Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Up periscope

Too damn busy to make a meaningful entry. Mostly "good busy", so no whining allowed. Maybe I'll do a brain dump this weekend. In the mean time...

Some friends are back in town.
Lisa is re-arranging my anatomy (Structural Integration).
Kathleen is - finally - jumping from the sinking ship that is her current employer and getting a new job.
My job is getting interesting.
Green tomato relish.

Sunday, October 07, 2007

Just call me 'Master'

Before I get to the main focus of this post, a few minor points.

I played a bit with two concepts this last week: 1) Treating my interactions with people as dealing with energy emanations and 2) dismissing expectations in dealing with others. In a way, these two point the same direction. The results were interesting.

Thursday I showed up at Lisa's to deal with trees and dishwashers (only got around to the trees). She wasn't there. Surprise [deadpan]. I found out later that she was at school waiting out a few people to get her grade in a 'problem class'. She forgot to call and tell me what was up. Another surprise [want some droll with your deadpan?]. BUT.....I wasn't dealing with a person, I was dealing with a bundle of energy. As soon as I reminded myself of that, I recalled what this particular bundle of energy was composed of, and it all made sense. All was cool - I dealt with it.

From another angle, this all seems to be an exercise in not personalizing things that have nothing to do with you. "Don't take everything so personal." But I digress.

For my trouble, I filled the trailer with tree clippings and got a pretty good massage.

And now, in the center ring, we have.... The new (in a few days) body master of the Horus Oasis (or at least the acting body master...something to do with not having died yet). The short version of why I was NOT wanting to accept the job is...
- Too damn busy.
- Fear of failure (I have past history on this, darnit).
- Disgust with some people and things in the local O.T.O. (I said "local", OK?).
- I was getting ready to leave it behind and focus on personal work and magick.

But here is why I said "Yes".

Gnostic Mass. This is my best option for participating in Mass, especially as an officer. There were other options out there, sort of brewing (a few folk in Salt Lake who have it in mind to do Mass outside the umbrella of the O.T.O., sort of like the Thelemista group out in the bay area). But that is all vaporware at this point, and there is nothing to keep me from doing both the official and rogue activities.

Development opportunity. It will be a challenge, I will have to learn and do new things. It will (if I pull it off) equip me with skills that will serve me well in other parts of my life.

Paying back what I have received. I lot of people went to a lot of effort to pull me through my first few initiations (both formal and informal). We have a few Minervals that deserve the same, and this is my chance to pay it forward.

And, of course, the fact that I just can't say no. Sort of. Just kidding. Sort of.

But I have my reservations. The only one that deserves mention is that some people have it in their head that I'll just have to get that pesky third degree initiation out of the way so I can be a real body master, not just a bloke acting like a body master. "So let me check my calendar. How does the next equinox sound?" Blech. Initiations should happen when the initiate is ready, not on an external timetable. I feel like someone is trying to shove something down my throat. The other side of that is that, left to myself, I tend to let things drag out far to long. This may push me out of my rut. But if it does, how do I know if the time wasn't really right? What are the consequences?

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Acting lessons

Short version:
Call from local O.T.O. official. Wants me to take over as acting master of local body.

Initial reaction:
Crap.
Crap, crap, crap and double crap.

Longer version to follow.

Monday, October 01, 2007

Still thinking

Musings first....

So I've had the "doing by non-action" of the Tao rolling around in my head. Rolling with it are some of the other pairings of thought posted recently. In this state of mind, while reading from Magick Without Tears, I run across definitions...

"To fill the mind entirely with one thing, to the exclusion of all else: This is Magick."

"To empty the mind of all: This is Yoga."

(I paraphrase.)

I didn't read any further (mostly due to external circumstance). But it all fit together. There was this little collision where I thought, "But in the O.T.O. system of MAGICK, the first instruction and practice is YOGA." And before the dust had time to clear, I understood. The mind cannot be fully filled with one thing, until it is FIRST emptied of all that is not the one thing. Yoga is the door to Magick. Didn't I write in one of my journals years ago about the need to banish before one can invoke? And also of the futility of a banishing that isn't followed by an invocation?

Musings are done, now the Monkey Politics

The angst of a few weeks ago has mostly either subsided or transformed. In the case of Lorna, after realizing that I needed to polity tell her that she needed to either go away or bring something to the exchange of energies, she managed to go away.

With the grrls in Salt Lake (the one where I have no freaking idea what to do), I had to cancel a last session before they went out of town, and now I have until mid-October to stew over it. This is a relationship I want to keep (duh), but some of the dynamics need to change. I've known this for a while, and I've also known that much of it has to do with me, and a little with them. Alas, even small change can sometimes be large.

As for The Woman in Tooele......
I reverted to the position that Kate tried to convert me to some years ago. Expect nothing, then you can't be disappointed. On my last visit, I did just that. And it turned out pretty good. Externally, it was a little better than normal, only in that Lisa was a little more communicative about some things. (How much of that originated with her, and how much was allowed by my change of mood and response?) Internally, it honestly did the trick. This even extended beyond the human interaction thing down to wrestling with the dishwasher. Instead of being a 2 hour 20 dollar job, it ballooned into a 5 hour 35 dollar job. But having flushed the expectations or desires to do other things on the list, it was just cool beans.