Using Your Will to Power Magick

The will that provides the power behind magic is a bit different than your everyday determination to accomplish a task. While determination may allow you to overcome obstacles that come between you and your goal and is very much a product of conscious effort, magical will has its roots in the true intentions of your mind at all levels.

You can force yourself to go back to work despite being physically ill enough to remain in bed maybe just one more day. You cannot make yourself well enough to return to work as long as part of you is enjoying this brief vacation from job you deep down feel is a drudge.

Therefore, the first step toward developing a powerful magical Will (to differentiate these from the common terms, I will capitalize the four requirements of magic.) is to thoroughly understand yourself. You must know what truly motivates you, all your likes and dislikes. Make a list and be absolutely honest; no wishful thinking allowed!

Make no moral judgements about yourself as you compile your list. Most of us would love to think that Mother Teresa has nothing on us when it comes to total dedication to helping mankind, and few of us enjoy admitting that we just don’t like many of the things society says we’re supposed to.

No one wants to be labeled a misfit or misanthrope, but not to worry; nobody has to see this list except you. You should be starting to understand a little about the last tenet concerning secrecy by now.

No ritual or rite, nor any of the training or preparation, and certainly not the elaborate self analysis need be revealed to anyone, not even members of your own coven. More on this later.

Magical Will is the expression of the innermost desires of your entire being in such a way that this Will becomes an almost physical force pushing its way through the cosmos, Will is to magic what inertia is to Newtonian physics; the propellant behind your work, the irresistible force that cannot fail to move mountains, if you so Will it.

This may sound like a tall order, but keep in mind that we are talking about goals, not accomplishments. Every bodybuilder is not going to become Mr. Universe, but every one that tries will be stronger for the effort.

Methods for developing the Will are as common as books on the power of positive thinking.

Where Wiccan and other magical systems differ from the common approaches to empowerment is that magic requires a total commitment of body, mind, and spirit to the task at hand while insisting that you accept your weaknesses as well as your strengths rather than discipline yourself to overcome those traits you may feel are negative.

To deny your true self will surely ruin any rite you hope to perform. Borrowing an axiom from the old ceremonial magical grimoires, what you summon to your Circle will typically come in the form you find most terrifying.

Know what you fear and be ready to deal with it. Deny your true self, and failure is inevitable. Stepping between the worlds touches the witch deeply, to the very core of existence.

You will find yourself in a place where symbols replace words, and these symbols are raw and direct. What you attempt to hide will be right in front of you, defying you to get past it and accomplish your work. You have undoubtedly noticed that many of the altar tools double as ancient weapons. While none of these can replace a powerful Will, they can boost your confidence, the effect being that of walking in a bad neighborhood after dark with a gun as opposed to being unarmed. Magical Will has its roots in the “child” mind. It is the sense of wanting something with all your being without regard to rationalization.

 Just as the child who wants a new toy gives no thought to the cost or usefulness of the desired article, the Will cannot be tempered by logic or directed away from its goal through appeasement.

This is why it is so important to reflect on any magical rite you intend to do very thoroughly, consulting every available resource before you begin the actual work. Once stirred, the Will possesses tremendous momentum.

You must be absolutely sure of your intentions and the probable outcome of that intent before you begin. The Will is a sleeping dragon that, once aroused, cannot be strayed from its course easily.

 If you have ever been obsessed with an unattainable goal, like having a crush on one of your elementary school teachers, you have a good idea of how hard it can be to reason with the Will and put the idea out of your mind.

 In its most negative aspect, the magical Will can motivate acts of extreme violence as a means of achieving its end, and it will celebrate such pathological behavior by producing feelings of enormous satisfaction that serve to motivate further such actions.

 The Will can also foster addiction. A Will totally out of control makes puppets out of people so afflicted, their lives becoming a chain of obsessive/ compulsive behavior patterns that are almost impossible to stop. In part, these dangers are the reason that many religious traditions forbid their followers to indulge in magic or the occult sciences.

The Will uses fear to manipulate the mind, so to control the Will, you must first learn to control your fears. It is impossible to discuss each of the four elements of magic in an isolated way because each is dependent on the others.

Fear can be eliminated as a motivating factor only by developing absolute faith in your ability to face and overcome that fear. Suppose you have had trouble falling asleep at night. You buy a sleep aid at the local pharmacy and find that it works quite well. Every time you use the remedy, you are rewarded with a good night’s sleep.

Not wishing to become dependent on an artificial means of achieving what should come naturally to you, you decide after a while to stop taking the sleeping pill.

The Will, in its typical childlike manner, has found pleasure in all this wonderful sleep you’ve been getting, and it sets about seeing to it that its pleasure does not stop just because you have rationalized that you should not need to take anything to fall asleep.

The Will attacks your powers of reason with the fear that you will immediately begin to suffer the most terrible insomnia of your life if you don’t trudge through the snow and cold to the all-night drug store a mere ten miles away and replenish your supply.

Overcoming fear takes more than rational thought; it takes real work and determination, and it requires that you know the truth of the situation that you are in.

Sooner or later, you will sleep, pills or no pills, because your body must rest. Only by having faith that this is so can you defeat the spoiled brat in your head that does not want to listen to reason.

Each time that you fall asleep without assistance, you strengthen that faith until Faith becomes the equal of Will. You are now on your way to having a mind for magic!

Exercising the Will

Before beginning these exercises, please remember that the object is to strengthen your Will, not to accomplish specific feats of magic. Just as it would be advantageous to condition the muscles used to perform a jump shot in basketball prior to actually attempting to score points, so must the Will be strengthened before it can be assigned a specific task.

 It is not easy to isolate the Will from other mental activities, particularly Imagination. Therefore, you will be asked to visualize certain things that require use of the Imagination. However, these visualizations are to the true development of Imagination what a still picture is to a movie. You will be asked to hold an image in your mind without imbuing it with life.

Likewise, the exercises for improving Imagination will involve the Will much in the same way a starter motor is needed to get a car engine running. The first step in these and all subsequent exercises is to create a quiet mental environment through meditation.

Any method that you have used that appeals to you can be used. What is important is that you achieve a state of calm that will enhance your ability to concentrate. Some people must have complete and uninterrupted silence to meditate, while others find a strong dose of heavy metal music produces the desired effect.

Use whatever works for you. My own method for reaching mental calm is to picture a scene in my mind that I have found restful. When I am especially troubled and in the throes of mental activity and stress, I visualize an ocean tossed by great waves and proceed to gradually reduce those waves to a mirror stillness. My mind tends to follow.

I have also found this method effective at reducing the influence of outside disturbances by making them appear as ripples in my quiet sea and allowing them to naturally subside.

Exercising the body prior to meditation can help to still the mind by producing a need for rest in the muscles that welcome the chance to relax and recover. Physical exercise can release chemicals into the body that increase the level of relaxation. Where the body goes, the mind will follow. Set no time limits to your efforts.

 You will find that the Will responds to periods of exercise regardless of their length. You will know inherently when you have had a positive effect on the Will. It is not necessary to time your efforts or to set aside the same amount of time for each session. The Will knows no time but the present. It does not have the ability to measure time.

 Trust your judgement, not the clock, to gauge success. Once you have reached the meditative state, assign your Will a job to do. Start with simple tasks that you know for a fact are possible. A good choice might be something that you have put off doing, like writing a letter to a friend. We all have such things that we procrastinate about without good reason, justifying their postponement with any number of flimsy excuses.

Stir your Will mentally as you would a stew. Picture it beginning to take form as you stir, becoming a bubbling homogeneous mixture in your mental cauldron. When you feel the broth is done, prepare to add one more ingredient, the job you have chosen as the object of your Will. Picture yourself holding the task in your hands, like a final piece of meat that must be added to your Will stew.

As those “reasons” you have used not to do the job arise in your mind, assign them to the stew as well, just as though they were spices for the broth that will dissolve in your tasty mixture and lend flavor to the dish.

When you are sure that the stew is again a homogeneous mix and that the job and your excuses have become integral to the stew, picture the task you have selected as being already done. As you do so, partake of your stew with great relish, taking in its warmth and goodness, letting to rejuvenate you with the knowledge that you have accomplished that which has long been impossible for you to do.

Eat as much of the stew as you like, knowing that you are charging yourself with energy with every bite. The more difficult you regard the task, the more stew you may want to ingest.

 Great tasks require great strength. When you are done eating, know that you have fed on the energy of the Gods and that nothing can stand in the way of someone so nourished. Empty your mind of all thoughts other than your desire to accomplish your work in its most basic terms.

Say to yourself,

“I WILL HAVE THIS THING DONE THAT I HAVE SET MYSELF TO, NOTHING CAN STAND IN MY WAY!”

It may help to visualize yourself as a child having cleaned the plate in order to have dessert. You will not be denied your pudding, having eaten your veggies to the last bite. Be convinced that this is how the Universe works. Your success is as inevitable as the action of gravity on a falling rock. It should be absolutely inconceivable that your Will might be daunted.

End the exercise by returning to the meditative state, secretly pleased with yourself that you have accomplished your aim. These exercises are successful if you feel that you are strengthening your Will, but magic will be the true test. Be confident that when you need it, your Will stands ready and strong. Repeat this exercise as often as possible.

Just as with weight lifting, you will exhaust your resources through your efforts and will rest to allow your mental faculties to recover.

Trust yourself to know when you need rest, but try to exercise as often as possible without undue strain. Progress depends on repetition. A second exercise for strengthening the Will involves addressing its individual components and attributes.

This exercise should be done in Circle. Cast and charge the Circle as you would for personal use as opposed to elaborate ritual. It is not necessary to raise the Cone or to call to the Quarters except in the most general way. You should, as in the previous exercise, relax your mind and enter the meditative state.

Once in this comfortable state of mind, plant the seed in your thoughts that the Universe and everything in it is composed of the four basic elements and that they are represented by the four quarters of the Circle.

Now use your conscious mind to attribute the aspects of your Will to these four elements as follows, From the North, know that the Will gains structure and form. It is this that allows you to bend and shape the Will just as you can with anything that has physical structure.

From the East comes inspiration, the tool that aims the Will at a particular target, cutting through all opposition.

 From the South comes the Fire that is the energy behind the Will, a force so powerful that, allowed to go unchecked, it would permit the Will to consume all obstacles and controls, including yourself. The Will burns with this energy that exceeds that of a nuclear reaction.

Only by controlling this power can you direct the Will. Control comes from the West in the form of Water, the symbolic liquid of the Universe that can absorb all things yet remain the same. It can quench any fire, and leave the object so doused hardened and ready for anything.

Work your Will through these stations and experience their effects as you proceed. Know that without your Spirit to move the Will along this circular path that it would not move of its own accord. You are the driving force behind its motion. You determine what is achieved at each station and when it may move on. You do not have to stop at one circumambulation through the Quarters.

You may want to out your Will through several cycles as different aspects relating to each station occurs to you. Be sure to begin and end at the same point each time: the North.

 It is at this Quarter that Will becomes a tangible item and therefore most useful to you. It is much harder to obtain light from the idea of a lamp than from the lamp itself. Your Will must have a form you recognize as useful to be of service to you.

The first exercise possesses all the correspondences of the second. Examine the former closely until you understand how this is so. Your effort will act as a model for assigning attributes to the four elements when you are constructing your own rituals. Do these exercises as often as you like, but do allow for rest periods.

Much like their physical counterparts, these exercises should drain you of energy, and you must recover before trying them again. As you become adept, use more complex problems for the first exercise. You will soon reach the level that is needed to conduct magic.

Note that the Will is not tempered by reason and takes no account of the problems that may result from your successful efforts. This is why you must give careful consideration of your goals with regard to their possible consequences before beginning to work magic.

Once the actual work has started, there is no room for second guessing. Doubt is the enemy of Will. You must be as sure as you can be that what you intend will be for the good of all or, at least, that you intend no harm whose consequences you are not ready to accept.

One more useful exercise that is far less formal than these two involves the development of psychokinetic ability. While this may seem to be no more than a parlor trick, the benefit is that it provides an opportunity to work your Will in direct contradiction to the rules of the rational mind. Take a piece of high grade typing paper, the kind that will not be easily soaked through by water, and crumple it up.

 Place the paper in a bowl of water so that it floats freely about the bowl. Now, using only your mind, will the paper to float in a given direction. It may take some time for you to succeed, so be patient. When the paper appears to be following your direction, reverse it. Continue this exercise until you have convinced yourself that the paper is not merely floating about randomly but is actually moving according to your efforts. Repeat this exercise as often as you can.

Keep in mind that you are not attempting to rival Uri Geller with your psychokinetic abilities but that you are developing your Will toward much more difficult duties. Whenever you perform these exercises or any others, log your results. Record your impressions of the effort you have had to put forth and the results you feel you have attained.

Since you will probably not want to use your Book of Shadows for something so seemingly insignificant, keep a separate journal similar to the kind that you would use to assess your workouts at the local health club, being sure to note your progress.