Breath, Vowels, Abraxas, and the Gestural Phonology of Altered States Some esoteric formulas are not meant to be translated. They are meant to be voiced. This is the point modern readers often miss. We approach ancient magical words as if they were damaged sentences. We ask which language they belong to, whether they are Greek, … Continue reading Sonic Mandalas
philosophy
The Oldest Syllabus: The Mithras Liturgy and the Ancient Object of Esoteric Psychology
What I mean by esoteric psychology Readers of this blog know that I have been circling one idea for years, and lately naming it openly: esoteric psychology. The name needs a word of explanation, because it does not mean what it seems to mean. It is not the psychology of people who believe strange things. … Continue reading The Oldest Syllabus: The Mithras Liturgy and the Ancient Object of Esoteric Psychology
What is Esoterism Really? The Pendulum and the Commuter: Why Nobody Can Define Esotericism, and Why That Is Good News
For forty years, scholars have tried to define esotericism. Faivre proposed a form of thought with six components. Hanegraaff traced a history of rejected knowledge. Bergunder called the word an empty signifier that means whatever a given era needs it to mean. Asprem broke the whole thing down into cognitive building blocks. Each definition corrected … Continue reading What is Esoterism Really? The Pendulum and the Commuter: Why Nobody Can Define Esotericism, and Why That Is Good News
How will Esoteric Psychology evolve?
Old Esoteric Psychology and Works in the Interior Laboratory: towards a lived knowledge As many know, we are currently developing a blueprint for a new approach in esoteric psychology. Esoteric psychology is not a new term. It has been used for decades, often in relation to Alice Bailey, the seven rays, esoteric astrology, soul development, … Continue reading How will Esoteric Psychology evolve?
Working with Abraxas: A New Kind of Inner Report of a Modern Magus
There is something happening in the world of hermetic and magical practice right now. More people than ever are working with sigils, evocation formulas, and inner transformation practices. YouTube channels, online communities, and a growing number of books are bringing these ancient arts into the twenty-first century. At the same time, universities are taking Western … Continue reading Working with Abraxas: A New Kind of Inner Report of a Modern Magus
What Shape is Inner Space? Is it Hyperbolic?
Close your eyes in a dark room and wait. At first, nothing. Then, almost imperceptibly, something begins to move. A shimmer at the edge of vision. A pulse of light that seems to come from nowhere and everywhere at once. Geometric patterns that appear, rotate, fold into themselves and dissolve. You are not imagining these. … Continue reading What Shape is Inner Space? Is it Hyperbolic?
New Landscape Holistic Project: The Magick Megalithic Circle Phenomenology, part 4: The Anima of the Stone – From Chthonic Presence to Enchanted Moura, A Three-Stage Journey Across Six Thousand Years
When visitors sit inside the grey stone oval at Monte Pocilgais, what they encounter is rarely a single, clean experience. It is layered. Something is felt before anything is seen. A weight gathers before any image forms. An atmosphere precedes any thought. Only later, if at all, does the presence begin to acquire a face. … Continue reading New Landscape Holistic Project: The Magick Megalithic Circle Phenomenology, part 4: The Anima of the Stone – From Chthonic Presence to Enchanted Moura, A Three-Stage Journey Across Six Thousand Years
When Psychology Studies the Occult Without Ever Going In
Where is the essence... A new paper in the Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences maps, with considerable care, the historical traffic between Western esotericism and psychology. The author, Júlia Gyimesi of Pázmány Péter Catholic University in Budapest, published "How Psychology Can Benefit From the Academic Study of Esotericism" in 2025, and traces … Continue reading When Psychology Studies the Occult Without Ever Going In
Podcast Episode: Authentic Spirituality And Inner Worlds
Pip: If you have ever suspected that the wellness industry is selling you the feeling of awakening rather than the thing itself, breath4balance has some thoughts — and some receipts. Mara: Jan has been writing this week about what authentic inner life actually looks like, how mystical traditions encode real experience, and where symbolic systems … Continue reading Podcast Episode: Authentic Spirituality And Inner Worlds
The Light That You Are: What the Tibetan Rainbow Body Actually Means
Jan M. Keppel Hesselink, MD, MSc, PhD There is a story told in Tibetan Buddhism that sounds, to the Western ear, like pure mythology. When a great meditation master dies, the body does not decay in the ordinary way. Instead, it dissolves into colored light. Witnesses describe rainbows appearing around the place of death. The … Continue reading The Light That You Are: What the Tibetan Rainbow Body Actually Means
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