How to visualize and visualization tips

You visualize every day. Unfortunately, it's probably not in your favor. By default, human beings have a negative bias, meaning we're more likely to think of adverse outcomes. Desiring to avoid our perceived threats can change our behaviors and bring our fears to life. What's even more concerning is that this confirmation can further validate negative beliefs, and a feedback loop of self-destruction ensues.

If our thoughts create our actions, if we could better control our thoughts, we could better manage our actions. Unforatuenaly, most of our mind is subconscious and operating on its own volition. So in truth, you can never really control your mind. However, what you can do is learn to consciously leverage the Hypnogogoic state, a natural part of the human experience, for your advantage. 

Understanding the hypnogogic state

In simple terms, the hypnogogic state is a liminal state of awareness between wakefulness and sleep. While the consciousness is transitioning from its waking state to sleep, it becomes increasingly malleable to new information. Meaning if you learn to work with this state of consciousness, you can improve your life areas.

How do you enter the hypnogogic state?

Now, this probably sounds challenging and like something hard to learn. It's not. I share a process on my youtube channel that can help you practice. When you dedicate time every day, you'd be surprised what you can accomplish. However, you can also google Yoga Nidra.

What is Yoga Nidra?

Yoga Nidra, or psychic sleep, is a branch of yoga focused on entertaining and sustaining a hypnogogic like state while in a guided meditation. Before modern sciences understanding the mind or the potential in this state of consciousness, ancient yogis used this state to plant new habits and philosophies into their consciousness.

We aren't doing that practice exactly.

I mention Yoga Nidra, not in an appropriative way but more as a reference for established practices with similar concepts to help you better build your unique understanding. Ultimately, every system works best when calibrated to your preferences; I'm just offering you an established template as a reference to develop the necessary skills before you embark on your evolving visualization practice

How do you start to visualize?

Before visualizing, you need to take time and think of what excites you. While you can work on imagining more than one scenario, it's best to start small and build up from there. I'd suggest honing in on one tangible thing you'd like to manifest to begin. Next, you'll need to unpack how it would feel to accomplish or experience your objective. 

Feel the completion

Think of the feelings you would associate with something you'd like to manifest. Let's say you want to write a best-selling book; how would that feel? You'd probably feel accomplished, proud, excited, and maybe even ambitious about your next project! 

You've likely experienced the emotions associated with achieving your goals at some point in your life. So you know how they feel. Now all you have to do is draw to mind that feeling when you enter a meditative state. Don't worry; I'll outline a practice at the end.

See your life with your completed goal.

Professional boxers and fighters have successfully predicted when they score winning punches in fights by visualizing the outcome. However, when they are doing this, they generally aren't thinking of the physical winning punch. They are thinking of what happens after.

The surge of excitement knowing the fight is over, the ref confirming the win, and final the seal of approval from the crowd's roar. They can see the camera's flashing, the undulation of a packed house of people, and their opponent receiving medical attention. They can feel the incredible sensation of cold water entering a parched mouth and taste the coppery flavor of blood. My point being, successful visualization is about absorbing and expressing the background details of your objective as much as if not more than the actual objective itself.

Get granular

You want to break your objective down into a series of parts. Let's view it as internal processes and external processes.

• Internal processes include thoughts, feelings, emotions, sensations, etc.

• External processes include other people's reactions, sounds, sights, etc.

When you visualize things, you want to trick your mind into thinking you're living that scenario. When you consider the events of our lives contain both internal and external processes, you realize how vital they are to successful visualization. 

Putting it all into action

Let's run through a quick exercise to give you all the information you need to start your experimentation with visualization.

• Think of three small, tangible goals you'd like to manifest.

• Out of the three things, which one is the most plausible in your life now? 

• If you did accomplish it, how would that feel?

• What thoughts would be going through your head?

• What would your life look like during this manifestation?

• Who else would be there with you?

Repeat regularly

Once you've got a clear picture of how accomplishing your goal would feel and look, it's time to put it into practice. If I'm honest, you're going to get the best results if you do this at least once a day for at least 30 days. The absolute minimum I would suggest would be doing it every other day for 30 days. Eventually, it will be easier to create the thoughts and feelings associated with your objective, don't worry or feel rushed. 

More to come on this topic in the future.

I've barely scratched the surface on this topic, but I feel confident that this article offers enough information to serve as a starting point. My primary intent is to create a general outline of my methodology and off it free of charge to people looking for this type of information. Once I accomplish the broad foundation, I can expand on the original concepts further. 

Optimism is a spell

Positive thinking has to be one of the most cliches, misunderstood, and beat to death concepts in all of spirituality. However, it's threadbare for a reason; there is some truth to the foundational idea, but the current approach misses the true power.

I was recently taking a members course by Gordon White of the Rune Soup podcast, and he mentioned the idea that optimism was a spell. The idea instantly began turning in my brain about how much more potent of a concept this was than the watered-down hermeticism of LOA. 

Before we dig into the topic, I must explain something; just thinking positive, happy thoughts is not enough. You can't spiritually bypass your way through life with saccharine sweet rose-colored glasses. At some point, you have to stop and swallow the bitter pill of reality if you want to make any meaningful impact. 

The first thing is accepting that you don't see the world as it is. You see the world how you THINK it is. That's a pretty big distinction. However, learning to be the observer of your thoughts is one of the oldest meditative principles known to man. Unless you can accept you're living in a fantasy world, you're doomed to stay stuck. But that first big bite of reality after the curtain drops and you're revealed in your rawest form isn't pleasant. It's downright painful. However, that's where the utility of optimism being a spell comes in.

Perks of optimism as a spell

• It doesn't negate the reality.

• Science can verify the impact.

• It means we can utilize it.

It doesn't negate reality like the law of attraction.

Unlike the positive thinking of LOA, optimism doesn't imply avoiding the truth, merely looking for the best possible aspect of current reality. It's the mental equivalent of learning to turn lemons into lemonade. Likewise, finding the best in a bad situation doesn't mean you don't acknowledge the bad or address it or live in fear of speaking of it; it means saying welp, that was shit, but at least I learned a lesson. 

Science can verify the impact.

I'm not going to bring up all the research; you can do the footwork yourself. So instead, I'll mention something that I take to be common knowledge, the placebo effect. If you're not familiar with this term, this is when an unsuspecting individual takes an inert substance, and they receive similar benefits to active medication. Western medicine has broadly accepted this as a fact of life, but there are obvious limits.

What does this mean on a personal level?

How you think about the situations in your life impacts your physical body, or in even more direct terms, your thoughts impact reality. However, if we accept that thoughts can make us well and create positive changes to physical reality, the opposite must also be true; they can make us ill and create unpleasant changes in the material world. Understanding this means that a strategy is needed to maximize the benefit and minimize the challenges.

How to use optimism as a spell

First things first, you've got to get honest about your circumstances. If your life is fucked up, you're working a dead-end job, you are in a dead-end relationship, or you're just a loser in general, say it. The new age concept of spiritually bypassing reality for the sake of avoiding crushing your feelings doesn't help you or anyone. So take the sting and then get on to the medicine. Remember, many other people have been in shit relationships, worked shit jobs, and been total losers but turned themselves around, so can you.

Next, you have to open up to the idea that things can change. You don't have to believe that things WILL change, just that they CAN. Maintaining this distinction from the law of attraction helps reduce the likelihood of falling into a delusional relationship with reality. Getting lost in confirmation bias and not looking at facts in a grounded way can lead to some pretty disastrous results. Let the evidence speak for itself, and don't deny what the data is telling you.*

*There is an intuitive aspect to this process, but it's nuanced and best discovered by yourself. Sometimes you have to step out on faith and the discernment needed to make wise choices when these times arises from an honest assessment of reality, not rose-colored glasses.

Lastly, it would help if you had a willingness to consistently re-enchant your world with optimism. Forewarning, it can get exhausting, and it's arguably more work than the Law of Attraction, at least initially. The reason being the LOA only focuses on love and light. I'm asking you to feel the world kicking the shit out of you, find the lesson while it's happening, and smile while doing it. The only thing that keeps you going sometimes is the fuck you attitude of not letting the universe break your spirit.

Shit happens

Optimism as a spell acknowledges that you aren't responsible for everything that happens to you. Still, you do have control over what those events mean to you. On the other hand, LOA makes your thoughts, words, beliefs the cornerstone of every problem you have. Now look, I'm all about taking responsibility for your mistakes and your life but telling myself I didn't get an outcome I wanted because I had doubt or negative self-talk about a situation is bullshit. Those things may cause issues at times, but there are other forces at play in the universe than me, and sometimes, there is no valid reason for why things happen; sometimes, shit happens. 

Turning trash into treasure

Life will shit on you at times. Ignoring that fact can make you miss a lot of lessons and growth. The advantage of optimism is you can say, "well, life just kicked the shit out of me, but what was the lesson in that shit show." You don't have to go through the cognitive gymnastics of neurotically agonizing over every word to keep the law of attraction from bringing bullshit to your door. You say how you feel and invest your energy into moving forward.

Closing Thoughts

Law of Attraction is a good set of metaphysical training wheels that can show you the power of your mind. However, at some point, you may want to upgrade your paradigm. Using optimism as a spell helps center you between the truth of the moment and the hopes of a better outcome. It gives you a clear target to work towards instead of living life from the rearview mirror. In the years ahead, we will need both clear-headed discernment and to heavily enchant optimism.

How to use affirmations for a happier life

Words are spells, and thoughts are things. However, most of us fail to recognize that truth. The human mind has a negative bias, and without some intentional pushback, we end up casting binding spells on ourselves. While this may sound like the ravings of an unsound mind, I invite you to suspend your disbelief for a few minutes and step into a world weirder than you might imagine. 

Words are magic

Chances are you've heard the magical phrase, "abracadabra." It's become a cliche term used by stage magicians the world over. However, it's unlikely that you know its origin or meaning. Abracadabra is an ancient Aramaic word meaning "I create as I speak." So what?

As I mentioned in the opening paragraph, the human mind has a negative bias. "The negative bias is our tendency not only to register negative stimuli more readily but also to dwell on these events." Additionally, the more we entertain specific ways of thinking, the stronger our mind is wired to think in similar ways. Meaning, unless you're consciously combating your biology, you likely have some unhelpful ways of thinking about the world.

Science Fact, Not Science Fiction

At first glance, it's easy to dismiss the saying "I create as I speak." Saying you're a millionaire doesn't magically make a million dollars appear in your bank account. If this were the case, I likely wouldn't be writing this article; I'd probably traveling the world. The truth of this statement is so subtle it's easy to miss.

How we speak reflects how we think and how we think impacts how we perceive life. Let me give you an example.

You start your day late for work because you overslept. In the process of rushing out the door, you stub your toe and accidentally spill your coffee on your shirt. Now you've got to change your shirt, making you even later. By this point, you and most people are already writing off the whole day as a bad day. In reality, it's just a few unfortunate moments, but we've opted into seeing it as an entire day down the tubes. 

While that may be an incredibly benign example, consider the implications of applying that thinking to significant periods of our lives in general or even yourself as a person. The consequences could be pretty dire.

Negative Cognitions

At the time of this writing, I've been in therapy for almost five years. Much of that time has focused on correcting negative cognitions. A negative cognition is a maladaptive self-assessment or negative belief developed from negative or traumatic life experience(s). These beliefs are the conclusions that we have about ourselves based upon our memories. Many of these from in your childhood then eventually become self-fulfilling prophecies. Sometimes we even unintentionally reinforce them with self-destructive patterns.

Here are some examples that I've dealt with personally.

• I am not loveable

• I am worthless

• I am ugly

• I cannot be trusted

• I cannot trust myself

• It's not ok to show my emotions

• I don't belong

• I should have known better

If words are spells, which I believe them to be, then negative cognitions are black magick or curses. While some may have malicious roots, most arise from an absent-minded statement that sticks with us. They could initially come from a family member, teacher, friend, or lover, but we continually recast the magick every time we utter the phrase in our heads.   

Breaking Black Magick

While this may receive some pushback, it's my experience that black magick's only real power is your belief in it. When we stop finding those things to be accurate, they stop having the ability to impact us. However, disbelief in long-held truths is a process that requires consistent effort. Remember, by default; the human mind perceives situations negatively; negative cognitions add some extra resistance to rewiring your brain. Thankfully, we can make space to start to reprogram how we think about ourselves.

The Power of Thought

After rigorous testing, science has widely accepted the placebo effect as a reality. What is the Placebo effect? The phenomenon of people receiving benefits from otherwise inactive substances through belief alone. While generally applied to the medical field, the actual impact of belief impacting reality is equally viable in most avenues, especially thought. 

Healing with words

Affirmations are essentially short phrases that offer emotional support or encouragement. While grasped upon by the New Age to questionable ends, you can leverage this practice for profound self-healing. However, just as your negative cognitions didn't develop overnight, affirmations will take time to work. Additionally, words themselves are just a starting point, but we'll look at that in a moment; for now, let's create affirmations from my negative cognitions.

• I am not loveable = I am loveable

• I am worthless = I am worthy

• I am ugly = I am attractive

• I cannot be trusted = I am trustworthy

• I cannot trust myself = I can listen to myself

• It's not ok to show my emotions = I can express myself

• I don't belong = I belong

• I should have known better = I am learning; mistakes are part of that process

Thoughts follow actions

I'd love to tell you that uttering affirmations alone would be enough, but they aren't. They offer support, but they don't have much sustainability unless we start changing the behaviors associated with our negative cognitions. Remember, negative cognitions often also condition a set of self-destructive behaviors, which will continually create situations to reinforce our old beliefs unless corrected.

Defining our Intent

The secret ingredient to affirmations is positive self-esteem. I get it; this may seem a bridge too far, which is why I'm discussing this in the context of magick and not traditional therapy. An indispensable aspect of magick is intent.

“Intent is not a thought, or an object, or a wish. Intent is what can make a man succeed when his thoughts tell him that he is defeated. It operates in spite of the warrior’s indulgence. Intent is what makes him invulnerable. Intent is what sends a shaman through a wall, through space, to infinity.”

— Carlos Castañeda

No particaption trophies

I can’t hold your hand and tell you everything will be alright because I respect you too much to lie to you. There are some things in life that unless we face them, will have serious negative impacts on our lives. That said, I do empathize with the impossible gap between negative self-image and generating self-respect. I had to cross it myself and I know the struggle. However, I don't do you any favors by telling you that it's easy; in my experience, it's been the hardest thing I've ever done. As toxic as the old concept of picking yourself by the bootstraps can be, sometimes you have to make yourself do the impossible. Thankfully, I'm not going to leave you empty-handed, and I can share what I've had to do. 

1) Why do you want to change your self-talk?

Feeling better about yourself is a great start, but you will need a more significant reason when the inevitable roadblock comes up. My reasoning for wanting to change how I thought about myself was to help others. I'd suggest finding a purpose that puts you in direct service to other people.

2) Practice Gratitude

This statement can sound like a sucker punch when your life is shit. However, I'm not asking you to bask in your suffering; I'm asking you to focus on maybe the one or two things that are going right in your life. If you can't find one or two things, think harder.

3) Do Esteemable Things

Most of us lack self-esteem because we aren't living in ways that make us feel good. However, there is a big world out there that is in dire need of help. Getting up off your ass and doing something good for someone else can have a significant head change, especially if you train yourself to do nice things without being asked and without telling another person.

In Closing

Words matter, and how you talk to yourself and think about yourself will impact your life. However, you cannot expect to make any lasting changes to your life so long as you continue to perpetuate the behaviors that feed into your old thought patterns. We live in a biological, psychological, and sociological world. They are interconnected systems and create lasting change; we need to work on all three areas actively.

How I learned to meditate even with ADHD

Meditation is such an essential part of my daily life that it's hard to believe I couldn't sit still for more than a minute at one time. Now, I meditate several times a day, lead guided meditations, and teach others some of the techniques that have helped me find deep meditative states. What helped me learn to meditate wasn't the cliche of "clearing my mind" or focusing on my breath. It took lots of subtle shifts in daily activities, attitude, and practice. Here's what I learned on that journey!

1) Meditation is a practice.

You don't have a good meditation or a bad meditation; it's all meditation. Even as someone who meditates at least two times a day, there are times when it can be harder to settle. This restlessness isn't a reflection of me doing something incorrectly; it's a symptom of being human. Life isn't static, and we will have days when things can be more challenging.

2) Meditation is about letting your mind clear, not clearing your mind.

I've got no clue where that misconstrued concept arose, but you can shed that idea now. I liken the intention of meditation to the following example.

Place a pencil in the middle of a rubber band and hold both ends while twisting the pencil. Continue to do this until you notice tension or resistance building. Stop turning the pencil and observe the force; this is the state of our minds. Meditation is when you let go of the pencil, and all of that tension is released. Regular meditation gradually releases your built-up stress, and clearing your mind is the result of this process. 

3) Face your demons

In some yogic traditions doing preliminary inner work was suggested before meditating. They believe that meditating before doing this work can potentially have harmful consequences. My experience was different because I used meditation to face my demons. That said, meditation isn't always "peaceful bliss."

Sometimes what prevents us from meditating are the very problems we need to face in meditation. To meditate, you have to be willing to observe your feelings without making a judgment call about them. Otherwise, the rubber band I mentioned early on will never release. Meditation is mainly about sitting with yourself, your feelings, and your surroundings

4) Exercise before meditation

Yoga and meditation go together like peas and carrots. In some yogic traditions, it's common to practice a set of yoga postures or "asanas" before meditating. Yoga activates your parasympathetic nervous system. The parasympathetic nervous system initiates a process of rest, repair, and relaxation. Entering a meditative state is much easier when your parasympathetic nervous system is active.

5) Diet impacts meditation

What you eat impacts how your mind functions, and while it makes sense, most of us never stop to think about it. Some more apparent foods that can impact your mind are high in sugar and caffeine, but they aren't the only ones. Dairy, soy, gluten are other foods that have the potential to impact your mind negatively. Last but not least, staying hydrated also has a massive positive impact.

Meditation Aides

The previous observations are just the tip of the iceberg in making it easier to start and maintain a meditation practice. Some tools make the experience more pleasant. Here are five meditation aides that I use regularly.

1) Meditation Cushion

When I started meditating, I would sit my butt on the floor and try to stay still. The problem is my crappy posture often made my back hurt a minute or two after starting. Instead of meditating, I was constantly working on ignoring pain or readjusting my body. Then I got a meditation cushion.

I'm not sure if this is unique to me, but when I sit on a meditation cushion properly, I have better posture.

2) Zero Gravity Chair

Up until a few years ago, I thought all meditation was sitting still and silent. Then I was introduced to Yoga Nidra, a form of meditation practiced lying down. While traditionally done on the floor, I had the opportunity to try it on a zero gravity chair and was instantly hooked.

Zero gravity chairs can support your weight evenly and effectively relieve lower back pain due to stress and tension. While you may not have any lower back issues, the experience of meditating in this type of chair is worth it alone!

3) Noise-canceling headphones

The world can be a pretty noisy place, and sometimes there are too many distractions to relax. Thankfully, you can carve out your auditory escape route with a decent pair of noise-canceling headphones. While I'd advise against using these every time you meditate, they can be a great way to tune out the world when needed!

4) Binaural Beats*

Without getting into the science behind it, binaural beats are tones that guide your brain function in certain states of consciousness. I've personally found that I can easily fall into meditative states by regularly listening to Alpha or Theta waves. Think of them as training wheels.

*You need to listen to binaural beats through headphones for them to work. I use apple Airpods Pro.

5) Essential Oil Diffuser

If it's not already obvious, smells impact how we think, act, and feel. To prove my point, think of a time when you smelled something delicious, and it sparked your appetite, causing you to lose focus on the task at hand. Some scents help us relax, boost our mood, and can even help us concentrate. Lavender is one of my favorite essential oils for relaxation!

Hopefully, you've enjoyed the meditation tips and tools I've shared so far! I know they've all made a world of difference for my practice. But I'd like to share one more thing that's helped me learn to meditate, experimenting with different types of meditation. Here are 5 of my favorites types!

• Mindfulness Meditation

• Visualization

• Movement Meditation

• Guided Meditation

• Yoga Nidra

Over the years of building my mediation practice, I've combined several methods and tips previously mentioned into a sequence that makes it incredibly easy to fall into and maintain a meditative state. While using one of these methods or advice can help make it easier to meditate, collectively leveraging them has a snowball effect.  

As with any habit or skill, small amounts of daily practice builds momentum. Gradually we rewire our brains, and achieving meditative states becomes easier. Once we have a good handle on mediation, we have much more leverage for working with other modalities.

How do you start a meditation practice?

If you're new to meditation, there are a few things that can help start a new practice.

• Set a date to start

• Start small - 1 minute a day is better than none

• Have a quiet and distraction-free space

• Hold yourself accountable

• Maintain this habit for 30 days

• Build onto it as needed

Final thoughts on meditation

There's so much more to share on meditation, but you've got a lot of new tools to unpack first. Meditation isn't something you study on the sidelines; the more you learn without taking action, the more likely you will overcomplicate it. Start now, start small, stay committed. 

In the next post, I'll explain how affirmations can help repair broken self-image and lead you to a better life!

How your schedule impacts your magick

Over the past few months, the blog has focused on filling in some gaps in my story. While it was mundane and lacking any magick or spiritual wisdom, it was necessary for me. With that out of the way, we can get into some of the good stuff. Before we get into magickal and spiritual practices, though, I'd like to start with an often overlooked aspect in these topics.

How you schedule your day impacts your magick.

One of my biggest strengths is the variety to which I've approached life. I've embodied the directionless habits of a drifter in my twenties, and I've lived a disciplined routine that bordered on monastic living in my thirties. What I've found is that both of these hold access to different angles of approaching magical powers.

One thing I learned from my psychedelic 20's was the Timothy Leary axiom "set and setting." While my party days are long behind me, this statement touches on how physical and emotional settings can affect your day. Another way of thinking of this is that the structure of the external world impacts your consciousness.  

I've found, though, that not only does the structure of your external world help construct your consciousness, how you schedule your time also influences how your mind works. Understanding that magic relies on your mental framework or consciousness, it also stands to reason that if schedule impacts consciousness and consciousness impacts magick, your daily schedule impacts your magick.

In my experience, I've found three distinctive states of scheduling time. Each state has its attributes, flavor, and personality. Two of these scheduling methods are extreme, and the third is a hybrid of beneficial aspects of the previous two. You have to embody the two extremes to the tipping point to access the third in my experience. However, you might be able to do so and as with anything I say, take it with a grain of salt.

Here's a quick overview of the types of magick

Structureless Magick

Composed of: Unitnetional oddities, weird experiences, associative sync

Lifestyle: Carefree lifestyle that doesn't have any cohesive organization. The schedule can change daily and is out of control of the individual.

Limitations:  Has a life of its own and can lead one to madness.

Structured Magick

Composed of: Intentional odd experiences, Manifestation of desires, 

Lifestyle: Disciplined lifestyle that has a clear pattern. This schedule is routine and is the foundation of success and happiness in life.

Limitations: Restrictive and can eventually orient one towards greed.

Flow Magick

Composed of: a blend of intentional and unintentional weird experiences

Lifestyle: Has daily objectives but does them as appropriate to the needs of that specific day. There is enough structure for the benefits of structured magick to bled through and enough fluidity for structureless magic to flow freely, creating an optimal life experience.

Limitations: Can be challenging to maintain initially, requires discipline and ability to set your schedule. 

Let's take a more detailed look.

Structureless Magick

In my twenties, the guiding compass was driven chiefly by random hedonistic impulses. The openness of this approach to my schedule allowed for the unexpected to be a common occurrence. It led me to exciting places, unique people and was the generative force of some of my best stories.

It seems the more space we make for the unexpected, the more we allow the universe to move us into new directions. To steal a phrase from Gordon White, we are "moved around the board." The openness of this lifestyle leaves space for other forces to influence some of your decisions and actions. While this can be invigorating, it can also be frightening and lead to some disastrous places, as my story shows.

Structureless magick has its own life and inertia. As such, the absence of restraint or coherent structure; will eventually lead to disaster. However, when channeled properly, it can create excellent results. I would posit the freedom of this model is essential to harnessing true power. However, to conduct structureless magick beneficially, we need its opposite, structured magick.

Structured Magick

Most of my thirties were about rebuilding my life as a result of uncontrolled structureless magick. Building implies structure, and considering all I had was rubble, I had to start with the foundation. The foundation for me was structure and routine.

Structure and routine offer something tangible to your life that better prepares you for the inevitable hardships that will arrive. Regularly engaging in the same set of constructive habits is akin to building a root system. It will support growth and sustain life. 

In my case, this was the restoration of my psychical, emotional, mental and spiritual health. The wellness in these areas also positively impacted developing a business, better social skills, healthier connections, getting out of debt, and self-reliance. Effectively structured magick was a catalyst for correcting all of the imbalances of structureless magick. 

The problem is at some point, structure and form become prisons. They are devoid of movement and inevitably become rigid. Over time, anything that does not bend will break, and life will eventually present situations that disrupt your routine and habits. Which, for me, resulted in panic attacks, anger, defeat, and a whole slew of other emotions.

Thankfully, life has a grey area, and here we enter into Flow Magick.

Flow Magick

Flow magick is the effortless act of being that has aspects of both structured and structureless magick working in harmony. It consists of having things to do but not being too committed to accomplishing them in any particular order or fashion and instead allowing the day to unfold organically.  

When you create enough randomness for unique experiences to occur and sprinkle in enough structure to maintain a level of coherence, life takes on a new form. It's more potent and visceral. You can blend the best aspects of two opposite ways of living into one harmonious expression of life, but it takes skill.  

The basic premise is the understanding that things happen on a different timeline than your own. You switch off the clocks and time systems that the rest of the world live by and tune into the universe's pulse. This process is incredibly destabilizing because we are shedding one operating system and switching to another. 

Flow magic is primal.

Society has influenced the mind and the way the human being interacts with its environment. Before living in cities, life allowed more space for the mysteries to play. Now we've unfortunately seemed to build layer upon layer of disconnection, with our days saturated in distraction. However, we can tune in to a more primal state by creating a different structure to our lives.

No alarm clock

It's shocking how much this can impact your day. Let your body sleep until it feels rested, and then get up and go straight into meditation. You want to tap into the power of the theta state your mind is naturally in upon waking. You can maximize this benefit by also using theta binaural beats through a set of headphones. 

Daily Meditation

Meditation orients your mind differently. We are looking to approach the world from a calmer and more centered perspective. It's necessary for navigating the world outside of the traditional approach to scheduling. Most modern techniques to schedule focus on productivity, while meditation focuses on awareness.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness is the practice of being fully present in the moment. Think of it like taking some of the practice of meditation to active parts of your day. You are observing the very act of being alive and the experience for what it is. In a non-stop society built on frantic impulses, the ability to fully experience a situation with your senses is a blessing.

Listen to your body

Your body is trying to tell you things all the time, but most of us aren't listening. When we crash during the workday and need a nap or unplug for a few minutes, many of us can't. When you ignore what your body is telling you, it distorts your intuition and makes it harder to function in a natural state. 

Don't judge

Part of flow magic is also letting your emotions be. That doesn't mean we don't investigate our feelings and what's causing them; it means we don't label them as good or bad. All emotions are carrying messages; we've just become shit at decoding them. When you stop viewing your feelings as good or bad and embrace the feeling as information about an experience, you open yourself up to an opportunity for learning.

Switching over to a flow magick lifestyle

In the future, I will be working on outlining what I perceive as one path to accessing the state of being that is flow magick. There are many different roads to the same destination, and you are encouraged to take what works for you and discard the rest. Until then, stay diligent on your path, and we will chat again soon.