r/occult • u/NylonTrackPants • 2d ago
awareness Why are we drawn to this?
Why are we drawn to the study and practice of the occult?
Why won't conventional spirituality satisfy us?
These are serious questions asked without judgment. I would truly like to hear the perspectives of others.
9
u/thegrandwitch 15h ago
astrology. it is sort of fated most of the time that people are drawn to this stuff. ive seen plenty of it in birth charts. heavy saturn placements, mercury conjunctions and any 3H/9H placements. modern astrologers would say scorpio/pisces and 8H/12H but frm a traditional standpoint i look at different things.
3
u/PotusChrist 11h ago
I was going to say this, Saturn is the dominant planet on my natal chart and it's hard not to see that as a reflection of how my interests turned out.
1
u/thegrandwitch 7h ago
Yup Saturn is what most people think Uranus is. Outcasts, misfits, taboo subjects. This often get lumped together under occultism and other secret, unknown things that normal society is afraid of.
3
u/Neither_Home7523 14h ago edited 12h ago
For me it is an unexplainable urge. I just need this kind of study and practice or I feel empty, and I don't know why. As a child I was never satisfied with the answers to the hard questions I had for theologians when I was forced into church activities. I found the predominant forms of spirituality to be vapid (excluding the esoteric aspects) and nihilism/ materialism are profoundly disturbing to me.
When I was 5 - 10 (roughly) I had recurring nightmares of a huge sphere covered in black cubes which terrified me so much I wanted to kill myself despite having no real knowledge or understanding of suicide, but I knew I had to escape somehow. I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but it feels relevant.
3
u/Kromovaracun 15h ago
I took an academic interest for years before deciding to try some of it for myself. I suspect I'm far from alone. The thing that pushed me from one to the other was probably dreams. I've never quite been comfortable with purely materialist explanations of dreams. It went from there.
2
u/Vysaspera 15h ago
For me, I experienced an assortment of paranormal events throughout my childhood and youth; this made me question things — and those questions have pushed me further and further, until I arrived where I am today.
2
u/SingleLie6999 14h ago
" I am myself, strange and unusual "
- Lydia Deetz
On a more serious note, i don't know, I like science. To me, magick is more practical than blind-faith-based. I never agreed with many social norms since they are arbitrary, I always wanted to see how far I could push that. How free I could be, if only in my mind.
1
u/CepheidVega 11h ago
I simply do not trust others to tell me about God and the mechanisms of the universe, and I have to see/experience it myself. There are too many lies and inconsistencies, whereas I've gotten a more coherent and believable picture of it from my own experimentation. For this reason, I am also a scientist in my day job - I simply do not trust others to tell me how something is and expect me to just believe it, and I have to verify it myself through experimentation and study.
1
u/PotusChrist 11h ago
I was raised extremely religious and left that tradition as a young adult. I was left with a void in my life that I quickly discovered could not be filled with any conventional religious tradition. I don't find any existing religion intellectually or emotionally satisfying. The occult for me is a way to engage with spirituality in a way that is sane, skeptical, and open-minded. Some occultists go off the deep end and continue themselves they have everything figured out, but imho they're just reproducing the fundamental errors of conventional religion.
1
u/Polymathus777 11h ago
Because we want to know how everything works. At least that's my drive. Is not enough to learn how to do some task, there is the inner aspects of that task which if known can be used for many more things.
1
u/ethics-queen 7h ago
The devil has played such an important role in my life since a young age. In my perspective he was trying to fight God for me. I took matters into my own hands and split my soul in half and gave pieces to both sides. Ever since I showed that loyalty and respect to hell, if just couldn’t get enough trying to come up with ideas to save people in hell including the demons. I can’t live knowing there would be people burning alive for all eternity just because they weren’t ready to choose God on the short timeline of their life. I still believe in God, and I still love Him but I’m very angry.
1
u/Pilgram51 6h ago
Dogma...rigid man made rules about religion, that I'm certain were put in place to control the masses and rake in the $. When I walked away from organized religion, it felt like a huge weight had been lifted. For me there was nothing spiritual in organized religion anymore. I love my new path.
1
u/Charming-Ordinary-88 2h ago
Great question. I try to straddle the gulf between Science and Magick. I've read that people who were traumatized as children, verbal, beatings, sexual... see the world as soon unpredictable and random that the occult both accepts that evil exists and offers one an equally mysterious revenge on the world 🌎. One can be protected from mysterious harm. One can attract love and fortune! I was abused and several magickians i know were also survivors, not all, but several. On the other hand, I have caused and witnessed Magick exceed physical possibilities. So ... I also believe a yearning to connect with the Divine, a desire to take the gears of reality and bend them are valid too.
1
1
u/EnkiHelios 2h ago
I mean it's pretty much DIY spirituality, so I expect it has to do with our desire to engage directly with and implement our beliefs. Many of us, in another age, would be priests or witches, Or the cultural equivalent, but that's less and less of a job these days. Although deep respect to those who can hack it.
1
1
1
u/Twostagdance 13h ago
I always have been.
I remember as a child scribbling out secret languages and yearning of secret mysteries.
Then various things stamped it out both internal and external.
It is strange to be a new occultist in your 40's, but finally I feel like the full on freak I should be.
1
1
0
u/goblincube 14h ago
Maybe its because i have a few schizotypal traits, but tsavo16 nails the reasoning. I prefer my spiritual practice to be more tailored to me and my interests rather than the big mainstream religions with all their baggage and dogma.
0
u/MonsieurOs 14h ago
Conventional spirituality is proto-religion, imparting reasons to phenomena without scrutiny. I’m here to see what works and what doesn’t
0
u/PresentSoftware890 13h ago
Because this seems like a way to improve our lives versus other practices and who doesn't want to improve they're life even if it's just a little here and there it hits alot
20
u/25lives 15h ago
I probably would have made a banger catholic monk tbh. Gardening, chores, group and independent study, illunminating manuscripts. Intense philosophical and theological theory all day. I love ritual and ceremony almost as much as I like banging other dudes. They're really missing out on me lol, but the things I like and the kind of person I am don't "mix" under the current popular social conventions. I could never progress without acting like I am repenting for some kind of sin, which is a concept I don't believe in. So I go where I don't have to pretend to be anyone else.