I like to collect quotes. My current favorite is from the British philosopher Herbert Spencer (1820–1903). He wrote, "There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance—that principle is contempt prior to investigation." This is an important concept for magickal people. When doing magick, it's important to have an attitude that your magick will work. It's part of the process. When looking at the results of the magick, it's important to look objectively at the work. If you don't believe something will work, you may think the results are negative even when you are successful. If you do believe something will work, you

This last weekend I was honored to be a keynote speaker for the 6th Annual Pagan Conference at the Claremont Graduate University. People and presenters came from all over the world. The topic of the conference was "Sustainability." Rather than focus on the sustainability of our environment, the paper I delivered focused on the sustainability of Paganism as a vital and evolving set of paths. For a scholarly crowd, my paper had the appropriate title: "The Similarity and Growth of Neopaganism and Early Judaism, and How that Indicates a Sustainable Neopagan Spirituality for the 21st Century." Honestly, it was a lot more interesting than the title might sound. The basic thrust of my paper is

If you are in the Southern California, please come to the 6th Conference on Current Pagan Studies at Claremont Graduate University. There are some great presenters including myself, Tony Mierzwicki, T. Thorn Coyle and others. This is a serious weekend conference for $50 or less. Click HERE for the event's schedule. Please come by and say hello. I'll also sign books for people, and I'll have my books available plus 2 new items that I'm putting together, including the basics of meditation. See you tomorrow!

Recently, the news was filled with reports about the Massachusetts special election to fill the late Senator Edward Kennedy's seat. Although polls show that people in Massachusetts tend to be politically liberal and support the Democratic party, the election was won by a more conservative candidate and a Republican, Scott Brown. Both the news media and the "blogosphere" have been inundated with know-it-all pundits giving all sorts of reasons for the vote. The Democratic candidate, Martha Coakley, was showing up in the polls just a month or two earlier with a 30 point lead over Mr. Brown. What caused this surprising shift in popularity to take place? Well, I'm not one of those well-paid