Mysteries, sharing of knowledge and dangerous practices

[Recursive Paradox]

Mysteries, sharing of knowledge and dangerous practices

I'm starting to find that I really understand the reasoning behind keeping certain elements within the mysteries of some religions.

The use of certain techniques, magic practices and channeling methods are indisputably dangerous for certain practitioners and for individuals who have not absorbed the proper philosophical and gnostic contexts for the things they are attempting to do.

I realize to a certain extent that entirely open religions run the risk of irresponsibly bestowing dangerous knowledge on individuals ala inexperienced kid with shotgun analogy. I won't pretend I know exactly the reasons why various religions (like Wicca) keep certain elements within the mysteries of that religion. But this is certainly a damn good reason.

I would love if people can give insight as to whether their paths are closed for these same reasons (if they can) or insight into other paths that went closed for these reasons as well.

The Mysteries of Etherism?

I've actually been considering stripping all of the metaphysical material that involves channeling from the public material and keeping that as the mysteries of Etherism. Because the philosophy is the part I want people to follow. The energy channeling itself is actually unbelievably ******** dangerous. Especially for individuals who aren't following the philosophy and carefully tending to their Self as well as truly understanding their Self. I mean, one of the most important parts of running energy through your body and spiritual reflection is a strong self awareness. Without it you run the risk of doing permanent and catastrophic damage to yourself. And because the energy is restructured, redirected and given purpose within your inner domain, you can't properly control or direct it without a true understanding of your inner world and your Self. You are not only the channel but the tools used to make the energy do what you want it to do. If you don't know your tools then you can't do this correctly by any means.

Past mistakes and painful lessons

I learned this painfully when I attempted to channel Void, an Aspect that was not in any way possible to align affinities with for me. I did what is likely permanent damage to myself and I'm quite frankly lucky that I didn't do more harm to me. And that's ignoring entirely the damage I did to my surroundings and to the individual I targeted with my attack channeling (the individual deserved revenge, but not of that nature. The response far outweighed the crime)

Dumping heavily entropic energy into an environment that really did not need that kind of hit is probably the worst part. It was a sign of a terrible lack of responsibility, wisdom and awareness on my part. I really can't say how much damage to the local energies of that area I did. I know that I'm keeping as aware as I can of anything ******** up or off so I can try to fix what I caused.

Hopefully others are working to fix the damage as well.

Whether they know that I was the cause is unimportant. If the founder of a religion can make such a colossal mistake in her youthful exuberance then what of an outsider attempting to enter the faith? I find myself intimately worried about what could happen if I hand the proverbial child the metaphorical shotgun without requiring them to read the manual first.


Logistics of having mysteries

I was happy to see that the methodology and philosophy of Etherism was not dependent on the Aspects and Essences being externals but could function just fine if they were thoughtforms. Technically the entire philosophy of Etherism and its Three Pillars are entirely functional without any of the metaphysical parts of the religion. So if you wanted to, you could follow a secular Etherism using just the philosophy (The Three Pillars; Growth, Wisdom, and Power, Elevation of the Self above all else, avoidance of Entropy of the Self, avoiding The Path of Decay, Self empowerment, avoiding social parasites and following the Laws of Mutual Respect) which is entirely relevant to just day to day life and personal, emotional, physical and mental growth and self treatment.

So it isn't like I would have to make up outer court material or present an incomplete religion to the outside world. I really would like critique and responses on this. Harsh if necessary. I'm considering changing the entirety of the public presentation of my path so this is sort of an important topic to me.  

[Fiddlers Green]

~Does the Happy Dance~

The only thing to watch out for are children who already have shotguns.
Even if you didn't place it in their hands, do you think you aught try to disarm, set it to safe, or at least teach them to shoot it without accidentally blasting everythign around them?
Where do the rights of the individual end, and the responsibilities of the aware begin?  

[RubyLight]

What it all boils down to is what you are comfortable with sharing. I find the methodology a fascinating read and have no intention of practicing it. However I understand your concern, especially considering the chances of causing permanent damage with channeling. Do what you think is best.  

[Adalyna]

its a problem for me, since I can only learn from open traditions. I feel like that will only allow me to get so far with my learning but, being initiated into an oathbound tradition would probably involve making lifestyle changes I'm not willing to compromise. So I'm on my own. I can see what you're saying though, about keeping dangerous secrets.  

[Recursive Paradox]

Fiddlers Green

~Does the Happy Dance~

The only thing to watch out for are children who already have shotguns.
Even if you didn't place it in their hands, do you think you aught try to disarm, set it to safe, or at least teach them to shoot it without accidentally blasting everythign around them?
Where do the rights of the individual end, and the responsibilities of the aware begin?

I guess it comes down to the fine line we build for any interaction. When an individual violates the rights of another is when you take him or her or hir to task for it. I feel right warning individuals who appear inexperienced but I don't feel right taking away their capacity to use that ability when it is only based on appearances.

If I have reasonably objective evidence that they are a disaster waiting to happen then I would probably move preemptively. But if I don't I can't ethically justify taking such action until they show themselves to be a problem.

Ugh, but then you're left cleaning up some nasty messes though. Which is part of why I don't like the public paths that reveal everything to everyone without work to get it.

It is a nasty little conundrum isn't it? Because someone could appear inexperienced and actually be rather sage about things and I would be really overstepping my bounds to take that individual to task.  

[Recursive Paradox]

Asahi Sara

its a problem for me, since I can only learn from open traditions. I feel like that will only allow me to get so far with my learning but, being initiated into an oathbound tradition would probably involve making lifestyle changes I'm not willing to compromise. So I'm on my own. I can see what you're saying though, about keeping dangerous secrets.

This actually seems to be a bit of a deeper problem then you think.

You see, at least in Etherism's case, channeling properly, safely and capably does require lifestyle changes. The philosophy of Etherism has an effect on many levels of a person's existence and if your lifestyle isn't already pretty close to what the philosophy would cause for your personality, needs and emotional state then your lifestyle would indeed change.

So in order to take from this path in a way that doesn't put you in immense risk you're already required to change things that you may not be willing to compromise. If many of the other paths are similar in effect, then in the end you're stuck even with open paths. If you want to take in new and possibly dangerous things, you have to be willing to change your life a little or to be changed by what you learn.

In any case, I most likely would only have an oath to follow the philosophy and an oath to keep the mysteries secret from those that don't follow it.  

[Adalyna]

I see what you're saying, though it isn't that I wouldn't be willing to make lifestyle changes for the sake of learning and growing, spiritually or otherwise, only that certain aspects of my lifestyle I am not willing to change. My partner is not religious or into magic or anything like that. I like to share with her what goes on in my spiritual life, and we generally don't keep secrets from one another. That's a bit extreme for some couples but it works for both of us. Because of that spiritual mysteries I become aware of are very important for me to be able to discuss with her, so to be honest to both her and myself I wouldn't be willing to make such an oath, unless she was an exception in the oath itself. So I take from what is open to me and hat I can gain from my personal gnosis. Its not that I'm not willing to change my lifestyle, its that I'm not willing to swear an oath of secrecy. There's other change I'm probably not willing to make and there are those that are, and then there are many that would be difficult to commit to, but I would usually take things as I go. Tell me if I'm not making sense because I seem to be struggling with words lately :  

[TheDisreputableDog]

You know, I was approaching this thread thinking of KO as open and wondering how I could respond. Then I realized, while Kemetic recon in general may be open, as you don't have to have any particular characteristics as a precondition for contacting the Kemetic gods, there are oathbound aspects to KO in particular. Shemsu-Ankh go through an oathbound ceremony to dedicate themselves at that level, and It-Netjer and Mut-Netjer (priests who serve as vessels for Names during Saqu) have a training and dedication process as well and spontaneous possessions are rare.

So I can actually relate to this. With your path, oddly enough, I would use a computer science analogy. The philosophy-only track is the black-box perspective: does the system work with no concept of the internal workings? Adding in the channeling part of it turns the experience white-box: you are now seeing the bits behind the UI.

Poe, is that an accurate description or am I off base?  

[CuAnnan]

Fiddlers Green

~Does the Happy Dance~

The only thing to watch out for are children who already have shotguns.
Even if you didn't place it in their hands, do you think you aught try to disarm, set it to safe, or at least teach them to shoot it without accidentally blasting everythign around them?
Where do the rights of the individual end, and the responsibilities of the aware begin?

This is a question I wrestle with.
How do you train someone who doesn't know they're toting around a loaded shotgun with a hair trigger?
How do you show them the shotgun without alerting them to its presence and if you do, are you not responsible for everything they do with it?  

[Recursive Paradox]

Asahi Sara

I see what you're saying, though it isn't that I wouldn't be willing to make lifestyle changes for the sake of learning and growing, spiritually or otherwise, only that certain aspects of my lifestyle I am not willing to change. My partner is not religious or into magic or anything like that. I like to share with her what goes on in my spiritual life, and we generally don't keep secrets from one another. That's a bit extreme for some couples but it works for both of us. Because of that spiritual mysteries I become aware of are very important for me to be able to discuss with her, so to be honest to both her and myself I wouldn't be willing to make such an oath, unless she was an exception in the oath itself. So I take from what is open to me and hat I can gain from my personal gnosis. Its not that I'm not willing to change my lifestyle, its that I'm not willing to swear an oath of secrecy. There's other change I'm probably not willing to make and there are those that are, and then there are many that would be difficult to commit to, but I would usually take things as I go. Tell me if I'm not making sense because I seem to be struggling with words lately :

I think that, by necessity, certain things do need to be kept secret, even from loved ones. We all have our depth and cores and sharing everything is really too much for a species that carefully balances between public social involvement and private self involvement.

I respect that you want to share things with her but you can't guarantee (and I can't either) that she will use that knowledge responsibly and wisely. Especially if her views are incompatible with the philosophy. Would you really be okay with handing her the shotgun that she accidentally blows off her own foot with? Or even worse, handing her the power that she accidentally hurts you with? It is incredibly destructive to one's mental state to hurt someone they love accidentally. Is sharing this knowledge worth the possible consequences for you and her?

I guess to me, I would accept if my partner took such an oath because the importance of these things is something I intimately understand.  

[Recursive Paradox]

TheDisreputableDog

So I can actually relate to this. With your path, oddly enough, I would use a computer science analogy. The philosophy-only track is the black-box perspective: does the system work with no concept of the internal workings? Adding in the channeling part of it turns the experience white-box: you are now seeing the bits behind the UI.

Poe, is that an accurate description or am I off base?

It's a little off, from the standpoint that the philosophy doesn't come from the channeling and metaphysics. They are beneficial to one another true but the philosophy can function without any of the metaphysics.

The channeling becomes playing in a pit with active land mines without the philosophy.

Think of the channeling as a computer language and the philosophy as a coding standard and education on how to use that computer language. Program without that education and standard and your code is not only hard as hell to read and use but you also run a chance of wrecking a bunch of things in your computer (maybe through some nasty little memory leaks).

The philosophy gives structure to the method and coding of the channeling in a way that allows you to not wreck yourself with it or make a bunch of problems for others. I mean really, would you program in C++ with it's fun pointer usage before you learned about the standards and usage?

I sure wouldn't. Memory leaks suck.  

[Adalyna]

Recursive Paradox

Asahi Sara

I see what you're saying, though it isn't that I wouldn't be willing to make lifestyle changes for the sake of learning and growing, spiritually or otherwise, only that certain aspects of my lifestyle I am not willing to change. My partner is not religious or into magic or anything like that. I like to share with her what goes on in my spiritual life, and we generally don't keep secrets from one another. That's a bit extreme for some couples but it works for both of us. Because of that spiritual mysteries I become aware of are very important for me to be able to discuss with her, so to be honest to both her and myself I wouldn't be willing to make such an oath, unless she was an exception in the oath itself. So I take from what is open to me and hat I can gain from my personal gnosis. Its not that I'm not willing to change my lifestyle, its that I'm not willing to swear an oath of secrecy. There's other change I'm probably not willing to make and there are those that are, and then there are many that would be difficult to commit to, but I would usually take things as I go. Tell me if I'm not making sense because I seem to be struggling with words lately :

I think that, by necessity, certain things do need to be kept secret, even from loved ones. We all have our depth and cores and sharing everything is really too much for a species that carefully balances between public social involvement and private self involvement.

I respect that you want to share things with her but you can't guarantee (and I can't either) that she will use that knowledge responsibly and wisely. Especially if her views are incompatible with the philosophy. Would you really be okay with handing her the shotgun that she accidentally blows off her own foot with? Or even worse, handing her the power that she accidentally hurts you with? It is incredibly destructive to one's mental state to hurt someone they love accidentally. Is sharing this knowledge worth the possible consequences for you and her?

I guess to me, I would accept if my partner took such an oath because the importance of these things is something I intimately understand.

It's not an issue of her understanding it or not, its just an issue of the way we live our lives. I don't need to be sharing oathbound secrets with my family or anyone else, and I don't expect anyone who's in a relationship to commit to this, It's a matter of personal lifestyle, not morality. My partner doesn't practice magic, and isn't as into spiritual things as I am. I do agree that handing people a loaded shotgun is dangerous, but this I suppose, is why I simply won't pick up the shotgun. As far as what I learn on my own, I doubt she'd take interest in practicing, and if she did, I'm sure she'd do so from a moral standpoint. If we were literally talking about a loaded shotgun, I'd trust her just the same, not to run off on a killing spree or shoot herself with it. It's not that there aren't limits either, If a friend tells me a secret they can trust me with their secret, it's there secret not mine to share with my partner. It's just an order of priorities, and a way of being honest within those priorities. If I were to join an initiatory tradition, like feri tradition or wicca, I'm sure she would respect my oaths, it's more an issue of not wanting to keep something that has such an value in my life from her. It's like if I was working on an invention for 20 years and finally got it working and couldn't tell her about it. That might work for some people, just not for me. Do I make sense, my tendency to word things poorly is getting worse lately.  

[Recursive Paradox]

Asahi Sara

It's not an issue of her understanding it or not, its just an issue of the way we live our lives. I don't need to be sharing oathbound secrets with my family or anyone else, and I don't expect anyone who's in a relationship to commit to this, It's a matter of personal lifestyle, not morality. My partner doesn't practice magic, and isn't as into spiritual things as I am. I do agree that handing people a loaded shotgun is dangerous, but this I suppose, is why I simply won't pick up the shotgun. As far as what I learn on my own, I doubt she'd take interest in practicing, and if she did, I'm sure she'd do so from a moral standpoint. If we were literally talking about a loaded shotgun, I'd trust her just the same, not to run off on a killing spree or shoot herself with it. It's not that there aren't limits either, If a friend tells me a secret they can trust me with their secret, it's there secret not mine to share with my partner. It's just an order of priorities, and a way of being honest within those priorities. If I were to join an initiatory tradition, like feri tradition or wicca, I'm sure she would respect my oaths, it's more an issue of not wanting to keep something that has such an value in my life from her. It's like if I was working on an invention for 20 years and finally got it working and couldn't tell her about it. That might work for some people, just not for me. Do I make sense, my tendency to word things poorly is getting worse lately.

That makes more sense. Thank you for clarifying.  

[Aeradia]

Is the content regarding energy channeling in Etherism different from information on channeling in other paths?

Even if the philosophy is different, if readers don't understand the philosophy then could they still effectively use the channeling? Could you point out the dangers as part of the philosophy?

I would venture to say that any form of magic can be dangerous, but I understand why some traditions are closed. Your abilities or understanding of magic do not need to be shared, but other individuals can still acquire similar knowledge if they truly seek it.
Perhaps this is why people are sometimes encouraged to turn towards RHP religions, to protect them from their own danger, or to place their trust to a higher being. Although the gods are not always loving.  

[Recursive Paradox]

Aeradia

Is the content regarding energy channeling in Etherism different from information on channeling in other paths?

It appears to be. I've yet to receive examples of a similar practice. Energy manipulation is pretty common, but energy manipulation through affinity adjustment where you run the energy through yourself doesn't seem to be.

Affinity adjustment being pulling out personality elements that you normally only have in certain situations to create a personality overlay over your pysche and adjust your affinity for a given Aspect or Essence.

That's one of the more dangerous parts really. And I've yet to see anything similar, with the exception of a mild conceptual comparison to paradigm piracy in Chaos magic.

Quote:

Even if the philosophy is different, if readers don't understand the philosophy then could they still effectively use the channeling?

No. In fact they would run the risk of immense danger to themselves and others. If they followed a philosophy that resulted in similar self awareness and self comprehension then they'd probably be safer and more effective but I won't make claims on whether the success rate is similar enough to condone it.

Quote:

Could you point out the dangers as part of the philosophy?

I can, but the problems seem to come more from people just going straight to the cool sounding stuff and ignoring everything else. People hear the phrase "magic" or "energy work" and skip everything to get to the dangerous knowledge first.

Quote:

I would venture to say that any form of magic can be dangerous, but I understand why some traditions are closed. Your abilities or understanding of magic do not need to be shared, but other individuals can still acquire similar knowledge if they truly seek it.
Perhaps this is why people are sometimes encouraged to turn towards RHP religions, to protect them from their own danger, or to place their trust to a higher being. Although the gods are not always loving.

Part of the problem is that Etherism isn't an RHP by any means. So the only regulation that exists is yourself and the others who are aware of you. Well, and natural selection.

But that's usually quite messy.