Which Is The Best Way To Learn An Art?, Solitary Vs Temple Vs Tutelage Options

Being a solitary practicioner and reading up on the book, "The practice of the magickal diary" has opened my eyes to just how observant and objective one is supposed to be in practice, my journal saw only a line or two each day until recently hardly the hourly notes Crowley devoted himself to and it all, of course, lacks the subtle reminder a mentor or guardian is able to comment on.

Obvious that its easy to trip and not notice you've fallen when practicing alone. The path, ones ego takes on all manner of shape and guise in its attempt to escape reconditioning, without a tutor holes can become chasoms filled with echoes of a deluded sence of self reassurance. A certain receptive faculty can be found missing in the general scheme of things, marked by an air of arrogance in most... myself included .lol.

That being said, no one knows your self quite like yourself and trueisms, inward revelations, contemplated on ones own won't find contamination of opinion enough to see them berated into dogma in order to conform to a particular schools stream of thought. The solitary path lends to a more shamanic approach in that way I guess.

So... as each has many pros and cons to learn from, which do you consider to be the best guide on the path to adepthood or self mastery in general? What's your opinion on each? As people have chosen either or they've obviously discriminated in regards to what suits them and hence should hold an opinion of its others.

Applies to all systems, feel free to move mods.

Sorry about my writing, like to mess with words and meaning .lol.)

Peace
.M.

don't apologize for writing beautifully and deeply meaningfully.

solitary... this has its fine points, definitely. I'm a huge fan of it. but it does struggle with the issue of having to reinvent the wheel to pull a cart. actually that is it's only drawback I think, that it fails to draw on available prior experience.

temple... not really a fan. it IS a way to draw on available prior experience, so that you don't have to reinvent the wheel to pull a cart. But your cart can end up being full of dogma and limited paradigms if you're not very very careful.

tutelage... if it's by a human, then it has the same pros & cons as the temple, but perhaps with more personal attention, but less broad of an input base. I am a proponent of the idea that tutelage can occur by way of the HGA, patron deity, higher self, etc. In which case I think you get all pros and none of the cons. except for one con. you learn dependency. Dependency on information, power, comfort, morale, confidence, etc. many forms of subtle dependency, and you must be weened at some point in order to really blossom. This is a hidden drawback for all non-solitary paths I think.

just my $0.02

Ah, dependancy, a lot of schools insist that you find a teacher to guide you through practices claiming that it can be dangerous otherwise but magic has a fancy free air to it even though it can be just as dangerous, more dangerous than most other forms of spirituality. Remember being treated badly by someone once, forgot that the effect of the grade I was in would undermine my judgement, the hurt had me in a rage and I sought to put a curse on the person... as I was online in such a mood looking into it the person phoned .lol. was so pissed, didn't recognise the number and picked up to a cheery friend thanking me for helping and chatting away apologising for what I had thought was an insult... could have cried. Power in the wrong hands can only work for corrupt reasons. An honest introspective can be difficult to master.

Think most people online would shy away from temple workings, people who work in groups are more extroverted, less likely to log onto a forum to talk to fellow occultists, more likely to be out skyclad in a forest someplace. The thread has failed to draw from a wide enough pool of practicioner and can only have a biased outcome **commits hara-kiri** .lol. know that I'm not a fan of temple work, like to be around folk... think I'm a fan of individuality, would find it difficult keeping in with people who don't think for themselves, can't talk to people I don't like either, too honest to pretend.

Solitary is the best way though generally beats the rest, think it aids in genuine contact with yourself, all someone else can do is spoon feed you their experience and opinion... helps to have inspiration, to know what you're trying to do but if you can cultivate all you need to work and learn alone, courage, perseverance etc then you're pretty much there.

There are pros and cons to both solitary and group work. It is only recently that there have been books available that would allow a solitary to learn more than part of a system. Even I remember when I was a teenager back when there were few books either written or available to an interested person. We didn't have the internet and couldn't order books online. There were no forums like this and finding others who had similar interests was difficult. In witchcraft, the tradition was to train within a coven. But at that time, coven leaders had passed at least a minimum standard of testing. Now you often have group leaders who have read one or two books and consider themselves ready to teach and lead a group. So now the quality of the teachers vary more than they used to while now there are more resources for the solitaries.

So... as each has many pros and cons to learn from, which do you consider to be the best guide on the path to adepthood or self mastery in general?

If you want to play an instrument, you need to practice constantly. Unless you are eating or asleep, you should be playing that instrument. When you absolutely must do something else, your beloved instrument should be wedged in between your thoughts and whatever you are doing. You don't need a better band or even a better instrument, you need to be so obsessed that you play that thing in your dreams and wake up eager to practice.

If you want to learn to draw, get 5000 sheets of paper, and cover them front and back with drawings. Then, do it again with 5000 more sheets. Next, do that again. After a few more times, if you are paying attention, you will be able to draw like a master. Save yourself the art school tuition, and spend it on materials instead: they are much more useful.

Do you want to learn Kung Fu? A weekly lesson, a book, and 50 dubbed DVD's will not cut it. You will need to stretch and exercise, train diligently, regulate your lifestyle to accommodate this art. No master or school can make these things less necessary.

Remember the first time you rode a bike or drove a car? Your first baseball game? The first video game you ever played? Did your performance improve?

The help and support of others is a blessing, but development of any skill or art depends on the individual.

I agree with a lot that has been said here. Whether you are involved with a group, an individual teacher, or on your own it is true that only being obsessively driven by any particular passionate interest will confer, in time, mastery in that interest - magic or anything else in life. I personally believe that if you are not naturally obsessed with magic, as with any other art, then you should not practice in the first place. If that passionate obsession is present, then it won't matter that much whether you are alone or with a congregation of adepts. You'll find your way.

No one really practices solo anymore, not in the absolute sense anyway, various books, compendiums, grimoires, etc., are available to draw from and in a sense they are a kind of group - a tradition, you don't have to discover every little thing yourself. At least in terms of various approaches to magic. But, you still have to do your own work, you still rely on your own experiences over time, and in the end whatever you read you are likely to come to your own conclusions and realise that whatever you were reading didn't entirely express what you yourself experienced.

In a temple setting there is a certain comraderie to be found amongst other who are hopefully as passionate as yourself about magic. It can be rewarding to have these people to discuss your experiences with if there is an open mindedness to be had. I don't fear dogma as much as some others do - there is a saying in many martial arts, one of those ancient truisms with no apparent origin, "Learn the Form, but Seek the Formless." A temple may have one way of doing things, but it's just an application of principles, and the principles are what you are there to really find by observing the Application. Some things can't be taught just by telling. Some people simply get stuck on the dogma and can't get past it. Don't become attached to a temple/coven/cabal/etc, though. Be loyal like a sibling, but remember you are an individual as well.

A personal teacher - well, those come and go, I don't personally think you should seek out an individual teacher at all. Certainly be open, and let everyone teach you a little something (when you are obsessed, everything applies to your obsession), but never attach yourself to a teacher; let them come and go in their own timing, because that way is the best way for both of you. Any teacher that becomes attached to you, is really a student in disguise.

Mm, non-corporeal teachers... there is nothing anyone can really say on this, I think. You'll either meet them or you won't, they'll tell you what you need to know and nothing more or less, and you should take everything they say under consideration as objectively as anything you hear from any other coporeal teacher. It's the only way to guard against ingenuine spirits or your own imagination. But, don't discount your own imagination either, because your own subconscious mind might need to tell you something sometime, because it understands things differently than your logical mind. Just treat all information the same regardless of the source.

In reality I think there is only one option - no one will walk your path for you, or even with you the whole way.

peace

I think it depends entirely on how your brain works as to which is the 'better' way to learn. Humans learn in different ways, and have different learning styles, which dictate how we best understand and retain information. Simple things like whether we learn best with visual or aural cues, by reading or writing a paper or physically doing something. There's lots of study into learning styles and how best to teach people. But we also have different capacities for learning alone, in a group, or in a one-on-one situation. I agree with Mchawi in that many people who frequent online forums tend to be those who learn best on their own, and also tend to be those who learn best through a written or discussion medium. So we as a group will probably show a bias towards the solitary path being the 'best' way to learn. But that's not necessarily representative of what actually IS the best way. Because it depends on who you are and how your brain is wired. There isn't one single way that is best for everyone, only what is best for us personally, or for us as a demographic of like-minded people.

For me personally, I learn best solitary. I agree with most of what Kath said in her breakdown of the pros and cons of each path mentioned, but with one addition. I don't think that as a solitary practitioner we necessarily have to reinvent the wheel each time. If we were learning in relative isolation then yes. But with the advent of the internet and published books, most solitary practitioners do a lot of research and learn from a lot of different sources, and so often have access to a wider range of teachings and opinions than someone who learns within a single group or from a single mentor (or even deity or their HGA). So personally I feel that we rarely have to reinvent the wheel unless we avoid reading or referencing sources external to ourselves, or unless we are attempting something that is not documented elsewhere.

I would be more inclined to say that rather than having to reinvent the wheel, a well-read solitary practitioner who wants to pull a cart actually has the ability to chose between a half a dozen different wheel and axle styles. While those who work within a group or with a mentor may only have access to one or two styles. Of course, not everyone is capable of finding the information they need on their own, and some people who are spoiled for choice are incapable of making a decision about which to use, but for those of us who work best under those conditions it's a clear winner, so to speak.

But no, I don't believe that there IS a "best guide on the path to adepthood or self mastery in general." Because humans can't all be generalised into the same learning-styles category, and I think you'll always get a significant proportion of people who struggle no matter which path is chosen.

Other than V.D's comment its a given that most online would, as Rae said, vouch for the solitary route. The downside to a solitary practice ends up being a lack in a proper sence of self scrutiny, reading up on the notes of Frater VIO in 'The practice of the magical diary' I seriously doubt that many solitary practicioners have for example mastered the astral realm in said A.A grade deeming them fit for the next... as W.E Butler says, in a temple you may even be set back a grade... the thought wouldn't likely cross the mind of someone burning the path on their own. Think I may even have put the book down to gather my nerves thinking of that possibility.

In referance to Raes comment, that we're all individuals... being scientifically minded ones spiritual awareness or level of advancement in any form of practice can be evaluated, gauged, in which case taking the above to mind, although without having scrutinized other forms of tuition, a self made "adept" or practicioner, when compared to say someone who has been taught is (in my humble opionion) less than likely to make the bar... I think its Pat.Z who talks of tutors who could or can literally introduce one to subtle forces level by level while teaching, this in his debate on the effectiveness of initiation at some level that Regardie didn't think was nessary, basically saying that he couldn't have had a well trained hierophant to have argued the point... and, subtly, that the New Zealand branch of the G.D had excelled where others had failed noted by their rewrite or paching up of certain initiatory ceremonies. Waffle. There's no real way to debate the point I guess thread is more one for opinion, intresting all the same.