(Actual) Splathouse Lore, Part 2: The Magician and The Stage

(Actual Splathouse Lore is an article series detailing how events in my life lead to the page you’re on now. If you haven’t yet, go back and read Part One).

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.”-Marianne Williamson

Ya’ know, I don’t know who the hell Marianne Williamson is.
I don’t-and that’s a shame. Especially considering I’ve thought back to this quote countless times over the last few years. Every time I do, I deny it at first. Failure is terrifying. Plenty of people are afraid of it. I feel a slight pang of rage when I read the first part. It flies in the face of human experience, of the creative process. Failure is an omnipresent monster stalking you. It’s wrapped in the shadows of self doubt. It strikes in the long hours at night-just as you’re about to slip off to sleep. It trails its fingers over your face just to remind you it’s there.

But then I keep reading. I get to the second half of that quote, and I pause.

“Our deepest fear is that we’re powerful beyond measure.”

It’s a confusing line. Especially with failure just a breath away. But that doesn’t make it any less true. It’s the spark that leads to the bonfire of realization with the last line.

“It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us”.

I started this week by telling you about one of the absolute lowest points of my life. A night I still vividly remember, even almost a decade later. I was so enveloped in the absolute darkness, the total acceptance of failure it took a goddess to burn it away.
Except it didn’t. That goddess, it was just me beneath it all. That last shred of myself saying “damn it, you shit head, wake up and fucking fight for this. Do you wanna die choking on your own vomit, or DO YOU WANT TO LIVE FOREVER?”

At the time, I didn’t have an answer. Intrinsically, I knew I could be happy. I knew I had the same potential-the same light-as anyone. I just didn’t know if I was strong enough to reach it on my own.
So my brain made something happen. The universe, it melded my reality until I found a way.

Maybe-in the most obtuse sense-I wanted what that goddess promised.

With a deep breath and way too many esoteric books, I came up with an idea. It seemed a horrid, terrible idea at the time. Really just a real shit-turd of a concept. I didn’t want to do it.
But we’re here now, aren’t we?
That dumb idea, it actually worked.

Birth of a Warlock:

Chaos magick (with a K) is a modern absurdist school of theory and philosophy. It was created by Peter Carroll  sometime during the late 70s and early 80s. To spare you a tremendous amount of grifty bullshit, chaos magick is “the power of positive thinking with fancy trappings”. The theory states that a magician (sigh, I hate even using the term) isn’t bound by method. It is their raw belief that shapes the universe on a microscopic scale-then at the macro level. If you believe hard enough in what you’re doing, your willpower becomes manifest.

It works. Not because magick is real or any such rubbish, but rather because it places you in a position to pursue change. It encourages you to seek resolution to issues within your life you might otherwise not have resorted to. Like servitors.

If you’ve no idea what that is, it’s okay. You’ll catch that a lot with occultism. Folks love using terminology and phrasing to purposefully make their ideas obtuse.

In the interest of time again, a servitor is essentially a representation a magician uses to channel energy. The more you believe in the servitor, the more likely the placebo effect of its energy is to help you. Let’s say you wanted to channel Superman. You could wear a shirt with his logo as you meditated on his strength empowering what you’re doing. Or you could wear a cape, or look at a picture of him as you sing his theme song. Whatever method you take, the requirement is the same-you have to fervently believe in it. You would have to honestly believe Superman was lending you his power and it was flowing through you.

Yes, I’m completely aware of how that sounds. And yes, people who practice chaos magic theory are aware of it too. The entire school is tongue in cheek-but the effects of chaos magic on us psychologically are very, very real. Think of it not as wizardry, but allowing people to believe they’ve control over their lives when they thought they had none. Again, it is the belief-not the methodology-that empowers the “magician”.

My servitor?
It was a more confident, capable and handsome version of myself. A guy who always had a barb or a joke. Someone who could bring people together, and crush those that would do them harm. He would accomplish it by being a storyteller, a performer. To make my belief in him strong, he had to be a lot like me. Almost a “gary stu”, as the kids say. So he would be grumpy. He would be a chain smoker, perhaps with a few self-confidence issues.

This is how lore jack came to be. The rest of his identity was set dressing and play to enhance my own inherent belief. Grant Morrison did something extremely similar with King Mabb in his comic The Invisibles. No, really. The Invisibles was a long-form sigil magic. Morrison has even confirmed it himself in interviews. With the concept of this “other self” ready to be projected, I sat down and tried to figure out what would make me happy.

This was roughly 2014. By this point I had been producing content since 2008. I had years of podcasting experience under my belt-but my passion was writing. It always had been ever since I learned to hold a pencil. I had wrote countless articles, and roughly a hundred pages of horror stories. I had spun my gears for a great long while, and felt depressed. I hadn’t gotten any further with my writing or content than I had when I started.

I couldn’t do it.
But “Lore Jack” could. He could make use of the belief in his abilities to fuel content production. The happiness and energy of other people would empower him to greatness.
So I started writing, adapting his mannerisms as my own. He needed big, powerful psychological energy to fuel his antics-which meant making a lot of people very, very happy. I thought and I thought, hunched over a desk with cigarette after cigarette turning my lungs to popcorn.

Then I-well, He-had an idea.
Porn made people happy. Porn made people really, really happy. Like the incantation to a spell, I could find the right words to help people cum. I could help make people happy in this hellscape of an existence we call life. But to put my “spells” to work, to empower myself with “magic”, I needed a stage.
Where else is a magician to perform?

So I started a blog. Not just for my writing-but to take the power and joy of my readers, and perform the hardest spell of all.

The ability to believe even for a moment that through all the darkness, I still had light in my heart. I still had a beautiful, burning soul. That “lore me”-and myself-were still loved, valid and wanted. It wasn’t easy. No spell ever is, really. But in the darkest moments of self doubt and introspection, I’d get a message. Someone would tell me they loved my work. They would say it made their toes curl, it made them cry. The emotion was palpable and real-and it wasn’t aimed at just my servitor.

It was aimed at me…

The money didn’t matter. Shit, I’d worked for free this long. The pressure fell to be a barely palpable thrum, then nothing. The darkness, depression and loathing in my mind burned away in the fire of self actualization and acceptance. In time, I came not only to accept myself, but to believe I could do anything. All I had to do was take to the stage, and try.

That belief made content production as easy as snapping my fingers.

The Power and Beauty of An Unfettered Soul:

I’d like to end this by saying you don’t have to use magick (with or without the K) to be great. You don’t need a servitor to accomplish creation. If you take nothing else away from the above, take this.
It is your belief that shapes the universe around you. It’s your ability to accept and fully realize your potential that can lead to amazing content and a fulfilled life. I want you to look into the mirror, right now.

Everything that composes you creates planets, universes and life. You’ve all the capability to do the thing and do it well.
Push forth from the dark and see the light of yourself. Even if it’s just a spark, even if it flickers like a candle. Hold that flame close-and turn it into a bonfire.

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