Magic 401: Horror
There is no part of magic work in vodou that does not require a strong stomach, the ability to experience things which are not just unpleasant, but downright terrifying. In my time doing this, I’ve been thrown up on, screamed at, threatened with weapons, had things thrown at me, had chunks of hair pulled out, had to clean up vomit, blood, urine, and feces—and that was just when assisting with healing. Healing is messy, and many times the things which hurt people have to quite literally come up so that they can confront and heal from them. I have, more than once, stood over someone throwing up enthusiastically into a toilet while they talked about something horrific done to them as a child, to say “let it out. Let it pass through you and out.”
Sitting with them the next day, they comment that they feel strangely lighter, which always makes me smile, ruefully. Of course they do. The poison in them has begun to drain. It is not done draining, but it has begun. I will wash the first of that poison out of my clothes later that day in the form of vomit.
In the astral spaces, I’ve had things happen which would have killed my physical body many times over, things far more capable of inspiring disgust than listening to someone describe abuse while vomiting so hard they miss the toilet and backsplash onto my feet. Things far more capable of inspiring horror than anything I’ve ever seen in real life, and my life has contained no small amount of violence.
One of the things a priest gives up is disgust, the judgement that makes you believe such things should be rare and avoidable but also the thought that these things are beneath you. A priest is available for whatever the spirit needs them to be available for. A priest gives up the capacity for horror which goes along with those judgements, horror and disgust which are rooted in the false belief that you can avoid death.
You will face your own death, more than once, in the process of being a priest or spiritual worker in this tradition. If you’re correctly in the process of becoming a priest or magical worker intended to deal with any of the domains involving healing, the dead, justice, demons (the removal of), or war (think of this as offense/defense), you will be almost continually in the process of dying—ego, belief, expectation, emotion, connection, desire, privacy, family, etc. Everything must go through that process, including your belief that your body is your own and will remain your own. We learn continuously, and in the process we will kill off what we were continuously. Sometimes this is less painful than others.
If this is not the path for you, you don’t want it.
If this is the path for you, you will not be able to stay off it, but you will not be able to stay on it without a teacher.
