New Release: Lake of Fire – A Daemonolater’s Guide to Ascension

Jump into the Abyss and learn to communicate and path work with the Daemonic Divine through ascension practice.

In Lake of Fire: A Daemonolater’s Guide to Ascension, Daemonolatress S. Connolly discusses the practice of ascension in theory and technique. Included are ascension formulas, meditations, astral work, dream work, and fear facing rituals meant to help the practitioner traverse their own lake of fire, and stare into the abyss. Also included is commentary on the practice of ascension, gleaned from over thirty years of working with the Daemonic Divine.

This is a KindleUnlimited titles! GET NOW ON AMAZON

Paperback forthcoming.

Daily Practice, Now With Motivation! #domagick

Today I wanted to talk a little bit about the importance of doing regular magical work. I’ve blogged about this before. Author and personal close friend of mine, Andrieh Vitimus, is starting up his new site this month (February) called Do Magick. For those of you who remember the Magickal 30 that he used to run, this is a newer incarnation of that. It’s a bit easier since participation happens in social media groups and on your own blog, twitter, or Facebook. A simple hashtag added to posts makes it easy for people following or participating to find the magicians who are actively participating.

The general premise is that you spend some time researching and preparing for the magick, then you spend at least thirty days embarking on the magick. During this time you journal what you’re doing and take really good notes while you’re actually working through the magick. And you share this (as detailed or vague as you like, though detail is more fun) through social media so that other magicians can follow along and see your progress on the magical work.

The entire project is meant to encourage magicians to go beyond thinking about magick, and reading about magick, and actually doing the work. Those of you who know me know that I am big on people actually doing the work. So I wholly support the entire project, and will be participating regularly. Posts for my own work will appear on my personal blog so that readers and those interested in magick will hopefully be inspired to do their own work. Posts will be tagged #domagick like this one. Of course if you’re not much of a voyeur and you’re ready to jump in and join us, you can go to the website and learn how to sign up. There are instructions on how the whole process works and if you need more information you can contact Andrieh directly.

So what are you waiting for? Sign up! I look forward to seeing what you’re doing and I hope you’ll enjoy reading about what I’m doing.

When Demons Wear Masks

This week I worked with Foras, a demon who can teach us how to strengthen our minds as well as our bodies. And who wouldn’t want that? Me, apparently—or so I thought. Despite my best intentions and several attempts, I couldn’t connect with him at all.

There are many reasons why my invocations might have failed, but I didn’t need to dig deep into my psyche or journal for hours to figure it out in this case. Simply put, I couldn’t see past his description in the grimoires. Every time I set out to meet Foras the “strong man,” I ran into Arnold Schwarzenegger during his bodybuilding years. He would raise his oiled arms, flash me a gap-toothed grin, and bellow, “Get to the choppa!” in my son’s worst Arnie impression.

I just couldn’t. My laughter made my typical invocations impossible. After I talked the situation over with my partner, I realized Foras might be throwing me a curveball on purpose. After all, he’s supposed to help clear our minds, not befuddle them. Overcoming the Arnie nonsense my brain kept throwing at me might be all Foras needed to teach me! Next time Foras extended the offer, I climbed in the damn helicopter.

My life has been in chaos this week, I admit. I moved house on the fifteenth and—although good fortune smiled on us during the entire process—I felt completely wrung out from anxiety by the twenty-second. I kept waiting for something bad to happen. A catastrophe has occurred on every other family move, so my body was sure it would happen on this one too. Our cat also seemed to be waiting for the other shoe to drop; he sang constantly, the world’s furriest opera star. Perhaps he could sense all the excess adrenaline running through my veins. Unfortunately, it’s taking my poor cat longer to calm down than it did me, but he wasn’t able to soar with Foras over a vast field of green yesterday afternoon like I was.

As the chopper lifted into the sky, all the nonsense that had stood between Foras and I fell away. I could still hear the copter’s blades above me, their rhythm carrying me into the heavens like a shaman’s drum. I didn’t turn to see the pilot. I no longer needed to know what Foras looked like to sense his energy. My mind suddenly seemed as clear as the blue sky all about me. I watched as the palm trees dwindled in size below me and enjoyed the quiet. That might seem ridiculous given how loud helicopters are, but in that moment I felt like the only man in the world. I knew I could return to the deserted island below me anytime I wanted to do so—and that it would be free of singing cats.

My partner interrupted me shortly afterward. He winced when I told him I’d been meditating, and I don’t blame him. I haven’t cut him much slack lately, but I haven’t cut myself much either. In a world where disaster is a sure thing, there hasn’t been any room. My brief time with Foras gave me the space to breathe and be realistic again. The crisis is over. And of course, my brain threw garbage at me! I’ve been a little busy. During a period when many people wouldn’t have bothered meditating at all, I should be proud that I got in a couple even mildly successful sessions.

Looking back, the question is: did my invocations fail entirely? I assumed they did because images of a greased, near-orange Arnie kept flooding my mind. In all likelihood, I was being too picky about the face Foras chose to wear. I’ve counseled numerous newbie magicians not to dismiss pop-culture characters immediately when they appear in visualizations. Twenty years of pounding the drum and taking journeys to the Otherworlds has taught me not to toss out the advice of a superhero just because he arose from a comic book. Likewise, I won’t ignore Spock’s theories because he ‘doesn’t exist.’ Neither do most Pagan gods, according to the general populace.

I won’t argue one way or another whether characters like Spock can come to exist on the astral plane. On the other hand, I’ve heard more people around the world can recognize Darth Vader than Jesus. While that may not be true, Vader’s cultural impact can’t be denied. For many of us, characters like he and Spock were the real gods and monsters of our youth. It only makes sense for them to occasionally take the limelight in our meditations and journeys. What doesn’t make sense is when we throw out their lessons unheeded.

I’m not suggesting that anyone worship pop-culture figures, though some Pagans do. Again, different strokes for different folks. Whatever you think on the subject, I know I’ll be quicker to take my own advice next time such a weird, giggle-inducing image pops into one of my journeys. Once or twice might have been my brain churning up trash, but a third time? That kind of persistence means something, and I would have been a fool to ignore it. If I had, I would have missed out on what Foras had to teach me just because Arnie rubbed my rhubarb the wrong way. Strong men are fine, but all those veins? Yuck! And I never could get through Predator.

Even so, apparently Arnold had something to say to me… after a fashion.

All hail Foras.

NOW GET IN THE CHOPPA!

6 Reasons Daemonic Invocations Fail

[This post is cross-posted from www.s-connolly.com]

Okay, so I’m sure there are more than six reasons that a Daemonic invocation could fail (in the manifestation department, both literally and figuratively). There could be any number of reasons based on the exact circumstances of said invocation/evocation (pick your poison).  But I’ve found there are six very common reasons this happens.

  1. ARROGANCE: No one likes a douche, not even Daemons. Not all Daemons respond well to being threatened, commanded, and talked down to.  This is where respect for the spirits you work with (even if dosed with a healthy smattering of fear) is important. You’ve heard the old adage, “You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar” ??  As above, so below. If a magician wouldn’t expect a person to show up to one’s house when rudely threatened or commanded to be present, why would one think a Daemon would be any different?
  2. FEAR: The magician is terrified. If you’re afraid, it might be a Daemon kept its distance because it didn’t want to give you a mental breakdown. If your psyche is too fragile to handle Daemonic manifestation, they can tell and they may still show up, but manifestations may be more subtle, or even so subtle a magician doesn’t recognize it for what it is.
  3. INDECISIVENESS: The magician isn’t really clear on what (s)he wants.  A Daemon can’t help a magician if that magician is not clear in what he wants, or the type of help he needs exactly.
  4. INSINCERITY: The magician isn’t sincere in what (s)he wants. If the magician has no FEELINGS toward what she wants, she can’t really claim to be sincere about it. In that case most Daemons will just shrug the insincere magician off. This is one of the big reasons having other people do magick for you doesn’t always work so well unless you know the person to some degree and they are somehow emotionally invested in your situation.
  5. NON-COMMITTAL: The magician doesn’t really want to commit to the magick or do the additional work necessary to bring about the manifestation of it. Basically, the magician is lazy and just wants everything handed to him/her after saying a few incantations. This is rarely how things work.
  6. UNREALISTIC EXPECTATIONS: It may be that the rite was well attended and the magick is manifesting, the magician just doesn’t realize it because what she’s expecting is completely unrealistic. Is she expecting burning pentagrams and dark figures rising from her living room carpet? Is the magician expecting a Daemon to drop a cool million on his doorstep for him to casually pick up and spend as he wishes? The magician in this instance might need to lower his/her expectations. Be realistic.

To circumvent these issues the magician must be respectful, able to stand against his fears, be decisive, be sincere, and commit to every magickal act and invocation. If he can’t do all six, then maybe he should reconsider performing the work at all. By paying heed to these six areas, he will increase his chances for successful manifestation significantly.

To learn more, join my newsletter in order to download the free chapbook: 10 Steps to More Effective Magick.  Need even more incentive to add your name to my mailing list? Members of my list are the only people who will have access to the grimoire The Preeminent Curse (coming in spring/summer 2017) and list members are also the first people who will have access to Official Melisa titles and limited edition print runs of new grimoires. If something sells out to my newsletter list, it won’t be offered to the general public. Additionally, newsletter subscribers are the first to know when significant new works become available.

PS- If you’re already on my mailing list and still want 10 Steps to More Effective Magick, just write to me from the email address you subscribed from and I’ll email you a copy.

DB Publishing: New Year, New Books!

DB Publishing & Official Melissa have some fantastic offerings for you in the coming year.

If you missed any of 2016’s offerings, check out the Daemonolater’s Guide series. Seven (so far) small guides with big results!

Then there was the Book of Agares: A Manifestation Grimoire .

In 2017, expect a few more Daemonolater’s Guides, as well as Daemonic Prosperity Magick.

That said, I also have a few additional titles coming out. One that will be exclusively for members of S. Connolly newsletter (my mailing list), The Preeminant Curse, and one that will initially only be available to my mailing list, Tredecium Daemonia. The limited edition (initially only available to mailing list members) will have bonus content. The publicly available hardcover edition will have only some of the bonus content, and the paperback will be the regular book in paperback. Ebooks of these titles will not be available. PS – if you already subscribed to the Official Melissa mailing list or this blog, you are likely already on the list. A good way to know is if you received an email from me back on November 23, 2016. If you did, you’re already on the list.

Happy reading in 2017! May all of your desires manifest!

Say Goodbye to 2016!

How would you describe 2016? It’s been so bad for some of my friends that they want to stay up until midnight tonight just to watch the old year die. I’m always up for a decent death bed vigil too, but I’m also a horror writer. I’m tempted to cut off its head and drive a stake into its heart for good measure!

But why was 2016 awful for so many people? I suppose we could blame the infamous Mercury-in-Retrograde or the rise of our God Emperor, Trump. Perhaps it is a little of Column A and a bit from Column B. If we work out the numerological value of 2016, adding each digit of the year together, we end up with 9, the number of completion, where all things must come to an end.

I know well enough that not all stories can end on a high note. If they did, happiness simply wouldn’t mean as much. The difference between it and sadness allows us to both recognize and savor joy’s sweetness.

More importantly, however, our stories are not over. You may feel like you played the villain in this chapter of your life. You may think that you played almost no role at all in your life this year—that you were little more than an extra in another person’s big scenes. 2017 promises to be different. When we add up its digits, we are left with 10. In Western numerology, 10 is reduced to 1, meaning 2017 is a year for fresh starts and new ventures.

Tonight, wherever you are, whether you are alone or surrounded by friends and fireworks, take a moment to purposefully wish 2016 farewell. Close your eyes and thank the year for what it has given you. Mourn what it has taken away. Tell it to go screw itself if you must! Then say goodbye. Let it go. You will be here tomorrow. You will be here, in 2017, but it won’t be. You survived and it did not.

Congratulations. You survived.

Happy New Year.

Give 2017 A Magical and Spiritual Head Start With These Easy Tips

Pagans of all kinds set lofty goals at this time of year. Some will aim for the stars and end up with a handful of glitter instead. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Despite what Master Yoda says, there’s value in effort alone. A magician who screws up a ritual is far more powerful than one who never leaves the couch.

Fear of failure can make it hard to pry your ass from the seat cushions, though, especially if you’ve never meditated or practiced magick before. Perhaps that’s why so many new Daemonolaters worry they will “do it wrong.” Truthfully, experienced practitioners worry that too, including me. In my case, perhaps it’s a holdover from being raised in a Christian household, and I’m secretly afraid a little red man with horns and a pitchfork will pop out of the ground to claim my soul. More likely I’m frightened I won’t be able to understand all the old grimoires on my 2017 reading list. For the first time in forever, I feel like a newbie. I understand even better now why daemonic sigils and enns can seem confusing and overwhelming at first.

So what can a new Daemonolater do to ease into daily practice slowly? How can you start fresh with your practice in the New Year?

Created with clip art from Freepik.com.
Created with clip art from Freepik.com.

Try getting in touch with Daemonic Divine through these suggestions.

Appreciate

  • Keep a gratitude journal. Not a wordsmith? Say thank you with a daily doodle or a photograph snapped on your phone. Do specific events or objects remind you of the blessings of particular daemons? If appropriate, say a prayer of make an offering in thanks.
  • Salt and spice your food with thanks to Belial and Verrine for their gifts.
  • Say grace. If you feel uncomfortable saying it at the table, try saying as you fill a pet’s bowl or when you fill the birdfeeder.
  • Eat an everyday food or do a day-to-day chore as mindfully as possible, using all your senses, while you dedicate the task to a daemon. How did your awareness of the task change? Could you sense the daemon’s presence?

Beautify

 

  • Create art that expresses your emotions, a problem that you want to overcome, or how you feel about the Daemonic Divine. Draw, paint, write, sing, knit, make jewelry or incense, sculpt…The possibilities are endless.
  • If you don’t feel that your art is good enough, remember that some of the first recorded spiritual art—cave paintings—were little more than stick figures, and they were more than good enough for the gods!
  • If you don’t know what to do with your arts and crafts when you are done with them, remember that some charities will accept art crafts as donations. Homeless shelters always need warm scarfs, hats, mittens, etc. Also, consider sacrificing any crafts you have made to the Daemonic Divine if it is safe for you to do so and you cannot donate them. Of course, the truly amazing artists among you could open Etsy stores!

 

Cleanse

  • Mindfully cleanse your hands, face, or body with Leviathan’s help. Focus on your physical grime.
  • Use creative visualization, repetitive sounds, and pleasing scents to relieve the tension of the day. Focus on your mental grime while running the light of the daemons you feel closest to through your body if you can picture it. If not, pray at this time.
  • Straighten your living environment while concentrating on sending negative emotions out the door! Ask Amducius to drive all obstacles from your path and Verrine to bring health to your home!

Dedicate

Purposefully plan to do at least one act in a daemon’s name each day:

  • Learn something new for Ronove.
  • Light a candle for Flereous.
  • Read Tarot cards for Delepitore.
  • Observe the moon for Unsere.

Did it change the activity or give it special meaning? Could you sense the daemon’s energy?

Educate

  • Read about your faith, its history, and its traditions. You don’t have to read full books if you don’t have time. Short articles on the internet can be a wonderful starting point if make sure to check the facts you find. Question facts in the name of Lucifer!
  • Try to include material written by those outside your faith to broaden your perspective. Read about other faiths for the same reason, including those you would never consider joining. Be curious.
  • Watch television shows and movies that feature characters of your faith and characters of other faiths. Do you think these portrayals are accurate, based on what you read?
  • Look into attending spiritual get-togethers or joining online forums to engage in discussions with others. Be respectful of group culture while being aware that not all groups truly want to get together to discuss spirituality and magick. Some groups are for coffee hook-ups only, while others want meeting leaders just want to sell you something. Be cautious but open-minded.

Stuff

I have just logged on after many a year. Read some of my own posts. I must have been useful and quite clever in my past. Back in 2011 I mentioned panic attacks. Still suffer from them. Sometimes, personal demons are very hard to beat. Sometimes life can be very hard work, and quitting the whole process seems like a viable alternative. What would there be to gain from this ? Apart from an immediate cessation to what ever you are feeling, also an immediate end to get beat your personal demons. To quote Rocky Balboa “Life is a very mean and nasty place. Life will beat you down and keep you there if you let it. It isn’t about how hard you can hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.”
After 7 years of panic and anxiety issues, I am still here and still moving forward. Yes sometimes life looses its sparkle, but accepting the challenge is better than quitting.

INTO THE ABYSS is based on a true story!

Did you catch this season’s American Horror Story? I’m not sure Roanoke flowed as well as the show’s previous years, but I blame poor writing over a faulty premise. I think films based on “true stories” can work even if the audience doesn’t believe the events portrayed in the movie occurred at all—but only if the audience cares about the characters. Of course, as an occultist, I’ve lived through an unbelievable event or two. Into the Abyss Cover

I’m amazed I made it through some of the things I tried in my twenties. Deciding to summon an Elder God, choosing to walk all seven gates of death on a lark… I have no idea how I survived long enough to hike down into the river valley with three friends on Halloween night, 1996. Perhaps my patron watched over me even then! Regardless of who or what protected back then, whatever we saw in the shadows encouraged me to ward my apartment for the first time. It also led me to write the original draft of “What You Wish For,” which debuts today in Into the Abyss.

When I read the other stories in the anthology, I kept wondering, “How much of this is real? How much have these magicians actually seen?”

After all, sight can be subjective. Consider the latest Marvel movie, Doctor Strange. Without giving any major plot threads away, I can say sorcerers occasionally fight in the movie without “mundanes” noticing their battles whatsoever. Spells protect people from the ugly reality of the situation, just as our own psyches can protect us from unpleasant truths. They do this by editing uncomfortable information out of our awareness. Isn’t it funny how you’ll rarely notice you’ve gained a pound unless you’re specifically watching for such a minute change, but you can’t ignore when an extra twenty stops your jeans from zipping up anymore?

That’s what I mean. We don’t always see what’s right in front of us because we choose not to do so. On the other hand, just because I’m staring at a cookbook and muttering under my breath while stirring cake batter doesn’t necessarily mean I’m struggling with the recipe. It could also mean that I’m reciting an incantation meant to hex the crap out of my neighbor and I’ll soon serve him a big ol’ slice instead! Appearances can be deceiving.

All right—maybe Doctor Strange is fiction. I admit it was hard for me to accept Tilda Swinton as an ancient male Tibetan too. Be that as it may, I have seen martial arts masters like those in the movie use chi energy as part of their attacks. I know magicians that have undertaken the infamous Toad Rite mentioned in Into the Abyss. I have channeled spirits and let them speak through me. And, for better or for worse, I saw the hulking thing that crouched in darkness beneath the bridge in my city’s river valley. I saw it and I heard it and…

Well, now. I suppose you’ll have to read the story I wrote. But be cautious when you venture Into the Abyss.

The line between fact and fiction can be wonderfully, magickally thin.

 

***

 

Into the Abyss collects eleven tales of suspense and horror written by some of today’s most formidable magicians. From the toad rite, to chthonic gnosis, to witches, werewolves and ghosts, to gods, daemons, and madmen, these stories are sure to have something for every reader. Pull up the blankets and turn on the lights—take a journey up the river Styx, Into the Abyss.

Featuring stories by: William Briar, Audrey Brice, David Owain Hughes, Peter Oliver Wonder, and MORE!

 

Be the Hero Halloween Deserves

Witches love a good banishing. As a magician and horror writer, exorcisms fascinate me. Whenever I watch priests battle the Antichrist, I cheer for the men in collars even while I cringe at every negative stereotype those films reinforce about daemons, daemon-worshippers, and Paganism in general.

I don’t need a Catholic priest—or any priest—to rescue me if I feel supernaturally threatened. Of course, not everyone feels as confident evicting spiritual jerks from their home as I do, but I realized a long time ago that witches recognize authorities far older than the titles of man. Since then, I have gone directly to my highest power and simply asked him to intervene directly whenever me or mine have needed protection. I recommend that anyone sensitive to this sort of activity do the same, especially when the veil is reportedly at its thinnest.

But calling on my highest power has often meant more than vibrating the appropriate Daemonic enn and drawing the right sigil on parchment. It has sometimes required I display more vulnerability than I have before—and it has almost always resulted in me knowing myself better, for good or ill. A thing learned cannot be unlearned, and that is the price of seeing God. A thing revealed can never be completely hidden again, and that is the price of exposing your belly to the Divine.

Yet our guts also seek to warn us of danger. Remember the last time you felt heaviness in the pit of your stomach, or when someone disgusted you so deeply you wanted to throw up? In today’s world, our conscience seems to reside in our digestive tracts.  We’re even told to relax by not “giving a shit!” In the past, my teachers have advised me to follow my instincts whenever they manifested through these physical reactions. Then again, many people who wouldn’t consider themselves magickal at all base major life decisions on intuition. And why not? Doing so keeps us firmly anchored in the animal kingdom. We are a part of nature. It feels both foolish and wasteful to ignore its gifts.

So, at the risk of baring my belly and looking like an idiot, I’d like to share a song I have used to banish spirits from my house multiple times, Batdance by Prince. (It’s also part of an eclectic playlist I’m posting for Death on Facebook over the next week.) The movie associated with this album exploded into my life when I was all of fifteen years old. I was mad at the world and drunk on the possibilities I’d discovered in Buckland, Starhawk, and Cunningham. I studied the lyrics, agreed “this town needs an enema,” and decided to flush negativity out of my life with the powers that had set my teenage heart on fire.

How did I do it? Intuitively and embarrassingly, using ecstatic dance and dismissive laughter. I had no idea I was playing with chaos and pop-culture magick. Since then, I have learned a good deal about channeling spirits thanks to “Batdance,” including how to horse more than one at a time. Does this mean I think you all should ghostbust with the late 1980s stylings of Prince?

Hell, no! The musical skeletons in your closet may be entirely different from mine. That’s the point. My relationship with the divine is unique. It’s impossible for two magicians to interface with the same daemon in exactly the same way no matter how hard they might try to duplicate each other’s work. Don’t feel weird if you have to look outside the box for ritual inspiration during the Season of the Witch. I sing and dance for the Daemonic Divine regularly. Sadly, I’m no musician! Until I have a wider variety of hymns to choose from, I can only use the rhythms that move me.

Isn’t that the point?

Happy Rite of Eurynomous, everybody. “I’ve seen the future and it will be Batman…”

…unless he is played by Ben Affleck.