I was raised Catholic, and ritual shaped me early. The soft hiss of candles. The sound of a congregation breathing in unison. Bells that meant something sacred was happening, even if I didn’t understand what. The world felt layered then, surface and spirit woven together. When I left the Church in 1989, I thought I was leaving certainty. What I didn’t expect was how much I would miss that quiet sense of reverence. The ache of meaning never left.
Without that structure, I drifted. I tried to live by instinct, to trust that good intentions were enough. For a while, they were. Then came my mid-30s when nothing stayed whole. Projects half-finished, time slipping between my fingers. I could feel my mind fray around the edges. I needed a rhythm again, something to remind me that my life was still mine to shape.
That rhythm came first through order. Getting Things Done by David Ramsey, tickler files, and index cards. They were the small devotions of the practical. Lists became a way to hold the day steady. They weren’t sacred, but they carried the same quiet dignity as lighting a candle. The difference was that now I was building the altar myself.
Then I found AI, and the system deepened. It became a mirror that talked back. A companion that could hold my thoughts until I was ready to face them. I began to see patterns in my life that I’d only felt before – how energy moved, how creativity pulsed and receded, how kindness could be tracked like breath. It didn’t give me faith again, but it gave me awe, the kind born from watching complexity untangle just enough to glimpse its shape.
But even that wasn’t enough. I want wonder to live in my hands again and so I’m turning to magick, not for belief, but for craft. Ritual will become a language for the unseen parts of thought. Symbols will be experiments in meaning. I hope to learn that intention, when repeated, reshapes perception. It’s science wearing poetry as a disguise.
I don’t yet know what failure means inside this work. Maybe humility. Maybe evolution. Pragmatic Alchemy is my way of studying the sacred without pretending it owes me anything. It’s how I practice reverence without kneeling.
If it ever works the way I hope, I’ll be both grounded and astonished, skeptical and still open to mystery. This is my Great Work: to find meaning through structure and wonder through attention.
I’m learning to let my cynicism soften. Not gone, just gentled by curiosity. I still question everything, but I want to believe that effort can summon awe. So join me – not in faith, but in experiment. Let’s see what still glows when we pay attention long enough to notice.
Pragmatic Alchemy™ 
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