"Listen, we pray you, with attention: for once only does the Great Order knock at any one door."- Liber Causae sub figura LXI
The majority of people today in modern spirituality and occultism have the idea that if you can just imitate someone else or claim to be devoted to a certain historical author or modern guru figure that you are "made" and will somehow have access to occult abilities or occult faculties. This is due to confusion about what initiation into the mysteries really is and that it is never bestowed upon a person by a human being, even if they had a ceremony in a lodge or from a lineage. Initiation is always achieved only by one's own efforts and deals with developing greater awareness. Crowley, in a letter to W.T. Smith, stated that he “warns all Aspirants to the Sacred Wisdom and the Magick of Light that Initiation cannot be bought, or even conferred; it must be won by personal endeavor.” It is often said by many Adepts that spirituality is simply "learning to pay attention" and this is my own opinion on the subject as well. It is said that "every act is an act of worship" if done with full attention. Initiation, by its very definition, means being confronted by a situation that you do not have the full ability to understand in your present level of awareness. In this way, it is dangerous because initiation entails coming in contact with a force that has the potential to overcome or master you due to your own inability to perceive or understand what is occurring around you. To be initiated means that you must change, and to change means that you have to "die" because if you do not, then you cannot become something new. It is possible to "die" when you are alive, to have your spiritual vessel broken and then remade anew without changing your physical body. This occurs during initiation and also on a yearly basis to every individual with the cycle of the Sun, the equinoxes, and the solstices, and becomes more relevant to all of us during the September equinox. To be destroyed is quite obviously a traumatic experience and this is why initiation (which entails a destruction of your present state of being) is ruled by the 8th house and can result in physical death due to the body's inability to adapt to the change. People have the mentality that "if I can just find some powerful person to imitate and suck off of I can become great too, then I will have others praise me" or "if I just read the book of someone who is great, I can cause others to believe I am wise too." This attitude is contrary to the initiated interpretation of knowledge (and initiation itself) in which it is understood that there comes the point in growth where knowledge without first-hand experience is worthless, and a person has to eventually carve out their own defined niche and learn from their own access to gnosis to have "true knowledge" that is then validated by the mutual Universal understanding of ultimate truth, accessed by adepts (not implying the postmodern idea that each person makes or finds "their own truth", but I'm say that it clears their misconceptions to reveal ACTUAL Universal truth that can be proven in actual reality). When the uninitiated person wants knowledge, they run to find someone with access to to truth (who simply "pay attentions" to reality and patterns) to explain it to them, due to their own inability to pay attention and observe reality around them-- meanwhile, reality is constantly trying to teach & adjust them, which is the path of the Adept. This refusal to learn on one's own and clinging to a childlike mindset of dependence has consequences on the path of the mysteries, which are the total enslavement to those who "explain things to them". Contrary to what most people believe, there is a debt that comes from accepting the knowledge of others and a certain dependency that is created that has real consequences for those who will not take spiritual responsibility for themselves. Most people claim to want initiation and when they ask, it is given to them. Because it does not conform to their ego's idea of what initiation is, lacking some apparent badge or title, they usually reject it in favor of servitude to another person and remain in ignorance. There is one true order of Adepts that is responsible for the evolution of humanity on a large scale, which transcends all physical limitations and is present everywhere. This order approaches anyone who claims to want initiation and gives it to them accordingly. This always forms the basis of any kind of test that the person must face that threatens to destroy them, but which is easily passed if they choose to "pay attention"-- the answer to every test thrown at any individual. We are never given any situation in life without a corresponding helping hand, which we can choose to or to not grasp when it is extended to us. Any person who fears or doubts this will usually fail their tests due to a lack of self-respect and a servile mentality, which renders them unfit for spiritual knowledge. A person should always face the challenges of life with unwavering conviction that if they look for it and pay attention, they will always find the metaphorical helping hand extended by God that allows them to transcend the challenge. But this is why I state over and over that to see the helping hand, they must choose awareness over ignorance, as the true test will always be to see if the person chooses the path of servility, sheep mentality, dependency on authority figures, and general unawareness that the lunar masses follow. rather than the royal solar path to the sanctuary of adepts, which revolves around the disciplines of "paying attention", self-sufficiency, and observing reality around and within them, which then causes all secrets to be laid bare before you. As Franz Kafka described with both brevity and tinge of ecstatic humor: "You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.".