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In The Way of the Will, David Shoemaker explores how the spiritual discipline of Thelema, founded by Aleister Crowley (1875-1947), can be utilized to enhance your psychological and spiritual growth. The book grew out of the author's own teachings and experiences—podcast episodes, classes, and of course, many years of personal practice and supervision of other initiates. It is a compendium of useful tools and perspectives designed to serve as one of many useful guides in the magician's library.
- Part 1 of the book, Qabalah, the Path of Initiation, and the Life Within, reflects on the ways your inner experience can be enhanced by tools such as the Qabalistic Tree of Life, Qabalistic psychology, and the symbolic world of astrology. This section also reviews the ways in which Thelema can inform your creativity, your sense of connectedness and meaning, and your experience of the nature of life itself. Part One concludes with a discussion of the inevitable ordeals that impact us along the path of the Great Work, and ways to cope with them.
- In Part 2, Thelemic Practice in Detail, several important (but rarely discussed) libers in the Thelemic corpus are reviewed, with an eye toward strengthening the use of these powerful practices with no-nonsense advice, and tips for constructing powerful, customized magical invocations are given. Part 2 also examines the deeper, personal magick accessible via attendance of the Gnostic Mass, and the ways the symbolic frameworks of the original Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn can be (and have been) adapted to express and enhance Thelemic principles and practices. Dr. Shoemaker concludes the book with a personal memoir of his own path toward awareness of True Will, including his experience of the "Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel"—the term often used by Crowley to describe the pivotal spiritual awakening potentially available to every human being.