Wards, How come nobody ever seems to mention them here? Options

Hey guys,
I've read people talking about use of the LBRP and such for banishing, but I just found myself wondering; how come I never see people mentioning barriers/wards?

A friend of mine and I were doing some Chaos related stuff a while back; we didn't know about the LBRP at the time, but at one point I came up with a sigil to put up what I envisioned/intended as a brick wall made of blue/white light around the perimeter of my bedroom. At the time, it seemed to work fairly well. I've had nightmares and/or wandering nocturnal presences for most of my life, and that seemed to keep them out for a week or so at least.

Does anyone here recommend the use of such things in addition to more conventional stuff such as the LBRP?

Greetings Petrus!
Not that I should be giving advice after my last mental lapse but the problem you mention is a good topic for discussion.
I've a sibling that is in the Art as well and she was suffering from petty snipes from her local Wiccan group...how many queens in the hive, so to speak. She meditated and was answered in a moment of inspiration from her Goddess to place a deep azure field around her in the Astral Light. The warding worked wonders! ...But...(there's always a BUT) she noticed that her energy was starting to flag and her dreams were slowly leaving and she was having a hard time staying focused and 'alive'. She had erected a 'permanent' shield! It was slowly strangling her. A very simple exercise is to draw a white circle of energy/light around you using both hands, starting by clasping them in the front then seperating them drawing the energy in an arc until they meet in the back and then forward again until you end up with your hands clasped again in the front. Envision the light as completely surrounding you. Remember to also think of just what this shield is to do whilst you are performing this. I like to start by calming myself, finding my center and breath slowly drawing in energy through pranayama (or whatever is your chosen method) and when I feel exhilarated I draw the shield. This shield will last for about 24 hours in the Astral. It must be renewed daily if you want its influence. Make sure that your shield/ward can breathe! It must be a semi-permeable membrane...a filter against negativity and assault!
Now there are many different kinds of wards. Wiccans (and others) sometimes favor the Elemental Watchtowers. I'd use that for more ritualized work. Other people use protective amulets to great efficiency. Matter of fact I'm building one now given to me (the formula) by my Forum friend who had helped me out as illustrated in my post 'Cautionary Tale'...

So lrt's hear it fellow members! What works for you? Any techniques that you'd care to share?
Good Journey, all! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

PS to answer your question directly...YES, it's always good to have protective measures on hand!
But be wary on how they are made and used!

Well, for one thing warding is just a synonym for shielding, and you see most of the talk about that on the psionic/energy work forums and on the chaos magick forum.

I agree with pretty much everything Bym said, and would add a bit more. One reason why warding isn't permanent is because anything you do energetically works reciprocally with your lifestyle. All the wards you can manage won't do anything for you if you consciously invite attack/problems, etc. This is because everything you do and think has an effect on the local fields of energy that you are constantly interacting with. So, it's important to take this into account, and take on a mindset and lifestyle that reflects the energetic action you took. And, for that matter the energetic action you take will more than likely have an effect on your lifestyle and mindset at least for a while. If there is a conflict between your energetic action and your mindset/physical action, then one or the other is going to go a little wrong.

In one sense, we are all of us warded in some way all of the time, or at least most of the time. Most people are more 'vulnerable' if you will, when they sleep, which is why many authors have suggested doing 'dailies' like the LBRP, etc., upon waking and before sleeping - this is a time when you are more likely to have picked something up, and likely to be open to new problems.

Any kind of 'in the moment' temporary ward you are going to make is not going to tax your energy very much. It'll persist for usually about as long as you think about it, and then go away when you are sufficiently distracted. Now, working with a sigil of some sort can be a different story, although one common method among chaotes is to create a servitor whose purpose it is to do the warding/protecting, and that usually involves some system of sustanence for the servitor, to avoid that problem of draining your own energy. And, there are plenty of ways to get around the whole problem of energy in the first place, but that's another discussion I think.

If you search 'shield' in the search function above (flag all forums) you'll find about a million methods we've discussed and collected here, mine included, so I won't go into methodology too much, but suffice to say that the three key ingredients to a successful ward are basically these: Whatever visuals you use should not be arbitrary - don't use colors you read off a chart just because they are classically associated with the necessary aims, unless you agree with them (should be magic 101, but you might be surprised); what's important is that you engage your own psyche. Visuals aren't even necessary, but it sounds like that is what you're accustomed to working with - just thought it should be mentioned. Secondly is that, of course, don't use the method or visual arbitrarily - be involved with the process physically, mentally, and even spiritually. Just imagining a white light surrounding you very well lighten your aura, but it probably won't protect you very well unless the intention of protection is behind it. You have to feel protected. You would think that doing the action, with the general intention of protecting yourself, would be the intention and engagement of faculties in and of itself, but you'd generally be wrong unless you've done it so many times that the process internally is practically automatic. I would personally suggest having a small number of methods/sigils/etc., for shielding that are mutable enough to cover every purpose, even ones you didn't think of until you needed them. I say a small number, because the first few times you perform these wards, you need to completely immerse yourself in that experience for that moment, and completely single out that intention so that you can maximize it's application. After a few dozen times, the act of doing it will pull you into that state, so long as you started the practice that way. At that point, creating a ward will be nearly instantaneous, if it is a very short action. Something as simple as a mudra is a great, simple, efficient 'trigger' for a ward.

Lastly regardless of what method you use, or what your inentions are behind the ward, perhaps the most important aspect of warding is to live it as intently as you do it. There are certain caveats to this, but it's a good general rule of thumb. As I said above, your physical and energetic actions/mindset are reciprocal. Many wards and shields are easily broken not by attacking the protections energetically, but by acting on the person directly - drawing them into conflict, forcing their actions through manipulations of either them or the people around them, saying things that undermine their confidence, power, etc. These are actions with corresponding energetic actions on the psychic/astral level. If that physical plane action undermines you here and now, it undermines whatever protection you have as well. The energetic plane and the physical plane cannot be separated. It goes the same with non-physical entities - if you erect a barrier against a poltergeist, it shakes some pictures off the wall, and you become terrified, then it has undermined your protection and now you are vulnerable again.

The point of this whole rant, is to drive in the most often unmentioned or forgotten rule of magic - the effect may only be on one plane, but to make it happen requires all three planes - physical, mental, spiritual (which you could also call emotional, or inspirational, etc.). That doesn't mean it requires ritual on the physical plane, but like it or not you are using your brain to do things, and that's physical. Visualizing is physical. Intention, which is absent any true structure coherent as a 'thought' when it is done properly, is mental. The confidence, emotional change, and elation are signs and reactions caused by the engagement of the spiritual plane. Note that they are not themselves the spiritual plane, the engagement and use of which defies any kind of in depth discussion, it's usually the last little bit of mastery most people come into, and the one we never truly master completely with all it's infinite depth.

Having read over that again, i'll re-emphasize the nature of the above; in order to maintain a ward, all three planes of action are also necessary. They become more passive in the sense that doing the initial warding is 'active' - then living in accordance with that ward is the passive aspect. Most wards don't break down as soon as you stop supporting them on these planes, just like most habits don't break as soon as you stop doing them. In a sense, it's the same thing, a pattern of energy, or a pattern of energetic actions as it were, which repeat as long as they are supported, and break down over time as we initiate other patterns counteractive to those already in place.

Hopefully that all makes enough sense to be useful.

peace