The Great Work: My Vision for the Left Hand Path (part one)

“Every moment is a nightmare of possibilities.”

Billions of people worshiping the one true God; bowing their cowled heads, raising their sigil soaked sleeve to cast a horned hand before emerald ooze, burning eye, and phallic tentacle… the flow, the vision, and the will of divinity.  And I am there, present among the throng to witness man’s change.  I believe it is possible to honor the summation of Ancient Ones, which I call the Formless Black Essence, without submitting or supplicating ourselves.  After all, what kind of Left Hand Path deity-cluster gestalt would seek our capitulation?  We are the singularity; the God we worship is our future selves.

Those who practice the Left Hand Path will never submit.  We cannot.  It goes against our blood.  However, self-mastery is a magnificent and practical tool designed to feed our lofty ambition.  Whosoever masters himself can just as easily master the world.  I hope those treading the Left Hand Path remember that wisdom when the time comes.  Because ignorance never sleeps, yet mankind seems to do little else.  Our shallow understanding is carried through every moment… latching onto us like cancer whenever we turn a blind eye to the terror of our situation.  We rarely watch ourselves unless it’s absolutely necessary, unless we are in the midst of crisis.  Perhaps that is why some of us occasionally crave self-destruction?

I look around and see nothing but sleepers.  Some are asleep shuffling off to work, some are asleep shuffling off to mindless entertainment, and still others are asleep while they shuffle off to their bed.  The sleepers who wish to sleep more… is there anything quite so detrimental to man’s evolution?

All those people at the temple, the future place of worship that we shall build, why do they bother?  What is religion for and why should we choose to form a spiritual foundation of any kind?  Because it’s to our advantage to see the world and our place within it from a cosmic perspective.  Not just man or society or humanity but realizing that the totality is part of a grand design, perhaps of our own making.  Even without deities or external sentient forces, man is able to see that he is the product of something extraordinary.  We are a work in progress; it is the drive to achieve that progression which makes religion valuable.  Religion is wish fulfillment of the highest and most fervent order.  Organized, we can make a difference on a global scale whereas individuals working alone we cannot.

The worship of Dread Cthulhu is the worship of Satan, but you already knew that.  And when I speak of worship I mean to honor, revere, or hold in high esteem.  Kali is Set and Odin is Lucifer.  All Left Hand Path forces should be equal in the eyes of individual practitioners.  The Formless Black Essence is a concept which I view as an amalgamation of every sinister agency.  All those Dark Gods are aspects of the ultimate force that waits for us outside this universe.  Those representations, with their particular aesthetic qualities, want what all LHP practitioners want.  We all want to be in control of our lives, to be fulfilled, pursuing pleasure and The Great Work as we deem fit, all while stumbling towards that final goal: to be as God.

Both the Devil and Yog-Sothoth are adversaries, opposed to the status quo, to nature herself.  For is it not perfectly natural to be ignorant, foolish, lazy, and suffering?  Without higher states of consciousness, man is at the mercy of the universe.  Nature wishes all her children to submit, to conform, and to do what it must to survive and appease basic needs.  However, man can go beyond nature.  He has a will of his own.  He can forsake shelter or companionship or recognition in favor of loftier goals like power and self-master and enlightenment.  These are unnatural aspirations.  Monkeys don’t seek enlightenment just as they will refuse to sacrifice their lives for a principle, glory, or personal conviction.  Consciousness exists contrary to nature’s laws; that is why man is the only animal to have attained it.  I still maintain that man’s early development was influenced by some unknown force.  If that clashes with commonly accepted ideas of science or modernity, then so be it.

And hopefully, the majority of you will agree that worship can be taken in a non-theistic way.  We can exalt something which exists only symbolically.  Can we not?  Satanists, Cultists, and all Left Hand Path practitioners are able to idealize a theoretical concept.  This means we’re able to understand something on multiple levels.  The glass is half full and half empty simultaneously.  Light moves as particles and as a wave.  The symbol of yin and yang is white and black yet wholly neither.  The same goes for the Ancient Ones or whatever Dark Gods one chooses to recognize.  Depending on the observer and circumstances, the divine (or infernal) is either real or unreal.  Quantum physics uses Schrödinger’s cat to help illustrate; the cat is placed in a box and at some unspecified point in time, lethal poison is introduced.  Without knowing when the poison is dropped, the cat is neither alive nor dead but in a super-position state that cannot be accurately determined until the box is opened, the results observed.  Furthermore, belief is created and destroyed at the whim of the believer.  That is why the concept of deity is immaterial to Left Hand Path coherency.  Our goals are the same:  autonomy, power, and self-deification.

See:  http://www.cultofcthulhu.net/2010/08/dark-pursuits-bathed-in-fire-the-observable-current-of-the-left-hand-path/

Can man ever be at peace while his lustful ambition rages within him?  Isn’t that what our struggle is for, reconciling the one with the other?  To get to that third side, the middle ground between black and white, dark and light, evil and good, yes and no… all of our answers are rooted in shadow making it impossible to decipher until some part of us dies temporarily while another part of us Awakens forever.

I have tasted the dichotomy of flavors together; it is a mediocre dish.  I can tell you that we must begin to see reality on multiple levels.  To take everything on a single dimension is to misunderstand it.  In fact, an individual view, no matter how wide and deep, cannot be the entirety of a living paradigm.  Deliberately eliminating the various subjective perceptions, both agreeing and disagreeing, is a vast miscalculation.  A worldview that comes from only one vision is incomplete; in time that paradigm shall wither and die.  That is precisely why the Left Hand Path requires open lines of communication, as well as, a willingness to appreciate the diversity which embodies it.

There are many dimensions for us to observe, for us to become (xeper).  Like a living paradigm, a soul, once it is created, does not exist in one dimension but in a multitude.  And this is our gateway.  On compound levels, we can create an entirely new reality… one of our own choosing.  A multi-dimensional Left Hand Path practitioner has the ability to circumvent those laws which ordinary man must obey.  In one dimension a man might be prisoner; however, in several other layers of reality a man could know grotesque amounts of freedom.  Attaining higher levels of consciousness along with the employment of Viridian Sorcery (or whatever term for magic you’d prefer to use) is the key.  Eventually, of course, our soul will exist beyond the universe (Universe A).  Such organic, concentrated, hyper-aware energy might crawl into the dark corners of space, slither through the corridors of time, and seep into that other realm, Universe B, where the Old Ones are exiled, where Satan and all His demons are banished, and where the Formless Black Essence flows ceaselessly.

The Cult of Cthulhu is part of the Left Hand Path; it is subject to those laws which supersede the law of nature and of man.  We subscribe to this path because it is our chance to escape the cycle of torment:  we are born, we suffer, and then we die.  Many have asked, “Is that all life has to offer?”  A few of us have whispered the untenable, loathsome secrets which vile worshipers ascertained aeons ago from their communion with that Higher Source.  No, the cycle of torment is not compulsory; there is something else.  Consciousness can be discovered, assembled, sharpened, crystallized, smoothed, refined, tested, and buffed out to a lustrous shine.  Consciousness is the soul’s vehicle.  Or, if you don’t like the word soul, then replace is with essence, spirit, or energy.  Within the Left Hand Path, such terms are interchangeable.  The important thing is that through consciousness that which is fundamentally who we are can endure, surviving the physical death of our body.  But even while still alive, a created soul may have tremendous influence over the world; it can create or destroy according to desire.

As was said, in order for this new understanding of ours to flourish something inside of us, our useless parts, must perish.  There is much about who we are that holds us back.  Life itself keeps us running in place since we are a product of nature while still being unnatural.  The natural way of things is to keep man as an animal, to tear him down until precious little is left to him.  Think of all our available energy and how it is wasted on worrying about this outcome or being anxious about that development.  The struggle to succeed in this world is just as artificial as the world itself.  If we could only Awaken for a short time to see with a calm, uninhibited, and honest purity, then we should know that at long last we are alive and present in this moment.  The strength of such a sudden hyper-awareness focused on multiple levels can only mean that at all other times we are utterly asleep!

How are we connected to life, to nature, the universe, other human beings, animals, our possessions, and what we experience?  Is everything a part of us, or are we separate?  On one level, everything is connected while on another level we are separate.  Just as in a certain reality external sentient forces exist, while in another reality they are reduced to merely symbolic representations of faculties buried inside of us.  The man who wishes to Awaken must realize both of these contrary states are true at different times.  Much of it depends on our current understanding.  An understanding which must be expanded, forced open if need be.  If the knowledge is presented and we have the capacity to accept it, then new interpretations may be observed.  Reality will come together in a fresh configuration that was hitherto blocked from us.  The ability to conceptualize something in a new way is the beginning of evolution.  However, if knowledge is wrong or being is wrong, then gnosis is stymied.  In this case, think of knowledge as information and being as ways information can be used.

We can only grasp what we see, what we can readily visualize.  Invisible truth is not truth at all because we are continually blinded by our limited perspective.  And yet an open mind begins to see what might be there, what might be possible.  The LHP practitioner must allow himself to access various theories and notions which might oppose his own.  There is no solitary way of comprehending the ineffable.  To know one facet does not mean an individual understands the entire gemstone.

Every moment of our lives presents us with opportunity.  Moments allow us the time and space to act.  Our actions can go in one of two directions, either towards the oppressive universe which endeavors to enslave us or away from it – facing a darkness ordinary man was never meant to fathom or appreciate.  Great men struggle against nature in order to overcome the role which our universe demands we play.  Opposing nature means going outside the limits of everyday man.  To become great, to rise above, to wrestle with the weak and stupid portions of ourselves, coming out of that struggle in victorious triumph… such is our potential if we would but face the dark side and grasp the outstretched tentacles of the Ancient Gods.

In each moment, ask yourself, “How is this contributing to my evolution?”  Change happens, but true progress is willed.  We are looking for controlled beneficial change, success on demand.  Breakthroughs should manifest at regular intervals, not once in a blue moon by the whims of chance.  Certainly, every once in awhile fortune occurs by accident.  This has nothing to do with evolution; it is blind luck.  Being able to direct one’s fortune is the path to progress.  Each day, state how you are contributing to your own advancement.  If you come up empty, then you know that more can be done.

Slaves live according to the will of others; a Master manifests his own will.  Such an anomalous state must begin with mastering who we are, and that is no easy task.  Human beings are prone to slavery.  Want proof?  Look around!  The self wants many contrary things and all at once.  When we begin The Great Work, our internal system is like a classroom full of children.  Without a teacher, sheer anarchy ensures that nothing gets accomplished.  Eventually, a mature adult with a positive attitude must be brought in if the class is to be instructed.

If every child in that classroom is one of man’s many ‘I’s, then a teacher equates to a Master ‘I’.  This supervising aspect or Master ‘I’ must be put in charge if structure is to be had.  The teacher needs to observe, discipline, and instruct all the other ‘I’s as if they were his students.  Master ‘I’ teaches them by way of his authority; chaos becomes order.  Of course, there may be one student, and hopefully no more than one or two, who is constantly disruptive, who obstructs the teacher at every turn.  Such a child cannot be taught at this stage.  This disruptive ‘I’ needs to be sent away to detention so the rest of the class may continue to learn.  When the disruptive element is molded and shaped into an apt pupil, it may return to the classroom.

Eventually, multiple teachers will arise, a curriculum will develop, and a principal or some kind of head administrator is found.  Whomever wields the most authority becomes the Master ‘I’.  It is his responsibility to direct proceedings.  Now, one has a school within him, a school for learning conscious ideas.  This is an example of the microcosm mirroring the macrocosm.  As above, so below.  A Fourth Way school is a community of students and faculty.  The same kind of organization can be created inside the individual who wishes to live deliberately, honestly, fruitfully, and to his full potential.

Know thyself; work begins with observation.  Do nothing at first but watch.  Take it all in… how mechanical you are, derivative, living out of habit, reacting, asleep, drifting along with the rest of that machine world which imprisons us.  Take it all in.  Breathe deep while remembering that you can separate yourself from suffering, from ordinary life.  Observe yourself… those parts of you that think, that feel, and that reach out to touch.

Man is almost never his true self because he’s too preoccupied with trying on his various masks, his false selves.  Put the masks down and let the cacophonous din of life fall upon deaf ears for awhile so that you may hear what approaches:  the age of fire and slime, an epoch of limitless potential.  Billions of people worshiping the one true God; bowing their cowled heads, raising their sigil soaked sleeve to cast a horned hand before emerald ooze, burning eye, and phallic tentacle… the flow, the vision, and the will of divinity.  It flows black, unbelievably black.  Like the void.

Ia Ia Cthulhu fhtagn,

Venger As’Nas Satanis

High Priest

Cult of Cthulhu

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 5th, 2010 at 2:51 pm and is filed under Beliefs and tagged with Ancient Ones, Awakening, Cthulhu, Formless Black Essence, Fourth Way, human evolution, Left Hand Path, Satanism, The Great Work, Xeper, Yog-Sothoth. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.