Occult Experiments in the Home

HIEROPHANY and WORP FM are available from wherever you usually obtain your podcasts or can be found on Apple Podcasts at https://tinyurl.com/2yvczz7a and https://tinyurl.com/4mu5cw3x. Even more details: https://oeith.co.uk/podcasts/ Support the podcasts and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share.

Exploring the shifts in our experience of the other between psychology, the paranormal, magick, and spirituality, encountering along the way: a phobia of spiders; the abject horror of the object of a phobia; the psychological origin of the abhorred other in the self; fascination and fixation in phobia; the example of H.P. Lovecraft; the binding of the other; the other as a false appearance; desire and false appearance; personal experiences of projection; an ironic example from James Joyce; Jung on the animus/anima; how to spot an animus/anima projection; drawbacks and opportunities from projection; the other on the psychological level compared with the other in paranormal and magickal experience; the paranormal other as that which sees us and makes of us a false appearance; the story of a bizarre coincidence; the sense of the other in this experience; the sudden shift from the psychological to the paranormal other; how this applies to other types of paranormal and magickal experiences; an example in a magickal context; the curious problem presented by cases of high strangeness/weirdness; the approach often taken by investigators of these; the reappearance of false appearance; the seeking for “the other of the other”; examples from John Keel and the Skinwalker Ranch case; how the other of the other leads to just more of the self; an example from the movie The Mothman Prophecies; the trap of seeking the other of the other; the possibility of an alternative; personal examples of attempting to summon aliens and high strangeness; the tricksterish quality of the results; the paradox of a non-existent, empty, yet palpable other; this other as characteristic of the spiritual domain; the simultaneous disappearance of the self; the ongoing tendency to seek the other of the other; the return to the psychological realm in the event of this; the end of the podcast; how these reflections on the other might offer a coda to the series as a whole. BBC2 Weird Night (1994). Strange days – coincidences, https://youtu.be/Cx56Qs2Q3g8?t=395 (youtube.com). Accessed September, 2022. James Joyce (1916). A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, https://tinyurl.com/3p6uyfpc (gutenberg.org). Accessed September, 2022. John Keel (2002). The Mothman Prophecies. London: Hodder & Stoughton. Colm A. Kelleher & George Knapp (2005). Hunt for the Skinwalker. New York: Paraview Pocket. Mark Pellington, director (2002). The Mothman Prophecies. Lakeshore Entertainment. Donald Tyson (2010). H. P. Lovecraft: flight from madness, https://tinyurl.com/4keac27f (llewellyn.com). Accessed September, 2022. WORP FM can be found on the usual podcast platforms and at: https://shows.acast.com/worp-fm. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share.

Joined again by Paul, we probe the weirder sides of therapy and working as a therapist: defining the anomalous in the context of therapy; shifts in awareness and reality; Jeffrey Kripal’s definition of the paranormal and how it applies to therapy; the intensity of the therapeutic encounter; the pertinence of the psychoanalytic understanding of therapy; resistance to anomalous experiences (AEs) among the therapeutic profession; Freud’s ambivalence in this respect; Paul’s research and the responses received; perspectives from integrative therapy; transpersonal trends in EMDR; how what the theory allows influences what clients bring; clinical parapsychology in Germany; professional versus personal world views; problems concerning confidentiality and the discussion of AEs; the specificity of synchronicities; a personal experience of a prophetic dream; the pathologizing tendency of therapeutic language; collapsing boundaries; the therapeutic potential of AEs; possibilities for openings; the challenge to egoic structures; how the therapist might greet an AE; the “diagnostic” use of AEs; instances in which AEs might not offer opportunities; the shortcomings of therapists; holding AEs for clients; another personal experience, somewhat like a haunting; a sense of “the other”; an AE as an opening of “the reducing valve”; different types of AEs; the relative frequency of psi experiences and synchronicities; pathologisation and power structures; a personal experience of a presence felt in a session; bereavement as a hotbed for AEs; the question of whether the therapist should disclose an AE; when therapy encroaches upon psychic mediumship or occultism; the intersection of therapy, spirituality, and magick; the contrasting ethical frameworks of therapy and magick; erring on the side of minimising harm; the more open the therapist can be, the greater the possibility of grounding for the client; moving beyond vetoing AEs; the overlap of skillsets between therapy and psychic mediumship; a proposal for “weird therapy”; the lack of any manuals for how to work with AEs; the importance of keeping multiple paradigms in play; “living with” and “living in”; the importance of the therapist’s embodiment; holding AEs for clients; attunement; why the therapist must be well-versed in the weird; authenticity; the necessity of a certain selflessness in order to heal through therapy; why spirituality and psychology need to go hand-in-hand. W.H. Kramer, E. Bauer & G.H. Hövelmann, eds. (2012). Perspectives of Clinical Parapsychology: An Introductory Reader. Bunnick, The Netherlands: Stichting Het Johan Borgman Fonds. Jeffrey Kripal (2017). Secret Body: Erotic and Esoteric Currents in the History of Religions. Chicago: University of Chicago. Thomas Rabeyron (2021). When the truth is out there: counseling people who report anomalous experiences. Frontiers in Psychology, 12: 693707. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share.

Exploring the relationship to our ancestors, and how it might affect our lives and spiritual practice, encountering along the way: Carl Jung and his relationship to the dead; ghosts, the dead, and the possibility of further transformations after death; conversation with ancestors; Jung’s Seven Sermons to the Dead; individuation and the dead; a disturbing personal encounter with the ancestors; the similarity to and difference from a demonic encounter; a fallow period in my magick; how magick “fails”; the importance of finding “our” dead; a recourse to art; some help from the Archangel Raziel; how identification with ancestors causes division among the living; the necessity of confronting and criticising the dead; what “criticism” of the dead really entails; the possible negative consequences of avoiding this; a ritual that lead to the composition of Liber Pisces; observations on the technique of active imagination; Liber Pisces as the answer to my questions about the dead; the appearance of Jung and Dante in the visions; Daniel Foor on “ancestral guides” and “happy ancestors”; family tree research; what I discovered about my ancestors and how I felt about them; the legacy of my ancestors in the way I reacted to them; the karmic significance of shame and snobbery; an encounter with a happy ancestor; my earliest named ancestor; the possible impact of ancestral trauma on our spiritual practice. Daniel Foor (2017). Ancestral Medicine: Rituals for Personal and Family Healing. Rochester, VT: Bear. C.G. Jung (1967). Memories, Dreams, Reflections. London: Fontana. Peter Kingsley (2018). Catafalque: Carl Jung and the End of Humanity, volume 1. London: Catafalque. Printed copies of Liber Pisces are available from: https://tinyurl.com/3y5ewpk6. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. OEITH is a content creator at Keikobad Radio. Tune in for 24/7 broadcasts on the occult, mysticism, esotericism, and the paranormal: https://radio.keikobad.com.

After a warning concerning the dark content of this episode, we explore (from personal experience) the shadow side of intense meditation practice: panic attacks on my first fire kasina retreat; the importance of reaching out for support from fellow retreatants; the usefulness of maps and models; fear, misery, and disgust; differences in approach between concentration and insight practice; the usefulness of distraction; the importance of sticking to the practice being undertaken; my second kasina retreat and how I made the same mistakes again; self-disgust; depression, unreality, suicidal ideation and intentions; the impact of life problems upon the practice; difficulties in reaching out for support; social alienation; projection of feelings of abandonment; the helpfulness of a group ritual and permission to freak out; the dangers of a highly focused mind; choosing the time and place for self-analysis; the importance of observing and offering support to fellow retreatants; my third kasina retreat, and some success at circumventing the same old difficulty; escaping the mind loop; the relationship and interactions between psychological issues and meditation practices; how psychological issues are resolved not by meditation but through other means; my own issues and how I have addressed them; the abject failure of the third retreat and how this came about; the need for processing and containment of overwhelming psychological issues; the difference between psychotic hallucination and beneficial insights; taking bizarreness as an insight versus living out the bizarreness in reality; the failure of processing and what helps re-integrate; the failure of processing and its possible relationship to trauma; the possible roles of trauma in spiritual practice; the usefulness of agreements to take a break from practice; the kind of experiences to look out for that might indicate a failure to process experiences; possible resistances to taking a break; the likely efficacy of some simple grounding interventions; circumstances leading to the failure of my third kasina retreat; the detriments of ending a retreat unexpectedly; summary of a simple model for keeping retreats safe; the real and significant impacts of spiritual practice and the difficulty of distinguishing psychosis from spiritual insight. If you are in emotional distress, struggling to cope, or feeling suicidal, then call Samaritans on 116 123 (UK) or the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (USA), or search for local suicide helpline services. There is someone there to listen and support you. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. OEITH is a content creator at Keikobad Radio. Tune in for 24/7 broadcasts on the occult, mysticism, esotericism, and the paranormal: https://radio.keikobad.com.

We confront this most terrifying item of magical equipment, to explore what makes it so volatile, considering: my first experience of Ouija; the tendency of Ouija to creep into more direct forms of manifestation; the lifelong impact of these experiences; an example of a very physical manifestation; the tendency with Ouija for things to get out of control; obsession and the possibility of harm; comparison of the Ouija with other magical systems; tarot, runes, and the I Ching versus the Ouija; the lack of any system or wisdom in the Ouija; a mixture of divination and evocation; the pendulum and the Forty Servants versus the Ouija; how the onus of safety falls upon the Ouija operator; William Benjamin Carpenter and the ideomotor reflex; the ideomotor reflex as a classic example of “explaining away”; the magical dimension of the ideomotor reflex; a recent (2018) experimental study of the Ouija using eye tracking equipment; the theory of Ouija messages as an “emergent property” of its operators; belief in the Ouija and lowered “sense of agency” (SOA); SOA as a potential but risky magical technique; effective Ouija usage as a balancing of SOA; Aleister Crowley on the Ouija board; using magickal protocols with the Ouija; an example of a working to communicate via Ouija with a djinni; some simple techniques for “locking down” Ouija communications; J. Edward Cornelius on the magical mindset required when using the Ouija; a consistent application of will, thought, and imagination, in order to create an ideal balance of SOA. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Marc Andersen et al. (2018). Predictive minds in Ouija board sessions, https://tinyurl.com/ytxes9e3(springer.com). Accessed June, 2022. Duncan Barford (2010). Occult Experiments in the Home. London: Aeon. Duncan Barford (2020). Summoning the djinn. In: Even More Occult Experiments in the Home. Hurstpierpoint: Heptarchia. William Benjamin Carpenter (1852). On the influence of suggestion in modifying and directing muscular movement, independently of volition, https://tinyurl.com/3enfb5cf (wellcomecollection.org). Accessed June, 2022. J. Edward Cornelius (2005). Aleister Crowley and the Ouija Board. Port Townsend, WA: Feral House. Aleister Crowley (1917). The Ouija board, https://tinyurl.com/2p9f3hnh (hermetic.com). Accessed June, 2022. Tommie Kelly (2022). The Forty Servants, https://tinyurl.com/2p87es2p (adventuresinwoowoo.com). Accessed June, 2022. Nuke’s Top 5 (2022). The Norwegian ghost, https://tinyurl.com/sb863ftz (youtube.com). Accessed June 2022.

Joined by my good friend Paul, we discuss the ethics of magick and the integration of ethics into magical practice, exploring: a somewhat unethical hexing; retaliation, its justifications and alternatives; proportionality; the lack of an ethical framework in chaos magick; the impossibility of an absence of ethics; ethical integrationism versus technical eclecticism; the postmodernist suspicion of morality; accusations of morality; codes of ethics versus ethical frameworks; the discomfort of autonomous ethical reasoning; the problem of post-hoc justifications; the role of interpretation in understanding actions and intentions; abdication of judgement as a strategy for avoiding ethical responsibility; the inescapability of judgment; the principle of minimising harm; the identity of intention and action in magick; the perils of action at a distance; the example of the sunflower as a sigil for victory for Ukraine; distance and disproportionality; the occult community and the question of who should retaliate when retaliation is justified; the ethics of restraint and non-involvement; avoidance of harm versus taking risks to achieve benefits; the risks and potential benefits of magick; an example in mindfulness-based therapy; when things get worse before they get better; the inevitability of harm in magick; the Faustian bargain; the potential for cultivating compassion; how ethics has begun to shape our magical practice; the uncertainty in balancing gain against harm; the deficiencies of "an it harm none"; how ethical thinking beforehand can make magick more effective; an example of a working for a situation involving allegations of misconduct and racism; the problems of a binding ritual in this context; Mirkachank, our servitor for turning a perpetrator’s actions back against them; the surprising outcomes from using this servitor; the problems of intervening from outside a situation; how certain types of personalities are unlikely to benefit from confrontation with their own actions; ethical discomfort as an important signal; our conclusions and the outcome from the working; the principle of parsimony of intervention; Daoist non-action as ethical rather than mystical; the principle of not being an arsehole; the simpler the working the more effective it might be; the fundamental simplicity of ethics; a developmental arc towards simplicity; the simpler and more ethical our magical practice, the perhaps the more it integrates with daily life; the subtle and long-term effects of magical practice. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Federico Campagna (2018). Technic and Magic: The Reconstruction of Reality. London: Bloomsbury.

Blowing the dust off some old diaries, we reflect on how kasina meditation generates magical powers, exploring: kasina practice and its rejuvenation by Daniel Ingram; the corruption of the original texts; the need for fresh terminology; different types of kasina; how a kasina is used; the importance and use of the retinal after-image; the cultivation of siddhis or “psychic powers”, and what these include; the circumstances of my first fire kasina retreat; the daily schedule; stages of the practice: after-image, red dot, black dot, and the murk; scrying into the murk as a means of realising a magical intention; a vision of a deity and “parallax imagery”; the experience of images that act like perceptions; the differences between perceptions and images; a thought experiment from Jean-Paul Sartre; perceptions as that which is given; images as a manifestation of an intention or will; different types of images and their commonalities; perceptions as offering endless perspectives on reality, and images as offering endless possibilities for departing from it; the characteristics of external images or media; perceptions as analogue and images as digital; magick and the erosion of the difference between imagery and perception; fire kasina as a hacking of the physiology of eye and brain to disrupt this difference; “seeing” with the mind, not the eyes; timescales for building the degree of concentration required; experiences of “travels” to different places; an experience of “the low-resolution vision space”; “the high-resolution vision space” and encounters with discarnate, sentient beings; meeting the Thai Spider Buddha; the strange experience of entering the high-resolution vision space; reflections on the nature of kasina practice; concentration as a limited means of manifestation; a warning about the shadow sides of kasina practice. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Bhadantácariya Buddhaghosa (2011). Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga), translated by Bhikkhu Nanamoli, https://tinyurl.com/2p9aup6j(accesstoinsight.org). Accessed May, 2022. Daniel Ingram (2018). “Fire Kasina Practice” In: Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha, second edition, https://tinyurl.com/2usvrcu5 (mctb.org). Accessed May, 2022. Jean-Paul Sartre (1972). The Psychology of Imagination. Secaucus, NJ: Citadel. Shannon Stein & Daniel Ingram (2017). The Fire Kasina: Questions and Answers on Retreat with Practice Notes and Commentary, https://tinyurl.com/3m8y58bv (firekasina.org). Accessed May, 2022. Arahant Upatissa (1961). The Path of Freedom (Vimuttimagga), translated by Rev. N.R.M. Ehara, Soma Thera, & Kheminda Thera, https://tinyurl.com/4crx5m55 (urbandharma.org). Accessed May, 2022.

Borrowing from Buddhism the concept of the “near enemy”, we consider how art, history, and psychology may look like magick but can harm our magical practice, exploring: the danger of the near enemy; pity as the near enemy of compassion; art, history, and psychology as near enemies of magick and their detrimental effects; the difference of this approach from Lionel Snell’s approach in SSOTBME; philosophy as a current near enemy that was once synonymous with magick; art as the most insidious near enemy of magick; the legitimate role of art in magick; beauty versus truth; Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn”; magicians who are artists: Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, and Tommie Kelly; how art and magick can be synonymous; art as a disguise for magick; the different intentions and skill sets of art and magick; Phil Ford and J.F. Martel on M. John Harrison’s The Course of the Heart, and Harrison’s response to this; Philip K. Dick as a gnostic writer and Harrison as an imitator of Gnosticism; Socrates’s expulsion of the artists from Plato’s Republic; my view of history as irrelevant to magick; the roots of my view in chaos magick and Perennialism; defining Perennialism and distinguishing it from Traditionalism; the value of different and multiple paths to truth; the tendency of the historical perspective to situate truth in the tradition rather than in personal experience; the value of tradition as a path to personal experience; psychology as a near enemy and my personal vulnerability to it; the spirit paradigm versus the psychological paradigm; how the psychological paradigm is likely to produce only psychological results; the different dimensions of truth: subjective and objective; the psychological paradigm as possibly occluding the objective dimensions of truth; Jung and the objective dimensions of the psyche; the subjective and objective dimensions of the mind in meditation, and psychology’s pathologizing of the objective dimensions. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Phil Ford & J.F. Martel (2020). Weird studies Ep. 81. Gnostic lit: on M. John Harrison's The Course of the Heart. https://tinyurl.com/2kjpywse (weirdstudies.com). Accessed April 2022. M. John Harrison (2005). The Course of the Heart. In: Anima. London: Gollancz. M. John Harrison (2020). The core of the heart. https://tinyurl.com/yeyr3h9y (wordpress.com). Accessed April 2022. M. John Harrison (2020). I can hear you. https://tinyurl.com/yckfj2wa (wordpress.com). Accessed April 2022. John Keats (1819). Ode on a Grecian urn. https://tinyurl.com/29z54pjh (owleyes.org). Accessed April 2022. Tommie Kelly (2021). Art is magick, magick is art! https://youtu.be/TcFVj9NBuJk (youtube.com). Accessed April 2022. Alan Moore (2016). Art and magic. https://youtu.be/WHxWE-S3nD8 (youtube.com). Accessed April 2022. Plato (2022). The Republic, 10: 598b. https://tinyurl.com/mt3vybc8 (tufts.edu). Accessed April 2022.

We approach the Middle Pillar on the Tree of Life as a possible guide to the dilemma of having a human identity, exploring: the contrast between identity and being; the advantages and drawbacks of emphasising one of these above the other; a parallel between the Pillar of Severity and identity, and the Pillar of Mercy and being; how these distinctions transcend politics; neurodiversity as a new and possibly radical category of human difference; neurodiversity as a possible recognition that the human being is not synonymous with the human mind; lack of mental imagery as a marker of neurodiversity; mental imagery in magick; Lionel Snell on seeing fairies; how the imagination does not depend upon mental imagery, because the imagination is universal; some ancient myths and other accounts of human nature; the changeability of human nature; David Abram on the separation of the human from nature; putting the blame on language and Plato; the primacy of forgetting in human nature; forgetting and remembering in Plato; remembering as resurrection; parallels between identity and remembering, being and forgetting, and the dilemmas of both; the Middle Pillar as an alternative to these; Kether as that which is beyond the human mind; Israel Regardie on the resolution of psychological conflict as a preliminary practice to magick; acceptance as the solution to conflict; Tiphereth as the model of acceptance and balance; the Middle Pillar as a combination of remembering and forgetting; Yesod as the unconscious and the storehouse of memory and images; the abyss and the enigma of Da’ath; the nature of Da’ath and a personal experience of it; Da’ath and the Holy Guardian Angel as useful fictions; the arrival at a useful fiction as a preliminary to the experience of Kether; the Middle Pillar as a pulsation of different kinds of remembering and forgetting. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. David Abram (1996). The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-than-human World. New York: Pantheon. Anonymous (2002). Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey into Christian Hermeticism. New York: Tarcher. Ramsey Dukes (2011). How to See Fairies: Discover Your Psychic Powers in Six Weeks. London: Aeon. Israel Regardie (1945). The Middle Pillar. Chicago: Aries.

How an ancient Tibetan meditation practice helped me through the night in a dark and haunted place, considering: the non-material existence of ghosts; the potential benefits of paranormal encounters; chöd: a meditation practice for dealing with paranormal experiences; Brighton Town Hall: its history and its ghosts; underground water and electromagnetic fields; the Old Police Cells Museum and a plan for spending the night there; paranormal investigation as a contemporary form of chöd; the aims and rationale of chöd; Machig Labdrön on demons, their nature, and how to deal with them; a paranormal investigation at the museum; the layout of the museum; the story of Henry Solomon; a strange experience of an out-of-place smell; possible interactions between imagination and place; the vigil begins; wrestling with the imagination; footsteps and strange sounds; recurrence of the sounds; what chöd revealed about the nature of fear; conflict between the meditator and the paranormal investigator; a big shock; compassion for a ghost; Kunkhyen Pema Karpo on gods and demons; seeing-through the paranormal as a source of supernormal powers; material explanations; the end of the vigil; reflections on the experience. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Daniel P. Brown (2006). Pointing Out the Great Way: The Stages of Meditation in the Mahamudra Tradition. Boston, MA: Wisdom Publications. Kate Elms (2011). Henry Solomon (1794-1844), https://tinyurl.com/bdf3urre (brightonmuseums.org.uk). Accessed April 2022. Machig Labdrön (2013). Machik's Complete Explanation: Clarifying the Meaning of Chöd, translated by Sarah Harding. Boulder, CO: Shambhala. Old Police Cells Museum (2021). https://www.oldpolicecellsmuseum.com(accessed April 2022).

Presenting a magical working with colleagues Jason Mendel and Paul, we encounter the Estes method of spirit communication, and its potential use in magick, exploring: the background circumstances to this episode; requests for magical interventions and the criteria for deciding whether to get involved; ethical considerations around magical interventions; the ethical mismatch between magick and everyday life; the unusual nature of the entity involved in this case; second order magick; details of our preliminary working, using the Estes method; the Estes protocols; a recording of the session; the question of why spirit communication often is not direct; a couple of odd synchronicities; Alan Chapman’s caution against parasitic entities; Metatron, Sandalphon, and a dead-end; arrival at an interpretation that makes sense of the session; the archangel Poiel; our formulation for the second working; the roots of the Estes method in paranormal investigation and pseudoscience; Hellier as a journey from pseudoscience into conscious magick; technology versus trance mediumship; similarities and differences between the Estes method and the Ouija board; the contrast between verbal and written messages in spirit communication; how it is not meaning that is illusory but meaninglessness; the reality of meaning and the similarity of meaning with love. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Tommie Kelly, Patrick Murphy & Jason Mendel (2022). TaSTA rituals 003 - the Estes method. https://tinyurl.com/2p87zfzs(youtube.com). Accessed March 2022. Jason Mendel (2022). The Estes method for magicians. https://tinyurl.com/2p9bbdhv (alampintheunderworld.com). Accessed March 2022. Jason Mendel (2021) Let’s talk about the Estes method. https://tinyurl.com/2p8jj44y (alampintheunderworld.com). Accessed March 2022. Greg Newkirk (2019). The Estes method: how the groundbreaking SB7 spirit box experiment is changing paranormal investigation. https://tinyurl.com/22nz82ue (weekinweird.com). Accessed March 2022.

Containing references to sexual abuse, far-right ideology, and the (literal) eating of babies, we face-off to evil, examining: two depictions of Cronos (Saturn) eating a child by Peter Paul Rubens and Francisco Goya; the contrast between their perspectives with regard to the question of evil; the myth of Cronos and the birth of Zeus (Jupiter); the archetype of Cronos and its contemporary influence; Cronos as autocrat and canceller of the future; Cronos as the shadow side of conservatism; the tyranny of the old over the young; sexual abuse of children as an aspect of the Cronos archetype; the case of Jeffrey Epstein; Cronos as the avoider of the law and of karma; how we are haunted by Cronos; gods and archetypes as hardcoded aspects of reality that cannot be changed but perhaps can be responded to; Rubens and Goya as offering two possible trajectories: embracing the real or transcending it; the ethical neutrality of either of these gestures; the Tree of Life as a map of reality; Chesed, The Hierophant, and Zeus, versus Binah and Saturn; the relationship between Cronos and Zeus as presented on the Tree of Life; Lon Milo DuQuette on The Wheel of Fortune and Zeus (Jupiter) as the restorer of karma; confronting evil versus taking responsibility for evil; the right-hand pillar (Mercy) and the left-hand pillar (Strength); the anatomy of each; Chokmah, Binah, and Geburah; The Chariot and The Hanged Man; both pillars as legitimate aspects of reality; my personal preference for the right-hand pillar and the sadness that is its consequence; Nick Land and accelerationism on capitalism as an aspect of reality; accelerationism, the left-hand pillar, and H.P. Lovecraft; both trauma and transcendence as routes to awakening and the divine. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Anonymous (2022). Rubens & Goya – Saturn devouring his son, https://tinyurl.com/33xrec24 (classicalartsuniverse.com). Accessed March 2022. Zac Braciszewicz (2006). Dreaming Saturn, https://tinyurl.com/mrxb45zd (wordpress.com). Accessed March 2022. Lisa Bryant, director (2020). Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich. Netflix. Lon Milo DuQuette (2017). Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot, new edition. Newburyport, MA: Weiser. Phil Ford & J.F. Martel (2022). Weird Studies episode 114: on the wheel of fortune, https://tinyurl.com/2s43frc5 (weirdstudies.com). Accessed March 2022. Nick Land (2021). Critique of transcendental miserabilism. In: Fanged Noumena: Collected Writings 1987-2007. Cambridge, MA: Urbanomic / Sequence.

We examine how Homer, Virgil, and Dante help us navigate the underworld and our relationship to the dead, exploring: the meaning of the hero's descent into the underworld and its personal significance; Odysseus's method of dealing with the dead; what Homer tells us about the underworld and how to work with it; Virgil's Aeneid and the descent of Aeneas; the difference of status among the dead in Virgil; the different impacts upon us of the dead, as explored in Dante's Divine Comedy; The Divine Comedy as an epic wholly about the underworld; the nature of the dead in Dante; the structure of Dante's cosmos; Virgil and Beatrice as Dante's guides; The Divine Comedy as an experiential text; the nature of the dead in Dante; hell, purgatory, and heaven as familiar states of being; hell as a recognisable state of suffering without end; purgatory as the possibility of a willed exit from suffering; the fractal or holographic nature of heaven's bliss; heaven and the non-dual experience; the life of Piccarda Donati and her supposed "sin"; "sin" versus "karma"; sin in the kabbalistic tradition: chatah, pesha, and avon; the application of these ideas to Dante's dead; how we might apply these descriptions of the underworld to our own practice. Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith. Buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/oeith or https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dbarfordG. Or you could send me a lovely book from https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/1IQ3BVWY3L5L5?ref_=wl_share. Clive James (2013). Dante: The Divine Comedy. London: Picador. Richmond Lattimore (2007). The Odyssey of Homer. New York: Harper Perennial. Rabbi Yitzchak Luria (2022). Three different kinds of sin, https://tinyurl.com/2p8u5y2w. (chabad.org). Accessed February 2022.

To know, to dare, to will, and to keep silence. We explore the magical virtues (specifically, “to keep silence”), known also as “The Powers of the Sphinx”, encountering along the way: the gift of dreams; how keeping silence still protects magicians; how silence can also harm magicians; why I am not silent about my experiences; an oddly pertinent dream; musicians playing music in silence as an analogy for how magicians stand in relationship to each other; the silent recognition of a shared link to the ineffable; the audible as different for everyone, but silence as the same to all; Éliphas Lévi on the Powers of the Sphinx; correspondences of the powers; why I find these unconvincing; Crowley’s take on the powers and their correspondences; Crowley’s added power, “to go”, as an equivalent to the tao or dharma; how the concept of the powers might be useful; the nature of human will; human experience considered as a straddling of realms and bodies; the physical and emotional bodies as “objective”; the mental body as “subjective”; imagining the objective mental body; machines versus angels; an answer to the question free will; the choice between free will and true will; humiliation as the human condition; the powers as ideals, indicating directions of growth and evolution; a less-than-perfect world; keeping silence as cultivating inner silence, and the silence of the divine; Anonymous and Crowley on the primary significance of silence; true will and silence; dreaming as an underrated practice. Errata: What Nishida Kitaro actually wrote was this: “If we see God externally, it is merely magic” (p. 77). Support the podcast and access additional content at: https://patreon.com/oeith Anonymous (2002). Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey into Christian Hermeticism. New York: Tarcher. Aleister Crowley (1943). Magick Without Tears. https://tinyurl.com/3yzx3644 (consciouslibrary.com). Accessed February 2022. Aleister Crowley (1991). Little Essays Towards Truth. Scottsdale, AZ: New Falcon. Éliphas Lévi (1896). Transcendental Magic: Its Doctrine and Ritual, translated by A.E. Waite. London: George Redway. Nishida Kitaro (1987). Last Writings: Nothingness and the Religious Worldview, translated by David Dilworth. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii.

We discuss issues of power and spiritual authority as presented by the tarot card The Hierophant, encountering along the way: Mercury retrograde in the ninth house; a flurry of synchronicities; the question of spiritual authority; the least sexy card in the tarot; common interpretations of the card: dogma and patriarchy; similarities and contrasts between The High Priestess, The Empress, The Emperor, and The Hierophant; Dion Fortune on passivity and activity on the material and the spiritual planes; The Hierophant as the passive masculine spiritual; personal burnout; a reminder of love; patriarchy, authority, and power; Paul Verhaeghe on the difference between power (a two-party relationship) and authority (three parties); authority as the representation of goodness and truth and the renunciation of personal power; the contemporary crisis of authority; spiritual power an impossibility; the question of where, in its absence, we should situate authority; deliberative democracy; the absence of authority as authoritarianism; The Hierophant as not a figure of authority, but a figure that knows where authority is to be found; how commentaries on The Hierophant provoke the question of where authority is found; "the nanny state", my personal ideal; the loving, caring father; Éliphas Lévi on The Hierophant as a loving father; Crowley's very contemporary Hierophant as an enigma and trickster; Mouni Sadhu's Hierophant as a powerful exponent of the will; Anonymous on the will as a vulnerability and a collection of "wounds", and on three types of magick; Anonymous’s types of magick reflected in the other commentators; the "pure" will as authority rather than power; Anonymous’s Hierophant as the embodiment of a process of "spiritual respiration"; prayer and benediction; Tom Hanks, Fred Rogers, and a cinematic manifestation of The Hierophant; authority as not about personal perfection but the embodiment of a spiritual process; the absurdity of neglecting human needs. Support the podcast and gain access to additional material at https://patreon.com/oeith Anonymous (2002). Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey into Christian Hermeticism. New York: Tarcher. Aleister Crowley (1974). The Book of Thoth. York Beach, ME: Weiser. Dion Fortune (1987). The Mystical Qabalah. London: Aquarian. Marielle Heller, director (2019). A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. Éliphas Lévi (1861). The Key of the Mysteries, translated by Aleister Crowley. https://tinyurl.com/2p8b74yt (archive.org). Accessed January 2022. Mouni Sadhu (2004). The Tarot: A Contemporary Course of the Quintessence of Hermetic Occultism. London: Aeon. Paul Verhaeghe (2017). Says Who? The Struggle for Authority in a Market-Based Society. London: Scribe.

Revisiting my experiences of awakening and reflecting on how things seem now, we ponder along the way: the culture of silence on awakening within Buddhism; the notion that enlightened people never claim enlightenment; my first ever experience of meditation; my failure at regular practice and a farewell to Buddhism; development of an interest in magick; returning to meditation as part of magical training; meeting Alan Chapman; effects of Alan's influence; embarking on the Knowledge and Communication of the Holy Guardian Angel; the 2012 prophecies and the Viking Youth Power Hour; encountering the teachings of Daniel Ingram; how to identify an authentic teacher; the advantages of “spiritual shopping”; using magick in order to experience awakening; replica hand grenades and black monoliths; my lack of faith in magick and my own experience; practical magick for mystical results; the danger of expectations; ego inflation versus lack of confidence; chaos magick as the tradition of not having a tradition; parallels between Crowley's Liber Samekh and Ingram's stages of insight; the realisation that the Dark Night of the Soul is progress; the basic and seemingly universal structure of awakening; discovering this structure all over the place; how the tradition and the practice do not seem to matter; intention and any suitable practice is all that is needed; my brash claims of attainment, and the reasons for this; how I used Ingram's teachings on the Buddhist four path model as my roadmap; descriptions and possible definitions of the four paths; a preliminary shift concerning distraction; my experience of first path: meeting Ultimate Truth; second path as the repetition of this; the major shift of a third path: a permanent awareness of something impossible and divine; God and death; the advice of Christopher Titmuss on dealing with a persistent duality; my experience of a seeming fourth path: nowhere from which to look; why I no longer regard myself as fully awakened; how the awareness has changed over time; a shift of interest towards trauma and karma; wondering about Christina Feldman's definition of enlightenment a “the implosion of all sankharas”. Support the podcast and access additional material at https://patreon.com/oeith Duncan Barford (2021). The Magick of A Dark Song: The Abramelin Ritual in Fiction and Reality. Hurstpierpoint: Heptarchia. Alan Chapman & Duncan Barford (2009). The Blood of the Saints. Brighton: Heptarchia. Alan Chapman & Duncan Barford (2009). The Urn. Brighton: Heptarchia. Alan Chapman & Duncan Barford (2010). A Desert of Roses. Brighton: Heptarchia. Aleister Crowley (1930). Liber Samekh, https://tinyurl.com/2p8a2ned (sacred-texts.com). Accessed January 2022. Daniel M. Ingram (2018). Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha, revised and expanded edition. London: Aeon.

Let's focus in on concentration, exploring: the arms of Baphomet; solve et coagula as "analysis and concentration"; how the mainstream lauds concentration; the prevalence of Attention Deficit Disorder; the union of dissolving and coalescing; Buddhist meditation; vipassana(insight) as solve, versus shamatha (concentration) as coagula; the nature and aims of shamatha practice; coagula and shamathapractice in relation to magick, sorcery, and ritual; belief-shifting and confirmation bias; the cultivation of psychic powers through concentration; solve, insight, and mysticism; undoing the duality between shamatha and vipassana; how insight requires concentration and concentration requires insight; some advice on how to approach shamatha practice; the importance of allowing some space for reflection in shamatha; Leigh Brasington on mindfulness of breathing; the psychological approach to concentration in contrast to concentration itself; the factors of concentration; rapture and happiness; concentration not a means to an end, but the connection with the object itself; the absurdity of the mainstream view; parallels with magick, ritual, and being in love; how there can only be concentration upon something that brings rapture and happiness; personal experience of difficulties during concentration retreats; panic attacks and depression; the mistake of trying to analyse one's way out of issues surfacing from concentration practice; the fruits of concentration practice as mental bodybuilding; concentration retreats as psychedelic voyages, calling for surrender and opening rather than analysis; the similarities of my mistake to the mainstream view of concentration; the role of my character in my mistake; concentration and "productivity"; manifestation as productivity or connection; action versus connection; obstacles to connection; how our relationship to our own mind might impede concentration; Winnicott on "primitive agony"; the mind's terror of itself; personal experiences of this; how retreats can provoke terrors, but perhaps also expose them to understanding; Dan Latner's account of his experiences; overcoming primitive agonies as a realisation of not what we cannot do, but perhaps what we are not doing; spirituality and occultism as discourses in which it is more possible to encounter concentration itself. Support the podcast and access extra material at: https://patreon.com/oeith Leigh Brasington (2017). Entering the jhanas, https://tinyurl.com/y63jfvtr (lionsroar.com). Accessed January 2022. Dan Latner (2021). 1. Episode Zero: The Dang Lantern Podcast, https://tinyurl.com/3h6ze2f2 (spotify.com). Accessed January 2022. Éliphas Lévi (1856). Baphomet, or the Sabbatic Goat, https://tinyurl.com/3mfpbya3 (wikimedia.org). Accessed January 2022. Donald Woods Winnicott (1974). Fear of breakdown. International Review of Psycho-Analysis, 1 (1-2): 103–107.

Let's join our minds to explore together the nature of telepathy, taking in along the way: the usefulness of magick in understanding the paranormal; definitions of telepathy and their problems; crisis apparitions; Nick Totton's definition of telepathy as "the experience of transparency between subjects"; the strengths of this definition; how telepathy tends to creep into both magick and therapy; telepathy in psychotherapy; a personal example of apparent telepathy in therapy; its significance in terms of my relationship to my therapist; reasons why therapy might encourage telepathy; the fear of telepathy within therapeutic organisations; Mikita Brottman's take on this and on projective identification (PI); the definition of PI versus projection; a common and widely experienced example of PI; PI as communication through a spectrum of possible means, not necessarily all paranormal; Melanie Klein's original definition of PI and Wilfred Bion's development of it; PI as a fundamental activity of the mind, a primitive kind of thinking; the "middle way" of regarding PI, and why this could be evasive; telepathy and anxiety; a personal example of a crisis apparition; telepathy in the service of intimacy as well as in the service of trauma; telepathy in the case of discarnate beings; a personal example; telepathy versus paranoia; how conventional communication is to telepathy as speech is to touch; Totton's suggestion that the paranormal is bodily; the multiplicity of bodies in occult philosophy. Support the podcast and access extra material at: https://patreon.com/oeith Mikita Brottman (2011). Phantoms of the Clinic: From Thought-Transference to Projective Identification. London: Karnac Books. Melanie Klein (1946). Notes on Some Schizoid Mechanisms, International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 27: 99-110. Thomas Ogden (1979). On Projective Identification, International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 60: 357-373. Nick Totton (2007). Funny You Should Say That: Paranormality, at the Margins and the Centre of Psychotherapy, European Journal of Psychotherapy and Counselling, 9(4): 389–401.

If reincarnation is real, then how does it impact on our lives here and now? We consider: the question of how reincarnation manifests in everyday experience; comparison of contact with the dead versus reincarnation; reasons for the relevance of reincarnation; spiritual attainment and insight into past lives; the AUTOTAR working; audio scrying with tinfoil; my supposed incarnation as Otto Berg; why the results failed to convince; the rejection of reincarnation in contemporary western Buddhism; Stephen Batchelor's agnostic viewpoint; Leigh Brasington on rebirth as “an immortality project” and on the Buddha's possible lack of belief in rebirth; the secular materialist style of Buddhism; reincarnation as a disposable doctrine, versus reincarnation as a springboard for productive contemplation; that what is reborn is karma rather than the self; karma as a tennis ball; the thrower and the catcher; contact with the dead as confrontation with the other, versus reincarnation as a continuation of the same; ways in which the dead physically return: incorruptibles; stigmatics; and organ transplant anomalies; incorruptibles as persisting physically not through rebirth but by being regarded as the living as not fully dead; Christ, the persistent returner; the stigmatic as carrying Christ's karma but having no identification with it; organ transplant anomalies as more like a haunting than an instance of rebirth; the experience of reincarnation as identification with something in another as a continuation of ourselves; why experience of a past life is not necessarily a memory; karma as not an experience but an impact upon experience; the EHNB working and its interesting results; tendencies, traits, and predispositions as possible manifestations of karma; my vision of a past life; its mixture of memory and imagination; its relevance to my current life; its recurrence in other workings and in therapy; reincarnation as a continuation of karmic issues; how that which reincarnates never manifests; Rudolf Steiner on the individual as a species; reincarnations and species; reincarnation and the living of similar lives; cases of reincarnation in rural China; individualism as an obscuration of how people are mostly alike; Steiner's previous incarnation as St Thomas Aquinas; the similar missions of Steiner and Aquinas; differences between Steiner's view of reincarnation and that of the Buddha; awakening as the end of rebirth and karma, versus rebirth as humanity’s fulfilment of a much larger project; karma as our manner of falling away from truth; the importance of self-compassion when working with karma. Support the podcast and access additional material at: https://patreon.com/oeith Stephen Batchelor (2021). Rebirth: a case for Buddhist agnosticism. https://tinyurl.com/mrxjp993(stephenbatchelor.org). Accessed December 2021. Steve James (2021). Guru Viking podcast ep122: mysteries of dependent origination – Leigh Brasington. https://tinyurl.com/2p96s8f2(youtube.com). Accessed December 2021. Steve James (2021). Guru Viking podcast ep120: meditation virtuoso – Delson Armstrong.  https://tinyurl.com/2p8ed2wt (youtube.com). Accessed December 2021. Changzhen Li (2018). 100 Reincarnation Cases in Pingyang: Extraordinary True Stories of Kam People Who Recall Past Lives. Self-published. T.H. Meyer (2010). Rudolf Steiner’s Core Mission: The Birth and Development of Spiritual-Scientific Karma Research. Forest Row: Temple Lodge. Rudolf Steiner (1971). Theosophy: An Introduction to the Supersensible Knowledge of the World and the Destination of Man. Forest Row: Anthroposophic Press.