The Sacred Hearth

It is easy to affect the physical world. You reach out your hand and pick up a glass and you have changed the glass and the surface upon which it was sitting, as well as the surrounding air. Take a sip and you have changed the quantity of water in the glass. You may not understand all the mechanics behind picking up a glass; the pressure of your fingers, the nerve and muscle responses inside your hand, the air particles surrounding the glass, the gravity affecting the whole situation, but you have complete faith that you can reach out and pick up that glass. So much faith, in fact, that you can do so without putting much thought into it.

You were not born knowing how to pick up a glass, or how to drink water from it. You did not even know at birth that you had the ability to do so. First you discovered your hands, you explored them, and then you practiced using them. You dropped things, broke them, dribbled water down your face, and then finally, you knew; and it was as easy to do as if you’d always done it. You might still drop the occasional glass, or spill the occasional drink down your front, but this does not negatively affect your ability to do it right the next time.

Magic also takes time to learn and you will make many mistakes but if you are willing to take the time to explore, experiment and practice, you can perform magic just as easily as if you’d been born doing it.

Magic is simply using spiritual means to affect the physical world. No one can deny that physical objects, such as a cool glass of ice tea or a hot cup of coffee, properly applied, can have dramatic effects on the psyche. A glass of wine in a ceremonial setting can have a similar affect on the spiritual. Likewise, the mental and spiritual can have powerful effects on the physical as well as each other. Believing in these affects is the most important aspect of successful magical work. If you don’t believe you can do it, you can’t. It’s that simple.

The reason the physical, mental and spiritual affect one another so profoundly is that they are all made of the same thing. Energy. Matter is formed of energy and your mental processes are formed by chemical reactions and electronic impulses. Everything has energy, which many choose to identify as a spirit, soul, aura or simply an energy field. We have the ability to altar the nature or “personality” of our energy through the power of thought. This is the basic foundation of magic. Those things that are non-living, such as rocks, are also formed of energy but they lack the consciousness to alter that energy, so they have static personalities. This is why you may hear so much about rocks being good for various specific applications. This book will not provide you with lists, but it will give you the skills needed to explore the personality of inanimate objects in order to make your own personal associations.

As most of your personal energy is tied up in mundanei things, like making sure your heart keeps beating, or forming the molecules that form the cells that make up every organ in your body, most of a rock’s energy is tied up in making it what it is. However, you, and the rock, have a certain amount of excess energy that surrounds you, making up your aura. This is what we call spiritual energy. Unlike a rock, you have the consciousness and creativity required to use this excess energy to command your body and mind into action to change not only your physical appearance and your physical surroundings at will, but also the manifestation of your own spiritual energy.

Your spiritual energy ebbs and flows and mingles with the spiritual energy of those people and things you encounter every day. In hectic moments this energy can scatter, leaving you drained and in moments of excitement you may be bursting with so much energy that you find it impossible to concentrate. You can control this ebb and flow and you can harness it. You can also learn to drain off excess energy and how to focus your energy on certain goals and “aim” it at specific targets. This is what we mean by casting spells.

Magic can also be accomplished by sending your consciousness or energy body out from your physical body to perform various acts. This is sort of work is referred to as Astral Work. It is accomplished by entering a trance-like state which allows you to separate your physical self from your consciousness. This is useful for delivering messages, placing suggestions and discovering the answers to questions. Though it sounds complicated, it is nothing more than the sum of several basic skills and knowledge which, once mastered, combine to make astral projection a rather simple feat. It is the mastery of these basic skills that may prove difficult, not because any one of them are particularly difficult, but because of the self-discipline it takes to repeatedly practice them until you can do them with ease. A teacher can guide you through very simple steps toward this goal but it is up to you to apply the self-discipline necessary to achieve mastery of these skills.

You should begin by learning the basic techniques of focus, meditationi and visualizationi, which are valuable for myriad applications both magical and mundane. Only once you have mastered these techniques should you move on to more specifically magical skills. Once you begin practicing magic, you will inevitably apply your own theology and morality to your actions. While I will not preach any specific theology here, I will caution you not to attempt to violate natural laws. You will not be able alter the movement of the sun or moon, for example. Magic is not capable of defying nature; it works with nature and in accordance to natural laws. Attempting to violate these laws will at best accomplish nothing, and at worst, according to some magical theory, lead to extremely negative consequences. This is not a moral or ethical statement. It simply is.

It is also important to understand that casting a spelli on a person means that you are sharing your spiritual energy with them whether the spell is a positive or a negative one. Thus, casting a spell on someone means that you are sharing your soul with him. For the duration of the spell, and possibly longer, you are intimately bonded to that person. This has important implications. At the very least, it makes it easier for them to cast a spell on you. It also makes it easier for them to astrally travel to you, entering your dreams and otherwise spying on you, and possibly finding out things you’d rather they didn’t know. In the case of a magically inexperienced person these dangers may not seem very relevant but this link can still keep a person in your thoughts and dreams long after they should have been let go.

As you go through this website and the tutorials it contains, keep in mind the way spiritual energy behaves. You will discover more about it as you go. It is important that you understand these basic concepts before sending energy out into the world. A proper understanding of the way magic works will in turn give you a proper ethical foundation in which to work, as well as improving the effectiveness of your magical working and ensuring your personal safety.