Chaos Magic Explained What Is It ?
Chaos Magic Whats It Is And How To Use It Welcome To The World of Magic & Mystery
By Natalie Mantle - Meditation For Freedom
What”is Chaos Magic? Good question. Since it was introduced to the magical scene in the late 1970’s it has generated a great deal of debate about what it is, what it isn’t, and who’s doing it right. Such circular arguments being beloved of occultists, it seems.
Before Chaos came kicking and screaming onto the scene, the dominant approach to doing magic (and still is, to a great extent) was the Systems approach.
So firstly below i will explain what this is ..
Magic The Systems Approach
So what is a magical system approach?
Magical system approach combine practical exercises for bringing about change with beliefs, attitudes, a conceptual model of the universe (if not several), a moral ethic, and a few other things besides.
- Examples of systems are :
- The Kabbalah
- Wiccan traditions
- Hermetic Order of The Golden Dawn of magic with all its grades, costumes, mottos etc.
- Shamanic Traditions
As far as most magical systems go, before you can start to wave your wand around so to speak or to bounce up and down on your head, til you reach enlightenment. One has to spend a good deal of time
reading up on the beliefs associated with the system, learning its do’s and don’ts, committing to memory lists of symbols and correspondences. As sign and symbols rule the world and attract things.
Also one has to learn how to talk to your fellow magi, and in some extreme cases, how to dress, walk, talk and use corresponding sign languages .
The Simplicity of Magic
Simplicity
How does this all come about? Well magic, like some of the great religious messages it’s essentially simple, but is prey to the process whereby simple ideas become extremely complicated beliefs which can lead you further and further away from doing any magic at all.
The birth of Chaos magic
Came about in the late 70’s, at about the time that punk rock was spitting out at the music industry and Chaos Science was beginning to be taken seriously by mathematicians, economists, and physicists.
The two names most commonly associated with the birth of Chaos Magic are Pete Carroll and Ray Sherwin, although there were others trying out things in the background, such as the Stoke Newington Sorcerors
who later became entwined with the first stirrings of the Punk movement.
Some of Pete Carroll’s early writings on Chaos was published in The New Equinox, published by Ray Sherwin, in which the first adverts proclaiming the advent of the Illuminates of Thanateros magical order appeared. Interestingly enough, there is no mention of the term chaos in the earliest versions of IOT material.
Ray Sherwin’s Morton Press then issued Pete Carroll’s Liber Null, and Sherwin’s own The Book of Results, which expounded the very practical method of Sigilization, as developed by Austin Osman Spare, which has become one of the core techniques associated with Chaos magic. Better know as SIGILS, watch the video below to learn about Sigils and how to use them .
Chaos Magic
The Basic Message of Chaos Magic
Is that, what is fundamental to magic is the actual doing of it – that like sex, no amount of theorizing and intellectualisation can substitute for the actual experience. You have to use techniques which can be employed to bring about change in one’s circumstances.
As the actual true methods of magic are basically shared by the all the different systems, despite
the differing symbols, beliefs and dogmas. Meaning What symbol systems you wish to employ is a matter of choice, and that the webs of belief which surround them are a means to an end, rather than ends in themselves.
Unlike the variety of magical systems which are all based in some mythical or historically-derived past. Chaos magic is borrowed freely from Science Fiction, Quantum Physics, and anything else its practitioners choose’s to. Rather than trying to recover and maintain a tradition that links back to the past (and former
glories).
Chaos magic
Is an approach that enables the individual to use anything that s/he thinks is suitable as a temporary belief
or symbol system. What matters is the results you get, not the authenticity of the system used. So Chaos magic then, is not a system, as it utilizes systems and encourages adherents to devise their own, giving magic a truly Postmodernist flavor.
Sinister Side
Needless to say, Chaos magic began to acquire a sinister reputation. This was due to three factors:
- Its a pick and mix/D.I.Y approach to magic was frowned upon by the traditionalist schools
- Many people associated chaos with anarchy and other negative associations
- That some Chaos magic publications were hyped as being blasphemous, sinister, and dangerous in a way that they were not
Which proved all the same to be an attractive glamour for those who required such a boost to the ego!
Principles of Chaos Magic
Whilst magical systems usually base themselves around a model or map of the spiritual/physical universe, such as the
Tree of Life (which can sometimes be described as a cosmic filofax). Chaos Magic is based on a very few core principles. which generally underlie its approach to magic, so feel free to experiment and see what works best for you.
The Avoidance of Dogmatism
Click Chaos Magicians strive to avoid falling into dogmatism (unless expressing dogmatism is part of a temporary belief system they have entered). Discordians use Catmas such as Us Discordians must stick apart!
Thus Chaos Magicians feel entitled to change their minds, contradict themselves and come up with arguments that are alternatively plausible and implausible.
It has been pointed out that we invest a lot of time and energy in being right. What’s wrong with being wrong occasionally?
Personal Experience is paramount
In other words, don’t take my word for it that such-and-such is the case, check it out for yourself. Magic has suffered extensively from text book theorists, who have perpetuated myths and out-of-date information purely due to laziness of one kind or another. Or perhaps to suppress the knowledge.
Sometimes it’s interesting to ask awkward questions just to see what the self appointed experts come out with. Some will emit a stream of verbal rubbish rather than admit to not knowing the answer. Whereas a true adept will probably say ” I haven’t got a clue”. Quite early on in the conversation.
Chaos magicians came to the startling discovery that once you strip away the layers of dogma, personal beliefs, attitudes and anecdotes around any particular technique of practical magic, it can be quite simply described.
Excellence of Magic
The Chaos approach has always advocated rigorous self-assessment and analysis, emphasized practice at what techniques you’re experimenting with until you get the results that you desire.
Learning to do magic requires that you develop a set of skills and abilities and if you’re going to get involved in all
this weird stuff, why not do it to the best of your ability?
Deconditioning
The Chaos paradigm proposes that one of the primary tasks of the aspiring magician is to thoroughly decondition themselves from the mesh of beliefs, attitudes and
fictions about self, society, and the world.
Our ego is a fiction of stable self-hood which maintains itself by perpetuating the distinctions of what I am/what I am not, what I like/what I don’t like. Beliefs about ones politics, religion, gender preference, degree of free will, race, subculture etc all help maintain a stable sense of self.
whilst the little ways in which we pull against this very stability allows us to feel as though we are unique individuals. Using deconditioning exercises, we can start to widen the cracks in our consensual reality which hopefully, enables us to become less attached to our beliefs and ego fictions, so that we are able to discard or modify them when
appropriate.
Diverse Approaches Magic
The Chaos perspective, if nothing else, encourages an eclectic approach to development, and Chaos Magicians are free to choose from any available magical system, themes from literature, television, religions, cults,
parapsychology, etc.
This approach means that if you approach two chaos magicians and ask them what they’re doing at any
one moment, you’re rarely likely to find much of a consensus of approach. This makes Chaos difficult to pin down as one thing or another, which again tends to worry those who need approaches to magic to be neatly labelled and clear.
Gnosis Chaos Magic
One of the keys to magical ability is the ability to enter Altered States of Consciousness at will. We tend to draw a distinct line between ordinary consciousness and altered
states of consciousness.
The willed entry into intense altered states can be divided into two poles of Physiological Gnosis
- Inhibitory States
- Excitatory States.
The former includes physically passive techniques such as :
- Meditation, yoga, scrying, contemplation and sensory
deprivation - While the latter includes chanting, drumming, dance, emotional and sexual arousal.
