When do you do banishing ritual

[007]

Hi
This will seem like a really basic question, but
When should you do a banishing ritual? Should it be done on a regular basis regardless or only at beginning & end of a magical act?
Thanks from
007

[SilverR]

I think it depends heavily upon what you are doing. As a personal practice, I've been doing the LBRP nightly, with general positive results.

[Anomaly]

Traditionally, Banishing rituals are performed at the beginning and ending of longer rituals. This is done for many reasons depending on the paradigm one finds themselves working in. Banishing rituals are performed to clear the space and mind and ready oneself for greater feats of concentration. Most banishing rituals come equipped with visualizations, sound or object concentrations, mantras and any of the other varied magical techniques which cause one to enter a trance state or gnosis.

Banishing rituals are also useful in ridding oneself of psychic contaminates which might remain after work with demons or spirits of an ill nature. This is so because the banishing ritual will return one to a conscious and focused state where in the mind can be aloud to act logically or competently. Also, the name implies the use of these rituals, we are banishing any unwanted phenomenon from the area. These ritual can also be specific to certain types of phenomenon depending on the work one finds themselves doing.

If you take my Vital/death force ritual for example, one can banish any number of things from oneself from habits to fear. This banishing can be performed at the beginning of other rituals or simple as a stand alone ritual. I have utilized it for metamorphosis as well as healing and as a banishing for unwanted mental states. I am going to experiment with adding bottle magic to this banishing for long term metamorphosis in the future.

Depending on the work I am doing, I will banish at the beginning of a ritual and then not at the end. When I evoke Hecate I never banish after as she is a great friend and ally and her influence is always welcomed in my home.

Banishing rituals also have the benefit of offering practice with visualization and trance states. These rituals can be performed whenever one feels the need. I tend to make it a rule of thumb to perform a banishing ritual every day especially if I am performing ritual on that day. The effects of these rituals can be astounding on the psyche. We can return ourselves to normal cognitive function by kick starting our focus and concentration with their performance.

These rituals tend to be of great use in situations where we find ourselves dealing with spirits like Goetic Demons. After a working with a Goetic spirit there will be a few days worth of tremors left over which must be dealt with. This can be taken care of with a simple banishing created by the magician. No amount of symbolism or religious glamour can beat an actual sincere declaration of ones will for something to leave and these rituals put one in a single pointed state where the will can properly be communicated.

Banishing rituals also offer aid in enchantment as they allow the magician to focus entirely on the banishing rather than the work which was just done. Any time a thought of the desired outcome reoccurs the magician performs the banishing to achieve no mind pertaining to the results. a full banishing ritual cannot always be done in this instance so I would recommend creating mental or astral banishing to aid in this endeavor. I have made excellent banishing rituals using simple things like focusing on paradox and contradiction rather than the desired outcome of a spell or working. Chaodiscordia and I have also received excellent results with some of the strictly astral or mental rituals using paradox and confusion as a gateway to gnosis.

The possibilities are endless and to be honest, there really is not true method for banishing rituals, just what others have found useful up until this point. Maybe you can create a new method which might become a staple in the future of banishing rituals. I would stick to the standard which states that we should perform them before and after rituals for now until you get a feel for them.

~Frater Dramaticus Anomalia~