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  • IIH Step VIII by André Consciência

    IIH Step VIII by André Consciência

    Introduction

    Franz Bardon’s Initiation Into Hermetics (IIH) is a structured training system for self-mastery and enlightenment through mental, physical, and astral exercises. Step VIII is that mythical step everyone keeps talking about, for it marks the transition from self-mastery to deeper engagement with universal forces and, consequently, gives basic maturity to follow on to Bardon’s other books, and to any other magical or spiritual system. 

    Before I go on, let me add that I do not advise leaving IIH to follow on other journeys. If you wish to engage with other systems all the better to do it, but keep working IIH until you finish it. The definitive game changer is in the assumption of the Godhead, and that doesn’t take place until later, nor can one operate with the magic mirror or be lifted into the spheres. Were it for me, I would not have advised Step VIII as the mark to follow fully unto The Practice of Magical Evocation and The Key to True Quabbalah, but step X. 

    That being said, Step VIII makes sure the practitioner has achieved and maintained a high level of elemental balance, has deepened their navigation of the mental plane consciously, and the practitioner now works with the pure essence of elements within the Akasha, the primordial substance underlying creation, a practice that showers creative abilities on all planes. As Step VIII develops this connection, the practitioner further influences the material and subtle worlds.

    Fluid condensers and talismans, introduced earlier in IIH, are now utilized with more potency, integrating mental, astral, and physical aspects, practitioners build the magic mirror, learn low magic and how to control the electromagnetic fluid and prepare for Step IX, where the focus shifts toward achieving a direct connection with divine consciousness and engaging in divine magic. In Step IX the skills and powers gained ensure the practitioner can handle the immense saturation and responsibility of advanced magical operations.

    Since Step VIII has been a suggested topic, let me tell you why I think it is such a crucial step. It is not because it prepares you for evocations when you can’t yet unite with divinity (consciously as in step X or ecstatically as in step IX) or travel to the elemental kingdoms to gain enough magical stability in the mental planes, or, for that matter, even operate the magic mirror. Step VIII is truly important because all it asks of you requires true mastery of all steps behind. And when I say true mastery I mean not true specialization but maturation. 

    Step VIII Mental Training

    Here we start taking our first steps in the mental body, exploring not yet the spheres or elemental kingdoms, but the mental plane in our surroundings. Let us examine how each mental step before is crucial for achieving this efficiently.

     Step I masters thought control. When in the mental body your mind is in the driver’s seat. Just like when driving a car, if you can’t control the wheel you either won’t get far or you will end up where you shouldn’t. 

    Step II masters concentration exercises regarding our five senses. I tell you, the mental body has no sensory system. When you imagine the senses, they start forming in the mental body, and not before. So, without this, you may as well leave the material body, but you will be deaf, mute, and senseless.

    Step III starts combining the senses and concentrating on more complex structures. When Step II starts forming the sensory organs of the mental body, Step III begins to make them operational and teaches them how to function naturally.

    Step IV teaches you transplantation of consciousness. Without it, you can’t possibly transplant yourself into your mental body. 

    In Step V you learn the depth point. You will need it to control the mental body from the center, else you will only be able to use it like a gamer playing a computer game from his or her seat, as transference to the mental body won’t be complete. One also learns the so-called space magic. Without it, it will not be possible for you to control your environment in the mental plane.

    Step VI teaches meditation on your spirit and how you may become conscious of the senses in the spirit. There is much to say about this. I have seen students tell Bardon never taught one how to distinguish between mental, astral, and physical bodies, doing a couple of exercises with the chakras that are supposed to do this instead. The whole IIH is based exactly on this distinction, and in this step it becomes quite palpable, to the extent that your mental body is literally possessing your astral body and the material body via the astral body. It could be suspected such students never completed all steps of IIH, or didn’t understand the words of step VI, or simply didn’t take it seriously. If step II and III gave a sensory system to the mental body, step VI will give it the structure of the human body itself or, in other words, the so-called mental body (to be clear, having a mind is not the same as having a mental body).

    Step VII calibrates the elements in the mental body. Without this, no stability is possible in the experience of mental wandering. 

    Practice (how to further master this step flawlessly)

    Preparation

    0 Start by what you have learned in Step VI, taking control of the astral and physical bodies via the spirit. Then test it via what you have learned in Step VII, by focusing on your will and infusing it with fire, then infusing your eyes with this will-fire, and imagining the fire outside. Then, sense your intellect and give it volume through the air element, load your ears with it, and practice acoustic imagination. Sense your feeling, give it volume via the water element and infuse your perception with it, imagining emotions. Sense your consciousness, infuse it with the earth element, load your taste and smell organs with it, and practice expanding your consciousness this way. Finally, tap into your conscience, infuse it with the akasha, and have the akasha-conscience infuse your whole being and the macrocosmos itself, imagining realization. This should get you set and ready.

    1 Observe your thoughts for five minutes, fix them for five minutes in the concept of pure light to the exclusion of everything else, remove the fixed thought of the light and remain in vacancy of mind. 

    2 Keeping your mind vacant except to the practice, start imagining around you the mental plane, or that all things become subtle and of a mental quality and nature. 

    3 Deepen this state by using all senses, sensing the quintessential perfume of things, listening to their mental vibration, seeing their mental oscillation, feeling their emanation, etc. 

    4 Start separating your mental body as suggested in step VIII, transplant your consciousness to it and eventually to its depth point, taking control from the center.

    Exercise

    00 Start by doing exactly what Bardon tells you to. Once you are more or less used to it, add these new layers.

    0 Perform the preparation (to be performed before each step, each step representing a different session unless stated otherwise). 

    1 Once outside in your mental body, sit observing your thoughts for about 10 minutes. 

    2 Sit fixing a thought for 10 minutes.

    3 Sit in vacancy of mind for 10 minutes.

    4 In your mental body, start imagining as in step II, then as in step III. 

    5 In the mental body, detect an object, animal or person, and transfer your consciousness to it. 

    6 In the mental body, imagine an object, animal or person, and transfer your consciousness to it, to its depth point, and take control from the inside.

    7 Before you leave to the mental body, impregnate the room with the mental quality, the subtle quality of the mind, free from the conditions of time and space. When you leave, once in the mental body, impregnate the room with its material dense qualities. This will help when you visit other persons, confer if objects check with how they were in the physical plane, etc. Later, you can do different experiments, like infusing the room in the mental plane with light, the akasha or a certain element, and see what happens. 

    8 In the mental body, reformulate IIH’s Step VI mental training, making sure the so-called mental body isn’t in any way in possession of the spirit, but that it is the other way around.

    9 Finally, in your mental body, focus on your will and infuse it with fire, then infuse your mental eyes with this will-fire, and imagine the fire outside. Then, sense your intellect and give it volume through the air element, load your mental ears with it, and practice acoustic imagination. Sense your feeling, give it volume via the water element and infuse your perception with it, imagining emotions. Sense your consciousness, infuse it with the earth element, load your mental taste and smell organs with it, and practice expanding your consciousness this way. Finally, tap into your conscience, infuse it with the akasha, and have the akasha-conscience infuse your whole being and the whole mental kingdom, imagining realization. This all should get you set and ready for mental operations that are in no way abstract and diffuse.

    Step VIII Psychic Training

    Here, we work The Great Moment of Now, in which I should include no clinging to the past and concentration disturbances as a compass to the magical equilibrium, since mastering The Great Moment of Now implies mastering the other aspects. We also begin to train the electric and magnetic fluids.

    Once more, let us examine how each psychic step before is crucial for achieving this efficiently.

    Step I teaches introspection. The Great Moment of Now is not about not being introspective and simply diving into drugs, sex, and rock and roll. It is constant introspection that allows you to identify and maintain the Great Moment of Now constantly.  

    Step II masters the ennoblement of the soul and leads to magical equilibrium. Without it, not only can one not link the Great Moment of Now to the Akasha, leaving the now to constant excess, as one cannot master the electric and magnetic principles. Without magical equilibrium, any powerful experiment with the electric principle will result in physical burnout, and any mighty experience with the magnetic fluid will lead to mental dispersion.  

    Step III has one being able to internalize and manipulate the elemental fluids inside. Without this, it simply isn’t possible to amass enough elemental fluids to generate electric or magnetic fluids. As well, the great moment of Now, hermetically speaking, requires elemental fuel to be maintained. That is why most people who cannot master the astral fluids internally resort to drugs and alcohol, erotic exchanges, or radical sports to live in the now, or go live wild adventures in nature, so they get the elemental substances from the outside or from material situations that are charged with them.   

    Step IV produces and accumulates the elements in the body harmoniously according to its analogous regions, and is a densification of Step II when it comes to its usefulness in Step VIII. Step II works in principle, Step IV in substance.  

    In Step V you learn to project the elements. This is required mostly to manipulate their sublimated form in the magnetic or electric state.

    Step VI teaches you to work with the akasha and to enter its trance state. This is the temporary version of experiencing the Great Now permanently, and therefore an introduction that will allow us to anchor the Great Now in its true nature, the Akasha. While this great Now in its true nature is the qualitative manifestation of the akasha, on the other hand, electromagnetism is the direct quantitative manifestation. Without the akasha, without its source, this quantitative aspect must consume the magician or whoever comes close to the magician. 

    Step VII works on your extrasensory abilities. These abilities are beyond the constraints of time and space, and teach you how to live beyond the constraints of time and space. If the great Now cannot exist beyond the limits of time and space, we may call it the small now. A now that is constricted and blind, unable to understand its patterns, instead of a now that is omnipresent and present.

    Practice (how to cultivate the Great Moment of Now)

    The great moment of Now is something that almost no one seems to talk about in the Bardon community. But it, itself, is the royal compass of one’s magical equilibrium, as all imbalances draw one away from presence (and, consequently, from the present). Balance is built on presence and builds presence, imbalance is built on absence and builds absence. 

    Let us assume you have mastered Step VIII exactly as Bardon suggests and can now deepen it to the point of maturity. Introspection by now should have become a mode of being, so that once a day what you will do is check your soul mirror and see if balance is being sufficiently maintained, and run it against any signs that you are not in tune with the great moment of Now. This may be subject to some mistakes at first. If you have plans for the future that may still be a valuable part of the Now: who doesn’t know the expectation, as a child, when Christmas is drawing near and we feel every breath? Plans for the future can be good, unless these plans are preventing you from being present. And if they are, it is our attitude that must be studied. 

    Be that as it may, right after you do this daily exercise, you should immediately rectify your attitude if it is wrong, or enforce it if it is right by: reception of food (a cookie may suffice), the magic of water (a cup of water), washing the hands using the magic of water, and by using commands of auto-suggestion. At this time any auto-suggestive command you give is likely to be loaded with elemental power and be accompanied by the gestures of the fingers, controlling the elements via the akasha. 

    After this is done, you should breathe in the elements sufficiently and in similar quantity, one by one, through all pores, and program them to keep you present in the now. The universe should be made of the element when you are breathing it in, and the element should have the quality of presence in the great now. Then you arrange the elemental accumulations according to each zone of the body (e. g. earth for the limbs and root of the spine, water for the abdominal region and bladder, air for the chest region, fire for the head).

    You repeat then the accumulations (with the same quality and effect) and project the elements around you in a circle (or project them directly from the universe), so that fire is at the part of the circumference at the south, air at the east, earth at north and water at west. All around you, then, is the Great Now manifesting, and you are in its very depth-point. 

    You create a second layer of this effect by entering akashic trance in the depth point of your own body, seeing your body as the manifestation of the Great Now and you its center. From here, you load and open your clairvoyant eyes with ease, like you are simply drawing in breath, and repeat with the other senses and extra-sensory abilities. 

    Finally, you work with the electric and the magnetic fluids according to step VIII, now loading the whole circle and the whole body with the elements until you get to the respective electric and magnetic fluids. In the electric fluid you strengthen your active powers in the spirit and crystalize your presence in the moment of now, that is:

    There is a sense of intensity and alertness as you sit in the seat of willpower, fully alive in this moment of burning vitality. All lingering thoughts about the past and future have been burned away and all mental clutter has been consumed. Your mind is clear and you are focused, enthusiastic and joyful, your feet well rooted in the Now. You have a limpid perception of the rhythm of your breath, of the lungs filling in and emptying out, and even though you are alert there is no tension. Your harmonious awareness flows freely and unhindered by time in the vast, open sky of the fullness of each moment connected to each moment in the flow of existence. You are vibrant, illuminating, and steady.

    In the magnetic fluid, you empower your passive powers in the spirit and keep crystalizing your presence in the great moment of Now. Meaning that by the end of it:

    You become receptive and immediately accept all emotions as they arise, aligning them with the present before they gain their own separate momentum. You see your inner states very clearly and remain detached. You have let go of control in exchange for flow and adaptiveness. You sense the ebb and flow of nature, your feet feel like they root into the earth and the unchanging reality of the Now. You have become more aware of your heartbeat, steady and unshaken by the tides of time. Your presence becomes timeless and unwavering, your attention draws to physical sensations, textures and the interplay of movement and solidity.  Stable like the earth and flowing like water, you are fully immersed in this moment of calm receptivity and unshakable grounding.

    Make sure the passive powers do not eclipse the active powers, and vice-versa, spending time to regulate both together. Finally one distributes the magnetic fluid throughout the feet and abdomen up to the pit of the stomach, and the electric fluid to the head, neck and chest. 

    This exercise ends here. But should the magician wish to heal someone through the might of the great Now, they have but to compress the electric fluid to the right chest and move it to the right hand, the magnetic fluid to the left chest and move it to the left hand, then heal the upper part of the person with the right hand and the lower part with the left hand. Should something more thorough be attempted, including healing physical conditions and symptoms, once should pose:

    1. The electric hand in the forepart of the head and the magnetic on the back.
    2. The magnetic hand in the right side of the head and the electric hand between the left side of the head and the middle.
    3. The magnetic hand should catch the forepart, back part and right side of the neck and the electric hand the left side of the neck, this hand healing all the way to the inside.
    4. Both hands should be placed in the forepart of the chest.
    5. The electric hand should be placed in the forepart of the abdomen and the magnetic in the back part. Then the electric hand should be placed in the left side, and the magnetic hand in the right side.
    6. Finally the magnetic hand alone should be placed upon the last vertebra and anus, focusing only on the inside. 

    Step VIII Physical Training

    Here, when it comes to influencing through the elements, we learn to deal with the so-called low-magic. When it comes fluid condensers, we give our first steps towards external alchemy. Both aspects deal with exactly the same influences from the previous steps.

    In Step I we learn to become aware of the body, of its interaction with things and how to manipulate this awareness to cultivate internal states (such as conscious reception of food, water, conscious washing, etc).  

    In Step II we learn to control the so-called prana directly, which is also called blood-magic, and in Bardon we do it via breathing and body-positions or asanas that influence the circulation of blood (although this has no direct mention). While before we were taking hold of the quality of awareness, in Step II we start to approach quantity-power. We also come from being aware of the body and controlling the awareness of its processes, to start directly controlling the body.

    Step III has one enchanting or vitalizing the body and the elements that interact with it, the body’s environment, its surroundings. In other words, consciousness takes hold of quantity and quality and starts to create its own sphere, we start to deal with the mystery of alchemical transmutation.  

    Step IV deals with the so-called dramatic magic, or ritual/ceremonial magic. First we controlled the body through magic, now we can make the body control magic.

    In Step V you learn that the elements outside are not only vital and influencing the world inside, as the world outside is inhabited by intelligence itself, manifested by different intelligences from the invisible plane, with which we are to enter passive communication.

    Step VI teaches you that also the world inside is inhabited by intelligence, via the creation of beings. These intelligences come to inhabit and influence the outside as well. The effort is to become conscious of this process.

    Step VII works with the deliberate creation of such beings, and on how to place them or give birth to them in the outer world. This is still alchemy, the creation of the homunculi, etc.

    By the time we reach step VIII, we are to deal with either elemental spells or fluid condensers by manipulating our awareness of the physical elemental substances or fluid condensers and how they influence us in quality, and we must change them or load them via quantity. We must transmute the substance, control its inner spirit and, especially with the spells, we must include it in a dramatic action that entails the substance, the body and the psyche as a single act of the spirit upon matter, which creates deliberately the being that takes action and makes sure certain phenomena come to pass. More or less dramatic, the fluidic condenser suffers from the same, as the simple act of loading it by raising one’s hand or gazing upon it entranced is a theatrical act, in the ceremonial sense of the word. If the magician has indeed mastered the previous steps, this happens naturally and more or less automatically just by following the instructions on Step VIII. But, after we come to a grasp of Step VIII, we can still make it less automatic and more conscious. 

    Practice (taking as an example The Influence Through the Fire Element – Combustion)

    1 Diet

    By diet we mean not only what one chooses to eat or to stop eating, but how one eats, how one washes, and how one breathes. Let us say we wish for the fire element to help us find a lost object. We should choose a diet that helps clairvoyance (because clairvoyance is directly connected to fire). 

    Firstly, we opt for foods that are easy to digest and free from toxins, reducing the energy required for digestion and allowing more energy into our desired intent. Foods should also be natural, fresh, and minimally processed, in other words, clean. 

    Substances that can cloud perception and interfere with the subtle energies needed for clairvoyance like alcohol, caffeine or nicotine should be selected out.

    Then we start by practicing conscious reception of food in the following recipes:

    – One small plate of blueberries, raspberries, citrus fruits, grapes, and pineapple (loading it and consuming it with the present tense desire of obtaining enough vitality for clairvoyance).  

    – One small plate of spinach, kale, carrots, sweet potatoes, and beets (loading it and consuming it with the present tense desire of cleansing ourselves from any obstacles to clairvoyance). 

    – One small plate of walnuts, almonds, flaxseeds, and chia seeds (loading it and consuming it with the present tense desire of enhancing brain function and intuition).

    • One small plate of quinoa, brown rice, oats, and millet (loading it and consuming it with the present tense command to maintain the energy steady enough for the operation).  

    – One tea infusion of mugwort (loading it and drinking it with the command to keep our clairvoyance vivid enough) and one smaller tea cup of mixed chamomile, peppermint and rosemary (loaded and consumed magically to enhance clarity, psychic sensitivity and calm the mind).


    Into the plates and tea, a small mixture of turmeric, cinnamon and ginger should be sprinkled, the mixture being loaded to heighten spiritual awareness.

    Finally, to ensure the astral fluids flow freely, simply leave spring or filtered water in the soft sunlight and drink it often. 

    Remember to eat consciously, not only with magical desire, but with slowness, savoring so each bite aligns your physical body and your spirit, imagining the food nourishing not only your material body but also the astral and mental bodies, particularly in the region of the forehead, at the top of the head and in the eyes.  

    2 Body Posture & Breath

    Firstly, begin with your ritual to master the elements with the akasha. 

    After this is achieved, sit in the Padmasana (Lotus Pose) or Sukhasana (Easy Pose) (you should have mastered the asana until the simple act of entering the pose immediately leaves you in a meditative state and balances the mind). Here, use alternate nostril conscious breathing by closing the right nostril with your thumb and inhaling through the left nostril the element of fire into your whole head. Close the left nostril with your ring finger, open the right nostril, and exhale empty. Repeat on the other side, this time breathing in light into the eyes. Keep doing it until your head is a blazing sun and your eyes its two brilliant centers. Then, use a technique called Kapalabhati (Skull-Shining Breath) coupled with conscious breath, where you inhale deeply clairvoyance into your eyes and your skull, and exhale all doubts of success forcefully through the nose while contracting the abdomen. This forceful exhalation prevents the subconscious from having time to attract the doubts instead of expelling them. 

    Finally, lay in the Balasana (Child’s Pose) (again, this should have been mastered so that simply by entering the position you immediately ground and calm the mind while tapping into vision). Do not forget to let the forehead gently rest on the mat to activate clairvoyance.

    3 Transmutation

    Get that piece of flannel or blotting paper about 4 by 4 inches, mentioned by Franz Bardon (if not available, try a piece of ordinary paper), that has been immersed in liquid condenser and allowed to dry. Now put the paper in front of you and transfer into it the whole clairvoyant light of the left eye and the attached fire of the left side of the head. With the help of the imagination through the material elements, concentrate into it the realized wish of seeing clearly and beyond doubt where the lost object hides. Time the effect, whether you wish to see it instantly or during the day when you enter contact with something warm. 

    By passive communication allow your guardian genius to draw through your hand on the piece of paper a shape to help with successful clairvoyance on this regard, and give it full life via the animation of images (the elementary should form from the accumulated fluids poured from your left eye and side of the head).  

    Culmination

    At once burn the paper. During the combustion, concentrate on the fact that the power is released by burning the paper or flannel, inducing the grosser elements to give the nitid impression of the whereabouts of the object, to be received via your loaded and clairvoyant right eye.

    Conclusion

    If you can piece together all previous steps of IIH in Step VIII and work them as a martial art should be practiced, with full integration, I don’t see why you will not master Step IX and Step X in a matter of weeks instead of growing impatient.  

    Further Information

    Andres Teacher Profile
    Franz Bardon Tradition and the Golden Dawn

    Magic and Mystical Introspection – Path to Adepthood
    Gaining the sense of an Elemental
    Neo Shamanism with Andre Consciencia
    Free Course – Introduction to Magick

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  • Magic Soul Mirrors by André Consciência

    Magic Soul Mirrors by André Consciência

    Introduction

    For my book The Path of Ipsos vol I (Sirius Limited Esoterica) I was assigned the task of providing means for magicians to access the different magical currents throughout the ages of humankind (and not necessarily by reproducing tradition). This resulted in a mixture of historical and magical research in the magic mirror via the akasha. At one point, scrying into pre-medieval times and early medieval times, I found myself writing about precisely the topic of magic mirrors and scrying balls, captured from out of the peaks and chasms of intense instances.

    “The magicians would empower their crystal balls with their life source until the orbs became life sources for the magician himself, the two pulsing as one heart. They would protect this source with statues where they anchored elementals, they being the golems, so that any invisible force coming towards the magician (anchored in the orb) would have to break the stone of the golems first. To the orb they would then bind souls as an additional source of strength. (…) Magicians would also use magical mirrors so that everything they did on the physical as watched by the mirror would replicate on the astral. (…) To the crystal ball they would feed elementals, in order to achieve what they called the eye of the dragon, giving it intelligence, self-preservation and magical abilities of its own. They would compress the power inside the orb for operations of greater magnitude, having it become igneous as the wrath of God. (…) Finally, in a final blow of physical and mental concentration, they would shatter the orb, either gaining supernatural intelligence and the mark of insanity, expanding and fusing with their ancestors, or ascending to affect time bellow. But some would make of their Great Work the polishing of the orb instead through magical balance.”

    Soul Mirrors and Magic Mirrors

    In my “Through the Soul Mirror to the Sphere of the Sun” (Falcon Books Publishing), I write:

    The soul mirror is what distinguishes Bardon’s system of hermetic training from all other training systems of hermeticism or magic, for, having dominion over his mind and soul, the magician is already a master in any exercise he might attempt. Introspection is an essential ingredient to the formula, and without it, he hasn’t yet identified his mind or soul. An Olympic champion cannot perform without perfect knowledge of his anatomy, for devoid of such knowledge, his anatomy will trick him into failing or else it will break in its structure and destroy the athlete.

    There may be readers who do not know what the soul mirror is, and who do not know who this Bardon, that is mentioned, is. Starting with the latter, he is Franz Bardon, a Czech hermeticist, and one of the most influential authors of Western esotericism due to his clear, practical approach to personal development and magical practices. Considering self-mastery and discipline as the foundation for true magical practice, he became the author of Initiation into Hermetics (focusing on self-discipline and elemental balance), The Practice of Magical Evocation (on summoning neoplatonic beings and working with the astral and mental planes) and The Key to the True Quabbalah (sound, color and sensation as a cosmic creative language).

    Favoring practical learning over speculation, his work leans on balancing the elements and achieving consonance between body, soul, and spirit. He rejected the use of magic for selfish or harmful purposes and considered it a philosophical practice aimed at enlightenment. The main tool was… the so-called “soul mirror”.

    So what is the soul mirror?

    A tool of introspection described in Initiation into Hermetics, in other words, a method for gaining self-awareness by reflecting on character traits and categorizing them into strengths and weaknesses. It is the practice of seeing one’s soul clearly, as though looking into a mirror.

    These traits, or inner qualities, are not only identified as they must then be balanced to achieve magical equilibrium. The work takes the necessary self-honesty to recognize patterns of behavior, emotions, and thought processes that may hinder or support the Adept to be.

    How It Works

    First, create two soul mirrors, one is the black mirror and the other the white mirror. In the black mirror you list all your negative traits, weaknesses, or bad habits that you feel hold you back, such as laziness, impatience, greed, or fear.

    In the white mirror list all your positive traits, strengths, or virtues that empower you, like compassion, courage, discipline, or creativity.

    Secondly, link each trait to one of the four classical elements based on their nature:

    Fire: impulses, traits like anger or courage.

    Water: emotions, such as envy or empathy.

    Air: intellect, like indecision or clarity.

    Earth: stability, such as stubbornness or reliability.

    Thirdly, make use of the soul mirror to see which element is dominant or imbalanced in your character. For example, excessive Fire traits might indicate impulsivity, while a lack of Earth traits could suggest instability. Take, as well, the intensity of the different traits into account.

    Fourthly, balance the Elements by addressing weaknesses (negative traits) and nurturing strengths (positive traits). Also, elements that are lacking traits or impact should be strengthened, etc. This balance is essential for advancing in Bardon’s magical practices. Only by understanding and mastering one’s inner self can a practitioner proceed to the more advanced practices of Hermetic magic, which require a harmonious and disciplined mind, body and soul.

    It is both a psychological and mystical exercise, that brings together inner reflection with the metaphysical framework of the Hermetic tradition.

    In Through the Soul Mirror to the Sphere of the Sun, I use this mechanism of introspection together with magic for the creation and materialization in oneself of complete soul mirrors that allow for continuous magical progress. Among a myriad of things, I use the magic mirror to strengthen one’s connection to one’s virtues.

    Once the magician is taking large steps towards perfection, he will place a black card with the fluid condenser behind the glass (…) he is to use the mirror as suggested by Bardon when the author writes:

    Sit down comfortably in front of your mirror and load its surface with the akasha-element which you are sucking into your body by breathing through lungs and pores. The loading of the mirror with the personal akasha can take place whether by your hands or directly via the solar plexus.

    With the method implied in this passage alone, the magician can extend his knowledge of his virtues through the magical mirror by meeting directly with the akashic virtues, and he will witness by such ways powers that he probably never thought he would, but this is not where the work ends.

    So, what is this magic mirror and how is it different from the soul mirror?

    A magic mirror is a tool used for practical magical operations of clairvoyance, divination, occult communication, and projection into other realms. It is essentially a medium that allows the magician to access higher planes of consciousness or interact with beings.

    It can be a physical object, such as a polished metal surface, a black mirror, or even water in a bowl, used as a focus for the magician’s concentration. Franz Bardon gives a specific technique to build the material mirror but this is not the focus of our article. The mirror is loaded to be aligned with specific magical purposes. Not mentioned by Bardon, are the so-called mental magic mirrors, that can be created in the mind’s eye through visualization and concentration and used as a reflective surface for thought control, extrasensory perception, or projecting one’s consciousness.

    In sum, the magic mirror is used for gaining insight into hidden matters or future events, interacting with intelligences, as a gateway to enter the astral or mental planes, for protection and impregnation and, as seen in various instances in Through the Soul Mirror to the Sphere of the Sun, for observing one’s own elemental field and refining magical skills.

    Differences Between Magic Mirror and Soul Mirror

    AspectMagic MirrorSoul Mirror
    NatureTool for magical operations.Tool for introspection.
    PurposeInteraction with the invisible planes.Self-awareness and magical equilibrium.
    Physical FormTangible object.No physical form; it’s a metaphorical concept.
    FocusExternal: accessing invisible planes or beings.Internal: analyzing and improving personal traits.
    Role in Bardon’s SystemUsed in advanced magical practices.Foundation for magical growth.

    The soul mirror lays the groundwork for magical equilibrium and self-mastery, making sure the practitioner is mentally and emotionally prepared. Once a solid foundation is established, the magic mirror can be used safely and effectively for advanced practices. However, there is a flaw in this logic. The magician who supposed the soul mirror is simply a stage of the work, is the magician who will maybe fall from a very high place. In other words, advanced practices do not replace the soul mirror, instead they make for advanced soul mirror work.

    How, then, can I use the magic mirror together with the soul mirror?

    1. Starting with the soul mirror, you use it to prepare yourself, to guarantee clarity, focus, and balance when using the magic mirror.

    1. Use the soul mirror to detect tendencies that may break your focus. For example, excessive Fire (impatience) might make you rush the process, while an underdeveloped Air element (lack of imagination) will limit your ability. Remember balanced elements build a stable mental and emotional state, allowing you to use the magic mirror with precision.

    2. Use the soul mirror to set clear, meaningful goals for your magic mirror practices. Often when we fail in our practices it is for lack of purpose.

    3. Use your soul mirror to uncover doubts that influence your work with the magic mirror. For instance, use the black mirror of your soul to find a negative trait that you want to work on (e.g., fear, insecurity) and decide to focus your magic mirror sessions on summoning the energy needed to transform this weakness into a strength. The same way, use the white mirror of your soul to amplify a strength that can aid your magic mirror work, such as focus, confidence, or intuition. If you struggle with fear, use the magic mirror to conjure courage (a Fire element trait) and strengthen your resolve.

    This integration creates a virtuous cycle: the more balanced and aware you are through the soul mirror, the more effective and transformative your work with the magic mirror becomes.

    4. If your soul mirror identifies Water as a strong element, focus on using the magic mirror for emotionally intuitive practices, like exploring relationships or dreams. At the same time, if Earth is weak, use the magic mirror to connect with grounding energies or practical insights.

    5. Based on your soul mirror, create affirmations that impregnate the traits you want to nurture. For example: “I am disciplined and focused” or “I radiate confidence and courage.” Speak or mentally project these affirmations into the magic mirror while gazing into it. Have the mirror reflect these traits back to you, reinforcing them in your subconscious.

    6. Visualize a negative trait (from the black mirror of the soul) manifesting as a dark, cloudy image on the magic mirror’s surface. Imagine this darkness dissipating as you focus on your desire to transform it into a positive quality. Replace it with a clear, radiant image symbolizing the positive counterpart of the trait. Let us assume you are working on impatience (a Fire imbalance). If so, visualize fiery chaos in the mirror calming down and transforming into a steady, glowing ember representing patience and discipline.

    7. Begin by observing your thoughts, then move to vacancy of mind. Loading the mirror properly, use it to call your guardian genius or elementals associated with the trait you wish to balance. Look into the mirror (or visualize it mentally) and allow intuitive impressions, symbols, or images to arise. Reflect on how these insights relate to your soul mirror and how you can apply them to transform yourself. If you are competent enough with the magic mirror, you may simply engage in conversation, which includes all of the above and adds clairaudience, clairsentience and a limpid animated image of the guide through clairvoyance.

    For example, if working on self-doubt, ask for guidance on how to build confidence. The mirror may present symbolic images (e.g., a lion for courage) that are magically and powerfully charged with understanding and inspiration.

    8. Use the magic mirror as a conduit for channeling energy to strengthen the positive traits in your soul mirror by impregnating the magic mirror with a fluid from your chosen source (e.g., the corresponding elemental fluid) and getting the mirror to radiate the trait you wish to strengthen. Have this might flow into you, aligning with the corresponding element in your soul mirror.

    For instance, if cultivating resilience (Earth), one should have the mirror glowing with steady, grounding energy, breathing it in through all pores to fortify strength and stability.

    9. Allow the mirror to project a harmonious image of all four elements in magical equilibrium within you. Memorize it with all your heart and senses, and let it go. Then have it project the living image of your soul mirror, and temporarily connect your very soul to the magic mirror, generating a physical soul mirror, so when you manipulate the magic mirror you are modifying your soul mirror. Order the mirror to transmute the second manifestation into the first now and in the luckiest way. Become.

    Conclusion

    The magic mirror provides a palpable medium to deepen concentration and helps channel and balance elemental fluids related to your traits.

    Additionally, the mirror serves as a symbolic portal for becoming, making internal changes feel more real and actionable, as it links your work on the self with form and force.

    Andre Consciencia at Perseus Arcane Academy

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  • It’s Training Time! by André Consciência

    It’s Training Time! by André Consciência

    I have often and for long been asked about the time one should spend daily to progress well in magical training, or the number of times a certain exercise should be repeated for success.

    When I thought of addressing this issue in an article, my first contemplation was that the answers felt so common sense that it would turn into a boring article both to the reader and to the writer.

    However, since I have been asked this question often, I am compelled to change my thinking and realize that there must be a common ground from which this question arises and that it is not an exception, and the answer is not common sense.

    Both questions, how many hours of practice per day and how many times should an exercise be repeated, cannot be answered quantitatively if we are to remain honest. However, we can begin to try.

    Read other posts by Andre Consciencia as well as interviews here.

    How many hours should you practice daily?

    Firstly, if I were to follow the premise that you should practice an exact amount of hours daily, I would have to assess which time of the day, how many times a day, how many days a week, if the stomach is full or empty, what you ate and drank, if you have defecated and urinated, the amount of hours you slept, the amount of hours you need to sleep, what is your physical condition, weight, what sicknesses you have, if you smoke, if your temperature is usually high (time feels faster) or low (time feels sluggish), the speed of your metabolism, if the space where you practice is subject to constant distractions or quiet, the specific exercises, etc.

    Do you practice during the morning?

    Do you sleep through the morning? Or do you wake up early? That changes the meaning of morning for you.

    Do you practice during the night?

    Do you tire and sleep early, or do you bash on the vitality of the stars? Again, this changes the meaning of nighttime.

    How many times a day?

    If your time is completely free you can practice twelve times and it will just build up. If your time is completely taken you can practice twelve times and you will manage to build up a lot of stress instead.

    How many days a week?

    Do you work at home? Is your work schedule always rotating? Do you have a constant job or are you a freelancer?

    Is the stomach full or empty?

    Some people will tell you it is bad to practice on a full stomach. Others will tell you nothing important should be done on an empty stomach. Who is right? You get relaxed after eating. You build static when not eating. Advantages and disadvantages? Wait… What was the exercise again?

    We are not getting anywhere with this. Not if we try to address all the quantities that come with the original question, and let alone if we do not.

    Now, let us try to address the issue qualitatively.

    Theory

    Emotions and Mood

    When we are having fun, as they say, time flies by. Positive emotions lead to a state of “flow” and this “flow” is the nature of the Dao, the only state capable of making magic occur, as I try to transmit in Introduction to Magic.

    In other words, magic only starts when we lose track of time, and conversely of our sense of space as attached to time. Then, removed from time, the magical space activates.

    When we are stressed (which includes boredom, discomfort, and anxiety), on the other hand, time drags.

    We can conclude that if we spend two hours training during stress, it will not achieve as much as 10 minutes in a state of flow, and yet it will still look like you have spent four hours training.

    Maybe it is a much better idea to enjoy your time training and fully engage than to stress yourself with the clock.

    Novelty and Routine

    Is there a sense of novelty in your training? The more information you process, the more time you light up. The less information you take in, the more time burdens. Novelty has your brain processing information at high speed, even if the information is simply the silence of a mind empty of thoughts. So, maybe bring with you to the training that feeling of endless childhood summers when everything was new and an adventure. In 10 minutes you will process as much as in those two hours.

    Weeks blur together when adults compress repetitive experiences into a single memory, and yet time feels slow and heavy. Be careful that routine may not cut you from life, the only true master, and leave you a student who has been stuck for a decade on the same step.

    Attention and Focus

    If you look at the clock enough when you are training, or try to listen to the alarm, every minute feels significant. So maybe spend all your training looking at that clock, and you will have trained these two hours for 120 meaningful minutes.

    Sarcasm aside, intentional focus is the objective, nothing else. This is why Franz Bardon for instance gives you timers like ten minutes. It is enough to create focus, and not enough for you to make time the objective.

    With enough focus your consciousness enters an altered state where a few minutes can feel like hours or a few hours like a few minutes. This is what you are aiming for. Time cannot teach you magic and you do not need it, instead you learn magic by being above time and time needs you.

    Age

    Back to quantity, just for a little while, and where we can be both generalist and objective enough: if you are young you need to practice less because every time you practice it will fill more of your life experience than it would for an old person. The older you are, the longer you should practice daily, so magic has enough space to occupy a significant part of your life experience.

    Trance and Memory

    Trance can freeze time in memory, one minute in trance becomes an hour with a hundred divinely intelligent reactions. You may be fixing your thoughts on a single subject for one hour and constantly forcing yourself back to it without much success, or you may surrender to your task so much that you enter a trance state: then not only have you mastered thought control as transference of consciousness, depth point and what else in a single blow. But you will still come back to these later in your training, see another angle in the appropriate time, because your devotion tells you so, your love and enjoyment for the craft, not that Saturn’s tyrant called time. When entering the temple, leave that wild race of today’s life at the door.

    I have given just a few examples of how quality should be prioritized over quantity when it comes to training. A lot more could be said. Let us also not forget that each person is different and each practice is different and this consequently affects how quantity should be considered. Mostly, Hermetics is not a race through time, but against time, leaving only a present now. You are never “out of time”, but outside of time, from where you can access “all the time in the world”.

    None of this is to say that, for instance, staying one minute in vacancy of mind is enough to master the exercise if well done. Staying ten minutes puts your willpower to the test. However, you will for time to stop being a resource and become pure rhythm.

    Finally, how many times should I repeat an exercise?

    At this point, we can come to a satisfying answer. If the practitioner has mastered the qualitative key and, consequently, the exercise, he can choose to repeat it the number of times he or she sees fit for a certain outcome- and I mean quabbalistically, since the quality will have been imprinted on the decided number.

    Practice

    Here are some exercises to help you change your view of time during your practice.

    Relationship with time

    1 Set the timer to 7 minutes. Wait for the 7 minutes to pass. There is the past where you started the chronometer, and the future, when the chronometer will hit seven minutes. The past and future feel split, and the present disoriented.

    2 Set the timer to 7 minutes. During these 7 minutes, engage in your imagination with a deep, flowing and growing conversation with your most loved one.

    3 Notice the difference.

    Every time you are training, you are engaging with and getting closer and closer to the Loved One, to the Divine you wish your union with. If it does not feel like it, review your motives to practice.

    Synchrony

    1 Set the timer to 5 minutes. Loosely wait for these 5 minutes to pass. You may notice that while you wait for these 5 minutes to pass your mind engages with different concerns regarding the past or future or about something going on in the present within the distance of space. All the while, something feels disconnected. There is a sense of isolation.

    2 Repeat, but before you set the timer, have your mind synchronize its internal sense of time with you, the observer, creating a “time bubble,” where both the observer and the thinker experience time similarly.

    3 Notice the difference.

    If your practice does not make you feel like you are becoming whole you are only feeding a bad habit.

    Time in Depth

    1 Set the timer for five minutes and simply wait for it to pass. When it ends go about your life and then, the next day, recall these five minutes you experienced the day before. You may notice this meaningless task has shrunk in your memory, appearing void and fleeting.

    2 Set the timer for five minutes, use them to celebrate intimately with yourself the most significant event of your life.

    3 Notice the difference.

    If you train like it is meaningless, if you don’t know the meaning behind your training, or if it does not hold great meaning, there is no good reason to train. In fact, you are not training but wasting time.

    Agency

    1 Set the timer to 3 minutes. Get passively stuck with them. These simple 3 minutes are a dead end, a procrastination.

    2 Set the timer to 3 minutes. During these 3 minutes, feel in control of all your actions and decisions.

    3 Notice the difference.

    When you are training to master a certain skill, the training is about getting to know how you already master it. As they say, “you don’t know it until you feel it”.

    1 Set the timer to 5 minutes. During these 5 minutes, reflect about your past experiences and the uncertainty of your future.

    2 Set the timer to 5 minutes. During these 5 minutes, reflect about the uncertainty of your past and the certainty of the future magician in you.

    3 Notice the difference.

    It is this magician you want to bring with you to the practice. It is he who practices. You are him.

    Encoding of Time

    1 Set the timer to 2 minutes. Count the seconds and minutes.

    2 Set the timer to 2 minutes. You won’t likely be able to think of the numbers, but you will still be able to focus on the milliseconds. Do just that, leaving seconds and minutes out.

    3 Notice the difference.

    During your practice, you want to engage the cerebellum (as in 2), it will feed you with a power that the basal ganglia and cortex (1) can often inhibit.

    Time Distortion

    1 Go spend some moments on social media. Let it go on indefinitely. After you finish, notice how the constant stream of updates and new content can make it difficult to form clear temporal boundaries. Also notice the “time gaps” when scrolling through endless feeds, where nothing of significance is registered by our memory, leaving a sense of amnesia.

    2 Go spend time with your own mind. Let it go on indefinitely, engaging with it but not attributing any meaning to its manifestations. You will see that the mechanics are the same at play in step 1.

    This is the automatic mind you are to bring to your practice, it has been eclipsed by itself and time went with it. Any content that comes to the practice is not a manifestation of your automatic mind now, but a direct and undistorted manifestation of your willpower.

    Temporal Fragmentation

    1 Spend a couple of hours multitasking, like you probably do already if you are a busy person. Notice how time feels disjointed and how, with this, your focus is fragmented.

    2 Spend a couple of hours doing a single one of the many tasks you quickly performed during your multitasking. Perfect it, savor it, be intimate with it.

    3 Notice the difference.

    The magician is cyclopic in nature. Whatever task he or she has ahead, it is the absolute task. Apply it to your practice.

    Perspective

    1 Go do your practice. For the sake of example, let us say you are performing passive communication with the invisible ones. Imagine what it would be like if the spirit took your hand in order to write, or what it would be like if the spirit spoke through your mind, etc.

    2 Go do your practice. In the same example, imagine that the spirit is taking your hand and writing, until there is no other possibility and to the point of experiencing it.

    I suspect why some practitioners get stuck in IIH is because they did not realize everything Franz Bardon states about autosuggestion in the beginning is to be diligently practiced in every single exercise from there on.

    Language Shapes

    1 Describe out loud what you did today and yesterday, then what you will do today and tomorrow.

    2 After a while, repeat, but without using the past or future tense, as if your language only had the present moment.

    3 Notice the difference.

    During your practices, all must be holistic.

    Time Awareness

    1 Set the timer to 5 minutes. Look forward to the 5 minutes to pass and time to move past you.

    2 Set the timer to 5 minutes. Look up for the five minutes to pass and time to move below through you.

    3 Notice this difference between horizontal and vertical time.

    You want to move through your practices, you don’t want them to move past you.

    Conclusion

    No amount of time practicing will change your attitude toward practice and lead you to success. Without the right attitude, all you can do is collect countless hours of failure.

    Introduction to Magic

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  • Gaining the Senses of an Elemental, by André Consciência

    Gaining the Senses of an Elemental, by André Consciência

    Introduction

    I have written before about the elementals, from the mythological, psychological and cultural point of view, traversing different traditions in time and space and reuniting, as hermeticism requires, the various traces in a universal stance, from there and from the influence of the grimoires deriving the magical applications. I have written from research and personal experience and experimentation, philosophically, in what a grimoire is concerned, and in fable, from which I recommend Duende – Dreams of a Kingdom Under the Earth (Star Lore Publishing) and A Magical Study Series vol I – A Guide to the Elementals. Because of my previous writings, this article will not be introducing the concept itself, and will jump directly to the heart of the matter I have in mind: obtaining the senses of a sprite.

    Background  

    Franz Bardon, in Initiation Into Hermetics, writes:

    “Neither fairy tales nor sagas exist for the true adept, because they are to be understood as a sort of symbolism concealing many deep truths. It is the same thing with all the gnomes, nymphs, fairies and salamanders. Based on his own observations, the magician can convince himself that beings like these really do exist. On the other hand, a magically untrained person whose senses are thoroughly undeveloped is of course subject to the vibrations of the material world only and will never be able to form a mental picture of the existence of any other kind of beings, to say nothing of being convinced of this fact. Most people are preoccupied by the material mode of life to such a degree that they will not understand anything higher and subtler outside our physical world and least of all will they perceive it. It is quite otherwise with a magician who is developing his senses purposefully and therefore will see and perceive far more.”

    Yet, when it comes to obtaining the senses of an elemental, Bardon works only with the substance of the elemental (i.e. the magician loads himself with the Earth element in order to become a gnome) and the shape of the elemental, that Bardon recommends be sought on the magic mirror or through clairvoyant trance. In other words, shape and substance are involved, but not the senses. Surely enough and to Bardon’s defense, he does mention consciousness transference, hinting that the magician should perform it.

    “An elemental being can come to an understanding only with a congener, a fact that ought to be considered most carefully. A bird is well matched only with another bird. In the same way, an elemental being will have an understanding only with a congeneric being, i.e., a being of the same element. Provided it should like to come in contact with another being, it would be bound to adopt a human form and human qualities to approach man in the form of man. At this point the magician will realize why he had to perform transmutation exercises in the previous steps.”

    But when it comes down to practice, what is given is:

    “If the magician has convinced himself of the gnomes’ shape, he only has to mentally take the shape of a gnome. Moreover, he must identify himself with the earth element, i.e., load his whole shape with the earth element without any accumulation. Now the magician has to imagine nothing else but to sink down into the subterranean realm of the earth.”

    Because most readers read even occult texts at the surface level (and rest assured a good grimoire has about ten layers of depth and meaning), transference of consciousness will unlikely be practiced beforehand. 

    Even it being practiced, at the earlier stage in which the now formed magician is, capturing the senses of an elemental in their totality and with clarity will pose a great challenge. 

    Still, Franz Bardon gives us more than usual. Before I had come to the point where we work with the elementals and the elemental realms in Initiation Into Hermetics, I had tried the methods of Papus with the magic mirror, who writes in the “Traite Méthodique De La Magie Pratique”

    “The magic mirrors are essentially organs [instruments, vehicles] of condensation of the astral light, so that coal, crystal, glass and metals can be used in their construction, in their manufacture (…) … the simplest of magic mirrors is a crystal glass filled with pure water. It should be placed on a white napkin with a light placed behind. (…)  all these mirrors have the sole purpose of producing the effect of concentrating in one point, in a portion of the astral light and to put the life of an individual, the individual conscience, in a direct relation with the universal memory field conservative of all things, all facts, all forms.”

    He proceeds to say the eye will feel stings when fixing the mirror but, with prevalence, the hues will start to change and the shapes to appear. There is a folkloric consecration of the mirror and a prayer to Anael. Added, are some prayers to the elemental kings taken from Eliphas Levi, whose methods, Levi having inspired Papus, are sensibly the same as Papus. Concerning evocation, an interesting explanation of the tools is given, and we proceed to inscribe on them kabbalistic formulas and names. No explanation is given about why these names should be any special beyond their conceptual meaning, or even how the formulas work. 

    I had some vague impressions on the mirror, enough to understand there was an interference and that such interference was different from element to element.

    I had also reached the point in the Golden Dawn system where we travel to the tatwas, which is to say, to the elemental realms.  We relax and enter a meditative state, concentrate on a specific Tattva symbol, visualize the symbol as a doorway to the ether, and we penetrate that doorway with our subtle body.

    There is no loading us with the element (focusing on the tattwa symbol does it but too subtly and almost by accident, since there is no instruction) and no transforming our shape. Most of what I got were distant fading translations, human mental specters of what the elemental powers are at their very root. This took place from 2002 to 2003 and I still have the magical journals, the records meaning more presently than at the time, since analogy was at place. 

    Be that as it may, these experiences were extremely incomplete and poor when compared to the experiences brought about by Initiation Into Hermetics. So, did Bardon work for me? It did, to the point where I can now write this article. You may find it is difficult at first, traveling to the elemental realms and engaging. Your senses are diminished you are dispersed and the elementals you will find are dim and dispersed as well. For instance, if you look at a fire, it keeps flickering. It is hard to engage with a tongue of fire as it keeps moving, appearing and disappearing. The kind of salamanders you may find at the beginning are like that. But as you deepen your efforts, you deepen yourself as a salamander, and you find your kin: if you stop looking at the surface of the fire, the root of the fire is stable and sovereign. 

    Another thing that is not mentioned is you need to start being able to perceive the elementals through the material world, since the material world, and not a tattwa symbol, is the best window to understand the operations of the elementals. 

    This being a matter for another time, I shall proceed and give my instructions on how best to develop those elemental senses, so you do not start with your senses diminished and your perception scattered, finding relevant experiences and encounters much sooner.

    The Appearance and Subtle Senses  

    Gnomes

    In A Guide to the Elementals, while describing the gnomes, I include the following elements:

    Mental Body/Neurological System

    They have a shining crystal at the top of their heads capable of lighting the dark interior paths of the earth, their eyes are almost blind and they sense with the light. Their heads are mostly empty. The crystal above their heads is analogous to their intellects and brains, and in a way, it is very similar to the crystalline that the magician has properly enlivened and activated in order to peer into the invisible world and communicate with it as well as to bring the astral sources to density. Gnome’s heads are empty, as are their lower minds. They perceive through the electromagnetic volt of silence and light.

    Astral Body/Nervous System

    There are two organs similar to glands, located in the armpits, responsible for perception of gravity and pressure in gnomes, so that their feelings and actions on the astral level occur mostly through magnetic gravity and electric pressure. Forming a downward triangle with these two, at the region of the stomach, there is a sensor responsible for organising pressure and gravity into the notion of space and structure. In the midst of their silence gnomes receive this input and shine their crystal light upon it.

    Etheric Body/Endocrine System

    At the umbilical region, they turn structure into meaning and they sense mystery: their awareness of these things is mostly physical, while ours is predominantly intellectual at the present time. Four glands below it, in our region of the bladder and intestines, are responsible for segregating etheric fluid condensers based on meaning and altering the energy of etheric objects. These are similar to the four elements in men.

    This is one of those fairy tales that is no fairy tale for an adept. Yet, it but indicates or illustrates a method, not being it. 

    The same can be said for:

    “We can explain the natural formation of gnomes by a conjunction of electric fluid concentrations surrounded by spheres of magnetic fluid encased by the elemental fluid of the earth element. These come to be inhabited by astral larvae ignited by solar sparks that are, in turn, imbued with the divine principle of the radiation of the mind.”

    This passage indicates that you might further prolong your explorations and better sustain yourself in the shape of the elemental if you, having gone so far as to master the electromagnetic volt, perform the same in yourself and impregnate it with the corresponding element with the wish that it feeds on the universal Sun to maintain itself, no matter the plane regarded. Also start breathing as the elemental (gnomes produce magnetic fluid out of the electric fluid; sylphs produce the electric fluid out of the principle of light; undines produce the magnetic fluid out of the cold; and Salamanders “inhale Light from the Akasha and exhale back Air. At the same time, they inhale Light from Air and exhale back the Akasha.” This way, the elementals will no longer see you as a ghost or mirage, but as bone and flesh, so to speak, and will see the semblance of a saint among them. It was known since the Ancient Egyptians, as can be derived from The Book of the Dead, that the subtle body not only breathes, but feeds, if it wishes to be stabilized. 

    Regarding the first passage, here is what must be done:

    1. Perform vacancy of mind until that diamond hard or impenetrable light starts to build or segregate in your psyche and inside your skull. Let it build to the point of saturation and open it up to the space surrounding you. Be with the light and in the light.

    2. Through the light, you might be tainted to try and feel the space around you as you usually do, imprinting in the light, from out of memory, your other usual senses. Don’t. Instead, begin to perceive only in terms of pressure and gravitation: that is, the vibration of the objects towards themselves and the vibration between them. Let this be your only sense of structure and distance for now.

    3. As you stay with this notion of the space around you, you will begin to understand it as a whole and your light will automatically start to infuse this “mandala” and intensify its oscillation. 

    4. Choose a particular part of the room, and the same will begin to happen in a more localized manner. While you are fixed in this part of the room or on one of the room’s objects, begin to project a new vibration that comes from your imagination: this mixing of vibrations is called a trajectory in terms of how the gnome moves. 

    In the most physical way possible, this is how a gnome works. The appearance of the elementals can vary greatly depending on the plane we are looking at or from. On the subtler planes they appear to work in a more graceful and loose manner to the human eye, yet the basic mechanism portrayed is still at play. For instance, if I look at an undine from the most material angle possible, the undine will almost always look horrible, dark gray and smell of rot and fetidness, due to the melancholic, fermenting and dissecting aspects of the water element. This is the reason why Meister Gregorius of the Fraternitas Saturni has described the elementals as devoid of light:

    “Very often, all sorts of strange formations become visible at the edge of the circle, most of them of grotesque appearance. They need not be paid attention to. These are so-called elemental beings, which look dark gray and lack any radiation.”

    The Esoteric Light Ritual, 1950

    However, when you look at that same undine through the astral light or the mental plane, she often shows herself as extremely beautiful and pleasurable to see and feel, exhaling those aspects of nurturing love and healing eternity we know. This is why, also, you are to take that shape of the elemental that comes from the mental matrix and forms the astral shape, easily captured on the mirror, more than the one that comes from the astral matrix to the ridges of solid matter, since this will give you malleability and intellect and not restrict you solely to the elemental sensory organs. Nevertheless, without those sensory organs firmly placed, you will likely remain unrooted and drift.

    Sylphs

    Mental Body/Neuro system

    If you strip down all the adornments that decorate, personify and animate them, sylphs can usually be perceived as a Y shape made out of seven spheres of light, the first three forming a downward triangle between them. It is this triangle and the sphere below it that form the mental body. In the two points at the top of the downward triangle, there are organs of memory and free association, radiating or being processed in the sphere below, which is an organ of savouring whose activities translate as wisdom. Below that sphere, in turn, there is the sphere organ of intuition, which has six lateral rays or filaments, one to perceive in the mental plane, one to perceive in the astral plane, one to perceive in the physical plane, one to capture impressions of the past, one to capture impressions of the present and finally one to look at the future.

    Astral Body/Nervous System

    Under the spheres mentioned above, there stands the climatic sensor, it has two rays, each one threefold. The ray on the left is the sensory organ for measuring temperature, humidity levels, and weightlessness. On the right, the nervous filaments can measure electricity, electromagnetism and magnetism.

    Etheric Body/Endocrine System

    Under the sphere that functions as a climatic sensor, there stands a sphere that digests the fluid of the air element in its lighter solar aspect.

    Physical Sensors/Limbs

    Right below the digestive organ, there stands the defective sphere or organ, which at one end uses the solar light to produce oxygen and on the other, uses it to produce further thermal polarisation and cause winds.

    Observe your thoughts until you relax into it then start inserting thoughts and memories, allowing your mind to answer them by itself. You will realize to this state of mind everything is a question to be answered, even that which has no question mark, and it answers not by reason but by free association. Keep observing these associations, how some are related to the present, some relate to the past, some to the future and how some connect these different points. How some are ideas, some are emotions, some are sensations and some connect these different aspects as well. As you prolong the observation with enough detachment, not answering the questions yourself but allowing the mind to move according to them, you will start to feel a sense of enlightenment. This is how a sylph thinks: he does not block the wind.

    Now expand your mind to include the sky, and you will immediately realize the same mechanics apply to the weather: its causes and effects, play of electromagnetic charges, temperature, humidity and intensity seem to work by macrocosmic passive memory and free association. Observe the weather, which now moves inside you as well, in this way, and you will soon notice you are automatically breathing the air element and the light within it. After several repetitions, as this becomes second nature, a magical control of the air element will start to occur. This is the basic sensory structure or mode of being of a Sylph.   

    Undines

    Mental Body/Neuro system

    If you see undines through an x-ray, they can usually be perceived as a curved line with seven centres and seven radiations, topped by a tail with a sphere close to it, and a head on the bottom that is crowned by a halo. It is the sphere close to the tail, the head and the halo that constitute the mental organs. The energy circles from the sphere down to the head, sublimating as the halo. This sphere is similar to a magician’s crystal bowl, but at the same time, an intrinsic part of the undine and not more separate from her than a human’s crown chakra is separate from the human. Through such a sphere, the mermaid perceives with extrasensory abilities and is able to impregnate space. The sphere is electromagnetic in nature while the head is of an electric nature and is the organ of thought. The halo is magnetic and symbolises the ecstatic state of grace of the being.

    Astral Body/Nervous System

    The spine or curved line with seven centres and seven rays is the astral body with the nervous organs of the undine. The seven rays represent her auric body and are emitted from the seven centres. The top centre, near the tail, represents conception, after which comes the centre of emotion into which conception develops, then the centre of expansion of that emotion, the centre of wonderment and processing or crystallization of such expansion, the centre that magnetises the feeling, the centre that directs it and finally the centre of secretion of the whole line into a dream-like ambience. The rays have the colours of the rainbow.

    Etheric Body/Endocrine System 

    This part of an undine’s structure corresponds to the tail, which gives the undine movement through swimming the magnetic currents.

    Physical Sensors/Limbs

    Together with the seven rays there come seven dark emissions of some sort of anti-matter. While the light waves of the seven rays capture the dark particles, the seven dark emissions dissolve them into oblivion, which seems to magnetise the physical presence of the undine.

    Enter clairvoyant trance and look long at your heart center. You will see and sense a variety of visions and sensations. When you have relaxed into it and are flowing naturally with the stream of vision, try and insert a thought into it, and another. This is how an undine thinks. You will see this thought reflected back but transmuted by the heart, and this is the grace of the undine. This process of transmutation is described in the seven rays, whether they are in the positive or negative pole. 

    As you become increasingly conscious of this automatic process of transmutation, you can start to influence it intentionally, learning how an undine navigates the magnetic fluid. 

    Salamanders

    Upper Body

    The upper body is enveloped by something similar to a hood. This casing seems to preserve the proper conditions of void darkness to cause the secretion of light. Inside it there are the arms of the ‘Y’ with two spheres or eyes in each edge. While one sphere captures, emits and perceives the magnetic fluid, the other does the same for the electric fluid. The arms function as limbs that cause the circulation of both fluids in the structure or body.

    Middle Body

    The middle body, the stalk of the ‘Y’, functions as both an antenna and a lightning rod. It conducts the electric and magnetic fluids and filters it into the mental, the astral and the etheric planes in accordance with the three horizontal lines. Around it there seems to be a violet cloak, suggesting wings that function as organs responsible for the ingestion of the air element.

    Lower Body

    The two arms of the inverted ‘Y’ work in a similar fashion to the upward ‘Y’, but the spheres or eyes at their edges capture, perceive and transmit movement and time, backwards and past, forward and future. The sharp line that descends from the middle pierces all concepts of duality and obliterates them. It is this organ or limb that, curiously, attaches the salamander to the physical plane.

    Again, practice vacancy of mind until from out of the emptiness a sense of light starts to build. Careful not to form any thoughts (meaning thoughts that have form, not meaning intention), look clairvoyantly into this uncorrupted and supreme light that manifests through the extension of your vacancy. Hold it until you see the light start to refract, likely first between silver-white and golden-white, then maybe red and blue hues. Study how they function, what they capture and what they transmit. Impregnate both hues with the desire to see all things and start breathing them simultaneously through your mental body, astral body and physical body. As you continue, the gift of prophecy is endowed upon you: seeing proportionally in all directions, your word, your vision, is carved in fire upon the fabric of existence. This sums up the skeletal structure of how a Salamander perceives and moves often automatically or unconsciously. 

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  • Who Was Franz Bardon’s Teacher?

    Who Was Franz Bardon’s Teacher?

    Who Was Franz Bardon’s Teacher?

    By S.H.

    I wish to discuss a question commonly wondered by Bardonists – “Who was Franz Bardon’s teacher?” In other words, who was the one who guided Franz Bardon as he undertook the journey from being a mere aspirant to being the great adept we know him as today?  

    The traditional explanation of how Bardon became a great adept is that he was a so-called “walk-in.” In other words, the body of Franz Bardon was originally inhabited by the soul of a normal human boy, but was then taken over by the soul of a great adept around the age of 18. Lumir Bardon himself believes this story and says in Memories of Franz Bardon that Franz’s teachers all noticed a great change in his character and handwriting around that age. Basically, what this means is that Bardon didn’t really have a teacher who guided him to adepthood; at least not during his life as Franz Bardon. He was already an adept when he took over the teenager’s body. Of course this doesn’t mean that Bardon never learned anything from anyone. There are a small handful of people I personally know whom I consider to be adept magicians, and one thing all of them have in common is that they are all constantly learning from everyone and everything in their lives. I’m sure Bardon was no different, so from a certain point of view he had many teachers. But he didn’t have a teacher in the way most Bardonists use that term when they ask who his teacher was. 

    Whenever the question of who Bardon’s teacher was comes up, many Bardonists are quick to dismiss the walk-in story. They immediately jump up and claim that Bardon was taught by Czech occultist A or Czech occultist B, or that he received training while he was a member of this or that Czech occult organization.

    The purpose of this article is not to try to argue for or against the walk-in explanation of how Bardon became an adept, but rather to explore the interesting question of why so many modern-day Bardonists immediately dismiss it. But before we dive into this topic, I have a question for you. 

    Do you believe in magic?

    At first, you might answer “Of course I believe in magic! I’m working through a system of magical training after all.” But what I’ve found is that many Bardonists think they believe in magic, but really don’t. If you asked them if they believe in magic, they’d say they do. But when their belief is tested, it’s found not to exist. The question of who Bardon’s teacher was is an example of the sort of test I am referring to. 

    Filing Cabinets and Drawers

    So why do many Bardonists automatically dismiss the walk-in story and instead jump up to claim that Bardon was taught by Czech occultist A or Czech occultist B? The answer can actually be found in an old article by Frater Acher called “Occult Topography – or how to help your brain learn magic,” which can be read here. As anyone who has read that article can clearly see, the minds of many modern-day Bardonists are like filing cabinets that simply don’t have the sort of drawers that can accommodate supernatural phenomena like walk-ins. But if you’re going to walk the magical path, then the filing cabinet of your mind really needs drawers that can accommodate supernatural phenomena. Without such drawers, you are basically handicapped and will be greatly limited with regards to how much progress you can make. 

    Just to clarify, having a drawer that can accommodate supernatural phenomena like walk-ins does not mean we automatically believe every walk-in story we come across. But it does mean we’re open-minded enough to consider them possible, and that we therefore don’t automatically dismiss them, especially when the story is coming from someone like Franz Bardon’s own son. 

    The Value of Wonder

    In his books, Bardon mentions astrology several times. It’s pretty clear that astrology is real. But if astrology is real, then this implies fate is real. After all, isn’t part of natal astrology using one’s birth chart to figure out one’s fate? 

    If fate is real, then this has some disturbing implications. It implies that everyone is either fated to successfully work through IIH or fated to fail to work through IIH. Roughly two decades ago, I was active on a Bardon Yahoo Group called Franz Bardon Magi. I recall interacting with some Bardonists via that group who were stuck on Step 1. Now Yahoo Groups is no more and most Bardon groups are on Facebook. On these Facebook groups, I recognize Bardonists who were stuck on Step 1 almost two decades ago and who are still stuck on Step 1. How is it that they are still stuck on Step 1, even after almost two decades? We can come up with many answers, all of them correct from a certain point of view. But the one answer underlying all of the other answers is that they are fated to fail in their endeavor to work through IIH. 

    So if people are fated to fail in their endeavor to work through IIH, is there no hope for them? Actually, there is still some hope for them, because there are seven things that can be used to change a bad fate into a good one. One of those seven things is wonder. In one of his articles, William Mistele explains that wonder is the most valuable out of all the things that can be used to change a bad fate into a good one. In that article, he states that to have wonder means to be aware that at any moment anything can happen. 

    When people automatically dismiss the walk-in explanation of how Bardon became an adept, this shows me that they don’t have wonder. As someone who does have wonder, I don’t just believe that at any moment the soul of an adept can take over the body of a teenage boy. I believe that at any moment things far more incredible than that can happen.

    Some Bardonists just aren’t capable of wonder. The filing cabinets of their minds don’t have the drawers needed to accommodate the idea that at any moment anything can happen, and these filing cabinets are already too solid and rigid to change, so new drawers can no longer be added. If such Bardonists are fated to successfully work through IIH, then this is fine. They have a good fate, so they don’t need to change their fate. But if such Bardonists are fated to fail in their endeavor to work through IIH, then this is very unfortunate. They have a bad fate, so they’ll need to change it into a good one. It is true that even without wonder, there are still six things that can be used to change a bad fate into a good one, but it’s much more difficult to use just these six. Wonder makes the task a lot easier. But hey, even if you succumb to your bad fate of failing to work through IIH, that’s probably better than succumbing to a fate of killing your father and marrying your mother like Oedipus did. Hopefully that’s some consolation. 

    Bardonists vs Nyingma Buddhists

    In the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, there are people known as tertöns who reveal spiritual teachings known as termas to the rest of humanity. The tertöns don’t come up with these teachings themselves. They receive these teachings in supernatural ways. One of the Dzogchen masters in my lineage was a tertön who received terma teachings from spirits called dakinis who visited him in dreams. In one of his essays, William Mistele tells the story of how a physical scroll containing terma teachings manifested in the hand of a young boy who was a tertön. The boy’s uncle, an advanced Buddhist, took a look at the teachings in the scroll, decided that humanity was not yet ready for them, and burned the scroll. 

    Practitioners of Nyingma Buddhism have no trouble believing that tertöns receive their teachings in supernatural ways. They have no trouble believing in supernatural phenomena in general. Yet if you tell the typical Bardonist that Bardon was a walk-in and became an adept in one of his previous lives rather than in his life as Franz Bardon, they’ll go “Nah, that’s impossible. Bardon must have studied with some Czech occultist or trained in some Czech occult organization.” Similarly, if you tell the typical Bardonist that Bardon learned the information in KTQ from the Earth-zone spirit Amalomi, they’ll go “Nah, that’s impossible. Bardon must have adapted that information from some version of the Sefer Yetzirah or learned it from some Czech Qabalist.” Nyingma Buddhists have no trouble believing that tertöns receive teachings in supernatural ways. Catholics have no trouble believing that bread and water turns into the flesh and blood of Christ during Mass. Followers of Haitian Vodou have no trouble believing that during their rituals the lwa possess certain participants. Why then do so many Bardonists have trouble believing in magic?

    Based on all this, it honestly seems to me like the Bardon tradition has fallen behind other spiritual traditions in a major way. So let’s catch up. Let’s do whatever it takes to develop our filing cabinets so that they have drawers that can accommodate the supernatural. For those who may not really understand the filing cabinet metaphor in Frater Acher’s article, what I am basically saying is to have some wonder. Or to quote one of my favorite poets, Mary Oliver, “Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable.” 

    S.H. is an up and coming Bardonist writer whose first book, The Gospel of Dreams, is set to be published by Azure Rose Publishing if and when Divine Providence wills it. 

    Image Attribution: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:FranzBardon.jpg

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  • Considerations and Practices on the Soul Mirror by André Consciência

    Considerations and Practices on the Soul Mirror by André Consciência

    Introduction

    When Tanya Robinson invited me to write on the ennoblement of character according to the hermetics of Franz Bardon, years ago, we thought the topic wasn’t getting enough attention and could use the effort. Today, after writing the book and building a parallel course, I still think the same, despite the previous efforts of other authors, like Virgil, or the recent release of An Aid to Introspection or Self-Knowledge, volume 4 of Czech Hermetics.

    I have put together some of the texts and bonus techniques in my optional group for the Magic and Mystical Introspection Course, adapted them, gave them a certain structure and order for them to fit together, and added some advanced exercises. If you are interested in specializing in the Soul Mirror, you might find my book Through the Soul Mirror to the Sphere of the Sun, in pair with the course, also of interest.

    I have left out practices in the book or course, and any practices given directly by Franz Bardon, which you can consult at his title Initiation Into Hermetics. Now onward we go, starting with some basic advice.

    Basic Tips on the Soul Mirror

    1 – Focus on small improvements, every day. By aiming to become a little better each day rather than for perfection, you reach achievable goals. Consider that small is all there is, and that when nothing is trivial everything is great.

    2 – There are metaphysical viruses, and we are assailed by them and have cooperated with them into a coping organism. Bardon calls them larvae, in general, the Corpus Hermeticum calls them Tormentors. On a larger global scale, Nema Andahadna calls them the Forgotten Ones.

    One of the side effects of this cooperation is that it leads us away from nature, from the nature that is natural to us. If we return to nature, even if for a moment, most issues in the soul mirror vanish from existence. We are balanced and in our best self and awareness. The virus is off. And it is even better than accumulating the elements and balancing them by astral means.

    Anywhere you can be immersed in nature, be it the wilderness, your local park, allotment or garden, will help you with the soul mirror.

    Once bathed in nature, switch off your devices, notifications, earpods and alerts. This time is for you to silence your mind and tune into the elements that you might usually miss.

    Notice the sounds of nature; plants, winds, animals and feel the heat from the sun, light filtering through trees or cooling breezes.

    Slow your breath and be calm and present.

    There you have it. When the day is closing, notice the improvements on the soul mirror.

    3 – Have a purpose; a reason for being (Akasha) and all will fall into place.

    On top of it, if you do not do what is right for you, the soul will show symptoms of sickness: all those things right there in the black mirror. Do the actions you love (fire) whether you are good at them or not; the actions you are good at (air) whether you love them or not; what the world needs (water) whether you are paid for it or not; and what you get paid for (earth) whether the world needs it or not.

    You will feed all the elements of the soul and keep it generally satisfied. This will balance you and you won’t need to do it sitting down and obsessing.

    Don’t worry, in time, while you keep doing what you love, you start being good at it, the world starts to need it, and you start to get paid for it. Now we are fulfilling the purpose.

    4 – I used to listen to Leonard Cohen, one of my favorite songwriters and interpreters, sing “there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in”.

    This tip is about imperfections. Often the darkness shows us the light. Stop projecting negativity into the faults and it will test if they are faults indeed. It will also likely unveil the real vice that is causing the projection.

    The Japanese fill the cracks with gold. If there is indeed a fault there it should be known by its fruits. Savor the fruits, if they are bitter, there is your master.

    5 – Approach the traits with an empty mind. To these traits, there are many possibilities.

    Try looking at them with a fresh and unbiased perspective.

    6 – No matter if a trait is active, like courage, or passive, like laziness, it needs your indulgence to engage with you. Abstinent traits, like keeping silence, need indulgence just the same.

    The soul mirror is all about balance in the end. Be the trait positive or negative, it seeks stabilization in moderation. Virtue or vice, engage, but not so much that you are then full. The virtue will keep being a virtue, for it knows moderation, the vice will starve, and moderation will make it useful and ultimately a might.

    Also, be mindful of the qualities you engage with, seek active qualities during the part of the day that requires more energy and passive qualities in the time you are resting or beginning to calm down.

    The traits in the soul mirror are to be treated just like food.

    7 – Identify if the traits are predominantly intellectual, emotional, or physical. The intellect can be easily re-educated through physical habits. For instance, if your mind is confused, practicing Tai Chi daily will clear it. The material body can be re-educated through intellect. For instance, if the body is lazy, the intellectual discipline of setting a schedule will fix it. However, if the traits are from the level of the soul, they will benefit from intellectual and material intervention combined. Let us say you feel an irrational aversion for other creeds. Your intellect should study the creed, your body should enter the temple and engage with the community. Do only one of the tasks, and it will fail.

    8 – Think like a philosopher. Study philosophy, art, and poetry. It will help you understand the dynamic of traits. For instance, fear is one root of ignorance, ignorance is at the root of confusion, confusion is at the root of obsessive control, and obsessive control is at the root of evil. You cannot defeat evil, you must fight obsessive control, but to do so, you need to stop refusing the truth (ignorance). However, how can you do that if you are afraid? On the other side of this tree of faults is a tree of virtue. The first thing is to become aware of the fear and present in this awareness, with constant present awareness, there comes love. Love defeats fear and accepts the truth. The one who accepts the truth builds sovereignty and freedom, it substitutes obsessive control and breeds good.

    Or, let us say you have despair, hatred and greed. You cannot fight greed directly, it is like trying to fill a cup that is broken. You cannot fight hatred directly, when you engage with it, you are polluted by it. Yet, you can conquer despair by accepting a higher power (not to be confused with doctrine and idealism). Without despair, hatred cannot cling to you. Without hatred and despair, satiation takes place and greed subsides.

    9 – Think like an alchemist too. Where there is too much form there is a distortion of harmony. Where there is too much force there is a distortion of harmony. Harmony is force and form in equal portions, and it is passive and active in the same amount. Now let us say you have a passive fault like you are too submissive. Trying to stop being submissive finds no stability where to stand your ground. You could counter with being too dominant, which is the active side of being too submissive. You would simply be left with another fault, and at last, ping pong between one vice and the other. Instead, actively practice and cultivate harmony, it will stabilize the mirror and centralize the powers.

    10 – Be patient. And if you lose your patience, be patient.

    Now that such is out of the way, and before proceeding, let us expand on why even go through all the work of introspection when we have the power of magic available to create whatever we wish, including balance.

    The Problem of Avoiding Introspection

    I’ve often been asked if the accumulation of the elements, tuning with the Akasha, ritual and works of an astral nature can balance and ennoble the soul, so that we can skip introspection and the soul mirror altogether.

    If one wants to be picky with nomenclature, in the Franz Bardon Tradition the soul is the astral body and the astral body is also the emotional body. The answer would be yes. We can repair the astral body with energy work.

    However, what is meant by the ennoblement of the soul through the soul mirror is more comprehensive. It is a work that extends to all 3 bodies, material, astral and mental. This means it repairs all the way to the root causes.

    When you solve everything with energy work alone, you become a hostage to magic. If you stop, you will crumble down like that painting of Dorian Gray. An analogy would be to say that because you are on painkillers, you are already treated. Although painkillers help with treatments when used with responsibility, they also camouflage the root issues. Another analogy would lie with the athlete and steroids. Steroids help build muscle tissue and increase body mass just like energy work strengthens the astral body. However, steroids cannot improve an athlete’s agility or skill, just like the soul cannot replace a mind that has solved its own structure and is working firmly and sound. What is more, replacing the training of an athlete with steroids will empower a body without structure or discipline, causing early heart attacks, strokes, tumors, failures, and psychiatric problems.

    Put another way, without deep psychological healing, the work isn’t done, and not only it isn’t done, as you will likely become a disaster in the waiting.

    Furthermore, the highest goal of Hermeticism is in the words “Know thyself and thou shall know all the mysteries of the gods and of the universe.” It is a work of wonderment.

    That being said, combine the soul mirror work with the astral balancing of the elements, rituals, my Ceremonial Magic and the Franz Bardon Tradition course, non-dual light , etc. You cannot run a marathon without vitamins in the body. Also don’t wait to be perfect, what would be the point then?

    The Help of Vacancy

    But since we are going to have all this supposed effort of introspection (do not start sweating, in truth, it is as natural as breathing to beings with a conscience), we might as well offer some effortless aid when it comes to bringing the mind to the right state for introspection. A simple technique to cleanse the mind of heavy thoughts, the heart of heavy feelings, and ultimately achieve vacancy, is given freely as Lesson 1 of my course “Journey to the Spirit World, Exploring Neo-Shamanism”.

    Journey to the Spirit World: Exploring Neo-Shamanism (Lesson 1, Level 1)

    Afterward, I suggest the method called the Sufi Purification of the Heart, which I have written in my book in progress “By the Same Mouth & Bone – Wisdom for a Unified Humanity”. It goes like this:

    “Review your recent thoughts, words, and actions. Contemplate your interactions with others, your adherence to principles, and your alignment with values. Be honest and non-judgmental, reflecting on the intentions behind your actions. Ask yourself why you behave in specific ways. Check if your intentions seek the pleasure of Divine Providence and the well-being of others or if they are driven by negative emotions.

    Take stock of your spiritual strengths, virtues, and positive qualities. Of the areas where you have made progress or shown resilience. Also, identify the spiritual weaknesses, negative traits, and areas where you struggle or fall short. It will require self-honesty. At this point, seek Divine mercy and Divine power.

    Based on your self-reflection, set goals for ennoblement, practical steps you can take to stabilize your strengths, address weaknesses, and align your intentions with higher principles.

    Engage in self-reflection ideally at the end of each day or week and recalibrate your efforts with self-awareness rather than self-criticism. The aim is to understand yourself and grow qualities that bring you to the realization of your own nature.”

    Awareness is at the root of introspection as at the root of magic

    Introspection, more than a practice, is a path, a way of life. This path requires acute awareness, not only of our actions and thoughts reviewed at the end of the day, but of everything around us, our bodies, our actions and thoughts in the ever present moment . To help with this, I suggest my free course Introduction to Magic. It can without contradiction be faced as one more level of Magic and Mystical Introspection.

    Contemplation

    The way of introspection is ultimately the way of contemplation, and the way of contemplation the way to Godhood. In other words, the goal of introspection is none other than the Godhead.

    Hegel had that reality is perceived in three levels:

    1 – Desire, where self-consciousness is directed at objects of awareness other than itself. This is depicted as the slave-slave. Some mystics meditate all their life without ever leaving this condition since they meditate on specific states of awareness as things.

    2 – Master-slave, where the self-consciousness is directed at another that is unequal to itself. This means self-consciousness becomes dependent on the other, enslaving the other in order to survive, and remaining a slave to the other therefore. Many magicians live in this state.

    3 – Universal self-conscious, where the self-conscious recognizes itself in another and the object of awareness is self-consciousness. This would be the way of contemplation. It is the magician standing in the center of the circle, or the mystic incorporating the four divine qualities of omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotence and eternity.

    Aid in ennobling the soul for ritual magicians

    The pitfall of advanced magicians is they may feel tempted to stop working on character. After all, they have everything available at the tip of their fingers. Let them push the right fingers and there is magical equilibrium. Except without introspection all they are is blind kings. To the magician practicing introspection, however, the following aids can be mighty tools.

    If you have gone so far as The Practice of Magical Evocation by Franz Bardon, you will be familiarized with the deeper meaning of the proceedings that will follow.

    1 – Put on your magical robe, isolating yourself from outside influences and purifying the soul from the inside. If you have practiced diligently, the simple gesture of dressing the robe should perform the feat automatically and potently.

    2 – Put on the magical belt, affirming magical equilibrium and lawful conduct.

    3 – Put on the magic band, hat, or whatever is the ritual vestment you use to cover your head. In this, establish firmly spiritual perfection.

    4 – Light the magical lamp, so your inner light is set to burn and nondual light purifies the chamber.

    5 – Draw the circle, so you are now at the depth point of the universe where you unite with the Supreme Deity to look back outside.

    7 – Activate the cup before you, so that all that stands within is immersed in wisdom, life and divine power. Now, as the deity, supremely and acting in the akasha, think of the highest and most supreme ideation of a virtue you want to establish or nurture and give it the shape of the wine, where it will, once absorbed, influence the mind objectively, change the aura of the soul and enliven the material body. If you are a quabbalist as well, you can make use of the letter C.

    8 – Drink, feel it rush through your veins and cells, permeate your mind and soul. Save some in a deposit you can bring with you and sip throughout the day. You can celebrate life by nurturing limited virtues or simply imbue the wine with magical equilibrium or, as the deity, imbue the wine with the deity itself, so that this divine state circles back into the material body and gains roots.

    Aid in ennobling the soul for quabbalists

    The method of materialization

    Here is the combination of the letters P-F-L.

    In the akasha, the quabbalist will think of the synchronization that exists between the micro and the macrocosm leading to divine virtue and evolution. Immediately, he or she will tap into it. Let there be meditation on this for a while.

    Then he or she will pronounce lowly with the threefold concentration the three letters in the astral, first without giving it any indications of time and space. The F, uniting/tuning will, intellect, life and consciousness, which is a mental translation of the spiritual synchronization of the micro and macrocosm. The quabbalist then applies the P, which manifests evolution as a state of intellectual humility, and the L, which manifests divine virtue as moral virtue.

    The letters are pronounced again lowly, in the astral plane, but they are given form. The P comes first this time, taking the shape of a gray dove and bringing purification to the astral body (the emotional manifestation of humility). From there we move to the F, so that the F takes the space of the magician’s astral body, manifesting the previous mental union of will power-intellect-life-consciousness as mastery of character, which conjoins with humility. Finally, the L letter is intoned, consolidating moral virtue into magical equilibrium and concluding the union of mastery of character and humility.

    The method of dematerialization

    The action is similar but we will be practicing with two letters, conceptually speaking. In practice, we will be using a method more similar with Rawn Clark’s TMO (The Magic of IHVH-ADONAI), of which I was a student when it was being formed, than quabbalistic formulation as taught by Franz Bardon.

    The powers that be are the letters E and Ae. Simply and quickly put, you enter akashic trance and from the akashic depth point you seek universal consciousness by the letter E, from there gaining mastery over all negative beings (Ae). In this formless and spaceless state, you look down into your mental body and descend by using EAe (formulated mentally) to the region of intuition, seeing through all thoughts, wishes and actions concerning the grosser plane. You look up and there is a direct link between this region and the akashic region of universal consciousness and mastery over all negativities. You look down and you see your astral body, upon which you descend formulating in a low voice EAe, and now you are in your astral consciousness with no clinging whatsoever to mental, astral and material aspects. Again, you look up, at the direct link between this state and the one of intuition and seeing through all inclinations. Bridge and unite both as your mode of cognition and look for any specific faults that you want to dissolve. Gather these traits in your awareness and soul, but remain completely detached while you take them into you and with you. Now rise up to the place of universal consciousness and mastery over all negative beings, holding tight to the traits. They will be dissolved in universal consciousness, unable to subside and survive.

    Remain in this state of purity long enough.

    For other posts about Andres work please see here.
    Andre Consciencia at Perseus Arcane Academy

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