Women and men are both offered equal opportunity where many modern occult training institutions are concerned. It is well known that entrance into the ancient mysteries in nearly every culture in the old world was open to both genders. Sometimes male and female initiates lived and were trained at different sites, in different temples, but the mutual agreement of their activities and goals was understood by those who had entered into the Greater Mysteries. It is well known that the gender issue in magickal training is a most important one.

Here, in this paper, then, I shall take a quick look at the formula which the system I was trained in applies to the tuition of the men and women in the process of the great work. It is believed that very little clear information has been published on this matter in past times, so I desire to present here my understanding of this most important issue in the hope of aiding aspirants, and tutors alike, to contemplate the matter more closely and thereby increase the likelihood of the student gaining greater success in their gaining headway, and the tutor a more fulfilling experience.

The argument delivered in this paper is presented in the format of a generalization in order to make a point. The author raises the issue that a variety of experience is expressed by each gender both physically and psychologically across a very broad range of possibilities. The argument, I believe, is supported in this form of presentation because it is recognized that under specific circumstances (particularly those marked by serious stress, anxiety or tension - which are important manifestations of progress in  initiation) members of both genders behave within very predictable well defined boundaries. 

It might be noticed by any aspirant who has spent long enough moving within occult circles, where any form of instruction exists, that both men and women are generally taught the same knowledge and are involved in the same practices in a similar way. In fact it is likely, in most esoteric schools that neither the tutor nor the pupil consider for a moment that the genders have quite different ways of learning and are naturally attracted to different aspects of the work. Nevertheless if we stop for a moment and consider the matter closely we might see how this state-of-affairs has manifested naturally within the wider realm of occultism in general and thereby recognize a trend.

Let us think of all the occult style groups that are presently available to aspirants at large, be they women or men. We notice that the Golden Dawn (G:.D:.) derived orders, Masonic and neo-Masonic systems, Rosicrucian Orders, Wicca (in all its manifestations, including shamanism and new-agers) and spiritualism together take the lions share of committed or semi-committed seekers on an international level. In this large arena we might notice that women are attracted in larger numbers to wicca, new-age themes and neo-shamanic practices. Whereas men tend, generally, to gravitate towards Masonic, neo-Masonic and the G:.D:. type systems. If we look at these schools themselves in order to understand what it is that they have that provides material of preference to one gender over the other we notice some obvious points. Wicca, apart from being a 'Goddess' oriented system is very simple, involves very little intellectual effort to partake (relatively speaking), and is a very practical approach to magick. In other words it is a doing rather than thinking process. The G:.D:. derived schools, Rosicrucian and neo-Masonic (as well as to a degree Masonic) systems are a more intellectual, thinking based processes, even though they can involve a practical aspect as well.

We notice, therefore, that it is more often men who advance into the higher degrees (or achieve most in, or appreciate most, those degrees) of western mystery school systems such as the G:.D:. and Rosicrucian type groups. Whereas women seem to appreciate more and make the greatest headway in wiccan, spiritualist and shamanic type systems. Why is this? The answer is simple. By nature females are more practical and emotional in their dealings with the world. Men on the other hand are intellectual creatures who find thinking, planning and analyzing is generally their preference to solving the worlds problems. Psychologically speaking we know this too. Women aspire more, or are naturally attracted to, or perform best in vocations where emotion, nurture, empathy and stamina in practical drudgery are more pronounced. Men, on the contrary, are attracted to or gravitate towards vocations where thinking, planning, analyzing and such-like activities play the greater role. Now I realize that this view is very generalized and also not considered politically correct in this day, but the fact remains that given a choice, without social or political provocation, men will go where they can think and be more mentally active and women where they can feel and be involved in tasks which do not involve much extreme calculation, analysis, or complex thinking.

Now we should point out here, before continuing, that many women might find these ideas derogatory. But I believe that this simply is a reaction to the trend of a society which has been largely male dominated and which has insisted that thinking is more valuable than feeling. It is not. The natural daily processes towards which the average female is naturally attracted such as feeling, nurturing, emoting, etc., and a preference towards (or ability to carry out effectively) tasks which do not involve complex thinking, in no way mean that women are inferior. These tasks play an important role in the necessary activities of every day which we as individuals, families and societies could not survive without. Just as man finds more complex mental activities easier to cope with woman generally find more complex empathic/psychic and emotive states those which come naturally. We hope I have made our point that each gender has its natural form of expression and both are equally necessary and productive, as well as unproductive at times.

Men and women, it might be noticed, do not cleave to these faculties so much because they like to, or because they mean to, but rather because that is what comes most easily to them. Remembering, of course, that I am making a generalization here. A good example, because of its extreme nature, is the environment surrounding any aggressive argument between the genders. In an intimate relationship between a man and a woman when a serious and aggressive argument breaks out in which both partners believe they are loosing ground (a common occurrence in marriages of all kinds) the male will by nature automatically retreat to his intellect and a female to her emotion as a form of defense. For example, in such a situation, the man will begin to carefully, and aggressively, pick apart piece by minute piece the entire issue, while the female often resorts to emotional states which are very characteristic of an absence of ability to think carefully under stress. Here the males approach is emotionally dead, the females state of mind is often barren of logic.

We notice in such severe circumstances that when the individuals personal psychology is taxed to its extreme it retreats into a very basic state in which the variety of predictable archetypal reactions is very limited. Instinct, in such conditions, drives us into opposite sides of the ring, gender-wise, where we can operate with a greater ease. For a man that means to become the thinker. For the woman, it is the emoter. We use this as an example in order to make the point that in 'general' the basis of male psychology (in a wake-a-day sense), is intellectual mentation (and by intellectual we do not necessarily mean intelligent). The opposite case is found with woman.

Now, where occult training is concerned, we first must be reminded that the primary goal of magick, if you like, is the advancement of the individual awareness. What I have termed the maturation of the Soul. Real, powerful, effective reliably repeatable magickal manifestations of legendary proportions cannot occur unless the individual who is the director of the magickal intention possesses specialized knowledge and a greatly matured Soul. So the start of a magickal career must begin, if it is to be successful, with involvement in a working training system which focuses almost exclusively on Soul maturation. Such training follows a universal formula. The first stage of this process necessitates the student forming an intimate relationship with the contents of his or her unconscious. The contents of the unconscious must be unveiled and accepted in order that the student may become whole, integrated and function on a higher level from which a super-human view of reality may be experienced as a daily affair.

The problem with this process is that the unconscious contains, amongst other things, the basis of all our personal and collective fears. The student seriously involved in the initial stages of occult training will, therefore, often and sometimes extremely so, experience anxiety, paranoia, and, of course, fear. The argument against this path by many students who approach occultism in a superficial manner is: there must be (or is) another way. But the fact is that in 10,000 years of occult tuition aimed at catalyzing the perfected maturation of the Soul, the ancient Egyptians, the Babylonian Magi, the Arab mystics, the Sufis, Rosicrucians and so on, have never discovered another approach to unfolding human occult potential to extreme lengths. There is no other way. In fact even those who deny this approach and play with magick anyway often find themselves victims of the very same paranoia and fear, at least at some point in their career, that mark a close connection to the contents of the unconscious sort for in the early stages of serious training. This is because magick itself, the ability to effect the physical world radically by mental means, has its source in the unconscious. Magickal techniques tap unconscious powers and therefore agitate and stimulate the unconscious. Sooner rather than later the darker side of the unconscious rises aggressively into the realm of conscious awareness and that can be shocking and disturbing for the individual.

It is, then, taken for granted by those individuals who have accepted the responsibility, and who have the skill of training students in the occult arts, that the crisis which they see as a natural part of the first stage of the process often involves male students becoming more intellectual in their approach and females more emotional and psychic. In other words their response to dealing with the pressure training asserts on their lives is to retreat into the familiar and predictable.

On the surface this might not seem like a problem. But in fact is the root of much misfortune. The aim of early training is to create an equilibrium within the Soul. A harmony between that which is masculine (intellectual) and feminine (emotional) within the pupil. For the male to exaggerate a bias towards intellectually understanding the matters of spirit and a female to pursue the path of psychism is in fact the encouragement of a greater imbalance than already exists in the novice. The male becomes more archetypically masculine, thereby repressing his feminine faculties more and more. The female under the same circumstances finds herself less and less capable of making clear accurate assessments of situations as her masculine psychological faculty sinks deeper into the unconscious.

The rapid and final result of such a mistake, of such a dreadful misunderstanding of the process of Soul maturation, is too often a loss of sanity, and on occasion even premature death.

The remedy, though, for this dreadful situation is simple. Both man and woman alike must begin their tuition with a clear understanding of all of the above. The tutor must take care to repeatedly explain in great detail the entire formula. Once this is understood then serious tuition can commence. Although the basic training schedule might be, fundamentally, the same for both genders, at the slightest sign that either a male or a female student is neglecting a focus on their contra-gender mental processes the tutor must enforce a strict reading, study and analytical program for the female, or practical and empathic meditative exercises for the male.

Almost by this method alone the student, which ever gender, may carefully and slowly begin the integration process with great effect.

It is understood, though, that the average student, who has been lulled by the mediocrity of commercial occultism, is quite happy to avoid the responsibilities and hard work which come hand in hand with more serious training. It has been noticed in the system I was trained in, for example, that about 80% of students within the first year of tuition decide that they are not willing to apply themselves to the task to the degree that the process requires. In many cases students who have retired prematurely from training have admitted that they have discovered that they are simply too lazy to carry out the most simple tasks, such as reading, record keeping and meditation. If we look a little deeper below the surface we might see in a good many these circumstances that such an early retirement is often sort after when the student has realized that serious personal changes are immanent. We must assume therefore that the average occultist adheres to the more popular and impotent magickal systems because they are in fact ineffective. That the actual desire of many occultists is simply to be seen to be interested in the subject rather than to be committed to deep personal transformation of legendary proportions.

The key to such deep change is found in a deep meaningful self knowledge and a careful manipulation of the internal gender nature (Jung's anima and animus) that we all possess.