THE DARK SIDE OF THE OCCULT: When Magick Goes Wrong

THE DARK SIDE OF THE OCCULT: When Magick Goes Wrong

Magic should be approached with critical thinking and rationality to avoid dangerous misconceptions and negative outcomes, while promoting personal growth and clear spiritual goals.

• 00:00 🔮 Magic can lead to dangerous misconceptions and outcomes if not approached with critical thinking and awareness of its true nature.
  • Exploring the misconceptions and realities of the occult, particularly the belief that magic inevitably leads to disastrous outcomes.
  • Magic is the art and science of causing change in consciousness according to will, distinct from Hollywood portrayals that misrepresent its true nature and potential dangers.
  • Engaging in the occult requires heightened rationality and reality testing, as it often involves a suspension of disbelief and can lead to abandoning critical thinking.
  • Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" warns against the dangers of superstition and magical thinking, while distinguishing between pre-rational magic, which lacks scientific basis, and post-rational magic, which recognizes inherent connectivity in the world.
• 04:34 🔮 Magic should enhance rational thinking and personal growth, but neglecting rationality can lead to harmful consequences.
  • Magic should enhance rational and scientific thinking, addressing deeper questions about life and personal growth, rather than serving as an escape from reality.
  • Understanding confirmation bias and applying rational, scientific thinking can enhance effectiveness in magic and personal happiness.
  • Magic serves as a subjective toolset for altering personal perception and experience, complementing rather than challenging the objective nature of science and rationality.
  • Balancing intuition and rationality is crucial for navigating life effectively, as neglecting rationality can lead to harmful consequences.
• 08:53 🔮 Prioritizing personal goals in the occult is crucial to avoid delusions of grandeur and conflict stemming from an exclusive belief in one's spiritual path.
  • The occult offers a vast array of systems and techniques, but the challenge lies in prioritizing personal goals over adopting others' frameworks.
  • Starting with clear goals is essential in Magic to avoid confusion and effectively utilize its tools for personal transformation.
  • Getting lost in the illusions of magic can lead to delusions of grandeur, distracting individuals from real-life goals and responsibilities.
  • Making magic your identity can lead to delusions of grandeur and the dangerous belief in a "one true path," fostering an "us versus them" mentality.
  • Believing in the exclusivity of one's own spiritual path can lead to conflict and violence, which the world does not need.
• 13:53 🔮 Magic should not be mixed with drugs, as it can lead to confusion, manipulation, and negative life outcomes for vulnerable seekers.
  • Famous magicians' erratic behavior is often misattributed to magic, but it is actually caused by drug use, particularly hard drugs, which should not be mixed with magic.
  • Substances should not be a regular part of magical practices, as relying on them can lead to confusion and a loss of reality, while alternative methods for achieving altered states of consciousness are essential for a magician.
  • Spiritual seekers, especially when disoriented, are vulnerable to manipulation by others, leading to significant life waste and misguided paths.
  • Cults and manipulative individuals can trap vulnerable people, making it essential to have clear goals when practicing magic to avoid negative outcomes.
• 17:53 🔮 Set clear spiritual goals, respect others, avoid drugs and cults, and focus on rational thinking to navigate the occult safely.
  • Set clear goals for your spiritual journey while staying grounded in reality and respecting others' paths.
  • Avoid imposing your experiences on others, focus on honing rational thinking and understanding cognitive biases to navigate the complexities of the occult safely.
  • Avoid drugs and cults, maintain control over your life, and only engage with material that resonates with you.
• 20:55 ⚠ Magic can lead to danger when belief systems overshadow personal decision-making, blurring the line between fantasy and reality in the hero's journey.
  • The dangers of magic often stem from individuals relinquishing their decision-making power to belief systems, leading to confusion between fantasy and reality.
  • The hero's journey involves venturing into the unknown, facing challenges, and returning with newfound wisdom or power to benefit their community, a theme prevalent in various world mythologies.
  • Every culture has a version of the hero's journey, which involves a magical quest that risks getting lost in irrationality and shamanism.
• 23:35 🪄 Balancing rational and magical thinking is crucial to avoid harmful extremes and foster personal growth through acceptance of life's challenges.
  • Engaging in magical thinking without grounding in reality can lead to losing touch with rationality, making it essential to maintain a balanced perspective through rational practices.
  • Balancing rational and magical thinking is essential for creativity and problem-solving without falling into extremes that can lead to harmful consequences.
  • Sometimes, apparent disasters in life can lead to positive outcomes and align us with our true path.
  • Acceptance of difficult situations can lead to resolution and personal growth in both life and magic.
• 27:37 🔮 Magic can lead to unexpected and dramatic consequences, prompting reflections on personal experiences and the importance of community sharing.

Summary for: https://youtu.be/2PhGXX3q0-4 by Noiz — Transcript From YouTube Video

THE DARK SIDE OF THE OCCULT: When Magick Goes Wrong

• 00:00 The dark side of the occult when magic goes wrong when it goes horribly horribly wrong. This is what everyone thinks is going to happen for some reason but we're going to find out what the truth is is. Magic actually dark evil satanic horrible will it ruin your life. Let's find out before we get started make sure to like. And subscribe. It really really helps the channel grow hit the Bell button to get notifications when we release content which should be every week definitely leave. A comment below let me know how's magic gone wrong for me has it gone horribly wrong for you. I'm actually super super curious all right so to kick it off. Let's talk a little bit about what magic is and what it isn't if you've already been on this channel if you're already interested in this topic. You probably know this very well but just a recap real quick magic with a K it is the Art and Science of causing change in Conformity with will or to be even more specific. The Art and Science of causing change in Consciousness in Conformity with with Will. What magic also is not is everything you've seen in the movies whether that's the super special effects budget Harry Potter version of magic or Lord of the Rings version of magic um which is cool but uh lives in the realm of fantasy or the horror movie version of magic from like the Exorcist and movies like hereditary and things like that all of these are Hollywood. None of these really have anything to do with actual magic other than they can kind of demonstrate perhaps States Of Consciousness that people can get into internally so in terms of demons coming from the nether Realms of Hell to drag you or whatever you've seen in any movies. This is not this is not real um. However people can convince themselves of things all the time they think is real and that's one of the real dangers of magic and that's what we're going to talk about now so we're going to go through. The top dangers the actual dangers of the occult and these are things definitely to watch out for although they're probably not what you think number one abandoning rationality okay so magic to get interested in Magic as a rational sane. 21st century person who has the internet who has Wikipedia who is connected to all the information in the world um just through a cell phone requires what we might call a suspension of disbelief all right. Now there's a lot of social stigma around magic because um for the reasons we've already discuss. People have weird ideas about it but also it's largely considered a pre-ra irrational way of thinking and it is and it is still practiced all over the world by you know perhaps pre-scientific or non-scientific people without any type of rational or scientific Focus. If you get into magic you need to be more rational than the average person. Not less you need to get really really clear on reality testing and determining what is real and what is not. There's a great book that was written by Carl Sean in the mid90s called the demon Haunted World which depicts a world full of people immersed in Superstition and New Age thinking and magical thinking and non-scientific thinking and it paints a very very dark picture and it paints a dark picture of where the world could be headed if we go fully into magical thinking and Superstition. Similarly I really recommend reading the work of the new atheists like Christopher. Hitchens who make very very compelling cases that it's religion and magical thinking that are the problem in our world and not the solution and frankly I don't disagree with them. However there's pre- Ral magic and post-rational Magic pre- rational magic comes before the Scientific understanding of cause and effect and it involves things like sympathetic magic and action at a distance. Things like this think about people putting pins in voodo dolls and all the shamanic rituals and that type of thing. This is pre- rational magic pre- rational magic is concerned with looking for some spooky or occult way to make a link between two different things just like in the voodoo doll right. But it's to it's not based on any scientific principle. Whatsoever post-rational magic is quite different. It's an enlightened understanding of the world that everything is connected already. Everything is in connection. We are in um complete connectivity with every and the internet demonstrates.
• 04:34 This post-rational magic comes at the world from a rational understanding of the world and builds on top of that and and that means having reason like training irrationality training scientific thinking. Now you can begin to build and ask questions like for instance what is the meaning of my life. What is The Quest For Truth can I change the story of my life that I inherited from my culture can I change the Story of My Life to make it one that is less limited that is more unlimited that makes me more heroic can I cultivate a um a Persona that puts my will out into the world or simply makes people around me feel comfortable and loved these are all the deeper questions and these are all the questions that magic can be completely addressed to. Magic is something that should build on top of rationality and scientific thinking not be a way to escape from them. Examples you can't just be a magical thinker. You have to already be a highly honed rational scientific logical thinker before getting interested in Magic because otherwise you can again get lost in the vapors very very quickly. You can you at the very least need a clear understanding of cognitive biases and how your brain can trick you. Most importantly go read the Wikipedia entry on confirmation bias right now if you're a magician and you haven't done this this or if you haven't done this or if you haven't done. It recently go read it now at the very least understand confirmation bias and understand the difference between that and synchronicity and how easily those can be confused. Rationality and scientific thinking will make you a more effective person a happier person and a better and more effective magician simply because it will allow you to not do things that are pointless. Uh don't work or counterproductive and frankly these days I'm a big fan of putting uh analytics and data into the into into the equation. An example um if you if you've been with me for a while you've probably seen these but um. The Muse headset can literally track your brain wave so now you have a scientific precise technically accurate depiction of what's happening in your brain instead of subjective second. Guessing. These tools are coming out all the time we're going to be reviewing a bunch on the channel. Now more than ever. It's possible to apply scientific thinking rational thinking and logic to to the process of Consciousness change. And we should because you should not be thinking anything. That's not actually true so really what we're aiming. For here is a balance. We want a balance of subjective and objective. Thinking we want rationality when it comes to you know basically the objective world and when it comes but also we want magic. As magic is a set of subjective tools. It's a tool set of tools for changing your internal experience in how you perceive the world. Right. Magic is concerned with the subjective experience science rationality that is concerned with objective reality and Magic I do not see as challenging science at all. I see it as much more akin to an artistic process or a lifestyle. It is I it is not a contender against science for truth. It's a set of tools for changing your subjective experience of life. So you can be. You can go air too far on the side of rationality. Also um by you know because of course we can all we've all had experiences where we've rationalized things we shouldn't have rationalized so. Also you can go too far in the direction of of rationality and what magic does is. It develops the intuition the gut feeling the gut sense of what is right for you and when you get those two things balanced the head in the heart if you will or the head in the gut um. Then you can navigate through life much better but we want both very welldeveloped the intuition and the rationality if you leave rationality completely aside um. It's very easy particularly these days on the internet. I mean we have people not giving their children medication uh you know granola moms on Facebook refusing certain medications for their children things. Like this um anti-scientific thinking can lead to very very bad things. It can lead to sickness and death and all kinds of of bad things so we need to be balanced all right number one first and foremost poorly defined goals.
• 08:53 The world of the occult in a magic is full of all these all these systems. These techniques these tools and it's it's a maze right right you've got everything from you know I don't know the Golden Dawn to Voodoo to neural linguistic programming to North tradition to more psychological more. Modern techniques. You've got a huge Supermarket to choose from and if you go into any bookstore. Uh you're going to be confronted with the huge new age your mind body. Spirits. Uh section which will promise you all of your your your desires all of your heart's desires if you just follow this system but then you've got like 800 different things to choose from and of course. It's encouraged for you to mix and match to look around to combine to always be learning more now. There's one huge problem with this which is you are beginning with other people's systems in mind rather than your own goals. The number one way to get lost in Magic and in life is to not begin with an end in mind. It's to not have a goal if you go into the World of Magic without a goal you're simply going to be lost in the vapors. Magic is just a collection of tools tools. They're very very good for changing. Consciousness. They're very very good for um getting you into a state of mind where you feel like you can do anything where you can be a hero where you can start the business where you can start. The relationship magic is excellent for all of these things but if you don't know what you want it for it's best not to get started at all. The number one thing you can do to succeed in Magic is write down your goals clearly before you start and then go looking for the right tools number two which can very very easily happen if you don't have. Goals is simply just getting lost in the weeds lost in the vapors uh lost in a kind of metaphorical funhouse mirror where you're simply seeing distorted versions of yourself every time you pass a mirror or um. You're constantly fixating on who you could become and obsessing. Over these ideas of people. Your mind shows you people that you could become yet you're not actually doing anything to become those people or become that person. That's getting lost in the vapors and it basically means you went into the Maze of magic without um without uh making sure you had a thread uh behind you to pull your pull your way back out. This can often lead to a lot of other negative things like for instance delusions of grandeur where instead of focusing on your real life. Human goals like for instance your career your relationship um paying your bills. This type of thing you inflate your ego into something like I am you know I am the second coming of or I'm the second coming or something like this and you see you know you see this all the time people decide something to the effect of their God and the CIA knows about it and it's trying to stop them from harnessing their power. The these are standard um delusions of grandeur. We see a lot of this in the magical community and uh it can simp the delusion of grandeur can simp be as simple as this by the way you want to be the best magician ever okay well well first of all nobody's the best magician ever second of all magic is a tool cool. It's basically like that's basically like saying I want to be the best person at holding a hammer of all time right okay well. You have the hammer what are you going to do with it making magic your identity. Um is a a FastTrack to delusions of grandeur. Don't make my mistake all right next and this is really is a big danger. One true path ISM deciding that you found the one true path now a lot of times. When people get into magic um. They can begin looking around for different experiences different paths and inevitably they're going to find one that is overwhelmingly cool and that they perceive themselves of have as having some unbelievable internal breakthrough through right and often. Then you know examples can be experimentation with entheogens going to certain certain weekend. Seminars meditating for long periods um going on a vacation somewhere to a sacred site and lots and lots of other ones can give you the feeling of a breakthrough experience and often the next idea is. I wish everyone could have this well. That's a mistake and often leads to one true paismom aspect of this which is US versus them. One true pathis quickly leads to my path is correct. Everyone. Else's path is wrong and I must fight them and this is the history of Bloodshed Warfare and Slaughter. On this planet which we definitely do not need any more of we have quite enough of it. Already. Thank you very much your path may be the one true path for you.
• 13:53 That's quite possible but that's just for you so make sure to let other people be themselves okay next drugs. It is what it is a lot of times when we look at famous magicians of the past who might have got into some bad behavior like aliser Crowley or Jack Parsons people like this um and people make judgments about their character and then apply that to Magic and say magic must be the causitive factor of some of their nutty behavior um. I would say it's not magic at all. Actually. It's drugs and often hard drugs uh drugs are bad okay. You really should not be doing them and you should certainly not be mixing them with magic. If you want a rational and clear understanding of what you're doing of course substances have been part of shamanic magical practices practice since the dawn of time and I would be simply lying if I told you that they don't occasionally um play a part in some rituals but um they should not be a lifestyle. They should not be something that you're consistently partaking in simply because you're going to lose track of what's real and what's not and when you're combining it with magic. That's a very very bad idea look for other ways to attain Altered States. Of Consciousness. There's a ton and it should they should all be in The Magician's repertoire everything from chanting to fasting to drumming to meditating to mantras. The list is endless and you need to know them. All drugs are a crutch um you need to be able to get into Altered States Of Consciousness at will without substances. It'll save you a lot of money too okay. So next up is Cults and giving your power away. A lot of the things that we've covered already are things that will lead people into confusion and feelings of being lost and if you've ever gone through periods of your life. Like this. Particularly if you are interested in Magic and spirituality you may know how disorienting they can be when you're in a disoriented State perhaps by making one of the previous mistakes we've discussed so hey don't make those when you're in a disoriented State. It's very easy for other people to um take advantage of you and that's why people in their early years as spiritual Seekers or at any time in their career but particularly um when they're undergoing their first spiritual crisis. People can be easy pickings for people who come in whether it's a single person or a group or a group with a charismatic leader or an established religion. People can be very very good at coming in and saying hey you look confused. I know exactly what to do listen to me and everything thing will be fine. This is a big mistake in life although it seems sometimes people are simply faded to make it for whatever karmic reason. But this is a big mistake and this is how people can end up easily wasting 20 30 40 or all of their life. There are many many people who started out as sincere. Spiritual. Seekers maybe in their teens or early 20s. Maybe did too many drugs and the next thing you know they get stuck in um. Some uh we won't name names but some organization or cult and they become institutionalized um in the sense of not mentally institutionalized but institutionalized in the sense of they become acclimated and stuck in that institution. Just like people who are in prison become institutionalized to the prison system and don't know how to function outside of it that can very easily happen to people who get drawn into Cults. It can be the same thing with simply charismatic but ill-intentioned individuals who may come into your life um to whether they are interested in spirituality or not to take advantage of somebody in a vulnerable spot so with all those that should suggest you a little bit about what doing it. The right way must be like so how do you do magic the right way okay well let's turn. All of these around because every problem in life contains the Kel of its own solution so let's go through it. Number one have clear goals why you interested in Magic.
• 17:53 What do you want out of it. Do you want more Career. Success do you want more creative success and creative artistic ability. Do you want simply to learn and actualize what you truly need to be doing in. This life are you simply curious well that last one you might want to work on a little bit but have a goal in mind and with that now you have a North star to go to even if things become um a little bit confusing along the way you'll always be able to reorient yourself. Next keep your feet on the ground remember that you're a normal human being you're not. God. The CIA does not care um keep your feet on the ground um. Now you can keep your head in the stars but keep your feet on the ground and that generally means maintain a real job maintain actual friends that are not interested in spirituality. Perhaps um maintain real world responsibilities and connections. Um exercise you know go to the gym get out go outside read books that are not about magic from time to time and generally make make sure you have a life next mind your own business. Let other people follow their spiritual paths and have their truth don't push. Your experiences on other people don't tell them they need to have these experiences and don't tell them that their experiences are wrong unless you're asked simply mind your own business. Things go a lot smoother that way and proceed a lot quicker by the way anyways because you're not spending you're not wasting energy flapping your gums about things next hone your rational mind understand the scientific method understand cognitive biases. This material is easily found on Wikipedia. There's a billion in one YouTubes on cognitive biases and and rational and scientific thinking. There's actually a lecture series I highly recommend called your deceptive Mind by Dr Steven Nolla who's uh runs the neuros skeptic blog who I'm a big fan of so hone your rational and logical thinking so that you don't play yourself. You know if you're going to go to the edge of the map where it says here there be dragons. The irrational Edge make sure you have the rational stuff down to a tea. First next don't do drugs. Drugs are bad okay enough said and of course don't join. Colts don't give your power away that doesn't mean that you can't learn from people that doesn't mean that you can't join groups. It means however your hands always remain on the steering wheel. If anyone ever tries to tempt or pressure you or cajo or guilt you into taking your hands off the steering wheel of your life and letting them put their hands on it. You d uh and that person is not your friend and should not be in your life. So keep your hands on the steering wheel at all times that includes if you're taking my courses or watching my videos or listening to my podcasts. Uh if it doesn't resonate with you fine I I I'm not going to chase anyone. I'm not I'm not proz here. I'm just kind of putting this material out there for people that are interested in it. So that of course includes me and my material as well.
• 20:55 Um you know and even this can also apply by the way not just to people but idea systems um kind of like we've touched on a little bit. It's people can easily give up their power to a a magical training system or a belief system and now instead of making their own decisions. They're letting the ideology or the system make their decisions for them. Um. That's can be just as bad sometimes that can be worse because it's harder to get away from so yes. These are the true dangers of magic um some of them um but in general as you can tell the dangers the dangers more or less revolve around kind of getting confused as to what's real and what's not it's kind of what they all boil down to losing the boundary between fantasy and reality and this is tricky because the role of the shaman the role of the magician throughout all history um which we see recapitulated in every Hollywood. Movie is you know the hero's journey where somebody starts in the comforting nice world of rationality and then goes out into the irrational. The world that everyone else is afraid to go into the unknown fairy world. The other world the magical world and then must face trials and have their metal tested but through that gain some type of new understanding or power that they can then bring back to their tribe for the good of their tribe to contribute to the tribe um. But the trick there is the shaman has to come back. You can't just go get lost in fairy world and and it's amazing how many world cultures have this story as part of their their mythology um of going out into the other world and then making sure you don't get stuck. Fairy world is like that or pany eating the pomegranate in Greek mythology. This is recapitulated again and again throughout world mythology there's similar stories in Tibetan Buddhism. This story is recapitulated throughout the world and I wouldn't be surprised if every single World culture has some version of this story. It's kind of like a burito. Every single culture has some type of burrito item where you have food wrapped in a some type of tortilla or rap. Every culture also has the hero's journey story which is why movies based on it are so ubiquitous that hero's journey story is talking about the path of initiation. It's talking about the magical quest. The key there is you have to come back so all these dangers essentially revolve around going into the world of irrationality of magic of shamanism of of um woo artistic intuitive thinking and then getting stuck there.
• 23:35 That's the danger and essentially what that means is losing your grip on fantasy and reality now everything that I've mentioned whether it's maintaining a normal set of friends exercising learning rationality and cognitive biases. All of these I submit to you if you actually follow. These will make you a more rational logical and grounded person than most quote unquote normal people out there. Right. Now cuz people aren't that particularly that rational and there's nothing for improving your rationality like trying to directly confront the irrational but that's basically what those all boil down to make sure you come back make sure that you're a really you know a big part of what magical training is is being able to step into um magical thinking and come back. People who are trapped in magical thinking are are that's a real bad place to be okay. I mean that's prey pre-scientific culture. That's you know granola moms on Facebook telling people not to vaccinate their kids from small poox. You know that type of thing that's where pure magical thinking leads to and that's crazy town. Likewise. Purely rational thinking completely eliminates the feminine side of the Mind the intuitive side of the mind and leads to things like genocide imperialism death camps and uh Ultra Precision. Uh you know Ultra precise exploitation of other people that you no longer have empathy before because you're 100% rational and 0% intuitive. So either one of those things uh is a bad scene too rational. Like 100% rational 100% magical you don't want either one of those you want to be somewhere nice in the center so that's the path the path is balancing and being able to step over and back from that fence to magical thinking and come back without it. Being without it um you know disrupting your life or your relationships in a way that adds to your creativity adds to your. Lal thinking adds to your problem solving and inspiration and joy in life but does not leave you stuck in a kind of confused State that's really the path. So of course. I want to wrap up with sometimes things that seem like a mistake or seem bad are actually good things in the long run and we all have this experience through life. Sometimes things happen uh particularly on the path of magic particularly on the path of magic that seem like unbelievable disasters. But then we look back 2 3 years later later and it turns out to be the exact thing that we needed to put us on the true path in life. You know it's like if that horrible thing hadn't happened uh then. Maybe I wouldn't have met the person that I'm with maybe I wouldn't be you know have the friends that I have maybe I wouldn't be um actually on the path. The career path in life that I want to be so sometimes your path through life. Sometimes getting on the right path looks like your current path falling apart. I'm going to say that again sometimes getting on the right path in life looks like your current path falling apart and this tends to happen consistently and that's normal you know that happening on a regular basis is normal. We want to make sure that we get as stabilized and clear as possible uh as we can. But the magical path is kind of an inward spiral that gets you further and further towards your true will and sometimes that can come with some pretty dramatic shakeups in your external life and hey even if you're not doing. Magic life is dramatic anyways. It contains old age sickness and death no matter who you are as the Buddhists say and so drama will occur. But drama is not always bad even if it looks bad at the time and sometimes sometimes the right approach to things. When things go wrong is simply to accept you may have heard the phrase whatever you resist persists. This is often quite true in life and in Magic so sometimes if you're going through something. It's bad and no matter what you do you can't seem to get out of it um like over a long period of time. Sometimes the best thing to do is simply to accept and that's what tends to allow things to open back up again if you've had that experience in life already.
• 27:37 Most of us have you know exactly what I'm talking about maybe if you're young and you haven't had that experience well just just keep on and pay attention and when that happens. Maybe think back to this video and uh I'll wave and say hello okay so that's going to be it for me. I hope you really enjoyed that make sure to like. And subscribe. The channel is definitely growing and we're having a lot of fun doing it. We're going to be improving it constantly and releasing new content hopefully every week so make sure that you hit the Bell notification Bell to get to get notified when we release. New videos and of course leave a comment below when has magic gone wrong for you uh and did it go right eventually in the end uh what is the most dramatic way that magic has gone wrong for you. I'm really really interested uh. I have a feeling. The comment section is about to go nuts and this is going to be great all right lots of love. See you soon we have to buy all the magic books. We have to read all of them we have to waste our lives reading Kavala.

Summary for: https://youtu.be/2PhGXX3q0-4 by Noiz — Transcript From YouTube Video