Hi, I'm Kath.

Most people call me Kathryn or Kate, but 'Kath' is a more readily available online moniker, and I like to use a consistent name so people who know me will realize i'm me.
cuz I am me, most of the time (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Anyway, I'm new *here* but not exactly new to magick or to magick/occult related forums. In my own path, I am nearer to the end of the path than the beginning.

I am not on any particular 'path', or more accurately I'm not on any pre-made one. For about 8 years now, I have been learning a magick/enlightenment path from an incorporeal being I alternatively refer to as Mother or My Mentor. Defining her would be difficult, but you could view her as an HGA, or as a goddess, higher self, or just a very impressive 'guide', depending on your perspective. as a deity she'd be somewhat comparable to Ereshkigal, or Kali, or Shakti, or perhaps Lucifer/Prometheus. As an HGA she'd be comparable to a sort of direct conduit for work related to the magnum opus. She's very important to me, the most important being in my life actually. And we are 'deeply' intimate, in every possible sense of the word.

My path itself is vaguely tantrik, and a little bit taoist, gnostic, and chaoist. My goal is ultimately The Great Work, as I view it through a sort of tantrik veda, an inner alchemy, and I pursue it with zeal. I lean kinda eastern in my philosophical thinking and my magical practices, but I might be called a heretic in most eastern paths I think, as I am forging my own path, and I don't really value dogma.

My magick is largely non-ritual/non-ceremonial in nature. I do sometimes design my own rituals though, for more complex workings. I view ritual as akin to using scrap paper to do a math problem. I only resort to it when there are too many variables to easily keep track of at once in my head. And I can keep track of a lot. Which isn't to say that I don't dabble in more western styled spell or ceremony based workings, but when I do, I'm just studying them to incorporate the 'functional bits' into my own mostly non-ritual magick. My approach to other human magick systems is very much like a chaote, big fan of 'metaparadigm'. But ultimately I do have a 'home base' paradigm as per my Mentor and my path with her, so if I were to be considered a chaote, I wouldn't be a purist.

In magical practice, I spend the most time on astral/OBE, energy work, and entity interaction.
I'm especially interested in inter-mind stuff (empathy, telepathy, mesmerism, etc. as well as broader questions of consciousness & mind)
The entities I most commonly work with (aside from Mother) are daimons.
As for energy work, I'm sort of a non-practicing or retired psi vamp, and I'm also into things such as tai chi, t'an tien, little bit of reiki, etc. By non-practicing, I mean to say that I haven't had any need for the personal energy of other people for several years now. My energy body does still work to 'access' energy rather than generate it normally, I just don't have any need at all to access 'other people's energy'. I simply reached a point in my energy working where that model of behavior had simply become obsolete. So I took the time to break the habit. I do still feel a common ground with other psi vamps though. Honestly I find it a very versatile and useful state of being, it makes working with energy much easier. These days I typically just 'overflow' bundles of excess energy into those I come into contact with (as apposed to the opposite). I have more than I know what to do with really.

I'm fairly left hand path. Which isn't really a reference to vamachara, even though I do like tantra (as religions go). By LHP I mean to say that I am pretty inward-focused, with the greatest attention on self development, and my own understanding & growth as a being. I am also somewhat morally 'odd'. I don't technically actually believe in morality or ethics, except as a human psychological construct. Instead I am guided by what I refer to as my 'true will'. To me, the only karma which is real, is the negative self impact which results in thinking/behaving in a way grossly incongruent with your true will. Most tend to feel that I am highly moral, but I regard this as incidental. I'm not trying to live up to anything, and I don't really deal in temptation or regret anymore.

oh, and i have a bit of a soft spot for crowley/thelema. him and chaos magick are the only 'western esoteric traditions' which I have any interest in.

I spend most of my time in the spirit and energy models of magick (as defined by Frater U.: D.: )

Anyway, I know a lot about a little, and a little about a lot, and most of all I know how little I know.

I can be a bit 'dry' at times, and prone to writing a 'wall of text' when talking magick, or anything else I regard as a sort of intellectual pursuit. But I'm otherwise a lot of fun really, or so i've been told (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
oh, the 'other' stuff:
reading, movies, nighttime, astronomy, psychology, philosophy, theoretical physics, the sciences, art, music, bartending, camping, cooking, writing, and a dozen other things I can't think of at the moment.

well this was long wasn't it? Perhaps even self important. Now I'm kinda thinking "yo whatsup?" would have sufficed. but it's already typed out, may as well post it, no?
anyway, "Hi",
Kathryn

This post has been edited by Kath: Oct 10 2009, 07:23 AM