How to Become a Magician
by Max Freedom Long

TO LEARN TO BECOME A MAGICIAN you will need to learn to use some
of your native talents which you may not as yet have taken time to
develop. There are several of these talents. Men and women have
demonstrated them all about us. Hardly anyone lacks latent psychic
abilities which may be trained and made to work in the performance of
magical operations. Telepathy is so easy to develope that many use it
without training. Ability to sense the presence of the beloved "dead"
is very common, and many have excellent mediumistic powers which
could enable them to perform that part of healing magic which depends
largely on spirit aid.

Step One

DEVELOPING THE HYPNOTIC WILL. Begin at once to learn to use
hypnotism, Mesmerism, and the two in combination. To do this you will
begin at once to practice accumulating mana (life force) surcharges.

When you can accumulate a very large surcharge, you can then
begin practicing to learn Mesmerism, which is causing the mana
surcharge to flow through your hands or along your line of vision
into a subject, carrying with it well-made mental pictures or thought-
form clusters (which you will have made in advance by the use of
your "will"). If your mana, which is the vital force of the body, is
sufficiently accumulated and is discharged strongly into the subject,
it will over-power the basic self in him and force him to accept the
mental pictures as his own, then react to them. Healing magic is
performed in this way.

The subject can be made to relax, to sleep, and so on. If the
shock of mana is sufficient, and the thought-form cluster made with
enough power, it can break up and replace complexes in the basic self
of the subject. If there are spirits fastened to the subject, and if
he has been brought to turn over a new leaf so that he will refuse to
respond to the promptings of the spirits, they may be driven out of
him and hypnotically commanded to stay away, after first being broken
away by the Mesmeric shock of the mana you have projected.

Be warned that if you project a surcharge and hurtful mental
pictures to or at a subject, and these fail to be accepted by his low
self, or are blocked from action by his High Self or by his spirit
friends who may be watching over him, the force and the mental
picture will rebound, often with greatly increased power, and lodge
in your own basic self, making it the victim. Use the evil eye or
spell-casting methods at your peril. Also be warned that all about
you are witting and unwitting magicians who may be consciously or
unconsciously projecting mana and mental images at you-- weak or
strong, good or bad.

Begin at once to practice becoming hurtless and helpful in your
every thought and deed. Learn to radiate good and helpful and loving
thoughts and do all you can to do good. In this way you will soon
build a permanent wall of radiation around you which will act as a
great magnet, of which you are the center. It will attract the good
by its positive pole and repel the bad. If you suspect that many bad
thought-form clusters of sickness, bad luck, etc. or many spirits of
an evil nature, are already bothering you from former projections
against you by magicians, or because you have been bad enough to
attract to yourself equally bad spirits, begin at once to use this
affirmation frequently:

"GOOD, GOOD, GOOD! I AM GOOD. I think only
good and helpful thoughts. I do good and eject all
hurtful deeds I try to find and throw our daily any
thoughts of hate, anger, greed, jealousy, and the
like. I now prove my unwavering determination to
swing completely over to the side of GOOD, by
DOING some good deed, no matter how small,
before continuing my day's activities."

THE ASPIRING MAGICIAN will do well to remember that most of his
or her daily tasks are performed to help others to some degree. If
each task is approached and blessed as a SERVICE or a good deed
lovingly done for others, the good will be true coin of the realm.

Step Two

STRENGTHEN YOUR WILL. This is a continuation of the step you
learned to take earlier. After you become proficient in the use of
the Mesmeric force or low mana, begin to strengthen your middle-self
WILL, or mana-mana. You must first take on a fair surcharge of low
mana because, without this being present in your body, the middle
self (conscious mind) cannot get enough of it to make up a batch of
strong will power. This power is developed by daily use of exercises
of holding your mind and full attention on something for as long as
you are able. Make a mental picture of the face of a loved one and
hold it before your minds eye without allowing the face to change in
any way. When it "slips" and begins to change or fade, rest a minute
or two. Accumulate a little more mana, and try again. Keep a watch by
you and note how long you can hold mental pictures. At first you may
find a few seconds your limit. When you have practiced daily for
several years, you will be able to hold the basic self to the task as
long as five minutes, and will by then have developed will power
strong enough to create, by a few minutes of this concentrated
attention on a mental picture, POWERFUL THOUGHT-FORM CLUSTERS which
can be projected by the Mesmeric method described in Step One.

If you wish to know whether you have a strong will now, test
with the Biometer (Note: this refers to the scale used for
psychometric analysis readings described in Max Freedom Long's
book "Psychometric Analysis," and the accompanying scale for
measuring vital force.) Tests made at intervals will show whether
your practice is getting results. Be warned that if you develop your
hypnotic or middle-self will without at the same time developing the
ability to become GOOD and BETTER day by day, you will soon have a
very unbalanced biometric pattern and it will begin to cause you much
more breakdown and trouble.

Some imitation magicians- those not having been trained
thoroughly in Huna- use their hypnotism openly. Beware of these
unless you have obtained their signature, written with their own pen
and with ink, and have tested it on the Biometer to learn whether
they are "black" or "white" magicians. The black will show a perfect
will-pattern but almost no personality circle, or, if a circle shows,
it will be counter-clockwise and usually far from round.

In your own work as a budding magician, avoid the use of
hypnotic suggestion as something apart from the Mesmeric element. Use
Mesmerism as in Step One, with the hypnotic will simply as an adjunct
to aid in creating the very strong mental picture of the GOOD
condition which you wish to implant powerfully in the basic self of
those whom you help and heal. NEVER ADMIT THAT YOU ARE A MAGICIAN,
just say that you have a natural gift for healing and will be happy
to try to use it if the one needing help will turn over a new leaf,
etc.

Helping others to turn over a new leaf and to become ready to be
healed is the GOOD DEED at its best. Remember this always.

TELEPATHIC OR PROJECTED MAGICAL HEALING is an important part of
this work. Contact must be established with the ones to be helped. A
hand-shake will string an aka thread between you which will make it
possible for your basic self to make contact at any time. Or the
basic self can follow the aka thread that is fastened to a signature
written in ink. This contact is telepathic in its nature, and you can
send with Mesmeric force a mental picture of healing which has been
constructed through the use of your WILL. Practice will enable you to
become more and more powerful as you go along. Also, results build up
slowly if the magical treatment is repeated over and over.

Step Three

RUBBING ALADDIN'S LAMP. No magician should be without a good
Aladdin's Lamp. Go to a junk shop at once and buy one. Take it home
and accumulate as large a surcharge of mana as you can. Then build up
your will to a high point of concentration and create a mental
picture of what you wish to have the Genie of the Lamp do for you
when you rub the Lamp and he appears to do your bidding. Millions of
people in the past twenty centuries may have rubbed a Lamp without
getting the slightest response. Their trouble has been that they did
not know that the "oil" needed to fill this type of Lamp is not oil
at all, but is a large surcharge of mana. So build up your surcharge,
make your mental image, and then rub your Lamp. If you don't have a
Lamp, remember that it is only a symbol-- the symbol of LIGHT. Just
think of a genie who embodies all the goodness and so all the LIGHT
you can imagine. Then rub something! Rub your hands together and
affirm:

"I am now calling to the Spirit of Light who
remains ever aware of me and ever ready
to come to me at my request when I fill myself
full of the mana which is the force or oil which
enables the Lamp of the Light to become lighted
and cast its rays down to enlighten me on this
darkened level of being. I affirm with full faith that
I now believe that my call has been heard and
that the Spirit of Light above me has come and
stands ready to receive the oil to be used for
helping and guiding and illuminating me and those
whom I will help. I now send flowing upward along
the connecting shadowy cord a strong flow of mana.
With it I send my carefully and powerfully constuct-
ed mental picture of the condition which I ask be
brought about."

Many aspiring students have given up at this point because they
could not see the Spirit of Light. This is greatly to be regretted,
for the Spirit is always there and will always accept the oil and
begin shedding helpful light. A daily replenishing of the Light which
stands before the altar of your Innermost Being may be needed if the
request you make demands much magical work. All experienced magicians
know that the instant and complete performance of a task by a Spirit
of the Lamp is possible only at rare intervals. They are content to
work for many days to get the full task completed.

BE WARNED at this point that if you attempt to use the magic of
the Lamp without first purifying yourself with many lustrations and
fumigations, drawings of signs and magical circles about you, there
will be grave danger that you will evoke the spirit of a dead person--
a spirit just as uncleansed and tainted with evil as you may happen
to be. If you are greedy and plan selfish gain, the spirit may be
equally so and may take your surcharge of mana and turn to bite the
hand that feeds it. Keep in mind the fact that all fumigations,
incense burnings, washings, and rituals of cleansing are, just like
the "oil" and the "Lamp," merely symbolic. These things, when read
about by a magician in a book of instructions tell him that a
cleansing of his thoughts and heart is indicated. Go back to Step One
and check what was revealed to you concerning GOOD.

Down the centuries magicians have written out their knowledge in
the form of "evocations" and "incantations," also "invocations."
Invariably they have veiled the inner meanings. For this reason the
student must take care not to be caught in the foolish trap in which
so many have been caught. In the semi-secret orders in Europe and
America even today, they are drawing magic circles, performing
strange physical rites, making fumigations, compounding absurd
mixtures of frog's eyes and the leaves of plants gathered in a
cemetery on the night of the full moon, and so on. Rare books
containing rituals and formulae bring hundred of dollars, and men and
women gather to study and to try to use them, always ending with
nothing accomplished.

If the student has seen such books, and there are many of them,
dating from the times of early Egypt on, be warned that the long
repetition of invocations with the exact pronunciation of Names of
Power are quite useless to the uninitiated. The magicians of all ages
have piled one absurdity upon another in their writings, all for the
purpose of causing the greedy outsider to waste his time, if he is
that foolish, trying to perform rites which cannot be performed, and
to learn to pronounce unpronounceable "names" without number. The
famous "Seventy-two Names of God" are part of this blind. So are the
endless names given to supposed gods and demons and spirits, good or
bad.

LOOK BEHIND THIS VEIL OF SECRECY FOR THE THREE
ELEMENTS WHICH ARE SYMBOLIZED IN ALL TRUE MAGIC!

Watch for the veiled mention of the three selves and their three
mana forces. Watch for the inner cleansing rather than the outer. You
can call a spirit, be it bright and good and helpful, or bad and
strong and dangerous, provided you have made a contact with it and so
have established an aka thread along which you can send a telepathic
call-- a flow of mana with the picture of its hearing and coming to
you. But just to know the name of a spirit and to speak it is a waste
of time. There may be a thousand spirits bearing that same name, and
besides, with no contact already made, your call will be empty. Be
warned, however, that if some spirit happens to be near, be it good
or bad, it may hear and accept the call, taking all you have to
offer, if it is bad, and perhaps in the end taking your body away
from you. Evil spirits may remain bound to the earth for centuries,
and may become most wise in the matter of doing evil for and against
the living magician who is even a fraction as evil.

You have read of "sympathetic magic" in which like produces like-
- a sprinkling of water causing a rain, and the pouring out of an
oblation of wine to the gods bringing about an outpouring of good
things to you in return. This is also a blind to veil away the
ignorant. Like brings like only when a powerfully constructed mental
picture is presented with much mana to the Spirit of Light so that on
this likeness the Spirit may construct for you a reality. The old
fertility rites supposed to bring increase in crops and flocks were
of use only if they served to picture the desired things and to
furnish through emotion some mana to empower the gods.

Step Four

AMULETS, WALLS OF PROTECTION, ETC. Having you that all drawing
of magic or ritual circles, pentagrams, and such things belongs to
the outer or symbolic side of magic, it needs to be said that a few
physical things can be used by the magician as points around which to
build mental pictures or images with a mixture of aka substance,
thought-forms and mana.

TO MAKE A RABBIT'S FOOT EFFECTIVE, for instance, it is not
enough to preserve such a foot and carry it on your person. The foot
must be gazed upon and concentrated upon a few minutes each day
for a number of days, and the student must picture the foot as a
center about which he is building layers, day after day, of that
plaster made of thought, mana and aka substance. As all mental
pictures are made of these three ingredients, and as a mental picture
is as enduring as any strong memory (which is, in actuality,
constructed of these three elements), the picture of a radiating
center of GOOD surrounding the foot of the rabbit soon becomes a very
real thing. But the foot must be encased in thoughts of GOOD FOR ALL,
not just for its owner, or it will be valueless. THIS IS A SECRET
WHICH FEW KNOW. To become a center which will attract good and ward
off evil, the foot must be used in connection with the bringing of
good to others as well as to the owner, and it must be used when
possible to ward off or remove evil in the same way.

ANY OBJECT, LUCKY PIECE, OR AMULET may be treated in the same
way. Shrines are centers into which GOOD has been poured in this way
by a saint or magician and made strong and enduring to radiate back
to the worshiper all the good he radiates to it in worship. Such a
center may be filled daily with fresh mana, and the good spirits may
be invited to come to it daily to obtain enough mana to give them
power to perform good deeds on the mental and physical levels. Like
birds coming to refresh themselves in the bird bath in your garden,
and then going to clear out hurtful insects, so the good spirits will
soon begin to come, taking the water of mana and looking to see what
requests you have left with the mana for them to fulfill. Your
requests are mental pictures of things you desire the spirit friends
to bring about if they can. Pour a mana surcharge into your magic
center, along with the mental pictures of good conditions desired for
yourself and friends. The spirits will soon be coming daily to take
the mana and to assist. But try not to disappoint them by forgetting
to leave mana and good requests for them daily, otherwise they will
soon scatter and go elsewhere. Just as a center of good can be made
in this way, a center of bad may be established if one is not
careful. The student who makes a rabbit's foot center with the desire
to get more than he gives, is guilty of breaking the first rule of
magic-- that of being greedy and hurtful to the extent that he wishes
to take things from others so that he may enjoy benefits. Keep
cleansed yourself. Keep your center clear of all things not fully
GOOD for everyone. You cannot steal and hold good things for long.
Payment must eventually be made. On the other hand, one can buy
almost any good thing with the coin of good thoughts accompanied by
good deeds.

A "wall of protection" can be built around yourself or a loved
one in the same way with the help of the Spirit of the Light. Put
only good into the wall and it will allow only good to pass in and
out through it... And so ends the lesson. Here is MAGIC for you...
for the taking.