Physical Bases And Appearances, just asking for opnions Options

This might belong in two threads, or it may have been covered. But if it's been covered I haven't found anything on it. After looking around websites and such I was just wondering about two rarely-mentioned things concerning Servitors.

One: When you use a physical base for a creation, just WHAT do you typically use as a base? A ring? A jar? A doll? A crystal?

Two: Serivtor appearances can range from huge dragons to humanlike things to blobs of gel-ish stuff from what I've heard . What do you usually use as a 'shell'? Or do you even use one in simpler cases?

There are no right or wrong answers to them, I know. But I after reading so much on how to make thoughtforms those two things have my curiosity.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Hope this info ends up useful to some one other than just me.

This post has been edited by Dasao: Dec 24 2007, 09:43 PM

For me personally, it helps if my servitors have a physical base that reflects their purpose in some way. But, that can be as simply as a painting, a drawing, etc. If you get yourself some beezwax (fairly cheap to buy a block of it online somewhere, I got 2lbs for like $10 US) one pretty effective method I've found is to heat the wax up until it's malleable, mold something reflecting the servitor's purpose/form, and you can add oils, herbs, stones, etc., corresponding to the energies you want it to use to accomplish it's task. Also you can easily carve the name of the servitor into it's base, along with whatever else you want to add to it in terms of energies.

I have made two recently via this method and they performed excellently.

My method is particularly hermetic overall, so I have a biased point of view towards methodology for my own work, but earlier servitors in my beginning works - one which is still around after 5 years - have functioned well enough with just a sigil made for them and kept in a special place, like a box, a shelf on your altar area, etc., out of sight and mind.

Some ideas, though - jewelry for servitors intended to help you out with something on a regular basis; statuettes are sometimes pricey, sometimes not, but you can find one that looks like almost anything 'normal' - or abnormal if you look in the right places ; An army man for a martial servitor; a chess piece for 'strategic' servitors (help you get a job somewhere, help you win at games, etc.); an interesting looking dice for servitors of luck and chance. The possibilities are endless. Think of a purpose and then a physical object that reflects that purpose in some way.

Of course, a most simple physical base is a candle of the color associated with the purpose, carved with the servitor's name/sigil, which gives you an easy way to monitor its lifespan - light the candle for some amount of time when you want the servitor to be active, or keep it burning for a week with a seven day candle, etc. There are some very large candles out there, and of course you can make your own as well, with correspondences blended into it.

Maybe even simpler is a stone or gem with the appropriate correspondence.

peace

Statue of a dragon, clay figure I made myself, jar, ring, teddy bear, charm on a necklace, golden lamp (like Aladdin’s), book, and sigils for temporary ones.

Statue of dragon the familiar looks like the statue, it looks like the clay figure, for the jar it looks like red smoke with many eyes, the one in the ring is a handsome sexy warrior man that I have a picture to help me visualize him. . .

The statue, clay figures, and teddy bear looks like the familiar. In the ring I have a handsome man, the jar ones usually contain a colored smoke servitor that corresponds to their task, and many eyes. . . .etc dumb stuff like that. . . Stones are good too with the sigil written on them, or not. . .

Each servitor has a picture I’ve draw or painted, a written “story” of their personalities, task etc, a base and a sigil.

Statues are pricy, I wanted to buy a Chinese dragon, instead I broke off the dragon off a clay statue I already had. Then I painted it a decent color.

I learned the more one spends preparing and thinking of the servitor (its being blue printed in the astral) before making it the stronger it will be. . .

Hope that made sense I’m writing late at night and I’m half asleep. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/yawn.gif)

Thanks both of you this really cleared things up. As far as bases go, I had this idea that might be nice, especially for a long-term creation.
A charm bracelet, with a crystal of some sort as the 'base' and the surrounding charms could be like attributes to it, or represent them at least. A book for something to help gather information, a shield for a guardian and such.

Thanks both of you this really cleared things up. As far as bases go, I had this idea that might be nice, especially for a long-term creation.
A charm bracelet, with a crystal of some sort as the 'base' and the surrounding charms could be like attributes to it, or represent them at least. A book for something to help gather information, a shield for a guardian and such.

That sounds like an excellent idea! It is perfectly fine to make the whole bracelet the base, and add charms to it as you choose to. A servitor can be altered once it has been made, although in my opinion it helps to standardize that aspect in some sort of ritual, so that you and your servitor are both reminded, when you work, of what you are doing and why.

Good luck, let us know how it turns out!

peace

This is off topic, but kind of what I had in mind for that was a being (in the form of a character I made up, a human or humanlike being) that would act as a sort of all-purpose guardian/assistant. This would be long-term as I would go for a simpler base for a temporary one.
I have the following charms but I might need to add/remove some it's far from perfect

A wing: Grace, speed, the ability to be right there in a flash when needed
A key: access to secrets and knowledge, discovery
A heart: loyalty and love
A ring with a (plastic) crystal hanging from it: balance, protection

bit I wouldn't be doing much until after the holidays, I'm pretty busy now....my relatives are here (IMG:style_emoticons/default/uglyhammer.gif)

More on topic, does it matter so much if the base is man-made like plastic? I wouldn't think it would make a difference

More on topic, does it matter so much if the base is man-made like plastic? I wouldn't think it would make a difference

All matter is the expression of spirit, therefore all matter is suitable for magick.

So, with that in mind, whatever works for you, spiritually and psychologically, will anchor magickal intention.

Now, the other side of that is the saying - as above, so below. This is where correspondences come from. Material patterns are expressions of subtle or spiritual patterns. Every material object is an expression, therefore each material object is suitable for some kind of magick, manmade or not. But, what you have to think about is what spiritual ideal the physical object is an expression of (and when I say 'object' I mean all manifested things, including sounds, colors, smells, etc.)

The only way to know experientially - and therefore, for certain - what energies are expressed in various objects, is to see them from a higher sphere, particularly in scrying Samekh, the path between Tipareth and Yesod (which is a hermetic bias on my part, of course.) But, there are a lot of books and papers on correspondences.

Plastic, I have found, is resistant to natural energies - it's difficult to accumulate elemental or planetary energies in plastic for this reason. Whether or not you can anchor a servitor to is not the question, but rather, in doing so, what properties will you imbue in the servitor?

So what are the properties of plastic? It's malleable and diverse, for one thing - we make millions of things from plastic - which may be a plus. It is weak against fire, however, so that may be a minus, when it comes to protection elements. Plastic doesn't decay - at least not in the short term - so it represents a resilient energy (some servitors, like ideas, dreams, etc., will decay over time in the weather of the astral, after a fashion).

Also, another consideration is, does the plastic base inspire you at all? One of the plusses to using crystals, metals, etc., is that they have always fascinated us as humans, partially because of how they look, what they feel like, etc., they inspire the imagination and give us a sense of connection to something. It will be difficult to use something for magick that you do not perceive as magickal.

Of course plastic has other properties, it's something that, as a magickal material, hasn't been explored very much, but it's possible to speculate, and apply the hermetic axiom - as above, so below - to understand what potentials it has. Do some research on plastic, put some consideration into it, and then make your decision based on those conclusions and/or intuitions. And for that matter, come back and share them with us!

Peace

Wow thanks all this info is really helpful!

Well I've done some homework on the subject, and the information seems to contradict itself. I've heard people say different materials carry different properties, and I've also read that since all materials are an "expression of spirit" as you put it perfectly, the only thing that really makes a difference is how you perceive it.

Do you think of steel as being tied to the Fire element? Then it is. At least to you, at least in that one case. Sounds a little sketchy to me but in a way I guess that's was Chaos Magick is all about. I've not experienced in paradigm shifting enough to say just how far things can shift though.

Also I've done a few (albeit short-term) experiments with plastic and metal and I really noticed no difference. The little balls of energy (that looked like balls) were sent to go watch someone who was out of the house at the moment and I got decent results from both Watchers. Next I think I'll try to get a "Voodoo Friends" keychain and see what I can do with that. I'll try to do more tests and being back better reports, especially after my finals.

Also, what about physical appearances? Do more complex shapes take more energy? I've noticed I'm best at making my little balls and things like dragons or people or animals tend to die or fizzle out on me easily. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/06.gif)

And once again, research on this shows opnions vary with the person.

This post has been edited by Dasao: Feb 16 2008, 05:26 PM

Wow, there's a lot of helpful information in this thread:) I especially liked Vagrant Dreamer's technique with the molding with the herbs and stuff, I think I'm going to try that sometime.
Thoughtforms, egregores, that kind of thing, I've been very interested in for a while now. I read - I don't remember which one now - but one of those Konstantinos books, which had a really good informative chapter on servitors, but it was very ritualistic. Since then I've been trying to find out more on the basic techniques and basis for the creation of thoughtforms.
A little off topic, but it also made me think back to Ye Old Witchhunting Days when familiars were considered to be daemonic servitors? Chances are they were thoughtforms of some kind. I think there's a lot of potential here that I'd like to learn more about.

Just my four or five cents worth of ramble.