Hands-On Chaos Magic: Reality Manipulation through the Ovayki Current - Andrieh Vitimus 2009

Why Is Trance Needed in Magic?

Most of the games in our adventure do in some way generate a trance state. Magic does not always seem to work, but a trance state does seem to be one of the most critical ingredients toward success. Certainly, in some circles, participants will simply mix herbs together and expect results to occur (at least that's the official line). The people who argue for these types of push-button magic are often the same people who do not get results.

Earlier we mentioned the psychic censor. In fact, the habit of disbelieving that change is possible completely saturates the American conditioning process. The fact is, the psychic censor (or the host of other names it is called) limits our conception of what is possible. When you believe something is not possible, it is not. We all have beliefs from our past experiences that hold us back. In the study of hypnosis, we have a critical factor that rejects information that is not in line with what we already believe (Elman 1964). If we cannot automatically shift our beliefs and patterns, how can we make more adaptive changes? Both in the internal world and the external world, we are told "no change." Essentially, our conditioning and the near-conscious parts of the mind are working against us when we try to do magic.

Additionally, most chaos magicians would claim that magic originates in the subconscious. The subconscious does not seem to operate in the way that the conscious mind operates. The conscious mind operates in a scattered from-here-to-there-to-here motion. Unfortunately, the subconscious mind operates at the level of a four- to fiveyear-old, but it has almost infinite power (St. Clair 1978). Four-yearolds have a very short attention span, and generally the subconscious will not act or do anything unless there is a singular point of attention in the conscious mind focusing upon the goal. This singularity in the conscious mind is the mechanism to tell the subconscious mind what is desired (and get it to act). Given the amount of distractions we all have, this extreme focus itself would be a sign of a deeper state of trance.

Introduction to Trance

We shift states of consciousness throughout the day. Our attention shifts from location to location. We daydream, we stop listening in a conversation. Often our minds go through our routines without thinking. Mind viruses (such as phrases or slogans that get stuck in our heads), advertisements, and even a good portion of other people rely on us not thinking and just automatically reacting, often saying yes or agreeing to something that we shouldn't (St. Clair 1978).

Strong emotions, advertisements, and, as we shall see, even beliefs can produce changes in your state of consciousness. A good argument can get you in a certain argumentative trance state where "the blood is flowing." Likewise, great sex can produce a certain euphoric high, and pain will produce a certain state of mind. These different trance states can be manipulated and worked with by the magician, and in fact later on, when we start to do invocation and evocation, it becomes necessary to take on certain states of trance to achieve the desired results.

As you have experienced firsthand, even just a posture or breathing change can have a radical impact on your state of mind. Let's try to start controlling the state of focus we have.

Altered States of Consciousness Exercise

Sometimes we are hyperfocused on one task, but sometimes we drift. Pay attention to your different shifts. When you slide away from a conversation and daydream, make a note of it later in your journal. When you hyperfocus on one thing, make a note of it. Try to begin to consciously control when either happens. Each time you are able to will yourself into either a daydream state or a hyperfocused state, make a note of it. This exercise is good practice whenever you have time to do it.

Trance Generation

In some literature, trance and the term gnosis are the same. Gnosis is a historically problematic term. In Liber Null & Psychonaut, gnosis is described as a singular state of focus (Carroll 1987). Gnostics would describe the term as a nonverbalized experience of the source or as relating to intuitively derived knowledge of a mystic sort (Pagels 1989). Most magical systems and religions would argue that results-based magic occurs by entering a different state of consciousness. You have to allow the subconscious mind to work. Most of the exercises up to now have been about studying and looking at different trance states generated by different body expressions. Different trance states are really easy to experience, but hard to write about. It's simple-when you aren't rationalizing whether something is real or not, you could very well be in a trance state deep enough for successful magic. If this sounds a lot like the trance states of the shaman, it is closely (if not identically) related.

Dennis R. Wier, in Trance, would say the trance states correspond to brain wave patterns (1996). A very light trance would probably be in the alpha (8 Hz-12 Hz) range, which is similar to a daydream. A solid meditation from breathing control could probably get you down to low alpha and theta (6 Hz-8 Hz) waves. Really letting go would get you down to low theta and delta (3 Hz-6 Hz) range. A heavy trance state would be down in that delta range, with a fair amount of magic taking place right at that 6 Hz frequency, in my experience. From practical experience, how real the imagined set of senses seems can be a good guide for how deep the trance state is and how far the conscious mind has been pushed aside.

Inhibitory Trance States

Inhibitory trance states are the altered states of consciousness that involve quieting the mind to a singular point of consciousness, idea, sigil, or mantra. This usually means restricting motion in some way. Some methods of achieving inhibitory trance states include meditation, asphyxiation, yoga, bondage, pain (it depends on the type-this should be a dull, continuous pain), sleep, chanting/mantras, or using isolation tanks or sensory deprivation.

These are really attempts to block out the world and our own thoughts. The goal is to quiet down the mind until the point is reached where it is possible to have a single focus. In this state, it is possible to communicate with "external forces," the subconscious, the Holy Guardian Angel, or whatever you are trying to contact. We have been practicing many of these techniques in our adventure. There are many more techniques than those listed. What is thought of as traditional meditation works to increase the ability to enter inhibitory trance states and stay in these trance states longer, assuming that merely being in this type of trance state without conscious thought or movement has traditional mental and physical health benefits. In my practice, daily meditation is a great mental stabilizer, and it definitely helps me improve my mood and decrease my stress.

Specific Example: A Little Death Posture

Peter J. Carroll simplified the death posture down to a motionless inhibitory meditation, but Austin Osman Spare used a particular stance that he called the "death posture." Spare's death posture involves locking both arms behind the head. Each hand grasps the upper arm of the other arm behind the head. The person then stands on his or her tiptoes. Truly physically adept people should try to stand on one leg. This posture is very difficult to hold. Breathing will become difficult, and eventually you will black out, so be careful. Make sure to do this exercise on a floor with adequate padding and pillows. It is at this blacking-out stage that the sigil is launched into the subconscious. Try out Spare's death posture for five minutes or so; it is a highly effective gnosis tool (Spare 2005). The death posture is a physically taxing and demanding exercise. Please be careful with it.

Memory Trance Exercise

As with the energy exercise, focus on a memory associated very closely with one of the following emotions: rage, love (ethereal), fear, lust, sadness, or happiness. Relive the experience and bring all of the emotion of the memory to the forefront. Start to associate the word relating to the emotion with the experience. Allow the emotion to take over; keep reliving the memory, trying to distill the emotion from the memory. Map the experience to your five senses. As with the NLP experiments, remember that generally more is more, so give the experience as much sensory detail as possible until the experience seems as intense as it can get. Add details if necessary. Keep making this brighter and more colorful, experience things as heavier and louder, and make the smells more pronounced. If possible, drop the memory and just try to continue to produce more emotion of the type you started with (anger feeds itself, love brings love, etc.) in the current situation. It's okay if you don't drop the memory right away, but as the emotion takes over it will get harder to focus on the memory and not the emotion. Just keep going further with the exercise until the emotion takes over and the conscious mind is no longer capable of remembering what started the emotion. I am sure you can imagine times when you were so happy that nothing else mattered, or so angry that you couldn't even think of anything else, or so filled with lust that it was the only sensation you felt. Of course, you could minimize the impact of any one emotion by using the general less-is-less NLP philosophy (usually).

Using the NLP anchoring techniques described earlier, try to anchor an emotion to a certain keyword for that emotion (so that merely repeating the word is sufficient to produce the state of mind). How does breathing or posture affect the emotion produced? Does a mantra change the effect? Experiment and play with the techniques, and also find some new ones.

Excitatory Trance States

An excitatory trance state means an altered state that raises one's energy to an extreme level of ecstasy. This usually means increasing motion. Some types of excitatory gnosis include dancing, drumming, fighting, sex, spinning, ecstatic chanting/shouting, domination, terror, running, and glossolalia.

The goal of excitatory trance states is to oversaturate your mind so that it is overstimulated by body input and must shut down completely in order to deal with the amount of sensory input. Excitatory trance is generally easier to master than inhibitory methods. The idea is simple: run until exhausted. While you are running, dancing, screaming, etc., what happens to your internal voices? Ideally, if you have done any sort of vigorous physical exercise, a point is reached where you are focusing only on the task of running or dancing or engaging in another activity. When the internal voices are quieting down, that's the point at which the magic can really start to happen.

This is far easier to do with excitatory trance, since the exhaustion and overstimulation of the body produces the desired state, whereas in inhibitory styles of trance, the body is locked into position and the mind is quieted down. Vodou and many shamanic styles of magic use many more excitatory dancing methods.

Chemignosis

Chemignosis can go either into inhibitory or excitatory trance, depending on the drug. Drugs are a useful but dangerous route to trance. There are benefits to them: First, they are a fast route to extreme trance states. Second, they can break some internal barriers to magic. Third, shamans have been using them for thousands of years as tools, and there is a lot of shared knowledge on various drugs and intoxicants.

However, the substances are a dangerous shortcut. The insight gained through substance use is often less repeatable than if you worked up the skills to do so without substances. Additionally, drug trance is uncontrollable and unpredictable. Sometimes an experience will quickly spiral out of control and if that situation happens, magic is no longer possible. Some ethnogens also have deep physiological side effects, including addiction and nerve damage. Psychologically, ethnogens and other drugs are often of a system-shock type, throwing budding magicians into the proverbial deep end before they are ready. I will fully admit the usefulness of substances in some situations, but be careful and be well informed, regardless of the chemical.

Seething

Seething is a Germanic shamanism method of generating gnosis (Fries 1992). Seething is a snake trance, and in my experience it can be either inhibitory or excitatory. In seething, the participant sways back and forth rhythmically until gnosis hits. If this is done as a gentle swaying, it seems more inhibitory in nature. If it is done as a violent shaking, it seems excitatory. I have achieved results using both types of swaying.

Try some swaying-five minutes in gentle breeze-like swaying followed by five minutes of extreme shaking. Does altering your breathing or the direction of the swaying have an effect on the state generated? Write down your insights in your journal.

Now It's Your Turn

Now that we have summarized different trance types, return to your journal. Look for examples that you think are inhibitory and excitatory, and use these techniques to fully quiet down your mind either by mental discipline or sheer exhaustion. As with the different banishing techniques, try to combine tools from your journaling that produce the extreme states of consciousness you have reached, with no goal except to obtain deep trance states and replicate those trance states.

Try to seek out experiences that generate a strong trance state by either inhibitory or excitatory methods. Use the building blocks you already have, and find more. If there are particular methods that you enjoy more than other methods, attempt to figure out why you enjoy some methods more than others. Do you perform repetitive actions in your daily life that seem to put you in a trance state?