CHAOS MONK

Chaos Monk:
Bringing Magical Creativity to the New
Monastic Path
By
Steve Dee
The Universe Machine
 Chaos Monk © 2022 Steve Dee

First published Summer Solstice 2022, by The Universe Machine,

Norwich

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or

transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including
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prior written permission of the copyright owner, except for brief quotations
in a review.

ISBN 978-1-7398688-3-3
 An Invitation

This is a call to come to the Quiet,

Those spacious places of the deep self.
This is a desert place found by the few
And others may laugh and call your journey madness.
Darkness is here
And only the brave can see that it holds the most brilliant of lights
Come, come my friends,
Come sit with those who are seeking the other side of silence.
Contents
Acknowledgements
Foreword
Introduction

Section 1: Theoreticum
Origins
What is Monasticism?
Why Monasticism?
The Enlightenment Arrives
A Beguine Snapshot
When is a Monk not a Monk?
Esoteric Orders and the Reformation
Recent Expressions
Modern Parallels
What is New Monasticism?
Interfaith Inspiration
First Steps
My Monastic Journey
Exercise 1: Sculpting Your Monastic Altar
What is Chaos Monasticism?
A case study
The Magical Retreat and Spiritual Conflict
The Abra Melin Working
Liber KKK (Kaos Keraunos Kybernetos)
Key Concepts for the Monastic Explorer
Working with Magical Tension
Hegel and Synthesis
Dialogics and Dynamic Tension
Syzygy and the Gnostic Explorer
Exercise 2: Creating the Internal Monastery; The Cell
Exploration in Chaos Mysticism
Chaos Mysticism Part 1: Big Creation, Small Creation
Chaos Mysticism Part 2: Working with Fragments of Self
Chaos Mysticism Part 3: The Chaos Buddha
 Exercise 3: Creating Your Monastic Collage
Section 2: Practicum
Living the Life
The Fourth Way and the Monastery in the World
Prayer and the Way of the Heart
Study and the Way of the Mind
Exercise 4: Lectio Divina
Pilgrimage: Journeying in the body and landscape
Psychogeography
Exercise 5: Pathworking
Making it Personal
Finding Your Gifts, Locating the Mission
Expressing Your Priesthood in the World
Section 3: Reflection
The Vows
Poverty/Simplicity
Chastity/Faithfulness
Obedience/Accountability
Openness versus Discernment
Freedom versus Structure
Personal versus Impersonal
Section 4: Action!
Pulling it Together
Spiritual Formation: Walking the Spiral of Change
New Monastic Spirals
Moving Things Forward: Developing Your Own Rule
Exercise 6: Writing Your Rule
Conclusion: Seeking Vision and Wisdom
Exercise 7: A Mindful Mass to Sophia
Bibliography
 Acknowledgements
Many thanks to Jo, Adam and Chris for being beautiful and
understanding my weirdness.

Much love to Nikki and Jules for our ongoing work together.

Big thanks to Kite, Charlotte, Yvonne, and Tommie for the feedback and
encouragement.

A deep bow of gratitude to the Oceans of our glorious planet for the
solace that they give me.

And to you, dear reader:

Seek the Mysteries! Become the one you know you are!
 Foreword
Chaos monasticism, you say?
Putting ‘chaos magic’ and ‘monasticism’ into the same phrase sounds
like another postmodern mashup, doesn’t it? It’s hard to imagine some
hooligan with chaostar tattoos committing to the discipline of a deep interior
life.
Or is it? I once knew a Cistercian monk who I was told was an ex-
gangster. Huge guy; hands like shovels. Good singing voice in the choir.
Chaos magic is the discipline par excellence for making the incongruous
congruent. Yes, discipline. I use that word again. Beyond the stereotype of
shouting at sigils and invoking pop culture icons, one engages with Mystery,
which unfolds in a unique way through one’s practice. Simply to be a Novice
with the Illuminates of Thanateros, the premier chaos magic organization,
one undertakes a program of not less than six months of daily work including
meditation, magic and personal metamorphosis. One’s commitment to the
program is tested in the relentless dailiness of consistent work and making
oneself accountable for it via journal and Mentor.
Discipline, see.
Early in the history of the movement, chaos magic turned its face from
transcendentalism in favour of an imminent, embodied magic effective in the
world around. In so choosing, early chaos magicians largely turned their
faces against the ‘spiritual’, in defiance of the historical connection between
mysticism and sorcery visible since Early Dynastic Egypt. However, as the
movement (and many of its adherents) has matured, the baby once thrown out
with the bathwater is being fished out of the bushes.
Some have abandoned chaos magic, thinking of it as a mere technology
and an insufficient vehicle for pursuing a spiritual tradition. Some have
reduced spirituality to something a merely operative chaos magic can handle.
Some chaos magicians have ‘bolted on’ a spirituality that fits poorly with
their magical assumptions. And some have grown mature in chaos magic and
broadened its scope to include those things summarily dismissed years ago,
such as spirituality, mysticism, enlightenment, illumination, or what you will.
Chaos magic is in fact well-placed to talk about mystical matters. Its
non-dogmatic approach is kindly understanding of our attempts to describe
what we’re experiencing, to eff the ineffable, unlike those many mystics who
have fallen foul of their sect’s dogmas or had to speak guardedly for fear of
reprisals. Secondly, that same approach stops us installing our own
placeholder descriptions as dogmas and enslaving ourselves with them.
And so we come to this book. I’m in this Foreword because I’m a chaos
magician who was raised a Catholic. My local parish was run by Benedictine
monks. From my first conversion I was a fan of Bede Griffiths, a Benedictine
who engaged with Hindu spirituality and of William Johnston, a Jesuit who
translated The Cloud of Unknowing and engaged with Japanese Zen
Buddhism. Since then, I discovered Alan Watts and thence Taoism, and also
Jiddhu Krishnamurti, whose work became a major influence on me.
Unsurprisingly then, as a chaos magician I found a kindred spirit in
Steve Dee. Like him, I’ve had some serious theological training, and it was
like swimming in warm water to be able to discuss these matters as chaos
magicians and as theological students. We could be comfortable discussing
issues such as vocation, formation, discernment, transformation, community
and service; issues the magical scene in general could pay more attention to.
Such conversations arise rarely and are over too quickly. In this book I
have the extended pull-up-an-armchair discussion here and now. Steve
speaks both as contemplative and as magician, drawing on not only his
learning and his training but on his practical experience. He gives us a rich
and full historical context, the necessary background for understanding what
monasticism is and is not. He also gives a well-rounded introduction to the
sorts of practices we can engage in here and now.
I regard Steve’s book as a prophetic voice restoring the ages-old
chymical marriage of mysticism and sorcery, especially—but not only—
within chaos magic. And I wish you well in reading it and applying it.

The Kite
2° Adept, Illuminates of Thanateros, Priest of Chaos
Wales, June 2022
 Introduction
Chaos Monk is an invitation to spiritual intensity. In the face of life’s
brevity, it seeks to offer a challenge to consider what truly matters and how
we might find skilful means for exploring such a question. As the pace and
pressures of daily living seek to crowd out our ability to find space and
silence, I believe that those traditions and techniques associated with
monasticism provide vital keys for regaining our balance. While some may
view such paths as ones of restriction or severity, as we travel together I hope
to demonstrate the profound value of what simplicity, faithfulness and
accountability might bring us when viewed through dynamic and responsive
lens of Chaos magical practice.
For many people, the very idea of Chaos Monastics or Chaos
Monasticism may seem like a contradiction in terms. When people are asked
to imagine their archetypal chaos magician, they often envisage black clad,
multiply pierced and tattooed purveyors of sorcery that have an anarchic
disregard for authority and tradition. It probably hard to imagine such eternal
rebels seeking contemplative quiet and discipline.
While the idea of exploring the intersection of Chaos magic and the
monastic impulse might feel somewhat unexpected, this is the strange
territory into which I want to take you. As with any spiritual tradition that
evolves and matures, Chaos Magic (now over 40 years old) is on its own
journey in exploring how it can maintain the energy of its own punk rock
origins while ensuring methods of practice that are more sustainable and that
lead to real personal change.
This book is a deeply personal one and unapologetically so. The impulse
to engage with the monastic current runs strongly in my veins and it
continues to be a deep personal obsession. When I started my spiritual
journey at age 10, I was captivated by images of orange clad ascetics from
both Hindu and Buddhist traditions. As a teenage surfer living on the
Australian Gold Coast, I spent plenty of time collecting free literature from
the Hare Krishna devotees and other proselytizing yogis looking for ready
converts.
Fast forward several years and having returned to the UK with my
family, I became very involved in Evangelical Christianity; and yet even in
the midst of an attempt at robust belief, my inner mystic was still calling.
Whilst a Seminarian, in my early 20s, I was drawn to the expressions of
monasticism that were revived within the Anglican Church following the
Anglo-Catholic revival of the 1830s (the Oxford Movement). While
undertaking my theological training, I came very close to joining a
Franciscan community due to the inspiration of Francis’ life and the
simplicity that his Order aspires to.
While ultimately I didn’t pursue this route (due to meeting my partner),
that aspiration toward the monastic continues to represent an essential aspect
of who I am. but I am still left with the question why I continue to be drawn
to a path that emphasizes asceticism and discipline? What draws so many
people to the form of stark spirituality that monastic traditions represent and
how might contemporary explorers distil its essential components?
This book seeks to explore such questions and how my own journey into
contemporary magical practice continues to include monastic dimensions
within it. As we set sail it seems prudent to define some terms and think
about history.
Section 1: Theoreticum
 Origins
What is Monasticism?
This is a big question. Many others have already exerted much effort in
seeking answers and evidence that might help categorize a similar set of
religious aspirations within our global spiritual and philosophical traditions.
[1]
From the Greek monos, ‘singular’ or ‘alone’, monasticism and the
monastic impulse are fundamentally a radical re-evaluation or rejection of the
tribal imperative to further life through the structure of the biological family.
The human drives to reproduce and acquire are brought into question by the
ascetic challenge posed by religious insight or revelation. Inevitably in trying
to understand the ascetic traditions outside of Christian monasticism we are
in danger (especially in translation to Western European languages) of seeing
similarity and missing their unique texture.
Traditions such as Hindu Sannyasa (lit. ‘one who lays down all’), the
Bhikkhu (beggar-mendicant) of early Buddhism and the earliest citations of
Muni (sage/renunciate) from the Rig Veda (2nd century BCE) all contain
unique and at times subtle variance that deserves further exploration. While a
detailed analysis is outside the purview of this work, we can see considerable
contrast in the degree to which the aspiration of monastic renunciation is
centralized within different religious faiths. In those traditions in which there
is a clear founder for whom the adoption of celibate renunciation was part of
their salvation narrative (Buddhism and Jainism especially), monasticism
tends to be held in highest esteem. Within those cultures in which such faiths
are dominant, even when someone’s family commitments preclude a
mendicant path, the community of lay practitioners develops a symbiotic and
supportive role in providing materially for those embracing renunciation.
While we must remain vigilant in recognizing the differences between
traditions, we are still left with the shared human question of whether we can
find commonalities regarding motivation and expression; what might they
be?
Although this association with the solitary, the isolated and the hidden
are often central themes within monastic traditions, we must not
underestimate the key social function that vocation has within the narrative of
these traditions. In her excellent book A Pelican in the Wilderness, Isabel
Colegate considers the factors that separate the vocation of the monastic in
contrast to the solitude sought by an eccentric or recluse.[2] Her exploration
highlights the sense of calling, discipline and community that seems shared
even by those monks following the solitude of the eremitical path.
On reflection, we can see this sense of vocation as having a number of
differing dimensions; firstly the monastic has a sense of vocation to their
position within the religious framework that they have chosen. Davis
underscores the monastic life as being an act of differentiation marked by
both ‘withdrawal and renunciation’.[3] Traditionally such renunciation
involves celibacy and the relinquishing of personal goods and autonomy:
Poverty, Chastity and Obedience. The embracing of such disciplines
demarcates the monastic space that allows the aspirant to fully experience
their countercultural calling. Vocation can be an elusive concept but in a
monastic context it often seems connected to a profound existential sense of
being different that echoes many of Colin Wilson’s observations in his
seminal The Outsider.

Saint Anthony
The monastic is innately revolutionary in their questioning of what
success might mean within the ‘normal’ world. This is in keeping with the
early origins of the monastic tradition within Christianity as a response to the
conversion of the Emperor Constantine (d. 337 CE) and the eventual
adoption of Christianity as the state religion of the Roman Empire (380 CE).
The gradual acceptance of Christianity within Roman culture seems to have
been a major factor in birthing an increased interest in ascetic practices.
While we can find evidence of proto-monasticism as being present as early as
the 2nd century CE in the Members of the Covenant communities in Syria, the
later desert fathers and mothers of Egypt are often viewed as the earliest
embodiment of Christian monasticism as an ascetically motivated retreat
from mainstream society. Whether via the solitary eremitical life (lit. ‘of the
desert’) followed by Saint Anthony or the Cenobite community structure of
Saint Patchomius (both early 4th century CE), we can see a distinctly
countercultural function in which the vocation of the monastic allows a sense
of the self-identity as outsider, stranger or sojourner within our current life.
The contemporary seeker is often little different; whether induced by a
lack of success in conventional life or by a rejection of its perceived
compromises, the religious Postulant (lit. ‘one who enquires’) often looks to
monasticism for a sense of homecoming or ontological stabilization that
normal life cannot provide.
This sense of vocation not only has intra-psychic value in providing
psychological stability for the person embracing such an outsider identity, but
it also has a powerful role in creating a social or inter-psychic bond. If the
monastic path involves the embrace of strangeness and otherness it can feel
powerful and validating to be truly seen and valued by others who have
chosen similar paths. In my own exploration of both traditional and now new
monastic expressions I can clearly recollect my sense of relief at finding ‘the
others’ with whom I could express my longings for such a life. While it may
be possible to live a deep and central aspect of ourselves completely in secret,
most of recognize the power of ‘coming out’ and allowing this dimension of
our being to be welcomed and reflected back to us through others.
Such communities are not without their challenges however, and one
might rightly ask how the parameters of such groups are defined and how
permeable should or can their boundaries be in order to ensure a necessary
degree of stability and coherence. In viewing the breadth of monastic
expressions across time and culture, their boundaries are usually defined by
the ethical guidance of a rule and a specific initiatory process that marks the
enquirer’s formal entry into the community or tradition.

Saint Benedict
Whether by embracing the monastic rules (Vinaya) of the Buddhist
traditions or by following the Rule of Saint Benedict (written 516 CE), the
community is both formed and sustained by a shared set of ethical
expectations and guidance. In addition, each Postulant will be expected to
follow a guided process of discernment and formation prior to taking formal
vows. The process of moving from Postulant to Novice, to taking formal or
life profession marks a mutual assessment by both the individual and their
community regarding their suitability for each other.
By means of both monastic rules and time-tested methods of individual
formation, the aspirant is oriented toward the personal and collective
expectations of Obedience as one of the archetypal trinity of requirements
within more historic forms of monastic life. The call to Stability, Fidelity and
Obedience within the Benedictine Rule or the more familiar Poverty, Chastity
and Obedience of the Franciscan version all provide a set of boundaries
around a certain form of practice and a specific form of life.
Why Monasticism?
 In contemplating the potential benefits of monastic principles for the
contemporary initiate or magical practitioner it seems sensible to consider
why people might embrace such apparent self-limitation as a way of living?
The Greek root of the words monk and monastic is monos [monazein,
living alone] and while this is most frequently viewed as meaning ‘singular’
and ‘alone’ i.e. not married; the implications of being removed from
prevailing forms of family life clearly extend to the monastic’s increased
ability to focus on spiritual practice. As we will see, such work can take a
variety of forms utilizing body, mind and emotions, but the monastic setting
is aimed at providing a framework to allow both an intensity and singularity
of intentions. The possibility of bringing such focused energy to our spiritual
work is central to the aspirations of the contemporary new monastic
movement and by extension chaos monasticism and we will consider what
this means for us later in the book.
We have already made reference to the sense of vocation and outsider
status shared by those drawn to monastic spirituality. While we might risk
over-simplification in trying to identify shared psychological traits, one might
hypothesize meaningfully about the desire for a consciously embraced
introversion and a distancing from the demands of marriage and materialism.
When viewed from a historical perspective, such celibacy offered a freedom
from the demands of both married and reproductive life; especially in the
lives of women.
Whatever the theological or metaphysical justifications for such
radicalism when we view groups such as the Beguines and Cathars we can
see the relative equality and liberty that they offered women in the Europe of
the medieval period. In their challenge to compulsory matrimony and
reproduction, we can see monasticism as providing a powerfully subversive
and Queered [4] way of living. Perhaps unsurprisingly both groups
experienced persecution and martyrdom in their resistance to attempts by the
Roman church to enforce both religious orthodoxy and conformity to a
centralized rule of practice.
In tension with established religion’s enforced conformity of belief and
by extension social patterns, the monastic ideal often represents a focus on
the internal experience of freedom. As such the relationship between
established religion and those pursuing mysticism has often been fraught.
Whether it is the cave-dwelling Sufi of Islam or the skull-bearing Aghori
Yogi, the mystical intensity of the ascetic practitioner threatens not only the
neatness of creedal conformity, but also the very stability of societies that are
reliant on social stability and polite behaviour!
The very process of being willing to relinquish our words and concepts
in our encounter with Mystery can create not only fear and uncertainty but
also an immense freedom and the possibility for dramatically new insight.
For those invested in maintaining hegemonic control the mystic’s spiritual
freethinking is inevitably threatening.

Saint Francis
The perceived dangers of such mystical liberty and internal autonomy
were bound to elicit a response from the mainstream church. When we reflect
on the founding of the Friar Orders of the Dominicans and Franciscans (both
in the 13th century CE), we can see them partially as an attempt to address
perceived heresy while simultaneously seeking to capture popular admiration
for the type of mendicant simplicity that groups such as the Cathars and the
Brethren of the Free Spirit embodied.[5] Such Friars (along with the Carmelite
and Augustinian varieties) seemed to embody a need to get monasticism out
of the cloisters and more engaged with the world. The Friar as a servant to
the wider world captures something of the Buddhist Bodhisattva vow in
realizing the value of our spiritual insights needs to be put to work in the aid
of others. In many ways these Friar movements can be seen as expressing a
spiritualized form of the knighthood archetype that was present during the
crusades in the Templar and Hospitaller Orders. As we will consider later,
this more engaged iteration of the monastic spirit had a central role in shaping
the new monastic impulse with its focus on outreach and the importance of a
living incarnational theology.
The transformative power of monasticism also played a vital (and
potentially disruptive) function when viewed from a communal and social
perspective. When we consider not only the spiritual but the social impact
that the dissolution of the monasteries had on England at the time of the
Reformation, we can see the importance of such communal dimensions.
Umberto Eco’s Name of the Rose is a vivid portrayal of the way in which
monasteries also provided refuge for some of the most vulnerable within a
society. These monasteries, as well as housing travellers and nursing the sick,
often provided political guidance to secular rulers via consultant with Abbott
or Abbess. In addition to these social functions, the choral, liturgical and
aesthetic environment of the monastery often acted as a cultural storehouse
within which the riches of the era classical could be copied, retained and
propagated.
Outside of the Church approved strictures of the Benedictine rule and its
offshoots, groups such as Beguines and their male counterparts the Beghards
provide us with an inspiring picture of how monastic expression as grounded
Koinonia (Gk. For community) can create change…
 The Enlightenment Arrives
A Beguine Snapshot
In summary, the Beguines were a network of predominantly female lay
communities that sought to pursue their own sense of vocation outside of
formal monastic rules and orders. The golden age of the Beguines was
between the 12th and 16th centuries, and their communal houses (Beguinages)
thrived most readily in the Low Countries of Europe i.e. the area including
Belgium, the Netherlands, and bordering on France and Germany.
While the Beguines were devoted to the monastic ideals of celibacy and
simple living, each house was free to evolve its own rule, and these
communities were noted for their continued involvement in commerce
(especially the textile trade) as a means of supporting themselves. They were
noted mystics who placed a high value on visionary experience, and some
scholars have noted the influence of troubadour romantic poetry and courtly
love traditions in shaping the way in which they employed metaphors of
romantic and erotic love to articulate their passionate longing for union with
the divine beloved.
As with so many radical and visionary groups in the medieval period,
the Beguines aroused a decidedly mixed response from those in authority.
While they were initially seen as embodying a high level of piety, the rate at
which women joined the communities was often seen as a threat to male
power and control. While the lack of suitable male partners (due to war and
the marital restrictions of Guild apprentices) may have been a significant
factor in their prolific expansion, the relative economic and spiritual freedom
granted within these self-sustaining communities was also a likely
consideration.
The Beguines had not submitted a common rule for Papal approval and
their emphasis on mystical experience almost inevitably drew accusations of
heresy. They received Papal condemnation in 1311 and in the previous year,
one of their most outspoken leaders Marguerite Porete was burnt at the stake
for failing to renounce her visionary work, which sought to depict her
encounter with God in terms of intimate and even non-dual terms: ‘I am God
by divine nature and this Soul is God by the condition of Love’.[6] Despite
their devout lives, church authorities often saw connections between the
Beguines and more overtly antinomian groups, such as the Brethren of the
Free Spirit.
In subsequent centuries, the Beguines underwent several waves of
renewal and rehabilitation, but the Protestant Reformation instigated by
Martin Luther in 1517, and the decline of the textile trade (their main source
of income), eventually contributed to their numbers diminishing. While the
anti-monastic agenda of the Reformation inevitably impacted on the
Beguines, their continued involvement in health care and education provided
them with an important social function. There were fears that the last Beguine
communities had closed in Belgium during the early part of the 20th century,
but at the time of writing this I was pleased to hear of a number of people
reviving Beguine communities in the hope of continuing their gift of a shared
and focused life.
Undoubtedly the inspiration of the Beguines has had a huge impact in
shaping more recent experiments in both New Monasticism and communal
living more generally. We will now spend time considering the development
of New Monasticism in the 20th Century and how such movements may
interact with the Magical and Neo-Pagan revivals.
When is a Monk not a Monk?
At a superficial level, the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century was
distinctly bad news for Christian forms of Monasticism in parts of western
Europe. Early proto-reformers such as the famed Bible translator John
Wycliffe saw the wandering Friars as parasitic wastrels who should be
getting proper jobs. Come the Reformation the longstanding tensions
between the Crown and monastic communities (often over land ownership)
came to a head. In his own departure from his monastic vows within the
Augustinian Friars, Martin Luther was clear in his view that there was no
scriptural basis for compulsory celibacy and he also rejected the depiction of
monasticism as the pinnacle of religious life. From the mid-1530s onwards
the suppression enacted by Henry VIII decimated the monastic life of Britain
and parallel experiences can be seen in those parts of Europe that embraced
Protestantism. The monastery was far from being a solely spiritual concern,
and the spiritually focused activity of the ‘Choir Brothers’ who carried out
the daily liturgical offices, were usually far outnumbered by those lay
brothers whose primary activity within the monastery was the maintenance of
its economic activity. Although the dissolution was primarily focused on the
acquisition of monastic property and its material potential, the secondary
effects were significant in relation to the social, artistic and contemplative life
of these nations.
While we might imagine that such political machinations would have
undermined the religious impulse driving monasticism, it can be argued that
it simply re-manifested in a new form via the Anabaptist and later Pietist
movements in Europe. In contrast to the so-called magisterial reformers (aka
Luther and John Calvin) who saw their work as seeking to retain as many
aspects of the Catholic Church as they felt able to, the radical reformers were
more extreme (and in their eyes more thorough) in their approach. As
highlighted by Jonathan Wilson-Hargrave[7] the emphasis of the radical
reformers on the independence of each local congregation and adult baptism
as an entry point into that community had marked similarities to the monastic
process. The taking of monastic vows within monastic communities, like
adult baptism ideally represents an expression of spiritual self-definition as
distinct from one’s family or origin, and each monastery while subject to a
rule, retained their localized autonomy to a significant degree.

George Fox: Founder of the Religious Society of Friends, wearer of Leather breeches, slept in
hedges, frankly a bit of a badass
 Within the broad family of movements inspired by the Radical
Reformation we can see a number of different connections to the ethos of
monastic life. The Quakers (also known as the Religious Society of Friends)
through their centralizing of collective silence in their meetings for worship,
provide us with an authentically Protestant form of contemplative practice.
Groups such as the Amish embody a shared communal life and smaller
communities such as the Shakers and the Ephrata Cloister adopted both
collective living spaces and embraced celibate lifestyles. For me this
powerfully illustrates the deep collective drive to locate a means for
embodying a spiritual life that is focused, communal and retaining
dimensions of asceticism.
Esoteric Orders and the Reformation
Rather than seeing the Reformation as being a bolt from the blue that
was triggered by Martin Luther nailing his ninety-five theses to the
Wittenberg Door, it can be more accurately viewed as part of the growing
Humanism that was embodied in the Renaissance and the decline of
Medieval Feudalism.
Great thinkers such as Erasmus promoted a new Humanism that saw
great value in reason, the growth of science and the ability of the individual
to gain new knowledge that was less dependent on existing traditions (be they
cultural, religious or artistic). Such rationalism and valuing of personal
revelation sought to challenge the Church’s reliance on superstition and
perceived obfuscation. While this sea-change can be viewed as bringing huge
benefits it can also been seen as being somewhat arid and anti-mystical.
In its emphasis on salvation via Faith alone (Sola Fide) rather than
salvation mediated through the Church, the magisterial reformers became
increasingly concerned about the nuances of doctrinal accuracy. This
emphasis on scholasticism and systematic theology risked bleeding out the
mystery of the divine and mistaking intellectual assent to doctrine with the
wilder act of existential trust that faith entails.
In response to such an imbalance we can see the potential importance of
not only the more emotionally loaded Pietism of writers such as Jakob
Boehme (1575–1624) but also the rise of Rosicrucianism. Between 1614–17
we see the publishing of three Rosicrucian manifestos that made claim to the
existence of a mystical brotherhood who were clearly influenced by alchemy,
Hermetic theurgy and Christianized forms of the Kabbalah. Inspired by the
mysterious figure of Christian Rosenkreuz and his initial brotherhood of eight
sworn bachelors dedicated to healing the poor, these manifestos catalyzed the
formation of groups even if they themselves were potentially mythical.
The impact of the Rosicrucians rippled outwards and the images of the
Rose and Cross had a powerful role in shaping the emergence and evolution
of Freemasonry as it moved from its form as a guild for actual (operative)
stonemasons to its current mystical or speculative forms. Current forms of
both mainstream Scottish Rite Freemasonry (Rose Croix) and the arguably
more esoteric rite of Memphis-Misraim make use of ‘The Golden and Ross
Cross’ within their initiatory structures.
While it might seem strange to see a link between the rise of mystical
orders and the rationalist inducing Reformation, we might at least entertain
the hypothesis that the decline of the magical centrality of the sacraments and
the dissolution of monastic life certainly had a role. If nothing else such
Orders represented a means of accessing spiritual intensity and identity in a
way similar to past routes that were now largely inaccessible. These Orders
sought to reintroduce Mystery into the heart of the individual while
remaining free from the power of the Church and retaining their Humanist
orientation.
 Recent Expressions
Modern Parallels
In examining the potential connection between magical orders and the
monastic impulse we can see significant parallels in contemporary
expressions as well as these earlier post-Reformation forms. Many modern
groups require an entry protocol that often draws heavily from the formalized
discernment process used by many monastic orders. The journey from
Postulant (Lit. ‘One who asks’), through to the Novitiate and then first
(temporary) Profession and finally lifelong solemn profession is a time-tested
approach designed to ensure a good sense of fit for both the candidate and the
community they are aspiring to join.
My own direct experience of working with such a structured approach
came via my ten-year involvement with the Illuminates of Thanateros (IOT).
The IOT in many ways represents a more organized manifestation of the
Chaos tradition in that it seeks to focus on the process of initiatory
development that can be experienced via group magical practice. For a person
aspiring to join the Order, they must have first undertaken an
enquiry/postulancy process via letter writing. This will help explore the
individual’s motivation for joining and any potential difficulties they are
likely to encounter due to their psychological or spiritual history.
As laid out in ‘The Book’[8], if the postulant can convince the Novice
Master of their geographical Section that they are a suitable candidate for
involvement in the Order, they can then enter the Novice stage. The novitiate
within the IOT is highly demanding and requires a minimum of six months of
unbroken, diarized magico-spiritual activity (similar to ‘Liber MMM’ as
described in Pete Carroll’s Liber Null).[9] In many ways the daily routine and
focus on stillness practices described in MMM under the ominously named
section ‘Mind Control’, has many resonances with a monastic approach. Only
once the candidate has completed this work and undergone the challenges of
the initiation rites will they enter the grade of Neophyte (4th degree). The
neophyte’s work has many parallels to the monastic first Profession in that
they then continue their magical work and further discern their sense of ‘fit’
with the order. Only once the fledgling magician has demonstrated their
esoteric competence and ability to work well within the tribal family of the
group will they be considered for the more solemn and potentially life-long
initiation into the grade of Initiate (3rd degree).
What is New Monasticism?
Any attempt at unearthing the origins of a religious impulse or
movement has to grapple with some complexity, and understanding New
Monasticism is no exception to this. Although New Monasticism is made up
of a number of interwoven threads, many take their inspiration from the
challenge posed by the martyred German theologian and Pastor Dietrich
Bonhoeffer:
‘The restoration of the church will surely come from a sort of new
monasticism which has in common with the old only the uncompromising
attitude of a life lived according to the Sermon on the Mount in the following
of Christ.’[10]
Bonhoeffer was a critical figure in resisting the rise of Nazism via his
involvement in the Confessing Church movement in Germany before and
during the Second World War. Many view his leadership of the underground
Finkenwalde Seminary as being an early example of the type of intentional
community that is often central to contemporary New Monasticism.
Bonhoeffer was tireless in his call to radical authenticity, and it was this form
of discipleship that ultimately led to his death; hanged in a concentration
camp in 1945.
In response to Bonhoeffer’s challenge, the call to a new monasticism has
had a multiplicity of manifestations. In considering these, we could broadly
sub-divide them in terms of those groups adhering broadly to theological
positions of Christian Orthodoxy (both Catholic and Protestant) and those
whose spirituality has been more profoundly shaped by interfaith dialogue.
The former group (most likely the first to embrace New Monasticism as
a self-description) derived their call to a simple and communal life directly
from a theologically conservative reading of the teachings of Jesus in the
New Testament. Writers such as Shane Claiborne and Jonathan Wilson-
Hartgrove breathed new life into Evangelicalism by taking inspiration from
monastic communalism and the social focused radicalism of the Anabaptist
tradition. Early manifestations of urban communal life such as Dorothy Day’s
Catholic Worker movement and the Sojourner’s community founded by Jim
Wallis provided this new generation with the challenge of manifesting the
social implications of the gospel.
Interfaith Inspiration
 A second major strand of New Monastic energy came in the form of
traditional Western Monastics taking a deep dive into the meditative
traditions of India. Father Jules Monchanin (a French Priest who travelled to
India to undertake parochial work amongst the Tamil peoples) and two
Benedictine monks—Henri Le Saux and the Englishman Bede Griffiths—all
answered a powerful call to explore their vocations in an Indian context in the
1940s and ’50s. Although started by Monchanin and Le Saux, Griffiths’
name became synonymous with the ashram they founded called
Shantivanam. Shantivanam was and continues to be a bold experiment of
East-West, Hindu-Christian dialogue and synthesis. While Father Bede was
often clear in wanting to resist a blurry syncretism, he was passionate about
exploring the mystical heart that he saw as being central to all true religious
expression.
This interfaith exploration was to have an inevitable impact back on
European soil, especially in light of the flowering counterculture in which
luminaries from the Beat generation and that mystical firebrand Thomas
Merton were embracing Eastern spirituality. The Catholic monk Wayne
Teasdale, taking inspiration from Shantivanam, travelled to India and took
Christian Sannyasa from Father Bede. Teasdale envisaged a monasticism that
brought healing ministry out of the cloisters and into the world. His vision
was articulated in his nine elements of Interspirituality that sought to move
ecumenical dialogue to a shared experiential core rather than arid theological
reductionism. The nine elements were as follows:

1. Actualized Moral Capacity

2. Solidarity with All Living Beings
3. Deep Nonviolence
4. Humility
5. Spiritual Practice
6. Mature Self-Knowledge
7. Simplicity of Life
8. Selfless Service and Compassionate Action
9. The Prophetic Voice[11]

Teasdale’s challenge to mature interspirituality has been taken up by

author-activists such as Adam Bucko and Rory McEntee and further
enhanced by feminist interfaith theologians such as Beverly Lanzetta.
Lanzetta’s vital insights regarding the via feminina (Way of the Feminine)
have found expression in her excellent book The Monk Within and her own
interspiritual order the Community of the New Monastic Way. Interspiritual
New Monasticism seeks to inject fresh creativity and take the movement
beyond the parochial confines of narrow creedal affiliation, as Davis
summarises:
‘One hallmark of this kind of ‘interspiritual’ monasticism is a
recognition that holiness is to be found in the secular and that religiosity
comes to expression in and through a range of vocations, whether
contemplative, ecological, artistic, or administrative.’[12]
 First Steps
My Monastic Journey
As stated in my introduction, my own interest in monastic spirituality
and expression is a deep one. The fact that I am writing a book about
monasticism as it relates to a tradition of experimental occultism probably
highlights that I journeyed a fair distance from Christian orthodoxy. While I
have discussed my personal religious journey in previous books[13], in
summary I find a strong sense of personal connection with an Interspiritual
approach albeit with a healthy dose of punk rock swagger.
My earliest spiritual inclinations were strongly orientated towards
meditative practices within the Hindu and Buddhist traditions and yet my
adolescent confusion regarding both my spirituality and bisexuality drew me
to the certainty promised by more muscular forms of Christianity. Predictably
this led to something of a psychological meltdown while in my early 20s at a
conservative theological college, and eventually resulted in my decision to no
longer call myself a Christian. Friends have asked whether I see this as a loss
of faith but personally I tend to view it as an expansion of faith in which
questions regarding my personal salvation became largely irrelevant as I
sought more direct means of gnosis in the present moment.
This process was far from easy, and in the midst of my own
psychological turmoil, I was driven back to silence and the meditative
technologies that monastic traditions often excelled at. In my journey away
from claiming Christian exclusivity, the Franciscans, the Quakers and
Theravada Buddhists all provided spaces in which the need to ‘believe’ was
slowly relinquished.
While studying Theology I was introduced to the work of that great
wizard Carl Jung and he became a doorway through which I entered the
world of Gnosticism, therapeutic exploration and the work of Magical
transformation. My eventual involvement with Chaos Magic (since twenty
years ago) was largely driven by the freedom of its approach and its interest
in why change techniques work rather than relying on extensive metaphysical
belief systems. Any attempts to believe too strongly have felt doomed to an
inevitable repeat of the deconstructive process and I have largely focused my
energies at how we can support the process of awakening within the lives we
have. In many ways I can see my ongoing attraction to Chaos Magic being
due to the way in which it provides a non-dogmatic approach to belief and set
of methods for exploring my own Interspiritual goals of change and
integration.
In the spirit of seeking to explore those tools and approaches that will
allow our monastic journey to have a vibrant and profoundly personal
dimension, I offer you the first of seven exercises that are contained within
this book.
 Exercise 1:
Sculpting Your Monastic Altar
One of the techniques that I employ during my day-job as a Systemic or
Family Psychotherapist is that of the sculpt. Sculpting is a tool for making an
external representation, or ‘sculpt’, of an internal process such as feelings,
experiences, or perceptions. It can use both items and bodily postures as way
of experimenting with the relationship between things and how their
orientation or distance might express the dynamics of communication and
power.
In this activity, I am proposing that we create an altar as a means for
exploring the interplay between different aspects of ourselves as we explore
the relevance of the monastic path. Often religious or spiritual altars express
something of our aspirations and longings, and it is interesting to note the
changes we make to them (or the time we spend in front of them) depending
on which guiding principles or realities we wish to experience more of.
The first part of our task is to collect a series of objects, pictures and
texts that embody those monastic, contemplative, hermit-like inspirational
figures and ideas. Pick those things that acknowledge our experience as
outsiders and inspire our process of quieting down and deepening our
spiritual practice. At this point it is important that we don’t overthink this
process. We won’t be looking at our neighbour’s altar to see who has
assembled the hippest pantheon!
We may draw our inspiration from the broad spectrum of our spiritual
histories, or our altars may reflect the narrowness of our current obsessions.
In my case I had a range of objects including a statue of St Francis, a set of
prayer beads, an icon of the Virgin and Child and some glass serpents that a
talented friend had made for me. I made little attempt to rationalize why I
needed this collection of monastic inspirations together; I was simply aware
that they embodied important markers in my own journey of inner
exploration.
 A sculpt in action
As a person with strong devotional tendencies, I then spent some time
offering incense to the assembled monastic inspirations and undertook my
normal meditative practice. This felt less an act of worship and more a
process of acknowledging and aligning myself with those things that inspired
me to go deeper.
If you choose to undertake this task, I recommend an initial period of
simply ‘sitting with’ the choices that you have made. Maybe make a note of
their presence and position within a journal or magical diary so that any
subsequent changes can be noticed. This could take the form of a
photographic record as well as words.
Working with sculpts can be accomplished in many ways, and it may be
interesting to note how this altar-sculpt evolves over time. You may want to
shift the objects to change their proximity to each other or we may want to
introduce new elements to either maximize a component or to provide a
sensed need for counter-balance (in my case a flaming glass heart that my
friend also made was placed within the loop of my prayer breads).
However you choose to work with this exercise, as with most sculpts,
the aim is to externalize those key aspects of who we are so that in seeing
them ‘out there’, we can then gain a greater sense of clarity having brought
them more fully into the more conscious parts of self. The purpose of
beginning such work is usually far more beneficial if we view it as an
unfolding process of questioning and exploration for ourselves rather than
attempting to rush towards answers.
 What is Chaos Monasticism?
If we view the Monastic impulse as a desire for spiritual intensity and a
guiding framework to direct that energy, how does this relate to Chaos Magic
with its emphasis on postmodern magical experimentation?
Pete Carroll in his excellent book Liber Kaos, describes a Chaos
Monasticism as a period of focused observance in order to ‘renew and
strengthen one’s dedication to the Great Work of Magic’[14]. Such work
challenges us to awaken from the busyness of our day-today routines and re-
sharpen our commitment to following a spiritual path.
The length of the monasticism and the frequency of its observances are
ultimately determined by the person undertaking the work, but he advises
‘they should be ended at some later point in a definite way rather than falling
into gradual disuse.’ In so doing he is acknowledging the likelihood that
entering such a period of focus and intention is a temporary rather than
permanent state of being. While someone may experience a sense of calling
that necessitates a prolonged immersion into such a state, this would be
viewed as fairly exceptional. A more typical pattern might be that the aspirant
would determine the period of observance before making their vow/statement
of intent. I thought it would be helpful at this juncture to provide a
monasticism that hopefully illustrates the variety and innovation that one is
able to inject into the process.
A case study
A recent example of a Chaos monasticism that I undertook involved a
fifteen-day intensive working that I dedicated to the Goddess Eris. During
this decidedly Discordian enterprise, I chose to follow the ‘Greater
Observance’ level of intensity that demands hourly remembrance of the
object of focus as well as daily performance of two pieces of magical work
dedicated to one’s chosen goal. In addition, the monastic is required to carry
an object (often a staff) as a means of triggering focus; in this case I carried a
golden apple that I had sculpted out of clay, inscribed with ‘kallisti’ (‘for the
beautiful one’).
Looking at my magical diary from this period I recollect that pujas were
undertaken, magical sigils constructed and trance dances dedicated to her
name. Apart from provoking some odd looks from work colleagues (‘Why
has he got a golden apple on his desk?’) it’s fair to ask what all this actually
accomplished?
In my own mind, the intensity and dedication demanded for such an
undertaking often opens up aspects of our beings that may have previously
lain dormant. For me this work with Eris allowed me to bring a new sense of
playfulness to my work as a psychotherapist and it deepened my own
dedication to offering priestly service to my spiritual community.
For the Chaos Monastic, while celibacy is not required during their
period of dedication, they are required to commit their sexual energy to the
greater aims of the working:
‘By dedicating any sexual gnosis to magic, the monk or nun affirms that
any sexual act is performed during the period of observances will be used to
cast spells for divination or invocation or similar magical purpose.’[15]
With this degree of commitment required alongside the hourly task of
visualizing the Chaos Star, it’s clear that the undertaking of such a
monasticism requires both focus and intensity during the chosen period of
observance.
For Carroll, this is a monasticism fully engaged with the world: ‘Chaoist
Monks or Nuns may be fully itinerant, and unless otherwise specified by
choice, the monastery is notionally defined as the entire planet.’[16] This is
the path of an itinerant monastic abroad in the world. Saint Benedict is
disparaging about the itinerant monastic or gyrovagi, (lit. ‘those who wander
in circles’) due to their perceived lack of stability and commitment to one
community, but the chaos monastic revels in the freedom of the road and
pilgrimage. While times of rest and retreat will be necessary, we are as likely
to take inspiration from Saint Francis wandering around Italy and travelling
to North Africa.
I have already made reference to the way in which Chaos Magic as a
tradition strongly embodies much of the movement and rapidly changing
fluidity that we might see as being synonymous with postmodernism. While
notoriously hard to define, postmodernity tends to focus less on fixed
identities and more on the activity and expression performed as part of an
ongoing process. Such thinking might also extend to our conception about the
self, and rather than employing the metaphor of a pool into which we must
dive to find its true depths, the postmodern self/selves are more like a
riverbed through which life flows. Our genetics and context may influence
the shape of the riverbed but the flow, quantity and river-carried debris are all
as likely to have a role in shaping us.
The postmodern era is typified by multiplicity, change and the
permeability of old boundaries. Whether in our professional lives, sexual
identities, gender roles or political affiliations, our old sense of certainty can
feel decidedly wobbly when faced with the turbulence often connected with
the postmodern mood.
For some seekers, such fluidity and uncertainty are highly disconcerting,
and the stability of monasticism can feel like a necessary antidote to the
aimless wandering that Saint Benedict cautioned against. In response to such
existential anxiety the temptation to embrace the solid certainty of various
forms of traditionalism can be both strong and understandable. In contrast to
this however, the postmodern magical explorer actively embraces the circular
wandering of the Gyrovagi.
In many ways this adoption of monasticism as a temporary focus may
have some similarities to other key domains of our lives. Whether it is via
part-time work or the shifting intensity of friendships and romantic
connections, pleasure and meaning can be fully experienced without
expecting fixity or permanence. When we allow ourselves to remain awake to
the evolution of these moments we can then more accurately assess their
centrality in our lives. For those of us who respond well to the shape and
discipline provided by our monastic work, we may seek a more long-term
arrangement that has the firmer boundaries offered by a monastic rule or the
taking of precepts.
In his excellent Syzygy: Reflections on the Monastery of the Seven Rays
Tau Palamas seeks to explore the Voudon-Gnosis of his teacher Michael
Bertiaux through the lens of classical monastic concepts. In contrast to the
orthodoxy of Benedictine monasticism, Palamas sees the more flexible
explorations of the modern gyrovagi as representing something vital
regarding the manner in which we travel the spiritual path. As wandering
monks, we find value in walking in circles. Ours is rarely a linear path and
our explorations sit better within the metaphors of the labyrinth and spiral in
which we dance with meaning and find valuable lessons even in apparent
dead ends.
Palamas challenges us to experience the dynamic tension and potential
instability of retaining our freedom to move and explore. Our monastery is
ultimately an internal one located within the sacred temple of the body, but
despite the lack of external discipline, its subjectivity is far from a rationale
for sloth or flippancy:
‘Our Monastery demands participation, work, and a mind that is free and
thinks for itself’.[17]
 The Magical Retreat and Spiritual Conflict
When considering Saint Anthony’s motivation for heading into the
deserts of 4th century Egypt we should not underestimate the power of
spiritual conflict. We have already touched upon monasticism as an
expression of spiritual intensity, but there is also considerable mention of the
theme of demonic conflict and spiritual warfare. In Athanasius’ Life of
Antony we find extensive descriptions of the various demonic visions and
conflicts that he had to confront within his monastic isolation. His spiritual
turmoil is variously described as a contest, a struggle, and a conflict.
While we might view Anthony’s spiritual warfare as being generated
largely by the dualism of his Christian worldview, themes of hardship and
sacrifice can be also be found in Buddhist monastic biographies such as that
of the mighty yogin Milarepa. In The Life of Milarepa[18] we find an
extensive record of extreme practice (both self-inflicted and at the hands of
his teacher Marpa) in which the body, mind and emotions of the practitioner
are pushed to the threshold of endurance in the pursuit of enlightenment.
While the hagiographies of both Saint Anthony and Milrepa are viewed
as providing role models for the practice of the immediate followers of their
communities and within their traditions, one wonders whether practitioners of
contemporary occultism should adopt such examples wholesale. At this
juncture it seems appropriate to consider the degree to which similar themes
are present within the wider Western magical tradition.
The Abra Melin Working
The Abra Melin working, from the 16th or 17th century CE, was made
famous by the (partial) translation of it by the Golden Dawn’s Macgregor
Mathers, and then infamous by his errant student Aleister Crowley, who only
partially completed it. This magical retreat takes either 6 or 18 months
depending on whether you follow Mathers’ translation from the French, or
the original German.
The aim of the magician undertaking this herculean task is to gain the
knowledge and conversation of their personal Holy Guardian Angel (HGA).
Once this goal has been attained and the necessary occult secrets
communicated to the Adept, they must then bind the twelve Kings and Dukes
of Hell in order to remove their negative influence on their life. Once done,
the magician gains the benefits connected to a whole squad of familiar spirits
via which new superpowers such as magical flight, treasure finding and
invisibility can be unlocked.
During the retreat, the practitioner in preparation for their contact with
the HGA is expected to embrace twice daily prayers, chastity, and a
conscious righteousness in relation to their day-to-day undertakings. Crowley
started it while living at Boleskine House in Scotland and then left it
incomplete as he went off to see Mathers while he was in Paris. Allegedly the
sense of psychic unease and house fires that are associated with Boleskine
House are a result of his improper banishing rituals.
Whatever the potential damage done to the value of Scottish real estate,
Crowley wasn’t done with the working and its approach and aims are clearly
visible, albeit with added Thelemic imagery, in his Liber Samekh ritual[19].
Similarly focused on contacting the HGA, this version of the Bornless rite set
within the grade work of the Astrum Argenteum continues to be consistent
with the intensified focus and potential for transformation that was central to
the original. While it retains the mechanism of the demonic that Abra Melin
employs, we can also see a move towards the daemonic in more overtly
linking the encounter with the HGA, with the Thelemic project of
discovering and expressing one’s true will.
Liber KKK (Kaos Keraunos Kybernetos)
In Liber Kaos, Pete Carroll describes Liber KKK as ‘a definitive
replacement for the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage, which system has
become obsolete due to its monotheist transcendentalism and its dependency
on repressive forms of inhibitory gnosis now considered inappropriate.’[20]
In Liber KKK we find a full flowering of magic as a form of daemonic
integration. During the minimum of 12 months of focused work, the
Magician is required to bring their unique creativity to the use of evocation,
divination, enchantment, invocation and illumination. These approaches to
the Great Work of magic are to be explored within the five levels of magical
activity: Sorcery, Shamanic Magic, Ritual Magic, Astral Magic, and High
Magic.
In contrast to the quietist retreat advocated by Abramelin, Carroll
advocates a radically different approach:
‘The work does not entail any form of retreat from the world, but rather
the world surrounding the magician is used as the proving ground for
magic’[21]
Being a good chaos-heretic, I can’t help but make links to these levels of
magic and the unfolding of the spiritual Aeons outlined in the Mass of Chaos
B: [22]
In the first aeon, I was the Great Spirit
In the second aeon, Men knew me as the Horned God, Pangenitor
Panphage
In the third aeon, I was the dark one, the Devil
In the fourth aeon, Men knew me not, for I am the Hidden One
In this new aeon, I appear before you as Baphomet The God before
all gods who shall endure to the end Of the Earth.
In my own reading, Liber KKK represents an internalization of these
unfolding Aeons at a personal and microcosmic level. At the risk of upsetting
Pete Carroll even further, one might draw parallels between this working and
the somewhat overworked integral ideas of Ken Wilber. Unlike Wilber and
his clunky mapping of domains of spiritual evolution, most contemporary
magicians are cautious about advocating a form of new transcendentalism.
Rather than a linear or even a spiral trajectory upwards, the postmodern
magician or monastic revels in exploring all these domains. In contrast to
seeing them as a challenge to move beyond, the brave magician may even
utilize the apparent tensions between these different approaches in order to
gain new insights and a fuller understanding of self.
 Key Concepts for the Monastic Explorer
Working with Magical Tension
To work with polarity at both a cosmological and existential level is
central to the work of monk-magician. Apparent polarities can generate
tension that can fuel our explorations and we must prepare ourselves for our
work to collapse those boundaries that we previously thought were clear.
One such boundary that I have spent my life exploring is the one
between the Mystic and the Magician. Take a moment now, to contemplate
these labels. What images are evoked for you; what ideas are stirred up?
Perhaps the mystic is dwelling in an isolated location within nature (a cave or
forest?). In contrast, the magician might stand within a circle surrounded by
books and the accoutrements of their craft. Are their genders clear? What
about their age or ethnicity? Are these images and ideas informed by practice
or a rich fusion of books, films and our projected aspirations?
When we start to explore such binaries, it is easy for stereotypes to
abound. What I would like us to do is to explore a hypothesis together; to
undertake an act of spiritual detective work aimed at digging into what these
ideas might mean. My own hunch is that while the Magician/Witch/Sorcerer
is seen as the person who consciously seeks to acquire and understand arcane
knowledge and techniques, the Mystic in contrast is one who seems to be
running out of conceptual language and methods. While the Mystic longs for
union with the divine, the Magician is generally as interested in exploring the
terrain of the psyche and body as they experiment with the raw material of
their life.
So far in this book we have been seeking to explore the value of both
these approaches and the riches that might be experienced when we allow
them to inform each other. Binaries can be fascinating, they can help us in
classifying and clarifying and while this may be helpful at a conceptual level,
we may rightly query whether they truly capture our reality. The fluidity and
uncertainty of where most of us reside is potentially far more complex and
interesting when we can open ourselves up to the rich mystery of what we
currently don’t fully know or understand.
We are living in complex times in which it can feel hard to find answers.
How does the magical monastic use the fruits of their training and study to
hold a position of both wisdom and radical uncertainty? Many of us feel
caught between the competing pulls of hope and despair, science and
superstition and claustrophobia and agoraphobia.
Ironically, I became interested in the occult precisely because it tried to
grapple with complexity and the acknowledgement that there would be no
easy answers. In contrast to the mono-answers of faith, here was a messy
hodgepodge of ideas called the Western Mystery Tradition that tried to hold
in dynamic tension the poles of light and dark, male and female, mercy and
severity. While we may long for a simpler solution (especially at times of
distress), I personally have become increasingly interested in how magicians
of varying stripes can find concepts to help us explore and manage dynamic
tension.
Hegel and Synthesis
It’s hard to think about binaries and their tension at a theoretical level
without at least a nod to the concept of the Hegelian dialectic. As an
expression of the philosophy of Idealism, Hegel (1770–1831) believed that a
dynamic process was at work, at both a micro and macro level, in which
ideas and their polar opposites were in a process of reconciliation, synthesis
or sublation. His ideas were then popularized by others in the formula:
Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis. Every idea (a thesis) will have its opposite (its
antithesis), and this polarity will eventually evolve a reconciling third
principle that at once retains and transforms the qualities of the original idea
(the synthesis).
I first encountered these ideas as a fledgling psychotherapist twenty
years ago when I undertook a training in Dialectical Behaviour Therapy that
was aimed at supporting people with intense difficulties in identifying and
regulating their emotions. For such clients, a primary dilemma is observed in
which they are trying to synthesize a balancing position between either
feeling flooded by emotion or dismissing their emotions and fleeing to a cold
over-reliance on reason. The synthesis in this case is called ‘Wise-Mind’ and
aims at helping emotions and reason to dialogue and inform each other.
 Such ideas and dynamics can provide interesting scaffolding for our
own initiatory processes. When we feel ourselves strongly drawn to a theme
or concept, our exploration may eventually lead us to its apparent opposite
e.g. an exploration of indulgence may also include a greater understanding of
abstinence. In our exploration of such apparent polarities, we may then
synthesize a mediating position that brings about a more profound perception
of the whole. Arguably this process of mediation and balancing is one of the
key tasks of the mature magician.
While there is much to be recommended in a deeper exploration of how
the alchemy of dialectical processes may be at work at both a subjective and
objective level, critics of its dynamic often question the neatness of its
balancing processes. Hegel in his Idealism was keen to locate an unfolding of
meaning that often feels unrelated to the ennui and impermanence that most
of us experience in our lives and magical exploration.
Dialogics and Dynamic Tension
In contrast to the balancing, reconciling metaphysics of dialectics, the
dialogical worldview seeks to grapple with what happens if we allow a
multiplicity of perspectives to co-exist without conscious attempts at
reconciliation. Inspired by the fiction of Dostoevsky and the philosophical
work of Bakhtin, dialogical theory and its therapeutic love-child Dialogical
Self Theory (cc. Herbert Hermans) explore the complex terrain of a reality
where numerous voices and dimensions of self are explored, voiced and
allowed to interact fluidly with each other so as to generate new relationships
and tensions. This is quite heady territory, but in my initial exploration of
some of its insights I felt that it potentially offered something helpful in
understanding dynamic tension as a gnostic-engine for initiatory change.
As magicians and Gnostic aspirants, we are working with such tensions
all the time and much of our spiritual work involves the exploration of them
as much as it does the imagined resolution. To work deeply with the self
usually involves a journey downwards into the roots of what really motivates
us. However we conceptualize the realm of the unconscious, the tools of
artistic creativity, dreamwork and more receptive meditative states are
important keys for exploring this territory. However much a part of us may
want a simpler synthesis, sometimes it is the tension that generates the most
interesting work.
Syzygy and the Gnostic Explorer
In seeking to work with the shifting dynamics and tensions that we
experience in the world, the magical explorer is often drawn to those
cosmological maps that reflect polarities as well as our attempts to work with
such manifestations of difference. The creative and fluid space between
apparent extremes could be viewed as a type of liminal zone or optimal
opportunity resulting from such tensions and thus provide rich potential for
those brave enough to do the work of magic.
Gnostic cosmologies are replete with such dyads, and we acknowledge a
central aspect of the Great Work as balancing the dynamic and creative
tensions within such pairings or syzygies. In a way similar to the ‘Wise
Mind’ dialectic used in therapy, when we pursue such balance we are inviting
an acceleration of these often demanding processes within ourselves. This is
a narrow path and the transformations wrought will be as unique as the
individual pursuing them.
The path of the Gnostic explorer is rarely an easy one. Generally, as
human beings we like the stable, reliable and safe and we only move out of
our comfort zone when we experience profound unease. In this discomfort
we sense that something is no longer working and no longer makes sense.
Our personal comfort zone will inevitably be created by a unique
combination of cultural, personal and familial stories; these form our sense of
who we are and what we have come to expect from the world around us.
When this worldview no longer fits with our experience of reality, we
are faced with a crossroads, a dilemma: do we suppress these new, potentially
painful shards of information or do we expose ourselves more fully to the
incoming of this new, potentially life-changing knowledge? In many ways
this process can be seen in the lives of those spiritual heroes whose lives we
have been reflecting upon.
When we considered the impetus for Saint Anthony to head into the
desert it was not only his personal struggle with desire, but also a sense that
the increasing mainstream acceptance of the Christian message was a dilution
of his experience of the gospel. In connecting to the life of Saint Francis we
can see that the Church’s involvement with the Crusades and its
disconnection from the poor, triggered a crisis in which Christ asked him to
‘rebuild my church’.
When we allow such insights and glimpses of gnosis to incubate within
us, they inevitably push us towards transformation. This is an alchemical
process that entails a dance between both acceptance and change. We are
confronted by the reality of what we have inherited, both our strengths and
challenges and we can learn to accept and appreciate our uniqueness and
what we can offer in service to others. Simultaneously we may be confronted
with harmful patterns of behaviour that need to change. Acceptance and
change both hold their own magic, and we often need to listen deeply to our
lives in order to discern which approach needs application.
As monastic-magicians we will inevitably return to concepts of balance
and the liminal tension that exists between apparent opposites and binaries.
So often we are drawn to those deities and spiritual allies who embody this
dynamic. At the end of my first solo book A Gnostic’s Progress I included an
invocation to that infamous margin-walker Abraxas; it feels fitting to share it
again here:
I call to you O dweller on the knife-edge,
Ambidextrous God,
Both hands, both paths:
A Shadow God, in the half-light of the pre-dawn,
Cockerel headed,
Rooting us in darkness and showing us the Sun.
Skirting Mysteries as Serpent legs
Move in and out of sight.
Creator, destroyer, begetter, purveyor of half-truths
That hold Wisdom still.
I think I know you,
And as I breathe in,
A Serpent tightens—
Wrapped thrice point five around my spine.
Breathing out, Silent Sophia beckons:
A deeper night, whose threshold you safeguard.
Hail to thee O great Abraxas
Whose glorious horror haunts me still.
 Exercise 2:
Creating the Internal Monastery; The Cell
If the way of the contemporary Chaos-Monastic is primarily that of the
gyrovagi whose spiritual expression occurs outside of the literal walls of a
cloister, then part of our work must involve the creation our own internal and
mobile environment for practice.
Hopefully for those committed to the gnostic journey they will have
been able to dedicate some part or aspect of their home in a way that reflects
their magical aspirations, whether that be a home altar or a quiet corner for
meditation. However we approach this question at a literal/spatial level, for
the gyrovagi living a secular life, there is still great value in cultivating our
connection to the monastic cell at an internal level.
This exercise is an act of magical imagination in which we create our
ideal monastic cell as a place that we can retreat to recapture our sense of
peace and minimize our distraction from our contemplative goals. The desert
father Moses the Black famously encouraged a brother: ‘Go, sit in your cell,
and your cell will teach you everything’.[23]
The cell can take any form you wish, a reclaimed cave, a whitewashed
room in a Cistercian cloister or the stone beehive huts (Clochan) on the Irish
island of Scelig Mhicil made famous by the Star Wars film The Last Jedi.
What is vital is that it is the space that you feel an affinity with, and where
you will deepen your practice.
Acts of magical imagination are most effective when we engage all of
our senses. What can we see, feel, hear, touch and even taste within this
space? Personally, I couldn’t do without my teapot! Include those elements
that capture your aspirations and also visualize its geographical location; is it
set within quiet gardens amidst a busy city, is it by a flowing river or on an
isolated cliffside?
Once you have identified and conjured the essence of your cell, it can
also be helpful to include an imagined journey to and from the cell. This
gives time for you to prepare for meditation and also your return back to the
business of the rest of your life. Know that this is your space and that you can
journey to it at any time you wish.
As we explore further dimensions of practice our cell might connect to
other buildings: perhaps a scriptorium for study, or a refectory where you can
meet with others. In contrast it may remain isolated as a representation of the
solitude you seek. Know that you can add or subtract elements as you wish,
and that the aim is to create a total environment that promotes the evolution
of your deepest self with the goals of peace and freedom in mind.

A cellular home
 Exploration in Chaos Mysticism
When we feel the pull inwards, when words no longer feel adequate and
the spaciousness of Mystery beckons, it might be worth asking whether the
existential heroism of postmodern magic has much to offer as we seek to map
out such terrain? Mystics of all stripes have often been confronted by the
paradox of trying to name the apparently unnameable. As the cliché goes:
‘the map is not the territory’, but I would still rather some kind of bearings
rather than feeling completely lost. Perhaps the best we can do is to plot some
of the contour lines of this strange landscape and take note of the places
where the rivers flow.
What follows are some rough sketches from the field:
Chaos Mysticism Part 1: Big Creation, Small Creation
Candles and incense were lit, and the wood burner was fed. We were
few in number but in the stillness between All Souls and Winter Solstice, we
had come seeking ‘the still point of the turning world.’
Vowel sounds are intoned as Gnostic pentagrams are vibrated through
the body and before we journey through drumming and sitting practice, our
declaration is made:

Zen-Gnostic Poem
(Ring bell 8 times)
‘We begin in Silence and Space
The realm of vast consciousness
The marriage of Darkness and Light.
In the pregnant space of reflection
Wisdom is born
Glowing deep blue against the blackness
Silver Star points grow
As the holy Aeon spins her web of connection.
Wisdom makes manifest
An outflowing of the multiple and the complex
The Craftsman makes the World:
Baphomet-Abraxas, liminal world dancer
Changing, growing and creating.
 We come to listen and to remember our original face,
We come as heroes of practice
Who sit like mountains together!’
For the magician-mystic, the stories of creation on the grandest scale are
also stories of self. Diverse cultures over millennia have grappled with both
imagining the process of cosmic becoming and also understanding individual
experiences of consciousness upon that stage. These are parallel processes
that mirror each other at the deepest level and the beliefs we hold about our
significance and structure are often projected upon the big screen of our
creation stories.
These stories may attempt to place us in relation to a supreme deity or
they may hold positions where speculation regarding our metaphysical
origins is kept to a minimum (as with many Buddhist schools). For me what
often feels different for the magician is that rather than viewing ourselves as
passive spectators of a completed process, we are active agents in which our
own self-creation is a vital chapter. While this potentially risks megalomania,
most of us chose to embrace the challenges of this approach rather than
feeling overwhelmed by powerlessness.
In my view the postmodern insights of Chaos Magic have something
valuable to offer to this process. While many Chaos magicians may embrace
worldviews that emphasize the uncovering of the essential Self/Buddha-
mind, the dynamic fluidity of the Chaotic approach also allows for the active
creation of self.
As I re-read my Zen-Gnostic creation poem, I am struck by its
fragmentary beauty and partial truths: a cut-up formed from moments of
inspiration and hard-won life lessons. This is a custom job, slowly stitched
together and arguably unique. The orthodox will decry its hotchpotch
constructionism, but these monstrous forms contain their own potency in
being born from an honest encounter with my own experience of both awe
and existential dread as I looked upon the vastness of the universe.
The Magician is engaged in an ongoing and arguably endless process of
zooming out (the Big, the Cosmic) and then focussing in, in the pursuit of
self. When I apply this method to the alchemy of self-transformation, perhaps
I can learn to accept the complexity of who I am and that I am very much a
work in progress. Effort and analysis remain essential, but it is also good to
question what the fuck I think perfectionism means and whether I can
relinquish my relentless conveyor-belt of self-improvement tasks.
 In thinking about what helps with this opening-out, here’s a few ideas
that I think are worth exploring:
Becoming A Mystic of the Self
While we might initially balk at the idea of the place of Mysticism
within magical traditions with a more rationalist/antinomian perspective
(mysticism being far too fuzzy and imprecise), I find potential value in the
way in which it might grapple with the expansive boundaries of self that we
experience in our psyche-centric exploration. Of course, each of us will have
favoured models of the self that provide helpful maps for reducing the
likelihood of confusion and feeling lost, but even these have their limits when
we are faced with mystery and the limits of the known.
My own commitment to this work has been about a desire to make self-
awakening the centre of my work while retaining a willingness to loosen my
old certainties about what I think that is. Life and initiation may well require
periods of focused crystallization in which consistency, boundaries and being
‘of a single-eye’ are required, but if we resist refinement and alchemical
dissolution, we may be carrying around the corpse of yesterday’s self. I’m
ever thoughtful of Odin’s experience on the world-tree and what it might
mean to ‘sacrifice self to self’ (Havamal 138). If we are able to retain our
sense of exploration, what might we discover as we take up the Runes
(mysteries) and seek to explore the fragmentary mysteries of our self and the
world around us?
Connected Independence
Most of us are familiar with the archetypal antinomian lone wolf who
makes great claims to personal godhood or apotheosis and yet is all too
clearly lost in a labyrinth of their own solipsism. Our initiation requires the
challenge and insight of others who have walked the path before us. While
we need to bring the sharp-edge of consciousness to our own motivation for
seeking connections, we also need to be authentic in acknowledging the
countercultural value of ‘finding the others’ who support and inspire our
efforts toward greater becoming.
The Ability to Play
While the early stages of individuation may necessitate a rejection of the
spiritual perspectives of family or culture, most of us go on to a more mature
position of ‘return’ to original ideas or images that we may have dismissed
during our rebellious fervour. Such a position reflects a certain lightness of
touch and an ability to engage with something while still questioning it. For
me this feels like a shift in which we move away from cynically dismissing
something and towards a position of being able to play with ideas and
concepts in a way that both values them but allows some distance and even
irreverence.
While determination and dogged focus are undoubtedly essential in
making progress as a Magician, how do we also ensure that we feel free
enough to experiment, to play and to make mistakes in that process? Whether
we are experimenting with new magical techniques, body-focused practices
or mythical framework for exploring awakening, I believe that we benefit
when we give ourselves and others permission to adopt a position of Shoshin
or ‘beginner’s mind’.
Being able to access this sense of play allows us to develop both an
internal flexibility and poise that enables us to dance with uncertainty, and a
more fluid experience of reality.
Chaos Mysticism Part 2: Working with Fragments of Self
In exploring the idea that there are parallels between acts of creation at
both a large and small scale, how might the way in which we view the origins
of the Universe shape our perception of self and experience of being a
human?
My own view is that the creative, cut-up style of Chaos magic provides
us with a position of dynamic agnosticism that allows us to engage openly
with the questions we grapple with. As we seek to explore potential models
of self, the Chaos magician-monastic (or at least this one) tends to exercise a
degree of both scepticism and down and dirty pragmatism. Yes, a specific
model may provide a language with which to access new insights, but how do
I take these lessons into the realm of my magical work so as to bring about
lasting initiatory change?
Under the sway of postmodernism, Chaos magic tends to be far more
interested in the self as a process rather than seeing it as a fixed entity. We
have already mentioned the idea of self, being more like dynamic shifting
riverbed rather than a still pool of unfathomed depths. Rather than initiatory
work being located in some far off idealized future, this ‘self as process’
paradigm challenges us to experience the work unfolding in the moment as
the primary location and focus of activity.
Most of us come to magical work in order to experience change. We
may have felt trapped by the old, outdated scripts and principles we were
adhering to. If we were simply content with these, we would not have entered
the Temple of the Mysteries. Whatever the techniques or traditions we
favour, my hunch is that we are seeking methods and frameworks within
which to improvise new understandings of self.
The artistic technique of cut-ups provides us with powerful insights into
the shifting nature of both consciousness and identity. The dynamic and
improvisational spirit of this approach captures well the experience of many,
and potentially provides a more fluid map for developing the more playful
style of working that we have already been considering.
Cut-ups also happen at a cosmic level and the Mesopotamian creation
myth Enuma Elish (lit. ‘when on high’) vividly depicts this. It tells the story
of a struggle between the elder gods of primal chaos and the young upstarts
embodying consciousness and order. The great primal Mother of Chaos
Tiamat is eventually slain by the heroic warrior Marduk who then forms the
material universe from her draconian remains. This speaks powerfully of our
own journey in pursuing the goal of self-creation; we may desire the
coherence and direction of the ordered and linear, but if we fail to recognize
the vital potency of the chaotic, our path is likely to become arid.
When we begin to pay more attention to the terrain of self, it can feel
both challenging and potentially disorientating. Too great a sense of
fragmentation and we risk both good mental health and the necessary
cohesion needed for day-to-day functioning. Embracing fluidity and
multiplicity can feel highly liberating, but we can also risk feeling distress if
our experience of subjective complexity runs contra to older expectations
regarding having a unified experience of self. Shouldn’t I be more consistent,
less conflicted and frankly have my shit more together?
I hope you are beginning to spot how tricky it can be to find metaphors
that help convey the complexity and mystery of the work that we are trying to
do! In my own attempt to map-out some of my own exploration of what I
experience going on, here’s one I made earlier…
 In this circularity I have been trying to spot the links between my own
chaos magical process and the role that intuition plays in inspiring the form
of play and ritual improvisation that takes place in the laboratory space of the
magical circle. While my intuition can definitely have an unexpected and
non-linear quality, the foundation for such gnostic insights has come by
means of research, reading, and the consumption of prodigious quantities of
tea.
Some may critique the apparent superficiality of Chaos Magic’s use of
consciously shifting between paradigms or models of belief, but it might also
be seen as pointing to a profound spaciousness at the heart of the Magician’s
work. Beyond the hip sloganeering of ‘Nothing is True, Everything is
Permitted’ is the insight that in moving between differing metaphors and
mythic expressions, we are recognizing the limits of our conceptual thinking
in capturing the numinous and transpersonal realms. If our postmodern
fragmentation contains the perils of feeling lost, bewildered and burnt-out by
the multiplicity of options before us, it also provides a profound possibility
where our sense of deconstruction opens us up to the flow of Kia-Spirit that
defies easy categorization.
When we dare to improvise, to step outside of the known and fully
rehearsed, we can feel like The Fool in the tarot daring to walk off the cliff-
edge. While that image is both powerful and inspiring, we should be cautious
about taking it too literally! To improvise is not to disregard health and safety
concerns or rely on blind-optimism, rather it allows us to trust in our own
cultivation of poise and the possibility of what can occur when we relinquish
the tightness of our control.
Such states of being are often associated with ‘flow’ and the outcome of
mastery and we know that these experiences often result as an outcome of
concentrated discipline in acquiring the basics. We would rarely expect to be
able to play an improvised guitar solo without hours spent learning scales,
and yet in our magical work we imagine that the possibility of mystical
experience isn’t enhanced by regular spiritual practice. The benefit of
revisiting magical monasteries like Liber MMM (or others of your choosing)
is that they allow us to reconnect to daily practices and thus deepen our
experience of both our self and our connection to others.
To conclude here’s a beautiful quote from the preface of Viola Spolin’s
Theater Games for the Lone Actor:
‘In the present time a path is opened to your intuition, closing the
gap between thinking and doing, allowing you, the real you, your natural
self, to emerge and experience directly and act freely, present to the
moment you are present to.
You, the real you, must be seen. There are many facets to your basic
persona unknown even to you, that you may come forth, appear, and
become visible. You, the unique, invisible, unknown, must emerge, be
seen, and connect!’
Chaos Mysticism Part 3: The Chaos Buddha
In reflecting upon the way in which Chaos Magic might allow for a
greater access to and acceptance of fluidity I thought it might be helpful to
share an example from my own practice about my shifting relationship with a
god-form; the Chaos Buddha.
 My own relationship with magic has always intertwined with Dharmic
traditions such as Buddhism, as the emphasis on introspection and meditative
practice felt like a necessary counterbalance to the more active methods of
much of Western occultism. This also resonates strongly with the
interspiritual approach of Bede Griffiths and Wayne Teasdale that we
explored when looking at the historical development of New Monasticism. In
my own journey this dynamic tension and synthesis between Eastern and
Western approaches continues to provide a rich source of inspiration.

Back in 2011 I found myself wanting to deepen my exploration of what

a Buddha-form might look like when seen through the lens of my chaos
magical practice. Digging back through some dust-covered magical diaries I
came across this semi-channelled piece that later became the basis for a large
group Puja:
‘(The Chaos Buddha) A Laughing Buddha-representing the
Erisian/Discordian stream of the Chaos impulse. A Trickster Buddha
who invites us to relax into our conflicts, to breathe into them, to half-
smile and release them to the deeper aspects of ourselves—to subvert
out linear, rational attempts to make things work. Chaos emanates from
a belly that bespeaks enjoyment, pleasure and playfulness rather than
asceticism, sacrifice and denial.
A place of succulence, opulence and contentment.
An earthy bass notes that challenges the belief that wisdom is a move
 away from matter. A playful Monkey Buddha. A Zen rebel, taking us
ever back to the circle rather than the straight line. Hail the Chaos
Buddha!!’
Reading back over this, I am struck by what it said about me and the
place that I was at in my life when it was both written and then deployed in a
magical setting. In the months prior to this work I had undertaken the period
of Chaos Monasticism already mentioned above, that had a strong focus on
Eris and Discordianism. As someone with a fairly wide stripe of seriousness
and intensity, I had felt inspired to explore this current as a way of bursting
my own bubble of taking my magic too seriously. The work was far too
important to not laugh at it!
For me, the creative engagement in this work was a Process
Theology[24] of the highest order. I was making no claims to ancient
traditions or unbroken lineages as I sought to give my own impulses and
spiritual desires an external shape. In this artistic expression of my magical
aspirations, I was simultaneously taking a radical and antinomian degree of
responsibility for the work while at the same time tapping into the archetype
of the Trickster, a spirit that has taken numerous forms across many cultures.
My work with the Chaos Buddha took on a particular intensity back then
and much of my sitting practice and engagement with Zen teaching stories
was done with a nod in her/his/their direction. By personifying my
aspirations and giving them an external form, I felt that I was able to engage
more fully than if I had simply tried to simply think about how Zen and
Chaos Magic might overlap. God-forms often act as amplifiers for our
intentions and allow us to engage our bodies and heart-based Bhakti type
practices.
Nothing stays still for long and when I thought about this reflection,
inevitably I began to think about how my work with the Chaos Buddha has
evolved. In recent years my own work has become less focused on the down
and dirty ‘results magic’ aspect of chaos magic and more on the meaning of
deep psychological change and initiation. For me that has involved a deep-
dive into Existentialism and how concepts such as emptiness and the Void
can be applied in the context of a Left Hand Path type approach.
In exploring this work, I remained aware that the Chaos Buddha was
gently nudging me to develop my past disciplines as a means for exploring
this new terrain. So much of Western Occultism can feel like another version
of the relentless project of acquisition: more books, more degrees, more
weird experiences and more funny hats. While all these things can be
meaningful and potentially absorbing, I must still deal with the reality that the
vastness of the Universe blows my conceptual little mind and eventually
(hopefully not too soon), I’m still going to die. Ultimately, I need tools and
perspectives for helping me sit with these realities and the senses of dread
and awe that they generate.
Thankfully the lens provided by the Chaos Buddha work is providing
me with some helpful keys for cultivating what I need. Whether it’s sitting
with paradox or surfing the waves of internal chatter this part-made god is
still proving to be a valuable asset. Cynics might dismiss my imaginary
friend, but as magicians we know that imaginary friends can be life changing!
In the large group puja to the Chaos Buddha that I led in 2011 we ended
with taking three deep bows while reciting three affirmations to the treasures
of Buddha, Dharma and Sangha:
‘I bow to the Chaos Buddha as the half-smiling fool.
I bow to the dharmic paradox that there may be no absolute truth.
I bow to the Sangha of my school—the tribe of holy idiots bold
enough to do the work of magic!’
My hope is that this piece of work reveals something of the process of a
magician as creative theologian, whose insights are continually reflected on,
refined and pressure tested through experimental practice. Feel free to take
inspiration and play with its imagery and ideas if they look helpful.
 Exercise 3:
Creating Your Monastic Collage
In thinking about cut-ups and the way they embody a pacey, postmodern
experience of self, I thought it might be helpful to slow down. While I love
cut-ups and have explored their value at some length in The Heretic’s
Journey (p 79–84), I felt the slow motion and more considered approach of
collage was a better fit for our monastic endeavours.
In assembling our Monastic altar, we sought to incorporate those
images, ideas and icons that inspired our own process of exploring our
contemplative journey. These subjects will now hopefully become even more
helpful as we work with this exercise that uses collage as means of delving
into the deep and often surreal realm of our unconscious.
I will state at the outset that there are a myriad of ways of working
magically with collage, and I offer this exercise as but one example (albeit a
creative and tested one!) for intrepid explorers to utilize. Unlike the more
randomized postmodern approach of Cut-ups, collages seek to work more
deliberately with aspects of the artist’s self as we engage in the act of
creation. Hopefully having begun a process of reflection regarding your
monastic inspirations, as we begin this activity, the images, symbols and
colour associations will begin to bubble to the surface!
To provide you with a bit of structure you might want to follow some of
the following steps:
Find the images and symbols that you feel capture the essence of your
journey into contemplative and monastic practice. Don’t be weighed down by
the expectations of others! If cartoon heroes or ambient musicians do it for
you include them alongside more standard spiritual symbology. What
colours, shapes, images and textures evoke for you your monastic
aspirations? Don’t feel pressured to be overly literal or representational.
Assemble art stuff. At a minimum you will need scissors, glue, pens and
pencils. Coloured paper of differing textures work and you may want to
incorporate pieces of text. Your imagination is the only real limit here! Make
sure you have a large piece of paper or card (A3 or bigger) so that you have
enough space to stick your stuff onto.
Find a space that you feel comfortable in. Ideally you should be able to
spread your images and materials out so that you can see the possible
directions that your collage can take. Personally, I like having some music on
to inspire me and I usually need a minimum of 45 minutes to an hour to let
the collage take shape. Having a time limit can also be helpful for this
specific exercise in that provides an end point rather than having to struggle
with that sense of not knowing when you’ve done enough.
In a way similar to light hypnosis, some meditative states and our entry
into sleep, this work will be best approached with a sense of playfulness and
a desire to not take it too seriously. Let your eyes move over your assembled
materials and images and simply begin. You can’t get this wrong and your
images and textures will build up during the duration of the work.
Often our results can surprise us. What I love about collage is the way in
which it allows the emergence of various pockets of activity and interest. Our
eyes may be drawn to one thematic cluster only to realize that there’s a
strange and unexpected connection to another part of our piece.
When our collage is completed, we can put it to any number of ritual
uses. I often place mine in the corner of the house where I meditate and do
ritual work. This allows me to come back to it repeatedly and spot emerging
themes.
Given the connection between collage, the unconscious and the realm of
dreams, one interesting practice could involve placing your collage under
your bed or pillow prior to sleep. Spend some time before sleep meditating
on your collage and let the interplay of images and textures enhance your
nocturnal journeying!
Section 2: Practicum
 Living the Life
The Fourth Way and the Monastery in the World
In exploring potentially helpful models of how new monastic-magicians
might express our path within the wider world, one approach that I have
continued to gain great benefit from is that of the Fourth Way or Gurdjieff
Work.
If, like me, you enjoy a good adventure story, you can do far worse than
read Gudjieff’s auto-hagiography Meetings with Remarkable Men. In it he
recounts something of his early life and formative experiences before
describing the search that he and his intrepid friends undertake in search of a
mythical monastic community called the Sarmoung Brotherhood. This
community or esoteric school of highly mysterious (if not fictional) origins,
was located somewhere in central Asia and was alleged to be the repository
of occult teachings regarding how humanity may gain true enlightenment. I
won’t spoil the story but needless to say, the subsequent teachings of
Gurdjieff and his followers are seen as resulting from that search.
Even a cursory glance at either George Gurdjieff’s own writing or that
of his most famous student Pytor Ouspensky,[25] will demonstrate the
complexity of the teachings both in terms of their cosmological view of the
universe and humanities’ role within its unfolding.
With its deliberate obscuration, invented terminology, and frankly weird
pseudo-gnostic mythos, the Work provides us with a set of ideas that are at
once intriguing and infuriating.
In short, the Fourth Way Work views humanity’s normal state of being
as machine-like. The demands of culture, family, our bodies and our lives
have made us automata. The requirements and pressures of our lives cause us
to forget who we truly are; we are on autopilot, we are asleep. The aim of the
Work is to wake us from this sleep. The existence of our soul cannot be
presumed upon, it must be worked for, and fought for: Soul must be created.
But how is one to accomplish such a task?
Gurdjieff recognized that throughout humanity’s history we have sought
to connect to God/Holy Guardian Angel/True Self etc. He believed that these
efforts could be categorized via the centre or starting point from which the
pilgrim began their journey. In short, these paths are the way of the body (the
fakir), the way of the heart (the monk), and the way of the mind (the yogi).
Whatever benefit may have been gained in the past through pursuing these
means in isolation, in our age and within a life lived outside of monastery
walls we need something more. For Gurdjieff, this is the Fourth Way.
The Fourth Way is the way of the sly man: the one who seeks to
harmonize body, heart and mind as they seek to awaken in the context of
everyday life. The Work challenges us to Self-remember, to become more
awake within this body-mind-heart unity. The methods we may employ are
varied, but the necessity for isolated cloisters has ended and we can pursue
the goal of awakening within our day-to-day lives.
While all spiritual maps and frameworks have their limitations, I find
the division of the Work into the three centres, and the three ways of being,
as a helpful method for gaining a holistic perspective on our exploration of
how we might deepen our new monasticism.
Prayer and the Way of the Heart
What might prayer mean for a New Monastic for whom the nature and
existence of a divine realm may be a somewhat blurry notion? The various
dictionary definitions of prayer tend to involve the directing of our intentions
towards something that is beyond our current comprehension. Prayer
involves mystery and a belief (however brief and variable) that the normal
processes of causality can be changed or influenced. For me Prayer is an
innately magical act.
However we try to subdivide the activities of the ceremonial magician
into categories such as invocation, illumination, evocation and even
divination (see our previous section on Liber KKK), all these actions are
reliant on currently unexplained, non-ordinary or even supernatural
mechanisms for them to be effective. Chaos Magic and other forms of
contemporary occultism have been right to challenge whether a literal and
ongoing faith in invisible forces is needed for our magic/prayer to become
effective, but there is still an act of appealing to something (a being, a
mechanism or process) that is not currently knowable through the normal
means of the scientific method.
Prayer and Magic can take many forms and while the louder, more
declarative versions are often a steady part of most monastics’ spiritual diet, I
believe that most folks called to the more internal, quietist path are seeking
something else. While the structure provided by the Benedictine hours offers
a framework in which the community is profoundly orientated towards the
Opus Dei (‘the work of God’), the existential drive to pursue such a vocation
is coming from a quieter, darker place.
In contrast to the more orthodox forms of supplication and intercession
in which the person praying invokes the aid of a spiritual force based upon
their previous track-record, the monastic seeks a much more expansive space.
The cataphatic theology in which positive statements are made regarding the
divine nature are often ways of reminding both ourselves and the Gods how
they have behaved in the past so that we can have a repeat performance in our
current situation. The Psalms are full of such appeals to the past narrative of
salvation history in the hope that change can be bargained for or leveraged:
‘Praise the Lord, for the Lord is good;
sing to his name , for he is gracious….
He it was who struck down the firstborn of Egypt,
Both human beings and animals;
He sent signs and wonders
Into your midst, O Egypt,
Against Pharaoh and all his servants’[26]
Adherents of mainstream theistic religions are not the only ones
vulnerable to relentless positivism and I have witnessed numerous magicians
(usually quite early in their developments) trying to treat the universe like a
cosmic vending machine. Such believers usually end up stuck in a paranoid
cul-de-sac of seeing significance in everything or end up leaving the path
entirely as their lack of omnipotence is clear evidence that it is all hogwash!
In contrast to such an approach, the monastic seeker is more open to
spaciousness of a negative or apophatic theology in which we surrender to a
greater sense of the mysterious, and what cannot be said regarding God. In
writings as diverse as those of Saint John of the Cross, Meister Eckhart, the
anonymous author of The Cloud of Unknowing, and Thomas Merton, we are
taken headlong into the mystical depths of a spiritual practice in which we are
required to relinquish what we thought about virtually everything:
‘Man’s last and highest parting occurs when, for God’s sake, he
takes leave of God.’ Meister Eckhart[27]
Here we are asked to face the limits of cognition, and we must open
ourselves to a type of intuitive knowing or Gnosis. This is a wisdom in which
our heart and mind inform each other and even if we have chosen to
relinquish an object of worship, we can still sympathize with the very human
longings for connection and intensity:
 ‘Oh, night that guided me,
Oh, night more lovely than the dawn,
Oh, night that joined Beloved with lover,
Lover transformed in the Beloved!’ [28]
This has the potential to be a deep devotion or Bhakti yoga purged of
saccharine excess and yet still yearning to understand and to be understood:
‘Sit with your friends; don’t go back to sleep
Don’t sink like a fish to the bottom of the sea.
Surge like an ocean,
Don’t scatter yourself like a storm.
Life’s waters flow from darkness.
Search the darkness, don’t run from it.
Night travellers are full of light,
And you are too; don’t leave this
Companionship.’[29]
The apophatic approach or Via Negativa is often connected with both
silence and the desert. These are the food and drink of the monastic traveller.
In the silence we experience relief from our endless narration about who God
is, who we are and what the world should be. It can be terrifying when such
endless story telling runs dry but it can also provide a blessed peace.
‘When a man goes out of himself to find God or fetch God, he is
wrong. I do not find God outside myself or conceive him excepting as
my own and in me.’
― Meister Eckhart[30]
A large part of what drove monastics like Bede Griffiths and Wayne
Teasdale towards Advaita Vedanta and other non-dual traditions was the way
in which they experienced the via negativa being expressed in those
traditions. In response to the popularization of Eastern beliefs and practice
within the wider development of the counterculture in the 1950s and ’60s,
these founders of the Interspiritual approach wished to retain an appreciation
of mystery and the dark vastness of God.
The feminist theologian and contemplative Beverly Lanzetta builds
upon this work in her articulation of what she coins the Via Feminina in
which the dark receptivity of the divine Mother shines new light on our quest.
This is a path ‘that is not susceptible to subject-object divisions, via feminina
eludes dialectical thought and excessive rationality because it is beyond
dichotomy and mind. It reveals non-dual intimacy—a dimension of numerous
mystical states—in its transcendent aspect’.[31]
In reality, the transition between the active and passive, the path of
words and the path of silence. are polarities that we move and dance between.
Exploring such dualities within the realm of magical practice, the ever-
insightful Ramsey Dukes contrasts Crowley’s cataphatic expression of magic
(via his word-heavy solar-phallic expression of Thelema) with Austin Spare’s
more receptive approach. Spare as the artist of the unconscious par excellence
laid the foundation for a more receptive form of sorcery in which our
intentions get floated out onto the vast, dark oceans of Kia:
‘I like the contrast between Crowley’s ‘do what thou wilt’ and
Spare’s ‘be what thou wilt’ because it illustrates my feelings that
Crowley and Spare represent, as it were, the yang and yin of the new
aeon.’[32]
We need both silence and words. Good music is as dependent on the
spaces between the notes as much as it is the notes themselves. Our words
and concepts remain vital in providing direction and purpose in our
exploration of dark silence, and without them we can easily drift without
purpose. Our words without spaces and pauses can overwhelm us and
become little more than clanging noise. Those of us drawn to the monastic
path are often full up with the cacophony that swirls around us. The monastic
leans towards the quiet path of the via negativa in the hope that better, richer
words will emerge over time.
In following this negative way, the clear vision of the new convert dims
and we feel that are operating as much by touch and instinct as we are with
planned intentions. The boundaries between Self and Not-Self, myself and
the divine, may either break down entirely or at least take on an unexpected
permeability.
This is a desert path, and in the desert the light pollution of our self-story
gets turned down and in this silence we look upwards. It’s unsurprising that
magicians spend so much time staring up at the stars. This is the realm in
which we encounter distant sparks in a vast darkness. In looking we are filled
with the dread and awe that reflect our internal world and the journey we
must take.
Study and the Way of the Mind
In our pursuit of subjective states of spiritual intensity, it could be easy
to dismiss the joy and sense of absorption that can be accessed via intense
intellectual study. The area of one’s research need not be religious, but for
those who connect to this path of knowledge (jnana) the sense of obsession
and the relentless pursuit of new pieces of a vast puzzle can feel profoundly
spiritual. The drive to know and to comprehend can ignite an inner fire that
might seem bewildering to those not captured by such passion.
In traditions as diverse as Tibetan Buddhism (especially the Gelug
school), Judaism, Islam and Benedictine monasticism, greater value is placed
on the memorization of huge amounts of sacred texts and commentaries.
Those who are able to gain such mastery are held in high esteem, and in the
Jewish tradition such prodigy are often called Illui (Lit. elevated or above).
Whether it is vast tractates of the Talmud or mammoth amounts of the Quran,
these acts of learning and recall are often viewed as evidence of Divine
omniscience.
Such paths have often been deemed as only suitable for males although
thankfully such patriarchal control is being loosened. The Women’s
ordination movement in the Judeo-Christian traditions and the amazing work
of Tenzin Palmo in the Buddhist tradition are reintroducing the essential
voice of women to theological discourse. In Tenzin Palmo’s case she has
created nunneries in which female monastics can engage in the vast heritage
of Tibetan Buddhist Scholasticism.[33]
My own journey into Christianity as a teenager had some parallels to the
path of study, in that my quest for certainty sent me down a rabbit hole of
very intense biblical study. This process absorbed several hours per day and
lasted for the four years prior to beginning my undergraduate theological
degree. This was a hugely productive and energized chapter of my life, and I
received much positive reinforcement from the Church community around
me who were directing me towards future leadership roles.
While I view such a period of absorbed focus as being one of late
adolescent enthusiasm, with hindsight I can also see that it contained some
less healthy dimensions. My obsession and the time invested in it were sadly
not accompanied by a great deal of practical wisdom. As with most teenagers
I was legitimately seeking to establish my own identity in distinction to my
non-religious parents, but in retrospect I could have communicated with them
more effectively. In addition, as I began my undergraduate studies in
Theology, I was in danger of mistaking knowing about stuff without knowing
it in a wiser, more integrated fashion. An eventual crisis of faith forced me to
slow down and consider my relationship to the amount of new information I
was seeking to consume.
 What follows is an example of how we might engage with inspiring
texts (be they scriptural or otherwise) in a way that feels more reflective and
overtly conscious.
 Exercise 4:
Lectio Divina
From an overtly spiritual perspective, the practice of Lectio Divina
(divine reading) offers a number of interesting methods for deepening our
engagement with material that we experience as being sacred. Lectio Divina
identifies a number of stages that the aspirant might go through in order to
further internalize the text, with the aim of transformation.
In this exercise I’m proposing that we utilise each of these steps in
engaging with material of your choice, whether that be Principia Discordia,
Bhagavad Gita, or The Gospel of Thomas. Our fifth stage then takes this
process one step further so as to create your own liberating work.
Stage 1: Lectio (Reading): Here we read or engage with our primary
material in a deliberate, conscious manner. You may want to break it down
into small chunks like a couple of verses or a stanza of poetry. I often find
reading a text aloud can give it a different voice and provide new insight. If
nothing else the reading of something aloud vibrates it through our bodies.
Stage 2: Meditatio (Meditation): During this stage we are reflecting
upon or pondering what we have engaged with. In some senses we are
seeking a Zen-like beginner’s mind, where we try to let go of our
assumptions and perhaps the previous meanings we have attached to it. There
is perhaps also a sense of slow simmering or percolation as we let the text
speak to the varying aspects of our being.
Stage 3: Oratio (Prayer): This might be a spontaneous prayer response
directed towards a deity or we might view it as the bubbling up of our
inspired response to our meditations. As we simmer in contemplation so the
deeper aspects of ourselves vibrate in response. Such responses should be
neither censored nor scripted; rather they reveal something real and
unguarded about how something impacts upon us.
Stage 4: Contemplatio (Contemplation): Here we rest and reflect on the
impact of our inspired response. Rather than a fevered response at the height
of ecstasy, now we sit with our own process of transformation so as to allow
a further maturation of any gnosis gained.
Okay, so far so good! Hopefully you can appreciate how this approach
might profoundly enrich and personalize the experience of your chosen form
of inspiring text. What I’d like to propose for the purposes of this exercise is
that we move this method on one stage further in engaging in a further act of
creation...
Stage 5: Creatio (Creation): Having read, meditated and been inspired
we are now able to channel this response into our own creative activity. In
seeking to work with the energy of this inspiration that has arisen, how do we
take this further to create our own art, literature or poem? How can we surf
this wave so as to experience greater liberty? For some people this may
inspire a freedom-text in the style of the original, but we shouldn’t be too tied
to producing a replica:
‘And lo, on the third day Steve decided that he must flee his
pressured job and head to the beach more often... and verily he was glad
and did rejoice!’
When inspiration takes hold it may be that your approach will be less
linear. Your acts of creation may be in making collage, cooking a great meal
for friends, or having a proper dance around your kitchen. So much of the
stuckness that we experience comes from our need to get it right, but like
many things in life most of us do better when we are allowed to relax a bit, to
be curious and to explore things playfully.
I hope you have fun with this approach and allow yourself the space to
explore how the things you love can inspire the creation of your own art.
Peace, love and freedom to those willing to respond to their inner muse!
 Pilgrimage: Journeying in the body and
landscape
When we scan the vast landscape of human religious experience and
expression, the act of Pilgrimage is almost universal. Moving from our place
of origin towards a sacred site is an undertaking in religions both theistic and
non-theistic. Whether it is the ground zero of the Buddha’s enlightenment at
Bodh Gaya, a Sufi Saint’s tomb, or Canterbury Cathedral, the power and
significance of a spiritually meaningful journey should not be
underestimated.
In the introduction to their wonderful and encyclopedic guide Britain’s
Pilgrim Places, Nick Mayhew-Smith and Guy Hayward make the following
observation:
‘Meaningful journeys are one of the few universal patterns of human
behaviour, seeking out special places where communities share their
memories, spill out their hopes and fears. They are places where all can
find wholeness, be part of something bigger. They are open to all.’[34]
Whatever the destination particular to our chosen religious or magical
path, the Pilgrimage represents a very physical expression of our devotion
and longings. We are no longer armchair aspirants, rather our internal journey
in pursuit of meaning is gaining a very physical and spatial expression.
Whether undertaken independently or with the support of others, we are
acknowledging that staying put is not enough, we need to hit the road.
Our journey usually begins long before we step outside our front door.
We may have spent months or years planning and anticipating this journey.
Finding the time, the funds and the support of others to make this possible all
contributes to casting a powerful spell upon such undertakings. Often the
amount of sacrifice needed to make our pilgrimage happen profoundly
encapsulates the importance of that destination as an embodiment of our
spiritual intentions. I have clear memories of what it has felt like as I began a
journey to a large Pagan gathering, a road-trip to a monastery, and even my
preparations to see a band like Fugazi whose music captured my politics and
desire for authenticity.
As we travel, our hopes and expectations sharpen our senses in a way
that creates story. Aspects of my own Pilgrimages feel etched in my memory:
what I drank in the airport, the challenges of negotiating a foreign public
transport system and those meals with fellow pilgrims where time slowed
down and deep connections were made.
On the road we often meet fellow travellers, and we resonate with a
shared knowledge that often remains unspoken. We connect with the
perseverance needed, the aspirations shared, and the badge of honour earned
via the journey. We have a common mythology as someone who was willing
to step outside mundane time in pursuit of new truths. Symbols and shared
songs while on the way add to the creation of a temporal community.
Markers such the white robe of the Hajj pilgrim or the scallop shell of the
walkers of the Camino journeying to the shrine of Saint James, signify us as
changed.
Given that Pilgrimage often involves journey to the remains of a Saint or
beloved spiritual teacher, as we travel we might find ourselves entering into a
new relationship with both time and death. When we travel with intention, we
enter a liminal zone between life and death, we have uncoupled ourselves
from our static, safe bases (if we ever had them) and we are forcing ourselves
to face change and the finite nature of our lives. In the light of our mortality,
how are we to live? What are we doing with the time we have left and how
does the life of our saint exemplify how we might do things differently?
 Discovering Wisdom: The Canterbury Tales
We might fantasize about the Pilgrim as being an embodiment of rugged
individualism, but such ableism has little place in the reality of mobility and
sensory challenges that many of us experience. Even if we travel alone most
of us have benefited from the support of a community that has helped get us
there. They become a cloud of witnesses (Hebrews 12:1) surrounding us and
cheering us on in spirit via thoughts, spells and Instagram messages.
Recent research has made connections between bipedal movement
through a landscape and the type of trauma processing that occurs via trauma
therapies such as Eye-Movement Desensitizing Reprogramming (EMDR). In
a way similar to the bilateral tapping or use of moving lights that encourages
eye-movement, travelling through a landscape creates a rhythm that seems to
allow us to make sense of things in a way that linear problem-solving alone
fail to do. The homespun wisdom of ‘just go for a walk’ may not be bad
advice and in my own experience as a somewhat nominal runner, I often find
that the rigors of a sweaty and breathless 5K run often allows access to
previously unconsidered wisdom.
Sometimes the sense of magical space that we inhabited during
pilgrimage can make the readjustment to normal life quite bumpy. Perhaps
the expectations we had were too high and we are making sense of
disappointment; perhaps the freedom of the road makes a return to our
previous life impossible? Intentional journeys create change, and no change
is without a cost.

Personally, I am taking time to recollect those past journeys and I am

savouring the way in which their magical atmosphere changed me. I’m also
planning my next adventure; I’m breaking out the maps and my walking
shoes and warming up my imagination for what is to come.

Here’s some more inspiration from the brilliant British Pilgrim’s Trust
to inspire you:
‘Pilgrimage (n.): A journey with purpose on foot to
holy/wholesome/special places.
People have made pilgrimage across countless geographies, cultures
and eras.
To turn a walk into a pilgrimage, at the beginning set your private
‘intention’; dedicate your journey to something that you want help with,
or for which you want to give thanks.
Pilgrimage is for everyone, promoting holistic wellbeing via pilgrim
practices and connecting you with yourself, others, nature and
everything beyond.’[35]
 Psychogeography
In thinking further about how we might magically engage with
movement in both the body and landscape, I recently interviewed my dear
friend and magical co-conspirator Julian Vayne, regarding his experiments in
psychogeography and the role that it played within his own initiatory work:

1. For the uninitiated, could you briefly summarize what

Psychogeography actually is?
Psychogeography is an exploration of the relationship between the mind
and space. The approach exists in various forms but the term itself was
coined by the radical French artists of the Lettrist movement. The term is
defined by Guy Debord as ‘the study of the precise laws and specific effects
of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the
emotions and behaviour of individuals.’ Since that time many practitioners of
the arts and other disciplines have made use of this term and of course it can
be linked to pilgrimage, vision quest and many other older practices. In
practice I like to think of psychogeography as a series of approaches to
landscape where we seek to reveal new aspects of a location and, in doing so,
our minds. This could mean exploring a known locality, for example a city,
but doing so in a way that disrupts our usual way of being that place. This
could involve moving through an urban space while using the map of a
different city. It could mean choosing which road to take with a toss of a
coin, or some other technique designed to shake up our usual way of being in
a place so we get to see it with fresh eyes. Psychogeography can also be
about how we move through space, such as whether we walk slowly, whether
we back-sight our route as we go, or what we focus our attention on. As an
example, I once took a group of psychogeographers around the exterior of the
British Museum in London. While we walked the roads around the building,
we stopped to take photographs of the objects in the street, such as benches
and traffic signs and generally interacted with the urban space around the
museum in the way one might engage with the objects encountered within it.

2. What is your history with this practice and what drew you to it?
As a child growing up, I had a deep and abiding love of the natural
world. However, most of the ‘natural’ spaces I had access to were wastelands
and building sites and I had the feeling that there was something wild,
something magical in these liminal zones where human activity met the
rowdy pioneer plants of bramble and nettle. As a young Pagan I spent plenty
of time engaging with ancient stone circles and other prehistoric monuments,
and the spirit of place has always been an important part of my practice.
Slowly I was able to discern the magic in the fully urban context, helped by
writers including Phil Hine’s notion of urban shamanism, the work of
William Blake and others. I realized that for me landscape-based practices
were about revealing the magic in every space, not just locations considered
to be banner-headline ‘sacred’ places.
It seemed clear to me that the process of the journey was important and
that, if one could see things in a new way, hidden mysteries could be
revealed. My early interest in folklore galvanized these ideas, as did my
encounter with the book by Iain Sinclair Lud Heat (1975). In that book
Sinclair explores the idea of a kind of ‘psychic heat’ emanating from some of
the buildings in London, notably the churches designed by Nicholas
Hawksmoor with alleged alchemical imagery in their construction. That and
the vogue for ‘earth mysteries’ and even psychic questing in the final decades
of the 20th century, encouraged me to explore a variety of
psychogeographical practices and to undertake several pilgrimages.
In 2018 Greg Humphries and I published our book Walking Backwards:
Or The Magical Art of Psychedelic Psychogeography which explores the
interface between esoteric practice, walking and a variety of magical
substances. Greg and I have taken many walks together and combined
psychogeographical practices with various psychedelic and psychoactives.
The experience of taking psychedelic substances is often described in both
contemporary vernacular and mythopoetic language as a journey or a trip.
While combining these approaches does pose certain challenges the radical
change in awareness that can be induced by substances such as LSD, DMT,
psilocybin, or mescaline, certainly has the capacity to reveal the awesome,
the weird, the sacred and the shadow in our environment to an unparalleled
degree. I wrote a bit more about this in The Fool & The Mirror:
“The emerging field of psychedelic psychogeography blends together
the inner mythic journey of the shaman with the physicality of wandering the
landscape. This practice may take place in urban settings or indoors at
‘museum level’ but it may also become a way of interacting with wilder or
more organic landscapes. This approach may be deployed as part of a
‘pilgrimage’ where participants walk between ‘sacred sites’ such as
prehistoric megaliths, remarkable nature features—such as the confluence of
rivers or unusual geological formations—or more modern locations
(telecommunications masts or lighthouses) that are interpreted in symbolic,
associative terms.”

3. What might be the similarities and differences between

Psychogeography and Pilgrimage?
Pilgrimage is an act of moving through space in a way that is centred on
the numinous. Psychogeography need not have a discovery of the sacred as
part of its project, and may instead be primarily concerned with political,
artistic or other processes. I think both are certainly way of moving where the
act of walking takes on a meta, archetypal significance and a single walk can
certainly have aspects of both.
I once went for a walk with my son for a few days along the Southwest
Coast Path. We camped out under the stars, listening to the waves. Was this
just a walk? Was this a psychogeographical exploration of moving in a novel
way to disrupt the usual power relationships? (At one point I had to ask him
to take the big rucksack as I simply couldn’t carry it any further. A profound
psychological moment of changed relationship perhaps?) Was this a
pilgrimage? Well, we were not walking towards an identified sacred site or
indeed along a road sanctified by religious association. However, was it in a
sense a pilgrimage towards the revelation of my son as an adult alongside
me? Yes, it certainly was that. My point is that the boundaries of these things
are fluid. I’ve set out just to go for a walk, nothing special, and found myself
plunged into a psychogeographical wonderland of the new by some simple
quirk of fate. At other times I’ve found myself being a tourist at an attraction,
most recently when visiting the Basilica de la Sagrada Familia in Barcelona,
and realised that I was actually on a pilgrimage.

4. For those interested in taking this further, have you got a couple of
practices that you would recommend as a way to get started?
Yes! Find a place to go exploring and try simply to change how (and
thereby why) you move in the space. Here are a few techniques that I’ve used
to ‘break set’ and to help me see things anew:
Try these ways of moving...
Walking very slowly (particularly in a city)
 Walking between certain areas (from tree to tree, from one area in
shadow or shade to the next).
Adopting a particular gait - such as limp, crouching low (to see the
world as a child might).
Walking on the balls of the feet (rather than the heels). This way of
walking is more common when we are barefoot and was usual before
hard-soled shoes became commonplace.
You can also try to bring your attention to certain elements in the
landscape such as:
Simulacra.
Reflections.
Cracks, edges, breaks and interpenetrations.
Weather and its effects.
Animals (actual creatures, including humans and representations of
animals).
The spaces between objects (in the Japanese the Ma), a ‘gap‘,
‘space‘, ‘pause‘ or ‘the space between two structural parts‘, and other
lacunae.
Seeking out a particular colour/other element.
Paying attention to smell, to other peoples’ conversations, to the
sounds of the space (as such a humming of electrical equipment or the
noise of car tyres on the road).
Patterns in architecture and other elsewhere in the space.

5. Given the limitations to health and movement that some folks might
experience, are there any modifications that you would make to allow
psychogeography to become more accessible?
There are of course many versions of psychogeographical and
pilgrimage related practice that can be done completely alone and indeed
without walking about. The classic shamanic inner world journey,
pathworking, imaginal meditative techniques for many spiritual traditions—
all provide the opportunity to travel without moving. Reading, film and other
media can do the same—they give us ways to access new worlds and, if we
take the time to reflect, they can help us understand our own context in new
ways. Then there is the use of psychedelics which can certainly provide many
of the same effects as pilgrimage and psychogeography. Terrence McKenna
famously said that travel and psychedelics were the two best ways to broaden
the mind and I think he had a point. That said it’s also vital not to mistake
neophilia for the numinous, we can travel deep into the mystery with a
magnifying glass and some patience if we sit for a while to observe a pond,
even if that pond is one we see every day.
Art by Greg Humphries from Walking Backwards (2017).
 Exercise 5:
Pathworking
Most contemporary Western magical traditions, at some point in their
curricula, make use of pathworking as a technique for inner exploration. By
making use of an imagined journey, the aspirant is encouraged to move
through any number of different landscapes and domains as a means of
gaining a fuller, more vivid appreciation of the icons and symbols that are
central to a given path.
When we considering the origins of this approach as a contemporary
practice, we can look to the fertile confluence of the Industrial Revolution,
the birth of Romanticism and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. It’s
hard to over-estimate the importance of the Golden Dawn’s role in providing
the esoteric underpinning for many of the subsequent manifestations of Neo-
Paganism. Central to their magical curriculum and grade structure is the
model provided by the Kabbalistic Tree of Life. In moving through the
various Sephiroth or spheres and the paths between them, the neophyte is
taken through a journey of spiritual development aimed at ensuring balance
and integration.
Whichever spiritual tradition or paradigm that we choose to work
within, the concept of a structured set of internal markers via which to
undertake an imaginal and (relatively) safe spiritual journey can be extremely
helpful. Whether we are seeking to encounter the guardians of the Druid
tradition amongst sacred groves or travelling to the pyramids to receive
secrets from the Egyptian Neteru, I thought it would be of greater benefit if I
described the component parts that I feel might be helpful for effective
journeying more generally, so that you, dear reader, can construct your own
within the mythological treasure-trove of your choice:
Grounding in a place of safety: Magic can be a risky business that often
asks us to question certainties and re-evaluate the person(s) we think we are.
When we set out on a journey it can be good to start by connecting to our
breath and body within an imagined setting that allows us to get our bearings,
and to connect to the values and allies that provide the motivation for the
work. In the Druid tradition this is often described as a sacred grove, but it
could as easily be by the side of the Nile or within the grounds of Apollo’s
temple at Delphi.
Descending to the underworld: Now this might reflect something of my
Luciferian tendencies, but I often like an initial period of connecting to the
Chthonic, underworld powers. Whether it involves the roots of trees, stygian
tunnels or dragon infested caves, I gain great benefit in reconnecting to the
dark and unconscious dimensions that such places often represent. We often
enter such realms quietly in acknowledgement of their power and the desire
to use such serpentine energy to ensure a rich depth to the insights that we
hope to gain.
Connecting to a source of Inspiration: When we re-emerge from the
underworld, blinking as our eyes readjust to the sunlight of the conscious
mind, we may wish to connect to a primary source of inspiration within our
mythic universe. Whether our encounter is with the guardian of a sacred well
or the Priestess of a temple, we may be met with a challenge as to why we
wish to access these places, and we may need to reconnect to our motivation
for pursuing this work and the extent to which any Gnosis gained will be put
into the service of the greater good.
The Ascent: Having restated our motivation and reconnected to the heart
of our work (Tiphareth if you are using the Tree of Life) we are then ready to
ascend in order to gain new insight and challenge. You may wish to frame
this journey to Shambhala in any number of ways, such as an encounter with
the Holy Guardian Angel or our future magical self. Here we must expect the
unexpected and we may also wish for portents and signs in future days as a
means of ‘testing the spirits’ and ensuring a balanced integration of new
knowledge gained.
The Return: Having gained wisdom and/or new insight, it’s important
that we return to base so as to ground these new perspectives and to ensure
that we can attend to other day-to-day matters without spinning off into
space. Returning at first to our sacred grove and reconnecting to body and
breath allows this process to begin. We may wish to formally conclude by
giving thanks to our guardians and by ensuring that we do something that
grounds us such as eating. Most magical groups eat and drink together after
magical work because the reality of these mundane acts ensures that we don’t
lose our shit/get lost in the realms of faery, and, by this point of the
proceedings people are often a bit hungry.
Bon Voyage!
 Making it Personal
Finding Your Gifts, Locating the Mission
In exploring the history of different monastic communities and
expressions, we often hear that part of their rationale for existence is due to a
calling to express a particular gift or charism. Whether that is the Franciscan
ministry to serve the poor or a Carmelite passion for the interior life of
prayer, Orders often shape themselves around the monastic vision of an
inspired founder or reformer (Such as Saint Francis or Saint Theresa of
Avila).
We have explored together the idea that monastic expression in its many
forms is calling to an intensity of practice that often doesn’t fit with the
expectations of a normal life. Those called to the desert (whether literal or
metaphorical), are in pursuit of something deeper, something more. They
want to find out who they really are and what they need to do while they are
here. They want to find their vocation and their true name.
One of the ideas that the amazing Ursula Le Guin skilfully wove into the
magical universe of Earthsea was the power of words and names. To know
the true name of a thing or a person was to have power over them, and the act
of sharing your true name with another was an act of profound trust. This
concept of a true name (usually received during adolescence) also contains
within it the idea that we each hold within us the possibility of bringing
something unique into the world.
In James Hillman’s excellent The Soul’s Code he considers how the idea
of the Greek concept of the daimon can help us discover those passions and
vocations that might provide a sense of coherence to our life’s journey. The
daimon was thought to be a tutelary or guiding spirit, who Plato saw as being
linked to the fate or life-purpose of the person determined before their birth.
[36]
The challenge for Hillman, and for ourselves, is how we tune in to
intuition and creativity, to align our lives to this deeper sense of calling and
purpose. When we are able to bring about this sense of greater congruence
with our daimonic, deeper selves, so it becomes possible that greater
inspiration might flow through us.
For Hillman a critical part of this experience comes via a positive,
mythic use of loneliness and self-isolation. So often the voice of our vocation
can be stifled via the constrictions of family or social conditioning. To
recover the ‘still, small voice’ of the daimon, we are often required to walk a
path that may be viewed as wilful antinomianism or rebellion by those
around us, as we question or reject their perspectives and values.
For some their sense of daimonic purpose feels so clear that they have
little doubt as to the life’s work that they need to pursue, yet for many of us
this process takes more time. The work of tuning in to the voice of our deep
self is aided by tools and approaches that allow exploration of this hidden or
‘occult’ terrain. Ritual practice, dream-work and art can all be highly helpful
means of recovering those powerful longings that may have become lost.
In reflecting on this process of discovering our ‘true name’ or ‘daimonic
purpose’, I find great inspiration the Grail story of Parzival and the way in
which his mother attempted to protect him from both the rigors and glamour
of Knighthood. While we can sympathize with her aim, having lost her
husband to the crusades, such attempts at control were destined to fail once
his own vocation has been activated.
As Parzival journeys along the road he finds that his certainties and self-
perception are repeatedly challenged as he seeks to find the meaning of true
knighthood and what it might mean to be worthy of the Grail. When he
begins his quest, the literal and the masculine provide him benchmarks for
how he thinks he should be in seeking to make sense of his universe. His first
guru Gurnemanz is more than adept in teaching him the use of the lance and
shield, but when considering matters of the heart and deep pain he is sadly
lacking. It is this stiff upper-lip, ‘don’t ask questions’ attitude that causes his
initial failure when confronted by the wound of the Fisher King. The Fisher
King’s vulnerability is too stark for Parzival and his inability to look upon a
radically different version of maleness blocks his access to wisdom.
To walk the path of taking our true form demands a form of self-
remembering and reflection that asks us considerable effort, yet to not
undertake such work is to stifle the process of initiation unfolding in our
lives. Many of us will be all too aware of what it feels like to have our
creativity blocked, and the cost incurred by our sense of psychological and
spiritual health, as Hillman puts it: ‘Without inspiration, what is left is bare,
aimless ferocity.’
The sharp edges of such ferocity often remind me that I’m working too
hard on things that don’t really matter or that I’m using such busyness in a
desperate attempt to escape the true cost of awakening. To close my ears to
this deeper truth, risks denying both myself and the wider world of the unique
manifestation of who I am and might become.
When we stop listening to the unfolding of our authentic self, we risk
disconnection from our will to life with all the dissatisfaction and potential
for depression that this might bring. The discovery of our unique charism
usually entails a gradual process of uncovering and even recovering of those
things that thrilled us in our youth. What matters is allowing our self to begin
this work: ‘It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey
that matters, in the end.’[37]
Expressing Your Priesthood in the World
Now that we have given space to reflecting on what our unique gifts
might be, and the power we can experience when we acknowledge and
explore them, I want us now to turn to how we might express and manifest
these strengths and assets in service to the wider world.
Having spent the last 40 years ensconced in a spiritual journey that has
allowed me to encounter a wide variety of folks who have described
themselves as Priests, I thought it might be helpful to explore some of the
shared concepts that seem important to those who hold a sense of vocation, or
calling to minister spiritually to others.
Perhaps the first and most obvious thing to observe is that a Priest
(whether Male, Female or non-binary) is usually a Priest of something or
someone! Priests of virtually all denominational stripes are usually seeking to
mediate and embody a deity, a principle or a process.
Even if the mission of our Priesthood is broad, there needs to be a
certain degree of clarity regarding the perspective we are seeking to represent
to the wider world. Some may be attracted to the status or accoutrements of
the Priestly role, but without a clear sense of vision as to who or what our
service is being offered, such Priesthood is likely to be little more than
costume play. For our Priesthood to have depth it feels critical that we have
internalized our goal to a degree that it has truly transformed us; we have
moved beyond merely articulating truths and more profoundly we are seeking
to demonstrate and become them.
Most forms of Priesthood seem to incorporate both the function of
Priesthood (what you actually do) and the ontology of Priesthood—how you
as a person have been transformed internally by having Priesthood conveyed
upon you. When we examine different traditions, we can see the way in
which they place varying degrees of focus on either part of this vocational
equation. For some schools Priesthood is predominantly sacramental and
initiatory in that the goal of ordination is the alchemical transformation of an
individual’s spiritual DNA. For others Priesthood is less about identity, and a
person may move in and out of a Priestly function depending on the role they
are adopting at a given time and what their community may require of them.
In seeking to comprehend ministerial roles that are more defined by
function, I was aware of my own background as a former Christian and the
way in which the Protestant emphasis on ‘the priesthood of all believers’ sort
to minimize any unique status or intermediary role for those who sought
ordination. I am aware of the way in which my own biases have been formed
by a good dose of Welsh anti-clericalism, but I’m glad to say that this has
slowly softened over time as I have been more fully able to appreciate the
initiatory and transformational power of having such vocations
acknowledged.
My own journey into Priesthood has been a long and winding one. In
my late teens I became a seminarian with a view to become an Anglican
Priest, but this was eventually derailed by the crisis of faith that pushed me to
explore a more magical-gnostic path. Eventually my exploration of Paganism
and magical practice led me into an intense encounter with Sophia as the
feminine embodiment of Divine wisdom and Gnosis and I became
increasingly aware of the obligations that this experience carried with it.
During my own encounter it was made abundantly clear that if I wished to
continue a working relationship with these forces, it would entail both cost
and obligations in representing her reality to others. While I am a firm
believer that vocation can take many forms that are uniquely shaped by the
individual and their context, based on my own experience I would question
the validity of any call to Priesthood that doesn’t have its basis in both
marked intensity and sacrifice.
Although we should be cautious about any insistence that a person’s
Priesthood must involve service to a physical congregation who hold similar
perspectives (this is especially the case if adherents are spread over a large
geographical area), we mustn’t underestimate the impact that our presence
and embodiment might have on those in our more immediate sphere. The
very magical act of someone pursuing a deep vocation and the creative flame
of the daimonic-self can be both inspiring and potentially disruptive for those
who feel they are simply going through the motions of day-to-day life. This
in part is the challenge of our service as a Priest: the ideals and forces that we
are seeking to manifest, become intensified and crystallized within ourselves
as we take the risk of mediating them to those around us.
In the last 10 years my own Priesthood has found expression via
mentoring and writing, and more publicly in naming ceremonies,
handfastings, and delivering eulogies at funerals. Often those seeking such
support have been less concerned about the fine detail of my weird
theological preoccupations and more drawn to the way in which my own
initiatory process has enabled me to sit with challenging life events. It feels as
if what I have to offer is less about metaphysical certainties and far more
about an ability to explore Mystery. For me those who manifest Priesthood
most readily are those for whom their offer of service to others is as a natural
overspill of the work that they are embodying in their own lives. Priesthood
can have a powerful role in shaping our magic; as we offer service to others
and represent the transforming impact of spiritual principles within the world,
so these principles are reinforced and given unique expression within and
through us.
 Section 3: Reflection
Hopefully, having spent some time exploring practices that will open up
your spiritual and magical journey as it relates to the new monastic impulse, I
will now seek to explore what the more traditional components of the
monastic path might entail when considered from a freethinking and
theologically creative perspective. The monastic guidance provided by the
vows and the life-rule are key ingredients in helping promote the type of
clarity and freedom that many of us are seeking.
 The Vows
The traditional monastic vows within the Christian traditions have often
been formulated as ‘Poverty, Chastity and Obedience’ or in the Benedictine
Rule as ‘Stability, Fidelity and Obedience’. However laudable these aims for
those called to follow a path of traditional monasticism, those of us who are
seeking inspiration from the new monastic impulse face the challenge of
translating these ideals into the everyday reality of our contemporary lives. In
addition, as magical explorers we remain mindful of how our insights must
allow us to embody freedom and evolution alongside the development of
discipline and asceticism.
As we will consider later when looking at how a Novice might evolve
their unique life rule, we need to explore these ideals more fully and unpack
the extent to which they do or don’t fit as tools for furthering our initiation.
One possible way of expressing the monastic ideals would be ‘Simplicity,
Faithfulness and Accountability.’ In seeking to provide structure for our
spiritual practice we may want to reflect upon what these three goals might
mean for us:
How might I simplify my path and my material existence? How much
do I need and how do I use what I currently have?
How do I remain Faithful to those people to whom I have made
commitments and who are vital in my life? Am I honest and open in my
communication and how do I demonstrate a love and deep respect for both
them and myself?
How can I be accountable to others as I walk this path? How do I use the
support of others to remain authentic and congruent? How do I support others
as they seek to pursue Gnosis? What role does spiritual direction play in my
life?
What follows is a reflection on each of these values or principles so that
the construction of your rule and personal expression of new monasticism
feels more authentic and uniquely your own.
Poverty/Simplicity
In our exercise that involved the visualization of the Cell in which we
undertook our prayer and meditation, we were invited to think about its
aesthetics and how they embodied our goals and aspirations. The monastic
cell’s minimalism usually points towards the need for space, simplicity, and
the reduction of unwanted stimuli, and an exploration of the vow of poverty
can be seen as an extension of this.
It might be easy to typecast the poverty of traditional monastic paths as
only being about denial and a removal of the self from the world. Debates
down the centuries have raged regarding the extent to which the true
monastic must go to escape material trappings. Umberto Eco’s Name of the
Rose is set at a conference debating whether Jesus actually owned his own
clothing! Buddhist monastics within the Theravada tradition commit to only
owning a robe, a begging bowl, a razor and a sewing kit, and part of Saint
Francis’s radical expression of poverty was as a response to the perceived
decadence of settled monastic communities.
In contrast to a simplicity fuelled by either a hatred for the material or a
belief that masochism will win divine merit, I want to explore the inspirations
of the Slow movement and Minimalism. Both of these approaches challenge
our often rampant consumerism, and seek to create enough space so that we
can truly appreciate a smaller amount of higher quality items within our
environment. In trying to slow down our own neophiliac pursuit of yet
another consumption-related dopamine high, we create the possibility of a
deep materialism in which we can truly enjoy the sensuality of those things
we are bringing into our lives. Such exploration is an explicit attempt to
move towards seeing conscious limitation as a freedom rather than a denial.
Slowing down doesn’t feel particularly in fashion these days. We all
want things at the click of a button: quicker service, faster broadband and
shorter travel times. If something is good surely it will be even better if we
can get it in half the time? In the busyness of our day-to-day lives wouldn’t it
great if we could apply the aesthetics of our drive-through, take-away culture
to our spiritual aspirations as well? Being a Shaman sounds so cool! Surely a
couple of weekend workshops should do it, or even better I heard of a three-
hour course via Skype.
Most of us know deep down that this isn’t going to get it done. In a
disposable age of quick fixes, fast food and botch jobs, something at the root
of our souls wants substance, and in our hunger for something truly nutritious
we have a hunch that the thing that we seek will require real effort.
The realisation that certain aspects of Western culture may be moving
too quickly for their own good is not a new one. In response to this hyper-
acceleration the Slow movement was born. Rather than increased
mindfulness being limited to a set of internal practices, the Slow movement
challenges us to wonder what would happen if such a mindful perspective
was brought to bear on the whole of our lives. What would our eating habits
look like, our transport arrangements, our approach to child-care?
Manifestations as diverse as the Slow food movement (born in Italy), the
Sloth Club in Japan[38] or the amazing The Idler Magazine[39] all challenge us
to question the need for speed and unnecessary complexity. As spiritual
seekers we are not immune to similar consumerism; in our desire to know
more, be more and progress more quickly we can easily become victim of
what Chogyal Trungpa called ‘Spiritual Materialism’.[40]
Philip Carr-Gomm, in his excellent The English Book of Magic, speaks
of the importance of the armchair in the development of the magician. While
people may dismiss those who spend time reflecting, reading, thinking and
musing, Philip in his wisdom sees such critics as embodying ‘an undignified
utilitarianism’. We need time to dream, to let our ideas percolate, to let parts
of our psyche lie fallow for a season.
Phil Hine[41] has noted the creeping work ethic that seems to be part of
Western occultism—more to learn, more to do, more, more, more! Most
magical orders stress that they are only interested in ‘highly motivated
individuals’, and while not dismissing the need for seriousness, sometimes
we need to embrace the Slow! My guess is that most of us got involved in
Magic because we dreamt and wondered; perhaps we need to dream once
more—get thee to an armchair!
In a similar fashion to the Slow Movement, the artistic impulse of
Minimalism has also informed how we think about our aesthetics in relation
to both the material and psycho-spiritual domains of our lives. In reaction to
both abstract expressionism and modernism, minimalism not only inspired
painting and sculpture but also architecture, interior design, music and many
other fields.
 Cistercian Minimalism
The inspiration of Minimalism draws heavily from the clean lines of
Japanese Zen, and the stark plainness of both Shaker and Cistercian
architecture. Ironically the Minimalist architect John Pawson designed the
Cistercian Abbey of Our Lady of Nový Dvůr and when the monks initially
approached him, they were concerned that his style might be too austere!
Perhaps it is unsurprising that the famed Cistercian Thomas Merton was also
strongly attracted to the sparseness of Zen Buddhist practice. Zen (both
aesthetically and metaphysically) embodies apophatic emptiness in a way that
few traditions can.
The often solitary oneness of the monastic path is centred on an
experience of the desert and space, and Minimalism as a movement taps into
this mood. The quiet wisdom of the minimalist is a call to let go of the
unnecessary, as Edward De Bono summarizes in his ‘Ten Rules of
Simplicity’:
 ‘Rule 5: You need to challenge and discard existing elements.
Everything needs to be challenged. Everything needs to justify its
continued existence. Systems and operations have a natural tendency to
grow ever more complicated. Things which were needed at one time
may no longer be needed. Where something cannot be justified then
‘shed’ it. If you wish to retain something for the sake of tradition let that
be a conscious decision.’[42]
In considering the call to simplicity from a new monastic perspective,
what does it mean to strip things back, to cleanse ourselves and relinquish
those things that encumber us? This is not a call to a form of prescriptive
legalism rather we each need to explore this terrain and assess what it will
mean for us. Each person’s taste will be unique, but the glory of an ornate
Gothic arch or a gilded Rococo mirror are usually appreciated more fully
when they have a greater sense of space about them.
In our introduction concerning the origins of monasticism, we
considered the way in which it was a direct challenge to our very human
tendency to locate our security in what we own and what we hope to acquire.
Monasticism is far from apolitical and, similarly to Minimalism and the Slow
movement, when skilfully applied asks us to reflect on the dangers of hyper-
acceleration and consumerism.
Chastity/Faithfulness
When we consider the history of monastic expression through time and
across religious traditions, it would be hard to deny that celibacy is one of its
central defining factors. The conscious renunciation of sexual activity and
relationships is common to Hindu Sannyas vows, Jain monasticism and the
vast majority of Buddhist and Christian monastic manifestations.
While we have been seeking to reframe the monastic impulse as a drive
towards periods of dedicated magical practice and more increased spiritual
intensity more generally, we cannot deny the centrality of celibacy
historically. Celibacy acts as both an indicator of a uniquely monastic
vocation and the foundational contract for a specific form of social
relationship. The singleness of the monastic aims to provide parameters
around their specifically non-sexual/non-romantic way of conducting
relationships as well as the implications of this when having dependent
children. This allows for the creation of a community of interdependent
individuals shaped by a common purpose or collective rule.
In her excellent overview of the history of Celibacy, Elizabeth Abbott[43]
highlights many of the more difficult aspects of how Celibacy has been
required by religious institutions and the potentially negative messages
regarding the body and sexual pleasure that feel embedded within such
requirements. Recent high-profile scandals have brought into focus the
damage perpetrated by people who have taken life-long vows of celibacy and
are sad evidence of what such forced requirements can do in distorting the
human spirit. The sublimation of our libido and sexual attraction when not
consciously embraced and worked with capably, has huge potential for
disaster. If we try and repress our attraction to others, there is a real danger
that those whom we desire become perceived as an enemy that we seek to
avoid and potentially control. The demonization of the desired other is all too
easy and the projected fantasies of the Witch trials and persecutions[44] seem
to evidence the negative impact of such repression.
It would be all too easy however, to typecast the Celibate as an angry,
repressed individual vulnerable to the hypocrisy of never being able to truly
live up to their ideal. Recent writers on Celibacy have highlighted the
positive psychological dimensions of embracing periods of life in which
sexual activity is de-centralized. In keeping with the clarity of focus that
monos implies, Sally Cline[45] described vividly her own need for celibate
space even when she was within a partnership; this allowed her to focus both
on her writing and also her recovered sense of her individuality within the
context of that relationship.
Celibate space may relate to the unavailability of suitable marital
partners (as was partially the case with the Beguines), but it can also be
viewed more positively with both a feminist and Queered lens.[46] In an age
before effective contraception, monastic vocation offered freedom from
compulsory parenthood and the space to pursue learning and spiritual focus
away from the demands of entrenched labour and dependent families. While
such renunciation involves sacrifice, the celibate in stepping outside of the
confines of the predominant narratives regarding romance and genital
eroticism is offered the potential for deep friendship[47] and the provision of
spiritual parenthood to others[48].
This creation of space and rechannelling of energy is a theme picked up
Ela Przybylo in Asexual Erotics. In this work she explores the ‘asexual
resonances’ within less sexualized expressions of relating, and how these
might be in keeping with Audre Lorde’s conception of an expanded eroticism
beyond necessary genital expression. Przybylo explores how various groups
and movements during the late 1960s and early 1970s sought to explore
elective celibacy as a means of personal and collective liberation. Groups
such as Cell 16 and the Young Lords, along with Valerie Solanas’ 1967
SCUM manifesto, are read through the lens of erotic asexuality and are seen
as valuing a similar impulse with regards the reclamation of both space and
selfhood. Przbylo sees such asexual tendencies as being key to a liberation in
which both white women and women of colour were able to free themselves
from expectations regarding the need for partnered relationships, compulsory
reproduction or home building.[49]
In her book The New Celibacy the researcher and pro-celibacy advocate
Gabrielle Brown seeks to frame periods of abstinence in secular terms as a
vacation from sexual activity. Such vacations offer the possibility of focusing
on wider interests, new ways of connecting to others and a chance to re-
evaluate the core beliefs regarding personal wholeness being dependent on
having a ‘good’ sex life.
While the adoption of celibacy (whether embraced temporarily or on a
permanent basis) can help create the intensity and rigours of the monastic
laboratory, other paths are available! If our wider aim is to embrace periods
of intense and focused spiritual activity, we are able to find methods for
bringing magical-monastic intentions to more active forms of erotic
expression. The Ngakpa school of Tibetan Buddhist practice provides us with
an example of advanced yogic adepthood in which practitioners can have a
sexual/romantic partner and children. These long-haired, white clad yogis
often see their family as being a rich arena for spiritual development and their
status as advanced practitioners is usually acknowledged and supported by
the communities that they live within.
One of the primary traditions I have worked with over the past 40 years
on my own interspiritual voyage has been the form of East/West tantric
magical practice espoused by the Arcane and Magickal Order of the Knights
of Shambhala (AMOOKOS). AMOOKOS views the path of the householder
as being entirely suitable for the pursuit of serious sadhana or practice.
When I began training as a magician in my mid-20s, the East-West
synthesis that I experienced in the AMOOKOS work made a great deal of
sense to me. Here was a magical group that made use of Yogic technique and
perspectives while at the same time incorporating the liberty and self-
determination associated with the philosophy of Thelema. In keeping with
such a spirit of freedom, while some members of the group may elect to enter
celibate Sannyasin states (especially in later life), the way of householder or
Grihastha is held in equally high regard.
If we return to the idea that the person inspired by either New or Chaos
Monasticism is primarily seeking a means of accessing both intensity and
integrity, we will now consider the principles that we might bring to our
intimate or partnered relationships that feel in keeping with these goals.
All of us inherit sets of rules and scripts about how we think we should
behave and who we should be in relationships. Such beliefs often have their
genesis in our families of origin, the cultural trends we imbibe, and the
shaping provided by our own experience and emerging sense of identity. In
the process of trying to understand the core dilemma of the pain and
dislocation that many of us feel in seeking closeness and relationship, it can
be tempting to ‘buy into’ a set of apparent certainties. Recent trends in self-
help literature have tried to find ways out of the confusion by playing ‘The
Game’, ‘The Rules’ or by mapping gender difference according to planetary
allegiance[50]. While I can understand the impulse of such books in trying to
find a cure to what ills us, I must confess to being highly unconvinced by
their over-simplicity and gender stereotyping.
In their book Re-writing the Rules Psychologist Meg-John Barker
challenges us to consider whether more healthy relationships come not via
seconding guessing the manoeuvres of the objects of our desire, but rather it
comes via a better relationship with our self in all its glorious complexity. In
a way that is very in keeping with the postmodernism of chaos magic, Self is
presented as both an ongoing process of change and also as a plurality of
differing aspects that dialogue with each other. Barker’s insights are offered
in spirit of openness and wondering; an attempt to explore the right questions
rather than providing pat answers.
The notion that we can be a better partner via a more connected
experience of ourselves is one that I feel sits well with the kind of space and
silence that the new monastic is approaching. While the boundaries and
expectations of a specific relationship will inevitably be negotiated via the to-
and-fro dialogue between partners, the ability to make ourselves quiet and
reconnect to the monos of our being remains vital.
This core respect for our own being in turn allows us to truly appreciate
the boundaries of the person or persons (in the case of polyamory) with
whom we are seeking connection. For discussions about consent to be truly
meaningful we have to be able to sense and respect both our own needs and
those of the other(s).
In order to rediscover a type of intimacy that feels truly authentic and
our own, we must first reconnect to our own bodies and allow our body’s
wisdom to challenge and deconstruct the stories that our culture and
experience have passed to us. In order to act compassionately and
consensually towards others we must first exercise proper self-care in
understanding what we value for our selves in this present moment. We must
seek to move mindfulness from the meditation cushion and into the realm of
our whole lives. For the householder seeking to explore the sacred and
sacramental nature of the erotic with a partner, when approached deftly these
joys can provide a powerful means of ‘knowing thyself’.
Obedience/Accountability
The idea of offering obedience can feel simultaneously arcane and
fraught with risk. Stories abound of teachers and gurus misusing their power
and a large part of our 21st century psyches does not like being told what to
do! With all of that being said, the bottom line is that we need other people.
Within the original monastic communities, the role of the Abbott or
Prior was critical in providing guidance, support and discipline. As we
consider the type of spiritual accountability and instruction that they saw as
key for maintaining focus as well as the creation of real community, we must
be cautious about attempts to remove such themes from our new monastic
creativity.
When following a path of intense spiritual practice, however much we
may want to emphasize our rugged individualism and uniqueness, most of us
eventually come to the realization that we can’t do this on our own. However
potent our initial gnostic insights regarding the need to take a radical degree
of responsibility for own salvation, we soon realize that we will need to
connect to the others for this process to be sustainable.
In thinking about the role of spiritual community and mentor
relationships in our initiatory work, I have been heavily influenced by
Gurdjieff/Fourth Way ideas with regards the importance of finding dynamic
spiritual relationships, in order to challenge and deepen our own explorations.
Learning something by oneself is of course possible, but most of us realise
quickly that everything from Tai Chi to foreign language learning is made
easier (and ultimately more fun) if we have a competent teacher or teachers.
In having an experienced mentor, our learning becomes more rounded as
pitfalls are avoided and the full range of sensory and kinesthetic information
becomes available to us.
As we seek to explore the deeper aspects of both ourselves and the
universe, it’s understandable that we should seek expertise in navigating
these mysterious realms. Whatever the benefits of book-based learning, there
are real limits to what can be conveyed magically through the written word
alone. As many of us spend more time typing, texting and liking on social
media, it’s easy to dismiss the idea that certain wisdom can only be conveyed
via direct relationship. The Kabbalistic maxim ‘from mouth to ear’ for me
conveys something of the person-specific tailoring that most deep
engagement with a tradition seems to entail. In the context of psychotherapy,
Carmel Flaskas[51] speaks of the importance of being ‘Witnessed’—a sense
of being truly seen by the other. There is something profoundly
transformational about real interpersonal connection—perhaps even more so
as we seek to develop soul. This may be about the sharing of some great
wisdom, but it might be as much about real presence whilst having tea and
biscuits together.
Learning within a spiritual or magical context is usually associated with
groups of other humans who organize themselves into orders, schools or
networks centred on a shared philosophy, lifestyle or ritual aesthetic. This is
often how we do things as Homo sapiens and however much our politics and
aspirations hope to flatten hierarchies, we usually self-configure into
something that looks like a tribe or family system. When we enter such
environments, inspired by our search for meaning, it is unsurprising that most
of us look to the longstanding members of such groups both for guidance,
and evidence that the group’s claims have some degree of validity.

Okay, so far so good, but if such groups can be beneficial why is it that
they can also be incredibly difficult? For me, part of why schools and orders
can be challenging is they often have profound tensions at their core. Like
families these groups often struggle to balance competing needs and apparent
polarities. What follows are a few examples of how these issues play out:
Openness versus Discernment
Most religious and philosophical groups require the internalization of a
certain amount of information, and adherence to specific behavioural
requirements. When we enter this as a newcomer to a group, we can often
feel that we re-enacting those scenes from our childhoods in which we were
seeking approval. When this is going on alongside the message that we
should be powerful, competent initiates we might be forgiven for becoming
confused and disheartened.
For me, the saying attributed to Christ is helpful: ‘Be as wise as serpents
and as innocent as doves’ (Matthew, 10:16). If we are too naïve, we risk
exploitation and buying into a type of group-think that can run contra to the
aims of initiation, but if we are too shut off and not willing to unlearn then
there is little point in being there.
Most of us don’t get it right on the first time of trying and it is also
possible that part of our difficulty lies in bringing the same expectations to
the School or Order that we would to other (more conventional) religious
contexts. Many enter a School seeking a Church and then seem shocked that
it feels more like a dojo!
Freedom versus Structure
Working with others can be tricky. By definition most esoteric explorers
are free spirits with anarchic tendencies. We can experience a deep desire to
work with others in order to empower and sharpen our work, but most of us
are prone to experiencing claustrophobia when we feel our agency and liberty
are being threatened!
In traditions that involve truly transformative perspectives there is a
certain inevitability that we will need to challenge existing values and
certainties. While they will never be perfect in their execution, many Orders
out of necessity have had to spend time reflecting on how they provide
boundaries and guidance to ensure that ethical standards are understood and
respected. Such reflection often takes decades of shared work to develop a
group’s maturity, and shouldn’t be dismissed lightly. Groups will always
make mistakes in the doing of the Great Work, but what feels critical is that
they have mechanisms for feedback and reflection so that the inevitable
mistakes are learnt from. The presence of such processes for self-reflection
are vital in ensuring that a School’s core philosophy is both truly life
promoting and able to counter any organizational excesses.
Personally speaking, being part of more formal magical/spiritual Orders
has provided me with an excellent opportunity to learn. Even if I might not
agree with some of what’s being proposed, the content and structure of such
systems gave me something solid to bash up against and thus refine my own
initiatory understanding. The pursuit of grades and curricula may become yet
another form of ‘spiritual materialism’, but at best they can fulfil our need for
structure and a way of mapping our development, especially in the early to
intermediate stages of training.
Personal versus Impersonal
While undertaking any deep spiritual work will inevitably lead to the
forming of close relationships with others, one of the strengths of an Order is
that they usually provide a corpus of techniques and perspectives to engage
with. Without a solid body of ideas and practice with which to engage, there
is a danger that our involvement becomes overly reliant on interpersonal
connection. While warm rapport and friendships can be a major strength in
the sustainability of group involvement, if we become overly dependent on
this, then our own motivations for doing the work can become distorted.
People inevitably come and go from magical and initiatory groups as their
own focus changes, or the costs of involvement outweigh the benefits.
Finding like-minded souls can feel amazing after perhaps years of feeling
isolated, but we must remain clear about our own goals, and alive to where
we may need to go next.
These tensions are likely to remain in play while we choose to take the
risk of building with others those connections that bring increased support
and accountability. The probability of finding some imagined perfect balance
between these polarities is both unlikely and frankly a bit dull. Like the
perfect job or the perfect relationship, the perfect group or school simply
doesn’t exist, but in recognizing the dynamics at work we may become more
conscious of the push and pull of such forces and how we might play with
and respond to them more skilfully.
For those of us who’ve spent more than our fair share of time wandering
in the spiritual supermarket, the finding of a teacher or a well-balanced
tradition can feel like the goal itself rather than the beginning that it actually
represents. Any teacher, Abbott or community worth their salt should come
with a health warning: if they don’t make at least some effort to put you off
I’d be worried. A good friend likened initiation to being like spiritual
dynamite. This seems to be in keeping with Georg Feuerstein’s observation;
‘the guru’s work with disciples is both a demolition job and a rebuilding.’[52]
Indeed! As someone who has sought and undergone a number of initiatory
processes, they definitely accelerate a process of change.
Section 4: Action!
 Pulling it Together
Spiritual Formation: Walking the Spiral of Change
When we think about how to make progress on the spiritual path,
sometimes we can feel that we are going around in circles. In many ways this
feels like very familiar territory to me in my day job as a psychotherapist. It
feels that part of my raison d’être is witnessing the strange spirals in the lives
of other human beings. For those who think that change happens in a straight
line, they probably haven’t been paying attention in class. Whether it’s
related to addictive patterns in our lives, relationship difficulties or trying to
discern which spiritual traditions fits us best, most of us have to revisit what
the pros call ‘the cycle of change’ at least several times before things shift.

The cycle of change (see the work of Prochaska and DiClemente)

recognizes that for most of us, the act of changing usually involves stages of
contemplation (thinking about how it might be different) and preparation
before we actually ‘do’ something behaviourally.
Most of us know what it feels like to be compelled into choices that we
haven’t given birth to and don’t feel authentically our own. They can often
feel superficial and usually don’t ‘stick’ in the longer term. Slowing down the
pace of change is often good in that it allows a more organic adaptation, and
some considered reprioritizing.
It’s hardly surprising that spirals feature so significantly within sacred
symbology; as a representation of what it feels like to journey inward or
outward, in ascent or descent, the spiral reflects that it often seems as though
history is repeating itself whilst in reality, we are moving closer to the goal
(even if it’s not necessarily the one we initially intended!). Whether we use
the spatial metaphor of a descent in search of depth or an ascent to gain
awakening, we can often feel caught up in a psychological Groundhog Day as
we revisit the same issues within ourselves and the same dynamics within the
same relationships.
Although it can be hard to believe while we are in the thick of the hard
work, most deep change comes through repetition over time. Learning
anything via repetition, whether it is dance, martial arts or playing a musical
instrument, can feel laborious as we develop muscle memory or lay down
those new neural pathways.
In working within the wheel of the year, be it in a Pagan, Christian or
other tradition, we experience in this repeating circle a sense of this repetition
at a macrocosmic level. What seems critical in the midst of these big cycles is
the degree of awareness that we bring in noticing the subtle shifts and
differences over time and location. Even if we were to celebrate each festival
in exactly the same location, the variance in conditions and our own place in
the life cycle bring newness.
New Monastic Spirals
When we are able to bring the insights from these spiral dynamics to our
exploration of the New Monastic, I believe that they can shine new light on
how we consider the traditional stages of monastic development. Rather than
seeing them as a linear progression towards a permanent state, it may be
more beneficial to see them as a cycle in which explore, formalize then
refresh specific stages of our work:
Postulant. Literally someone who asks or enquires; the postulant is the
person curious enough and dissatisfied enough to begin their monastic
journey. In approaching a community or Order they are seeking resources,
information and support in understanding those methods and teachings that
may prove to be a gateway to gnosis. Within many groups the period of
Postulancy is open ended in order to allow free exploration, but it is rarely
less than three months. A Postulancy may take far longer as individuals
discern their sense of calling to a contemplative path and the process of
enquiry may lead the aspirant to another group or in an entirely different
direction.
Novice. The Novice is the seeker who begins their practice in earnest.
This is often a period of at least twelve months in which one is able to follow
an entire cycle of the year within their chosen tradition(s). Here we
experience the ebb and flow between darkness and light and between
passionate drive and wavering uncertainty. It is vital that the novice
experiences the full spectrum of these emotions so as to work with and
through them. This period provides the Novice with a chance to devise their
life rule in which they seek to cultivate those structures that balance both
discipline and freedom.
Professed. Having completed at least twelve months as a Novice, the
aspirant may be suitable for taking profession within an Order. When
working within an Interspiritual context, most groups will embrace the
validity of varying lineages and also the importance of new work arising
from unique contexts. Senior members of an Order are ideally able to support
you in recognizing which lineages or traditions may best suit your
temperament and theological inclinations. The role of the Professed is to offer
service to others both within a spiritual community and in the wider world.
This is a serious mantle to bear and should not be rushed at.

If we approach such stages as an ongoing and spiralling process, our

new monastic identity can move and evolve as it needs to. While the
Benedictine aspiration to stability is vital in allowing communities to feel
safe and dependable, our re-imagining of these ideals must enable there to be
the space and fluidity so that personal development remains possible. Within
the Order that I am involved in, Profession is required to be renewed annually
as a recommitment to an individual’s rule of life.
For me what feels vital in considering this theme of personal formation
is that the process is robust enough to allow profound alchemical change
while still allowing individual freedom and expression.
This is the slow alchemy of Spagyric processes that draw out and bring
together via fermentation and distillation. This requires time, space and
attention. With the degree of hyper-acceleration that seems so endemic within
Western culture, it can be hard to hear that something is going to take both
time and significant effort. For me it feels that this more gradual, organic
form of emergence takes us beyond the realms of spiritual consumerism and
allows what James Hillman described as the ‘soul making’.
My own attempts to slow things down and locate deeper roots had
previously been via a reconnection to the path of Druidry. When I started
exploring the path of magic over twenty-five years ago it was to Druidry that
I was initially drawn. Perhaps because of the apparent gentleness of its style,
and the way in which it allowed the Christian and Pagan to converse with
each other, it provided me with a less jarring route into occult practice.
Alongside my more daring adventures in Chaos magic and Tantra, I have had
this slow burn affection for a path that seeks to hold together creativity,
magic, and wisdom, in the grades of bard, ovate, and druid. For the Bard the
focus of the work is connect to creative energy—often via artistic exploration
—while the Ovate seeks to develop their intuitive and potentially magical
capabilities in order to provide healing. Once these foundational skills have
been cultivated, the Druid grade is focused on gaining leadership skills and
the ability to communicate philosophical ideas more effectively. The
integration of these areas of esoteric learning is all towards the aim of
creating a balanced practitioner, who is able to provide effective Priesthood
within their community.
Of the little we know about the druids from early sources (interested
readers may like to check out the excellent The Druids by Ronald Hutton), it
seems likely that it took at least twenty years to complete one’s training. For
me this is good news as it means I’m just about on schedule. If all this was
about was some obsessive attempt at Celtic reconstructionism, I’m sure it
would have taken far less time, but my hunch is that my deeper relationship
with the druid tradition has been about the discovery of what Wisdom and
Soul should look like in the world around me. The roots of this work are deep
because they are as much about my creativity, my social work and my
relationships as they are about some well-choreographed wand waggling!
Moving Things Forward: Developing Your Own Rule
We have already considered how the traditional monastic vows have
often been formulated as ‘Poverty, Chastity and Obedience’ or in the
Benedictine Rule as ‘Stability, Fidelity and Obedience’. In this book we have
spent time thinking about how we as contemporary practitioners face the
challenge of translating these ideals into the reality of our daily lives. In
addition, as Gnostics and magical practitioners, we remain mindful of how
our insights must allow us to embody freedom and evolution alongside the
development of discipline and asceticism.
When Benedict begins his rule, he opens with a challenge: ‘Listen!’ To
follow the monastic path, we need to be able to truly quieten ourselves and
tune in. If we are part of a community with a shared set of principles, we
need to sense ourselves in relation to those people who are fellow travellers;
more profoundly however, we need to listen to ourselves. We have explored
our connection to the daimon as the embodiment of the deep self, and it is
this connection to profound silence that allows us to make our monastic
expression authentically our own.
 Exercise 6:
Writing Your Rule
The Novice is granted a blank canvas onto which to paint their life rule.
One possible way of expressing the monastic ideals would be ‘Simplicity,
Faithfulness and Accountability.’ In seeking to provide structure for our
spiritual practice we may want to reflect upon what these three goals might
mean for us:

1. How might I Simplify my path and my material existence?

How much do I need and how do I use what I currently have?
2. How do I remain Faithful to those people to whom I have made
commitments and who are vital in my life? Am I honest and open
in my communication and how do I demonstrate a love and deep
respect for both them and myself?
3. How can I be Accountable to others as I walk this path? How
do I use the support of others to remain authentic and congruent?
How do I support others as they seek to pursue Gnosis? What role
does spiritual direction play in my life?

This is an exercise that can take days, weeks or even months as we

ponder these questions, and the kind of answers we find for ourselves as we
truly tune in to the deepest voice of our daimon.
Your rule need not be overly long and beware of too many resolutions
that have a restrictive or negative ‘Thou Shalt Not…’ type wording e.g. rather
than ‘I will not use alcohol for the next month’ perhaps consider the purpose
that you wish to put this period of abstinence: ‘I will use my sobriety to
enliven my artistic practice’.
The canvas of the rule is yours to create on, but in light of the areas we
have considered in our practicum section here are a couple of prompts to
inspire you:
☐ How do I wish to structure my time in silent meditation or prayer?
How many periods of practice do I wish to adhere to?
☐ How will I use sacred reading or study as a way of fuelling both my
intellectual and emotional life?
☐ How can I use Pilgrimage or psychogeography as a means of
moving through landscape and to allow non-linear forms of
 reflection?
☐ How might I begin expressing my Priesthood into the world via
daily work, spiritual direction, and teaching to others?
☐ How can I make regular connection to fellow pilgrims for support
and sharing of ritual work or practice?
☐ How can I consume more consciously? What am I eating, drinking,
buying, and consuming? How do I ensure my best health, moderate
the use of intoxicants and also balance my need for things and
information?
☐ What might the role of monthly spiritual direction, or meeting with a
soul friend, play in order to promote accountability and encourage
vision?
☐ Can I commit to a period of yearly retreat (perhaps for a minimum
of three days) as a way of refreshing my focus and reviewing the
shape that this rule needs to take?
☐ How can I bring my personal creativity and unique voice to this
work? What is the expression of my deepest self? How can this find
expression into the world?
Remember, you don’t serve the rule, the rule serves you. The rule is
scaffolding to allow you to build the monastic-magical work that allows you
greater peace, freedom, and happiness. If it stops doing these things, change
it until it does.
 Conclusion: Seeking Vision and Wisdom
The purpose of this book has been to support you in exploring those
ingredients and approaches that allow you to bring new vision and insight as
to how you pursue your magical and spiritual goals. Whatever the shared
commonalities between those of us who walk an esoteric or magical path, we
are still required to dig deep into our personal heroism in order to express our
unique and authentic selves. Often this requires receptive listening to the new
work that our inner genius is drawing us to.
Like Saint Anthony, our drive into the silence of the desert is rarely born
from our contentment; more often it is our ennui and turmoil that pushes us to
relinquish those things that while once helpful, now encumber our journey
onwards. The monastic path asks us to refine and simplify so that we might
become the truest expression of who we were born to be.
We have explored how practices of the heart, mind, and body allow us
to manage the tension and uncertainty at the core of our humanity and our
search for the magical within life. We rarely reach a once-and-for-all still
point of resolution, rather we are the cosmic tight-rope walker whose wobble
and then counter-balance allows them to continue across the chasm:

‘At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from
Nor towards.
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the still point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.’[53]

In this book we have thought a lot about how we experience wisdom via
the dance of finding a middle way through extremes. Like Ma’at with her
cosmic scales, we have been trying to pay more attention so that we can
weigh things more accurately.
In conclusion I want to share a piece of my own ritual work with the
Gnostic Goddess, Sophia. For me she embodies our pursuit of wisdom and
the vital role of peace making and mediation. In her willingness to create she
represents our need to take risks and to express our unique and sometimes
messy truth even when others pass judgement in their lofty detachment. She
holds within herself the synthesis point between polarities and the dynamic
tension of paradox. In representing these things, She continues to be a
powerful inspiration for many of us seeking to embody monastic ideals
within our everyday contexts.
I wish you well fellow traveller, kudos for sticking with this frequently
winding path! However you chose to explore the New Monastic impulse, I
speak a blessing into your ear that you may truly become the one that you
know you are.
 Exercise 7:
A Mindful Mass to Sophia

Open with a singing bowl (or a bell) rung 8 times as the celebrant walks
the circle clockwise, ringing the bell once to each of the 8 directions.

We begin in Silence and Space

The realm of the Pleroma
The marriage of Darkness and Light.

8 breaths are taken by all participants together.

In the pregnant space of reflection

Wisdom is born
Glowing deep blue against the blackness
Silver Star points glow
 As the holy Aeon descends
And gives birth to life.
Selah

We then undertake 20 minutes of silent meditation—using the physical

sensation of breathing as an anchor for awareness and gently surrendering
thoughts, feelings and bodily sensations as they arise. Once we have
acknowledged them, we return our attention to the breath.

Wisdom makes manifest

An outflowing of the multiple and the complex
The Crafter makes the World
Soul glows and breaths:
‘I was sent forth from the power,
and I have come to those who reflect upon me,
and I have been found among those who seek after me.
Look upon me, you who reflect upon me,
and you hearers, hear me.
You who are waiting for me, take me to yourselves.
And do not banish me from your sight.
And do not make your voice hate me, nor your hearing.
Do not be ignorant of me anywhere or any time.
Be on your guard!
Do not be ignorant of me.
For I am the first and the last.
I am the honoured one and the scorned one.
I am the whore and the holy one.
I am the wife and the virgin.
I am the mother and the daughter.
I am the members of my mother.
I am the barren one and many are her sons.
I am she whose wedding is great, and I have not taken a husband.
I am the midwife and she who does not bear.
I am the solace of my labour pains.
I am the bride and the bridegroom, and it is my husband who begot
me.
I am the mother of my father and the sister of my husband and he is
 my offspring... I am the silence that is incomprehensible and the idea
whose remembrance is frequent.
I am the voice whose sound is manifold and the word whose
appearance is multiple.
I am the utterance of my name.’ [54]

Trance drumming occurs at this point, which generally lasts between 10-
15 minutes. The drummers use the technique outlined by Michael Harner,
where trance is induced through the use of a consistent drum beat of around
200 beats per minute. After the trance period and drumming ceases, the
following words are spoken:

The many forms beget Joy

But also the forgetting of our original face,
We give thanks for these moments of stillness and remembering!
Wisdom calls:
Does not wisdom call out?
Does not understanding raise her voice?
At the highest point along the way, where the paths meet, she takes
her stand;
beside the gate leading into the city,
at the entrance, she cries aloud:
‘To you, O people, I call out;
I raise my voice to all humanity.
You who are simple, gain prudence;
you who are foolish, set your hearts on it.
Listen, for I have trustworthy things to say;
I open my lips to speak what is right.
My mouth speaks what is true,
for my lips detest wickedness.
All the words of my mouth are just;
none of them is crooked or perverse.
To the discerning all of them are right;
they are upright to those who have found knowledge.
Choose my instruction instead of silver,
knowledge rather than choice gold.’ [55]
We give thanks to you O Holy Sophia.
 Mother of Wisdom.
When we struggle to hear
Help us to listen.
In the rich darkness of silence,
Help us to bring insight and mediation to this world.
Help us to find balance in the dance
To find peace and to be peace
So Mote it Be!

Close with three bells.

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[1] Such as Lanzetta (2018), The Monk Within, and Davis (2018),
Monasticism.
[2] Colgate (2002), A Pelican In The Wilderness.
[3] Davis (2018), Monasticism, p15.
[4] For more on the Queer theory and theology see Dee (2018), The
Heretic’s Journey.
[5] Vaneigem (1994), The Movement of the Free Spirit.
[6] Porete (1993), The Mirror of Simple Souls, p104.
[7] Wilson-Hartgrove (2010), ‘A Vision so Old it Looks New’, in
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[8] https://iotbritishisles.com/the-book-of-the-pact/
[9] Carroll (1987), Liber Null and Psychonaut.
[10] From a letter to his brother John in 1935. Bonhoeffer (1990), A
Testament to Freedom, p421.
[11] Teasdale (1999), The Mystic Heart, p 109 onwards.
[12] Davis (2018), Monasticism, p118.
[13] Dee (2016), A Gnostic’s Progress, and (2018), The Heretic’s Journey.
[14] Carroll (1992), Liber Kaos, p187.
[15] Carroll (1992), Liber Kaos, p189.
[16] Carroll (1992), Liber Kaos, p187.
[17] Palamas (2013), Syzygy, p38.
 [18] Heruka (2011), The Life of Milarepa.
[19] Crowley (1973), Magick, p355.
[20] Carroll (1992), Liber Kaos, p155.
[21] Carroll (1992), Liber Kaos, p156.
[22] Carroll (1987), Liber Null and Psychonaut, p132.
[23] Ward (Translator) (1981), Sayings of the Desert Fathers, p138.
[24] For the interested, there is more regarding Process Theology in my
book (2016) A Gnostic’s Progress, p22 onwards.
[25] Ouspensky (2001), In Search of the Miraculous.
[26] Psalm 135: 3–9.
[27] Blakney (1941), Meister Eckhart: A Modern Translation, p204.
[28] Saint John of the Cross, The Dark Night of the Soul, (2019 translation
by Lewis).
[29] Rumi (2001), The Pocket Rumi Reader, p42.
[30] Quoted in Fleming (1988), Meister Eckhart: The Man from Whom
God Hid Nothing, p31.
[31] Lanzetta (2018), The Monk Within, p80.
[32] Dukes (2011), What I did in my Holidays, p30.
[33] Mackenzie (1999), Cave in the Snow.
[34] Mayhew-Smith & Hayward (2020), Britain’s Pilgrim Places, p 6.
[35] https://britishpilgrimage.org
[36] Price & Kearns (Editors) (2003). The Oxford Dictionary of Classical
Myth and Religion.
[37] Le Guin (1969), The Left Hand of Darkness, p188.
[38] Honoré (2004), In Praise of Slow.
[39] https://www.idler.co.uk
[40] Trungpa (2002), Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism.
[41] Hine (1993), Prime Chaos.
[42] De Bono (1998), Simplicity, p283.
[43] Abbott (1999), A History of Celibacy.
[44] Kramer (1486), Malleus Maleficarum, Spreyer.
[45] Cline (1994), Women, Celibacy and Passion, p230.
[46] Dee (2018), The Heretic’s Journey, p25.
[47] Rothblum & Brehony (1993), Boston Marriages.
[48] Khandelwal (2003), Women in Ochre Robes, p 184.
[49] Przybylo (2019), Asexual Erotics.
 [50] Gray (2002), Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus.
[51] Flaskas (2002), Family Therapy Beyond Postmodernism, p59.
[52] Feuerstein (1998), Tantra: The Path of Ecstasy, p93.
[53] Eliot (1944), Four Quartets: Burnt Norton.
[54] ‘Thunder Perfect Mind’, from Barnstone & Meyer (Eds.) (2009), The
Gnostic Bible.
[55] Proverbs 8:1-10.