Before we get to it, an update! So I have finallymanaged to move into my new house, and have set up an extremely basic altar consisting of both familial dolls and the central fetish piece in the new ritual room. Over the coming months, I hope to evolve this up into a new, fully seated indoor temple with correct spaces for all of the four witch gods. This includes Sepheranz, who up to this point I have never had a dedicated space for. I know that Sepheranz is particular requests this of people – no single shared altar is really fitting for Sepheranz. Im looking forward to explore my innate link to her and her more esoteric aspects that are suitable for myself in the coming months ahead. An altar to the Lord of the Dark Star is also under consideration, as well as a place at the west for the Ivory Spider. This will allow the correct energetic space to pursue the opening of Lucifers Stellar Gate, an important pillar to begin the third of the phases of opening Belials Stargate in the flesh and soul. I am also preparing something for a local group, with the help of another Hecatian Witch for the Sabbat, so times are pretty busy here!
This post is actually one I’ve been meaning to put up for awhile now, and it addresses what I simply call the ‘Mirrorworld’. In many different occult texts, you will see many different diagrams, theories, arrangements for the differing realms that surround and penetrate our own, thus making up the All. These often come with many interchangeable and confusing terms which often don’t seemingly relate to our own experience as occultists and witches.
So far, working with the Witch Gods, the Trees have proven a very useful and valid map for exploring both the Nightside and Dayside realms which make up our own Universe. However, one of the more interesting realms, by far the most visited one for me, is the one mentioned above, the Mirror World.
This realm seems to be the closest to our own – being just one small slip or step out of phase with it, best accessed through the Dreaming Gates. From my experience, this Mirror Realm acts almost as a film that surrounds Malkuth/Nahemoth, and from here the tunnels seem to connect to the realms known as Yesod / Lilith through chthonic or lunar paths that are revealed. It is a strange in between place, that is both aerial and chthonic at the same time and for me acts as a primary point of ingress to the Other.
I call it the mirror world or mirror realm because simply, the place appears as a flip side to our material world, looking as if it has been run through a harsh grayscale or colour desaturation filter, and literally abounds in some places with many, mirrored surfaces as reflections in all materials seem heavily amplified. The nearest term I can find that matches this is Etheric Plane, but it is so inadequate as a term and misleading due to its etymology that I do not describe it as such. The areas within this realm as usually counterparts of their real ones, although usually more structured, devoid of many details and with many areas smoothed or minimalised.
Hall of Mirrors, Harold Davis
Sound, light and weather within this realm depend on the region. Some places have no sound whatsoever, as if every surface was made up of some sound swallowing material. Everywhere else the sound is almost muted, as if coming from a point underwater. Light also varies – some areas are harshly contrasted, as if you are standing somewhere without an atmosphere whilst still being recognisably on ‘earth’. Other areas are lit as if by an unseen, non existent light source which hits all surfaces equally removing all shadows. Weather also varies – from raining downwards, raining upwards, to raining shards of glass or other objects. and usually areas are windless. The sky is either completely clear and cloudless or everywhere is covered in a dark, thick white mist like something out of, for lack of a better description to fall back on fictional examples, Silent Hill or Stranger Things.
The sun is never observable in the sky here – attempting to look for it seems to never succeed – the moon is always there, and appears as either one of three archetypes. White, and bleeding a strange, clear liquid. An ominous, black ball surrounded by fire like an eclipse. Or lastly, dark earth like red, weeping blood.
Vegetation in this place is always autumnal colours, or otherwise of dark foliage. Trees in the main are leafless, although some evergreens still stand twisted and gnarled. The temperature of the entire realm seems to be lukewarm – only once did a temperature change occur when I was here, plummeting rapidly caused by one of the strange inhabitants that lives in this place.
Photographer unknown
The beings that reside here are strange indeed. The most obvious inhabitants are the human and animal dead – this in between place seems especially the home of some of these lost souls. Once I remember walking in a deserted city, the sky harsh white, each buildings glittering surface almost painful to look at. There i came across an old lady, who seemed distressed. I remember trying to calm her, but all she could do was protest over and over again, saying she was looking for something, this something I got the impression strangely, was a red balloon. She paid little attention to me, until she eventually looked at me with glazed over eyes and simply stated ‘Young people these days just don’t understand’ before she vanished in a cloud of dust from a wind that never existed.
Other inhabitants seem to be like something that has walked straight out of a Guillermo Del Toro movie, an assortment of various forgotten folk spirits that make up the weird menagerie that regular roams around this place. Few are threatening, most are strangle and bizarrely welcoming in nature. Vehicles are seemingly also mirrored in this realm – the spirits sometimes utilising them in strangely human like fashion to get from place to place. Angels with broken wings wander lost amongst these strange ruin like areas, and in the forest strange fae like creatures build dwellings with broken bricks and other detritus they’ve managed to scavenge. A lost traveller asking these entities to direct them will usually find themselves taken on an adventure that whilst illuminating in some manner, usually leaves them ever more lost. Sometimes valuable information can be found here off these entities which seem to have a capacity to see into the past, present and future. Some of them will actively come forward, guided by the Gods, to impart gnosis to the seeker who walks these realms.
Unknown work, Brian Froud
The overall feeling of the place is a neutral one. Some areas are more sinister than others, some are incredibly bright and strangely ‘vibrant’, as far as a place lacking strong or any colour can be. Just as some places are much more dangerous in our world, and others are very safe, so are the corners of this strange world. It is a place where it is incredibly easy to wander off the beaten track… whatever you encounter, the only thing you know is that its unlikely you’ll have come across it before..
Elements of the mirror world seem to remain static. However, sometimes, huge areas seem to change and morph, sometimes becoming quite incongruous with its counterpart on the physical, distorting into a more surreal landscape. As such, its important that the fact the realm is in a state of flux is kept firmly in mind so that one does not becoming disorientated on travelling here.
At this point, I think many readers will be asking what makes this different from other kinds of dreamscape. One is ironically compared to the above point, is a strange consistency. Despite changing environments, the general characteristics as described above hold continuously between penetrations to this realm. Secondly, unlike a standard dreamscape, all visits to this place are generally incredibly lucid, with sounds, smells, even tastes vividly remembered if the transit here is of sufficient strength. Yet this place lacks the sheer raw energy or power which when encountered radiates over the traveller in other astral realms of the tree which lie far beyond it. It also seems to lack any particular hierarchy, for I have never encountered any of the Gods here other than near the aforementioned tunnels. As such, it seems a ‘playground’ for a myriad of entities that match its vibrational pattern.
Thinking on it longer, I believe that this is the same shamanic realm that is often talked about by other practitioners, albeit reflecting the current world soul and the impressions we leave on this realm by our daily interactions with each other and the world around us on the physical. I am reminded of a conversation with a friend.. Maybe spirits trapped between the living and the dead wander here, waiting for their souls to be retrieved by those who are curious, brave or just plain desperate enough to try.
Shadowman, Gregory Tom
Ave Hecate,
~S~
Taken by Duncan Reddish for the Beltane Fire Society. Used under fair use.
The Luciferian Revolution 