Tutor Time!

My tutor’s first correspondence:

Cara Soror,

 

Welcome to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. My name is H. Soror M.D.L.L.  It is with great honor that I have been appointed as your tutor to help assist you in achieving your greatest potential as a Golden Dawn magician.

 

I must mention that although I fulfill the role as tutor, by no means am I to be considered a “ guru” or exceptional super-human to be patronized. My role is as that of an initiated Golden Dawn guide who has simply walked the Path before you. From a  personal viewpoint, and from my experience with other Fraters and Sorors in this Order, I believe that we are here to learn from each other. As a traditional Order, we are part of a hierarchical Order structure, but by no means is one individual better than another. We are all just at various stages of personal development and grade work; brothers and sisters aspiring to ascend personal limitations to become more than human and one with the Divine Light . I believe that in the end we are all equal and all divine, just as in finality with the original Divine Source, there is no duality.

 

The process of spiritual evolution is one that unfolds with time, self – realization, philosophical study and practical dedication to the Great Work. The inner alchemy that takes place by practicing theurgy and self-realization is much akin to a karmic ” hot -house” where our karma is sped up, allowing us to achieve our greatest spiritual potentials, but as such, the path of self-development is not always soft, since we may be faced with our own personal shortcomings in order to overcome them. Also, we find wonderful latent talents and true purpose. With these aspects in mind, we undertake great responsibility in our lives and in our spiritual Work. Real Magic is about self-transformation, understanding of and eventually mastery of unseen energies–and with that, change can manifest in our outside world once the inner world is realized, and eventually we strive to consciously ascend limitations of the material world – hence the Hermetic axiom “To become more than human.” Our order is an organization that teaches an authentic Hermetic magical path, a system based on Western Mysteries,  but as such, it is not a religion. Members can practice any faith or no faith as a personal choice, and we do not discriminate. The only requirement in regard to anything devotional at all is that a member must acknowledge a Higher Power than themselves, such as a “Lord of the Universe” as we generically label it, but that can be whatever your Higher Power/God/Goddess/Nous/Source(s) is/are !

 

The Order is also not the same as Freemasonry. Some of the primary Golden Dawn founders in the 1800s happened to be Freemasons, but our Order is not a Freemasonic Order, it is a “Magical One” teaching real ritual magic, and admits both men and women equally ! The only similarity it really has to masonry is in some similarities of basic initiatic ritual structure. I have to clarify what kind of organization the HOGD/A&O is periodically, as some pledges join to either find their “ guru,” “ priest” or “ freemasonic network” only to be disappointed later on. If you are inclined to do well without too much “hand holding,” you will fare well on this Path! Most of the Great Work is done individually. We must know ourselves and be willing to transform on the inside, and free will takes precedence.

 

Part of our responsibilities as Fraters/Sorores is to document and track our own progress by journaling. This is for our own individual benefit, not a tutor’s nor anyone else’s, however in order to progress in the Order and get appropriate assistance from a tutor, I must stress the importance of the journal submissions as this tends to be an area where students tend to procrastinate. Even I have had my moments in the past with this, and believe me, having to catch up on all that documentation is not fun and will only slow down your progress ! If you have read any magical literature prior to pledging this Order, then you will have noticed that journaling is a must for all magical practitioners, whether one is a member of a magical order or as solitary mage. It is considered an additional benefit to have someone to help us out on our  Divine paths as needed. The journal is the guideline used for this purpose in our Order, as our organization is world-wide and we are here to help members at a distance. As we are an Order with a living magical tradition and not just some correspondence course, you are encouraged to get your 0=0 physical initiation as soon as you are able, should you decide to pursue this Path and become a full member.

 

I must mention that it is allowable, per availability at our Temples, finishing the pre-requisite ritual Work, tests, and tutor authorization,  to possibly  get the 0=0 and 1=10 in one occasion if you happen to not reside close to a Temple (within a few hours driving distance) and/or are experiencing financial difficulties that curtail the amount of travel you can make. There is no definite guarantee you will be able to get your 0=0 and 1=10 at the same time, as it depends on the aforementioned factors. This convenient approach is for new members to experience genuine physical initiation but have disadvantageous circumstances. Grade advancements are also not only based on the tests, but also on the ritual Work and quality of that ritual Work you are doing and your corresponding experiences, so it is very important to do the practical Work in order to advance.

 

Your journal is to be submitted  monthly. You may even want to include extra content such as additional astrological influences, Moon phases, theoretical studies, divination results, dreams or anything else you think will be of benefit to yourself.  That is up to you, so long as the basic structure is intact. Please allow at least a couple of weeks (though I do try to respond asap) for me to respond to your journals, as I do have a regular, daily professional career, family, religious duties and other Order related administrative duties to take care of, such as teaching classes and co-managing a HOGD/A&O Temple of which I am currently serving as a Hierophantria,  as well as tutoring.

 

Sometimes there are personal emergencies that throw us off track temporarily. If this happens to you, please send an e-mail to let me know of the situation. I do strongly believe that it is part of the Work, and our progress,  to be able to persist despite the setbacks of the mundane aspects of our lives. The sooner you can send something, the better service I will be to you as your tutor, and the easier it will be to complete the grade work . The journal can also be as detailed or as sparse as you deem necessary to convey your progress and to keep for future self-reflection. From personal experience, detailed is better, so long as it does not turn into a drama diary of personal events that do not pertain at all to the Work or circumstances that may be affecting your Work. But if there are some experiences you are having in your life that may be asynchronous events to the Work you are doing, and/or are having significant positive or negative effects, then feel free to include them.

 

As a regular practice, please direct questions regarding technicalities of ritual and related issues to the Harparkrat cyber temple inner forum so that all members can benefit from the Q & A. You will then also have the bonus of getting more feedback from other Fraters and Sorors. If you still have other questions, please feel free to include them in your journal or send me an email. After receiving your journal report, I will review and return it to you with constructive commentary. I look forward to working with you. Many blessings and best of luck on your journey in the Great Work!

 

Pax et LVX,

H. Soror M.D.L.L.

Sub-Praemonstratrix Ordinis without Portfolio

HOGD/A&O

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I Got In!!!!!

Wowza!! I just got the good word — I made it into the HOGD Outer Order and have been assigned my tutor! I SO cannot wait to get started! Gonna go buy a really nice journal right now! 🙂

Care Soror,

Welcome to our outer order, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. By becoming a member of our order, you have taken the first step into the Great Work of ritual magic and alchemy. Although you are at this time a member of the Golden Dawn, you are still not an initiate. True Golden Dawn Initiation can give you a great boost in your spiritual development, and you are already eligible for traditional, physical initiation at one of our local Golden Dawn temples. You will likely have to travel to one of our temple locations to receive this initiation, however. In order to keep travel expenses at a minimum, it is therefore advisable for you to wait for initiation at least until you have qualified for advancement to the 1=10, Juniorus, grade. You then may take both initiations during the same journey. Whenever you feel you are ready for initiation, please write to admin@golden-dawn.com to request that your initiation(s) be scheduled.

To qualify for advancement to the 1=10 grade, you must first satisfy certain theoretical and magical requirements. These are clearly listed on the “curriculum” link in the member’s area of our website. In order to satisfy the magical requirements of each grade, you must begin to keep magical diary and to thoroughly record of all magical work that you do.

Today you were assigned a personal tutor who is a member of our order whose motto and email address are included with this email. This individual will supervise your magical progress in our outer order, and will determine when you are ready for advancement to the next grade. You are required to submit via email a report to your tutor once a month containing a summary of the magical work that you have done during that period. Your tutor will review your report and will return it to you with valuable feedback.

Parallel with your practical work, you should study thoroughly the theoretical material in our curriculum as well. Once your tutor is satisfied that you have completed the magical requirements of your grade level and you believe that you have mastered the theoretical material as well, your tutor will provide you with the necessary password to complete the on-line examination. Upon successfully passing the examination, you will be issued a dispensation for initiation into the appropriate grade at one of our temples.

Please note that our tutors each have a heavy volume of students and will therefore have to restrict their contact with you to the reviewing of your regular reports. All questions that you have regarding your grade work should therefore not be addressed to your tutor, but rather should be posted on our Tutorials Forum inside the members’ area of our website. Our tutorials staff reviews the forum regularly and routinely answers questions there . This allows us to answer questions more efficiently.

Please further note that the tutorials forum is for the posting of grade-work related questions only. It is a moderated environment for serious study and not a place to gossip discuss order history, etc. We have other fora for that sort of thing. Finally, you should use only your alias on the forum and it is prohibited to include any private email addresses in posts. Any off-posting or violation of these rules may result in suspension of membership priveleges.

Your main daily magical work in the 0=0 Grade of Neophyte will consist mainly of the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram (together with the Rite of the Qabalistic Cross), Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram (with the QC and Analysis of the Key Word), Ritual of the Middle Pillar, and the Rose Cross Ritual.

You can find all of the above rituals in “The Ritual Magic Manual” by David Griffin (Golden Dawn, Beverly Hills: 1999). You may download the rituals necessary for your grade work in .pdf e-lesson format in the curriculum area of our website.

Your new tutor is:

H. Soror M.D.L.L

(email address removed by me)

Finally, you should make or acquire a black robe to use in your magical work. You will eventually need this robe when you are initiated into the Neophyte grade at one of our temples.

Sub Umbra Alarum Tuarum, Yeheshua

G.H. Frater Lux Ex Septentrionis

Imperator Ordinis, Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn Chief Adept, R.R. et A.C.

Archon Basileus, Rosicrucian Order of Alpha et Omega

“Ex Deo Nascimur.

In Yeheshua Morimur.

Per Sanctum Spiritum Reviviscimus”

PS- Below you will find a sample framework to give you an idea how to prepare reports for your tutor:

Monthly report

Motto:

Date of report:

Period:

Day of week/date: (work done/significant results i.e. feelings/visions etc.- studies of texts)

Day of week/date: (work done/significant results i.e. feelings/visions etc.- studies of texts)

Day of week/date: (work done/significant results i.e. feelings/visions etc. – studies of texts)

General comment:

Overall health since last report:

Any significant dreams?

Development of social life/relationships?

Additional comments:

I Am (Not) What I Am

I am not a cynic; I choose my sarcasms carefully.

I am not jaded; I am one who’s seen it all, so you’ll have to do better than that.

I am not impressive; I’m unimpressed.

I am not a slacker; I just like my breakfast in bed. And lunch. And dinner.

I am not stupid, but I might make you think I am—remember, it’s easy enough to be dumb, but playing dumb takes real skill.

Patience is a virtue; it’s just not one of mine, so hurry up and wait–and hold my purse.

I am not repetitive, so I’ll say this only twice: the minutes I take becoming that trophy on your arm are not my “football minutes.”

I am not a whore, and I can’t be yours, because Babylon’s pockets run deep.

I am not remote, aloof or above it all; I am cautious with my trust and my affections (after all, remember what happened to Alice when she followed a rabbit down a hole, and also what curiosity did to the cat).

I am not a bitch; I am a Babe In Total Control of Herself.

I am not the Other Woman; I am a Woman who fell in love with her Best Friend at an Inconvenient Time.

Nor am I a mistress; I consider myself a master at it now.

Anyway, Love is blind, isn’t It?  And they don’t make scarlet letters these days in Braille. 

I am not an amateur; I am professionally unapologetic.

I am as guilty as I am blameless, and I will be neither judged nor absolved.

I do not worship false idols; I sing to the ghosts of my identities, and pray to those they used to love.

I’m no angel; pay no attention to the wings, and oh yes—I’m not the ‘droid you’re looking for.

I am not a wife, but to the marriage of true minds, I do not admit impediments.

I am not a “kept” woman; I like to keep to myself.

I am not lovable, yet all I need is Love.

I am not a liar; I live in unconventional truths that sail uncharted seas.

I am unschedulable; I have my own agenda, so just tell me where and when.

I am not a bride, and I have always said “I do.”

I do not suffer fools; my own foolishness is insufferable enough (and why do fools fall in love?)

I am not an adulterer; I am merely an adult. I made my bed, now I will lie in it unmade. And oh, yes–unalone.

I am neither a princess nor a goddess; I am the shoes on Cinderella’s feet (both sackcloth and slippers), and my kingdom has not come.

I have not found God, but I have seen His face, heard Him sing, and felt His kiss, unfailing. His Light falls warm upon the face of my branded, unbridled soul. And I am as good at being God as He is.

I am not creative; I just like hearing myself write.

I am not a friend, yet there are those I would do anything for just to see them smile.

I am not a lover; I live in sin, and love it.

I am not a mother, yet I have carried for Him forbidden fruit that fell too soon from the vine.

I am not waiting, but I can stay if it’s what you want, and I am always leaving things behind.

I am not a disbeliever; I do not follow blindly, though at times I blindly lead.

I am not strong, but you will not break me.

I am not asleep, so please don’t wake me.

I am not what you think, not what you expect, and everything you want me to be.

I am what you see—I’m what’s hidden—the arcane, the unpardonable me.

And despite the cost, I am free.

I am not a label,
not a number,
not a cog in the wheel.

I am The Wheel, and I will not be reinvented.

I am and am not.

(Get used to it)

I am I.

I am.

(not)

I.

Sono Intus Lux Lucis

“Don’t take life too seriously … you’ll never get out of it alive.”

That’s what they (the Proverbial “They”) say, anyway. And you nod or you shake your head, and you chuckle a little, as if you’ve never heard that one before.

It may as well be “It is what it is” or “Been there, done that,” “Think outside the box,” or maybe “Git ‘er done!” It’s just another “something” people say when there’s nothing else to say–like some sort of emotional placeholder where you get to fill in the blank with another blank (“Johnny, tell her what she’s won!”) because it’s easier to pay lip service to a cliché when things are rough than to let yourself get too close to the pain. Because, hey, you never know when it might be contagious, right?

And in some cases, it just might be. After 11 years with the same company, I was laid off last month, but I’m not the only one. I was one of 165, so there are 164 others who are feeling like corporate roadkill right about now too. (Some epidemic, eh?) And what are we, the newly jobless, expected to take comfort in?

“It’s not personal. It’s just business.”

Oh, I know, I know–right about now you’re probably thinking this one:

“Bitter much?”

Well, yes, but that’s another post for another day. What I’d like to say to my former employer today is simply this: Thank You.

Yep. “Thank You.” Thank you because you’ve given me the opportunity to reach down inside and find my bootstraps–yeah, the ones I forgot I even had. It took a little while to fumble for them in those boots so full of impossible expectations you made me wear, but I did find them, and now I’m ready to give ’em a good yank.

I also want to thank you for giving me the “time off” I’ve needed to explore some paths I’ve wanted to set foot on. There’s a light down one of those paths, and I intend to find it.

“Run to the light, Carol Anne, run to the light!!” Hell, we all want to run to the light, don’t we? (That quote’s from “Poltergeist,” by the way, for those unbaptised in all things gloriously 80s–I wonder if they’ll ever remake that one.)

Well, that’s where you’ll find me–me and The Dream King, that is–hand in hand, just walking paths and looking for the light we know each of us has. And we do have it, that Light. You just have to figure out where to look.

So … wanna come with? 😉