Tag: IOT British Isles Section

Dreamworking 

By Coral Carte

Recording and understanding one’s dreams is one of the foundational practices for a chaos magician, and is part of the novitiate curriculum for the Illuminates of Thanateros. I have been keeping a dream diary since I was 18, after encountering the writings of Carlos Castaneda, whose explorations of dreaming as a shamanic art opened a doorway for me into a deeper dimension of magic. Over the years, I’ve come to recognize that there are many kinds of dreams. Some offer clarity on everyday life, elaborating on the subtle emotional layers of mundane events. Others are unmistakably magical — revelations from the deep psyche that offer guidance, warnings, or invitations to refine one’s practice. And then there are those dreams that cross into the underworld, where it becomes possible to commune with the dead and other beings.

Dreaming is central to my path as both a chaos magician and a human being. Some dreams have left an indelible mark upon my soul. Once, not long after my mother’s death, I dreamt that I was with her in the land of the dead when I encountered a close friend who had appeared unexpectedly. He seemed shocked and confused, so I stopped him, calmed him, and stood by as he continued his journey. Only later did I learn that he had been shot and I most probably had been on the other side to meet him as he crossed over. Encounters like this remind me how fluid the boundaries of consciousness can be, and how the dreamspace allows us to serve as witnesses and companions in the mysteries of death and rebirth.

I keep both a magical diary and a dream diary. The act of recording dreams is a dialogue with the subconscious — and the subconscious, once it knows it’s being heard, begins to speak more clearly. I found that preparation is important: setting an intention before sleep, leaving a glass of water nearby, and keeping a notebook ready for immediate recording upon waking.

Once the dream recall is working and your dreams are clear enough to be recorded, then it’s time to work on the significance between the deeper layers. Give each dream a title, note the date, and list the symbols. Some, like water or stairs, are universal; others are deeply personal — square white tiles personally bring a recollection of my grandmother’s kitchen and therefore represent my safe space. Over time, as you weave these meanings together, the dreams begin to reveal the architecture of your own magical practice.

Learning the art of dream working not only deepens one’s magic, but also refines the subtle senses, opening channels of perception through the aethers. With patience and devotion, the dreamer becomes a bridge between worlds — able to receive guidance, commune with unseen intelligences, and move with greater awareness through the vast tapestry of consciousness itself.

The Origins of the Role of Priest of Chaos – by Dave Lee

The idea of the Priest/ess of Chaos has been in the IOT for decades, probably originating with Pete Carroll’s Psychonaut, particularly ‘Occult Priestcraft’ and ‘Ordination’.

‘A magical priest as distinct from an adept is someone capable of administering the sacraments and rites of initiation, exorcism, Extreme Unction and Mass, and of discoursing wisely upon mysticism and magic to whomsoever may require these things of him.’

He adds: ‘Most adepts will be able to function as priests unless they are following a particularly solitary path. Initiates will find that acquiring the powers of a magical priest does much to further their progress towards adepthood.

‘An occult priest should be capable of dealing with all of these issues:

  • ‘To provide techniques of Emotional Engineering.
  • To give life a sense of Meaning.
  • To provide some means of Intercession or Intervention.
  • To supply an explanation of Death.
  • To formulate a Social Structure or Cult.’

As you can see, these functions could be expressed within the IOT but it’s clear that they’re meant as skills to acquire for service to non-members.

The  BI Section’s first admin document, the MT’s handbook (from around 1994) mentions in the section ‘Work towards 3*’ that ‘You may also consider beginning the work of the Priest or Priestess of Chaos, including promoting Chaos Magick to a new audience.’

So the functions of the P of C have been understood as:

  • priestcraft for service to non-members, such as baptisms, marriages and funerals. ‘Hatching, Matching and Dispatching’
  •  Someone who can ‘discourse wisely’, i.e. bring chaos magic to a new audience.

The latter function overlaps with one of the ‘Obligations’ of the Adept, as spoken in the Adept Ritual (Liber Kaos):

              ‘I offer myself as a vessel through which the pact may pour out teachings of magic.’

This identifies the PoC as one of the functions of the 2* Adept.

Obviously not every Adept is suited to doing public presentations, but I think every Adept should be able to articulate their magical life to the extent they can communicate something of its essence to non-IOT people.