QUOTE(The Sorceress @ May 2 2008, 02:56 PM)
Lately, I've been having this argument with myself. (IMG:
style_emoticons/default/confused012.gif)
When I do my rituals, there's a nagging part of me that thinks "This is silly ... this is stupid ... this is nothing more than superstition ... Yadda, yadda, yadda."
I think that we all experience that at some point or another. I have always taken it as the Ego mind trying to persuade the real Self to step back from the precipice that magic represents. The Ego likes for the world to be the way it is 'supposed' to be, and wants to keep it that way - there's security in the sense that one knows how the world works, and that there is nothing unknown about living out this incarnation. The Ego wants to have things figured out - magic represents delving into the mystery and confronting the unknown. That's a scary process for the finite Ego to go through. I think you simply have to remember to keep reason, intuition, and instinct in balance, and simply remind your Ego when these thoughts occur that this isn't something you came up with off the top of your head, and that in the end, confronting that unknown and continuing your journey is beneficial to the real you - and that the Ego is supposed to serve your ends, not the other way around.
QUOTE
The magick is real (I have seen it manifest many times.) I can't help but wonder, though, if the gods we worship are nothing more than figments of our imagination?
This has been weighing on my mind for some time. (IMG:
style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)
Being a panentheist myself, I think that there is a single source of existence, above and beyond all Gods - anything less than that source deserves respect, but not worship. Whether they are real or not then becomes an immaterial question - if they are real, then they are a source of inspiration, exaltation, and help along the journey. If they are not, they still serve as archetypes by which we focus ourselves towards developing specific parts of ourselves, and as symbolic mandalas by which we explore the possibilities within creation, both inwardly and outwardly.
From a thoughtform based approach to reality, they are most certainly real, as real as anything else, although again worshipping them is like worshipping the thought rather than the thinker.
Hope that helps. Everyone hits a point of questioning everything 'up until now'. I think those periods of reflection are important because without them we simply meander along the path haphazardly, never stopping to consider if we are walking it the best way we can. Without retrospect, we may move forward, but we may not really grow; we simply learn the same lessons over and over again.
Peace
Loss Of Faith
May 2 2008, 12:56 PM
