Ten years ago, I would not have made a post on this subject for fear of giving others a false direction based on my unique experiences. Say a new student might not have similar results if left to a more personal, experiential, experimental and scientific approach. With a new person doing Enochian, we would just call the spirit up and let the new seer scry away. We would ask them prepared questions about what they are seeing, and troubleshooting the ceremony as we went. Sometimes it took two or three sessions to get things rolling with an inexperienced magician, but most of our colleagues were already Adept at magic before we even began scrying, so we had a lot of success. This care and discretion with new people is something I picked up from my A.`.A.`. experiences with different friends over the years, the old 'don't lead your witness' with respect to magic. Now with experience training 30 or more people with this work, I have seen the same phenomenon happen so many times, I no longer feel the need for such a ponderous and slow approach training people, and am pleased to jot some notes down if they will help anyone else on the matter. Here's a few things that I would have liked to have heard when I was just getting started that aren't in any book.
Practice from the beginning repeating your visions aloud while they are happening, if working alone, learn to record as you go. A little practice makes it easy, and you can learn to let the vision continue on without loosing it. There is nothing more pointless and boring in Enochian group work than working with a single seer who is silent the whole time as they scry and later who can't remember what they saw, or loose trance because they haven't cultivated the skill of writing or repeating aloud for a scribe to record what they have seen. Magic is very serious business, but it can be fun for a group too. No gawking or party tricks, but I doubt anyone would get involved if they weren't at least interested in it! It is like learning to type, it is best to practice the good habits of repeating visions as they come or learning to write as it happens, right from the beginning of the ZAM work. A magician's better speed and accuracy will come as a result. A Canadian, I also liken this to tapping a tree for sap, it is a renewable resource. I have found these simple practices that follow have halped many, including myself, improve in the art.
At the trance-inducing point, after the key is read, I often repeat the hierarchies again, and definitely test using the spirit name (as well as the banners, the seven double letters, all the basic stuff). I like to repeat vibrating the spirit or senior's name the most at this point, it helps me tune in quicker. I vibrate it, but I noticed if people belt it out with too much gusto, it can break the trance, so we often try to not do it theatrically like in an LRP, but let the seer vibrate it quieter, but still properly. Here is the key: do it as taught, but visualize it having a tremendous force in the vision. That way we stay in our trance.
After each bout of vibration, slowly the picture comes clearer, and in stages audio and visual clarity take place. We test it with the traditional order methods, then when I hit the place where full audio and detailed visual contact occurs, like you said, they definitely want you to get to the point! They are very impulsive without being impatient or reckless. There is simply a raw 'get to business' that I have rarely experienced with other entities, and especially not with Goetic or planetary spirits. It is almost as if they are waiting patiently for us to get it together while we take our requisite few moments to go under trance, or 'tune in' and they are already good to go with their first sentence. "Why have you called?" or some such. It feels like a jolt where this imperative impulse to reply quickly is communicated to me. When training a new seer, they are often frightened at this moment, regardless of the preparation before. It really sinks home that these entities behave as if they are independent beings, regardless of one's preconceived personal philosophy on the matter. Let us take the psychological concept of projection into account here. It works for any relationship, spirit or human. For example, the spirit of my wife is only a psychological projection of mine when I mistake her for my mother, and endeavour to set sundry menial tasks for her, otherwise the universe still behaves as if she was an independent being =).
There is also a high level of empathy possible with these communications that some of us don't notice at first, I imagine I can actually feel what they are feeling. Really they are supremely genuine and severe beings.
I prepared a generic list of questions for my first working, mainly because it was what you were supposed to do, but right away they seemed shallow and inappropriate because they were not tailor made for the entity. To choose an entity, I use the astrological attributions of element, sub-element, and possibly planet, etc. For example, the Mercury Senior on the Earth Tablet is Ahmlicu. Then using this as a basis, one can ask specific articulate and relevant questions of them, and at best work with them for a specific personal need, instead of calling them up one after another to create a nice book or grimoire of attributes as was my previous compulsion! With a specific personal concern, they are much more helpful. Regardless of the system of attributes one subscribes to, or how well we know ourselves, starting somewhere with care is better than beginning from a place of no genuine effort towards making a new contact with another being. it is literally the first meeting at the beginning of a relationship.
Finally, I never ask an Enochian Senior to do anything menial for me on the physical plane, that task seems reserved for other ranks of Subservient angle Angels and other spirits. I actually prefer the seven planetary spirits (i.e. Bartzabel, Quedemial, etc) from the Qamea system of evocation for those sundry tasks.
This post originally appeared on the Golden Dawn Forum, and after I received a few replies, I slightly reworded it for purposes of clarity.
