Carcosa Bound

Things can get weird when you’re tired, exhausted, and out in the woods alone.

Fortunately I was on the home stretch of my first ultramarathon when the trees began speaking.

It was all so obvious, too; they’d been there the whole time, but this was just the moment they chose to speak, or I was able to listen. Unsurprisingly, they were pissed with humans generally, and especially about what we were doing to the air and water.

It wasn’t like I was given some sacred mission or something; it was more like the resigned grumbling of a neighbour, or the talk you have standing in a queue in a store. Like, what were any of us going to do about it?

I’d had some episodes of sustained high strangeness when running before – including several weeks where every run led to a visceral awareness of physiological structures making their symbolic origin known; the “Goat legs” times. It really helped climbing steep hills.

Also, breathing – feeling, with extreme sensory clarity, that joyous detonation of cellular energy when fresh oxygen reaches the bloodstream.

I think, in this way, I came to glimpse the possibilities in that cryptic Austin Osman Spare line, “The soul is the ancestral animals” – the body lives in the soul, and so, necessarily, all the ancestors do too.

Also, to finally reach the top of a far-away hill, in a lather, with the blood singing – to claim the ascent, and perform prayers on the hill top; often this results in immediate feedback – I see all sorts of wildlife appear; goats and rabbits, hawks and bush parrots, butterflies and absolutely seductive mosses that invite the weary runner to just sit a while... Once, in the most surreal running experience I’ve had, I came across an emu, which was utterly terrifying. Those things are massive, and very assertive.

Other traditions have running weirdos too

The Marathon Monks of Mt Hiei provide a wonderful example from another tradition, of Magical running, taken to the levels that only Japanese Buddhists can go to. These monks, of the Tendai sect, undertake the formidable Kaihogiyo process involving years of dedication, with seasons of daily ultramarathon-length treks.

The monks carry with them a knife and rope, so if they fail to complete their run, the expectation is they will kill themselves. Enlightenment is the only thing that matters. A bit of material – including a great documentary on this – is available, and well worth checking out.

Adventurer Alexandra David-Neel’s wonderful Magic and Mystery in Tibet has another fascinating example. While travelling across the Tibetan highlands, her group spots a lone individual bounding across the plateau at great speed.

A cursory explanation follows, which states he belonged to a mysterious order of monks who focus exclusively on cultivating siddhis that make them light. He would prepare for his run fastidiously, then – wreathed in chains so he wouldn’t float away – was given a message to deliver (or something) and sent on his way. To interrupt a runner like this would result in his certain death.

Then, she changes the topic, and doesn’t mention it again (though does a great many other fascinating things – this is wonderful and classic occult travelogue).

Certainly, this seems like something that could be explored further, through some sort of sustained Kasina working, though this is not my area of primary focus or expertise.

Other Applications

I really learned Qabalah this way, too – mapping the tree to the body, running and chanting godnames, calling angels, visualising all the magical tools from Crowley’s 777, and all the rest of it. It all becomes quite wonderful and exciting, racing around suburban streets on otherwise peaceful nights, in all your astral get-up, surrounded in visualised golden light, clouds of incense and choirs of angelic voices.

Or – just drilling in the Middle Pillar, that venerable fix-all; breath and footfall become the metronome, pacing the meditation, literally. After a good 45 minutes of so, this really becomes quite intense. And – life is busy – it can be hard to make time for both physical and magical training; there is huge benefit in bringing these together, from an efficiency perspective, if nothing else.

There is something inherently and inescapably spiritual in running long distances, if you choose to look at it this way. Equally – spiritual growth and development are so frequently described in terms of a journey, an adventure, or climbing mountains, as well as training.

Seems a pretty obvious correlation, and offers a great way to keep strong, fit, grounded and out of the house – and out where the wild things are.