2016 should be Magick!

I thought I would start the year with my version of reality.  I'm aware that I sound crazy to many people when I go off on this particular tangent.

After a 20 year slog through comparative religions, eastern philosophies, western philosophies, mythologies, shamanic practices, animism, and 20th century fads, I found that I had gathered my own set of beliefs.  When an evangelical asks me what religion I am or where I go to church, I explain I have my own religion and go to my own church regularly.  I can say it honestly enough, and few continue their quest to add me to the ranks of their own mega church after that.  (I realize it might be the crazy look in my eye that makes them drop it).

But while it is not a lie, it doesn't fully explain anything.  Early on, I made the mistake of getting more detailed, and those same people that are so very literal with their own holy book, get quite demeaning of beliefs that "stretch the boundaries of believability"  I fully understand that statement, as it is what started the 20 year trip into libraries and esoterica when I was 19.

Amazingly, few of my beliefs are set in stone.  Most of those are fully compatible with physics laws--though perhaps utilizing those holes in what we know to allow for the mystical.  I love that light is a particle and a wave, and that we can't mate Quantum to Relativity---still.  Keep working on it, though, because I'm quite sure that my changeable beliefs can accommodate that.

I like the words GOD and GODDESS, though goddess is currently my favorite, as all the God-headed religions seem to focus on keeping women in roles that are both subservient and convenient to men's usage.  That definitely stretches my boundaries of believability.  It almost defines the reason that those beliefs were not just thought but also spread about and maintained.

I also like Magick and  I like it with the K at the end, because it seems to make it less Vegas and more mystical and amazing.

When I was 17, I wrote a stupid research paper about early hominids focus on God and finding explanations for the world around them.  The whole point was that humans hunt for god, for meaning, not just scientific explanations but a mystical, spiritual connection with the world.  Science explains, but spiritual things connect us.

I knew even then that it was possible that was  some instinct; like the salmon returning to the same place to reproduce or the swan mating for life.  It is part of what makes us human.  It might be some sort of crossed wire that makes our brains need more mystery or purpose, but it is a part of us.

Traditional religion can meet this need, although I think it might be why fundamentalism becomes so insane.  The need for a connection gets warped.  The need for that feeling of connection to something more is not necessarily filled by organs and and hymns, tradition and ritual.  While the beliefs contain stories of Magick--transmogrification, miracles, healings--promises of eternal life, eternal virgins, eternal paradise, they don't really involve current magick, just stories of it.

I think we need to live with magick.

I see a movie where lightning bolts shoot from the mans hands, a witch creates a fog out of dried bat and fresh herbs, an elf touches a snowflake and changes it to a diamond that can guide you to your destination---I'm entranced.  Those things should be possible. When someone annoys me I want to be able to point at them and have their ink pen change to a feather.

So my beliefs include Magick.  Although, like most that believe in Magick in this day and age, I don't expect it to be a fireworks show, but subtle, ritualized, reconnecting me to the earth and the sky.

I think we all need that connection.  Need it with our souls, our spirits, or just our cross-wired neurons, but we feel the need.   We need the mythology to help us, like poetry or art or ritual--feel that connection.  Need the freedom to think things that are not already set in stone, to dream our dreams and wish our wishes and feel a part of the song that is where and when we live.

I'm hunting for Magick this year.  I'm going to find it..