Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

I’ve offered three weeks of technical theology—doctrine, hermeneutics, and exegesis—which are, granted, a bit simplified for general consumption. But now I want to turn it around and go in the other direction. I want to see how untechnical, unsophisticated, and entirely simple we can make it.

A huge part of what I consider to be my mission in Thelema is the ability to turn all of this occult mumbo-jumbo into ‘conversational Thelema.’ If all you have is a complex symbol set and nothing practical for which it is used, then it’s worthless.

Look at nearly all the current influencers out there. There is zero practical communication going on despite the numerous people who wander by and claim, “Oh, you make it sound so simple, and I’ve never heard it so easy before.” Hogwash. You won’t find any kind of applicable, real-world message in those YouTube videos. And a lot of it is organizational backscratching. Or it’s just a lot of “Here’s a symbol, isn’t it neat? It’s the symbol that we use a lot for magick, cool, right? You should know it and use it, cool, right? Sure. If you want to know more, there’s a workshop for $666 next weekend. Pay me.”

In fact, I would challenge you to really dig into a lot of the articles you read and suss out the message itself. What is the principle you are getting from that article? What did you actually learn that you can take with you? Or did you just get some person’s thoughts on a grievance or an upsell on their next video course?¹I literally just saw a video about how one influencer is leaving Reddit and Facebook Thelema group because he doesn’t like the comments people are leaving on his videos. Not that I blame him, per se, but at the same time, what did he expect when he was peddling his Amway Thelema to the masses? It doesn’t have to be every sentence in the article. I just mean, what is the core message that you took away from it? Or was it fluff?

Mere What?

One of my favorite entry-level books in all of Christendom is one of the most misunderstood books: C. S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity. It was never intended to convince Christians of anything at all, yet it remains in the Top 10 lists forChristians year after year. But Lewis wrote it for non-Christians. He wrote, “the best, perhaps the only, service I could do for my unbelieving neighbours was to explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times.” Whether he accomplished that task is left for others to decide.

Recent discussions have brought up the topic of “beginner books” again, and I’ve already expressed my opinion about that elsewhere.

Would something along the lines of a Mere Thelema (or maybe Thelema for Normal People) be such a beginner book? I don’t think so. I mean, yes, but not in the way most concerns are framed.

I think the biggest complaint about such beginner books—aside from the regurgitation factor, of course—is that they are geared toward other Thelemites, toward other occultists, toward those with an interest in “magick” and other occult topics. They are not written for individuals with little to no exposure to Crowley, Thelema, magick, or even the occult in general.

They certainly aren’t written for those who have experiences that are hostile toward occult topics. Can you imagine trying to explain Thelema to someone who comes from a background where “The Great Beast” is a raging red dude with horns who breathes fire and wants to drag you to hell?

Trying to “promulgate Thelema to Thelemites” (or even just other occultists in general) is a fool’s errand.²I mentioned in a footnote on Organic Thelema that a friend of mine once stopped me over dinner and said, “I’ve always been of the belief that ‘promulgating Thelema’ amongst Thelemites is asinine. How are you going to promulgate to people who hold the same ideals as you? What you’re really doing is seeking validation, ya cheeky bastards.” And she’s not wrong. Go peddle your magick books over there for sure, and I’ll even buy them, but if we’re talking about explaining and defending Thelema with the neighbors as C. S. Lewis was doing for his religion, then taking a Mere Thelema approach might not be an absurd idea after all.³The deeper exposition of Thelema to Thelemites is a separate topic. But that’s not the topic here.

Granted, I’m talking to you. Most of you, my audience, are probably Thelemites or Thelemic-adjacent or have an interest of some kind in this material. I’m preaching to at least half a choir. I’m okay with that. Some of this is about bouncing ideas off (hopefully) friendly faces. Yet, at the same time, these are public posts, and the idea that someone who isn’t part of our choir might see them and make sense of it all is a real concern of mine.

So, let’s try it out—at least in brief. I’m not going to write a whole book right here. Promise. But I combined some older material I already had lying around and then updated it with some new material I’ve written just for this exercise (if you recall, I mentioned once before that I adored thought experiments!) to create a dossier-type outline for what I would put into a book if I were to flesh out my own Mere Thelema. And then, I’ll dig a bit deeper into some of the ideas behind this approach.

I hope you’ll let me know what you think.

This should probably be called Notes Toward a Mere Thelema, but here we are anyway.

Mere Thelema

Introduction

You should understand from the start that there are no means here to determine if Thelema is right or wrong for you. Though I will tell you it is rewarding and your life will be better for it. You may just have to take my word for it up front until you experience it for yourself. There is also no discussion over any organization you should join. I will say my advice is that of Groucho Marx’s: “I don’t want to belong to any club that would accept me as one of its members.” I jest, but only slightly. We’ll talk about organizations some other time. Community is important. Organizations not so much.

I am of a very strong conviction that in order to truly understand one’s place in the universe—or just around the block in your own town—there has to be an understanding of one’s personal philosophy and how that works in life. But just the word philosophy is offputting for many people who think it requires decades of deep study or calls up images of meditating monks or stuffy academics in “ivory towers” beyond the pale of common folks.

Nothing could be further from the truth about philosophy.

In looking for where the rubber meets the road, one cannot escape from philosophy by dismissing it as too cerebral or too theoretical or too impractical. The only alternative is whether philosophy guides us by choice or by chance. Those who believe philosophy has no sway in practical life are usually those who most helplessly absorb it from the chaos of society around them.

An acquaintance of mine who offers “occult teachings” used to ask his students three questions: Who are you? Why are you here? What are you going to do about it?⁴I was fascinated to discover, while researching for an upcoming essay, that there is a Christian spiritual formation plan using three similar questions: “Who am I? Why am I here? What am I searching for?”
Ken Wilber has apparently endorsed (co-founded?) the Center for World Philosophy and Religion, and they have a new metatheory I just discovered the other day in which they have three driving questions—look familiar? “Where am I? Whoam I? and What ought I/we do?” I remember having a discussion about this while visiting with him one weekend and thinking, “This is brilliant.” At the time, I had been trying to find a way to really break down the basics of Thelemic philosophy into a digestible form. I was using four basic pillars of philosophy—metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and politics—as the basis of my own work, and the deeper implications were all in place, but something was missing. I really wanted a way that could tie it all together to make it conversational. I realized that all this together was what I’d been looking for to build Thelemic philosophy in a simple manner but also as a way to disseminate Thelema “in a language that everybody can understand.”⁵Aleister Crowley, personal correspondence to C. S. Jones, February 1916.

And this is how I’m going to break this down for you today. A Mere Thelema.

Who are you?

While this is one of the first logical questions we ask in philosophy, it’s not really the first actual question we ask ourselves in the course of any deep dive into our personal quest for meaning.

But, funny enough, Thelema makes this an important feature of its whole program, you might say. It’s important that you know who you are, at least to some degree. You don’t need some mind-blowing experience on shrooms or light up your consciousness with “seeing God” or some kind of “nondual experience” (whatever that’s supposed to mean, right?). We can cross those bridges when we get to them. None of that matters right now.

For right now, all I want you to know is that you are you. I know that sounds simplistic, but work with me for a moment. I want to keep this simple.

You exist as a complete, unbroken, unified, whole something. Doesn’t matter what you want to call it. We like “star.” And you are a whole star unto yourself. That’s you.

But—and here’s the really important part—are you listening?—you are also a part of all kinds of different relationships with other whole somethings (we like to call them stars too). You can’t avoid them. All of existence, everything around you, all of “life, the universe, and everything” (thanks, Douglas Adams!) is about relationships.

And you, a whole something (a star!), are a part of all those relationships.

Metaphorically:

• Each of us is an individual star.

• Each of us may be part of a star system with planets.

• Each of us may be perceived as part of a constellation of stars.

• Each of us is birthed into a galaxy.

• Each of us exists within an entire universe.

We can talk about “finding yourself” some other time, but ultimately the who you are is defined by the relationships you have with the other whos around you. We are all connected.

Almost sounds like a Dr. Suess story, right?

Why are you here?

This is usually the first question we ask ourselves. Why the fuck am I here? What the hell is going on around here? For the longest time, so much of our life is framed around our purpose in life: education, career, social relationships, goals, and choices.

Everyone around you is trying to tell you why you’re here. Parents, preachers, teachers, and all those other little puppets trying to tie their strings to your wings. And I’m not saying that you need to stop listening to them all, but maybe you need to take a breather now and again and listen to the quiet.

Alright. That was enough quiet for the moment.

Thelema says that you have a why. But I’m going to tell you it doesn’t really matter if you know what that why is or not. It can be helpful. Or it can cause you all kinds of existential dread trying to figure it out. Either way, you are drawn to that why like the magnet needle on a compass—whether you have a compass or not.

But here is the key that is going to cook your noodles. Are you ready for it?

You can fight your why, and it will hurt. One part of Thelema is discovering your why and working with it. You may or may not be able to discover it completely, but something is better than nothing, and finding that you’re headed in the right direction down a trail is better than trying to cut your way through a jungle with your bare hands.

On that note, I should tell you that the other part of Thelema is accepting that life happens. Yup. That’s part of the glory of Thelema. Let me repeat it for you: life happens.

Thelemites are called the thrice-born, which is just another way of saying that we accept life as it happens: the good, the bad, the beautiful, and the ugly. We don’t always have to like it. We can continue to work for a better world out there. But we accept that life is what life is.

Does that sound like a paradox? It is. Thelema is full of them.

What are you going to do about it?

This is really the heart of Thelema. As much as so many would like to go on and on about the why and the Will of the why, it’s really this piece that is the most important part of Thelema.

What are you going to do about it? What’s “it,” right? What are you going to do about knowing who you are and why you are?

What good is it to know these things if you don’t do anything with them?

There are plenty of individuals and organizations out there which will tell you that Thelema is all about “I got mine, fuck off.” They sound no different than the thousands of evangelical churches aligned with far-right capitalist politics.

No matter what they tell you, that’s not Thelema.

So what do we do with all this stuff?

Change. That’s it. Change.

If we go back slightly to the why for a moment, our purpose in existence is just to experience life. But part of all that is to experience change. Now there are all kinds of deep theological reasons for this, and I’m going to skip right over all that for now, but the point is that experiencing change is what we do here. Again, it’s the good, the bad, the beautiful, and the ugly—the experience of all this change is what we do.

Can we work toward change? Can we work to make the world a better place? Yes, of course. What’s the point of change if we can’t work toward the change we want? People have this strange idea that if they’re driving to Los Angeles (that’s the destination), they’re not allowed to stop along the way for souvenirs in Area 51 just because that’s “not the destination.” It’s on the way, it doesn’t change the destination, and it doesn’t alter the road forward. Stop and get the damn little UFO mug!

Go forward and change the world for the better. Help others find their why (with their consent, of course). Make life easier for people around you. Some trite self-help book once said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” It may still be trite, but there’s something to that.

I never did mind the little things

In one of my favorite lines from the 1993 movie Point of No Return, the main character is encouraged to say, “I never did mind the little things,” when she’s most uncomfortable, angry, or scared.

Inevitably, someone will tell you that Thelema is or isn’t a religion. Or they will try to tell you that Thelema can’t be defined. Or they will tell you all kinds of nonsense to confuse you about how you can’t really make up your mind because it’s impossible to do so anyway.

I have framed Thelema for you here as a life philosophy, a life path, a way through life, or a mode of living. Take your pick. It doesn’t really matter. I think when we start to put labels on things, we end up marching in crusades that hurt other people in the end. The world has seen enough of those.

People become uncomfortable, angry, and scared when you start to talk Thelema in specifics. They come from a background of real or imagined religious trauma or some kind of antagonism they feel they need to act out to prove their worth in the occult community. It’s the little things that get in their way of success. They mind the little things and ignore the things that matter most. Who are they? Why are they here? What are they going to do about it?

I don’t particularly care if you want Thelema to be a religion or not. It doesn’t matter in the end. We of Thelema have many different expressions that are possible for you to explore—or, by the time you read (or I actually write) this book, we should if my life has made any difference. [Okay, that’s probably snarky, but I couldn’t resist!]

Conclusion

Frankly, there are still some pieces missing here. I can see it. I’m sure you can too.

After I finished this, I had an epiphany that slapped itself down right on top of the epiphany that started this Mere journey in the first place.

Who cares?

When I look around at those who profess to be Thelemites, I don’t see anything different. I don’t see any success that sets them apart from anyone else in a liberal humanistic society. I don’t see any articulation of life meaning that indicates that Thelema has much at all to do with their well-being, their enjoyment of life, or even their practice toward any kind of spiritual distinction. Yes, even the O.T.O. ones who do the whole Gnostic Mass and initiation rounds. They’re just as empty as the rest. I see a lot of smug grifters, though.

The question that still remains unanswered even by this brief attempt at a Mere Thelema is to what end? to what purpose? to what meaning? to what engagement with life does Thelema offer anyone at all? If all you can do is wave your hands in the air and mumble something about how “it’s all personal and no one can figure it out,” then you don’t have meaning, personal or otherwise. You have ignorance disguised as illumination.

Did you know the word joy is used fourteen times in the Book of the Law? The word law is also used fourteen times.⁶What? You thought because I think qabalistic masturbation is ridiculously overrated that I don’t have any skin in the game? If I were a pencil-pushing kinda Thelemite, I might think there was a significance to that … coincidence.

So where is the joy of the Law? Where is all this joy? I’d really like to see some Thelemites take on our “religion of the sun” without having to fumble around in a darkened room all the time.

Joy. My next rewrite will have some focus on joy.

More on Street Theology

After you hook someone, you can beef it up with all that religious stuff if you want. Or you could go the philosophical route. I’ll even help you out with both of those. But this is where I get a bit more technical on you.

To be clear, Thelemic philosophy—indeed, even philosophy in general—cannot determine what we will choose or accept or do in any given situation, but it provides the clear and consistent foundation that shapes the assumptions we use to determine how we will make those decisions on our own. Put another way, without an understanding of the philosophical assumptions that we make, we are no better than a ship tossed about in a storm. Philosophy is our rudder and our sail through the experiences of life. Where we sail will always be up to us, but how we weather the inevitable storms on the open sea will be determined by our basic philosophical assumptions. It is with this understanding that I suggest Thelema is “absolute in its execution while being individual and personal in its interpretation.”

Philosophical Foundation

I’m about to step out into dangerous waters. Are you ready for it?

Defining Thelema must be done in a manner that is obvious and accessible to all. It must start with the recognition that the Law is for all [AL 1.34] and that none are left out. Any authentic examination of Thelema must take into account a direct and well-rounded approach. An examination of any worldview must be able to satisfactorily answer four questions: that of origin, meaning of life, morality, and destiny.

The first three of these questions encompass metaphysics (ontology), epistemology, ethics, and, as an extension of ethics, politics. (Destiny is covered via eschatology under theology rather than philosophy.)

Breaking this down even further into useful, common phrases, we find this:

1. Metaphysics: individual authenticity

2. Epistemology: self-discovery

3. Ethics: personal accountability

4. Politics: social responsibility

If I were to express these concepts further in plain English, I would do so like this:

1. You are the center of your own universe,

2. You are more than the sum of your parts,

3. There is no such thing as a free lunch, and

4. Our universe includes other Stars. Act accordingly.

Within this particular approach, each category of philosophy builds on the previous aspect as such:

Metaphysics leads to epistemology, Epistemology leads to ethics, Ethics leads to politics (and aesthetics).⁷With apologies to Yoda. [Also, aesthetics is not covered here.]

You will find that each of the particular frameworks associated with these philosophical categories builds on the previous in a logical manner:

Individual authenticity leads to self-discovery; Self-discovery leads to personal accountability; Personal accountability leads to social responsibility.⁸We could break this all down differently: Social responsibility is grounded in personal accountability; Personal accountability is grounded in self-discovery; self-discovery is grounded in individual authenticity.

When we put these back into our Mere Thelema breakdown, it starts to look even better:

• Who are you? (Metaphysics)

• Why are you here? (Epistemology)

• What are you going to do about it? (Ethics and Politics)

It’s a beautiful arrangement that allows for even more depth in our approach to personal philosophy while grounding it in useful language that is available to everyone. While this is colloquially labeled Street Theology (for its ability to explain Thelema concretely and segue into more complex religious concepts), it is essentially the basis of explaining Thelemic philosophy in a very simple, common language.

Hierological Foundation of the Three Pillars

It is not enough to merely pick words out of the air and suggest they are hierologically sound. Given the Book of the Lawas the foundation of all-things-Thelema, it is wise to ensure that these pillars are secure also from a scriptural position.

To that end, I submit these same areas of focus, which can be expressed as follows:

Who are you?

• Metaphysics (individual authenticity): Every man and every woman is a star. [AL 1.3]

Why are you here?

• Epistemology (self-discovery): Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. [AL 1.40]

What are you going to do about it?

• Ethics (personal accountability): So with thy all; thou hast no right but to do thy will. [AL 1.42]

• Politics (social responsibility): Love all, lest perchance is a King concealed! [AL 2.59]

Defining Thelema

It is here that I will formally define Thelema for you in thirty-one words.

Thelema is the philosophy and religion of individual authenticity, self-discovery, personal accountability, and social responsibility based on the path of enlightenment found within the Thelemic canon, specifically Liber AL vel Legis.⁹Annotated Definition: Thelema is the philosophy [intellectual approach] and religion [emotional approach] of individual authenticity [metaphysics], self-discovery [epistemology], personal accountability [ethics], and social responsibility [politics] based on the path of enlightenment [condition of being informed spiritually] found within the Thelemic canon, specifically Liber AL vel Legis.

Where Am I Going With All This?

Street Theology [Mere Thelema] is accessible to anyone. It’s easily understandable by anyone. No one has to go as deeply into the philosophical categories or hierological explanations with anyone.

Start with the basics. Who are you? Why are you here? What are you going to do about it? That’s enough.

Filling in the blanks, to see the depth of a core Thelemic philosophy or theology, isn’t important. That can all happen later.

However, this core philosophy of metaphysics as individual authenticity, epistemology as self-discovery, ethics as personal accountability, and politics as social responsibility serves as the basis for all the materials here at Integral Thelema.

And nothing about that is going to change around here. If anything, the only thing that is changing is how I view Integral Thelema. The more I write, the more I realize that I’m producing first drafts for something in the future, releasing thoughts for feedback and criticism. To some degree, I feel a bit like Gurdjieff or Wilber in that my writing has gone through a series of phases and continues to do so until I (eventually) end up with something I can work with as a “final result.”¹⁰I’m not comparing myself to either of these men personally, merely their writing development over time. But I don’t think it will be in this form, this approach via intellectual theology [theologia speculativa] that I’ve taken thus far (despite being entirely bound by caritas quaerens intellectum).

Mere Thelema

However, I am laying the foundation for a new project in the future. 2029, to be exact. That’s making a lot of assumptions, but it’s all I have at the moment. If my assumptions hold, then in 2027, I’ll be tapping some people on the shoulder to spend two years building an online Journal/Publication called Mere Thelema.¹¹In addition, I would like to see two online resources built to go along with Mere Thelema: that I’ll discuss when the time is right. My ultimate goal is to gather a team to build a whole new ecosystem to support Thelemites that isn’t about playing astrological bingo, New Age videos, or reading obscure Victorian grimoires, but spiritual development through personal practice that matters. It is about a Thelema in the 21st century and beyond, not continuing to huff the occult influences of the 19th century and all the sludge that came before. I will need writers and web developers. This is not a vanity project for me. If I have to do it alone, I’m not doing it. It is that important to me that it not be undermined by being a solo project.

It will be the counterweight to that cesspool, Thelemic Union. While it will be a semi-open Journal, it will not be a free-for-all. It will be highly curated, tightly focused, and incredibly mindful of the image of Thelema being offered.

It’s not a call to unity.

It is a call to write across a broad spectrum of real-world issues and theological topics through the lens of Thelema, directly and boldly, with an eye for nuance and clarity.

It’s a call to maturity.

If you’re already interested, let’s talk.

Love is the law, love under will.