Chaos Magicians tend to be very (you guessed it!) chaotic people. The kind of people who would dream up things like the MARVEL COMICS PANTHEON or a X-MEN Cabbala.
Anything you believe in and give energy to is real. If you want to believe in the MARVEL COMICS pantheon and use it in your magickal working, it will probably work for you. The same is true of Greek mythology, the Tiny Toons, or anything you can think of. Of course, most working magicians prefer to use something based on more historical systems, but there's certainly no requirement. Belief, focus and energy are the keys. The idea is to invent, borrow, steal, forge, whatever, a system you can make yourself believe in totally, at least during your working. You can laugh about it and think it's crazy after the working's done, but during the magical working you better believe totally, or nothing will work right. Most magicians find it difficult to believe totally in something one minute, then think it's a joke later on, so most people will end up adapting one or more systems they more or less believe in at all times. Of course, if one could handle switching systems left and right all the time, then that person could be considered the "perfect" chaos magician, which would actually be contrary to the spirit of most chaos magicians.
So how is chaos magick actually practiced? That varies completely depending on which person you talk to. It's a highly personal and variable system and is generally different for each person involved with it. Some rituals that chaos magicians have bothered to write down have ranged from very silly to utterly and totally terrifying. In spite of all this chaos , there is one technique that a great majority of chaos magicians utilize at one time or another. That is the technique of sigilization. In a nutshell, this involves formulating a detailed sentence of desire, translating it into some sort of symbolic representation, concentrating on it for a time, then sending it off into the void and forgetting about it totally. It's a very effective, simple, and practical magickal technique that can be used almost anywhere and with very little preparation or expense in time or materials. A lot of creative methods have been devised for the translating into some sort of symbolic representation phase. Before this is done, most people will eliminate all the duplicate letters from the sentence ov desire. Then, anything goes to make it into a symbolic representation of the original. It should be completely unrecognizable as the original sentence of desire. Some people have concocted their own complete alphabets for doing this. This is not necessary, and there are many other methods which work just as well. You can use whatever method you feel is best, or even think up a completely new one.
Once the sigil is drawn, it is concentrated on for a time, until the magician feels the time is right. There is absolutely no way to describe how this is known. Suffice it to say that you will know. Then the energy is fired off into the void of the unknown and the entire working is wiped from the memory of the magician.
The reason for wiping the working from the memory is a simple one, but very important none-the-less. Many chapters in many great books have been devoted to discussing the fact that lust of results will wipe out most magickal workings. Anyone who has practiced magick can tell you this. If you get too wrapped up in hoping and lusting that the working will work, it won't. You have to sort of detach yourself from the working so that your lust for the results doesn't mess everything up. And clearing it from your memory afterwards is just one way of ensuring this.
If the working involves another person -- such as love spells, or some type of war magick as many of these types of workings do, then there is usually another step involved. Some method is devised to transmit the sigil to the intended subject, either via psychic means, or via physical means, physical actually being preferrable in this case. If the intended subject actually sees the sigil, the power is definitely magnified.
The energy absorbed by the sigil will act on the subject's subconscious, while the very fact the he/she sees the sigil will have an effect on their conscious mind. When this is done, some way is employed to connect the sigil to the subject, such as using a picture or drawing of the person.
Then the sigil is transmitted to the subject, either via psychic means, or via physical means. Devising ways of physically transmitting the sigil isn't very easy. If the working is a healing, of course, this is a moot point -- they're usually there at the working, so it's taken care of. When something like a love spell or some type of war magick is being done, it's more complicated.
Pager sigils are one way. The methods are limited only by the imagination of the magician.
Anyway, this is far from a complete reference on chaos magick..... not even close. There are thousands of sites on the web containing information on chaos magick and related topics. Search for chaos magick in any search engine and you'll find plenty of links or go to your local library or bookstore to find a book related to chaos magick.
JANUARY 1999
