Accidental Sorcery?, Casting spells without trying? Options

Hi,

I'm not sure if I posted this in the right section; the way I learned, sorcery was defined as magick done only in the mind. So if I did post this in the wrong section, would a mod please move it to the right section?


Tonight, as I was outside watering my plants, I was looking at the lights from the elementary school that's across from my back yard. As I stood there looking at the lights I thought to myself how I really disliked the lights (they are very bright street light type lights that are always on).

I started to think, wouldn't it be great if I could just get rid of the lights with no effort? So, just playing around, I picked out a light and imagined that I had a sharp metal spearhead in my hand. I imagined myself raising my hand to my mouth and blowing, as if I were blowing a kiss. In my mind the spearhead zoomed through the air and in 1 to 2 seconds traveled the 100 to 200 yards to the light and made contact, destroying it. Almost instantly that exact light went out. I don't know if it turned off or burned out, but it went out and didn't come back on.

It reminded me of something else that happened earlier this year where I was at a funeral and thought to myself, "wouldn't it be strange if the deceased's spirit started playing with that lamp; making it turn on and off?" And that's what happened; the lamp shut off immediately and flickered on and off throughout the whole service.

In both these incidents I didn't intend to cause any change, I was just playing in my mind. 'What if' scenarios, but they happened anyway, instantly.

I've been practicing magick for well over a decade, but I've never had this happen, that I know of. I may have but just wrote it off as coincidence. And instant results to boot.

My question is, is it possible I was preforming magick without any intention of doing so? And if so, why the instant results? I understand these could very well be coincidences, but that's really far out there if they are.

Do any of you have any experience with this happening to you or anyone else? Do any of you have any stories like this where you might have caused change but you weren't even trying?

I welcome your thoughts and stories.

Do any of you have any experience with this happening to you or anyone else? Do any of you have any stories like this where you might have caused change but you weren't even trying?

yep (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

frequently. I think, that one of the neat realizations I made in the occult was that we're basically always doing magick, whether we intend to or not. We're constantly influencing the reality around us with our thoughts, energy, etc.

I don't think it's always so blatantly obvious as your light experience, but sometimes it is. When i was young, once my father had basically infuriated me. I forget what it was about (guess it wasn't too important eh?) but I was absolutely livid. So he had gone outside to play catch with my little brother, and i was in the bathroom looking in the mirror and fuming. And in my mind I mentally reared back and hit my father as hard as i could. It was just a fantasy, a sort of way to burn off steam, i wouldn't *really* hit him like that. But the fantasy was very vivid and felt 'potent' anyway, at almost the exact moment I hit him in my mind, I heard a yell from the back yard. shortly thereafter my father and little brother came inside. He had been hit in the face by the baseball, shattered his glasses and gave him a beauty of a black eye. He told my brother that he had a wicked curve ball, to which my brother pleaded innocence.

Obviously these things happen naturally. Just as lights go out. But when the timing is so precise, and it just feels like you 'did' it... well it's hard to not think that there's more than 'chance' involved. From a probability & statistics standpoint, events like this are a one in a billion shot. To think that there's more to it than chance is not just superstition or paranoia IMO.

This is why it try not to think to much or hard unless I am trying for some result. When you think about something even just what if games you gather energy with your thoughts, and when after some time of thought, you happen to visualize a release -poking the light for example- the gathered energy follows the path we unintentional gave it.

Granted Taoists shouldn't do a lot of hard thinking anyway (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif), but when you give something a release, power -however you define it- is sent on that path. Emotions are often a sign or symptom of want, and once you have a want your Will often follows. To be sure lights that are always on will go out, and baseballs tossed about will go awry, but because they are more likely to happen when tossed or left on, they are also more easy influenced by magick. To my mind it does not need very much energy to make something that is likely to go wrong, do so.

I used to do odd things like this all the time. My workings are strongest with groups of people rather than objects, so that is how many coincidenceses manifested in my youth. When playing cads with people who where decent at the game, they would miss an obvious combination or try some play that was not likely to win. Much like Iamnoone there was no Will for that to happen, only a want to win.

This post has been edited by fatherjhon: Jul 15 2010, 11:16 AM

oh yeah - and it is not without intention - you did intend to cause change, 'just messing around' or not

Thanks for all the replies. Now that I see this happens more than I thought, I'm gonna have to start watching what I think and visualize. Please post more experiences if you have them; I find this fascinating.

I come from the point of view that individuals are merely catalysts of the grand sort, and in all honesty, we just happen to be atop a gathered amount of energy when it sets off and goes in a direction that we happen to find convenient. Such that an apple falls from a tree into our hands, and our hand happens to occur at that place and time, and if it were not our hand, it would be another.

This occurs thousands and millions of times over and over again, with or without our knowledge, and in a way, one thing we often forget is that its the magick that finds us and channels through us, not the other way around. What 'command' we have over the elements exists on a level so minimal that in reality that it could be that its more of a coincidence that the aether/source happens to have us there asking for things as opposed to random instances.

I come from the point of view that individuals are merely catalysts of the grand sort, and in all honesty, we just happen to be atop a gathered amount of energy when it sets off and goes in a direction that we happen to find convenient. Such that an apple falls from a tree into our hands, and our hand happens to occur at that place and time, and if it were not our hand, it would be another.

This occurs thousands and millions of times over and over again, with or without our knowledge, and in a way, one thing we often forget is that its the magick that finds us and channels through us, not the other way around. What 'command' we have over the elements exists on a level so minimal that in reality that it could be that its more of a coincidence that the aether/source happens to have us there asking for things as opposed to random instances.

So you are saying that, for example, if someone is meant to die, the universe or whatever you'd prefer to call it, uses the path of least resistance to achieve the task? The person is meant to die so the universe uses the late bus driver that's speeding to kill the man? But if the man happens to step out of the way of the bus he would later choke on an apple, the next best path of least resistance?

Is the only reason I imagined destroying the light because the universe needed that light to go out and used me to channel the energy to do it, or did the universe take the opportunity that I presented to channel energy through me? Basically, did the universe control me or just take the opportunity that I gave it?

I want to make sure I'm understanding you correctly. Please explain more.

Hey there~ awesome questions. I'm being serious, I love food for thought, so I'll try to answer each of 'em.

So you are saying that, for example, if someone is meant to die, the universe or whatever you'd prefer to call it, uses the path of least resistance to achieve the task?

I'd say that the universe does as it pleases, and that in that way, we are extensions of it, and we're frankly far too small and narrow minded to actually understand what sort of path it'll take. I'm fairly slow, incompetent and young, so I'll also say that I'm not calling anybody stupid, just to be up front, its more that the universe does as it pleases, and I doubt considering its literally existence, that it doesn't require any form or concern about resistance or difficulty.

But, at the same time, I honestly have no idea. To take the traditional rational system challenge against an irrational system, I would frankly have no idea what would happen if the hypothetically impenetrable shield and the all piercing lance were to collide.

The person is meant to die so the universe uses the late bus driver that's speeding to kill the man? But if the man happens to step out of the way of the bus he would later choke on an apple, the next best path of least resistance?

Lovely example. I'm also being serious, death is a fantastic thing to bring into this equation. Frankly, I'd say yes, but at the same time as I noted, that I don't think that a rational system can comprehend the way the universe does its business. But, in a happy Calvinist way, I'd say everything has been taken into account, including our free will. Whether or not its your bus driver or the apple, or our stereotypical angry 土地公/patron turf spirit, I'd assume that something would happen some way, but I'd say that I'm not smart enough to calculate the variables to determine whether or not an infinite force with a mind/soul/'thing that governs itself' would go about doing that. Looking at it another way, if the universe itself were to look down into everything, i'd assume that the variables and timeframe that i'd calculate be a completely different thing. Its like how the owner of a fish tank would think differently from the goldfish running away from the squid on the bottom of the tank.

Is the only reason I imagined destroying the light because the universe needed that light to go out and used me to channel the energy to do it, or did the universe take the opportunity that I presented to channel energy through me? Basically, did the universe control me or just take the opportunity that I gave it?

Frankly I don't know, but I will say that for example, ripping somebody out of a diabetic coma, or Picasso painting Guernica instead of Andy Warhol doing it when he's drunk occur for reasons beyond our own comprehension. I would say that yes, in fact that the universe had plans in mind for you, but they had plans for me for having to re-type the word plans 4 times in this sentence because I couldn't spell it right. But at the same time, I don't think that our natural idea of "because" and "therefore" might even apply to the universe, but basically, I don't feel that we have any right to claim what's ours as ours if we're going to go with that. How are we supposed to live and conduct our lives in ways we wish to? I'd say that an alternative is to acknowledge the concept and continue on with life as we wish to, since we don't have the brain power to go about charging at celestial windmills. Yes, this post is fairly irrational, dis-empowering and long, and will piss people off, but I feel the idea of all of this is to just acknowledge the fact and waltz down the whatever paradigm you/we've selected and do whatever you're doing: the universe will handle itself in whatever way it wants to.

One experiment you should to just to see what happens, is take a complex living system. Preferably a dog, cat, or human being, you get it, anything with a slightly higher form of intelligence than an insect, and isolate it in every way you can. Avoid the mess of putting it into a vacuum chamber, and go straight to the point and isolate it energetically: create so many blockages in its energy system to the point that barely energy can travel out (and in, of course) and observe for a few days (or hours, depending on the life form) its behavior. We're really not as far from being cells in the universal plant than we think we are.

This post has been edited by kaboom13: Jul 15 2010, 11:57 PM

(Before I start, let me make something perfectly clear. I'm not attacking you; I don't mean any disrespect in any way, and I'm not questioning or challenging your beliefs; but this post may be seen as such due to the fact that I'm horrible when wording text while at the same time trying to get my point across. I just want to make it clear that my only interest is having a conversation with you and learning more about what you believe as well as learning more about you as a person. This post may seem as if it's angry or defensive or any other number of emotions; it's not. I just really suck at getting my point across in text without sounding like an a**hole. I don't intend to do it, it's just one of my faults.)


I think I'm starting to get what you are saying. Let me know if I'm wrong.

Let's go back to examples because that's the best way for me to describe ideas and concepts.

Let's say the universe is a human, "we'll refer to it as Universal Human as to not get confused" and we (Conscious Humans) are each or collectively a cell or part of a cell within the Universal Human. Am I correct in understanding that you are saying that like Conscious Humans the Universal Human doesn't give any, if very little, thought to the small bits that make us up? I mean we (CH) KNOW about our cells and even how they function and what services they provide but we don't name them or care about what happens to them as long as they are preforming correctly. Only when the cells malfunction and create cancer or attack the body in some other way do we take notice. Are you saying that like our cells we are programed from creation to follow a certain path as a whole, individual, or both in order to serve the body of the UH? No free will, will never have the capability to understand anything significant about the UH or ourselves really, just a small part that makes up the whole that the whole really isn't aware of?

Or are you saying that it's all just an accident and the UH has no consciousness, we are bound by unbreakable universal laws and can't change anything on really any level, and we're the ones creating and living in a delusional state thinking otherwise? Basically are you saying that the UH has a consciousness but it's so grand that we'll never be able to understand anything about it or any of the plans it may have or are you saying the UH has no consciousness at all and everything is just a matter of calculations, variables?

I, myself, believe in the second, the no god/consciousness theory, except I believe in freewill and that our own consciousnesses and freewill make us different from normal energy, sort of above the natural law if you please. Immortal, infinite consciousnesses.

Anyway I believe you are saying that we really don't have any control at all, in any form, I'm taking liberties in say that; let me know if I'm wrong. If that is the case, on a more personal note, what are you doing on a magick board? One of the main aspects of magick is to cause desired change; if you don't believe we have any control or capacity to change things, why are you here? I'm just curious. Also I have a feeling our posts are going to get off topic from the OP pretty quickly and the mods might have a problem with that but I do wish to continue this conversation. So, if you have to, pm me so we can continue, if you want to continue that is.

Hey hey~ this is fantastic questions.

Your first question is a tough one for me, and I hate feeling like i'm dishing out Christian arguments (I don't exactly agree with their paradigm.) UH is what Voudoun and Daoism refer to as the "distant god" UH as an entity is completely different in every sense of its existence. Its conscious and sentient by our definitions, but far, far, far, far more than that. Voudoun claims that UH is an inherently different form of consciousness and any communication directly with him without an egregore to back him is would be essentially either be entirely nonsensical or we would lose our minds in contact with such a massive force that we'd be incapable of understanding anything forever. Daoism theorizes that UH (the jade emperor in this case) is essentially an egregore that's so powerful and beyond our own comprehension that his very perception of himself is so completely beyond our own organic mind's ability process the concept that we cannot connect with him in any useful way that he uses Gods and Buddhas as a middleman.

Basically, my view of UH is a combination of both Voudoun's view and Daoism. (Just a footnote, they're both stunningly similar and I actually work in a mixed paradigm between them and a few others. Try it if you can take gods that demand kowtows and will brutally punish if you violate their laws.) UH is essentially a consciousness (which isn't even the right word to describe a thing that massive) that's essentially an entity who's power is immeasurable beyond our comprehension, and the fact that we're physically bound to organic brains and spiritually bound with egos, we cannot even accurately percieve UH.

The next part of this would be how UH and we interact. First off, I'd say that total nirvana essentially elevates an individual into a state where they break away from the physical, and spiritually, they are completely integrated with UH, basically dying, or actually becoming part of UH's existence/'consciousness.' In our perception of things, UH basically has basically total and absolute control of literally everything. Free will is a matter of perception; it does exist, but in all actuality, our free will is apart of UH, which essentially makes free will an illusion. And following this notion, the tangible and the physical laws that exist and the flukes and flaws, and everything, literally everything is the work of UH.

But, none of this ultimately matters. Working against or with UH doesn't matter. UH is literally infinite (I think, i'm still trying to figure that out, I perceive UH as infinite), and our finite contribution or contradiction in the face of infinity is pointless, but at the same time UH's 'work.' (ugh Christian terminology) What to do from here? UH doesn't matter. Whether or not that you care or not, since you don't make a difference, that leaves to doing whatever you want, perceiving whatever you want. The 'true' big picture is so big that the single pixels we are won't make a difference. So, all there is to do is to pay attention to being individual pixels. Live happily, murder, torture, save lives, destroy lives, its your damn problem, and your fruits are your own.

This pertains to magick. Following what I set out, UH is literally everything, controls everything, et cetera et cetera. (No, I have no idea what'd happen to the destruction of the universe we perceive as it is.) UH exists as not only an entity but literally time, existence, our own perceptions of stuff at the same time. Therefore, I'd say that in all actuality, magick happens to us, not the other way around. Typically, the idea of magick involves an individual having the agency to act and change things, right? I'd say that these weren't changes to begin with, more just a continual flow of events. As an individual bound by our sentience, we perceive change because we don't perceive the actual flow of events that occur, and that what we perceive as magick is not an actual diversion in what's supposed to occur, but just another event that's intended to occur.

I'm on forum because a gigantic amount of my practices are still by definition magick. I think I've defined free will to be really an illusion, but ultimately, in our finite existence (versus the infinite), that illusion really doesn't completely matter. I still have to kill energy forms, deal with psi vamps, go into gnosis, do energy manipulation, make contracts and negotiate with egregores. As stated (I hope to god I did), that really, we do have a capacity to 'change' stuff. In all actuality, we don't, in this almost pointlessly huge way of seeing things, but in the way we see the world through our eyes and feel through our senses, we do 'change' things.

Right now, I'm still a bit torn about magick, but this is also interesting to brush shoulders with theologians that aren't christian. For literally all eighteen years of my life, I've used my own personal energy to do things. I make my own constructs, I do my own work, et cetera, I don't have problems with energy unless if I do something exhaustive. Then comes along universal energy, nature et cetera, and pretty much, its magnanimously more powerful than any egregore that I know, and doesn't have a consciousness in a form that I can't comprehend.

I might've missed some questions, but basically, this is the first time i've fully explained my paradigm, I might go onto pm or actual email for the sake of convenience, since this is just the tip of the iceberg.

By the way, my last psychiatric evaluation has deemed that I'm legally and clinincally sane and stable, and I've demanded an explanation, but I'm not apparently delusional. I explained almost all of this (or everything I could when I was asked about my beliefs), and I stared at the doctor and asked about sanity issues, and I haven't had any. Or I haven't discovered any anti psychotics being laced into my food.

This post has been edited by kaboom13: Jul 17 2010, 10:09 PM

Thank you for your post; I understand where you're coning from so much better now.

Getting a small glimpse of your belief structure I can't help but be overwhelmed by the shear incomprehensibility of it all. By that I mean, your explanation of what the UH is is so complex that if I tried to understand it my mind would unravel. Which is the point I guess and validates your explanation of the UH to have been successful. I'm taken aback by the 'largeness' of it all.

How long have you been coming to this realization? I ask because wrapping your mind around even the realization the UH is so unknowable and complex must have taken some time. If you came to understand this quickly then I must say that your mind is more cohesive than mine; I wouldn't be able to absorb and adapt to that knowledge, it would destroy my mind.

I would never be able to find comfort in an existence where my actions and freewill really didn't matter in the entire scope of it all. I guess that's one of the reasons I don't believe in a UH in any form. Being controlled, being a 'programed machine' for lack of a better metaphor or insignificant to the larger scheme is the opposite of everything I am. If what you say is true than I guess I'm just programed that way.

Back when I still believed in a Creator, at best I believed I was equal to it; do to the fact I couldn't fathom or accept being controlled or 'less than'. I still don't understand how people can view themselves as 'less than' or 'not worthy' (I'm referring to most Christians as well as Muslims ect.. ). But different strokes for different folks; I'm not arrogant or ignorant enough to believe that I KNOW the absolute truth and everyone else is wrong.

You can imagine how my Christian family reacted to my beliefs. "That's Satanic thinking." to paraphrase. Which is true I guess. The one thing you are taught as a Christian is that God is above ALL things and nothing can EVER be equal to it, and if you happen to think otherwise then you're evil.

Of all the things you discussed, the bit about merging with the UH and losing One's spirituality really caught my attention. The very thought that what I believe to be quite possibly the most important aspect of my existence is actually trivial is brilliant. I say that because it forces me out of MY paradigm, and that always leads to growth and change for the better for me. It doesn't even matter if our definitions of spirituality differ; the idea now exists non the less. I can't wait to concentrate on it and think it through.

How do you personally cope with all this knowledge? Do you take comfort in the fact that everything is following a plan (even if it's impossible for you to understand it.) ? Or do you not like that fact and just 'deal' with it?

And please don't feel that you have to explain your psychiatric health; in my opinion and beliefs you don't need to be validated by anyone other than yourself. I accept you and your beliefs for what you and they are. If I went with the majority definition of reality than I would still be a Christan; among other things. I'm my opinion just because the majority or any other large group says reality is 'this' doesn't mean that it is. I feel that each person makes their own reality and that each reality made by whomever is legitimate. In MY reality God doesn't exist, but in my sister's reality it does and his name is Jesus Christ and when she prays to him he listens and answers her prayers. Jesus don't exist in my reality (yet. I may have an experience that proves otherwise.) but he DOES exist in hers. To make it as clear as possible, think of YOUR reality as a separate universe from everyone else's reality that may or may not share common characteristics. So basically, everyone exists in their own universe with it's own unique set of rules. People may argue with that, but it doesn't matter. I will NEVER believe that what you say isn't the truth; I will NEVER tell you that you're wrong; because I don't believe you are wrong. MY reality may differ, but that doesn't mean that YOUR reality is false in anyway.

Out of curiosity, why the psychiatric exam anyway? Did you ask for it or was it 'forced' on you? You don't have to answer that if you don't want. I don't want to pry; I'm just curious. I do hate to think it may have been forced; that would be mentally and emotionally painful and damaging.

Hey there~

I'm really happy I can help. To be honest, I have been a fairly messed up kid for a really really long time. I've known that for quite a wihle, and pretty much when I had the opportunity to actually get help, I sought it out and i'm recovering from crap that happened.

Since I was a kid, I've had egregores around me, teaching me, explaining stuff to me, running long commentaries through me, explaining why for example, killing is inappropriate at that moment, and generally small things that kept your mind intact. They also taught me everything I know, and they told me stories. Stories about stuff like UH, and whatnot.

Frankly, I don't genuinely comprehend the concept of UH, and this big picture is slightly a pointless waste of time. I can understand the concept, but I can't genuinely comprehend it, and its a total waste of time. My teachers basically told me its the cosmic joke. Genuine truth is pointlessness, inaccessible, and unknowable. The small truths of our lives: our feelings, our hope, our fears, our dreams, are the truths worth knowing. Though they aren't 'pure', and they aren't the greatest picture, they're all you should work with. "Go on with your life, why the f%*! should you care about the big picture? " was literally what my teacher told me when she taught me this.

Fate technically doesn't exist on our plane of existence and perception. Events, according to our observation will continue to occur. If you shoot a man, the gun in your hand fired a bullet that seriously wounded an individual. In the big picture, fate exists, but this big picture is so big that its stupidly pointless that you might as well disregard it. In our plane of focus, we are responsible for our actions. We will be rewarded in one way or another for our actions. You can throw away the notion of UH, and still be okay. You won't be saved or damned for knowing or not knowing this concept.

But, back to your final question, my teachers reached out to me because I think that I couldn't actually establish a legitimate bond with other human beings. My original goals in therapy was to develop compassion towards the living. There was one point in my life where I've shut people I don't like in spiritual Faraday cages simply because it was fun to watch them struggle under the weight. I'm still honestly horrified and disgusted by things I did, but to be honest, I feel that spirituality is a sign of some degree of great emotional trauma. It means that normal coping mechanisms couldn't save you, so for some strange reason, whether it was out of pity, or some celestial raffle, some Gods somewhere decided to be your guardian angel.

If UH starts becoming a problem, I would seriously seek therapy. Therapy is not for nutjobs, its for fine tuning the brain, and teaching individuals how to change your own oil and soup up or tone down your brain when you need to. Preferably look for one that's more open minded (when i was looking for a therapist, I found they usually explained their own beliefs up front.) If you have more questions about this stuff I can give you preliminary answers privately.

This post has been edited by kaboom13: Jul 18 2010, 09:38 AM

Yes, I would love to know more about your past experiences if you'd be comfortable sharing. I won't ask you anything about your past right now, instead I'll just let you tell me whatever you're comfortable with.

I would love to know more about the egregore that worked with you. Anything and everything you can tell me about them would be wonderful. I've also had contact with beings when I was younger but nothing to the extent you have; they really didn't teach me anything directly.

You mentioned you have trouble establishing legitimate bonds with people. This interests me due to the fact that I'm in a similar situation. I don't form bonds with people either; when I look and see two people who are in love or best friends, I can't understand the relationship they share. It's so foreign to me. I honestly don't think I could ever have a bond like that with a human and honestly I don't want one. It's so strange to watch everyone around me chasing each other looking to establish that type of bond. As I watch them all I can think is, "Why do you want that?" I can't understand it. Not only that, but solitude is bliss as far as I'm concerned. Figuratively as well at literally.

I came to the conclusion a long time ago that my soul isn't human. I have a theory that souls can form in different places. For example, Earth. I believe that if a soul forms on earth or the 3rd dimension than it will be perfectly suited for existence here. These are the people who just 'work' here; they fit into this dimension and world perfectly. I believe that a majority of the souls on Earth formed here. I don't feel that my soul did.

Ever since I was a kid I felt different and had trouble understanding human behavior. The world just felt backwards in every way; it still does. I've NEVER felt connected with people, as a matter of fact, it's always been like I'm surrounded by another species. The best way I can describe it is like I'm in a foreign land surrounded by foreign people and their foreign culture. They can't understand me and I can't understand them. The ONLY time I've EVER felt like I belonged somewhere or with a certain group is when I started communicating with a group of spiritual beings in my sleep. The beings and I were/are all connected, knowing each other as well as being a collective; many beings as one. When I started meeting with them, I finally felt I had come home to where I belonged with the people I belonged with. I can't even begin to describe the relief I felt. The cruel part is I would always wake up here. It's these feelings combined with the always present feelings of difference that lead me to the belief of not having a human soul. I know the only connection I'll ever be able to have is with them but as far as I know I'm the only one here. I hope I'm not alone and I look for them but so far I'm still alone. Being with 'my people' as I call them is the only thing I care about.

How is being alone for you? Or if alone is the wrong word, how is not having legitimate connections to other people for you?

wow, I work some overtime and you guys pack 50 zillion of my favorite topics into a single thread while I'm not looking.

gosh I don't even know where to begin. I guess i should start with a preface as well, and point out that on some of these topics, the subject matter is so complex that I may speak in a dogmatic sounding tone, just for the sake of expedience, to get an idea across as concisely as possible. I'm not really a fan of dogma, and I am distrusting of religion and other self proclaimed sources of 'truth'. My thoughts on the matters which follow are the result of either first hand experience, personal experimentation, personal insight, or direct teaching from a deity (no middle man). And so I tend to feel fairly sound in my concepts on much of these things, for reasons which I could elaborate on extensively but will skip the rationales for the moment. Anyway, nothing is "provable", there is no "really real truth". But I have what I feel are strongly backed inclinations on some of these topics.


Time:
Time is so weird. Time is like... "flowing through causation". Basically things happen in a predictable pattern. the pattern itself is only predictable if you know every single subatomic particle in the universe though... so it can seem quite a bit unpredictable. And it is unpredictable without omniscience (or 'foreknowledge', which is another topic related to the relationship between 'mind' and 'matter'). But basically, in a somewhat simplified version of the way things really are (simplified to portray the underlying basics of how it works) everything happens as the result of everything that has happened. Tomorrow you will drive to work, because yesterday you got a new job. you will stub your toe because you forget your keys when you go outside, and return to find them in a hurry. you will do this because the day before you left them in a different spot than usual, because you were more focused on the ketsup stain on your jeans and getting some soapy water onto the spot. etc. etc. etc. except it's not just you, its 7 billion other people, animals, plants, inanimate objects moving through space, or not moving through space, all interacting with energies, potential energies, etc. resulting in "the time-line". And it's predicated entirely on "causation". A causes B causes C causes D, etc.

Do you have free will in this model? yes.
Are your actions, and even thoughts, "predestined" in this model? yes.

now most people will stop here and say "hold on, you can't have both free will and predestined behavior!" But I am saying that you can, and that this is the answer to that philosophi-physics dilemma. It's difficult to solve only because the nature of it is hard to grasp. Basically, you have free will, but your free will is one of the billion things which interacts in the universe, in a predictable way, building the timeline. Or put another way, you are a co-author of your destined path through time, yet it is destined, following the basic rules of causation. Or put still another way, tomorrow you will decide what to eat. you will get to freely decide what to eat ...but ...you have already decided what to eat tomorrow, you just haven't caught up with that decision yet. So in effect, you WILL eat a certain food tomorrow... and even though you decide to eat it, you're destined to do this, and will flow through that action without consciously realizing anything other than your own free will. It's equally fair to turn the two around and say that even though you're destined to eat that food, you're going to decide to do so. This is very hard to grasp if you try to make 'the universe' or 'time' into a persona. It's not a persona. it's not a contest of wills here.

Past, present, and future, all exist concurrently. Only our consciousness exists (most of the time) at a single point in this expanse of 'time'. What you will do tomorrow, you already did "yesterday" two days from now. You get to express your inner will and your hyper-individualistic sense of self... your free will. But you already did it. it's already done, you just haven't caught up with it yet. so you're going to do things a very precisely particular way tomorrow, and it will seem like you're making it all up as you go, but in some ways you'll be more like a needle following a track on a record. I'm really running out of metaphors for this concept. so i'll move on.

Consciousness (related to time):
Now we add our consciousness to the mix, and it throws a monkey wrench into the system I just described. Basically time is a predictable flow of causation "within a closed system". But our consciousnesses exist (at least in small part) outside this closed system. The human mind is magnificently more than just the sum of it's physical parts. I dare say that the human brain is more like an intersection of physical and metaphysical realities. So this part of ourselves is capable (though rarely) of undertaking iniatives which are not naturally occurring parts of our universe's causality driven time-line. This basically gums up the whole system, and makes it so that knowing the exact state of every subatomic particle in the universe is no longer enough to actually predict the flow of causality. Though it comes close. Basically you could know the future, like say take a 60 second slice of time from tomorrow. And in that 60 seconds, things should play out 'as scripted' (in the causality time-line). For example, during those 60 seconds, a dog will bark outside, exactly 17 cars will pass by on the road outside. the dust particles in a sunbeam coming through a window will move "just so", you will blink exactly X many times, breath Y many times, etc. Any conversation will be 'exactly so'... 99.99% of the time. But 0.01% of the time, something will be 'off'. And that is because someone else (in the intervening time between our foreknowledge and the time frame we have foreknowledge of) also has a foreknowledge, and may, based on that foreknowledge, decide that they don't want to stub their toe. Which may have a cascading effect on the timeline itself, resulting in a very noticeable LACK of the dog barking on time in our 60 second 'foreknown' time frame tomorrow, and a couple of the dust particles may be a bit off too. Basically, psychically capable minds act like conduits which introduce influences into the timeline which come from "out of bounds" in our universe's causation flow. The further into the future a foreknowledge is, the less 'solid' it is, as there is more intervening time for extra-universe 'noise' to distort the flow of events.

I can say that the only times which you can be 'aware' of engaging in an action or thought which is not a part of your 'script' in the time-line, is when you have an episode of very detailed foreknowledge. Like during a prolonged precognitive deja-vu. You can come to realize that things are occurring 'just so'. Usually this realization alone will knock the mind out of whatever gnosis it was experiencing which caused the deja vu in the first place. But not *always*. Anyway, even knowing what you are supposed to say, do, move, etc. it is easy to follow your 'script'. It requires no effort at all. Instead it takes conscious, willful, effort (born from the consciousness processing foreknowledge) to deviate from the causation flow. So perhaps you say what your friend was about to say, (jinx you owe me a coke) and make a point of waving your arms around in the air, just because it didn't belong in this universe's natural time-line. All of which probably won't have any dramatic effects on the time-line ...probably, there is that whole 'butterfly wing effect' theory (IMG:style_emoticons/default/bigwink.gif)

And then of course there's the possibility of 'holistic' changes in behavior, based on long term exposure to 'out of bounds' influences. For example, I may come to feel empowered by these realizations, and seek to build up Will as an unstoppable force, manifesting my life in ways which are wildly different from how I would have without psychic/extra-universal influences. I may not know "exactly" how I am deviating (without a very detailed foreknowledge to compare with) but I can realize that I am making life choices and forging a path which is different than I would have without the influence of information & forces external to this universe's causality system. The most extreme example of this, is that I sometimes view my relationship with my 'mentor' (a discarnate deity-being) as a cooperative venture seeking to forge a path through 'potential variants of the timeline' to engineer my intersecting with a particular event in time. That event namely being the achievement of my ultimate spiritual goal.


so where was I... oh yeah, the "UH" as you guys have designated is perhaps not really a "universal human"... I mean i know that's just a metaphor, but its a metaphor which follows in line with a very human tendency to "personalize" things which do not *really* have a persona. For example, cars, plush toys, rivers, mountains, stars, etc. So I guess my point is, that there is no overriding force which "decides" when someone will die (following your guys' example here). If they meet with a bus, then they have already met with a bus, and you will have been able to read all about it in next weeks obituary which will have been eloquently written 'just so'. And the only way they will not meet with a bus, is if something 'out of bounds' to the natural causation chain in this universe interrupts that particular line of dominoes from tipping that way. Which all sounds very fatalistically predestiny oriented, but it's not, the guy walked out in front of that bus of his own free will, for his own reasons, but by the time the obituary is written next week, he will have already made the free willed choice which we *then* know he made. He's already done it, he just hasn't caught up with it yet (currently).


"Infinity is infinitely depersonalizing"
When you are finite, existing as a single point in the universe, you have an 'identity'. What shapes that identity is the fact that you are separate from 'everything else'. Let's say you like ice cream... you can't like ice cream without being a finite being. if you were infinite, there is no specific "I" to like ice cream with. And even if there was, your 'self' would consist of 7 billion humans (among other things), not all of whom like ice cream. The very basic concepts of 'like' and 'dislike' which are the foundation of identity, are not possible from an infinite perspective. Personal identity is the very living breathing art of differentiating between self and 'other', if there is no such distinction, then there is no personal identity. This is the basis for the difficulty in engaging the infinite Aum, as finite beings whose existences are literally based on our individual ego. This is why nirvana is sometimes described as 'nothingness', and sometimes described as 'everythingness', both of which are equally incompatible with personal identity, the existence of a personality, inherently incompatible with Descartes "I think therefore I am".

much of which is 'loosely' related to my spiritual path. loosely
I mean, my "ultimate goal", my magnum opus, is essentially to achieve and maintain a paradoxical state, at once finite and infinite.
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technically, your thoughts about rejecting the concept of being "less than" something, IS fairly "satanic" in nature (if we go by the philosophical tennants of nontheistic satanism).
Which is one of the reasons I'm fairly satanism-friendly. though I just can't bring myself to throw myself fully into any path that seems to be trying to fashion itself as a mirror of my former brainwashing cult... err... faith.

And I agree Iamnoone, being a hairless ape can be a real drag sometimes. It's not the physiology, its the other hairless apes.

(there's a lot of cool comments and ideas and insights by both of you that I didn't get a chance to respond to, this is a very neat thread though, in terms of the ideas being kicked around (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) )

Kath I demand a high-five of the epic sort. You have again made my day

"Infinity is infinitely depersonalizing"

I'm not sure if I accentuated this point thoroughly, but I'm saying that UH, or as you've pretty much worded it, the unconscious, collective absolute "god"/thing is also time and consciousness. I'm just curious, you differentiate between this "UH"/god/thing, and time and consciousness, could you care to elaborate the difference?

hehe, um... well, i don't quite believe in a UH/god/thing exactly. no "creator being" in my concept of the universe. so I pass on that part of it.

time, in my thinking, is the universe, in a flow, moving through causation. with both the future and the past already existing. so I don't think of time as very personalized either, it's just 'time'. it's just while i sit here wondering what words to type next to explain my thoughts, i've already actually typed them, I just haven't moved to catch up with those keystrokes yet. (well, until now anyway)

consciousness is neato. I don't understand it as much as I'd like to, but I study it a lot. the more i learn the more i end up with new questions. It seems to be mainly to do with the human brain. But there are aspects of consciousness, perception, memory, awareness, etc. which seem to wildly violate not just the physical capacities of an organic brain, but even break physics laws. which suggests that some element of the consciousness is transdimensional in nature. making 'mind' a heck of a lot more than just the byproduct of an electro-chemical bio-computer that looks like a noodle.

At the moment, i am more impressed with the magnitude of the things I dont know about consciousness, than I am the magnitude of the things I do know. So I'm reluctant to ramble on about it too much. I mean, i know a great deal about how the human mind works, on a psychological and neurological level, as well as cognitive science. but, i don't know as much as I'd like about that part of consciousness which exists beyond the physical brain. It strikes me as something I may not really get entirely figured out until I complete my spiritual goals in life. I do feel that consciousness is related to 'the infinite' the universe. but the exact nature of that relationship? well, if i knew *that*, then I'd be pretty close to wrapping up my time here on earth (IMG:style_emoticons/default/bigwink.gif) I mean, most people have paradigms regarding this matter. and I'm familiar with most such paradigms. but I'm not quite satisfied with a paradigm, or even a working model that makes functional magick. I want to really figure it out. I have a sense that it's the sort of understanding which would 'change everything'.

Here is a link to visualize the universal human, cellular human continuum. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mandelbrot_sequence_new.gif
Where does the universe end and the cell begin when there are universes in the cells and cells in the universes.

Consciousness transcends the body. It flows in the cells, it flows out into the universe.

Higher consciousness means stronger magick....stronger sorcery.... stronger attraction.....stronger manifestation.

Everything is finite and infinite, it is only perspective that changes, like matter to energy to matter to energy ... What we perceive at any given time is our perspective, the finite perspective, but if we pull back enough we see that it all keeps going on and on and on, big bang, big crunch, big bang, big crunch or 2 into 1 into 2 into 1 into 2.... IT is perspective that we control, thus we control whether we are in heaven or hell. Is the world upside down or is it us? PErspective we can control, like flipping a switch, then our reality switches as well from the inside out, you can't see the light if you are concentrating on the dark...vice versa...blah blah blah

Kath,

Some of the things you said are kind of an conformation for me. I'm going to copy paste something I wrote and posted a few days ago on a different board; I'd like your opinion on it.
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I have precognitive dreams; here's one of the theories that I've formulated to try and explain them.

It's my opinion that our consciousness doesn't solely exist in 3rd dimensional space time.

In 3rd dimensional space time our consciousness exists in the present, in the moment, this is all we experience. We may remember the past, but we ONLY experience the present. But if our consciousness partly existed in 4th dimensional space time then we would experience every single moment of our lives at once; there would be no past, present, or future. To make it clearer, in the 4th dimension if you were to look at yourself in a mirror you would see a snake like creature; at one end the moment you were born and at the other the moment you die, the middle would be a physical representation of your entire life between birth and death. In the 4th dimension you would experience your entire history all at the same time.

Now, let's say that our consciousness doesn't purely exist in the 3rd dimension; one part exists here while another part exists in the 4th dimension. We'll say that the part of our consciousness that exists in the 4th dimension is connected to the subconscious part of our brain here in the 3rd dimension. I say that because dreams take place in the subconscious. It's also my opinion that this is where the psychic sense exists; precognition, intuition, ect...

Now let's say that the part of your consciousness that exists in the 4th dimension is self aware just like the part of your consciousness in the 3rd dimension is self aware. Let's say that for whatever reason your 4th dimensional consciousness is looking at itself and sees that a part of itself is damaged and that damage affects it adversely.

Remember, in this scenario your 4th dimensional self exists all at once; to make it clearer, imagine you break your leg here in the 3rd dimension but instead of hurting just where your leg's broken the majority of your body hurts starting at the break and spreading up towards your head. That's how pain is perceived in the 4th dimension; if your grandmother dies and it permanently changes how you see yourself and the world, let's say you become anti-social, that means it's going to affect the rest of your life here in the 3rd dimension as well as the 4th. In the 4th dimension the pain/change from the death would start when the death accrued but would affect the rest of your 4th dimensional body that exists AFTER the death.

Can you follow that?

Now let's say that your 4th dimensional self doesn't want this damage to be permanent and effect it's body forever. The only course of action to repair the damage is to not let the damage take place. So your 4th dimensional body looks at itself and sees that the pain starts when your grandmother died. So in order to prevent the pain that effects it, your 4th dimensional self sends a vision/memory of your grandmother's death into it's 3rd dimensional self BEFORE the death occurs. The part of your consciousness that exists in the 3rd dimension receives the vision/memory and therefor you are more prepared for your grandmother's death, thus lessening or preventing the damage/pain/effect. The damage is repaired or lessened; the job get's done.

My precognitive dreams ALWAYS have to do with me or someone I'm close to being in danger. I either avoid the danger if at all possible or warn the person to help them avoid it. And believe me, my family has learned to trust and follow what I tell them. Before they didn't, but after the exact event that I told them would take place took place and they got hurt the exact way I told them they would, they've learned to listen.

Why can't they see things like I can? I have no idea. The only thing I can think of is that they don't know how or maybe it's a 4th dimensional talent or skill that not everyone has. I like to imagine myself as a 4th dimensional doctor. Someone's 4th dimensional self comes to me and says, "I'm in pain and it started here." And I say,"Ok, I'll send a message/memory back to myself in the 3rd dimension to try and help you avoid the incident that caused the damage." So by doing that I can heal both their and my 3rd and 4th dimensional damage/lives. I stop them from making a mistake in the 3rd dimension thus making their 3rd dimensional life better as well as their 4th.

That's just one theory thought.
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Where do precognitive episodes fall in your understanding of 3rd dimensional time? In your opinion, are my dreams the unpredictable aspect of consciousness you were talking about? Obviously if the information I receive is followed the timestream (for lack of a better word) changes or we are shifted into a different timestream or possibly different universe. If time and space can't be separated then there is no changing it right? One can only jump into an alternate universe where space time matches the decision / change of course. For example, time travel would be impossible since space time in this universe is already determined so if one did travel through time they would actually be traveling to an alternative universe.

Or do you think that the dreams fall into the other aspect you described, where a decision is made and is just followed out? My consciousness sends me a 'vision' and i've already decided to act on it or tell the other person and they've already decided to act or not act on the information?

What's your opinion?

I'm going to have to jump on this, but I might not directly answer it, since the short answer would be, that I have no fucking clue why.

I started out having precognitive dreams as a kid. Since I don't know when, I always remember dreams, every single one of them. Most of them are literal, and I'll have dreamed about these events years and months ago, and others are prophetic, some allegories, some painting emotional situations, others physical objects I'll hold at some point in time or another. More or less, I'm in a perpetual state of deja vu, and nothing really shocks and surprises me. I've moved onto tarot after that, and if intoxicated and I have the cards out, I'd basically hallucinate (more like envision) the outcomes that I'd map out.

With my experience with foresight and whatnot, is that these events hold no actual contextual value, and are inevitable. I don't think it has anything to do with linear time, as you guys have talked about in general, but I think that our minds interpret prophecy in a linear sense because it feels like the most straight-forward way to explain something with little to no rational ground, but we still somehow to know that its true.

I feel that in a way, precognition falls into a state where the individual is partially dissociated with himself. Imagine if the world was a gigantic office with cubicles (horrifying, I know). You're working in your cubicle, and when you suddenly dissaociate, you stand up on your chair (which comes with practice) and you look over the floor of cubicles. you can see the everything within your own scope of vision. I feel that precog lies in this state of mind. But if the individual were to not stand upon the metphorical office chair, but actually float, they'd be able to then (after defying the laws of physics) float throughout the building and see the entire building as it is, resulting in demi-omnipotence, which didn't really give me the sense of precognition, it just gave me something completely different.

Regarding your 4th dimensional healing, Shamanism actually does that. I've begun diving into the spirit world for around a year or so (lucid dreams, dissociation), and more or less, what happens is instead of really having patients, or symptom prevention, you just go about doing stuff. You generally follow your instincts, and you do what you have to do. Most of the stuff that occurs generally ignores time, or really everything on this plane of focus. I'm not really sure how to explain it without more prompts

a wonderful post!

oh i'm right there with you on this! - seeing through the eyes of the soul, the permanent dehumanizing dissociation and sociopathy, the feeling that oh yeah been here done this and i remember doing it but still i have to do it yet again for some crazy reason (then trying to mess with it to change the outcome to be different than the memory), sensing the flow of life as spirit around and about, but invisible to the eyes, being taught lessons all over the place from different teachers/sources that bring knowledge from beyond with some experiential and some just popped in, sensing things that need to be fixed and just fixing the with the 'no thought'

this is sorcery that we're doing, right? - i'm still not sure of the name for it, but i'm totally sure this is what i should be doing, and i wouldn't have it any other way

first impression : "brilliant!"

but, i'm half asleep. need to chew on this a bit longer, and perhaps while fully awake (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Would like to add to the atmosphere of intrest here and say, Wow!, can't comment as the current of intrest has long passed me but nice posting all the same, good topic.

I do not think the 4th dimensional higher self can be damaged or hurt by anything on the physical plane. There is so much violence on this world, wouldn't everybody be receiving these messages about impending trauma? If it could feel pain then it could also feel pleasure, and we would all be receiving guidance pushing us all towards pleasure but this is not the higher self...this is the EGO. The higher self can see farther than our physical selves, it can see the future better than we can. A timeless dimension without the divine feminine creating - maintaining and destroying is to exist in a moment forever, to be static forever....that is not part of our universe. Time can flow forward and backward, speed up and slow down but can never stop.

So what is precognition? To me, it is communication, from the higher self that can see farther than I and is interested in my welfare for a reason. The higher self is interested in teaching, guidance, evolving us. To become more than animal, to look up rather than look down. These precognition communications are sent to keep the student alive longer, to learn more....some students are open to learning some are not. The whole purpose of life is to evolve...to move away from animal ego to become a more spiritual being. When you move the ego aside, and clear your Karma, energy moves up the spine to the higher self, it moves from the material to the spiritual.....

I do not think the 4th dimensional higher self can be damaged or hurt by anything on the physical plane. There is so much violence on this world, wouldn't everybody be receiving these messages about impending trauma? If it could feel pain then it could also feel pleasure, and we would all be receiving guidance pushing us all towards pleasure but this is not the higher self...this is the EGO. The higher self can see farther than our physical selves, it can see the future better than we can. A timeless dimension without the divine feminine creating - maintaining and destroying is to exist in a moment forever, to be static forever....that is not part of our universe. Time can flow forward and backward, speed up and slow down but can never stop.

So what is precognition? To me, it is communication, from the higher self that can see farther than I and is interested in my welfare for a reason. The higher self is interested in teaching, guidance, evolving us. To become more than animal, to look up rather than look down. These precognition communications are sent to keep the student alive longer, to learn more....some students are open to learning some are not. The whole purpose of life is to evolve...to move away from animal ego to become a more spiritual being. When you move the ego aside, and clear your Karma, energy moves up the spine to the higher self, it moves from the material to the spiritual.....

In the metaphor I used concerning damage to one's 4th dimensional self I wasn't referring to actual physical pain. I meant a kind of damage that affects the 4th dimensional self in a permanent negative way. For example, if you developed a debilitating limp from breaking your leg. That limp would affect you the rest of your life possibly causing you to miss out on beneficial experiences (like running in a marathon where you meet your spouse for example). But if you didn't break your leg than your life would be different and you could participate in events that would give you different experiences. Think of it like your 4th dimensional self actively developing itself in a positive way by affecting it's 3rd dimensional self.

Why don't we all receive these messages? You said it yourself; "some students are open to learning some are not". Maybe they can't or won't hear / see what's being sent. Also, no two people learn the same way. I think my theory also fits into your statement, "The whole purpose of life is to evolve." Why couldn't one's 4th dimensional self actively evolve itself by communicating with it's 3rd dimensional self in order to change 3rd dimensional events? Maybe my 4th dimensional self is interacting with my 3rd dimensional self so BOTH can learn and evolve. Maybe that interaction is only one tool one's 3rd and 4th dimensional selves use to evolve.

In all actuality I don't know why precognition exists or why I have precognitive episodes. Unfortunately there's no scientific method to find out why precognitive episodes take place or what purpose they serve in concern to the bigger picture. I think trying to figure it out is like a caveman trying to figure out why the moon gradually disappears and reappears every month. It's fun to speculate though.