30 July 2012

Do Ghosts Eat?

I've seen ghosts for as long as I can remember.  When I was little they scared the hell out of me.  I was brought up to think that anything metaphysical was evil, and therefore ghosts must be out to get me.  As I got older my experience taught me differently, that ghosts were definitely something "else," but that they weren't generally all that bad.  As I got over the bone-breaking terror I started actually listening to the ghosts instead of covering my head with a pillow and hoping they would go away.  I learned that ghosts are actually pretty interesting and a lot of them are very nice, if a little morose - but hey, I'm a little morose so no harm there.  I've been actively working with ghosts for about fifteen years now and have had a lot of chances to observe and study them. 

One of the great mysteries of metaphysics is why ghosts do what they do.  Some ghosts hang out in the places where they lived, others follow people, yet others drift from place to place, etc.  One of the things I've noticed over the years is that certainly places are a lot more likely to have ghosts than others.  Any place that sees regular intense emotion is more likely to have a ghost in it than a place that doesn't often see people emoting.  Ever notice how places like schools, clubs, arenas, and parks are incredibly eerie when they're deserted?  It's not just that they're so different without people, it's that the energy of thousands of screaming people is soaked into the concrete, literally bouncing off the walls and flying through the air.  That amount of energy is quite palpable to anyone bothering to pay attention and it acts like a beacon to the metaphysical.

Places like that seem to swarm with metaphysical entities, particularly ghosts.  Why should that be?  I've noticed that a lot of the ghosts in places like that don't really seem to belong there.  Yeah, someone murdered right after going to a club might haunt the place, but what about ghosts flitting around an elementary school?  My theory is that places that are that flooded with energy are essentially a free buffet for spirits. 

Ghosts are made of energy.  They are, essentially, big blobs of a finite amount of energy vibrating at a particular frequency.  Just like the living, everything ghosts do expends energy (appearing, speaking, moving objects, etc.).  When people spend enough of their energy they eat food and turn that food into more energy.  Ghosts don't eat they way they we do, but they must replace the energy they spend somehow.  When ghosts are around it's quite common for people to experience a sudden drop in the temperature of the room, feel a bout of vertigo, etc., and it's theorized that this is the ghost feeding on the energy around them in order to manifest in some way.  Feeding on ambient energy in that way is a lot like gleaning for berries in the woods - it takes a fair amount of work to get enough to make a meal.  Places like sports arenas have so much extra energy just hanging around it's a lot more like sitting in a chair while your grandmother heaps your plate with more food than you could ever possibly consume - it's a hell of a lot less work.  If I was a ghost I'd probably make an occasional stop at the local energy smorgasbord when I was getting peckish. 

I think places that have been filled with intense emotions tend to be equally filled with ghosts because it's easy for ghosts to exist there with so much free energy floating around.  Why work for your meal if you don't have to?

17 July 2012

It is wrong...

that I really enjoy blowing peoples expectations?

On the Radio Tonight!

Hey folks, tune in to the Grand Dark Conspiracy tonight at 10pm edt/7pm pdt to hear me talk about shadow work, things that go bump in the night, and the meaning of evil.  I had a fabulous time the last time I was on this show and am really looking forward to it.  I hope you'll join me :)

04 July 2012

Shadow in Nature

There was a wonderful article written a month or so back on the prevalence of Pagans of various flavors to idealize nature as being benign, pure, and good (I cannot find it for the life of me, so if you can please put a link in the comments).  In reality, nature - I'm talking real nature, not your local park - is glorious but brutal.  Nature is not a wholesome sanctuary where we can retreat from our hectic lives to find peace and safety.  Nature is a place of harsh extremes, survival of the fittest, and literally awesome vistas.  There is no better place to explore the balance of light and shadow than in nature.



I spent today steeped in the extremes that nature offers us.  I went to Mount Saint Helens and hiked the South Coldwater Trail to Coldwater Saddle.  For those of you not familiar with this mountain, it blew up rather spectacularly in 1980.  The picture above was taken this afternoon and you can see the acres of trees that are still blasted to this day.  In a place like that you can see both unparalleled beauty and incredible harshness.













To have both the stunning views of Coldwater Lake and its surroundings and views of the twisted metal of construction equipment caught in the blast, Mt. St. Helens is a reminder that nature is not a happy shiny place where people can frolic in edenic bliss.  Nature is awesome and terrible.  She deserves our reverence and respect because she will give until it hurts and then, when we think we've got it all figured out, she'll whollup us but good.

26 June 2012

Shadow Magick in Llewellyn's Magical Almanac

No, I have not fallen off a cliff.  I'm still here and still writing when I can.  I've spent the last few months (and will be spending a few more) stuck up to my eyeballs in a huge project at work and it's pretty much sucking my will to do anything that requires more mental effort than looking at trees and going "Oooo, pretty."  So, unfortunately you won't be getting proper regular blog posts for a while.  Sorry about that, but I gotta pay the bills.

In much happier news, yesterday my contributor copies of the 2013 Llewellyn's Magical Almanac arrived!  I've got an article in this year's edition on basic Shadow Magick.


If you're a regular reader, then you'll be fairly familiar with the content of the essay, but it does encapsulate the important points of the basic practice all in one place.  I hope you pick up a copy when it hits the shelves later this season :)

(My article starts on page 298)


06 June 2012

Oregon Vortex and House of Mystery

Last weekend I had the great pleasure of driving down to Ashland, OR to visit the magnificent Oregon Shakespeare Festival.   On our way south we decided to finally visit the Oregon Vortex and House of Mystery.

I'd been hearing about this place for years and had always been intrigued.  It's one of those places that has a house full of insane angles that creates insane optical illusions.  This place also claims to be host to an energy vortex that warps perception and mass.  I came expecting to enjoy the optical illusions and be sarcastic about the energy claims.  I was quite surprised to find out that there actually is an incredibly strong permanent energy vortex centered in the House of Mystery.   

We arrived shortly after noon, on the only sunny day all weekend, just in time for a tour (which took about an hour).  Our guide began by going into the history of the place which has accounts of odd phenomena going back to the Native Americans.  There are old stories of mammals not liking the area, so you don't see many squirrels or rodents in the Vortex - the area is famous for spooking horses.  People tend to feel odd there as well, experiencing vertigo, headaches, pressure, etc.  I found that as we neared the center of the vortex I could feel a palpable shift in the ambient energy; akin to moving from still water into a flowing river.  As someone who can channel energy quite well I just opened myself to let the energy flow in the way it wanted to and didn't feel any negative effects.

The House of Mystery itself is an old assayers office that fell down a slope during a storm and landed all akimbo up against a tree. If you let yourself be guided by the warped visual cues it gives you, you will feel the worst vertigo of your life.  Everything feels like it's going sideways.  (photo from http://news.opb.org/article/oregon-vortex-offers-spooky-mystery-all/)


It's in the house that things really get interesting because the center of that vortex is right inside it.  According to the guide, they were recently visited by a Celtic Shaman who said that the vortex was home to a portal of some kind.  Before the guide told us where it was I went right to a spot on the floor and pointed at it, saying "It's right there." The guide confirmed that it was the same spot the Shaman had identified (confirmation that my energy senses are on track is always nice).  I don't know where that portal goes but it's definitely there.   I didn't sense anything negative about it so I felt totally comfortable playing with all the fun ambient energies.

If you're every travelling on I-5 through Southern Oregon I highly recommend taking an hour and visiting the Oregon Vortex and House of Mystery.


16 May 2012