2008 Annual Meeting Deputy Master's Address
From Sekhet-Maat Lodge
Saturday, April 5, 2008 ev
by Sr. Aletheia Mnemonicas
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I stand before you having been your Deputy Lodge Master for just over a year. Last year, I spoke with you about community, and about how proud I am of each of you in joining together and finally being a real, loving community. This year, I would like to take that idea one step further and talk about communal motivation. This year my personal goal is to motivate each and every single one of you to take at a minimum, one step up in the way you think about volunteering and being involved within our Lodge. From our newest minervals, as well as our upcoming minervals, to those of us who’ve been around for 5, 8, 10 years and more. One step up for our Lodge.
The word motivation means different things to different people. It’s not something that comes in a package or in a special offer. It is not a set factor. It is as individual as we are and comes from inside us. It is an inner energy that we must muster or find. It can be an extraordinarily powerful force. The motivation of single individuals can change the path of the world. Where, we ask, do we as Thelemites find that kind of strength and determination?
It’s all the more extraordinary then that motivation is simply and purely "thought."
Uncle Al himself had a good handle on this, and teaches it to us:
“Fixed thought is a means to an end. Therefore pay attention to the power of silent thought and meditation. The material act is but the outward expression of thy thought, and therefore hath it been said that "the thought of foolishness is sin." Thought is the commencement of action, and if a chance thought can produce much effect, what cannot fixed thought do?”
The way we feel about something can sink us into lethargy or drive us into a frenzy of activity. It is those thoughts put into words that provide us with the fuel for motivation and that is what we call encouragement. The trouble is, finding that encouragement is not always easy.
It’s amazing that our thoughts alone can be responsible for such a powerful force. The fact is, we are the product of what goes on in our minds. Yet many of us think negatively about our prospects, our dreams and our ambitions. Many of us approach our magickal work attempting to banish that which we fixedly think is present in our lives, (debt, loneliness, addiction, laziness) rather than an invoke that which we Will. We allow the reality of our day-to-day work to get us down. We become disconnected from our path and our ambitions. We become discouraged and lose our motivation. We are the death of encouragement.
When we were younger, we dreamed big dreams. It seemed a simple process to imagine a world in which we could be and have whatever we wanted. Dreams and invocation were a big part of our reality. Positive thoughts poured out of us and things seemed to be very simple. Of course, we grew and learned very quickly that things did not just happen. We learned that we had to put in effort and even hard work to get what we wanted.
Many times we gave up and decided to opt for easier options. Strangely enough we discovered that there were no easy options and as a result we became dissatisfied. We lost the thread that connected us to our dreams; we went wayward of our Will. The stars remained high and bright in the sky yet we trod with heavy feet through the world of responsibility nursing our selfish grievances. We did what we were taught by lazy action and blamed others for our disappointments. Routine responsibilities seemed to engulf us. Family, school, work, financial and other obligations took over. We became at the mercy of these forces and relinquished control and responsibility for our own destiny. As Initiates we must overcome this, yet often because of the sheer workload, we are still overcome. Daily ritual, meditation, asana, volunteering, ritual, initiation, doing Will, officering, Resh, paying dues, going here, traveling there, picking up things others have dropped, stepping in, stepping up, stepping over. It is quite frankly, exhausting isn’t it?
Tragically enough, at this low point, motivation that needs to come from inside ourselves is replaced with having to do things in order to please others. Things may be sweetened for a while by incentives. We might plan, for example, to take a magickal retirement, later, if we do all of our things now, telling ourselves that we deserve to have something to look forward to.
Yet none of these things, including that retirement, that next initiation, or seeing the Lodge grow, in essence, the things that we buy with our rewards for service, seem to make any difference. Too soon, we have to face up to the reality. The debts must be paid. We have worked too hard, burned out our flame, become less than radiant. What to do? Many of us grudgingly return to our work in order to fulfill our 'responsibilities.'
We need to change this sad state of affairs. We need, somehow, to rise above this and take a look over the hill. Somehow we must find that motivation again and we absolutely MUST show our new initiates that work in our beloved Order is fulfilling and has value to them and their process. We must find some motivation that is linked to what we want and to what we are inside.
The fact is, there are always going to be tasks that we have to do that we dislike. Dues always have to be paid. Dishes always done, events organized, the engines that heat our crucible, masses, initiations and classes must always run. This takes us back to where we discovered that life could be hard work. Being responsible for a lodge is hard work. Now when I say responsible, many of you may glance over to Joseph, or another member of the Exec and say to yourself, “Ahh, yes, it must be hard for them.” However, my friends, you would be wrong. Well, not about the hard part, but yet, so very wrong, about the WHO. IT IS YOU who are responsible for this work. As I so clearly pointed out last year, YOU all are the community, the Lodge, the future of Thelema in this Valley. It is up to you.
I could go on, but another truth is that you must simply accept this fact and move on. Deal with it and 'Do the thing.' Sweeten unpalatable tasks with small rewards and incentives, if you must. However, do them for the love of someone else. Do them for the love of Thelema, the lodge and for your brethren. Get down to work with your brethren and share the burden. Sweeten the bonds of fraternity by working side by side.
Of course, you may be thinking, “Ok Kim, I gotcha, I’ll do dishes, yada yada, here’s your annual speech, when are you going to start crying?…” Answer is, I’m not. Instead I say to you, Great, glad to hear you are ready to start working, now do you really know what doing those dishes and doing that work buys us? Do you have any idea what we, as a community can accomplish if we ALL start to do?
We will buy us the ability to accomplish our mission. We, the Initiates Sekhet-Maat Lodge, in the Valley of Portland Oregon, of the Ordo Templi Orientis are tasked by our mission with the following:
- Being dedicated to the high purpose of securing the Liberty of the Individual and his or her advancement in Light, Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, and Power through Beauty, Courage, and Wit, on the Foundation of Universal Brotherhood.
- What work can we do in the lodge that contributes to this?
- We will preserve and advance the religious tenets, doctrines, principles, teachings, traditions and rites of Ordo Templi Orientis.
- How soon can you sign up to child in the mass? Officer in our initiations?
- We will encourage creative excellence through aesthetic expression in all areas of individual and group endeavor, and promote an ethos inspired by Liber AL II:35—"Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy & beauty!"
- Where is the draft of that original ritual you wrote a few years back? Let’s do it!
- We will maintain and improve our physical presence near the center of Portland, Oregon, from which we will continue to offer services in support of our mission to our members and to the public.
- When was the last time you cleaned this floor, shining it with your magickal intention?
- We will uphold the highest standards of excellence and effectiveness in the practice and dissemination of our religious, spiritual, magical, and ethical teachings.
- Can we have Liz’s email box FULL of requests to teach the public about Thelema, the Gnostic mass and get people excited about taking initiation and begin to learn our Mystery?
- We will espouse and defend the principle of individual liberty while cultivating strong fraternal bonds within our ranks.
- Are we surrounded with the love that inspires us to create bonds that are supportive of each and every one of us being God? Do we worship this divinity in each other?
- We will foster harmonious and constructive relationships with the academic, business, civil, and greater social communities within which we operate.
- Can we throw open the doors and mingle with our greater community, shining our light unto the world?
So, on a lighter, yet serious note. How do we get from washing the dishes to running an empire? Unbelievably the motivation required is the same. It comes from the same place, which is inside you. You start with the big picture. Let us focus for a minute on what we really want. Accept that this will be hard work. Accept that it will require sacrifices and begin to make them.
Speak directly to your heart. Have a 'No holds barred' honest conversation with yourself. Your subconscious mind is a powerful place. It can allow you complete and clear conversation with your HGA, or it can leave you shaking with uncontrollable fear. Work daily to speak with your HGA and do what she tells you to do. Success in Will depends on one thing and one thing only and that is the thoughts that you feed it. So, my challenge to you as a community is to dream our dream, focus on the bigger picture and feed your mind only with positive thoughts about how we will get there.
Most people feel insecure and out of their depth at some times. We feel this way if we do not think we have the skills to reach our target. Skills can be learned, so set about learning them. “But I don’t have the skills to help with the big jobs!”, you say. I say to you, that the accountant is not necessarily the best person to be the Treasurer. It is she who is devoted to the future of O.T.O. who is simply willing to learn, that becomes the best Treasurer. You all are already in a good place to learn with a huge reservoir of leadership knowledge.
As an example, the person who washes the dishes is really only a few feet away from the chef, especially in our kitchen.
If you are the dish washer and you would like to become the Chef, then you do the following: In between washes, offer to prep vegetables. Come to work an hour earlier and stay later. Offer to help, not simply because you are a nice person but because you want to learn. Start to acquire more skills. Make yourself invaluable, the more you learn the closer you will come to your goal. Give yourself challenges and seek opportunities to push yourself. Get outside of your comfort zone.
It's interesting to note how so much of our daily conversation is so negative. The words we use and the body language we display is relentlessly downbeat. We need to focus on turning this around. Problems become opportunities and as for failure; it is the most valuable learning experience you can have.
“Fear is failure, and the forerunner of failure: and courage is the beginning of virtue.”
We need to move from a position of having to do something, towards being in control. Let me say that again, because I don’t want you to miss it. We need to move from a position of having to do something, towards a position of being in control.
We need to move from having to pay our dues, towards controlling our financial future. Move from having to submit that paperwork towards owning our organizational structure. Move towards having to do those numerous rehearsals, towards owning the beauty and strength that our initiations afford us.
Choose to do something and you are taking control. If you 'have' to do it, or are told to do it, then you have lost control.
Get moving get motivated, take risks, and find new perspectives. Immerse yourself in reading Crowley, it doesn’t matter which Crowley, Do the ritual, and do the Work. You'll find it's all the same: drive, determination, and a refusal to give up. Above all paint yourself into the big picture of the success of this Lodge. Draw, mould and create the future of Thelema in this Valley. If we all continue to move this caravan forward, it will go.
It is simple, but it is not easy. It requires that you, and you, and you, each and every one of us, all devote ourselves toward the accomplishment of the Great work. You were put on this earth to make a difference, accept nothing less. The sooner we start, the sooner we will succeed.
Success is your proof;
courage is your armour;
go on, go on, in my strength;
& ye shall turn not back for any!
— Liber AL III:46
Love is the law, love under will.
