would like an initiate's commentary on a difficult subject
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hello all,
i am relatively new to magick and have not been initiated into any order although i plan to. i'm in a bit of a spiritual crisis in regards to my sexuality, however. i identify as transgendered. there are many ways to interpret this but the most common way of expressing it is that i feel like a woman trapped in a man's body. it feels similar to how amputees define their phantom limbs, except my phantom limb is my entire body.
the ontological paradox of this identification is unnerving. there are two forms of being that extend in opposite directions. although being can be rejected for doing and the ethical discourses (mainly primitivist vs. transhumanist) will resolve themselves according to will under the presidency of choice itself as paradox, i find it difficult to accept that commiting myself to such a path will hinder my search for the wholly other.
i would very much appreciate any INTELLIGENT, SOPHISTICATED perspectives on this subject, whether it be a pro or con argument. gender variance can be made into a system of magick itself and i am often led to the assumption that gendered embodiment determines sexual orientation and that orientation can be changed if we deconstruct the signification of bodily parts.
those interested can consult the works of kate bornstein, judith butler, donna harroway, susan stryker, riki wilchins, sandy stone to name a few
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Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Well, primarily, I think it would be important to note that Crowley himself struggled with understanding his own sexual orientation, if not his sexual identity.
@LipsoftheFly said
"hello all,
i am relatively new to magick and have not been initiated into any order although i plan to. i'm in a bit of a spiritual crisis in regards to my sexuality, however. i identify as transgendered. there are many ways to interpret this but the most common way of expressing it is that i feel like a woman trapped in a man's body. it feels similar to how amputees define their phantom limbs, except my phantom limb is my entire body.
the ontological paradox of this identification is unnerving. there are two forms of being that extend in opposite directions. although being can be rejected for doing and the ethical discourses (mainly primitivist vs. transhumanist) will resolve themselves according to will under the presidency of choice itself as paradox, i find it difficult to accept that commiting myself to such a path will hinder my search for the wholly other. "
The previous paragraph is a bit difficult to parse. When you say that "there are two forms of being that extend in opposite directions," I had a difficult time at first understand whether you were talking about yourself or about Thelema. I figure you are speaking about yourself, but it may be helpful to know that basic to Thelema is the exploration of both masculine/feminine, projective/receptive polarities on an ontological level, as well as the resolution of the two within your own particular dharma, or Will.
I'm sill not quite sure what you mean by "I find it difficult to accept that commiting myself to such a path will hinder my search for the wholly other." Is there something about the path you are preparing to walk that you believe will hinder your search for resolution? Would you mind clarifying it? It seems like there may be an assumption here that isn't clearly put forward.
"i would very much appreciate any INTELLIGENT, SOPHISTICATED perspectives on this subject, whether it be a pro or con argument. gender variance can be made into a system of magick itself and i am often led to the assumption that gendered embodiment determines sexual orientation and that orientation can be changed if we deconstruct the signification of bodily parts.
those interested can consult the works of kate bornstein, judith butler, donna harroway, susan stryker, riki wilchins, sandy stone to name a few"
If anything, this path will set you toward discovering your own answer for yourself with the aid of that part of you which is your highest and innermost Self. You just go right ahead and "[censored] for a dog" any god, devil, or human who tries to deny you this - your spiritual birthright.
Love is the law, love under will.
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when i say there are two forms of being that extend into opposite directions, i mean there is myself as it exists in the immanence of my body and there is myself as it exists in the transcendental nature of my libido. i feel there is no highest, deepest or truest self because all arguments contradict themselves. that's kind of how i feel about my sexual identity. it contradicts itself. it's like my sexuality is centered in the abyss. the signifier (the word) and the signified (the meaning of the word) do not match. at times i interpret this position to be a great gift but since i am unenlightened and my mind cannot yet percieve unity (at least not consistently) i also many times realize the same position as madness. it's a difficult cycle.
in a thelemic context one could question the meaning of will. is it an individual constitution or a collectively imposed illusion? again this is a duality through which no extremes can be taken literally or meaningfully. the answers are always both simultaneously. my problem is that since the dichotomy of man/woman is so pertinent to me, the so-called "correspondences" of every dichotomy imagineable presents itself in my mind as my unenlightened mind oscilates between these two extremes of how to interpret my body (either as the immanent or the transcendental)
what glimpses of unity i have had have told me that it does not matter what choice you make. "all paths lead to nowhere" as the zen roshis would say. but the sheer magnitude of every choice i make is magnified by such dichotomies as free will vs destiny, individuality vs collectivity, subjectivity vs objectivity, and perhaps the example which is most illustrative: what is different vs what is the same.many transgendered people surgically alter their bodies to embrace that transcendental aspect of themselves while denying the immanent. i do not entirely resonate with this narrative so i am unsure of how to interpret the best path for myself. when i welcome pros and cons i mean so on an ethical level. i understand that thelema is profoundly anti-ethical but if anyone can clear some things up for me that would be fantastic.
surgically altering one's body is not only completely against nature, it reproduces gendered stereotypes to a certain degree, though not completely. it says bodily parts MUST NECESSARILY mean this and not that. it's also extremely dangerous and such medical interventions are life threatening.
there are many transgendred myths out there. it's not a matter of finding legitimacy it's a matter of choosing. i ultimately see my true self or dharma as whatever i choose it to be. maybe i'm lucky to say that. perhaps not everyone can deep down convince themselves of that statement. i'm stuck in a place where dichotomies are apparent everywhere and i'm stuck with the most difficult choice of all: to choose or not to choose?
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" i feel there is no highest, deepest or truest self because all arguments contradict themselves. that's kind of how i feel about my sexual identity."
Yes, sometimes terminology confuses the issue. In that case, perhaps you could understand it as your own, ideal, future self, or as the unconscious image of your own self-made-whole, or as your future "enlightened" self. The resolution you seek for yourself in the future is what I would call the very image of the Self guiding you forward. Some part of you believes this self-made-whole exists, or you would not seek it. Instead of "believing" up front that "it" does not exist, perhaps investigation into the direct experience of what others are speaking of when they use these terms will be more profitable to your quest. Remember that blind disbelief is just as unprofitable as blind faith.
Leave time for the input of others as well.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Love is the law, love under will. -
@Alrah said
"I sometimes wonder how doctors would react to a hermaphrodite trapped inside a single gendered body. muse"
www.amazon.com/Herculine-Recently-Discovered-Nineteenth-Hermaphrodite/dp/0394738624
check these out.
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@LipsoftheFly said
"hello all,
i am relatively new to magick and have not been initiated into any order although i plan to. i'm in a bit of a spiritual crisis in regards to my sexuality, however. i identify as transgendered. there are many ways to interpret this but the most common way of expressing it is that i feel like a woman trapped in a man's body. it feels similar to how amputees define their phantom limbs, except my phantom limb is my entire body.
"
I'm not exactly sure I understand everything you're saying (a lot of PoMo jargon there, I'd need to brush up on all that if I were to really dig deeply and try and understand what you are saying).
But insofar as what you are saying seems to be related to gender and magick, I think there's a lot of the writing in the Holy Books that plays around with gender in relation to the HGA that someone in your position might benefit from greatly.
I'm talking about Liber Ararita, Liber VII and Liber LXV especially, all of which taken together cover the entire career of the Adept.
In particular, if you study Liber LXV and AC's commentary on it (one of his greatest and most plain-speaking commentaries), you will notice that there's a lot gender interplay there, some of which Crowley discusses (giving you an idea of how to approach the other instances of it).
IOW, the aspirant can be conceived of as male, the HGA female, or the other way round. So I'd guess, if you have some sense of what it's like to be both male and female, that ought to be helpful wrt some of the work you've got to do leading up to the invocation of (and ultimately intercourse with) the HGA.
I'd say that's the only *serious *thing to think about re. gender and magick in the context of discussion here - the socio-cultural dimensions may be interesting in their own right, but are not so relevant to the business of magick and mysticism, which is more about you, personally, and how you face the Universe as a whole.
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93,
" Lipsofthefly said:
i'm stuck in a place where dichotomies are apparent everywhere and i'm stuck with the most difficult choice of all: to choose or not to choose?"Going from what you've written, that seems to be the core issue - not *sexual *identity as such, but identity, with the primary problem emerging in how the core identity is expressed sexually. That is, whatever contrary ideas are formulated in the interface between Briah and Yetzirah, the world of Creation and the world of Formation (that is, Water and Air, the Heh and the Vav of YHVH) are expressed on the mental/astral plane of Yetzirah as confusion and division, and manifest in Assiah, (final Heh, Earth) as a confusion of how to express yourself sexually - and also, I assume, in how to *receive *sexual expression.
So, you're in a life where discovering an inclusive reality and identity is the goal towards which you're striving.
Socially constructed sexual identity is pretty monolithic. If I say I'm a single-gendered het male, society is comfortable with that. If I said to those so comforted that I also accept that expressions of a feminine nature are an essential part of me and my life, then the comfort level drops. (I'm a Libra, so Venus is my ruling planet, and a lot of Libra men have great difficulty adjusting to what Venus means in the psyche). Most magicians, eventually, have to deal with bisexuality on some level, even if it doesn't require explicit physical expression.
In your case, you are looking for physical [censored] with men. But you've also rejected your own choice. Could I suggest you backtrack on yourself and, rather than analyzing this any further with what Gurugeorge pointedly called PoMo jargon (which you seem to have done to a great extent already), spend some time meditating on just what you get from being undecided? What is the protective or survival aspect? What can you achieve through this? Does it get you attention, or sympathy? Does the very fact of not having a specific sexual identity confer, say, a renegade social identity?
I'm not saying any of those is at the root of things here, but trying to offer suggestions on where to look.
One point I do dispute, though:
"i ultimately see my true self or dharma as whatever i choose it to be."
I would say rather that for this life, your dharma is set. You can spin your mental wheels and play with all the concepts you've mentioned for the rest of your life, or you can move towards accepting that somewhere inside yourself you've already made a decision that this should be your dharma. And go from there.93 93/93,
Edward
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LipsoftheFly: If I understood you correctly, it sounded like you were initially concerned about whether or not something inherent to the nature of this spiritual path was going to force a decision on you about which version of yourself you needed to be, based on some ultimately arbitrary standard for sexuality and sexual identity. I hope that you have seen that it will not. Instead, it offers only very consistent and precise tools for you to figure it out for yourself to your own satisfaction.
Regarding the masculine/feminine aspects of the correspondences and symbolism. There is a deeper logic to qabalistic symbolism that mere gender stereotypes. It's based on the concepts of projectiveness/receptiveness - or even positive/negative polarities of electrical current. Of course, we all know that men can be passive/receptive and women can be aggressive/projective. Qabalistic symbolism focuses more on whether the "kind of mind" or "action of mind" represented is projective/receptive - some are even considered "hermaphroditic." That deeper (or perhaps simpler) logic may be exactly the sort of prop, or fixed point, that could help you begin to relate to the symbols (and your own psychological processes) more systematically and consistently - with some sort of "reasoning" that isn't offensive to your personal experiences.
Just a thought.
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i can certainly resonate with some things that have been said. there IS quite a bit of pomo jargon because i don't know how to percieve it any other way. i've tried searching my sould but i've found that sexual identity is all bound up in morally relativisitic taboos. as crowley wrote: there is love and there is love, the dove and the serpent. choose ye well. or something like that.
i tried picking up the commentaries on the holy books but they were far too espensive for me right now. i'm interested in what edward mason had written in terms of interpreting the experience quabalistically. if there were contrary ideas formulated on the interface between briah and yetzirah, how would one go about clearing up this confusion?
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@LipsoftheFly said
"if there were contrary ideas formulated on the interface between briah and yetzirah, how would one go about clearing up this confusion?"
You would let each be true on its own plane. Nothing is more useful than "separation of the planes," and nothing more likely to trip you than "confusion of the planes."
This is especially true in matters of sexuality where
- purely physical things
- emotional things
- opinions
- morality codes
- guilt and shame
all get mixed up with each other, as if any one of them had anything to say about the others.
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Without getting into specifics of your particular question, I think that USA, that is, unconditional self-acceptance is the most important thing. Secondly, the understanding of the Law of Cause and Effect, i.e., that there is a cause for every thing in the Universe; there is always a reason for something, whether to learn, of for future growth etc. I wish you the best in finding your answers.