Structure and Magic
How to find the balance and get results
Awhile back, one of my good friends was discussing facilitation work and he shared how he added structure to the magic and brought magic to the structure. It struck me as a very interesting phrase. I knew he was applying this phrase to facilitation and yet I also recognized how it applies to the practice of magic.
I wrote The Process of Magic years ago and it was my attempt to describe the structure of magic using the word process. In that book I describe the principles of magic that are at work and how those principles, in conjunction with the techniques of magic, enable a magician to manifest a result.
I chose the word process intentionally because magical workings aren’t typically thought of or described as processes and yet that is essentially what they are. It’s not exactly romantic or mystical to describe magic in that way and yet it is accurate.
Adding Structure to the Magic
Whether we use the words ritual, ceremony, spell, process, or working, what we’re essentially expressing is that there is a specific set of actions occurring that are designed to produce a result. We execute these actions and something happens. Even if we don’t get the result we want, we get valuable information from the experience that indicates what is and isn’t working.
We add structure to the magic so that something can actually happen. The structure creates direction and linearity, which is useful for producing results. Yet if we add too much structure, we lose the magic. If everything is locked down there is no room to allow probability to come into the equation and align the desired result with the beingness of the person doing the magical work.
Adding Magic to the Structure
I add magic to the structure when I get curious about the structure and am not set on specific pattern or process. The linearity of the structure also needs the non-linearity of magic, which introduces random variables, synchronicities and alignments that turn possibilities into reality.
There is a purposeful direction and drawing upon of the powers that be, regardless of what those powers are, and they interface with the structure to create a process that enables something to happen. Then it all gets released out into the world.
The structure is the container and we need that container. We also need to know how to let go of the container. We release it, and the potent magic we’ve worked and that’s when the synchronicities happen, reality tilts sideways and the result becomes a reality.
Finding the Balance
How do we find the balance between structure and magic? We do it through a careful negotiation where we consider what the desired result is, and build the structure backwards. We pick out the specific actions and principles that we’ll draw on that fuel those actions. Then we execute the actions, whatever they are and let the magic happen.
It’s a simple description of what happens. Yet the execution of it is a balance between form and essence, power and realization. This is something that can only be realized over time and through practice.
Exercise
Pick a magical working you did and look at it from the perspective of structure.
What structures are in place and how do they help you design and apply magic to your life?
Other ways we can magick together
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