"As far as I know I haven't achieved the KCHGA, ...."
"I'd love to hear from you how you came to such an evaluation. are you aware of signals, signs, indicators, for which you can watch and you haven't seen them? I'm convinced that this kind of thing is imperative to 'condition achievements', and, while it is obvious that people can be mistaken about their own process, we definitely can become aware of how others perceive us and get a sort of 'peer review' from those without apparent bias, if we have dedication to the task."
Good question, and this self perception is definitely conditioned by reading other people's accounts, hints from this forum, etc. Currently I have no personal ties to a teacher or anyone I would trust to make this valuation. I've had experiences involving communication, visions, sex, etc. that jibe with certain accounts reported by people here (and much of the time Jim Eshelman will helpfully correlate where on the tree of life such experiences might fall). One thing that's difficult, especially from the viewpoint of not being initiated into a community, is sorting out personal hallucinations from "the Voice." One mode of communication will for a time provide answers and indications of the future well above the threshold of chance, then will dry up; my understanding will change; a new model will gradually appear. It's definitely more difficult from a self-initiation perspective, although I can sense things are progressing somehow, just from new life conditions, magickal development, uncovering a more specific sense of purpose, etc. It's my understanding (mostly from posts here) that the KCHGA is an event that forever alters one's perspective of who one is, and, although I feel hints of what is True (none of these words, haha) in meditation & pranayama & ceremony, it doesn't feel quite as if that is the perspective from which I live out my life.
"how did you confirm that Brother Proserpinus has achieved it?"
Good question again - I just took it at face value as an account from an organization that has grafted this label onto a particular experience and has, within its own framework, criteria for evaluating whether its own members have achieved it. Much like Crowley's account. ("If we define the KCHGA as this particular thing, with these particular factors, then, using those premises, X has or has not achieved it.") My method for extrapolating it to my own experience has been to tie it to signposts from other traditions - particularly the path model of Theravada Buddhism, along with my relationship to the inner teacher.
"have you studied with Zen monks or engaged in zazen or been part of a sangha? I'm watching for signs of equivalency, lists of symptoms of success of some time, etc., and hoping you might have more insight into it. 😄 "
I wish I did. All of my practice has been hermetically sealed, haha, although, like anyone, the deeper one gets into the path, the more one comes in contact with people working at a particular psychic level who "know what you're talking about," sometimes in their own terms. I'm guessing most have experienced this before - it's like a 6th sense, as if you recognize something in the other person and they recognize something in you. There have been people where, within seconds of meeting them, something inside just knows, and more often than not we're talking about mysticism or magick within 5 minutes. It's like gaydar for occultists, haha.
I'm definitely getting the premonition that I could be attaching to a more formal community in perhaps the near future as I feel life pulling me towards relocation, but am being patient, as I feel my HGA is giving me plenty to chew on currently.
"I'm somewhat reactionary, especially to dualistic condemnation and suppositions in the negative about certain processes, beings, etc., and so encountering these i'm likely (compare Fr. Achad, i suppose, inverting the Tree of Life, much as i later did in a different way) to attempt to come up with an explanation for why someone might be achieving success in a way that looks like failure to those who have insufficient experience or who have a limited litmus so as not to be able to assimilate LHP modalities for achievement. this doesn't say anything about positive indicators, of course, but i'm merely broadening the conversation a bit with regard to systems of advance and the protocols for evaluation."
Very interesting, and the way that you've worked with traditional symbolism is quite intriguing, although I can see how people could find it threatening or confusing.
"while the engine that's powering it, breaking us open bit by bit, is insight practice - the HGA - an incomprehensible, contentless entity guiding and manifesting those comprehensible forms."
"I'm curious why you call it these things. Crowley at points associated it with the augoeides, a tutelary spirit, and i'm unsure where it acquired all these superordinary qualities. Socrates is known to have had one, for example, though i wonder if these more restrictive understandings would in any way qualify for what you're talking about."
These descriptions are definitely how it manifests in life, which I can verify from personal experience. But the face continually shifts, and its totality is definitely beyond any particular manifestation. The particular above conception is based on correlating accounts of the KCHGA with Buddhist insight meditation, which, as I said is the engine that has personally gotten me the furthest on the path, including introducing me to the HGA's outward forms.
"these were written more than a decade ago, and i'd love to hear your reflection on the contents of either."
Very cool, and I've had experiences quite close to this, although, not being part of the OTO, my meeting of the entity came about directly, visually, (later audibly), and it's only lately that I've been opening up to the hermetic/tarot symbolism. There have definitely been pitfalls to this approach, as far as criteria for what constitutes actually teaching and what constitutes delusion. More recently I've been opening up to lucid dreaming and have been instructed by various guises of the entity on this plane, as well as being instructed about the astral sheaths of the body during ritual practice.
"if it is so basic, how is it done? what do you do when you practice it?"
So simple. You start out with verbal mental notes. ('feeling the texture of the keyboard.' 'thinking.' 'seeing.' 'hearing.' 'remembering.') Be patient, and after a while, you become conscious of the sensations themselves without needing to mentally keep track. That's when you become perceptive of these grains of reality speeding up or slowing down in cycles, eventually seeing the feeling of self flickering in and out of existence - no more real than any other sense impression. I've found that doing this during magick practice/scrying greatly enhances their vividness and effect.
"the first time i ran into this phrase it was in relation to St. John of the Cross and his mystical writing, with the experience of the absence of the highly desired God. I'm guessing that you're talking about being 'off-point' or 'disoriented' of attention, not tracking, and easily distracted."
Yep. The thing that insight practice helped with most was assigning this as a technical term, without the emotional connotations. Even thought the emotional content of feeling cut off is still there, it feels easier to deal with when it's seen as insight cycles slowing down, and more importantly, the basic practice of noting has the effect of drawing a person out of it into the next stage.
"do you have a URL for that chart? with a bit of poking around i did not see it."
Check out the bottom of:
*(http://integrateddaniel.info/book/)
It's a two-page pdf, listing the points in the cycle, the vibratory speed, and even Tree of Life correlations. There is also a file with basic insight meditation instructions. His whole book there on the site is probably the best exploration of meditation and spirituality I've ever seen.
"As the outward notion of the HGA has developed in my life, insight practice has taken on more and more of a bhaktic nature."
"intriguing! deity gazing seems conducive to it."
I could definitely see deity gazing and trataka as great practices for integrating concentration, insight, and bhakti.
"The sensations are the internal lover and the process's relationship to kundalini and sex (even sex magick) becomes clearer and clearer...."
"the former i can understand, but the latter (in relation to kundalini) aren't immediately apparent to me or easily understood simply by your mention here. I also don't understand the (presumably humorous) mention of porn music."
I agree, and it was kind of odd for me to just drop those references without explaining them. Basically, for me a large part of dealing with the HGA lately has involved sex - the polarities of internal gender, the sensing of chakras during sex, polarities of giving/receiving, etc. It all ties in to the insight cycles and kundalini - the entity teaching you this stuff also happens to comprise all those sensations you note during meditation. The notion of who you are and what you are seeking in life starts to change drastically with this degree of spiritual intimacy. I wasn't trying to reference porn at all actually - to the contrary, a large portion of this training has involved cleansing the psyche of old and damaging notions of sex (including a 5-month period of celibacy) and also learning to be as present and conscious as possible during it, even cognizant of what a particular sex act's purpose might be at the moment of orgasm (which is why i referenced sex magick).
"while i can understand the attraction, i also want to connect what i call idolatry to it in a sense of exteriorizing and idealizing the god, and noticing how this affects one's relationship with one's devotional focus. I think there's a kind of 'porn of the bhakta' that can affect one's worship in questionable manners"
Agreed. So many traps, although I definitely find myself agreeing with the idea of the object of worship not being important (other than personally) so much as the worship itself.
"thanks for all your ideas and expression here. very inspiring!"
Thanks! and thank you for the responses and conversation - inspiring as well. Although the guy in that video creeps me out, haha.