Liber null psychonaut

It is more to weed out the mere curious from the serious student willing to put in the time ,research and practice to get deeper into the more esoteric arts. Reviewer: mikhailmonju - - September 8, Subject: response As a response to that comment: where might we find more accurate text, other than hoping to meet someone randomly?

Reviewer: graverubber - favorite favorite favorite favorite favorite - August 10, Subject: A Modern Classic For those who care about such things, this is an indispensable work. Reviewer: tyven9 - favorite - May 17, Subject: Total Rubbish! I'm glad I didn't pay for this book because it was a total load of crap and as an initiate of Thelema for the past 38 years, this book is 1.

Not nearly concise enough for the subject matter. What I saw and read here was some guy who's trying to grandstand with knowledge and experience he clearly does not have - spreading inaccuracies and misinformation, severely skewing what Thelema is and how it is used. The dead giveaway? He jumps right into magick. The mark of a grandstanding wannabe. This book would appeal to these wannabes who think that chaos magic will make them appear more powerful or intelligent to others or who want to be a witch in a week.

That's NOT what Thelema is about. This book is written for the average teenager who wants to make a rebellious stand against parents, church, society or try to impress their friends by pretending to embark on what is really pretty powerless magick.

Liber Null is a good name because as far as true and meaningful knowledge and command of magick goes, this book is pretty void. This "order" that the author has put together appears nothing more than a role-playing game group. Thinking, "I am alseep"; my I is blinded. The intellect is a sword, and its use is to prevent identification with any particular phenomenon encountered.

The most powerful minds cling to the fewest fixed principles. The only clear view is from atop the mountain of your dead selves. This operation is traditionally known as attaining the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel.

It is sometimes known as the Magnum Opus or Great Work. The Augoeides may be defined as the most perfect vehicle of Kia on the plane of duality. As the avatar of Kia on earth, the Augoeides represents the true will, the raison d'etre of the magi- cian, his purpose in existing. The discovery of one's true will or real nature may be difficult and fraught with danger, since a false identification leads to obsession and madness.

The operation of obtaining the knowledge and conversation is usually a lengthy one. The magician is attempting a progressive metamorphosis, a complete overhaul of his entire existence. Yet he has to seek the blueprint for his reborn self as he goes along. Life is less the meaningless accident it seems.

Kia has incarnated in these particular conditions of duality for some purpose. The in- ertia of previous existences propels Kia into new forms of man- ifestation. Each incarnation represents a task, or a puzzle to be solved, on the way to some greater form of completion.

The key to this puzzle is in the phenomena of the plane of duality in which we find ourselves. We are, as it were, trapped in a labyrinth or maze. The only thing to do is move about and keep a close watch on the way the walls turn. In a completely chaotic universe such as this one, there are no accidents. Everything is signifcant. Move a single grain of sand on a distant shore and the entire future history of the world will eventually be changed.

A person doing his true will is assisted by the momentum of the universe and seems possessed of amazing good luck. In begin- ning the great work of obtaining the knowledge and conversation, the magician vows "to interpret every manifestation of existence as a direct message from the infinite Chaos to himself personally.

He takes complete responsibility for his present incarnation and must consider every experience, thing, or piece of information which assails him from any source, as a reflection of the way he is conducting his existence. Keeping a close eye on the walls of the labyrinth, the con- ditions of his existence, the magician may then begin his invoca- tion.

The genius is not something added to oneself. Rather it is a stripping away of excess to reveal the god within. Directly on awakening, preferably at dawn, the initiate goes to the place of invocation. Figuring to himself as he goes that being born anew each day brings with it the chance of greater rebirth, first he banishes the temple of his mind by ritual or by some magical trance.

Then he unveils some token or symbol or sigil which represents to him the Holy Guardian Angel. This symbol he will likely have to change during the great work as the inspiration begins to move him. Next he invokes an image of the Angel into his mind's eye. It may be considered as a luminous duplicate of one's own form standing in front of or behind one, or simply as a ball of brilliant light above one's head.

Then he formulates his aspirations in what manner he will, humbling himself in prayer or exalting himself in loud proclamation as his need be. The best form of this invocation is spoken spontaneously from the heart, and if halting at first, will prove itself in time.

He is aiming to establish a set of ideas and images which correspond to the nature of his genius, and at the same time receive inspiration from that source. As the magician begins to manifest more of his true will, the Augoeides will reveal images, names, and spiritual principles by which it can be drawn into greater manifestation.

Having communicated with the invoked form, the magician should draw it into himself and go forth to live in the way he hath willed. The ritual may be concluded with an aspiration to the wis- dom of silence by a brief concentration on the sigil of the Au- goeides, but never by banishing. Periodically more elaborate forms of ritual, using more powerful forms of gnosis, may be employed.

At the end of the day, there should be an accounting and fresh resolution made. Though every day be a catalog of failure, there should be no sense of sin or guilt. Magic is the raising of the whole individual in perfect balance to the power of Infinity, and such feelings are symptomatic of imbalance. Liber 51 If any unnecessary or imbalanced scraps of ego become iden- tified with the genius by mistake, then disaster awaits.

The life force flows directly into these complexes and bloats them into grotesque monsters variously known as the demon Choronzon. Some magicians attempting to go too fast with this invocation have failed to banish this demon, and have gone spectacularly insane as a result.

Some of the various densities of the aether have only a partial or probablistic differentiation into existence, and are somewhat indeterminate in space and time.

In the same way that mass exists as a curvature in space-time, extending with a gradually diminish- ing force to infinity that we recognize as gravity, so do all events, particularly events involving the human mind, send ripples through all creation. Various methods of intercepting and interpreting these rip- ples constitute the mantic art or divination. These ripples through space and time can only be received if they strike a note of resonance in the receiver and are not drowned out by noise or suppressed by the psychic sensor.

Some forms of resonance exist naturally, as between a mother and child, or between lovers. Otherwise, they have to be established by concentrating on the object of divination. The general level of mental noise can be suppressed by silencing the mind by some gnostic method.

This also assists with the concentration. The inhibitory mode of the gnosis is most frequently used. Sleeplessness, fasting, and exhaustion may cause prescience through visions, but as with drugs, there is always the difficulty of maintaining concentration.

Any form of magical trance can be adapted for divination by first directing an intense concentration toward the desired matter of divination or some sigilized form of it and then allowing impression to arise into the Vacuous state of consciousness.

Many of the excitatory techniques can be used, but some with difficulty. Augury may be made by sacrifice, and men have tortured themselves for knowledge, but sex is the easiest. Eroto- comatose lucidity or sex-trance describes a condition brought about by continually stimulating and exhausting the sexuality by any possible means until the mind enters the borderland state between consciousness and unconsciousness. So far, only direct prescience, the ideal of divination, has been discussed.

These can augment the practice of divination greatly or ruin it utterly. Assuming that the magical perception can forge some sort of tenuous connection with the answer to a question, symbols are shuffled, drawn, or selected in some manner to carry the answer into the conscious mind. Then a further effort must be made in the interpretation to get that magical perception to come into com- plete manifestation. Symbols are easy to come by; any system can be used — the difficulty lies in forging the magic link.

In obtain- ing the symbolic result, the magician tries to let the magic slip through below the level of conscious control, but must not let the process become merely random. For example, in cartomancy or Tarot divination, one should look through the pack first and then shuffle but lightly, or the result will be completely random, and the chances of the spread being able to stimulate the magical perception will be reduced.

Once the symbol has been obtained, it should be used to help the magical perception crystallize more fully. It should become a basis for lateral thinking or intuitive guesswork rather than as a final answer to be mechanically interpreted.

Astrology is not a valid form of magical divination because it assumes a causal relationship between events which are linked only very weakly if at all. If the relationship were strong, then astrology would be an ordinary secular science. As the relationship is very weak, astrology owes whatever success it has to the natural prescience of its practitioners and obscures its failures with im- precision, evasiveness and ambiguity.

The best methods of obtaining symbolic intermediate results are those which are just below the threshold of deliberateness, but above the threshold of pure randomness. Shamanistic type methods involving the casting of bones, stones, or sticks marked with runes are simplest and best. As methods involving the fall of coins or dice, the separation of yarrow stalks and their rules for interpretation became progressively more complex the more re- mote the prescient ability became.

Highly complex mathematical systems represent decadence of the art. Of all the forces which obstruct divination, none has more power over the civilized consciousness than what is called the psychic censor. Although we could not function without it, it is useful to be able to turn parts of it off at times. Hallucinogenic drugs knock it out unselectively and are not much use. The magician must begin to notice all coincidences which surround him, instead of dismissing them. Often one notices that just before somebody said something, or an event occurred, one knew it would happen.

This can happen several times a day, but we somehow, almost unbelievably, manage to dismiss it each time and not connect the occurrences together. If a definite effort is made to consciously note these occurrences as well as to record them in the magical diary, they start to become much more numerous.

So many coincidences occur that it is ridiculous to use the word coincidence at all. One is becoming prescient. The creation of direct effects, like prescience in divination, represents a high point in the art and is just as elusive. Making things happen by either method is referred to as the art of enchanting or the casting of enchantments. From a magical point of view, it is axiomatic that we have created the world in which we exist.

Looking about himself, the magician can say "thus have I willed," or "thus do I perceive," or more accurately, "thus does my Kia manifest. If the Kia had willed a different set of limitations, it would have incarnated elsewhere. The tendency of things to continue to exist, even when unobserved, is due to their having their being in Chaos.

The magician can only change something if he can "match" the Chaos which is upholding the normal event. This is the same as becoming one with the source of the event. His will becomes the will of the universe in some particular aspect. It is for this reason that people who witness real magical happenings at close range are sometimes overcome with nausea and may even die.

The part of their Kia or life force which was upholding the normal reality is forcibly altered when the abnormal occurs. If this type of magic is attempted with a number of people working in perfect synchronization, it works much better.

Conversely, it is even more difficult to perform in front of many persons, all of whom are upholding the ordinary course of events. In trying to develop the will, the most fatal pitfall is to confuse will with the chauvinism of the ego. Will is not will- power, virility, obstinancy, or hardness. Will is unity of desire.

Will expresses itself best against no resistance when its action passes unnoticed. Only when the mind is in a state of multiple desire do we witness the idiot agonizations of will-power. Pitting oneself against various oaths, abstentions, and tests is merely to set up conflicts in the mind.

The will always manifests as the victory of the strongest desire, yet the ego reacts with disgust if its chosen desire fails. Desires are re-arranged before an act, not during it. In all things he must live like this. As reorganization of belief is the key to liberation, so is reorganization of desire the key to will. In practice, many difficulties can be gotten around by using various types of sigil.

The desire is represented by some pictorial glyph, by a wax image to be wounded, bound, or healed, by the characters of a magical alphabet, or by some image in the mind's eye. All these serve as a focus for the will. Concentration on these spells should be augmented by some form of gnostic exaltation to cast the enchantment. When considering any form of enchantment, remember this: it is infinitely easier to manipulate events while they are still embryonic or at their inception.

Thus does the magician turn that aspect of Chaos which manifests as causality to his advantage, rather than oppose it. The desire then manifests as a convenient, but strange, coincidence, rather than as a startling discontinuity. The will may be strengthened by one other technique aside from the concentrations of magical trance, and that is by luck.

The magician should observe the current of his luck in small, inconsequential matters, find the conditions for its success, and try to extend his luck in various small ways. He who is doing his true will is assisted by the momentum of the universe. We will begin by discussing the Spirit of Black Magic. Magical power is the key to the heaven-hell of the now. Unaware of this, many slip into the unsatisfactory greyness of small fears and small desires confused.

Then they invent pleasur- able or painful hereafters to replace the present. The life force seeks ever the flesh, body, ideas, emotions, experiences, etc. For without the flesh, Kia has no mirror for itself, and there is no awareness, no ecstacy, nothing. The schema of Liber Nox. Eternal warfare is the price, purpose, and reward of existence. Kia evolves into a myriad of experiences, and these are all Self. They are all forms of our awareness. To oppose the great dualities like sex and death, or pain and pleasure, the great evolution of Kia, with lesser fears and desires, is the beginning of failure of satisfaction.

Existence is the great indulgence. Anything less than this, any attempt to avoid part of oneself is to invite loss of form, a self-negation leading to a shrinkage of spirit. The Self alone is God and should recognize itself in all things. For those who uphold limited values bind themselves to medioc- rity and failure.

Those who self-righteously value their own con- tradictions are mighty on this earth. Our dual nature is all mo- rality; it is foolish to be other than we are.

Acceptance and living without restraint I will call the highest virtue. The greatest sinners are the greatest saints, though they may be unconscious of this.

Great men are greatly dual. And doubleness is not the end of it. Every moment the consortium of "I" puts forward a new face. I am not who I was seconds ago, much less yesterday.

Our name is multiple. I am a colony of be- ings sharing the same envelope. And Kia, the self-love which binds them together, will one day hurl them apart—attempting even death for its satisfaction. What is a god but man wielding the force of Chaos? To him nothing is true; everything is permitted. There is no purpose in his existence; he is free to choose his own. He has bound himself to earth forever and reincarnates at will.

For the universe is mad and arbitrary in her ways. Nothing is unchangeable except change itself. The only universal principle is the universal lack of princi- ple. And must our dualities be kept in coexistent separation to retain the power of satisfaction?

The small pleasures of the gour- met, semidigested, overripe, putrefying food have come almost full circle to the consumption of excrement, with little satisfac- tion. Rather would I take plain wholesome food for the body, and taste the nectars of revulsion and delight but occasionally. Seeking pleasure is the surest invocation of displeasure, one falls back rapidly into the general greyness. But if an emotion be pushed to the furthest realms of non-necessitation, then there is nothing to balance ecstacy but ecstacy.

Gnosis is the mechanism by which Kia draws back from the flesh in preparation for the mighty indulgences of magic. A great saving to accomplish a greater spending.

Kia is nascent energy seeking form. It can be represented by Atu 0, the Tarot Fool, or the Joker. Its heraldic beast is the vulture, for it ever descends to take its satisfaction among the living and the dead. The experience I received was this, that my innermost self or soul or spirit Was no thing formless without quality nameless pure power, Yet it was anything that it touched, I am this illusion and I am not this illusion Amen.

The advantage of using such material bases is that the power residing in them can be built up over a period. Four main types of material base are used. Those which contain reserves of a particular type of power such as fetishes, talismans, spirit traps and amulets; those which act to carry some effect to its target like powders, philtres, wax images, and knotted cords; those which act as a basis to receive divinatory impressions; and those which act as an anchor for some aetheric form which can be sent like a magical weapon.

In addition, blood and semen may be used as sources of the life force. Various other bodily secreta and excreta: hair, fingernails, spittle, etc. Talismans, amulets and fetishes are charged by a process analogous to evocation. Talismans are usually the recipient of some simple charge that evokes strength, courage, health, virility, no-mind, sleep, or some other emotion, or state of power in its possessor when he concentrates on it.

If the talisman is well enough made, it should continue to evoke its effect even when it is not being used for concentration. The form and composition of the material base should be suggestive of the desired effect.

Amulets are objects containing a portion of the aetheric and life force with a particular task to perform and are semi-sentient. They can only be created by the strongest forms of evocation. They are fashioned in the form of a small man or creature, and during the evocation an aetheric duplicate is placed inside the material form. They are most commonly made to protect places or persons within a short radius of action. When such things are created by a group or tribe of persons over a long period, they are known as fetishes.

Any sort of material base is a spirit trap in some way, but some substances, notably crystals, absorb aetheric imprints very readily. Quartz crystals, which are large and readily available, can be used to pick up impressions by leaving them near charged places, persons, or objects.

If a spirit or elemental is discovered to be inhabiting some place it can be trapped by plunging a crystal into its form. The material base can be composed of anything suggestive of the desired result and may include possessions or parts of the body of the intended victim. As the material base is being compounded, the magician does everything possible with concentration, visualization, and gnostic exaltation to imprint his desire into it.

The charged matter is then taken and placed where the victim will come in contact with it. Instruments of sorcery also find their uses in the mantic art. Most divinatory tools serve only to receive impressions from the operator's magical perception. Charged instruments contain a residium of formless aetheric energy which actually amplify the impressions.

Most devices in this class are magical mirrors, crystal spheres, highly polished surfaces, and pools of dark liquid or blood. The Mirror of Darkness is an instrument fashioned from black glass or natural obsidian. It should be carried concealed close to the body. It may be charged by using it as a focus for concentration in the magical trance of no-mindedness.

One gazes into it unwaveringly for long periods until it opens like a pit or tunnel beneath one. Only after this aetheric tunnel has developed is the mirror of darkness ready for use. The perception reaches through the tunnel as the will directs it to other regions of time and space. Magical weapons are created by building an aetheric dupli- cate of some existing device such as a wand, sword, dagger, pointed bone, or dart.

The aetheric form is kept inside the materi- al base until projected forth by a strong focusing of the will. Skilled sorcerers are able to reach through the mirror of darkness to the target or victim and hurl the magical weapon down after it. Close proximity or even contact with the target is otherwise required.

Personal blood sacrifice may be made to a magical weapon, or it may be made the focus of an orgiastic rite and anointed with sexual fluids. But with or without these adjuncts, it is intense, pro- longed concentration which imbues these devices with power. Amulets and weapons of great power are sometimes given personal names by which they are controlled. Sometimes such devices have acted quite independently of the incompetents into whose hands they occasionally fall.

It is most commonly seen or ex- perienced when the physical body passes close to death. It does not have a definite fixed shape, although there is a natural tendency for the life force to hold it in the same image as the physical body. Even when it is exteriorized in the body's image it is not necessarily visible to ordinary perception.

Like all aetheric matter, its effects on ordinary reality are variable and depend on the ability of the life force to make a real effect coalesce at some point. Thus, the double is able to penetrate solid matter, but at other times it may have a degree of tangibility and be able to effect material happenings. In the occult martial arts, it is projected just beyond the striking surfaces of the body by visualization and a sharp yell which accompany the physical blow.

A portion of the aetheric force may even be left inside the opponent to cause what is called the delayed death touch. The force may also be projected beyond the body to inform one of the movement of enemies behind and projected to the body's surfaces to ward off blows.

In most forms of psychic heal- ing, this same force is projected, commonly through the hands. The double may also be made to take on various alternative forms, most commonly animal form. Theriomorphic beast-like manifestations of the double are often atavistic. They cause a form of possession by the behavior patterns of the animal concerned. These patterns may lie dormant in our memory, or it may be that we have access to aetheric memories.

Whatever their source, these atavisms create terrifying effects. Even if the aetheric beast form is kept within the physical body, it may manifest as strange physical prowess, the ability to cower wild animals and confuse and frighten we humans. Projected beyond the body it can serve as a vehicle for the consciousness to experience the mode of travel and abilities of the animal. Skilled magicians may attempt bizarre composite forms like gryphons and basilisks as magical vehicles. In the normal cycle of birth and death, the life force carries little or nothing from one incarnation to the next.

Of all the techniques of gaining access to the double, narcosis is the least controllable and most dangerous. Nevertheless, since time immemorial magicians have been smearing themselves with pastes compounded from the solanaceae alkaloids, thornapple, nightshade and henbane, and consuming various other halluci- nogens and trance inducing drugs as well, just for this purpose. Visualization is the weakest technique used on its own, but it can act as a model on which to build that peculiar bodily sensation which comes from movements in the aether.

Sometimes it is felt as heat, as a sort of itching, or as an ache. One can only persist with imagining something until a sensation develops. Sharp, high pitched yells and exhalations of breath are used to help project the force in martial arts and occult yogas.

Dreaming is the most challenging and complete method of freeing the double. Ordinary dreams are an ingenius jumble of half-forgotten events, hopes and worries. They are a more graphic form of the mental chattering, fantasizing, and daydreaming that the waking mind does. In the same way that the day mind learns to differentiate between real things and fantasy, so can the dream consciousness learn the difference between real and fantasy dreams.

Real dreams are the key to the double. The first step in creating the double is to establish it in a real dream. The hands are the most easily visible part of the body.

Dream consciousness is particularily linked to the sense of sight. The magician strives to see the hands of his double in dream. The desire to do this is concentrated on intently before sleep every night for as long as it takes success to crown one's work.

During this time the hands may feature in many ordinary, idle dreams which may become very complex and bizarre. This is not the desired result. Success is an abrupt and discontinuous experience. The command to see one's hands is suddenly remembered as one realizes one is dreaming.

Suddenly the hands are there in full clear view. The shock is like being rudely awakened from daydreaming or bursting through a membrane. To prevent the shock causing awakening, the experience should be repeated several times. Liber O Then the magician resolves that he will see a particular place that he visits in his waking hours also. Summoning his hands in dream, he looks at them, then moves them aside and tries to find the place he has willed to go to.

If the vision begins to fade, he goes back to his hands and tries again. He must strive to get all the details of the place correct and to be there at the same time of day that the dream takes place. Eventually he will find that the double actually is at the desired location. While everything you need to do is contained on those pages, the description is very short and very likely newer magickians will have issues preforming an evocation from just reading this chapter.

Have success… actually do the practices! But remember, getting into those states is a skill that takes practice for most people. So, do the exercises until the practices are rather easy and are unfulfilling, then move on to the next section. Another awesome part of Liber Null and Psychonaut is the section that teaches sigil magick.

Sigil magick is a rather powerful, but simple form of magick invented by Austin Osman Spare, but popularized by Peter Carroll in this book. You can also turn it into a mantra. Carroll argues that the more things you believe to be true, particularly about yourself, the more limited you are. Incidentally, this is why Crowley and many other occultists are so interested in destroying the ego.

The essential work on the practice of chaos magic, one of the fastest growing areas of Western occultism. Liber Null and Psychonaut —written not only for students of chaos magic, but to separate the necessary from what may be the unnecessary formula of magick—covers much new territory.

Carroll has taken methods from Austin Osman Spare, shamanism, paganism, and Chaos science and synthesized them into a new system of practice. His approach combines methods from shamanism, paganism, and chaos science.