Can We, Whenever We Want?

One of the most difficult concepts in Magic is a concept that seems trivial in everyday life — the notion of Desire.

Indeed, the idea of desire as the driving force of the world-process lies at the heart of Thelemic Magic. At the same time, distinguishing between the apparently similar concepts of «desire», «intention» and «will» often proves very difficult, and their semantic fields frequently intersect or are confused.

Nevertheless, clarity of action and clarity of thought are closely connected: only someone who thinks clearly can act clearly, and for a Magus clarity of action ensures effectiveness.

Therefore we must clarify what the Tradition means by these terms.

The Magical Myth calls desire the cosmic principle of unity. We have already discussed that the World-process consists in the fragmentation of the Absolute’s integral consciousness for the purpose of self-knowledge in the totality of its aspects, and then the restoration of that unity, made actual. It is clear that potential and actual being exist in a binary relation, that is, they attract each other, and only their separation provides the power needed for the world process.

The participants in this process are embodied in the Three Great Principles: the binary’s tendency toward neutralization — i.e., the power of world unity — manifests as the Principle of Feeling; the differentiating principle, which singles out individual elements in order to actualize them — manifests as the Principle of Intelligence; and the Power that arises from their separation, the world’s driving force — manifests as the Principle of Will. In other words, Will is feeling directed by intelligence.

We have already said that at the level of a concrete being, will is the ability of a being to organize, i.e., to order and direct its desires.

From the above it is clear that the Magical myth calls Desire the power of attraction arising between two states of a single system — between more and less developed states. For example, the attraction of the “hungry” state to the “sated” is the desire to eat; the attraction of the “weak” to the “strong” is the desire for Power, and so on. Being a manifestation of the Principle of Feeling, Desire as such is unstructured; it merely marks the process of union, but does not include paths to realizing that union. An ordered desire is the power of unification directed along a specific path — this is Will. Naturally, the process of direction itself requires calculating the route — the Principle of Intelligence.

Thus any realization includes all three elements of this triad — the passive attraction (desire), active understanding (intelligence), and neutral movement (will). This aggregate, underlying any actualization, is called intention. That is to say, intention is desire balanced by intelligence through will.

We also mentioned that this process of realization takes the cyclic form of a vortex born of the quaternary law.

Now we return to the question with which we began — is realization possible just because it is desired? Desire unbalanced by intelligence is only one of the poles of the binary, which cannot remain stable on its own. To return the system to stability, a second pole is necessary. And if that pole does not become intelligence, or if the balancing power of intelligence yields to the driving force of desire, then desire is balanced by fear. Indeed, usually the desire to acquire something is accompanied by fear of not obtaining it. Since desire by its nature is passive (as a manifestation of the power of unity), fear assumes the active role in the formation of the vortex. This means that contrary to its purpose, this vortex will be directed not toward achieving the desired result, but toward failing to achieve it (that is, toward whatever the fear is aimed at). And this gives rise to the well-known formula — the more strongly we want something, the harder it is for us to get it.

The way out of this situation is also obvious: desire must be balanced by intelligence. Then the driving force “I want it so” is replaced by the balancing force “it must be so.” The formation of such a stable vortex is called forming an intention. And if a vortex is formed by intention, then its realization depends only on the power of its creator.

Thus, the basis for achieving effective results in Magic is considered to be the skill of forming intention — that is, the ability to create balanced programs which, being endowed with Power, lead to the attainment of the desired result.