Meditative Steps to Achieving Your Dreams
I got recommended sigil work several years ago by my astrologer. At the time, I was working in hospitality, feeling stuck and undervalued in the rat race. He looked at me and said,
“It’s clear you shouldn’t be working in a chicken shack. Even if it’s the best one in London.”
We had an in-depth conversation about my passions and ideas, planetary alignments, and astrological remediation. He suggested that I create a daily routine, exploiting the influence of the planets to gain some traction in my life.
He also mentioned that casting sigils was something he did that offered him great results. Turned out that he was a Chaos Magician in his Spare time. (Accept my jokes please).
Are Sigils Just Scribbles or Do They Really Work?
Some call it psychology, some call it magick, others call it Jesus.
Whatever it is for you, let it take you there, I say.
Sigils are often associated with Chaos Magick, which is results based. It can seem somewhat akin to yuppie-style goal setting, which is why I prefer to blend sigil making with the yogic tradition of sankalpa.
Big magick and big meditation for the eclectic yogi witch.
I find working with sigils particularly rewarding because of the creative element. They seem private and intimate, stripped of the grandiosity of fancy rituals. There is something about loosening my mind and drawing out my own symbol into three-dimensional existence that simply feels good to me.
Our ancestors clearly thought the same.
Neolithic rock art is full of signs and symbols that some attribute to early sigil work. We could also make a strong case for sigil crafting in the birth of Chinese writing, which is firmly rooted in Neolithic Oracle Bone script. The later development of Fu Talismans, created by Taoist ceremonial magicians could also be deemed as a form of sigil crafting.
Shang dynasty characters on fragments of an oracle bone dating between 1600 and 1050 BC. British Library
Sigil Recipe
Fun news is that sigils are easy. Here is the recipe that my astrologer handed over to me:
Ingredients:
§ Pen
§ Paper
That’s it. But your sigil designs can be as ornate and elaborate as you wish.
I have used paints and pencil crayons in the past. Hell, I’ve even used photoshop and created digital collage versions...
So, in summary, there is no strict rule about how you construct your sigil. Call the paper and pen combo, the Classic.
Method:
Write out your sankalpa. (Read my article on how to create a sankalpa if you need some guidance).
Cross out all the vowels in your sankalpa statement.
Cross out any repeated letters.
Merge the remaining letters into a glyph.
Get creative with your glyph to make it look visually appealing.
I suppose this last part is optional, but it is part of the process that I genuinely find helpful. It infuses the sigil with more of my intention and places greater emphasis on its importance. You may even find that you develop your own style, which is pretty cool.
Don’t be discouraged if your sigils don’t look like how you envisioned them. That’s just the nature of art.
You may face some concerns about it being too plain or not magickal enough. If you have made it with intention, know that there is no right or wrong. It does not have to look like something straight out of a medieval grimoire.
Activation:
You have an array of choices when it comes to how you want to reach a transpersonal state. You may already have a magickal system you work with. By all means, incorporate it.
Here are a few of the more popular means of achieving this:
§ Meditation is the cleanest form of non-ordinary consciousness. It is what I recommend.
§ Energy work such as reiki, smudging, employing the use of sound, are all great options.
§ Consuming psychedelics is another way to reach a funky state of mind-alteration.
Obviously, activating your sigils is not reserved to these options above.
Other ideas might be that you recite a mantra or, like me, you may want to employ pranayama techniques. Infusing the sigil with prana is reminiscent of yantra magick. Get tantric and invite a goddess to charge them for you.
As you can see, you can’t do this wrong. Follow your intuition when it comes to bringing your sigil to life.
Now What?
And now, forget about them.
Yup. We want to consciously forget everything and let our unconscious do the work it’s supposed to. Let your sankalpa flicker in between these worlds via your sigil.
Destruction:
Once the sigil has been internalised, their destruction is traditionally encouraged.
I have read several sources about using fire.
Burning your sigils brings a highly ritualistic element to Sigil Magick, which I love. It reminds me of ancient Vedic fire rituals and contemporary fire magick. Why not add a little bit of psychodrama?
As smoke rises into the ether, the feeling of energy release is highly satisfying. The sigil has become an offering into the expanse of the universe. You could even choose to take this one step further, utilizing the ashes in some fashion.
However, some sources advise against destroying your sigils as they should remain in your environment where it can be unconsciously absorbed. I have tried both burning and keeping them. Both practices have their merits.
I find keeping them as art pieces or as cameos in my visual diary / grimoire to be a valuable record of my spiritual journey. They also remind me that yes, I made a sigil and my sankalpa lives on somewhere in the soup of unconsciousness.
Notes & Recommendations
If you need direction or inspiration on how to create your own sankalpa, or even simply to understand more deeply about the nature of sankalpa, read this article here.
If you are a newbie or simply looking for something different, read about the various types of meditation you can try.
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🎨/📷 by Austin Osman Spare, tarot deck images, c.1906