Marcus Mattern
Marcus Mattern is a highly sought-after teacher of Alchemy and Hermetic Astrotheurgy in the Golden Dawn tradition of magick. His course on the Tools of Magick has inspired students all around the world to awaken to their true power to shape reality.
Marcus has been building the occult community for years with community-building meetings, monthly Archangel Sigils, lessons on and hermetic philosophy, and detailed ritual guides based on his years of rigorous practice. As leader of the Inner Alchemy Order, he teaches practitioners how to transmute their worst traumas into gold, guiding them to deep and lasting emotional healing.
Marcus runs one of the most engaged and supportive groups of magick practitioners on facebook. His ability to explain abstract esoteric concepts in simple, practical terms, and his skill in delivering free guided rituals has earned him a dedicated following.
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The Four Trees of Life
Someone asked me of it was worth taking my new course on the Tools of Magick if they’d already studied the Hermetic Qabalah on their own. The answer is a distinction that could help a lot of people trying to wrap their heads around one of the most esoteric—and most useful—maps of consciousness in the world.
While each section of the tree of life corresponds to one of the four worlds, the entire tree of life itself is also best considered of at four levels of depth:
1. intellectually
2. from the outside
3. from the inside
4. beyond the inside-outside distinction
And these four levels correspond to the material tree of life, the etheric tree of life, the astral tree of life, and the mental tree of life.
The Material Tree of Life
In Assiah, the material plane, the tree of life is simply an intellectual system dividing experience into ten categories. This is the philosophical tree of life that scholars can understand to greater or lesser degrees, but you can be a complete atheist and still master this level of the tree of life. This level is like reading about wine without ever tasting it.
The Etheric Tree of Life
In Yetzirah, the etheric plane, the tree of life is a palette of ten powers you can channel for energy work: healing, manifestation, and raising consciousness. An intellectual understanding is necessary so that you actually know what you are channeling, but so is some form of ritual, so you can call upon the Archangels and names of God associated with each sphere on the tree of life. Such ritual magick, which may be done instantly with talent and practice, connects your individual consciousness with the ten divine sources of all consciousness. In hermetic magick, this level corresponds to becoming a magician. This level is like tasting wine and developing your palette to the point of recommending wines and wine pairings to others.
The Astral Tree of Life
In Briah, the astral plane, the tree of life is the universe from the inside. If you want to touch both your hands, you can physically put them together, or you can realize that your awareness is already inside both of your hands and you are touching them in that way. At this level of studying the tree of life, you realize that you are intimately connected to the entire universe from the inside. And the ten spheres of Qabalah are the ten cardinal directions of consciousness you can use to navigate the universal body of your world-self. In hermetic magick, this level corresponds to the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel. This level is like tasting wine and then becoming the wine, so that you experience it as vividly as you experience the inside of your own body.
The Mental Tree of Life
This is the level of the tree of life I can only speculate on, because I have not experienced it. However, I will share what I have gathered so far: In the Atziluth, the Mental Plane, the tree of life is like the nervous system of the universe, directly connecting the source of all creation, God, to every creation in the universe. You cannot attain this level of understanding the tree of life, because at this level, you cease to be yourself in any way. Instead, you are both fully divine and fully human and your every action perfectly expresses the divine will as a member of the body of God restored to full consciousness. This level is controversial because, like Shabbatai Zevi, someone who merely thinks they have attained it is capable of great and destructive heresy. As a result, many insist it is simple not attainable. In hermetic magick, this level corresponds to Crossing the Abyss. This level is like drinking wine from the Holy Grail and realizing that you are not yourself, nor are you the wine, but you are the awareness of the entire universe experiencing your body, and the wine, and all created things simultaneously.
If you want to learn practical Qabalah for yourself, now is the perfect time to get started. My course on the Tools of Magick is now taking new clients for the Spring Semester, beginning January 25th. In this six-month course you will learn the fundamental rituals of Golden Dawn magick to consecrate your own pentacle, sword, cup, and wand, and initiate yourself into the four elements of earth, air, water, and fire. This course is the prerequisite for the Path of Ascension, which leads you through each sphere of the Etheric Tree of Life so you can attain the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel for yourself.
In this course you will:
Learn to sense and move energy in the body
Learn to channel energy with the hands to heal, consecrate, and initiate
Consecrate your own wand, cup, sword, and pentacle for use in magick
Construct your own Astral Temple so you can comfortably perform magick anywhere
Learn the Qabalistic Cross and Greater Pentagram Rituals
Learn to speak to the Archangel, Angel, Ruler, and King or Queen of each element to get useful information.
Join now receive the first self-paced month of the course IMMEDIATELY. The next chapter will be made available when the spring semester of the course launches in January of 2025.
Each month of the course is $150 and includes about 7 hours of video lessons, two monthly group rituals, ongoing support via chat, and a one-on-one meeting after the last month of the course.
And I’d love to talk to you, so book a Consultation for the Tools of Magick Course with me so we can work together to chart your course through the path of High Magick. The cost of this session counts toward your purchase of the first month.
I'm so pleased to be teaching the secrets of magick at this new and expanded scale and I would love for you to join me.
Let the Divine Light Descend,
Marcus Mattern
How to Live Happily Ever After
My father died when I was six years old. The loss was devastating for everyone. My parents were two of the most loving and in-love people you can imagine. When they found each other, they thought this love would be the rest of their lives.
And it was. For one of them.
My mother somehow managed to raise three children on her own, one of them (my brother) severely handicapped. I was the youngest, but I helped out as much as I could as soon as I could.
The experience taught me about the two-sided coin of love and grief. Everything you love becomes grief when it goes away.
And sooner or later, everything goes away.
This realization ruined my relationship with love for most of my life. I wanted more than anything to find a woman I loved as much as my parents loved each other—and I fully expected her to die suddenly and horribly if I did.
This approach-avoidance lead me to date rarely and to never get close to anyone I wanted to keep. This is how I ended up in an abusive relationship. I could only stand being close to a woman if I also wanted to get away.
Intimacy equaled death.
But that relationship taught me some hard truths. You can’t save anyone, you can only give people the tools they need to save themselves. And you aren’t really trying to save anyone. You’re only putting another person in front of you because it’s easier than facing yourself.
This is the hidden bargain of many relationships: you help me hide from myself and I’ll help you hide from yourself.
Once I left that doomed relationship, all I had was myself. And I took the decade of effort I had spent trying to please someone else and turned it inward. This lead me to magick and alchemy and the tools I needed to work through all the barriers to love in my hardened heart. In the process I discovered something miraculous:
There was someone I loved as much as my parents loved each other. There always had been: me.
You have no idea how much you really love yourself. Every beat of your heart says “I love you.” Every breath you take says “I love you.” And every movement of your body in the world is expressing this love in an endless celebration of your own existence.
The true love you absolutely need to find is the love of your own life. Other people can celebrate it with you, or they can hide it from you, but they can never replace it.
I surprise myself with how happy I am now. How easily I laugh and smile. How loving I can be to others. It doesn’t come from being fortunate or having an easy life. It comes from washing away every traumatic stain on the mirror until I could finally see myself for who I really am:
The person I will love unconditionally for the rest of my life.
And I know that you are just as lovable. Because I see myself in you. Just as I am everything to myself, you are everything to yourself.
And you deserve to live happily ever after too.
I’ve helped dozens of people transmute the worst experiences of their lives into sources of inspiration by using the secrets of Inner Alchemy.
All traumas and negative emotions have a vital role to play in your spiritual development and worldly success—when you have to courage to confront them, embrace them, and give them a new, positive role in your life.
Based on the genius work of Hermetic Alchemists Jakob Bohme and Mary Ann Atwood, the Internal Alchemy Order combines journaling, breathwork, and energy work to draw upon the divine energy needed to transmute any emotion into its opposite.
Inner Alchemy will teach you to understand the artful purpose behind all life events and to experience your life through the heavenly eyes of your higher self—as the gift it truly is.
Begin transmuting your life today.
