What is This Thing Called Magick?

Perhaps one of the biggest draws to the Wiccan religion is its promise of magick. And who among us wouldn’t like the ability to call upon “unseen forces” to help us live our daily lives, and to brighten every aspect of our material existence: love, prosperity and career all at the command of simple ritual or incantation. Doesn’t everyone what to be happy? And wouldn’t success in all of these areas bring about complete and unrestrained ecstasy?

If this is your view of magick than I assure you, you will be sorely disappointed. Magick is not as mysterious or supernatural as one may think. Magick is mundane. We, both you and I practice it, mostly unconsciously, every single day of our lives. “What?” you say. “I don’t practice magick. I wouldn’t know where to begin.”

First we need to put the word “magick” into proper perspective. Due to much disinformation – mainly from television and movies – many have a fantasy image of what magick is. Most recently the Harry Potter book series has captivated both youths and adults with its magickal tales.

The simplest definition that I can offer is that magick is the manipulation of energy, which is created by combining two components: thought and emotion. Thought and emotion can be further simplified to one word: desire.

Magick is the act of creation, and all of us create every day. Every movement we make, every thought and decision that effects change in our environment is an act of magick for we are in a constant act of creation. The problem with our “creations” lies in the fact that most of the population does not put proper focus into their creation. And further more, tend to focus on meaningless things that create nothing of use to themselves or others. Therefore, a more precise definition of magick would be the manipulation of energy with intent – via strong personal desire – meant to create positive change in oneself and his/her environment.

Now before you get too disappointed with this simplification of the topic you should be assured that magick is a valid exercise that can bring about real and lasting change. Let’s consider a simple example – or ritual – of what I will call Mundane Magick. You tip the milk container over your cup of coffee only to realize that it was returned to the refrigerator empty. After experiencing a brief emotion of frustration or disappointment your thoughts turn to finding a pen and a piece of paper. Using this ink filled wand you proceed to record your thought on the page:

Shopping List:

Milk

You now decide to carry the ritual a bit further and add a few other items below the word “milk” that you will need while at the store. The ritual has been carried out and action has been determined to take place in the near future. Once you have gone to the store and picked up the milk and various items you will have physically created the thought and emotions from earlier in the day. You’ve made magick!

Magick comes down to our ability to use our own Personal Power, to make decisions and then to carry them out to a fruitful conclusion. “But”, some may ask. “Shouldn’t real magick just happen without any physical contribution from us?” Please forgive the reference, but I tend to agree with the Christian writer of the biblical Epistle of James:

Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works. James 2:17-18

This is a very metaphysical statement. Believing is not enough. There must be a commitment of completion behind the thought and emotion. Energy demands action. And action will brings results: sometimes positive and sometimes not.

The example above is extremely mundane, but it is the very foundation for all magick. Let’s take this a step further into an example of a ritual ceremony meant to create a desired outcome, that is, a goal. In this example let’s suppose that you are looking for a new job. You could do a ritual as mundane as picking up the local newspaper and checking job listings and making calls and scheduling appointments for interviews. Or you could canvas door-to-door looking for employment. But suppose that you would like to add a bit more energy to your search. This would be the second type of magick that I term Ritual Magick. In this case you will set time aside out of your busy schedule and write out a ritual script and perhaps a spell that you will use during the rite. No . . . you won’t go to the Internet or a book for the spell. You will write one from your own thoughts and emotions. You will build energy that is imparted from you to the tools that you will use. Perhaps you will spend some time doing research to find herbs, oils, candles, and etc. that correspond to the nature of your spell that you can use to enhance the environment that will further stimulate your desire (thoughts and emotions). You may even choose to make a talisman to carry with you. Once you have done all the preliminary work you are ready to cast your spell.

Everything is now ready. It’s time to set aside some quiet time and put a “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door. You will create sacred space by casting a Circle. The Circle is meant to act as a battery containing the energy that you will raise within it until you are ready to release it to the Universe. You perform your spell, release the energy and the spell is done. And now the spell is activated to do its work. And while it’s working, you go get the local newspaper and check the job listings and make calls and schedule appointments for interviews. Or you could canvas door-to-door looking for employment. So what’s the difference between the ritual ceremony and the mundane ritual? If your desire was actually strong enough, the ritual ceremony gave you more focus for achieving your goal. It enhanced your drive to accomplish your desire quicker. Perhaps the ritual will give us more confidence at the interviews, which will make us appear to be a more worthy candidate for the position and so forth. Magick is all around us, all the time. The same opportunities that we find after performing the spell existed before we performed it. The difference is with us. The ritual puts us deeper into an attitude of awareness. When we are properly focused on our desire the opportunities that always existed suddenly become clear to us, and we are suddenly able to act upon them.

Okay, I’m about to give you the whole secret of magick: take control of your own life by using your own Personal Power. Magick is not about getting things that you don’t work for, and is not a tool for bringing you love, prosperity or anything else for that matter. This idea is nothing more than a smoke screen reminiscent of that of the Alchemist’s quest to change lead into gold. Only the uninitiated “alchemist” spent time in such frivolous pursuits over glass beakers and open flames, toiling with hazardous metals such as mercury. How many of us are pursuing our own dangerous materialistic magick with just as much zeal without realizing the truth of Magickal practice?

What then is the practice of magick for? In one word: transformation. Magick is the process of transforming material into spirit. To the Alchemist, lead was the symbol of the Material while gold was the Spirit. In other words, magick is the ability to bring our material (thoughts and emotions) existence under control and to give our will over to the Will of God/dess. It is a pursuit for spiritual evolution. Magick does not so much affect the world around us as it affects and changes us. When genuine change has occurred within us then we are able to affect the environment around us. Without personal change, we can be nothing but ineffective. A person does not become successful by sitting around and chanting affirmations and reciting spells. However, affirmations and spells can put the individual into the right frame of mind in order to affect the necessary change.

Most of us think of magick as a way out of our own dreary predicaments: loneliness, poverty, unfulfilling careers or seemingly unproductive lives. However, our religion does not preclude us from the pain and suffering that abounds in our world. It does, however, give us the tools to control our own lives. We do not need to be a captive to our environment, but we can use our own Personal Power to rise above whatever situation that confronts us.

There is a saying often heard within the Wiccan community stating that magick should only be used as a last resort. Although I fully understand the point being conveyed here, I do not fully agree with it. As we have already seen, magick, quite naturally, must be and is done every single day as a normal part of living. What is actually meant by the statement is that a person must do everything within her/his own abilities, that is Personal Power, before resorting to so-called supernatural or additional means. It is most often the case that we already know what action must be taken to rectify our situation, but we do not do it what needs to be done out of fear of loss or failure. And, to top it off, most of our situations are of our own making and we want a quick way out of the mess that we got ourselves into. So, we hide behind ineffective magickal rituals – that can do nothing because we do not have the proper focus to begin with – and remained inactive and unchanged. We have misunderstood the true nature of magick.

If each lifetime truly is the vehicle that carries us through Spiritual lessons (a theology test, so to speak), constantly seeking “extra help” in our dilemma is tantamount to cheating on the exam. This is the same concept that we learned from the passage from the Epistle of James above, but let me rephrase it a bit: ritual without taking decisive action will result in nothing. True magick comes from within and not from without.

There is a third category of magick that I call Group Ritual. This is perhaps the most powerful type of magick that can be performed, especially when the group practicing is in complete harmony. There is nothing stronger than the group mind. It is a powerful force that has brought about radical changes in our world throughout the ages. Whereas, what I’ve termed, Ritual Magick is on a personal scale (microcosm) and meant to affect personal change in the practitioner, Group Ritual is meant to affect on a much larger scale (macrocosm). It works in the same fashion as Ritual Magick, but with faster and stronger results. Perhaps a ritual will be done for the benefit of one of the members of the group, but this time the combined energies of the group imparts much more energy into the working. Harmony among participates is essential. If I may offer yet another mundane example, as a performance magician I know very clearly the benefit of an audience that is harmonious and responsive, and one that is not. And I assure you that working for an unresponsive audience – one that offers no energy in return – is an extremely daunting task. When a group is focusing on a single issue, the energy created has a much more likely chance of having an affect.

There is yet one more aspect of magickal working to address, and that is the truly miraculous outcome, for example, the healing of a person with cancer or some other life threatening disease. Normally, in these types of cases, the ritual magick becomes one of prayer and the lighting of candles. In my opinion, prayer and the magick that we have discussed so far are of a different nature, for this is an instance when we must call upon something higher than our own abilities, even if it is nothing more than our own Higher Self, which is that aspect of our being that is pure, eternal Spirit. Although, I strongly believe that if an individual has the proper focus, healing can also be achieved via Personal Power. The inherent problem is that when the body is racked with disease and pain it is a sign that the Chakras have been shut down or are not open to the proper levels, and the individual is most likely unable to access those reserves of power necessary for healing oneself. The prayers, giving of energy, lighting of candles offered by others act as the power source of focus that are keys to promoting positive, renewing energy in the stricken. The laying on of hands is an extremely powerful method for passing energy from the healthy to the sick. Magick on this level enters the realm of the miraculous.

Rev. Magus
FirstDegree Priest, Correllian Tradition USA
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