What Is Magery?

What is magery? The simplest answer is it's what mages practice.

The biggest problem with that answer is that if you mention "Magi" to most people, they think of three wise men bringing gold, frankincense, and myrhh as gifts to a baby in a manger 2000 years ago -- and they haven't been heard from since.

And it is quite likely that the average person does not know a single person who self-identifies as a mage.  That does not mean they don't know someone who practices elements of magery unknowingly.

A search of the web is not much help either, as most sites just equate magery with magic in general, or they are concerned with mages in a particular fantasy universe, usually from a series of computer games or novels.

The easy response is that magery isn't real, it is just a fantasy created by some creative minds.  The biggest problem with that is the word "just", implying that existing solely in the mental realm makes it meaningless.  That is most definitely not true, as through the work of people mental constructs become physical reality.

Keeping the power of magery hidden is not accidental.  People who do not believe magery exists don't try to resist it.  One way this is accomplished is by making it appear as pure entertainment. Careful examination of what stage magicians do yields more useful results.  They call individual acts "tricks", and a large part of what they do is in fact tricking people through the use of misdirection.  People enjoy this because they don't really suspend disbelief -- they know people can't be cut in half and survive, or go in a box and disappear.  It then becomes an intellectual puzzle, trying to figure out how they were tricked.

Take away the context of a show and the situation changes radically.  When you view the same kind of misdirection without the props, you may actually believe what you are seeing is reality, especially if it within the realm of ordinary experience.  This is what mages do: they change people's perceptions so that the way they interact with the physical world is changed.  This definition helps clarify what is and what isn't magery.  Actually doing so will be the subject of the next post.