Yeah, I guess it would seem weird. Idk, I've always been interested in the spiritual and mystical. I've wanted to learn more about the occult as well but I'm kind of scared of it
As a teenager I was more commonly associated with neopagan spiritualists, many of whom practiced witchcraft. I've been told witches worship the devil but everybody I've talked to that self identifies as a witch said no. I never identified as Wicka. I was more of a Jedi. Had I read the Daodejing at that time in life I probably would have identified as Taoist. But I sought community with pagans and pantheists and druids because they were accepting and because they shared some of the beliefs that I held at that time. I once believed that all life was infused with a vital force like a life force, a living spirit. Something that would fuse the material world to an ethereal netherworld like a collective consciousness of a biosphere. And I believed that psionic powers like telepathy and telekinesis and astral projection were all possible because of this. Now before you judge me, remember that there really wasn't much an atheist or skeptical movement. So whenever anybody protested on the imposition of the religious right they'd either identified as pagan or they identified as satanic.
When I was 13 and I was interested in satanism, it was through a homeless guy with a book in his hand. The church of satan today, I don't keep up with it anymore but its become like this occult kind of like black magic oriented LGBT oriented group I don't know whats going on with it. The Satanic Temple really kind of screwed up all that up. But the Church of Satan didn't jump on the internet and get a presence until way too late because they were busy trying to thumb wrestle and see whoever's gonna get Anton LeVey's estate and who's gonna be the high priest and they then just kind of screwed up off and didn't think it was gonna go anywhere. They were trying to catch up but they kind of just lost the ball. Its all dead. It was kind of on its way out because when LeVey died that was it.
Back when I was experimenting with voodoo and stuff. One of my many phases that I went through as a kid. I've always been very drawn to the Eastern philosophies. I practiced Zen Buddhism for a long time. I went to silent retreats at temples, I did the whole zen tea ceremony, I meditated a lot.
My dad's side of the family has a lot of Christian ministers and theology professors. Same with my mom's side, a lot of nuns. Then part of my step-mom's side of the family is related to royalty in the Austria/Czechoslovakia area. Their family refer to themselves as Bohemian in ethnicity and were kicked out of Czechoslovakia in the 1920's for practicing black magic.
I began dabbling in the occult. I bought books on the occult and wrote dirty poetry. For some time I immeshed in different kinds of very dark theology. It doesn't matter if you believe in demons, smoke and mirrors and if you think Alister Crowley was just another Anton LeVey. What matters is it was steeped in this occult black sex magic with my occult magician friend practicing black magic as a kid.
