There is a ninety five percent chance that you are a cultural orphan. Unless you are a part of the approximately five percent of the global population who are a part of an extant indigenous culture, you are a cultural orphan. Your lineage was severed from the practices of its ancestors hundreds of years ago. If you are Caucasian, this happened so long ago that there is nobody left alive who knew anybody who knew anybody who knew those traditions. There have been attempts and revival and reconstruction. But nothing of true antiquity survives intact. You are an orphan. The Locust King and the Hungry Empire swept through your land, wherever your ancestors lived, and destroyed what your ancestors had preserved for thousands of generations. You are alone.
If you wish to reconnect with the magick your ancestors once touched, you must rebuild. What you build will not be what your ancestors built. You will be influenced by your own experience. You will be influenced by pop culture. You will be influenced by global culture. You will assimilate and syncretize your experiences into something completely new. This is unavoidable. This is perfectly normal.
First Nations people often refer to such attempts as Plastic Shamanism. And this is true. This is unavoidable. You cannot help it. You are the child of plastic. You are scavenging for treasure in the discarding trash of Empire. Of course you will be a Plastic Shaman. Accept it. Move on. And build something from the plastic.
- A Slacker’s Guide to Magick
- An Imposter’s Guide to Magick
- A Skeptic’s Guide to Magick
- A Screw Up’s Guide to Magick
- The shamMAN’s Path
Recommended Reading
- Truth and Bright Water, by Thomas King
- What We Leave Behind, by Aric McBay and Derrick Jensen
- The Chicken Qabalah of Rabbi Lamed Ben Clifford, by Lon Milo DuQuette
Professor Harbinger's School for Villains 