Our consciousness of ‘self’ gives us the means to become in 'At-One-Ment' with every other person, animal, tree, rock, river etc., in the home that we know as Mother Earth.

Many folk will instinctively feel the divine spark of spirituality inherent in nature. A solitary walk by a beautiful river, a stroll through a wood in Spring, or the awesome thrill of an approaching thunderstorm in late Summer. All these natural phenomena can make even the most ordinary person hanker for more of these feelings of elation that can grow from these experiences. Many years ago such feelings made me want to discover more of the euphoric 'at one ness' with magickal nature. As a child I often experienced dejavu.

Something told me that I had been to certain 'unknown' places before I didn't just believe this, I actually know it to be true in my heart. I also had magnificent experiences on flights over rooftops and fields which I later found out to be occurrences of Astral Projection. I discovered beauty of spirit in a spider's web, a nettle patch, a shoal of Sticklebacks swimming in a brook; in fact I found it throughout my early years in every aspect of the natural world that I was exposed to. Today I have rediscovered magickal nature anew in Pagan ritual in its many various forms. Recently, I found out from my mother, that my Grandmother and my Great Grandmother were very popular in their day with friends and neighbours when the subject of divination cropped up. They often read the cards, tea leaves and crystal ball. So maybe occult interest has been instinctively passed down to me from ancestors of old. Romantic notion or not - I like to think it's true. I found that in order to grow spiritually, first I had to eradicate the past 'monotheistic' mind control systems that had been drummed into me from childhood. A thorough study of Pagan mythology was the tonic to counter my past 'brain washed' up bringing, I discovered that all Christian feast days were based on older native Pagan festivals. I also discovered that Christ was not the first 'Sun God' figure, Adonis, Attis, Osiris and many others got there first - so what was all this blarney about the 'One True Faith' and resurrection etc? The Christians had nicked everything. I also realised that magickal energy was just waiting to be explored, it was there all around me in the trees, hills and fields, so why shut it out in some stuffy old man made church? We need names so as to understand (at a ground level) the aspects of Human experience/consciousness that work through us, so we call them Gods or Spirits. These personifications (the Gods) of our world are real if we open up our true selves to them. It's no good just giving them lip service like many neo-Pagans do in a type of pseudo/scientific manner. We must really open up our mind and soul to the Gods, we have to give to them in order to link with them magickally if we truly want to journey into greater wisdom, awareness and spiritual growth. It is the sacrifice of the old self that propels us forward, Mithras slaying the ' Sun Bull ' (his own negative self) portrays this point admirably. Working magick and casting spells is deeply rewarding, whether it is Earth, Cord, Candle magick etc. The spell provides a central focus that conjoins us with the Gods. With patience and correct timing I find that most spells do come to successful fruition. However, even if I get things wrong there is always a sense of increased awareness and heightened spirituality following a rite, so positive magickal growth does stem from rituals even those that may not seem to immediately hit the mark. We don't create magickal energy (it's already there to start with) we heighten or raise it, then redirect it to its given target.

Sometimes we miss our goal but with skill (and foresight) we often as not score a Bull’s eye and achieve a desired effect. The God forms to be used in magickal ritual are dependent on the psychological make up of the individual Witch/Magicians concerned. Many practitioners seem to need the security of what they see as an 'established' structure with maybe a Celtic (Druidism) or Norse (Odinism) pantheon of deities. Some prefer to go more exotic with Voodoo, Japanese or Oceanic Gods. This matters not one iota so long as one is comfortable working with a given class of deities. I work with the Roman Gods simply because I find that their blend of complex classical imagery and incorporated native sense of belonging suits my personality very well. After all much of this country's culture owes it's spiritual heritage to the Roman Pagan inroads. They cross-pollinated their Gods with Celtic deities and improved upon them. The Romans anthropomorphized ideal/perfect Human concepts i.e. love, maternity, courage joy, etc in the form of images of the Gods. This ensured that every individual could see the image being sought. Such personification of divinity marked a radical change in native British culture to see images of the Gods was to know them, enabling the adherent to reach greater levels of awareness and perception. The Romans had Gods/Goddesses for absolutely EVERYTHING and that suits me well too, not just the Sky, War or Water etc, like Celtic deities but also for things like Peace, Doors, Gardens, Good Faith and Stimulation etc (incredible!). Every thing and it's action in creation was allocated it's own presiding deity (which incidentally compliments present day magickal theory i.e. everything vibrates and has it's own different aura) by the Romans. This fact alone I find immensely attractive as it lets me explore spirituality in every day life in every place that I go.

To know magick is to sincerely open one's true self up to the beautiful yet awesome power of the Gods, this cannot be fully appreciated on the logical conscious level of thought process. When we leave the cold thinking analytical mind set behind and give ourselves up to the Gods, then and only then do we begin to understand the real nature of magickal power.

In order to understand spell-craft we need to almost return to the days of innocent childhood when anything seemed possible. In those periods of life we didn't possess the restrictive taboos that adulthood imposes upon us. A dream or a hope then was soon quashed by the harsh words of a parent. "Don't be silly" or "grow up and act your age" words that could destroy plans that until then seemed within the child's grasp.

The point here is that we need to rediscover that lost part of ourselves that know how to let go of the shackles of mundane reality in order to succeed with magickal working. The Pagan Priest or Priestess recognises that reality is multi-layered. These layers or should we say levels each possess their own laws that appear sometimes quite tricky to define, yet interact one in accordance with all the others. The levels in question have different names in different cultures and periods of history. To the modern Pagan or Witch they are generally entitled: physical, etheric, astral, mental and spiritual. Each stratum can and does frequently overlap with the others. Each level is just as real and important as all the rest. To deny reality on planes other than the physical is to invite mental deterioration or at least stagnation. I believe that much of today's troubles i.e. stress, emotional-malaise, crime and Illnesses are due to this depressive atheistic dependence upon only the mundane physical side of reality.

The physical, logical plane is vital, It is holy and it cannot (or should not) be denied, because higher levels of reality are equally important and functional. In order to wiggle a single finger one must first 'think' (mental-level) about the proposed action, even though the action itself takes only a fraction of a second to achieve. Before the thought is formulated it must be created on higher planes originating ultimately with the spiritual. The physical strata is taken so much for granted by modern man with his so-called scientific world view that higher levels of existence, known well to his ancient ancestors, are now predominantly ignored by the majority. The result of this truth is evident now in the spiritual thirst being felt by numerous individuals in society. Any level of reality is sterile and redundant without all the rest; look at the blank faces staring out of a Monday morning Bus stop or traffic jam for evidence of this sad fact. Essentially, to produce effective magickal results, one first needs to be of a sound and mature mind-set. To be afraid of Magick is to be afraid on what dwells deep within the abyss of one's innermost mind. People of a nervous or unstable disposition would probably do well to sort themselves out emotionally before attempting to seriously traverse the magickal stratum. Although the tautly minded are wise to tread carefully with magick, it must be added here that the mature practitioner of magick realises that we all create our own demons and magick is an excellent method of controlling and conquering these negative aspects of self. Magick is the power of creation, it can mould empires and yet it can also destroy them. It is a neutral energy that can be used like electricity (which is one manifestation of the life force) for positive or negative ends. The monotheistic mind-set has for centuries tried to categorise Magick into classes of black and white. Such ill-conceived thinking is rejected by the genuine practitioner as a remnant of dualistic, Church-orientated indoctrination. Magick is divine Life Force, it is divine light pure and simple and it is our sacred birthright as conscious beings to use this divine light (just as we use everything else within our grasp), to become better people. Higher planes of existence are, as we have discussed, the origin of physical manifestation. We all act as transmitters and receivers for the divine light, in much the same way that a radio can pick up our favourite music programme. The power of magick is divine and we are a vital part of this process. Through magickal practice and training we can learn to travel from one plane to another. Because we are conscious of this we can manipulate the levels to achieve our chosen aims.

The key to magickal travel is within the human consciousness, which can be altered to work on higher wavelengths. The consciousness itself makes use of that other aspect of self, the imagination to go betwixt the different dimensions to create change. Altered states of consciousness (ASC) are common to all religious rituals regardless of cultural and historical background. Trance heightened awareness and seemingly strange unearthly behaviour observed from the rites of Druidism to the wild, dancing priests of Mars are all connected by a common magickal denominator. Once this actual link has been personally experienced through magick, it will be realised that all peoples are not strangers but brothers and sisters under the same sun. In magick the consciousness is projected by means of the imagination into the astral level of existence. Most of the time we dwell in the physical plane, our conscious mind-set being unaware of a myriad things just outside of our immediate mundane perception. Much of what we cannot understand is blocked out of our mundane consciousness by what is known to Witches as the psychic-censor. This mechanism is basically there for our own protection. The human mind could not possibly function without this defence unit. Its loss would lead to mental and eventually spiritual erosion. To lose it would be like being hit by a psychic missile travelling at the speed of light! The psychic censor can however be bypassed from time to time in order to travel through the planes when working magick or attempting divination. In spell work the consciousness is fired up, over stimulated then cast into the given target zone on the astral dimension through visualisation to achieve a desired objective.

A spell then is a way to create change in ourselves, the astral level our environment and ultimately in our own destiny. Magick and spell-craft is not a parlour game, it is not something that one dabbles with (contrary to what church authorities would have us all believe). It is a beautiful earth-orientated way of life; a way of being that puts the practitioner in touch with his/her own true destiny and the planet that sustains us all.