WORRYING

Magickal work deals with powerful conscious, subconscious, and even unconscious forces deep within the human mind. In order to use the power of Magick, The Magickal aspirant must become as free of psychological hinderances as possible. Experts such as Israel Regardie went so far as to insist that prior to studying the Occult Arts, all Magickal students undergo a course of intense psychotherapy.

One of the problems that can sabotage a Magician is the modern plague of WORRY. Unchecked, WORRY turns into an all-consuming ANXIETY. At the moment, an astonishing TWENTY PERCENT of American adults use anti-anxiety medications. The figure grows annually. And why not? We have entire businesses dedicated to promoting FEAR in the public, calling it “NEWS.” Big corporations use fear to market products even as institutions use fear to keep people in line – and who among us can doubt that politicians deliberately use fear to control our votes?

For many people, anxiety becomes something to worry about, creating a destructive loop. Given the negative forces in today’s world, it behooves anyone so much as considering the study of the Magickal Arts to take a good hard look at their mental state, including their reasons for wanting to study. Whether or not you are plagued by worry – and who among us can honestly claim to be free of worry at some time in our life? – the talk below by Dr. Albert Ellis delves into the concept of WORRY and why human beings worry. Over the course of a long and productive life, Dr. Ellis showed tens of thousands of people how to overcome many psychological problems that stem from worry, including procrastination, perfectionism, shyness, and anxiety. Not overlooking medical/biological causes for anxiety, Dr. Ellis showed practical and logical ways to deal with it.

In his youth, Dr. Ellis suffered from deep shyness and fear of public speaking. So he understood what this feels like. He got over this through methods he developed and later termed Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy. He refers to it by initials in this talk. When Ellis developed this system back in 1955, he ignited a firestorm of controversy – which is typical of “science.” The history of science is littered with the destruction of scientists who made advances. In the 19th Century Dr. James Esdaile demonstrated a startling surgical survival rate for operations performed under hypnosis. Also in the 19th Century, Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis found that the simple act of physicians washing their hands saved lives. In the mid-20th Century Dr. Wilhelm Reich, Sigmund Freud’s most promising student, discovered and experimented with new forms of energy and healing. ALL THREE MEN WERE REJECTED BY SCIENTISTS OF THEIR TIME. They were all drummed out of the medical profession. Dr. Reich died in PRISON after the United States Government burned his books and took an ax to his medical devices (more on REICH at THIS LINK).  Sigmund Freud himself suffered the slings and arrows of The Establishment, losing his affiliations with medical institutions and groups as his closest colleagues turned against him. Despite this well documented history, people in the Science Industry fancy themselves “open-minded” persons who readily adapt to new discoveries.

In my page on ALCHEMY I relate the sad story of Dr. Barry Marshall who was roundly attacked by scientists for PROVING – not for theorizing but for PROVING! – that stomach ulcers came from bacteria and not stress. It took two decades for Dr. Marshall’s reputation to get repaired as the Nobel Committee reluctantly presented him with their “prize” in medicine. But he had committed the sin of showing that accepted medicine was dead wrong. And his work developing a simple cure for stomach ulcers eventually killed off Big Pharma’s multi-billion dollar ulcer treatment industry. THAT, no doubt, was Dr. Marshall’s big sin…

Among unprejudiced and fact-based scientists there is a revealing joke told: One day a research scientist announces a major breakthrough in the quest to attain HUMAN IMMORTALITY. “Oh, great,” sneers a university professor upon hearing the news. “If the Department Head lives forever, we will never have any scientific progress!” 

The fields of Science are littered with the ruins of great men and woman who made game-changing discoveries that the establishment refused to accept for years. Dr. Albert Ellis almost suffered that fate in the 1950/60s, but before long his innovative psychological work produced extraordinary results. Ellis lived long enough to see a remarkable 25% of all American psychologists trained in his system – and the number now grows annually.

I have no doubt that everyone will get something from this talk by Dr. Ellis, a speaker of rare candor and wit.

“21 Ways To Stop Worrying”