The hardest part of Magick isn't the Magick.

[Wildchildx11]

The hardest part of Magick isn't invoking or evoking a God (it's up to them if they will answer) anyone can petition or do Magick for money, material possessions, etc.

It's actually the basics and transforming yourself, shedding the parts, shedding the aspects of yourself holding you back.

Anyone can petition and invoke a God for a new car, for finances, for [insert material possession of their choice] and even if they have no proclivity towards Magick, sometimes they will be sucessful. That isn't the point of Magick, the point of Magick is transforming yourself and working on yourself so you'll be able to carry out your own will without invoking a God.

Let's take love for example. Just the act of working on your anxiety and self-defeating beliefs will increase your confidence, just the act of loving yourself, will be more likely to increase your confidence, will be more likely to grant it.

The point of Magick and the hardest thing for people to grasp is actually the fundamentals. Anyone, even the novice mage can use Magick to influence and change reality, people do it constantly without realizing, only the true Magician can use Magick to influence and change themselves.

 

[Xenophon]

Pretty much true. If I use magick like a stolen credit card, the shite I accumulate isn't going to benefit me in the long run anyway. Good point here.

 

[IllusiveOwl]

I believe some traditions consider magical self-transformation to be Greater Magic, and effecting external change to be Lesser Magic or Sorcery. Though what you've listed, dealing with neurosis, anxiety, and building self-esteem through self-love sounds like work in Psychology (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) or Psychic Alchemy. It's difficult, sure, but I wouldn't call it the most difficult.

Many Shamanic initiation rituals involve a type of torturous death to achieve powers and Ascension past the limits of our bodies, often it is literay agonizing and achieves much more profound change in the self past correcting errors in a person's egoic mechanism. Effecting changes in the ego is certainly possible through magic (especially when powered by suffering) erasing anxiety, erecting confidence, making oneself more attractive (usually through a mixing of the last two with a hint of mystique), but killing one's ego and becoming reborn as one's true magical self free from these flaws due to illusion and misunderstanding? Outright death & rebirth is harder than change & psychic transmutation when it comes to magic. Not only do you die, but your whole understanding of the cosmos dies with it in the face of Gnosis and everything collapses in all directions to reveal some completely alien truth; those not determined and steady enough go mad from the terror of such an experience.

I would argue change of that magnitude to a person's experience is the hardest part of Magic(k).

I have found that the works of Alex Grey show the true unpleasantness of ego death accurately and artfully. I've had similar experiences while in sensory deprivation trance states and really got perspective from them.

 

[Konsciencia]

Ever since my Spiritual Awakening, I never pay any mind to material things. I am happy with my Connection to The Source. However, Spirituality is a hard road to go through. I know, I'm still going through some shit, but I learned to embrace even the most outrageous obstacles because in the end. These obstacles are blessings to me.