Low Magick by Lon DuQuette (the reading strategies book TXT) 📕

About the Author

Lon Milo DuQuette is a preeminent scholar, magician, and speaker. The author of fourteen critically acclaimed books on magick and the occult, DuQuette is one of the most respected and entertaining writers and lecturers in the field of Western Magick. Visit him online at www.lonmiloduquette.ning.com.

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

Low Magick: It’s All in Your Head … You Just Have No Idea How Big Your Head Is © 2010 by Lon Milo DuQuette.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Llewellyn Publications, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

As the purchaser of this e-book, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. The text may not be otherwise reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or recorded on any other storage device in any form or by any means.

Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the author’s copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

First e-book edition © 2011

E-book ISBN: 9780738730325

Cover design by Kevin R. Brown

Cover images: background © iStockphoto.com/Selahattin Bayram;

brain © iStockphoto.com/Todd Harrison

Interior illustrations by Llewellyn art department, except: Pentagram of Solomon and Hexagram of Solomon on page 163 by Jacqueline A. Williams; Ganesha on pages 118, 122–123, 126, and 129–131 by Wen Hsu

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Llewellyn Publications does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public.

Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific reference will continue or be maintained. Please refer to the publisher’s website for links to current author websites.

Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

This little collection of memories, insights,

and embarrassments is lovingly dedicated to the members

of our Monday Night Magick Class past, present, and future.

“There is no truth, only stories.”

Zuni Saying

Contents

Acknowledgments

Prologue   Stories

Zero   First Let’s Talk about Fear

One   The Dogma & Rituals of Low Magick (Dogme et ritual de la bas magie)

Two   The Formula of Solomon

Three   The Law of Attraction, The Power of Intent & My Date with Linda Kaufman

Four   Family Secrets

Five   My Planetary Talismans

Six   A Weekend Alone with the Spirits of the Tarot

Seven   A Midsummer Night’s Curse

Eight   Astral Projection: Traveling in the Spirit Vision (or, Real Magicians Eat Quiche)

Nine   That’s Not What Invocation Is About

Ten   … And That’s What Invocation Is All About!

Eleven   Pop Goes Ganesha!

Twelve   The Rabbi’s Dilemma

Thirteen   The Exorcism of Our Lady of Sorrows

Epilogue   It’s All in Your Head … You Just Have No Idea How Big Your Head Is

Appendix I: My Brother Remembers Our Father

Appendix II: Apostolic Succession

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to recognize and thank the following individuals, whose encouragement and support over the years he shall always treasure: Constance Jean DuQuette, Jean-Paul DuQuette, Marc E. DuQuette, Judith Hawkins-Tillirson, Rick Potter, Donald Weiser, Betty Lundsted, Kat Sanborn, Patricia Baker, Chance Gardner, Vanese Mc Neil, David P. Wilson, Jonathan Taylor, Dr. Art Rosengarten, George Noory, Poke Runyon, James Wasserman, Rodney Orpheus, Robert Anton Wilson, Robert Larson, Brenda Knight, Sharon Sanders, Michael Miller, Michael Kerber, Jan Johnson, Brad Olsen, Janet Berres, Charles D. Harris, Michael Strader, Phyllis Seckler, Grady McMurtry, Israel Regardie, Helen Parsons Smith, Alan R. Miller, Ph.D., Clive Harper, William Breeze, John Bonner, Stephen King, and a very special thanks goes to Elysia Gallo and the wonderful team at Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd., for making this project such an enjoyable experience.

[contents]

Prologue

Stories

I am always at a loss at how much to believe of my own stories.

Washington Irving

Next to silence, stories are the most divine form of communication. Stories are alive. Stories are holy. Stories are gods that create universes and the creatures and characters that populate them. Stories bring to life all the triumphs and tragedies imagination and experience can summon to the mind. Stories speak directly to our souls.

Stories are magick.

As I begin the seventh decade of my life, I find myself more inclined to listen to a story than to study a text or reflect on an argument—more inclined to tell a story than to presume to teach a lesson or offer advice. Perhaps it is because as we grow older we have more stories to tell, and experience and wisdom conspire to add dimension, texture, and perspective to the lengthening register of our memories.

For whatever reason, I find myself at this season of my life unable to approach the subject of this book from any direction other than relating my personal experiences. This is not to say that I haven’t integrated a great deal of theory and technical information within my nonchronological narratives. Indeed, I believe there is more than enough magical “how-to-ness” nestled within these pages to keep a motivated magician busy for some time. But it is the story that informs—the story that teaches—the story that reveals the magical “how-why-ness” (and in some instances, the “how-why not-ness”) of the magician’s life.

However, storytelling has certain disadvantages—foremost being the fact that memory is a fragile and subjective thing. Pain, regret, embarrassment, shame, wishful thinking, fantasy, and old-fashioned self-delusion constantly threaten the accuracy of our recollections of the past. Absolute objectivity is impossible. But unlike other mortals who lead less examined lives, the magician is obliged to keep a diary, and may refer to specific events recorded in his or her magical journals. I’ve relied heavily on my scribblings in the preparation of this book—a painfully embarrassing ordeal, I assure you.

Also, in the course of telling a magical story, one must consider the sensitivities and the privacy of other individuals, living or dead, who may be part of the action. Over the years I have been blessed to meet and work with some very wonderful and colorful characters, most of whom would not be recognizable personalities in our magical subculture, but a few of them I dare say