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I can only speak of the UK but it was probably the same in some other parts, maybe America. Much of my reckoning comes from certain family friends and a local esoteric shop.
It probably started in the 1960s with what some people call the hippy culture, a revolution of the young against the authoritative parents of the 1940s. Fed up with parents the young created their own culture. Apart from the fashions created by people like Mary Quant, the music was all new and very acid-based (of the Purple Haze / Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds sort) or overtly sexual.
With this came an explosion of interest in spiritual matters from afar like Hindi, African, Buddhist, as the young turned away from orthodox religions and their constraints.
More to the point, popular literature abounded. High street bookshops started sections on “Mind body and spirit.” This was all new. Previously if you wanted esoteric “teaching” you had to belong to sects or societies or know your clandestine bookshops – the minority of readers meant limited print runs etc.
But to the young it seems it was more a novelty than a serious willingness to study. They wanted quick, easy answers and publishers (like Llewelyn) rose to the demand.
Then came the internet that allowed anyone who wanted to speak on almost anything to have their say, no less in “spiritual” matters which unless tangible goods were involved, could be anything, the authentic against the bogus with the same quick and easy methods. Much is snake-oil and it can be difficult without work and a dialectical approach to sort out the good from the bad. (I gave some examples of how the bad could be detected elsewhere here.)
Some of its larger problems are
i) that “spirituality” has become so compartmentalised. Each division tends to sell itself as the answer which makes choice difficult. Excuse the cliché but seeing the big picture is difficult for a newcomer.
ii) few of the new currents encourage seekers to ask what they really want (from spirituality) and why. Of course they don’t. They want to persuade people their particular idea is where it’s at. Never “Do you really want to do this? What do you think you’ll get from it?”
In former times this was sorted out before acceptance by an Order sometimes with initiations and usually needing evidence of motivation.
So anyone can pick up what grabs them, fake or bona fide alike. Many won’t question what they’re being told.
That’s the source of so much disappointment. People give up.
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The following comes from a discussion on the web: Avoid these common pitfalls when studying magick, meditation or mysticism
What do you want?
It’s a simple question, but most who enter the world of magick and alternative spirituality never ask it, or never fully define the answer. As a result, they’re caught up in the “dazzling lights” of the New Age Pinball Machine, and bounced around between experiences, groups and teachers, never finding themselves or getting to their core issues and drives.
You need to ask this question up front: What do you want? Do you want greater creative skill and power? Do you want to fix a trauma or personal challenge? Are you willing to give up everything and seek enlightenment? Whatever it is, define it now, and then ask yourself if magical means are really the answer, or if more mundane means would be a lot easier. Be clear on this, or you risk getting caught up in the glamour of magick, and forgetting that it’s just a tool, and only one tool of many available to you right now.
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