What Do Occultists Actually Do? A Journey from Lurid Fantasy to Mundane Reality

A Journey from Lurid Fantasy to Mundane Reality

The Occultist

The Occultist

The Popular Imagination: Sex, Drugs, and Summoning Things

Ask the average person what occultists get up to, and you'll receive a delightfully lurid catalogue of activities that would make even the most dedicated practitioner wonder where they're supposed to find the time. According to popular perception, occultists spend their evenings:

• Summoning demons in chalk circles whilst wearing dramatically hooded robes (always black, naturally)

• Sacrificing virgins, chickens, or virgin chickens, depending on which tabloid you've been reading

• Hexing their enemies with wax dolls and strategically placed pins

• Communing with Satan over a nice cup of tea and some damned souls

• Dancing naked in the moonlight (weather permitting)

• Generally causing mayhem through the strategic deployment of candles and muttered Latin phrases

  
  

The occultist of popular imagination is equal parts Aleister Crowley, the villain from a Dennis Wheatley novel, and that weird goth kid from school who never quite grew out of their phase. They're dangerous, sexually deviant, probably on drugs, and definitely up to no good. They've "sold their soul" (presumably the metaphysical equivalent of a dodgy car-boot sale), and they're coming for your children, your pets, and your immortal soul, roughly in that order.

The Speculative Middle Ground: Conspiracy Theories and Occult Panic

Move slightly closer to reality, and we encounter the realm of conspiracy theories, where occultists transform from individual eccentrics into shadowy cabals controlling world events. Here, our practitioners are supposedly:

• Running secret societies that manipulate global politics (the Illuminati being the perennial favourite)

• Hiding occult symbols in corporate logos, pop music videos, and innocent-looking children's cartoons

• Performing elaborate rituals in the basements of government buildings

• Using "magick" to influence elections, stock markets, and the outcome of football matches

• Indoctrinating the masses through subliminal messaging and sinister hand gestures

  
  

This version of occultism treats it as both infinitely powerful (capable of controlling world events) and rather pointless (they've apparently used all this power to... hide triangles in music videos?). The occultist here is simultaneously a master manipulator and a complete time-waster, which is quite the achievement.

What We Actually Know: Welcome to the Tedium

Now, let's talk about what occultists actually do, which is considerably less exciting and infinitely more bookish than either popular culture or conspiracy theorists would have you believe.

Reading. So Much Reading.

The first thing to understand about serious occultists is that they read. Constantly. Voraciously. Often, books that would cure even the most stubborn case of insomnia. Your average practitioner's bookshelf groans under the weight of:

• Impenetrable medieval grimoires in dodgy translations

• Commentaries on those grimoires

• Commentaries on the commentaries

• Qabalistic texts that make advanced mathematics look straightforward

• Alchemical treatises where everything is a metaphor for something else

• Anthropological studies of comparative religion

• Philosophy, psychology, mythology, and history texts

  
  

Most occultists have spent more time in libraries than most librarians. They can tell you the difference between the Greater and Lesser Key of Solomon (and why both names are misleading), explain Agrippa's threefold division of magic, and have opinions about various translations of the Sefer Yetzirah. They will absolutely share these opinions at length if given half a chance.

Meditation and Visualisation: Sitting Very Still Indeed

A substantial portion of occult practice involves sitting quietly and doing apparently nothing. Advanced practitioners of ceremonial magic spend months—sometimes years—learning to visualise things with perfect clarity whilst maintaining meditative states. They're building "astral temples" in their mind's eye, pathworking through symbolic landscapes, or practising complex breathing exercises.

To the outside observer, they appear to be napping. To the practitioner, they're supposedly navigating alternative states of consciousness. To their partners, they're "doing that weird thing again."

Ritual Work: Extreme Cosplay Meets Theatrical Performance

When occultists do perform rituals, they're essentially engaging in highly structured, deeply symbolic theatrical performances for an audience of... themselves (and possibly some non-corporeal entities, depending on one's beliefs). A typical ritual might involve:

• Spending an hour setting up an altar with items placed in very specific positions

• Drawing circles and pentagrams with obsessive precision

• Calling upon various divine names whilst facing specific directions

• Performing gestures and mudras that look suspiciously like elaborate hand-waving

• Reading lengthy invocations in languages they may not fully understand

• Then spending another hour tidying it all up again

  
  

The entire affair is less "terrifying communion with dark forces" and more "very serious dress-up with religious overtones." The main risks are:

• Accidentally setting something on fire with all those candles

• Throwing one's back out with enthusiastic ritual gestures

• Neighbourhood complaints about the chanting

• Explaining to one's housemates why there's chalk all over the living room floor

  
  

Divination: Professional Pattern Recognition

Many occultists practice divination through tarot, geomancy, astrology, or other systems. This involves:

• Learning complex symbolic systems (back to the reading)

• Interpreting random or semi-random events through those systems

• Providing counsel based on these interpretations

• Arguing with other practitioners about whose interpretational system is correct

  
  

It's essentially pattern recognition combined with counselling skills, wrapped in symbolic language. The occultist doing tarot readings isn't communing with spirits (well, most of them aren't) so much as using a structured framework to help people think through their problems. It's psychology wearing fancy dress.

Record Keeping: The Magical Diary

Serious practitioners keep meticulous records in their "magical diaries." These contain:

• Detailed accounts of every ritual performed

• Results (or lack thereof) from magical workings

• Dreams and visions

• Astrological correspondences

• Hours spent on various practices

• Endless self-analysis

• 
  

It's less "Book of Shadows containing terrible secrets" and more "spreadsheet of mystical experiences with notes about what did and didn't work." The exciting parts read like: "Tuesday, 3 am: Attempted scrying. Saw nothing. Possibly need a better mirror. Also, note to self: 3 am is too late."

Networking: The Occult Coffee Morning

Much occult activity involves meeting other practitioners to:

• Discuss obscure points of magical theory

• Argue about whose interpretation of Crowley is correct (spoiler: it's none of them, because Crowley enjoyed being obscure)

• Compare notes on practices

• Complain about how Hollywood gets everything wrong

• Drink tea or coffee whilst wearing fewer dramatic robes than one might expect

  
  

These gatherings look less like covens of sinister conspirators and more like particularly nerdy book clubs where everyone's read different books and wants to explain their book to everyone else.

The Slightly Disappointing Truth

What we're left with, then, is something rather bathetic. Occultists are essentially:

• Scholars of esoteric philosophy and symbolism

• Practitioners of structured meditation and self-development techniques

• People who enjoy elaborate personal rituals

• Students of comparative religion, mythology, and psychology

• Individuals seeking alternative frameworks for understanding consciousness and reality

  
  

They're engaged in what might be called "applied philosophy with props." The robes, incense, and dramatic gestures are training wheels for consciousness—theatrical elements designed to engage the psyche at multiple levels. The complicated correspondences and symbol systems are frameworks for organising inner experience. The rituals are structured methods for inducing altered states and reinforcing intention.

Are they calling upon actual non-physical entities? Accessing genuine supernatural forces? Working with deep psychological structures? Engaging in elaborate self-delusion? That rather depends on one's ontological commitments and remains a matter of considerable debate—including among occultists themselves.

The Aleister Crowley Effect

Much of the disconnect between perception and reality stems from figures like Aleister Crowley, who deliberately cultivated an image as "the wickedest man in the world." Crowley was undeniably brilliant, producing some genuinely profound work on consciousness, yoga, and magical practice. He was also a tremendous showman who understood that "mountaineer and scholar produces careful synthesis of Eastern and Western mystical practices" is far less marketable than "BEAST 666 PERFORMS SEX MAGIC WITH PROSTITUTES."

Crowley's self-promotion created a template that popular culture still follows: the occultist as transgressive, dangerous, and sexually adventurous. The reality—that he spent most of his time writing, practising yoga, and arguing with other occultists about ceremonial minutiae—is considerably less sensational.

Contemporary Practice: Even More Mundane

Modern occultists are even more disappointing to stereotype-seekers. They're:

• Working regular jobs (you've almost certainly met occultists without knowing it)

• Raising families

• Paying mortgages

• Practising their arts around work schedules

• Buying candles from supermarkets rather than mysterious shops

• Using apps to calculate astrological correspondences

• Discussing practices on internet forums with people across the globe

  
  

The internet has been particularly devastating to occult mystique. Practices that once required years of searching for obscure teachers are now available via PDF. Questions that might once have remained mysterious can be asked on Reddit. The mysterious occultist has become just another enthusiast sharing their hobby online, complete with unboxing videos for their new tarot decks.

What They're Actually Pursuing

Strip away the theatrical elements and the cultural baggage, and most occultists are pursuing:

Self-knowledge: Using symbolic systems and practices as tools for understanding one's own psyche, motivations, and patterns.

Altered states of consciousness: Exploring the range of human experience through meditation, ritual, and various techniques—essentially, experiential phenomenology with candles.

Meaning-making: Constructing frameworks for understanding existence that integrate rational thought with direct experience and symbolic knowing.

Personal agency: Developing a sense of control and intention in their lives through structured practice and psychological work dressed up in magical language.

Community: Connecting with others who share their interests in esoteric philosophy, symbolism, and alternative approaches to consciousness.

Aesthetics: Let's be honest, some people just really like the robes, the altars, and the theatrical elements. There's nothing wrong with this.

The Uncomfortable Middle Ground

The most honest answer to "what do occultists actually do?" might be: "It depends on whom you ask, and they'll probably disagree."

Some practitioners take an entirely psychological approach, viewing their work as engaging with deep structures of the psyche through symbol and ritual. Others maintain firm belief in external, non-physical entities and forces. Many occupy an agnostic middle ground, finding the practices valuable regardless of the ultimate metaphysical reality.

What unites them is a willingness to engage seriously with pre-modern epistemologies, to work with symbol and ritual as tools for consciousness, and to maintain practices that Western culture generally dismissed as superstitious nonsense. Whether one considers this profound engagement with alternative ways of knowing or elaborate self-deception is, ultimately, a matter of perspective.

In Conclusion: The Disappointing Reality

The uncomfortable truth for both sensationalists and sceptics is that occultism is neither as exciting nor as silly as generally portrayed. It's a set of contemplative and philosophical practices wrapped in symbolism, pursued by people who tend toward scholarship, introspection, and bookishness.

The virgin-sacrificing, demon-summoning, world-controlling cabal? Pure fantasy.

The ridiculous charlatans performing meaningless rituals? An uncharitable caricature.

The reality? People sitting in rooms full of books, trying to expand consciousness through structured practice, and occasionally wearing fancy robes whilst waving at the cardinal directions.

It's all rather disappointing, really. But then, reality usually is.

Alan /|\

The next time you encounter someone claiming to be an occultist, you might try asking them about their reading list. You'll be there for hours, but at least you'll understand what they're actually up to. And if they do start going on about world domination and demon summoning, well... they've probably been reading the same tabloids as everyone else.