  If you hover your mouse cursor near it, you should see an 'Edit' link.  Click it.
  
  
  
  5. On the edit page you should see a 'Save' widget.  This has the 'File URL' you need to include the image in your post.  Highlight the url and right click then select 'Copy'.
  
  
  

  Use bbcode to embed image in comment or post.

  
  6. Paste the file URL into your comment.
  

  

  
   
  
  7. Add the img tags on each side of the URL.  It should look like [img]Your File URL[/img]
  

  

  
  8. Submit your comment as normal.
  

  Admire the glorious image in your post

  
  9. Profit.
  
  
  
   

Getting started on kiamagic.com

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  The first thing you need to do is get yourself an account!  If you have one already, make sure you log in to see this article properly.
  
  If you don't have one yet, you'll need an invite code. I suggest 'Hail Eris'. Then you need to go to the registration page and enter it.  The rest of the sign up process should be self explanatory.
  
  Once you have an account, this article will look different...

Key to the City

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  If you want to know the secret of city magic, it's quite simple, I'll tell you...
  
  Go for a walk. The city is a reflection of ourselves. The front streets, those named and numbered streets, they are our conscious and public selves. The back alleys, the nameless streets, they are our deeper and hidden selves. There you will see garbage, graffiti  gardens, and compost heaps. Growth, decay, and the discarded and ignored.
  
  Go for a walk. Circle. See the front beautiful and perfect, then the back a messy ruin. See a busy growing glorious disaster of a back yard, then go around and see its boring facade. When you become comfortable with both sides of the city, you begin to see both sides of its people, you'll have more access to both sides of yourself.
  
  Keep walking, the city itself will teach you magic.

Spring Equinox forest stroll.

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  We just had our first forest stroll in Craig Phadrig woods. There was three of us, a good number for a witch meeting. We met at the upper car park off Leachkin Brae at 17:30 and walked through the path passed huge resin yielding spruce. We stopped there for a moment to say hello to the giant and collect some nice thick lumps to burn as incense. We continued on the path going  around the hill and then to the hill fort at the top. We had a nice chat about spell casting, eating pine bark and a few other subjects. We said hello to many tree stump or tree root trolls on our way through the woods.
  
   
  

  

  
  At the top we raised a sacramental horn of Norfolk Punch and shared some freshly baked pine bread (it didn't include any pine flour but had some pine nuts and oil in it as well as pine and spruce ale) whilst worshipping a beautiful sunset sky and views to the snowy  peaks around. A lovely way to mark the equinox and celebrate the beginning of the spring.