Introducing Bondwork
Over the past three months I’ve been working on a general project for myself to “re-enchant my life”. Really, to me, this is one of the most important things I can do in my life, up there with (and tied into) things like “build strong communities” and “make a difference in the world.” But task-management is a thing, and so making it a specific theme has been really beneficial.
Part of re-enchanting my life, to me, means recognizing what in my life is informed by my spirituality. And thinking about that has brought to the fore something that’s in the back of my head a lot in my practice, the difference between “mysticism” and “magic”.
This is a distinction I see talked about pretty frequently in esoteric circles, and there’s a lot of different words for it. For my purposes here, I’m talking about “mysticism” as the pursuit of spirituality towards internal experience, and “magic” as the pursuit of spirituality towards external effect.
I’ll be the first to say that these definitions are not perfect, and that any sort of internal work is likely to have external effects, and vice versa. But still, it seems like a clear distinction at least in terms of how people talk about it. I touched on it a bit in my previous post about Six Ways, in that case talking about ”sorcery”, and reading that book has brought that kind of work to my mind more than ever. In contrast to that book’s “magic” approach, I’m aware that a lot of stuff I talk about here is more “mystical”. I talk about my connections to my gods, my experiences of the spiritual world around me, but less often about what I might do with it.
I think there’s a lot of reasons for this. In part I think that’s because I’m definitely drawn to the mystic experiences, or at least my own particular version of them, and that’s a good and valid thing. There’s also the fact that I don’t often feel a strong need to. My life is pretty good. I’m privileged to not have to do magic for money, or employment, or personal safety.
But I think there’s other reasons too, ones I want to challenge in myself. One is anxiety. Saying ‘here’s magic stuff I do’ sometimes makes me worry I’m going to sound a bit kooky. And then there’s the fact that I’m not good at asking for things. I’ve been known to exhaust myself seeing to others’ needs rather than tending to mine, and there’s been enough times my desires have gone unmet that I’ve learned how to ignore them. And both those things, my worry about cringe and my desire to be comfortable with desires, are things I want to push back against.
So, it’s time to talk about Magic. I know what it looks like, in my context of Wanderers and Antlers and Rivers and Roots, even if I’m not practiced of it. It’s called Bondwork, or if you want to get fun with the wordplay, Ligaturgy. As the name suggests, the tools it operates with are bonds. Relationships. Those usual ‘magical laws’ of sympathy and contagion, brought to the fore and enmeshed in an animist context. Everything is relationships, and Bondwork is about being aware enough of those relationships that they become not just conduits, but spotlights, and ladders, and shields.
How about a concrete example? Sigil work is a thing I’ve done on the regular since I’ve been exploring magic in general, going on two decades now. The classic chaos magic description of sigilization is that you’re abstracting out a desire into something that can work on your ‘deep mind’ or at the ‘fundamental levels of reality’. But in the context of an animistic world of relationships, a sigil is a job posting. It’s a means of forming a working relationship with a specific spirit-of-concept, whose nature is intrinsic to the desire being manifest. From this perspective, the process of making and empowering the sigil needs to be just spiritually-involved enough to get notice, and the attention and effort involved in that process also serves as an offering to the spirit.
Why this, rather than a more classical description of sigil operations? The first thing that comes to mind is that it works for me. When I detach my mind in a classic sigil process, it stays detached. When I do it this way, it stays engaged, and effects seem to come along with it. It also supports the other work I do, providing a way for me to express my own desires (when I get up the courage to do so) while still feeling part of the spiritual ecosystem.
It goes the same way for other ways of approaching magic too. My use of magical tools started to work a lot better when I thought of them as spirit-helpers, with names and needs, even if that need is simply to be well-cared-for. It also helps me find new ways of working with them. Here’s an example: A few months ago, I got a small flashlight/lantern, simply because I liked the look of it. But I found it was drawing my attention in a way that I found rewarding and also curious. So, I focused on building a spiritual relationship to it. Offering attention, energy, kind words, a name. And that bond grew, until I understood its spirit as one that helps me direct and build my own focus when I want to work on a project. A creature of brass and wire and LED, a friend of the Player-with-Light that helps me express myself and finish things that are important to me. I have it glowing right next to me here as I write this.
There’s a lot more to cover about this topic, and I’m looking forward to doing so. Just taking this step to say “I can do magic” is a big one for me, a valuable component in the re-enchantment of my life, and I’m excited to do more.