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MAGIC
is about power and control - the ability to create change in accordance
with magical will. The change is effected through ritual acts in which
supernatural forces are invoked and made subservient to the to your will.
Will is understood by magical practitioners as the focusing of desire;
will is something that much be created and trained. Belief in ones ability
to perform magic involved coming to accept a belief that one is capable
of creating change [that one is powerful] and that the change will occur
according to ones will [that one is in control].
Transforming
yourself
Most people
associate magic with outer change and spell work. There are many
books and techniques designed to help you harness the power of nature,
thorough the use of hers, stones, colours, candles and symbols.
These are powerful ways to do magic, but magic is essentially about
creating inner change. Props may be useful but it is the mind that
works magic, and success at spell work is believed to rest upon
the mastery of medication and visualisation exercise.
You may want to begin a meditative visualisation by lighting a candle,
asking for inner guidance, breathing deeply and closing your eyes.
You can use body relaxation, incense, guided countdowns and soothing
imagery to get into an altered state of mind where you can access
your inner energy patterns - your conscious and unconscious thoughts,
emotions, dreams, hopes and fears. Most importantly you can connect
with your inner guidance, awaken your psychic abilities and connect
with healing spirits and gods.
Now in your inner vision, imagine yourself the way you want to be.
Use images of coloured light and simple symbols to work with energy.
If you need courage, think about what colour feels most like courage
to you. Then imagine yourself surrounded in that colour: You could
also create an affirmation to give you more courage.
Other techniques for magical change include creating an inner sacred
space that you can go to anytime and anywhere, regardless of where
your altar or ritual tools are. In your imagination build an inner
temple of learning and healing. Create a gateway to your spirit
guides. Look into an inner mirror or crystal for glimpses of your
past lives. All of this takes place on the inside, but creates a
powerful and lasting change. Listen to your inner guide and let
it take you on your own incredible healing journey.
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MANDALAS
From a Sanskrit word meaning 'magic circle' or 'disc', a mandala is a
circular visual representation that is used as a focus point for the practice
of mediation. When creating a mandala the artist attempts to coordinate
his or her personal circle with the universal circle, reflecting how his
or her life fits into the larger whole.
The mandala art form is widely used in the East and often associated with
Tibetan monks artists and Navaho Indians who create them out of multicoloured
sand as formal geometrical expression of sacred vibrations; however, mandalas
transcend culture and religion, time and place. When a person concentrates
on a mandala they are attempting approach a higher plane of consciousness
and, according to psychologist Carl Jung, they are the ultimate symbols
for uniting our inner and outer selves. Jung found that the integrative
properties of the mandala had benefits in psychotherapy; by drawing mandalas
patients could make order out of inner confusion.
Creating
your own mandala
You do not
need to be artists to create a mandala. You can make one in any
way that you want and with any material there are no right or wrong
mandalas, it can be drawn, shaped of clay, cloth or flowers or any
material you like. It can even be created in your minds eye. Here
is one way to go about creating a mandala.
Gather your materials and go to a quiet, private space. Light a
candle or burn incense to establish a reflective mood. You may find
it helpful to sit quietly for a few moments of prayer or meditation
before beginning your mandala. This helps focus your attention on
messages from the unconscious. Perhaps an image, a colour, or even
a movement will come to you as the beginning point for your mandala.
Next draw a circle freehand, with a compass, or traced around a
plate or other template. The circular shape represents a natural
and ultimate wholeness and appears in symbols dating back to the
Palaeothic Age. Then fill in your circle with the colour and content
of your choice. Typically the circle is orientated to four points.
Sometimes this is done by squaring, in which a square is drawn outside
the circle; other times it is drawn by geometric designs such as
interpenetrating triangles or other designs drawn inside the circle.
Allow your mandala to unfold with as little thought as possible.
Let go of all your ideas about how a mandala should look. Virtually
anything round can be viewed as a mandala; the sun, the moon, a
clock, the earth, a wheel. Octagons also have mandala shapes. Square
and triangles suggest mandalas too, since circles and triangles
may be drawn within squares and vice versa.
When you have completed your mandala, write the days sate on it,
and then put it somewhere in your living space where you can walk
by and see it often. Let it be part of your life for a few days.
Be open to receive any message it has for you. The colours, shapes
and numbers of a mandala can show us our inner picture. Like the
symbols in dreams it is thought they hold a specific message and
by meditating on it was can reach a higher awareness of self.
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MASSAGE the
kneading, pressing, rubbing or stroking of muscles and the soft tissues
of the body for therapeutic purposes. Massage therapy is an ancient healing
art practiced by all cultures that was first documented in Chinese writings
around 3000 BC. Today it is a popular, non-invasive and safe alternative
therapy known for its physical, psychological and even mystical benefits.
There are different schools of massage based on these three effects.
The physical school of massage concentrates on producing physical benefits,
such as pain relief, relaxation for tense muscles, increasing blood circulation,
and stimulation of lymphatic drainage, which promotes the removal of toxins
from the body. It is perhaps best represented by 'Swedish massage', so
named because it was developed by Swede, Per Henrik Ling in the early
nineteenth century. Most masseurs today are taught six classical massage
movements as defined by Ling; effleurage, petrissage, kneading, hacking,
cupping and tapotement.
The primary focus of holistic massage is physical and psychological benefit.
This school works on the whole person and incorporates theories of energy
medicine into its practice. The masseur works to balance the flow of the
universal life force through the body whiles also providing physical benefits.
Psychological benefits include the reduction of stress and promotion of
feelings of well being because of the release of endorphins into the body
after a massage treatment. Shiatsu, Rolfing, reflexology and aromatherapy
are examples of holistic massage.
The 'spiritual' school of massage may or may not involve physical massage
and its primary aim is to align energies in the body. Examples of this
type of massage school are therapeutic touch, reiki, zero balancing and
polarity therapy.
MEDICAL INTUITIVE
A person with a specific spiritual healing ability who has learned to
hone and apply skills of intuition to the filed of medical diagnosis.
A medical intuitive can visualise the anatomy of the human body and its
energy field, the aura, and correctly diagnose the root causes of disease
and poor health. They can then direct their healing energies to the afflicted
area.
A gifted medical intuitive uses their intuitive powers to 'see' and pinpoint
specific illnesses, imbalances, weaknesses and pre-clinical disease states
in the organs of the human body, as well as fields of force or auras around
the human body. This work is done by intuitively scanning the body for
areas of imbalance that may need alignment or treatment. Often the medical
intuitive will be able to explain the connection of the energy to an emotion
or an event causing the illness.
The most widely known medical intuitive diagnostician was Edgar Cayce
who claimed to be able to read many aspects of a person's health intuitively
and his focus centred on the health of the energy body and the physical
body. Cayce proposed that stress, attitudes and emotions affect ones health
and that negative emotions released toxins that could create energy depleting
imbalances. He believed that all illness is the result of overloads and
blockages in these three main aspects of energy - physical, mental and
spiritual. In one of his readings, Cayce said 'Healing of the physical
without change in the mental and spiritual aspects brings little real
help to the individuals in the end.'
MEDITATION
A contemplative technique of focusing your concentration on a specific
object or thought for self-improvement or spiritual growth.
The supreme goal of meditation, typically practised by the non-secular
world, is union with the absolute. Secular mediators use meditation in
their daily lives to create feelings of calm or open in body and soul
and to improve health, creativity, self-esteem, success and relationships
to cultivate psychic powers and gain self-knowledge. Meditation by itself
cannot achieve these goals but it can help develop the power and ability
to do so.
MEDIUM Mediumship
is the receipt of information that is not available through the normal
senses, typically from spirits of the dead. Mediums serve as a channel
for communication between the living and the dead. They may also heal
and produce physical phenomena, such as the movement of objects. A medium's
communication with spirits is often governed by entities known as controls.
Some psychical researchers believe that so-called controls are not spirits
but are secondary personalities of the medium instead.
Typically mediumship manifests in adulthood, but early in life there may
have been indications - a child hearing or seeing things others do not,
for example. Often a medium will resist the gift but gradually begin to
accept it as unavoidable. If the mediumship is to develop into a real
skill it often requires training. There are some who believe mediumship
is an inherited characteristic but this is generally not the truth. Many
mediums have no family history of mediumship.
METAPHYSICS
is a branch of philosophy concerned with the study of first principles
and being. Its central doctrine is that all things are part of one main
source [intelligence and energy], and that each thing, animate or inanimate,
should be respected for its particular form of this one main source; therefore
each thing has an independent function and all are contributing to the
main source.
In recent times, the meaning of the world metaphysics has become confused
by popular signifiers that are actually unrelated to metaphysics. Magic
and the occult, for example, are not so much concerned with the metaphysical
enquiry or the nature of being; through they do tend to proceed on the
metaphysical assumption that all being is 'one'.
MIRACLE is
something that happens beyond the scope of reality and it typically occurs
within a religious context. Miracles are usually attributed to a divine
and/or supernatural power that intervenes in the normal course of events
and changes their expected or predicted outcome. Examples include miraculous
healing and changes in weather that the weather forecaster had failed
to identify.
Modern scientific views of nature, and therefore the definition of miracle,
fall roughly into two schools of thought. The rational materialist view,
dominant in the nineteenth century, attempted to explain everything in
terms of matter and energy, governed by rigid laws that determine all
events. In this view the supernatural is an illusion. In the twentieth
century, however, a less rigidly deterministic scientific model of the
universe began to emerge, thanks to mainly Einstein's theory of relativity,
Heisenberg's quantum theory and growing acceptance of the minds control
of the body. Many scientists therefore have been more willing than before
to admit that there are 'more things in heaven and earth' than nineteenth
century scientists realised. This is not so much an acknowledgment of
the supernatural as it is a willingness to include in nature what may
seem supernatural according to our present knowledge.
MUSIC
the ability of musical sounds to influence positively or negatively health,
mood, morality and consciousness has been known for centuries. Music as
form of therapy has been used in almost all cultures for healing, meditation
and exploring consciousness.
In Eastern traditions sound vibration has long been used for healing and
spiritual development, combined with chants, musical instruments and movement.
The ancient Chinese believed music to be the basis of all things and Confucius
stated that if the music of a civilisation changed, then its society would
change too. The ancient Greeks believed in the healing power of music
for insomnia and anxiety. Aristotle believed that music affected character.
Pythagoras found that all music can be reduced to numbers and concluded
that the universe could be similarly explained.
According to modern research the elements of music that have been shown
to have physical and psychological effects are rhythm, tone and pitch,
interval [the distance between the notes] and timbre [the nature of the
music which creates associations in the listeners mind]. It is thought
that music's beneficial effects are due to the principle of entertainment,
a physics principle in which stronger vibrations cause weaker vibrations
to begin pulsing in the same harmony. Therefore music is able to entrain
the body, mind and spirit by affecting physiological rhythms, and studies
have indeed shown that music can alter pulse rate, brain waves and blood
pressure. It can also help release emotion, ease physical pain, induce
relaxation and encourage the release of the bodies feel good hormones
- called endorphins.
Music therapy, which focuses on the areas of pain relief and stress reduction,
enjoyed a revival in the late twentieth century largely due to the work
of violinist Helen L. Bonny, which book 'Music and Your Health' [1973]
was the first in a series of books and features on the health effects
of music.
Music can also have toxic effects on the body. Some forms of music, such
as heavy metal, have been shown to negatively affect the health of plants
and animals and have been associated with depression and aggressive behaviour.
New age music, which came to the fore in the 1970's, has been criticised
as bland and tuneless, but supporters believe that it can expand consciousness
and foster physical and psychological well being.
MYSTICAL EXPERIENCE
an experience on which a person transcends the bounds of ordinary consciousness
to awareness beyond time, space and the physical.
Mystical experiences are typically spiritual but not necessarily religious,
a person need not be a monk or a nun to have once. According to a 1987
survey by the National Opinion Center in Chicago, over 40 per cent of
American adults claimed to have had some type of mystical experiences.
Psychologist William James believed that there were four characteristics
of mystical experiences:
1. They are difficult to describe or convey to others.
2. Time and space are transcended.
3. Although they seem eternal in real time they are fleeting, lasting
only a few second.
4. The individual feels swept up and held by a separate power and this
may be accompanied by a feeling of separation from the body, as is the
case with out of the body experiences.
James believed
the simplest type of mystical experience was that 'ah ha' moment that
bursts upon a person when a new insight occurs or when sometime is seen
in a new light. He also believed déjà vu was a simple mystical
experience. Higher up the mystical experience ladder he placed sudden
awareness of the absolute and a feeling of unity with it.
Typically mystical experiences occur when a person is alone and feeling
relaxed. A number of things can trigger a mystical experience including
dreams, music, art, daydreaming, light and words. Although experiences
are included by techniques such as hypnosis, fasting, chanting, prayer,
dancing, creates control and meditation.
Mystical experiences are said to flood an individual with immense joy
and a sense of gratitude, wellbeing and, in some instances, ecstasy. Awareness
of the body seems to be lost and bodily functions slow right down. The
rise of powerful kundalini energy and the physical sensations associated
with that are also reported, as are paranormal powers such as levitation,
clairvoyance, materialization and so on. Mystical states are also frequently
characterized by light and heat, but in the very highest states all physical,
mental and emotional sensations fall away. A dramatic change in life circumstances
typically follows a mystical experience.
According to Freudian psychology mystical experiences are illusions, and
psychologist Carl Jung regarded them as liberations of the unconscious.
Humanist psychologist Abraham Maslow described certain mystical experiences
as 'peak experiences' which were therapeutic and essential to health,
wellbeing and development of potential.
Some scientists think that mystical experiences is a brain function that
can be induced by stimulation of the temporal lobes, which lie beneath
the brains hemisphere. At the turn of the twentieth century British doctor
John Hughlings noticed that epileptics have different temporal lobes from
others, and in 1933 American doctor Wilder Penfield was able to induce
mystical experience phenomena in epileptics by stimulating their brains
with electrical currents. Although the lobe theory remains controversial,
in the 1970s and 80s the relationship between paranormal experiences and
the temporal lobes was established further with electromagnetic stimulation.
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The General
Discussion Group
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Professional Discussion Group
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Some of Steven and his colleagues have created an online resource to support
them in their work given that due to the nature of their international contacts
the Internet offers an excellent way of easily keeping in contact and up
to date. If you would like to explore and if it relates and will support
your professional work
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