To: alt.magick
From: tyagI@houseofkaos.Abyss.coM (tyagi mordred nagasiva)
Subject: Peripheral Perceptions; Advice (9409.prphrls.tn)
Date: 49940715 
Quoting: |liuk@starbase1.caltech.edu (prudence) 

|...since I've started [doing magical things]...I feel more confident,
|self-assured.  Reccurent nightmares that I've had for many years are
|now changing to better endings and then disappearing altogether. 

Burgeoning will.


|Great!  BUT...for the last month or so I've also started to "see"
|things out of the corner of my eyes.  A lot!  Usually at about eye
|level; sometimes closer to the ground.  When I turn, there's nothing
|there.  

You are becoming aware of UFOs.  No kidding.


|What's going on?

We project stuff into our experience all the time.  Sometimes
it is important to us, this projection (in prediction, some say it
enhances and becomes the Sight or Vision associated with Myrddin).
Sometimes it is completely undeserving of our attention, like static 
on the experiential radio-set.

UFOs (unidentified Flying Objects) are seen all the time.  Usually
they remain unidentified and are of no lasting value except to feed
into the Cthulhoid-Space-Alien-Gods-Invasion-Mythos.

What you are describing can be used as psychic bolstering if you like
or ignored as fluctuations of your developing instrumental awareness.
One way to use them is to consider that they are fragmented aspects
of your Shadow-self, blipping into your consciousness just as they
disappear into your integrating whole.  Another is to consider that
you are drawing 'evil energies' which must be fended off, which would
intensify the process of will-expansion, eventually leading to a kind
of 'Rebirth' experience (the classic 'Born Again' cycle that so many
fundamentlists pursue without understanding).

I've been ignoring them for years and these days they only come up for
me when I'm on the edge: e.g. lacking for sleep, recently startled by a
very loud noise, all alone in a dark, unfamiliar place.  Doing grave-
yard security shifts put me in touch with a shitload of demons, let me
tell you!  Centering directed awareness (accomplished with flourish
by 'banishing spells', resolves the fear into experience and pranayama
(breathing power or relaxation into oneself) will allow persistent
activity during the pain, awe or horror.
  

|I've come up with 4 possibilities:
|1)  I'm attracting "something(s)" by my actions

A somewhat antagonistic worldview, but it can be effective.


|2)  I'm somewhat nervous about what I'm doing, even though I'm not
|aware of any nerves, and that's causing me to overreact to visual noise

That's how I tend to approach it, trained rationalist that I am.
I have experimented otherwise, of course, summoning demons, but
the above is my default and I find it quite effective.


|3)  The two are completely unrelated

They are related in that they are the explanations of experience within
which you you appear to seek composure.


|4)  I'm wacko.

Meaningless and only good when there are few alternatives or when you are
attempting to lodge a very severe blow to your psyche.


|Question:  Anyone with more experience care to make a diagnosis?

Diagnosis: take a warm bath with candles.  Listen to some Kitaro.
           Do some yoga or meditation.  It's like gas.  It *is*
           possible to learn to enjoy this flux, and it can be a
           discipline all in itself.  Nothing to worry about overly.
 

|heavily interested in the "occult" and tried all sorts of things such
|as ouija boards, crystal balls, and "sceances".  Never got very far. 

Good sign.  Most are a waste of time, especially as the general
public uses them.


|to experience was the feeling of being watched; occasionally "seeing"
|things, "hearing" things.  

Shadow-self watching, hoping you'll make contact.  Some equate this
with your HGA watching over you.  If you were given strict Christian
preprogramming prior to scientific indoctrination, then be sure you
decide how to tell 'demons' from 'angels'. :>

I wasn't, and for me they aren't different from one another (cf dakinis
in Tib. Buddhism and 'djinni' in Arabic culture).


|These unsettling experiences, along with my
|emersement in science, led me to abandon the whole thing.  

Excellent demonstration of will-exertion (based on fear or no).


|Later, I
|told myself that my experiences were the fantasies of a child.  But I
|was never fully convinced of that.

Good.  Convictions and certainties will destroy your ability to perceive
the infinite diversity of human experience.  Become convinced of anything
and you kill some aspect of your soul.


|still wrestling with childhood ghosts, 
|prudence.

Many cut themselves off from these entities forever in their stupidity.
That you have retained some connection is promising as I see it.  If you
wish to find some means of interaction rather than continuing to banish
them (I never do banishings, formally, though I do meditate upon occasion),
then find yourself a language (symbolic) and generate some momentum behind
the communication.

I used tarot for years, gleaning responses from my HGA.  It *is* possible
to retain the strict scientific training and continue in the occult, but
philosophical acuity is needed to ferret out the stupid assumptions that
would otherwise prevent contact and Conversation.

Look at it this way: wrestling is a form of play.  Perhaps you can find
out what your playmates want to do and form a kind of bonding with them.
Some would of course recoil in horror at the mention of 'pact', yet they
see the world in terms of duodimensionality and tv-soundbyte fictions.

Proceed with caution and listen carefully to your intuition.  Beyond this
there is absolutely no advice which may be applied with consistent and
beneficial results.

tyagi
tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com