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[chaos_current]

Hello NonFluffyPagans

Comments

[wibbble]

After some years of mostly-apathetic paganism, I'm not convinced that there's such a thing as deity. To be honest, I'm not convinced that there's such a thing as 'magic', beyond tricking yourself with a psychological placebo.

Which isn't to say that I don't trick myself with a psychological placebo now and again. I just don't know if there's any effect outside of my own head. I'm not even sure if it matters one way or the other.

[chaos_current]

I've come to the nebulous decision that I do believe magic exists, but I don't believe it's a common skillset. I'd say I believe about ... I don't know ... 93.7%, maybe, of people who believe they are practicing magic are, in fact, practicing a psychological placebo type of experience.

Maybe that will be a future post -- how people specifically define magic, what they think it's capable of, and whether it's something anyone is capable of. That might get more EXCITING.

[wibbble]

At this point I'm not spending much energy on these kind of really philosophical issues - I just don't have the spare time or energy these days.

I'm just happy that some things seem to work, psychological placebo or otherwise.

[moon_ferret]

I know from reading that your world is busy these days and I can understand why you aren't spending much energy on this kind of thing.

So my question, I guess directly, is if you don't think it matters one way or the other, why do you do it? Or do you even bother any more? I know that I have been too busy with what I consider Real World Considerations that I haven't dragged out the Witch Hat or even really my Pagan Hat in months. I haven't bothered because I want to have my mundane shit handled before I mess with anything that is an energy expense.

[wibbble]

For the most part, I'm not doing anything. When the chain for my pentagram bracelet snapped, I made a point of getting a replacement, but that was largely because I find wearing it comforting. I've often had a little object of some description I'd carry with me (to pick a random example, about ten years ago it was a single playing card), for reasons that seem to make sense at the time. I suspect that my bracelet is filling that roles now

[starfish327]

i personally don't think it matters. someone asked me how after getting one social science degree and half of another why i still believe in magick if all i'm doing is making myself feel better- and i told her that maybe that's the point. what difference does it make what we call it, if it gets the same effect.

[wibbble]

I had an increasingly hilarious conversation the (Russian) owner of the company I work for on the last day before the Christmas holidays last year. They'd bought in champagne to go with the normal Company Beer, and I think he drank about a bottle of it himself, so he was getting increasingly drunk throughout a conversation on how demonstrably intelligent people could believe in god/be religious

[mellowtigger]

The metaphor I use is that "there's no such thing as purple".
http://mellowtigger.livejournal.com/50641.html

Living with multiple metaphors simultaneously (seeing purple while knowing there's isn't a purple) is a very useful skill, I've found. It hadn't occurred to me that maybe some people are incapable of doing that. That's a troubling thought.

[greeneyedpagan]

Did you get that new job because you 'cast a spell' and it changed reality, or because you 'cast a spell' and it made you more confident?

If the spell made you more confident than you were before you performed it, did it not also change reality?

Or by reality, do you mean only manipulating the physical, measurable things of the world?

[wibbble]

I'm so not getting drawn into a discussion on the nature of reality at 0821 on a Monday. :op

I chose the word as a convenient shorthand for 'everything that exists outside of your head'.