NO GODS BUT MY OWN 09
Releasing the Lord of Locks
RENOVATION SYMBOLS
I've always had a thing for power outlets. Their clean design and focus on function over aesthetics. The look of surprise in their pareidolic faces. For me, a resonant energy crackles at the edges of the image. There's an empowering presence that touches something at my core that I can't quite explain. The outlet is a symbol of power, like an energetic mascot, and it fills me with a sense of security and strength.
I think most of us have symbols with a similar resonance, even if that connection goes without notice. Anyone with a penchant for wearing certain logos or characters knows what I’m talking about. Same goes for those with sigils and symbols they fall back on repeatedly during the course of their magical practice.Â
Symbols create a powerful shorthand for these energies and ideas. They allow us to distill certain desires into a singular image that also communicates and connects us to others who feel the same way.Â
This applies to nearly all aspects of life. Sports enthusiasts recognize their tribe by seeing others wearing the same jersey. The same goes for fans of pop culture and recognizing fellow fans by the logos and symbols they present. People know what to do when driving or walking down a street or hallway by heeding the directions given to them by signs populated by shadowy figures or simplistic pictograms.
These same presentations of loyalty or adherence to an idea embodied by a symbol also create an amplification of power by seeding their spread and strengthening their recognition.
That feature is both the benefit and the curse of symbols. They are haunted things that are easily corrupted and co-opted. They can be used to manipulate and control, instill fear or coerce. It's all up to culture and those that utilize those popular symbols to decide the dominant narrative. The individual gets drowned out when trying to recontextualize symbols in ways that may be counter to the popular usage.
I have to constantly remind myself that symbols are not malevolent but instead that darkness belongs to those who decide how a symbol is used, especially when they are used in less than ethical ways. That's the problem with how well certain symbols slot into a person's way of thinking. There are people and entities out there, scratching around the edges, trying to figure out how best to take advantage of the deeper vibrations of a symbol and seek out those that are drawn in by a welcoming sign or sigil.
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I created The Disruption Generator as a direct challenge to the biases and symbolism of the tarot because the tarot has been completely and utterly co-opted. It's on t-shirts, calendars, and tote bags. You can get cards decorated with Hello Kitty, gummy bears, and nearly any vein of pop culture fandom you can imagine. It's been presented and misrepresented in the media for decades. Some of the major arcana from the Rider-Waite tarot might as well be the occult answer to the Coca-Cola logo.
It’s made it impossible to approach the tarot in a pure, individual way and the same can be said of nearly all symbols to some measure. Every popular religious, pagan, and occult symbol has been bought, sold, and diluted to a point beyond pure interpretations or devotion.Â
I am not suggesting that we ignore the old symbols or toss them out entirely. Far from it. These symbols are of obvious worth and power. They have to be if they've stuck around for as long as they have and continue to resonate with so many people.
What I'm proposing is the adoption of an alternative set of symbols, one without loaded definitions and saturated cultural influence, one that can be integrated into any kind of practice without usurping what a person already utilizes. Symbols that are already all around us, just waiting to be repurposed and re-energized.
I call them RENOVATION SYMBOLS.
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Look around you for a moment, beyond the obvious and into the ambient texture of your environment. There is an unrecognized symbolic language hiding all around you. Your power outlet. The spirals of the burners on your electric stove. The accidental hexagram created by the configuration of broken slats in your window blinds. The altered message created by a weathered street sign. All of these things can be utilized for the creation of a new symbolic language.
There is a power within the ignored things, the things that exist only out of utility and are forgotten the moment they go unneeded. This is why I call them RENOVATION SYMBOLS. You are taking something that has gone dull and giving it a new shine.
In issue 21 of the first volume of Grant Morrison’s The Invisibles, the character Jack Frost is being chased by agents of his enemies. He gets cornered in his mother's apartment but notices a pattern in the letters contained within the logo of the show Top of the Pops on a television running in the background. Some of the letters are in a different color and spell out a secret word, one that summons a powerful frost spirit that stops his pursuers when it is spoken aloud.
He reinterpreted the ambient symbols within his environment and used them to summon an inner power that would have been otherwise impossible to access without the subtle nudge of secrets hidden within the mundane.Â
I understand this example is taken from a work of fiction but there is great potential in the concept. These symbols are an untapped resource, not only because of how ever-present they are but also because I believe they can hold just as much power as any other symbol if we allow them to.
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I didn’t notice when the power outlet began popping up in my art. The backgrounds of drawings started to get littered with outlet faces in odd places. I had an undeniable urge to paint a seven foot tall power outlet on wood repurposed from my ex-girlfriend’s coffee table. For some reason it was the only image that burned bright enough in my mind to cover up the memory of a person who made me feel small.
It was when I got the outlet tattoo on my leg that I paid more attention to how much this symbol had taken over. After it healed I would find myself rubbing it absentmindedly, almost as if I was counting prayer beads. I could feel it’s presence crackling under my finger, calming me.
It wasn’t long before the outlet became a part of my signature. It had been branded upon my soul and my identity.Â
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There are benefits to adopting a benign symbol like the power outlet as a source of energy and inspiration:
The simple design makes it easily replicable and allows for a wide variety of variation while maintaining the core symbol.
It has a presence absolutely everywhere.Â
Your usage of the symbol can be as occulted as you want due to the symbol being so pedestrian and omnipresent.
The first two reasons are pretty self explanatory so I’d like to focus on that last piece for a moment. What better blind is there than working with symbols of known definitions but in occulted ways? It would be like trying to decode a document written in the Wingdings font. Utterly unreadable for those without the tools to see.
This may seem like a chaotic, Babel-like situation because these symbols are so pedestrian and viewed so often that we may all be using the same symbols but with completely different definitions behind them. I argue that there may be some overlap but there will be far more disparity. Just because there are consensus definitions does not mean that we can add an unknown and personal layer beneath.
This leads me to ask: shouldn't this be exactly how magic is?
Shouldn’t we each be utilizing symbols in the ways we need for our personal practices, regardless of how it’s used by others?
I think this is absolutely the case.
If every tarot practitioner came up with the exact same reading there would be no use for multiple tarot practitioners. Same goes for astrology and all of the other intuitive arts of the occult. Everyone comes to these symbols from their own angles, skewed by their own experiences and biases.Â
Why shouldn’t we view the symbols all around us, no matter how mundane, with the same level of reverence and self-reflection?
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Our lives are spent surrounded by symbols that have been compromised and corrupted. It's a war of psychic attrition and they've been at it for decades without much notice. It only feels right that each of us co-opt as much of that landscape for ourselves as we can, even if it's only by small measures.
For every shrine devoted to the Coca-Cola logo or Nike swoosh, I want to see an altar to the alchemical couple as embodied by the unisex bathroom sign. For every person covered head to toe in ADIDAS, I want to see holy robes decorated in weaponized HIGH VOLTAGE signage.
What mysteries could be hidden behind those shadowy figures decorating the signs all around us?
What actions are those innocuous silhouettes obscuring?
What would it take to mobilize them in service beyond their stated purposes?
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I want to leave you with a challenge.Â
There is a French word for an aimless walk called the flâner. It doesn’t take much of a commitment and won’t cost you anything more than your time. The point of the flâner is to find yourself in a place you didn’t expect because you weren’t thinking about where you were going.
My challenge to you is just that. I want you to think about all of these things I just said, about ambient symbols and taking back your existential landscape, and go out for a flâner. Wander to new parts of your neighborhood. Let the previously unseen wash over you. Think about your surroundings more than your destination.
What symbols do you see?
Which of them will speak to you?Â
It's up to you to decide if you're willing to listen to the secrets our mundane world is trying to whisper in your ear or if you'd rather just ignore them, letting them fade back and disappear into the periphery.
LORD OF LOCKS
MASTER OF CHAINS
AVATAR OF SECURITY
As the spirit of all things secured, The Lord of Locks watches over passwords, combinations, and keys. Its aide can come in handy whenever you’ve lost or forgotten the means to open things otherwise locked away. Puzzles, trivia, and things otherwise forgotten fall under the realm of The Lord of Locks as well. The mind has a way of making prisoners of useful memories and facts. The Lord of Locks can assist in sussing out the combinations or keys needed to access those necessary pieces of information.
Take care when petitioning The Lord of Locks for help. It despises crime and may lash out at those looking for help to take things from others. Never seek aid in lock-picking or hacking passwords. Those are The Lord of Locks domain and it does not appreciate those who might desecrate that ground.
The Lord of Locks responds best to tokens carried upon your person. A simple key, tucked away in a wallet or pocket, can sometimes be enough to please The Lord of Locks and inspire it to give assistance.
NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
I recently did a stream with my good friend Keats Ross, of We The Hallowed and Dakota Slim fame. We talked about Outlet Omnibus and NGBMO a bit. It was a great chat and well worth the watch. Check it out here.
Not a whole lot else going on around NGBMO headquarters lately. I’ve begun work on another oracule project called Fauna-nomicon but don’t intend to say much about it until it’s all finished. Beyond that I’m focusing on designing the NGBMO collection to be released after the twelfth and (probably) final installment of the newsletter.
That’s all for this installment of No Gods But My Own. I hope nothing but the best for all of you.
Thank you for reading.
EJM