Show Notes
There's a meme that's been evolving since 2021, and in its current chaotic incarnation, it's become accidentally magical—even if the people using it don't realise it. In this episode, I'm unpacking "do it for the plot" as a practical framework for the year ahead. Not just as permission to take risks, but as a way of activating synchronicity and maintaining agency when things inevitably go sideways on the way to your goals. I'll walk you through how to use this alongside your existing magical toolkit—your amulets, your enchantments, your divination practice—and share the diagnostic story I keep coming back to for checking where I'm actually at versus where I think I am. I'm also introducing a new project I've been wrestling with: hospicing modernity's magic. Because the late twentieth century gave us some genuinely powerful techniques wrapped in a frame that insists magic isn't real. I want to find a way to respectfully retain the useful stuff and jettison the less-than-useful. There's practical advice here for interrogating your intentions for 2026, plus some thoughts on why the slacker-era re-enchantment is officially over and what needs to replace it. Happy new year, kids!
More from Rune Soup
The one and only Peter J Carroll has completed his incarnation. I wanted to get down some thoughts about what he and his work meant to me. You can also watch this one.
In this side quest from the Hospicing Modernity's Magic series, I make the case that Synchromysticism is modernity's best available form of omen logic. And that getting good at it is one of the more reliable ways to get good at magic. We'll cover Seneca's distinction between the candle and the comet The rise and decline of synchromysticism as a subculture. Jung on the I Ching and psychoid archetypes. The Māori concept of wairua. And the practical toolkit. Show Notes Chris Knowles on Cosmic Connections: Mystical Practices & Reality's Hidden Language. Wearing Jung's Skin Like A Pelt. Jake Kotze on The Higherside Chats.
Ayahuasca's peak cultural moment has been and gone. So what does she do now? And what are the lessons for western magic in the complex journey of this incredible plant teacher? I have some thoughts on all this mid-dieta, in the Upper Amazon. As usual, this one is also a YouTube video. You can see it here. Here's the link to the Santa Rosa centre. (The website is a little weird but this is the place!) Here's the piece I wrote after my first piñon blanco experience.
It's the anniversary of the reception of the Book of the Law. Joining me to explore the questions of What to make of it?
Is magic just a less sophisticated form of psychology? That is probably the cornerstone claim of what I am calling 'Modernity's Magic'. And in the next instalment of our series 'Hospicing Modernity's Magic', I want to look at: How psychology diverged from magic and why. Jung's role during his lifetime. What the magicians of modernity did with the 'legitimacy umbrella' they received from Jungian thought. Which parts of this journey do we take with us into the magic of today? Chapters 00:00 Introduction 01:11 Wearing Jung's Skin Like a Pelt 01:57 The 19th Century & Roads Not Taken 07:56 The Red Book 10:50 Active Imagination 15:26 Jung & Astrology 17:59 Is Magic Just Psychology? 22:09 Synchronicity 29:17 The Yi Qing & Moments in Time 33:08 Synchromysticism as Omen Logic 35:26 Psychoid Archetypes & the Unus Mundus 43:00 The Post-Jung Pelt-Wearers 49:27 What to Hospice, What to Keep 52:32 Use Magic to Legitimise Jung