How Does One Become A Extremely Talented Magician?, Magicians Options

If someone wanted to become a extremely talented magician how would he go about it? Is 'talent' in the arts an aft form or can it be achieved through hard work and dedication? I believe my current magikal skill and ability is very limited as I have only done a few servitor magik rituals. I want to be very honest here and say I am extremely critical of magik and if it even exists. I have contemplated dedicating a entire life to this and gaining incredible skills but I just need to know it's real so that I know it is not a life wasted. I feel in myself I have been ignored by every entity that is out there as I have never had a run in with one and feel kind of helpless.
I have a question that goes out to the most respected on this forum in that if you were to start from the beggining where would you start to get the fastest results possible? my interests lie in evoking entities and servitor/egregore magik. Alot of my ideas in the past have been a little crazy but I really want to do this the right way and you can be sure your advice will be followed to the roots. Any tips?

Thank you and happy holidays.

If you're not sure that magick is even real, then I think you'd want to deal with that issue in and of itself before looking at how to become an extremely talented magician. To an experienced magi, what you're saying sounds a little bit like "I don't know the girl very well, but I was wondering how I should go about making a happy marriage with her?" If I were you I'd devote a lot more time to this issue before thinking about how to be a great magician. That said...

If I may make a conceit, I consider myself to better at magick than most... but I do not consider myself an "extremely talented" magician, quite the opposite actually. So anything I would say to answer this question, would be "conjecture" not the wisdom of experience. I do have a lot of experience in a magical path, but I have zero experience at being an extremely talented magician. I guess my point is that this is true for 'almost' everyone. I suspect that most of everything else shared as advice here is also conjecture. It's just a thought to bear in mind when mulling it all over, that "advice is common, and knowledge less so". That said, I don't disagree with any of the previous pieces of advice, on the contrary, I've added a couple books to my amazon.com wishlist. But do understand that any advice is 'advice' not gospel. And that any advice I would have to offer would be the advice of someone aspiring towards the goal, who has spent some lengthy time pursuing it, but has not achieved the goal yet. It is easy and straightforward to say "this is how I got to where I am", and it is easy to say "this is how I THINK one might progress past where I am", but don't let anyone say "This is how you progress past where I am" because it's all an educated guess at that point. And unfortunately, you're asking for insight which reaches beyond where many of us (perhaps 'any' of us) have already climbed. So have your grain of salt ready.

Curiosity - The nature of any such path is always exploration, unveiling knowledge, understanding, peering into that which is arcane ("hidden"). To excel in it, I would say that you must have an innate curiosity which has a 'ferocious appetite'.

Open Mindedness - You can't learn from anything you 'dismiss'. So dismiss nothing, and learn from everything.

Cynicism - This is the counterpart to open mindedness, if you really want to uncover deep understandings yet avoid the pitfalls of faulty info, then you must wield openmindedness in one hand, and cynicism in the other, and cut your way through everything there is to cut. Neither should be your preference, and everything you touch with one, you should touch with the other as well. Understand the universe of ideas as a realm of possibility and imagination and diverse perspective. Without planting yourself so firmly into a particular idea that you lose the ability to touch other ideas with openmindedness. And without being so ungrounded that you become too easily swayed.

Read - I won't say read this book or that, but do read. Read with reckless abandon.

Do - Hands on experience is worth a thousand tired lectures on methodology. Practice, do, experiment, touch, fondle, prod, make your magical experience tactile, visceral, and personal. First and foremost, LEARN BY DOING.

Astral Project - Get out of body, do it any way that you can get to work. Explore, learn, contemplate, see through different eyes. Know your reality as a many layered thing, and touch those layers first hand.

Nonhuman Resource - I don't care what sort of being it is, do your best to gain the insight of a nonhuman entity. It affords you a level of perspective, insight, and paradigm shift which is impossible if other humans are your only resource for ideas & understanding.

Logic - Understand logical flaws in thinking. For example, lack of proof is not a disproof. Lack of disproof is not a proof. These two stand out as particularly meaningful. For example, if you do magick, and it does not work, it is not a disproof of your magick. Likewise, if you do magick and it does work, it is not a proof of it. Things such as this are only evidence which offers some insight into the probability of the magick's effectiveness, they are not proof of anything. There are many other examples, a formal study of logic would be useful.

Determination - There is no quick & simple digest of everything you need to know to be an extremely talented magician. I firmly believe you will NOT find all of that in any single pre-made path, or book series, or practicing method, or religion, etc. And there will be times when you are simply at a loss as to how to progress further. Make your Will to achieve and learn as a magician into an unstoppable force. Let nothing stand in it's way. nothing. Make your approach to magick itself into your most powerful magical working, a forging of will and intent and energy and determination that knows no bounds and will not be stopped.

Relentlessness - For every obstacle to your knowledge, crash through it, circumvent it, erode it, undermine it, go over it, even seduce it into opening for you. Let no method go unused in breaking down the barriers of your path to knowledge. And where one barrier stands un-phased, assault other barriers until such time as you find a weakness to the former and return to it with new ammunition. Assault knowledge like the force of water, pour through every opening that gives way. Crash relentlessly against every barrier, find the weak spot in each, and overcome it. Nothing can stop water from returning to the sea, not even mountains of rock. In time, all obstacles fall to its rushing force. Be like that towards your magical goals.

Anti-Pride - When doing your magick, sure you are an unstoppable force, etc. But when contemplating how you're doing, focus on your shortcomings. The minute you start to think in terms of "gee I'm pretty great aren't I?" is the minute you lose your thirst and motivation and drive. When enacting Will, be great. When contemplating progress, don't let any achievement, or sense of pride, or egotism, stand between you and a continued insatiable thirst for 'more'. Do NOT be a rabbit that sleeps before the finish line. Don't be a slow turtle either. Be a rocket powered drag racing car that never sleeps and shows your uncompleted path no mercy. Be prideful, be mighty, but don't let that EVER interfere with a perfectionistic and relentless pursuit of your path. Any self critique, for the purpose of advancement or self betterment, should always reflect zero pride.

Teachers - Beware of those who fancy themselves 'gurus' or 'teachers' who seem to have said "gee i'm pretty great aren't I?", their growth is dead, and they have little of value for you. They may even seem to be drawn to the light of your persistence & determination to push onward. They are dead weight and would only slow you down. Pick their brain for anything novel, and move on. That said, do not disrespect ANY potential source of knowledge, that is the first step towards self limiting pride. And understand that not all 'teachers' are prideful... just most of them (IMG:style_emoticons/default/bigwink.gif) The reluctant teacher is often the best teacher (unless their reluctance is just a further example of their pride). Myself I poitedly avoid the role of teacher because I don't like the effect it has on me psychologically, and I loathe to think that anyone should listen to what I have to say and accept any of it blindly, or lack a perspective of their own. To find my ideas or input being accepted as dogma is a very unpleasant experience.

Multi-task - Work your understanding like a crossword puzzle, use previous answers to fill in blanks to new questions, and don't be afraid to skip around a lot. And then understand this to be a very complex crossword puzzle, which exists in 3-D (or more) when you start to consider differing paradigms and their interrelationship. Don't be afraid to have a hundred unfinished explorations at once. You're not going to be able to just complete them all sequentially. Don't waste any time, pour your efforts into whatever is giving way to you in that moment, and temporarily set aside things that aren't. Which isn't to say that you should approach things with a wishy-washy lack of confidence or determination, remember your exploration of the arcane is an 'unstoppable force'. Just maximize the fruitfulness of your time.

Know Thyself - "You" is a being which you are only very superficially aware of. The more you uncover this creature called 'self', and the more you integrate that into one harmonious holistic self-being, the more potent your magic will be. Explore yourself psychologically and spiritually. Peer into those dark corners, loose the skeletons from their closets, ask yourself the questions you dare not ask, consider every facet of self, and embrace 'the whole' instead of letting some facets of self shun others. Become one holistic substantial being, instead of just the veneer of a being you largely don't know.


or something like that...
I feel like I'm forgetting a lot of really important points actually. In fact, I am certain that I am.

This post has been edited by Kath: Oct 14 2009, 08:41 AM