Matters of the mundane: Chapter I
Writing this essay, I am sitting on a train, which is vibrating. I am tapping a keyboard, and the pressure of the keys is registering in the neural centres within my fingertips, these are travelling via electricity to my brain, which in turn processes the signal and allows me to interact. The train vibrates, I can feel this, I can account for it. My fingers will generally find the right keys. And now the train has started to move, so as I look out the window, my eyes have to adjust.
Change.
Everything is changing, and ones attunement with the change, and ability to readjust within this changing world is highly important on the successful road. In the realms of the mundane, which are so often spoken to us as the realms of illusion rather than truth, everything is constantly in change. Plato told us that is was decaying and untrue; indeed there are very few universal principles, the laws of ethics, the processes of politics, even the healthy individual. All that is seems to change. The old berate the young, and the young berate the old. Do they not remember what it was like to be young? Say the in betweens, but then maybe they have forgotten the mistakes they made and learnt from, and maybe they do and it was simply a different reality.
The ability to surf this fluidly changing ocean, to kayak down the turbulent stream of life requires the ability to balance, to stay afloat, to steer to where we want to go. To reach the higher realms, or calmer seas we need to stay afloat long enough. To build a pyramid to the stars we first need to set our foundations in stone on the ground, indeed we need to dig deep, below the ground we currently see to lay firm foundations. The priestly class simply cannot be supported without the yeomen below him farming and creating produce to sustain him.
In the world of magic, for a conjuror to understand another trick, it is highly important that he first knows what he is 'seeing', what is the supposed 'truth', what is the opinion being forced into other peoples minds. Unless he knows this, then there is no way he can work out what feints are being employed on the way to this event.
The dark adept needs a firm grounding in the mundane realm, he must learn the currents and eddies, and how to navigate them, how to steer, how to balance, and ultimately as he challenges himself, he will need to learn how to swim, and how to get out and push when there is no other option. He needs to become a master of his territory, and until this is achieved there is no hope of surviving long enough to reach richer waters of higher produce and resources.
The dark adept has a fundamental requirement to cater for his mundane needs. He must be healthy, he must be financially stable enough to invest in his projects, he must be supported in that human desire of company that hangs around the necks of the large majority of us.
Due to this, skills and talents suited to the mundane world, and its navigation and success within are of much importance.
The mundane supplies the support infrastructure through which we can weave the essence of higher forces, greater powers, from the cool whisps of logic, through the sometimes seismic waves of philosophy, to the deepest darkest esoterica.
So allow yourself the time and indulgence to pour yourself and your abilities into the skills of the mundane world. It is highly important to become fluent within the realm of academia, highly important to become an adamant persuader, highly important to be of healthy mind and body.