Before moving onto a couple of notes on advanced sigil magic, there are a few points worth clearing up.

Some readers, I’ve noticed, convulse with nervous laughter whenever I mention the word ‘masturbation’.  And no wonder, 

next to wetting the bed or shitting in your own cat’s box for a laugh, it’s the one thing no-one likes to admit to.

Well, I’m afraid there are more embarrassed giggles afoot as we tackle this topic one last time and hopefully reassure some

worried correspondents: Masturbation is only ONE of countless methods you can use to bring your mental chatter to a 

standstill for the split-second it takes to charge and launch a sigil.  I suggest masturbation because I’m kind-hearted, because

it’s convenient and because it’s fun for most of us.

Children of Christian Fundamentalists or any other youngsters checking out this site in defiance of their parents’ insistence on

the literal truth of a series of folk histories composed several thousand years ago in the Middle East, may find it difficult to 

masturbate in the face of the Bible’s strict rules about spilling seed on stony ground (lucky for you, girls! In spite of His 

thoughtful addition of a clitoris to Adam’s lively rib God apparently overlooked the potential for female masturbation and forgot

to prohibit it. Then again, he did add ‘thou shalt not suffer a witch to live’ to cover His ass in any eventuality).  Under these 

circumstances, I’d suggest a chaste kiss or a ride on the dodgems, either of which should be enough to white out 

consciousness for as long as you need.

If you don’t suffer from the symptoms of religious mania but STILL can’t make the one-backed beast with yourself, I’m afraid 

you may have to use a more involved method.  Bungee off a bridge, perhaps, or sit naked in your local graveyard at night.  Or

dance until you fall over.  The important thing is to find your own best method for stopping that inner chat just long enough to

launch a fiercely-visualised sigil into the gap.  States of exhaustion following ANY intense arousal or deprivation are ideal.

And if you experiment and still have trouble with sigils, try some of the other beginner exercises for a while (see upcoming 

chapters of POP MAGIC! or get hold of some good spell books from the list over in the second week of the column.  I’ve only 

met a couple of people who’ve told me they can’t make sigils work so maybe there are a few of you out there who genuinely 

have problems in this particular area.  Tough luck but it doesn’t mean there’s no magic for you to play with.  I couldn’t wheeze

‘Twinkle twinkle little star...’ out of a clarinet but I can play the guitar well enough to have written hundreds of fabulous songs. 

If I’d stuck with the clarinet and got nowhere would that mean there is no such thing as music? Or would it indicate simply that

I have an aptitude for playing the guitar which I can’t seem to replicate using a clarinet?  If I want to make music I use the 

instrument I’m most comfortable and accomplished with.  The same is true for magical practise.  Don’t get uptight about it.  

This is not about defending a belief system, this is about producing results.  

USE ONLY WHAT WORKS.

SIGILS: DISPOSAL 

Some people keep their sigils, some dispose of them in an element appropriate to the magician’s intent (I have burned, buried, 

flushed away and scattered sigils to the winds, depending on how I felt about them. Love-sigils went to water - flushed down

the toilet or thrown into rivers or boiled in kettles.  War-sigils were burned etc... Some of my sigils are still around because I 

decided they were slow-burners and worth keeping. Some are even still in print.  Do what feels right and produces results.)

Soiled paper and tissues can easily be disposed of in your mum’s purse or the pocket of dad’s raincoat.

VIRAL SIGILS 

The viral sigil also known as the BRAND or LOGO is not of recent development (see ‘the Nazis’ 20c. 20s-40s) but has become

an inescapable global phenomenon in recent years.  The Nazis were the last thinkers of the Imperial Age; they still thought 

world domination meant tramping over the 'enemy' and taking his real estate.  If only they’d had the foresight to see that global 

domination is only possible using corporate stealth-violence methods and combined that with their undoubted design senses; 

the rejected artists who engineered the Third Reich might have created the world’s first global superbrand.  The McDonald’s 

Golden Arches, the Nike swish and the Virgin autograph are all corporate viral sigils.

Corporate sigils are super-breeders.  They attack unbranded imaginative space.  They invade Red Square, they infest the 

cranky streets of Tibet, they etch themselves into hairstyles.  They breed across clothing, turning people into advertising 

hoardings.  They are a very powerful development in the history of sigil magic, which dates back to the first bison drawn on 

the first cave wall.

The logo or brand, like any sigil, is a condensation, a compressed symbolic summing up of the world of desire the corporation 

intends to represent.  The logo is the only visible sign of the corporate intelligence seething behind it.  Walt Disney died long 

ago but his sigil, his cartoonish signature persists, carrying its own vast weight of meanings, associations, nostalgia and 

significance.  People are born and grow up to become Disney executives, mouthing the jargon and the credo of a living 

corporate entity.  Walt Disney the man is long-dead and frozen (or so folk myth would have it) but Disney, the immense,

invisible corporate egregore persists.

Corporate entities are worth studying. They and other ghosts like them rule our world.  So...figure out why the Coca-Cola spirit

is stronger than the Doctor Pepper spirit (what great complex of ideas, longings and deficiencies has the Coke logo succeeded

in condensing into two words, two colours, taking Orwell’s 1984 concept of Newspeak to its logical conclusion?)  Watch their 

habits, track their movements over time, monitor their repeated behaviours and watch how they react to change and novelty.  

Learn how to imitate them, steal their successful strategies and use them as your own. Create your own brand, your own logo 

and see how quickly you can make it spread.

Build your own god and set it loose.

APPLIED MAGIC 

Is about making things happen and performing experiments. In these endeavours we do not need to know HOW magic works 

only that it does.  We prove this by doing the work, recording the results and sharing our information with other magicians.  

Theoretical magic is all the mad ideas you come up with to explain what’s happening to you.  Applied magic is what makes 

them happen.

THE MAGICAL RECORD

Always keep a journal of your experiments. It’s easy to forget things you’ve done or to miss interesting little connections and

correspondences.  Make a note of everything, from the intent to the fulfilment.  Make a note of dates, times, moods, successes

and failures.

Study YOURSELF the way a hunter studies prey. Exploit your own weaknesses to create desired changes within yourself.

BANISHING 

Banishing is a way of preparing a space for ritual use.  There are many elaborate banishing rituals available, ranging across 

the full spectrum of pomposity.  Think of banishing as installing virus protection software.  The banishing is a kind of 

vaccination against infection from Beyond.

Most banishings are intended to surround the magician with an impenetrable shield of will.  This usually takes the form of an

acknowledgment of the elemental powers at the four cardinal points of the compass.  Some like to visualise themselves 

surrounded and protected by columns of light or by four angels.  Any protective image will do - spaceships, superheroes, 

warrior-monks, whatever.  I don’t bother with any of that and usually visualise a bubble radiating outwards from my body 

into space all around above and below me as far as I think I’ll need it.

Why the need for protection?

Remember that you may be opening some part of yourself to an influx of information from ‘non-ordinary’, apparently ‘Other’

sources.  If you practise ceremonial magic and attempt to summon godforms or spirits (see next month) things will 

undoubtedly happen.  Your foundations will be tested. There is always the danger of obsession and madness. As magical 

work progresses, you will be forced into confrontation with your deepest darkest fears and desires.  It’s easy to become 

scared, paranoid and stupid.  Stay fluid, cling to no one self-image and maintain your sense of humour at all times.

Banishing reminds you that no matter how many gods you talk to, you still have to take a shite and be able to cook dinner 

and talk to people without scaring them.

When you complete any magical work, ground yourself with a good laugh, a good meal, a good shag, a run or anything else

that connects you with the real world.  Banishing after your ritual is over works as a decompression back into normal world

of bills and bus stops and job satisfaction.  The magician’s job is not to get lost in the Otherworld but to bring back its 

treasures for everyone to play with.

You now have the basic techniques of magical practise at your disposal. 

Get out there and cause trouble.

Next in POP MAGIC! we’ll move forward into some of the more exciting and bizarre areas of magical work including :-

HYPERSIGILS

MEDIA DIVINATION

BUILDING SERVITORS AND OTHER CYBERNETIC THOUGHTFORMS

HOW TO CHAT UP GODS 

BEYOND THE ABYSS: THE MAGICAL SELFPLEX

See you there. Bring your own wand.