Manifesting Prosperity
A Wealth Magic Anthology
Edited by Taylor Ellwood
Stafford, England
Manifesting Prosperity: A Wealth Magic Anthology
Edited by Taylor Ellwood
© 2008 First edition
Smashwords edition 2010
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Cover Art: Andy Bigwood
A Megalithica Books edition published through Smashwords
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Contents
Introduction, Taylor Ellwood
Undoing the Poor Occultist/Pagan Stereotype, Taylor Ellwood
Wealth and Abundance, Janet Callahan
Financial Magic, Vincent Stevens, I.S.U.A.G.
Money for Nothing: Making Wealth Magic Work, Nick Farrell
Creating an Abundance of Wealth, Sage NightStar
Vodou Wealth Magic: An Introduction, Kenaz Filan (Houngan Coquille Du Mer)
Green Magick: Money and Pagan Consciousness, Leni Hester
Managing Prosperity through Magic: A Night on the Beach with Yemaya, Mama Donna Henes, Urban Shaman
Ancient Commerce Magick, Tony Mierzwicki
Vision and the Wealth Quest, Frater Andrieh Vitimus
Strategic Magick, Psyche
Lakshmi Magick, Hermeticusnath (Aion)
How I Used Wealth Magic to Move to Portland, Taylor Ellwood
The Wealth Magician’s Allies, Jozef Karika
Using Collage for Growing Wealth: Theory and Practice, Wes Unruh
The Use of Money in Magic, Vincent Stevens, I.S.U.A.G.
Sustainable (and Self-Sustainable) Investment, Lupa
Introduction
Taylor Ellwood
Manifesting prosperity is something that I believe most, if not all, people want. What prosperity is to you is probably different than what it is to me, but regardless of that, the desire to manifest prosperity is a primal force which expresses itself most in the desire to acquire pieces of paper and little round metal circles which is commonly called money. Plastic cards are also the rage, because they provide credit for the use of that money. Unfortunately people forget an important axiom that should always be remembered when it comes to manifesting prosperity into your life:
Money is not an end, in and of itself; it is a means to an end.
In other words, you can have lots of money and still not be prosperous. Money can enable you to manifest prosperity, provided you know what to do with that money. Having money, in and of itself, does little for someone who doesn’t use it to enrich hir life.
This anthology provides techniques on how magic can be applied to help you manifest prosperity, particularly through such financial resources as money and credit. However, an even more important focus is the examination of personal responsibility and choices when it comes to managing your financial prosperity. I firmly believe that the personal choices we make set the tone for the wealth that we manifest in our lives.
There are some who will disagree. I’ve been told that it’s not personal choices which cause people to be poor, but rather its broad economic trends which show that the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer. However, I think claims like these are sometimes used as a justification for the circumstances that people find themselves in. Let me be clear and note that there are situations, such as life threatening illnesses, which can in fact devastate any financial reserve a person has. And it’s certainly true that the wages paid to many people are wages that are pretty poor. The broken health care system and also the economic trends which can devastate a housing market or the credit market certainly impact jobs, which are usually the prime source of income for most people.
Nonetheless, even these factors can be mitigated by making responsible personal choices for finances. And while we may not have control of those broad economic trends, we do have control of our personal choices as well as of the attitude that we choose to take on when handling financial matters. People who argue that they are poor because of broad economic trends have chosen to give away any sense of empowerment when it comes to handling money because they believe it’s too big for them to handle. They want to blame everything but themselves for the state of their financial being. People who are well off and argue that broad economic trends are the problem are people, who no matter how well intentioned, are inadvertently oppressing the very people they think they are helping. When you tell someone that they can’t help the circumstances they are in, you take away the impetus to change those circumstances.
Financial wealth, and for that matter prosperity in general begins with personal choices. For example you can choose to take responsibility for your attitudes toward money, or you can continue to blame those broad economic trends for why you continue to handle money poorly. The choice is yours! In fact, the choice to be responsible for how you handle money is an act of magic, in its own way. Practical magic is based, after all, on the desire to change certain circumstances in your environment, or within yourself, in order to manifest a better alternative. By choosing to be responsible for how you handle money, you can also choose methods that can help you accomplish that goal. Magic is one of those methods.
Another method involves acquiring knowledge and understanding of the system you are working magic in. Finance is a system, and to really be empowered to manifest prosperity into your life, you have to understand how that system works. Many people get discouraged, believing that learning about finances is both stressful and dull, but if anything learning about finances can be fun, provided you have the right attitude and a desire to learn. The peril of ignorance isn’t just credit card debt or even dealing with those broad economic trends I mentioned above. Rather, such ignorance can lead to living a lifestyle that you feel trapped in, because you need to pay off that mortgage or acquire lots of stuff, or whatever else it is you feel trapped about.
Understanding how finances work can lead to making informed choices, based off an awareness of what your circumstances, needs, and wants are. When you know how a system works you can manipulate that system and also apply other forces such as magic to it, in order to make it work for you, instead of against you. As a personal example, I am not sure I will ever buy a house. In the U.S. culture we are taught that buying a house is part of manifesting the American dream and also part of acquiring a source of wealth that builds up capitol, and yet with the sub-prime bubble popping this is clearly not the case. Even sources of finance that aren’t associated with real estate have been impacted by the sub-prime bubble popping (one of those broad economic trends mentioned above). People are losing money on the houses they have bought. Factor in the expenses needed to make repairs, buy housing insurance, and the property taxes that need to be paid and the question of whether a house is a solid investment has to be reconsidered carefully in light of any other choices you may want to make. My desire, for instance, to manifest a successful independent business involves understanding that if I need to pay for a house and that business isn’t initially as successful as it would need to be, to pay for that house, I might have to work at a regular job to pay for the house and thus delay my financial independence that much longer. The choices you make have an impact on the life you live. So, it’s important to recognize that while you are impacted by broad economic trends, you are even more so impacted by your understanding of the financial systems you deal with and the choices you make based off that understanding.
In this anthology, it is our goal to show examples of wealth magic and explain how the techniques work. We also want to show where failures or shortcomings were encountered and how the practitioner refined the magic to address those shortcomings. Magic is a process, and when applied to any system there will be some successes, but also some failures. As long as we can learn and adapt we can eventually succeed in manifesting the prosperity we desire. The one thing we must not do is abdicate personal responsibility for our choices by claiming the reason we’re poor is because of broad economic trends. Recognize those trends and recognize their impact, but also recognize your responsibility in making choices with how you manage your finances. No matter what financial “class” you fall into, you can still prosper, provided you understand the systems you’re dealing with and effectively manage the resources you currently do have access to. A little magic to make situations go your way doesn’t hurt either.
I can’t guarantee that you will become fabulously rich if you read this anthology. I can say however that you may come away with a better awareness of how your choices and the attitudes that inform those choices can impact the financial wealth you do manifest in your life. I can also say that you may come away with a better sense of the options you do have access to. What you do with that awareness is what will determine if you can manifest the prosperity you desire into your life.
This anthology is a complement to that community, and I encourage all of you to check it out. The goal of that community is to help each other learn how to handle finances better, and share our successes and failures so that everyone can benefit. By cooperating, instead of competing, we can manifest the prosperity that all of us deserve.
Taylor Ellwood
October 2007
Portland, OR
Undoing the Poor Occultist/Pagan Stereotype
Taylor Ellwood
Ever heard of the stereotypical “poor Pagan”? The one who barely lives paycheck to paycheck, drives a hunk o’ junk around because s/he has no credit, and never seems to get ahead? This stereotype, when it comes to money, is justified by the idea that being poor is virtuous. The rationalization is that it’s okay if you’re in debt, and/or don’t have much money--you’re keeping it real by not being too materialistic or capitalistic. Coyle sums up this stereotype best when she says, “I hated money because I hated what I saw as a mechanism of control and oppression. Poverty itself became a status symbol to show my friends” (2004, p. 196). But this virtue of being poor isn’t really a virtue at all or a status symbol. For many (but not all), it’s a rationalization for why a person is poor, so that s/he can feel better about hir decision to stay poor. Pagans aren’t alone in this, but it seems that we are pretty good at providing reasons for accepting poverty over wealth. For those Pagans who are disabled or chronically ill, poverty may not be a choice, but instead an unfortunate reality that can’t be avoided. Even so I have a suggestion at the end of this article as to how we as a community can help the members of our community who aren’t as well-off because of situations radically out of their control.
While you may not have complete control over how much you’re paid at a job (Though you may improve how much you’re paid by continually performing excellent work, or by looking for a better job that pays what you’re worth.), or the environment that you live (Though this can be changed by either moving away or alternatively choosing to do what you can to improve the environment you live in (i.e. make sure your streets and sidewalks are litter free). The more you take care of your environment, the better chance that others will start to care as well.), you can decide what you choose to do with your money. Even the debts you pay were debts that you took on, whether it was to purchase luxury items on a credit card or to deal with an unfortunate situation such as a car accident. Money management is an essential skill that many people lack for a simple reason. They have a bad attitude or bad conditioning about handling money and don’t want to deal with it as a reality. What this means is that when it comes time to pay bills or handle other financial situations they may be subconsciously sabotaging themselves and handling money in a way that’s counter-productive.
You can take control of your attitude when it comes to money--but you might not learn you have that control until after you’re knee deep in debt and sinking further. In addition to the attitude problem that many people face (not just Pagans), another problem is that people aren’t educated in financial literacy, i.e. how money works. High schools generally don’t teach many classes on finances and other real-world issues and unless you decide to take courses in college about accounting or other related majors you likely won’t get the education there. At home, unless your parents talk to you about money and how they handle it you likely will only learn how they handle it from observation. (And, of course, if your parents don’t handle money well, chances are you won’t either if you use them as examples!). Most of us learn what not to do with money, and that through hard experience, which is the absolute worst way to learn about finances.
You usually have to make costly mistakes to learn how to manage money effectively. Run up some credit card bills and you’re stuck with high interest rates and struggling to pay the debt off. Don’t put money away into savings or investments and you may find yourself working a fast food job in your eighties. Spend too much on books, video games, and other luxuries and you may not have enough money for the bills, therefore accumulating even more debt. Live paycheck to paycheck and when something big comes along, such as the transmission going out on your car, or an uninsured medical emergency, you’re not going to have any way to pay for it. None of those experiences strikes me as particularly virtuous or desired.
Pagans and magicians don’t have to be poor. I suggest, in fact, that we adopt the attitude that having money is a good thing. Money is good to have because it can insure relative self-sufficiency, and it can pay for unexpected situations, such as an accident or sickness. Money can pay for education and provide security for old age, and it can allow you to travel to other countries and experience other cultures at their source. Of course, those are just a few reasons why having money is good; I’m sure you can think of plenty of others.
We first need to look at our current attitude toward money. Take a moment and look at a bill or a checkbook or something else that’s financially relevant. Take a pen in your hand and on a blank piece of paper write down your initial impressions when you look at the financial artifact and think of your monetary situation. If you find yourself writing and/or thinking of money in negative terms then you need to adjust your attitude. The reason you need to adjust it is because your attitude about finances is sabotaging the conscious choices you make when you have money. In fact, your attitude probably is one of scarcity, with worry focused on what you don’t have. When the attitude is focused on what you don’t have, you sabotage what you do have in an attempt to get what you don’t have.
Because most people haven’t been taught financial literacy we usually have negative experiences with money. This negativity imprints and we soon regard money as an affliction or a problem as opposed to a means of offering potential security and/or freedom from bad circumstances. Certainly this was the case for me, once upon a time. I always had some form of debt that needed to be paid off and yet no matter how I tried I just couldn’t seem to get ahead or feel confident that my money would last beyond the current paycheck. But one day, having complained about money for the umpteenth time, I happened to pick up a book Rich Dad, Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach their Kids About Money--That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not! by Robert Kiyosaki. The core concept I got from this book was that I alone was responsible for how I spent my money and that my education about money and how I thought and felt about it greatly shaped my spending of it (Kiyosaki 2002). This seems like such an obvious point, but to someone who felt that money was an amorphous force that controlled his life, I found it to be liberating. No longer did money control me. Instead I could take control of it.
I suspect that many other magicians & pagans, were they to examine their attitude about money, would come to a similar realization. Although this awareness is liberating, we still need to undo the negative attitudes we have. There are a couple of ways to start doing this and I’ve found both of them have really helped me get a handle on my financial situation.
Meditation, Magic, & Consciously Loving Money
My first solution involved meditation. I prefer using Taoist meditation practices that involve dissolving internal energetic blockages. These energetic blockages usually also have emotions, beliefs, and attitudes attached to them. By dissolving the blockages I can allow myself to feel those emotions, beliefs, and attitudes, and then consciously change them so that they no longer sabotage me (Frantzis 2002). However, any technique will do provided it allows you to enter into a state of mind where you are receptive to examining and changing your beliefs on a particular subject. The reason this is important is because our everyday mundane consciousness tends to operate on autopilot, which means we don’t always examine why we are doing what we are doing. By being contemplative and reflective about the problem we can see it from a perspective outside our everyday tunnel vision. This in turn can lead to conscious change.
Once you’ve examined the attitude and decided you want to change it, you need to determine what you will change it into. For example, I changed my attitude of money from dislike into love of money. I decided that I would love money and in return invite it to love me. Using meditation, I changed my memories of bad experiences with money into positive experiences where I learned to love money. I visualized myself in the various moments where I’d gotten negative imprints about money. I then visualized myself changing the actual occurrences into ones that were more positive in terms of how I handled money and felt about it afterwards. Through these meditations I was able to undo the negative imprints and create more positive ones that helped me feel more comfortable with handling money.
To reinforce this positive attitude further I decided to create an entity that would encourage my wife Lupa and I to love money and become more knowledgeable about it. Lupa made a pouch out of blue leather (we associate the color with money). In the pouch we placed a couple of coins and other personal effects that represented our desire to change our attitude and approach to money. I then came up with a phrase: “I love money”. I took out the repeating letters, condensing the phrase into “Ilvmny”, which was now the name of the entity. To bring the entity to life we decided that the energy that would feed it would be both the spending and receiving of money. Every transaction would give the entity energy to perform its task, which was to help us cultivate better financial habits. Our first transaction was to go out and buy books on money management. After each purchase and every time we make a sale, deposit a check, or invest in stocks we hold the pouch and say, “Thank you Ilvmny.”
Although my first solution was to use magic to help me change my attitude, I also knew I needed to learn more about money. It wasn’t enough to have a positive attitude about it. Something I’ve noticed in myself and many other people, Pagan and otherwise, is a decided lack of knowledge of how money works. Living from paycheck to paycheck illustrates this because it involves using money strictly for day to day survival with little preparation for the future. My second solution was to acquire financial literacy.
Financial Literacy: Making Money Work for You
I have a confession to make. When I created “Ilvmny” I figured all my problems were solved. I now had a wealth entity that would generate lots of money for me and everything would be okay. I had changed my attitude about money as well, so I figured that would be enough. But I was in for a surprise, because the entity asked me a question: “What do you know about handling the money you bring in?” I had to admit that I could handle my day to day finances, but beyond that, I wasn’t sure. I didn’t know the first thing about a retirement fund, or how to invest stocks. “Ilvmny” pointed out that it couldn’t help me generate wealth if I didn’t know much about how to handle or even how different financial systems worked. The reality of my situation was that I was living paycheck to paycheck.
When you live paycheck to paycheck you’re working for money. This is what seems to happen to a lot of people. We go to work, we make money and we spend it, putting little, if any, aside for a rainy day or retirement. When a situation does come up we wish we had more money to solve it, even though it’s not really more money that will solve the problem — it’s making money work for you.
First, you need to learn how money works. If no one talked with you about money and how to use it responsibly then what you need to do is educate yourself. This doesn’t have to involve evening classes at a college (and in fact that would probably be the most expensive and least successful way to learn about money in the immediate real world). Instead, I’d suggest going to your local bookstore or library and looking in the business and finance section. You’ll probably want to get several books on how to handle personal finances because you never want to get just one person’s opinion on any situation, let alone on how to handle money. I’ll list a few recommendations at the end of this article, but you might also want to see what members of your family or friends have read about personal finances. Speaking of family, if you have kids, start talking to them about money as you learn. You can never educate your children about money too early. In fact, you may help them avoid mistakes you made and come out ahead when it comes to retirement and other financial matters.
Many people don’t pick up books on money because they think such books will be loaded with technical financial jargon and hard to read. But a good book will explain the different terms and principles in a clear and concise manner. People also might think that money management is boring. While it may not be as riveting as, say, a mystery novel, once have a basic understanding you may find that it’s actually an interesting subject to learn about. Even if you still don’t find the subject fascinating, it’s important to educate yourself about it. You don’t need to know the intricacies of the daily life of a stock broker, but knowing the basics of how money works and how you can make it work for you will make your life a lot less stressful.
Making money work for you means learning how to invest in stocks and IRAs, maximize your 401k plan, and getting the most out of your bank accounts. When you know how to make money work for you, it becomes its own magic, with the result being more numbers than you had before, provided you take advantage of the systems in place. For instance, with stock investment, you don’t have to invest stocks through a broker. You can invest in a company directly by taking advantage of the direct purchasing program offered through a company’s dividend reinvestment program. This allows you to make your money work for you and know where that money is going. At the same time the wealth that is generated isn’t wealth you had to earn. Instead you let other people (i.e. the employees in the company) earn it for you. To use another example of making money work for you, there’s a lot more to a bank than free checking or savings. Do you know the interest rates of your account? Do you know the other options available to you at a bank? Do you know the differences between a bank and a credit union? Knowing the answers to those questions can impact how much your money works for you as opposed to you working for it (If you don’t know the answers I’ll leave it to you to do some research. It’s worth your time, trust me.).
Ideally, when money works for you, you have money to pay your bills, some set aside in savings to take care of emergency situations and some applied toward investments for your eventual retirement. You want your money to grow in such a way that a lot of the money you make isn’t even money you had to work for. Your goal isn’t necessarily to end up rich (though that doesn’t hurt) but it is to end up financially secure, without having to worry how you’ll pay off your debt or take a day off work without pay or even retire. If you do want end up really rich, you may have to take some big risks to get there.
As you learn financial literacy, you’ll develop your own style of managing your resources, as well as determining how to achieve your goals. The reason you want to read a variety of authors on this subject is so you can get some different perspectives on how money is managed and grown. You likely won’t agree completely with each perspective, but you’ll get something out all of them. The most important thing to do though is not to rush. Read, research, and decide what will work best for you when it comes to managing your money. If you can, play a game that simulates financial situations, before actually committing yourself. Playing such a game lets you take some risks without losing any money. A game I’d recommend is Virtual Stock Exchange, which lets you invest in stocks in a simulated stock market.(http://www.virtualstockexchange.com/Game/Homepage.aspx)
Are We Getting Too Materialistic?
I suggested earlier that the poor Pagan stereotype is not virtuous, for the simple fact that being in debt and/or having to worry whether you’ll make your ends meet each week or month is never an ideal place for anyone to be in. But is having money evil? I think, in and of itself, money isn’t good, evil, or any other moral value we may place on it. It is however a force, one that must be acknowledged and respected because it’s one we interact with everyday. Even learning how money works won’t necessarily make you more or less materialistic, though it will help you become better informed about your spending habits.
Where the virtue (or lack thereof) comes in is with you and your choices. Once you know what your spending habits are you can choose to change them. If you find yourself spending most of your money on luxury items for yourself, perhaps it’s time to stop purchasing them. Find other uses for your money such as your child’s college fund or funding for that trip to Europe you’ve always wanted to take, but never had enough time or money for. Or you could simply choose to be more generous with your money.
Another stereotype that Pagans are accused of is of not offering enough public services or charities that help the community at large. As Pagans become more successful with money this perception can be changed. When you have more money to spare you can put some of it toward the charity or public service of your choice. Better yet, you can help those members in your community who are poor and have no choice in it. Adopt a Pagan family or person who’s less well off. Donate money or food or other goods to help them out. Support your community and in doing so create a closer connection so that everyone can benefit. Remember though that money alone won’t solve the world’s problems or even that of a local community. Devoting some time to public service or giving some food to food banks or doing some other form of community work is equally valuable and worth doing.
Loving money doesn’t mean you’re a materialist and out to steal from the poor. Loving money merely means that you enjoy being prosperous and prefer it over other circumstances. You won’t turn into a yuppie or a snob by choosing to love money, unless you want to. For me, loving money isn’t about putting money before everything else; it’s really loving the idea that I don’t have to worry if I’ll be able to pay this or that bill or feel guilty because I wanted to buy the latest Jim Butcher novel. There’s enough to worry about in life. Security about money or bills or buying a book without cleaning out your checking account is something all of us can have provided we accept that having money doesn’t equal being materialist. Remember, it’s your choices that define how you think of yourself and who you are.
I recently created a shrine for my wealth entity. It’s not to worship money, but it is to show respect for it, and its place in my life. The pouch that represents the physical entity was placed beside a small coin bank I have. The coin bank is actually a small armor truck with four cylinders for each type of coin. A sigil is painted on the truck to attract more coins to it. Every time I come home with change, the change is put into the cylinders and eventually wrapped up and deposited in my savings account. Above the bank truck and the pouch is a painting of a magical dollar bill. The shrine is a good reminder to respect the impact money has on my life and on the lives of people around me.
Money is a medium. Without it, we can’t easily survive. With it we can enjoy what life offers while establishing financial security for the rough times and old age. Remember that it’s not how much you make that insures a good relationship with money; it’s how you use the money you do make that determines if you have a good relationship with it. Even someone who doesn’t make a lot of money can still come out ahead by using the resources s/he has wisely. And you can always help other members in the community who aren’t in as good a situation as you are. None of us have to be “poor Pagans”.
Bibliography
Coyle, T. Thorn. (2004). Evolutionary witchcraft. New York: Penguin Books.
Frantzis, B. K. (2002). Relaxing into Your Being: Breathing, Chi, and Dissolving the Ego. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books.
Kiyosaki, Robert T. (2000). Rich Dad, Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money--That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not! New York: Warner Business Books.
Recommended Reading
The Motley Fool: You have more than you think by David and Tom Gardner
The Motley Fool Investment Guide by David and Tom Gardner
http://www.fool.com
The Intelligent Asset Allocator by William Bernstein
The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason
Smart Couples Finish Rich: 9 Steps to Creating a Rich Future for You and Your Partner by David Bach
Secrets of the Millionaire Mind by T. Harv Eker
Wealth and Abundance
Janet Callahan
In the coven I used to belong to much of the learning was self-directed; based on meetings with the High Priestess about how things were going in our lives and some questions she asked each of her students to see what areas of their lives each initiate needed to work on. When I was an initiate several years back, one area my High Priestess always asked about was the challenges that were going on in our lives. What came out of my discussion with her was an assignment to go work on manifesting abundance in my life.
It was a strange assignment, as far as I could tell. My husband and I have professional jobs. We have a house that was new when we bought it, in a quiet neighborhood, just a few blocks from an excellent elementary school, nice cars…more cars than drivers, in fact. We own a business, which is at a break-even point, plus or minus a bit – and when it’s minus, we invest in the business from our personal accounts to make up the difference. We have more than three computers per person in our house, and more than one printer per person, along with all the other electronic toys you can name. Sure, we have debt, but doesn’t everyone? And our debt was either from the business, or from stupid things we did in college when we didn’t have jobs.
But I went home and tried to sort through why she’d made this assignment, because I respected her insights. Before I could even think about trying to manifest abundance, I needed to figure out why I should be thinking about it and what it meant to me. And so that’s what I set off to do. Being an engineer, and having a much stronger affinity for research than for meditating, I started with the dictionary. Merriam-Webster says that abundance is “an ample quantity: PROFUSION,” “AFFLUENCE, WEALTH,” or “relative degree of plentifulness.” That definition didn’t seem to be all that helpful – I have an affluent lifestyle, I consider myself to be wealthy. I have many of the material things I want, and there are very few things that I might want that I couldn’t buy, if I wanted to. I rarely do “prosperity” spells – quite honestly, money comes when I need it because I have a really good job, and so does my husband, and even when we weren’t gainfully employed, manifesting money to pay the bills was never a problem, so why abundance?
Since I hadn’t managed to research my way out of this problem, I realized I was going to have to meditate and look at my life, and figure out what things my High Priestess saw that I didn’t. And over the course of several weeks, I realized that the connotations of abundance that had been instilled in my thoughts were where the real problem was.
In my exploration of my thoughts on money and abundance, I realized that I had been conditioned to believe that all I needed was to be able to pay this month’s bills before they were due. Much reflection brought me to the realization that, in my mind, abundance really boils down to having enough money to pay the bills - and that’s it. There’s nothing there about having the money to get things without using plastic (because as long as the credit card bill is paid, you’re good). Further, while I live a fairly material-rich lifestyle now what I began to realize was that there was so much more that I could have, if I could get beyond the conditioning of my childhood that just paying the bills was the only thing money was good for, and the only real goal.
I grew up in a lower middle class family. My parents hid the reality of our situation from us kids, but we knew money was an issue. We lived in a lower middle class neighborhood, where everyone went to yard sales to buy clothes, and where it wasn’t uncommon for people to get food stamps when they lost their jobs, or to get free lunches at school all year round. Our moms traded coupons. At my house, my grandparents gave us canned fruits and vegetables from their garden, and they butchered meat for us too. And all of these experiences taught me that the best you could hope for, money wise was to work hard, only buy the necessities, and hope you had enough to pay all the bills.
When I went to my next review with my High Priestess, she asked what I had learned about abundance, and I told her about my feeling that I thought money meant being able to pay the bills, without necessarily having anything extra.
She asked if I’d thought beyond money in my meditations, and I realized that I hadn’t. Time is another key player here; a lot of the things we did when I was a kid to make up for the lack of money took a lot of time. And a lot of the services I pay for now, like hiring a lawn service to mow the grass, are me spending money to gain more time. The two concepts are intrinsically linked.
When I asked her why abundance was the thing she wanted me to work on, she pointed out that one of the most stressful things in my life at that point had been that I felt that my house has been taken over, and I didn’t know how to regain control.
At the time, our business, a non-profit group, and a fledgling temple were all being run out of my house. Also, my husband and I had two roommates – one who worked for us and came with two cats, and another was an old friend leaving a bad relationship, with three more cats, to go along with our three cats. We had been working on finding a building for the temple to turn into public ritual space (and a library, and a meditation room, and all those other things that Pagan organizations seem to need), and had manifested several really nice buildings that were perfect…we’d just not manifested a way to pay for any of them. The same was true for the business – the basement and garage were serviceable, but I really needed the mental space that getting it out of the house would provide, and the money to do so wasn’t easily available. The non-profit needed an office and a part time office assistant so I’d have more time. And all of this needed to happen without me paying for it by creating more debt.
My High Priestess and I had a long discussion about the things I needed in my life. Beyond money, and time, things like good friends and love and spiritual fulfillment. And that sometimes, spending extra time could save you money, and sometimes spending a little money could save you time, but they’re not necessarily interchangeable.
So, with that new understanding, she sent me home to try again. I started by deciding that I needed to re-define abundance in my mind. First, I started by making a list of what I think abundance should be in my new world view. And while it’s not just money, it certainly starts there.
Defining Abundance for Myself
For me, having a life of abundance now includes:
First and foremost, no debt. No credit card debt, no car loans, no student loans – the only allowed debt is the mortgage on our house. If I can’t pay it off this month, I should set the money aside until we have enough to pay cash.
Having money to travel without putting it on a credit card, and to be able to enjoy traveling without watching every penny or skipping some activities because they’re too expensive.
Having time to travel – not cutting trips to visit family or friends short because I don’t have enough vacation days.
Having money to deal with a large unexpected purchase in cash – car repairs, household appliances breaking down, and similar situations.
Having money to go out for the evening when I want, including nice restaurants, the symphony, or concerts, rather than sticking with fast food and then going to the movies at the dollar show.
Having time to spend with my spouse, and with good friends and other important people.
Being able to save up money for things like improvements on the house or a new car, rather than putting those types of things on a credit card and paying them off later, or waiting for the tax refund.
Building the business to the point where it can support itself, in a building other than my house, with several full time employees.
Being able to make my living from my business and other outlets, rather than continuing to work for a large corporation.
A rich social life with many friends, both locally and in other places, whom I can spend time with and enjoy being around.
A rich family life - having children in particular, but also enjoying the time I have with my family.
Having time to work on things that I personally find meaningful – writing, reading, meditation, magick, and the like.
Giving myself time (and motivation) to treat myself better, in body, mind and spirit.
Being able to treat myself to things like massages and manicures, and to join a gym or take a dance class without feeling like I am short-changing the family budget.
Making sure that the organizations that I am involved with having everything they need, while maintaining a balance between my needs and the organizations’ needs.
Learning when to say no – both in terms of my time and my money – when I can’t take on something new, and when to let go of things that aren’t working. And allowing myself the mental space to know that this is not a character flaw.
Taking Control of the Abundance in My Life
The next step was to gain control of the household budget. Every expense is now tracked in a software program, by category. All expenditures above about $20 are discussed between my husband and I before they are made.
One of the key points that I realized in doing this was that if I had no credit card debt, I wouldn’t need credit cards – a fairly sizeable portion of our income goes to pay those bills, and only major expenses go on them these days. Even more, though, was the realization that, without debt, my husband or I could decide to quit our day jobs to focus on our business, without sacrificing much (if any) of the comfortable life we have now. So we made a plan to start focusing on paying things off now, delaying purchasing any new things that aren’t essential, and putting some money aside in savings.
Next came the mental work to do some internal transformation to help make this all a reality. I set about building a picture in my mind of how life would be if I had these things. Our house would have me, my husband, our cats, and eventually our children. We’d be able to park a car in our two-car garage, rather than having the garage full of a roommate’s furniture and all the extra storage for the business. We’d have a large building a short drive away, housing our business, the non-profit organization’s office, and a meditation space for the temple. I’d work there, bouncing between the business, work needed by the other groups sharing the building, and writing on my own, as time and work load dictated. I’d be able to keep a schedule based on what makes my body happiest, rather than based on my employer’s preferred work hours. When we do have children, we’d set up a room just for the kids in that building housing the business, and run our own little mini-daycare for our employees.
Every week in my own private rituals, I would raise energy around this vision, making it feel more and more real each time. I took a Chinese coin and charged it with this energy, and I carry that coin around in my wallet to this day. Every time I open my wallet, I see that coin and am reminded to think before spending money, and particularly before pulling out a credit card. I’m reminded of where we’re going, and where we’ve been.
I wrote up a very detailed list of all the things I needed to have happen – the office, more business, both of our then-current roommates moving out, all of it. And I asked my coven for help – in fact, they decided to make helping me manifest it all the major working during one full moon ritual.
Within a month, one of our roommates had moved out.
Even more important, though, was re-programming all the things that told me this was not abundance – the things that made my relationship with money dysfunctional. Many people would go back and re-live experiences, changing things along the way, replacing the old memories with better ones. But in this case, I thought a different tactic was in order.
Over the course of several months, I went memory by memory through all the lessons on wealth and abundance in my childhood. And I firmly planted a “marker” in my head for each one, where I could stand and watch both the way things were, and the way things could have been at the same time – like watching TV using the picture-in-picture feature. In each case, I left the old memory intact, but with a clear comparison of how things could have been, rather than how they actually were.
And now, every time I think about how I could do something the “old” way, I pull up those memories as a reminder – it could be so much better if I stick to the new way of acting. I also routinely set up both “versions” of any potential decision, and compare the likely results as a way of making sure I stay on the right path.
Moving Forward With Abundance
It’s a long journey, and I’ve certainly not solved all the problems yet.
Money wise, we have been making progress - we’ve been paying our employee from the business account instead of our personal accounts more often than not, and business is picking up.
Only a handful of things have gone on the credit cards in the last year and a half – and most of them were unusual business purchases, not personal ones. We’ve re-arranged the credit cards, getting the interest rates down very low - and we’ve got a plan to have them all paid off in a few years.
The car loans got paid off, as have a couple of other outstanding loans, and we’re focusing on throwing everything we have towards paying off one specific debt, then another. We’ve also got a savings account, with an automatic withdrawal from our regular account every paycheck.
This year we went on a short vacation, and paid for it all straight from our bank account. While our tax refund is going to pay for our new deck, there will be money left over for paying off other things, and for putting aside for emergencies.
We’ve spent some money organizing – the business is largely confined to the basement these days, and one of our walk-in closets (which has a window where I can see the moon) became my library and meditation room, with a small working altar.
Time wise, the temple got shut down due to it simply taking up too much time for too little reward. And the time saved there has been re-allocated to my friends and family.
The remaining roommate is working on moving out this year. While he’s said that before, without much success, this time he has an actual plan to make it happen.
I found the non-profit group a tiny corner of someone else’s office and hired an office assistant, and then three months later moved to a better office that meant having our own space. We’ve also been blessed with a handful of office volunteers who are working through a lot of the things that I just don’t have time to do.
The combination of changes means that I have more time to write, and more time to hang out with people who are important to me. It means I have more energy to put towards ritual, and more money to put towards paying off bills. And with each bill that gets paid off, there is even more money to put towards paying off the other bills.
And over time, the things I used to do seem more and more alien to me. The new ways of viewing things seem more normal, and are easier to follow. It’s been a long time since we went and bought something “just because” – both my husband and I are more likely to put off the initial desire for something until we’ve had time to discuss and determine whether we can pay for it in cash.
We’ve also decided to clean out closets and storage areas, have a yard sale, and donate whatever is left to charity. My husband started taking the bus to work because it was cheaper than driving, and in doing so, we have decided to sell one of the cars, and the motorcycle. They’re nice status symbols, but just not really important to us anymore.
Even one of my most closely held desires – the desire not to let people down – has fallen to the strength of this new vision of how I want life to be. I came to the conclusion while writing this article that I would resign as director of the non-profit organization I’ve run for the last two years. The stress I was under to keep things functioning and the time it takes away from my family finally reached a point where they outweigh the good things that running the group brought me. While it is not the easiest thing for the organization to handle, I’m sure they’ll find someone equally talented who will be able to do a fine job running it. In the meanwhile, the 20-30 hours a week that I’ve put into this the last two years will now be used for other things, particularly writing, growing the business, and spending time with the people who are important to me.
Because wealth is not about what you do, or how much you do, it’s about what kind of life you live with what you’ve got.
Bibliography
Merriam Webster Online Dictionary, Retrieved July 9, 2007 from http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/abundance
Janet Callahan is a Detroit-area Pagan forging her own path as a Modern American Polytheist. Ms. Callahan wears a large number of hats, including Dianic priestess, writer, artist, business owner, and engineer, although she’s recently permanently retired the hat that says “Program Director of SpiralScouts International.” Ms. Callahan has previously had articles published in Cup of Wonder and has had poetry published on paganliving.com. As always, Ms. Callahan appreciates the unconditional love and never-ending support of her husband Barry, her mother Linda, and her close friends and family-by-choice, JCB and JTT, as she pursues a more creative and fulfilling life.
Financial Magic
Vincent Stevens, I.S.U.A.G.
A note on definitions:
In this essay, I use the term “financial magic” to refer to all magic working in the financial sphere from job hunting, to attracting money, to gaining wealth.
Introduction
I was introduced to complex financial magic in 2004, when I decided to apply my interest in magic to financial means. I had often avoided it for such purposes as most reports I had heard on financial magic had been of results that were at best unreliable or unpredictable or at worst complete failures or disasters. In addition, I had seen people often distracted by financial magic to the point that they failed to apply non-magical (and more effective) solutions to their issues.
However, as my magical practices had gone on, I became aware of the many ways one could apply magic, and that financial magic was an area that promised to be both helpful and interesting to explore. After having several definite successes in financial magic, I felt I can use this essay is an attempt to codify my findings and experience into a useful guide.
In talking to several pagans and magicians over the years, I have heard them decry the state of financial knowledge in the pagan and magical community. I have argued in turn that this is not a problem unique to any community. In my country, the United States - people’s financial understanding is often abysmal and it’s not relegated to any one group or subculture. As of this writing, I live in a country whose savings rate, for the population as a whole, border on the negative - and this during a time of changing economies and Globalization.
Financial knowledge is important to financial magic for one simple fact - if you don’t understand the system you’re working magic with and on, your magic’s chance of success is much lower. What financial knowledge I have came, in fact, from realizing how much I and my friends didn’t know when I was younger and sitting down and learning. In short, a good deal of my knowledge comes from a post-college panic where I realized the depths of my own ignorance. These moments are excellent teaching tools, so treasure your panic. People may know their gods, their Sephiroth, and their spells, but if you’re working on something as a “black box” of a system that’s a mystery to you, then you have less to work with. Your magic and its outcomes will be affected as you can’t “connect” to the contents of what you’re trying to work with. Magic is a useful tool. It is the ability to take the complex relations of the world and synchronize them with our mental and physical activities, and bring about effective results by this interaction. But if we don’t understand the systems, including the financial systems we work with, we limit ourselves.
So, in short if you’re going to do financial magic, you need to understand how the financial world works. That may sound boring, trite, or frightening, if not a combination of all three. However, I’ve found in both financial knowledge and financial magic, understanding finance can be an exciting experience. Money and trade have been with humanity since the beginning, and it is well worth getting to know them better.
The rest of this essay presents an outline for integrating financial knowledge into your magical practices. You may not do everything listed below; perhaps in fact you’re in an emergency and need some financial magic now. But the exercises and time line below are meant to produce understanding, and results.
Step 1: Your Psychology Of Money
The first step to dealing with financial systems and magic is dealing with ourselves, our thoughts, and feelings about money. In fact, as you do financial magic, your own psychology will be with you for all of your practices - so you need to understand yourself first. After all, no matter how many magical models you use or gods you invoke, you yourself are still the one common factor to all your work, your successes, and your failures.
The problem with understanding our attitudes and psychological approaches to money is not ignorance - it’s the fact that we’re used to it. Purchasing, investing, and paying bills are all so automatic to us, so common that we don’t think about them. We’re swimming in a sea of electronic payments and exchanges of currencies, often little aware of what we’re doing, why, and what it means - until we pause and think.
Making the effort to understand your attitudes towards financial issues lets you be a more effective magician. You can figure out how to direct your energies, how to work around any particular personal issues that may sabotage your efforts, and avoid mistakes in the future. You may even learn a few related things you didn’t expect, or have a good laugh at your past successes or mistakes.
I strongly recommend that, if you are new to financial magic or at all unsure of your goals and abilities, you review your attitudes and feelings about finance with the exercises below before making any attempt at workings. The psychology of money, economics, and finance is subtle and something we all too rarely think about. You don’t need any backfire or even unexpected successes in such a delicate area. The wrong success can be as much of a problem as a failure or backfire.
These exercises are designed to make you pause - and think. Use them as recommended and as needed. They are not overtly magical, but may lead to useful discoveries. Your goal, in short, is to better understand yourself. You might be surprised how much you don’t know about this person.
EXERCISE 1:
Write down five things you believe firmly about money, finances, or economics. Once you’ve written them down, ask yourself why you chose to believe them. Do not blame anyone or anything else; determine your choice, conscious or subconscious, for each thing. If you’re not sure you can come up with an explanation, pick the best one that pops into your mind - its likely closer to the truth than you realize. Take complete responsibility for your beliefs.
Think over your answers and write down the impressions you had about yourself and your answers.
If you are determined to do financial magic, do this exercise at least once a week until you feel comfortable doing it. See what you learn about yourself and what you believe. What do you find out?
EXERCISE 2:
Write down your financial goals. Do this once a month as you engage in financial planning or magic. Again, ask yourself why you chose these goals and take complete responsibility for them. Keep this up during your financial magical practice.