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If you want readers to act, instead of just read, you need to start with why you do what you do.
I’ve been thinking through the “why” of direct magick.
It started with this TED talk from Simon Sinek:
If you don’t have time to watch, here’s the summary: Most people fail to inspire action because they start with what they do (a list of products), then they how they do it (what makes their products different). That’s certainly what I’ve been doing, focusing on techniques like energy healing and the general idea of doing magick consciously.
But people who inspire action start with why. Apple’s is “Think different.” Martin Luther King’s was “When man’s laws conflict with God’s laws, man’s laws must change.” And once listeners buy into the Why, they’re motivated to act on the How and the What.
(But really, watch the video, it’s a great talk).
I’m no Steve Jobs, and I’m certainly no MLK. But it’s gotten me asking: “Why direct magick?” I’ll post my thoughts as I develop them over the next few days.
Other posts in this series:- Why Direct Magick (February 4, 2012)
- Why Direct Magick: Curiosity and Results (February 5, 2012)
- Why Direct Magick: Two Kinds of Amazing (February 6, 2012)
- What Genuinely Amazing Magick Looks Like (February 7, 2012)
- The Real Reason for Direct Magick (February 12, 2012)
I watched this a year or more ago — was great then and now. The TED talk series has some really cool speakers and topics… on just about everything. “Why magick?” — because we want to believe there is ‘something more’ out there ( and inside us) which can inspire and open our eyes to the greater mysteries of ‘it all’. How we get there is with teaching such as yours — direct manipulation.
I’m developing my own system based on emotional states. Why emotional based magick? Because emotions are the greatest propulsion system that people have. The end goal of my system is to conjure ANY emotional or mental state of being at anytime.
Some desire the kind of magick that goes out into the world and performs a task, I, on the other hand, believe that all I need to do is put myself into the right state of mind to become the kind of person that can achieve the task at hand.
Will you be conjuring those emotional states in yourself, or in other people?
@Mike
I will conjure emotional states within myself.
Here are a few posts that might help:
https://magickofthought.com/2010/09/how-to-prove-magick-to-yourself-in-90-minutes/
That’s on recognizing the energy signature of different emotions. Instead of doing it with a partner, do it with yourself, then practice building energy in that signature in yourself.
https://magickofthought.com/2010/09/how-to-calm-people-with-energy/
Somewhat advanced and quite technical, but a good explanation of how to influence emotions in others. Might give you some good ideas on influencing them in yourself.
The short story is:
-Learn to recognize energy signatures
-While in a certain emotion, build energy, and memorize the feel of its signature
-Build energy in that signature, move it to your head, and it should help you get into that emotional state
(I say “should” because the full technique is a good bit more complex than that).
Now, realize that shifting your emotions like this won’t help you cause other external magickal changes. But it can help you make good decisions, get through business meetings, and things like that, so it can be quite useful for effecting positive change in your life, which it sounds like is what you’re after.
Another bit that might help is mental posture: https://magickofthought.com/2011/02/do-magick-anywhere-instantly-with-this-easy-skill/
Instead of learning the posture for engaging mental muscles, you’d learn the posture for different emotions. I haven’t tried it, but it seems like something worth looking into.
Hope something in there helps you. Let me know how it goes.
Thanks! You have me a lot to study and work on!
“Now, realize that shifting your emotions like this won’t help you cause other external magickal changes.”
Aren’t internal magickal changes just as amazing as external?!
I like the idea of magick that changes the inner person into what they wish to be.
You make a fair point. If you’re using magick to help your mind do things it couldn’t normally do (like stay calm in a crisis), that is useful and, with enough skill, amazing in its own right. I stand corrected.