Inedible wrote:Likes2Read wrote:
Suppose you buy a car. The car dealer is not going to provide you with driving lessons, pay for your gas and car insurance, and drive you around. Once you buy the car, the onus is on you to get/renew your license, pay car-related costs, and drive the car yourself.
Great example. A car. Everyone can see it and touch it and tell you it is real. People at the grocery store who don't know you and haven't just meditated for hours can put your groceries in it. These days cars even talk to you when they want more gas or oil or something.
Charles_Odinforce wrote:
That's all fair, and I was seeking to clarify more than anything. Of that, roughly 3%, what have you found is working best for you? I may have suggestions that can build on that depending.
My main conclusion is that there is no substitute for putting in time sitting to meditate. I started ramping up in September when my biofeedback device arrived for measuring heart rate variability. It lets me know right away when it is working and when I am just wasting my time. So I gradually started ramping up my time and now a normal day is a minimum of 90 minutes. 120 is more typical, and a few days have been closer to 240. There is nothing like immediate feedback to keep someone going.
The lighting and background at work are good. I sometimes start to see auras glowing around people there. When it happens, it starts out small and starts to glow quickly until it starts to be more important than the physical body of the person. It isn't under control. It just happens. That is the annoying part. There is no doubt in my mind that it is real and meaningful, but it isn't something I do so it is hard to count things like this.
Ok, those are some fair and good responses. On the "no substitute for hard work", I can't argue that. There are a lot of things that boost work put in, but without the work going in they don't help much at all. What work have you done with things like guided meditation if any?
Likewise, what work have you done with manifestation toward a goal? What I mean is, a lot of focus seems to be sensing a spirit in a very "pronounced way" rather than working with a spirit/spirits to achieve a goal. I come from a very traditional background of magick in some respects, with the biggest focus being on achieving a result in one's life. You change other peoples lives and your own life enough times, you stop doubting.
The aura seeing is a good start. Have you tried it with a mirror, even though not something you reproduce your own reflection can act as a "blank pattern" for your mind to then overlay your spiritual senses onto?
I'm a proponent of the idea there is no "extra sense" and that all senses are overlaid through the mind onto existing senses. This is why we will have 2 people see the same spirit in 2 different ways with "key similarities" those similarities are something defining of the spirit, the mind is filling in the details. Everyone has theories on the why of that, and I won't get into my own thoughts too much, but I can also see why that would be creating a lot of doubt.
To be blunt, it will never be like a car. However, it may wind up being like a martial art. More often than not the spiritual is something you see "when in motion." You can talk about taking a martial art to someone who doesn't practice that. You can explain what it is like. However many laymen will doubt your abilities till you put them into a wall with it or face first into the ground. Magick in my mind is similar. It's why I don't seek to prove it to people that don't believe. If you go gentle (just as you would in a martial art) they will argue that they could just go faster or harder to prevent a movement. Only once you've injured people do they overcome that bias. So it is in martial arts, so it is in magick in this respect.
I would put my spirits on tasks, REASONABLE tasks, remembering that all magick is constrained to the altering of probabilities (in a greater or lesser degree) and that even magickal beings are held to those limits.
I'd also look into Shamanic Journey practices, guided meditation (youtube has a lot of free ones) to help build up the image center of the mind. There is this bias against using the mind to fill in the details from the "sense of impression" we get when in communication. I'm also of the belief that many people who claim to not engage that part of their brain have gone into an elaborate set of mental hoops to avoid admitting they do that.
I often recommend someone start journey work, or projection into a realm, with the visualization of a tunnel that they can feel but not see. This gives you a sense that works well with eyes closed as you gradually progress to sight. Most people respond well to that. At some point the part of the mind that controls journey kicks in during the "tunnel walk" and you find yourself where you were aiming to go.
Lastly, at least for this communication at this moment, if it must be "something like a car" for you then I'd say you are walking the wrong path. The spiritual is a very insubstantial thing in experience many times, with profoundly substantial impacts in the mundane realm. Now, if you are comfortable with it being like a martial art, where the proof is in the application initially, and the more esoteric becomes visible as time goes on, then I say keep with it!
It's a great idea to have someone have a look whether the spirits conjured to you would manifest or show up to another person. I did this too. I asked my therapist (she does gestalt therapy, heartIQ, etc and meditations) to have a look and she actually saw my fylgia 
I was more than happy about it.
