My altar

I’m a chaote, a chaos magickian; I don’t adhere to any religion and I don’t subscribe to the well-known instructions on tools / weapons or altar layout. My altar is for my mediation and magick weaving. I’m comfortable with energies, elementals and perhaps spirits and dæmons, but as a chaote, I don’t claim to know or understand the objective reality of such entities, I flow between theories.

I don’t have an athame or wand, and feel pretty silly waving one around. I am attracted to athames and wands all the same ;)

My altar evolves to match my desires and requirements; it’s already developed since these photos.

Working from the centre:

The candle (and the many reflections of its flame) is my focus. I have eight candle colours to choose from, each scented appropriately (designed to order).

The candle is sat on a dish for cleanliness and safety, and this dish is now sat on my satin wrapped scrying obsidian mirror.

Surrounding the candle at the four directions are my tiny elemental bottles.

Surrounding all this are my eight chaos coins, sigilised and charged, at the eight directions. The order of the eight changes depending on my understanding and desires regarding their elemental correspondences.

Behind all this are my Tibetan chimes, a mirror ball, a Mathmos glow-stone, a glass globe, a hexagonal marquetry box filled with little things.

Next to the hexagonal box is a mini altar to XXXX, with eight pounds and a candle.

Then there’s my ‘wish pot’ of spent or fired sigils. Translation here.

Two dishes of stones; every visitor to my home is welcome to steal a stone.

Two stones.

A Japanese / Chinese carved ‘rock’ - a gift from a lost friend. Says ‘Peace’ or some such nonsense.

Split wood.

A very old book. Ahem.

Backgammon and chess boards.

Abacus.

In the centre you can see I have a glass rock garden of sorts, guarded on either side by Gog and Magog. These authentic carved godlings are direct from the continent of Africa, and were probably crafted in the 1930s or 40s. They terrified me as a child. I’m careful to never separate them.

Looking on the left now, you can see a vase with black stones and white glass (no reason, but I like the reflections in it), a frame with a carved leaf, various boxes and my two flaming oil burners (for light and heat, not fragrance).

I could clear all this away tomorrow and start with a slab of granite, paper and a pen. I’m an empty-handed mage, see. My current altar evolved as part of my lounge, it is a sacred space-time for me. I use two astral temples as well, but they would take even longer to describe, and the polaroids never come out.

Also, see my Pre-Abramelin Operation preparations.

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Find me on tumblr at Xaos.me.uk and on Twitter as ChaosMagick

When I enable answers on a post, remember if you ask a question in return there’s no way for me to respond. You’re welcome to ask me a question via tumblr.

I understand the tumblr publishing checklist. Sigh ;)