Unusual/Innovative Magic? | Miscellaneous | Forums

Jarandhel Dreamsinger said:

Ok, since no one has offered any suggestions in the past few months, I guess I'll start.

I'm sorry, Jarin. I don't think my suggestions could be anything you haven't seen before, and I haven't found enough time to practice around schoolwork. It's hard to only be able to focus on so many things at once, with my varied interests, but I wouldn't want to call myself a practitioner and rarely practice. :)  And it feels like even in magic there's only so much that one can apply themselves to at one time. I don't like to do things in a harried way but I get anxious to acquire skill/proficiency as well.

This isn't a suggestion for reading material, since I still haven't really found any that meet the criteria I was asking about, but an observation:

Cartoons have created generations of children with more magical potential than the world has ever seen.

Yes, I completely agree. ;D

Let me draw upon some of the cartoons from our own childhoods to make this point. I'll start with a pretty popular show that I'm sure many of us watched, either in cartoon form or in the movies: Ghostbusters. I'm talking the Real Ghostbusters (Ray, Eagon, Winston, Peter, Janine, and Slimer) here, not that copycat bullshit with the gorilla. Anyone here have trouble visualizing a proton pack, or the beams they shoot? I know I can picture them very very clearly with very little effort on my part. And It seems to me that visualization would be pretty effective for oh, I don't know, a ritual involving banishment?

Oh yeah, I saw the movie a number of years ago. 🙂 I don't recall that much about it, but I think I know what you're talking about.

Next cartoon: Superman. Too many individual cartoons to pick between, but I guarantee we've all got a real good mental image of Superman. What could we use that for? Well, instead of trying to visualize impregnable force fields, walls, armor, or what have you in order to shield yourself why not just visualize yourself as Superman? Is it even difficult for us to picture bullets bouncing off his skin? The invulnerability of Superman is damned near ingrained into our psyches at this point. Why not use that?

I think that's a great idea. Really creative, and relevant to people today. I wouldn't have thought of that…

We're basically programming ourselves and our children with highly potent thought-forms. Clear visualizations that they will need little to no effort to picture in the future, due to long-term repeated exposure as children. As occultists, how can we ignore the potential that offers?

Well, I'm not anti-TV, and I'm not pro-TV either. Kids will always gravitate toward it and I think it's good for 'em in reasonable amounts. My siblings and I watched hours of cartoons, and we turned out alright…sort of.  Additionally, we were fortunate because we were children at a time when there was a lot more “enchanted” stuff – I remember when Disney films had music by Hans Zimmer and Elton John, and this was not unusual. The first movie I ever saw in theaters was Dreamworks' The Prince of Egypt! Gorgeous, meaningful little movie. So I think as long as the richness is there in some form, that kids will have enough soul depth to be magically aware, and I agree that cartoons (when well-executed) can nurture potential. 🙂 As long as the children are taken seriously, it all works out.