Accelerated Thinking

This month I have mostly been thinking about the abysmal state of online networking for less political occultists. Since Musk took over Twitter it has become antisocial media, and an unwelcoming place unless you are a Right Wing hate group or Christian grifter. Ultimately just another addition to the incel messiah’s list of failed projects. Then there is Mastodon, where Left Wing cliques hide from each other while expecting anyone who dares open their mouths to slap a content warning on everything they post. Not a good place to share your opinions because someone is guaranteed to get loudly offended and start the cancel train rolling. And finally we have Facebook. Zuckerberg neutered free speech on there long ago and the resulting Centrist dystopia is old news at this point. No, none of these are the answer for those who just want to get on with their magick, and I only wish I knew what was.

Publishing Updates

So just a quick update this time around. After three months of very intense writing, I have now submitted the final manuscript for my first full book to the publisher this week. It came in at around 77,000 words and includes a handful of art pieces too. I have ended up with an entire self authored anthology of sorts, a handbook for those who want to follow me on my journey into postmodern necromancy, chaos magick and witchcraft. It goes without saying that the pathworking I accidentally embarked upon while pushing myself towards being ready for the deadline in early September has indeed changed me in eldritch ways of course. Seeing so much of yourself blinking on the screen in front of you is one thing. But turning those blighted insights into words that can be followed by people you will likely never meet is definitely another. All goes to plan I will have another update before it hits the digital storefronts for Halloween. Watch this space.

Empowered Words

“Satan here held his Babylonish court, and in the blood of stainless childhood the leprous limbs of phosphorescent Lilith were laved. Incubi and succubae howled praise to Hecate, and headless moon-calves bleated to the Magna Mater. Goats leaped to the sound of thin accursed flutes, and aegipans chased endlessly after misshapen fauns over rocks twisted like swollen toads. Moloch and Ashtaroth were not absent; for in this quintessence of all damnation the bounds of consciousness were let down, and man’s fancy lay open to vistas of every realm of horror and every forbidden dimension that evil had power to mould. The world and Nature were helpless against such assaults from unsealed wells of night, nor could any sign or prayer check the Walpurgis-riot of horror which had come when a sage with the hateful key had stumbled on a horde with the locked and brimming coffer of transmitted daemon-lore.”
— H. P. Lovecraft, The Horror at Red Hook

Occult Almanac

September really begins to ramp up the astronomical observances as we witness the inevitable slide into the darker half of the year. It starts with the New Moon on the 3rd and First Quarter on the 11th, before the Harvest or Hazel moon dominates the sky on the 18th. This will be a Super Moon and also coincide with a partial lunar eclipse visible from the USA. It then finishes its monthly journey with the Third Quarter on the 24th. Mercury reaches its Greatest Elongation West on the 5th, with both Saturn and Neptune in Opposition to the Sun on the 8th and 20th, respectively. All three are significantly easier to view on these dates, which makes it the perfect time to do some celestial magick. Demonolaters may choose to celebrate Luciferge Rofocal’s Holy Day on the 14th and the second Rite to Leviathan on the 21st. Finally we have the Autumn Equinox, or Mabon, on the 22nd. A festival of harvest and plenty, many of the foods associated with Halloween are also given special importance in ritual around this time, albeit with a far more jovial purpose.

Necronomicon Mortui

A list of notable members of the occult, paranormal and Fortean community, ordered by date of death as opposed to birth. Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente, Witch, born 4th January 1922, died 1st September 1999. Jane Roberts, Medium, born 8th May 1929, died 5th September 1984. Robert Fludd, Magickian, born 17th January 1574, died 8th September 1637. Leila Ida Bathurst Waddell, Magickian, born 10th August 1880, died 13th September 1932. Edward James Ruppelt, UFOlogist, born 17th July 1923, died 15th September 1960. Eileen Jeanette Vancho Lyttle Garrett, Medium, born 17th March 1893, died 15th September 1970. Pamela Colman Smith, Magickian, born 16th February 1878, died 18th September 1951. Paracelsus, Alchemist, born around December 1493, died 24th September 1541. John Edward Mack M.D., UFOogist, born 4th October 1929, died 27th September 2004. Karl Zener, Parapsychologist, born 22nd April 1903, died 27th September 1964. Edmund Dawson Rogers, Spiritualist, born 7th August 1823, died 28th September 1910.

Memento Magus

A noted figure in the occult life of Aleister Crowley, it is all to easy to only view Leila Ida Bathurst Waddell (born 10th August 1880, died 13th September 1932) through his reflected glory. This would be a massive injustice, as not only was she an accomplished magickian in her own right but also an acclaimed violinist who famously fiddled her way around the world. Leila, or Leylah as she appeared in The Book of Lies, studied music under Leopold Auer and Emile Sauret, men who both shared a reputation for recognising rare talent. She would then meet Crowley while playing in London in 1908. Central to the Rites of Eleusis, and a co-author of Magick (Book 4), it is hard to imagine Thelemic ritual developing its more bacchanal aspects without her melodic input. Eventually tiring of his infidelity she returned to Australia in 1923, and passed away from cancer around a decade later.

Media Magick

One of my all time favourite films, Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things is a masterclass in how a great story can elevate even an amateurish project into mythical territory. Yes, the zombie makeup is as bare bones as you can get, and admittedly they only appear in the last twenty minutes of the movie. But it is the snappy dialogue and pained interactions between the cast that really sells the narrative for me. Less a monster movie and more a look inside a group of surprisingly likable libertines being led to the slaughter by their far from charismatic cult leader, it is when trading blows through snappy dialogue that we see the movie at its best. It is weird to think that a film about a wannabe warlock travelling to an island graveyard with dreams of becoming a master necromancer could feel so grounded in early 1970’s occultism, but the script really helps raise that idea from the dead.

End Notes

And there it is, the latest issue of my occult and paranormal newsletter ready to go. As we move towards the second half of the year my plans for The Accelerated Chaote remain pretty much unchanged. Preparations for the final few previously published articles to go live here all the way into early October have now been completed, and it feels kind of weird to be coming to the end of what actually turned into a swirling mess of very fine edits. As I have been using the original versions as submitted to the companies that I was writing for, mostly as a way of preserving my narrative voice, that definitely necessitated more clean up work than I first thought. Being a dyslexic author in the occult field is certainly interesting, though I am far from complaining. If I was not me, neurodiversity and all, I could not write the way I do. So If you like it, remember to subscribe and share because more is on the way.