My psyche hold several different personas, each representing an aspect of my personality, or a role used in my day-to-day activities. Recently, I leveled up with my Annunciation (Part 1, Part 2) into becoming a Black Cleric of Lucifer. Inevitably, this has changed the balance of my system somewhat. I’ve found that Cal, the persona who operates as my masculine principle, drifted because of the imbalance, but I’m not sure what exactly needs to be done to level him up, as well. So, I have designed a tarot reading to investigate.

Cal

Representing my most masculine self, Cal’s persona centers on being a “lifting bro.” He started in my head as a very focused and primal entity, gaining definition when I listed to Jack Drago’s file: Alters: Manly Spirit. Until that file, Cal had been only an idea, a facet of my core personality that I showed at the gym. After the file, Cal became his own persona, complete with a slightly different personality than my own, his own needs and wants, etc.

But, over the years as our system grew, Cal changed radically, getting smarter, getting dumber, changing physical appearance, disappearing for a time, being reabsorbed, splitting back off. It’s been a little tumultuous. My own dedication to my workouts, eating plans, and my body building efforts waxed and waned accordingly.

In my confusion, I thought that the changes in my motivation for working out caused Cal to be in this gray area. It turns around that Cal being in this gray area is the cause of my changing motivations. When I went through the experience of my Annunciation, Cal had been changed, too, or, more aptly, the environment that Cal lived in changed around him and he no longer quite fit in it. When I realized this, I realized, too, that perhaps he had never been given the attention he needed to fully become a stable persona.

Recently, I began consciously invoking Cal when I go to the gym. Soon after a prayer to Marbas to accept my workout as an exaltation, I consciously allow Cal’s persona to come to the fore and run our shared body through the workout as a means of keeping myself from slacking and to allow Cal to fulfill his primary function. Last week, I had a realization that my ongoing issues with body image had kept me from fully accepting Cal, thereby keeping him in an ill-defined turmoil of constant redefinition.

Body Issues

For almost two decades, I had been morbidly obese. Without getting into story of how or why, about a decade ago, I realized my health was being destroyed from within and took steps fix it. This included a gym routine, an eating plan, bariatric surgery, skin-removal surgery, and, in the last year, getting a coach and starting steroids. I am not where I want to be, but over the last year, I have begun to see the body I have envisioned for so long taking shape.

If being obese represents a defense mechanism — as my therapist assures me it is — then I have begun to emerge out from under the defenses and to see the defense itself as no longer useful or damaging in itself. I have gained the strength of personality to see the defense become useless.

I believe this process accelerated with my Annunciation and with my asking Lucifer directly to “remove any defect of character within me that keeps me from serving him.” My body image issues — basically, compulsively seeing myself as ugly and unworthy because of my body shape — represents a defect of character. As these issues dissolve under the influence of Lucifer, the inappropriate clinging to the defense becomes more obvious, and thus, the instability of Cal becomes more apparent.

If I’m to treat Cal as a viable persona, then I need to stabilize him. But how? What does he need? What is his identity exactly? What are his goals and what role should he serve in the system. It can’t go one as it has because that will lead to chaos and Cal would eventually breakdown again. Much like Cal, my workout motivation and zeal for my eating plan must be reinforce and taken further if I’m to reach the goals I have set for myself.

The Reading

I decided to use three different decks for my reading: The AttendTheSabbath Tarot, The St. Jinx Gay Tarot, and the St. Jinx Feather and Stone Oracle. Why three? I use the AttendtheSabbath deck as my primary Luciferian deck (as is obvious from other posts re: readings on this blog), so I wanted to include the energy of those images as a dark basis for the reading, almost a primal energy. I thought of the The St. Jinx Gay Tarot as a more positive, active set of imagery — less about the identity and being represented by the AttendtheSabbath deck and more about action, goals, and doing in the world. The new St. Jinx Feather and Stone Oracle does not have traditional tarot cards, but instead a set of personas and roles that might help me understand the role Cal should play as my masculine principle; it represents an insight off the standard Tarot descriptions as a counterpoint.

In a moment of inspiration, I designed my own card layout for the reading in question.

1. Identity — Representing the sacral chakra, the fundamental energy of the masculine principle (in me, a cis-gendered human male, at least), this card would describe who and what Cal is.
2. What Was Needed? — Representing the baseline needs Cal once had and is moving away from
3. What Is Needed? — Representing the ongoing and future needs Cal will have
4. Actions — What actions does Cal need control over? What actions of our system will he govern in a tangible sense?
5. Goals — What are Cal’s ultimate goals for himself, for the system?
6. Role — What role will Cal play in the system?

Cards 1, 2, and 3 will use the AttendtheSabbath deck; cards 4, 5 will use the St. Jinx Tarot deck, and Card 6 will use the St. Jinx Feather and Stone Oracle deck.

Casting the Cards

To cast the cards, I first invoked Lucifer by reciting his enn and listing his dignities. I asked Lucifer primarily to gain his favor when practicing sorcery, as he is the “Keeper of the Black Flame.” I invoked Philotanus by his enn and asked him to show me forbidden knowledge, as is his purview. I then drew the cards into the spread.

1. Identity — V of Discs (Reversed) — Recovery from a material loss and the gaining of insight into spiritual matters or practices.
2. What Was Needed? — Warden of Blades — A dominant and courageous male; coming and going of misfortune
3. What Is Needed? — XVIII The Moon (Reversed) — Peace after a struggle; gaining insight into and overcoming buried emotions or inner turmoil
4. Actions — 5 of Pentacles (Reversed) — Recovery from a material loss or spiritual poverty
5. Goals — 6 of Pentacles — Giving, receiving, sharing material success
6. Role — The Alchemist — Transmutation; Transformation; Trial and Error; Practice.

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At his core, Cal (representing my masculine principle) has been about overcoming a material loss [V of Discs (Reversed)], in this case, less about finances or property, more about my literal physical body. Of course, his first and primary task had been to help me recover my health in a tangible, material sense. For the onset, he had been a powerful, dynamic force — almost a stereotypical lifting “bro” (Warden of Blades) and he had sought out similar role models on which to pattern himself. This worked for a while, but it is clear that something had changed and the battles he’s been fighting to regain my health — against this misfortune of mine — has passed; he’s won. He needs to evolve to pass away from the conflict into something else [XVIII The Moon (Reversed)]. The guidance is to recognize the victory, step away from the battle, and refocus the energy from fighting to building.

Yet, the actions Cal needs to perform are somewhat still somewhat the same as his identity: recovery from the material loss and the spiritual poverty that came with it [5 of Pentacles (Reversed)]. It’s incredibly telling to me that in two different card positions, the same card was pulled [V of Discs (Reversed) and 5 of Pentacles (Reversed)] indicating to me that Cal is still acting within his core identity and that the identity itself does not need to be altered fundamentally.

But, Cal does need to be retasked somewhat. Having attained material success, he needs to enjoy it, relish it, give it away as charity, and receive more of it through these actions (6 of Pentacles). Abundance breeds abundance. I find it also very telling that, after the two identical cards were drawn that the next card in the sequence was pulled, indicating the need to further the journey.

Cal will provide the role of transformation in the system. He has before and will continue in that role, as he has been the force that has reshaped our material body through hard work (The Alchemist). Just like an alchemist in a laboratory, mixing potions, transmuting metals, etc., Cal will use his skills to push our material form forward into bigger, thicker gains through practice, practice, practice. That’s his role, to keep us on track and to keep our motivation moving ever forward. I’ve often used the phrase “relentless incremental improvement” when thinking about body building and this fits Cal.

Conclusion

Everyone needs to evolve. Even as my core persona works to fully realize my role as a Black Cleric, so does Cal need to evolve into his next role, one that brings material transmutation through repetitive use of his skills. He has moved passed being a bombastic warrior fighting against a seemingly insurmountable task (losing about 100 lbs of obesity) and now confronts the inner turmoil that generated the obesity in the first place, a pervading lack of self-esteem. The lack has already mostly dissolved, but that fact needs to carry through to the material body we occupy. Moving away from this spiritual poverty toward material success, Cal’s goal is to be generous with our body — goals that fit with my pacts with Lucifer, Marbas, and Asmodeus.

I have to stop struggling against Cal because of my body image and give him space to do what he has been created to do. Once I stop resisting, he will fulfill his role and transform us into the what we need to be.