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phil farber by Alex Burns (alex@disinfo.com) - December 20, 2000 |
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| Phil Farber is a postmodern magician who conceived the future of initiatory ritual. Part of a revolutionary cabal that includes Robert Anton Wilson, Genesis P-Orridge, Laurence Galian, Peter J, Carroll, Phil Hine, and Antero Alli, Farber has updated Aleister Crowley's definition of magic ("the art and science of causing change in conformity with Will") for the contemporary environment. His unique and humorous synthesis enables the individual to manifest hidden desires, discover their True Will, and experience Mastery of the Self. Crowley's notoriously Rabelaisian libertine lifestyle and Sadeian sexual rebellion overshadowed his prolific anthropological research and intensive yoga practice. Farber 'rescues' this overlooked scientific strand of Crowley's legacy. He updates ritual techniques derived from Middle Ages daemonology and Enlightenment Rosicrucian schools with insights gleamed from Cybernetics (Norbert Wiener) Psycholinguistics (Alfred Korzybski, Noam Chomsky), NeuroLinguistic Programming (Richard Bandler, John Grinder), and Hypnotic Trance (Milton Erickson). In FutureRitual: Magick for the 21st Century (Eschaton Productions, 1997), Farber applies Occam's Razor and dazzling wordplay to a frequently misunderstood (mind)field. He explores how tools such as bio-feedback, chaos theory, meditation, mind-machines, psycho-active drugs, and "therapeutic metaphors" (Erickson) can radically restructure our subjective experience of the cosmos. The genius of Farber's open-ended and constantly evolving framework is that it is about decoding and changing meta-patterns and systems, not simply content: the practitioner can substitute preferred personal aesthetics for Farber's evocative neo-Pagan deity encounters. Thus, Farber nimbly avoids the twin errors of rigid adherence to an atrophied tradition, and becoming ensnared in an infinite regress of mirage-like goals. Farber's framework can also be employed for everyday trance occurrences, such as overcoming phobias and improving personal relationships. For Farber, the ritual chamber is an artificial environment (the "setting") for re-imprinting the traumatized psyche and simulating cognitive "meta-programs" (the "set"), not a place for becoming enraptured by your delusions. It is a sacred place to exalt the beautiful symmetries of the individual consciousness. This precise and clinical approach to "giving the unconsciousness more requisite variety" is closer to neo-Sufi traditions (George Gurdjieff, Idries Shah) and chaos magick, than the stereotypical borderline psychotic occultist (whose weak ego-barriers leave them at the mercy of their subjective imagery, which 'floods' the verbal mind). Our "values" and "ideologies" possess hypnotic qualities, and are rarely of our own conscious choice (but pre-programmed and culturally transmitted by the family, media, education, and religious institutions). Farber's bitingly satirical novel Breaks: The Adventures of Richard Nixon in the 21st Century (Xlibris, 2000) takes a sledgehammer to "group-think" and "consensus trance", in a breath-taking alternate universe that includes Timothy Leary's optimistic Space Migration scenario. The book is a must-read for fans of Tom Robbins, William S. Burroughs, and James Joyce. |
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Amazon.com Author Interview: Phil Farber Paradigm Shift Phil Farber's Home Page Eschaton Books Inner Balloons Green Egg High Times Breaks: A Novel Disinformation Dossier On George Gurdjieff Disinformation Dossier On Robert Anton Wilson Disinformation Dossier On Timothy Leary Disinformation Dossier On Laurence Galian: Beyond Duality Disinformation Dossier On Genesis P-Orridge Disinformation Dossier On William S. Burroughs Disinformation Dossier On Laughing At The Black Iron Prison: Tom Robbins & His Never-Neverland Of Conspiracy |
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