I would venture and say, you KNOW it when it happens and you know it is real and you are not daydreaming. It is true as Rawn said, if you go through the steps then it is a controlled experience based on the progression you have learnt through the previous steps. However if and when these things happen, not a ritual but spontaneously, then you feel it and you know it. Have you looked calmly, not intensely at a tree and felt you were part of it? Or seen the wind blowing in the willows and identified to the blowing air? If you have then you know it is not your imagination but a real FEEL it experience. Bardon allows you to wifully control it because as a Magician you are the Master of the elements and not merely a wondering soul With my best wishes jay ----- Original Message ----- From: JSC_Magi <jsc_magi@...> To: BardonPraxis@yahoogroups.com Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2003 3:38 PM Subject: [BardonPraxis] re: Practice Rituals & Doubting Yourself Good day to all, First off let me ask a question. Does anybody do a kind of ritual when they do their bardonian exercises? I mean do you just sit on a chair or lay down somewhere and say " Ok, time do do my exercises!" or do you actually do a sort of ritual before you get into the bardonian exercises. By a ritual I mean like doing the Lesser Banishing, or a purification or lighting inscense? The reason i ask is that me and a fellow occultist have been having an ongoing debate/discussion for the last several years as to whether it is better to light inscense, do a purification etc, etc before starting the exercises or just to do them. My argument is that by doing a ritual like a purification and lighting inscense and a short empowered meditation/prayer for guidance before doing the exercises set up a kind of sacred energy aura to the practise, its help you center yourself and get into the proper mind frame. His argument is that by doing this you are setting up certains keys that your soul/mind/spiriy, whatever you want to call it, will need to be able to achieve the same results. In other words when you need to use your skills, such as in a healing, you won't be able to because your "Self" will need to tune into the keys to be able to access the energy needed because that is how you have conditioned your "Self" to tap into and access and use your skills. Next question. How does one learn to discern the difference when talking to spirits, or when doing mental travelling etc, between what reallity is and fantasy. I mean that when doing a tarot reading there is an unwritten rule that you should not do a divination on your own microcosm because you are too attached to the situation and will get cloudy resulsts. By this I mean since the answers and interpretations come through your "Self" wishfull thinking will influence the results and bring you the answer/interpretation that you are looking for. Now does this apply to tha later Bardonian exercises like mental wandering and contacting elementals? e.g. you are conversing with a spirit, or so you think, and get a reply. Now is it your own mind using information you already possess answering you or is it the real deal? In other words is this truly a magical experience wher you are truly contacting a spirit or just wishful thinking in other words a figment or your imagination? e.g 2. You are doing your mental wandering exercise things are going good, things are going great. You see your cat, your room etc. You go further out and as you do you see a car crash or something totally different like someone stealing your mail etc etc. Now how can you tell what is real and what isn't, did it really happen or where you just daydreaming? Hope I didn't confuse people too much but these are questions that have been nagging at me for a while and was wondering about other practitioners opinions and maybe even experiences if you are so guided by your "Self" to answer. Thanks to all for your replies, ideas and opinions. Lloddfafnir Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ADVERTISEMENT To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: BardonPraxis-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]