There is an old adage in the martial arts: Energy follows intent. Sounds like a definition of magick, doesn't it? Since the perfect striking technique is eighty to ninety percent energy or chi, one could say that martial arts are really full contact magick. This is the concept that inspired the title of my latest book, Full Contact Magick.

Not long after the release of Wiccan Warrior, I taught a series of workshops in various parts of North America. I had the people in these workshops perform simple exercises derived for Chi Gung to get the chi flowing within them. Immediately afterward, many of these people would announce to me that they had experienced sensations of heat, cold, or pins and needles. Many would tell me that they'd never felt anything like this before. Some of these people had been practicing some form of magick for years. This was how I discovered that many people in the Pagan community don't know how to use energy. This was one of the reasons that I wrote Full Contact Magick.

The other reason was the tremendous response that followed the release of Wiccan Warrior. People wrote asking for more detailed information on how to follow a Warrior Path.

Direct Your Energy
I am not attempting to create a new tradition of Wicca here. The system that I teach can be applied to whatever tradition of Wicca or spirituality that you now practice. It is meant as a new starting point. Full Contact Magick is a guide to help you create your own Wiccan practice and personalize your Book of Shadows. Ultimately, every spiritual path is a very personal one. We are all different. Your magickal journey will be like no one else's. Due to what I found in my travels across North America, I created a book that returns to basics: A book of magick that contains no spells. There are countless books of spells out there, but none of these magickal exercises will work if you can't direct your energy at your desires. Full Contact Magick contains exercises to develop your energy and sensitivity to make your magick more effective.

More Than Ritual
In his book Triumph of the Moon, Ronald Hutton estimated that eighty percent of the Wiccan community are solitary practitioners. A lot of solitaries are self-taught from books. As a result, many Pagans seem to think that magick is simply a process of lighting some colored candles, reciting some bad poetry, and snapping one's fingers. Many people confuse ritual (an important tool) with magick. Full Contact Magick is about raising and directing energy. For this, you need no ritual nor any ritual paraphernalia or props. All you need is what you came into the world with. You can access energy instantly in magick just as the experienced martial artist can. Full Contact Magick teaches you how to develop and use your natural abilities.

Amber K once said that once you call yourself a Witch, you can no longer be a victim. You are announcing to the world that you are powerful. It is this idea that draws a lot of people to the magickal traditions. People want control of their destiny. The trouble is that a lot of people within the Pagan community desire empowerment without having any idea how to achieve it.

Full Contact Magick is about coming into your power. This book more fully describes the Warrior path that I introduced people to with Wiccan Warrior. The Warrior path is one of empowerment and effectiveness, not a path of violence. It is about accessing your internal energy and strength in order to control the direction of your life, to find ways to overcome obstacles and problems, to heal yourself mentally and emotionally, or just to know yourself better. Full Contact Magick is about accessing your natural gifts. This book will teach you how to forge your reality into your dreams. The Warrior path is about taking charge of your life.

Fresh Perspectives
Full Contact Magick is divided into five books. Each is related to one of the five elements that makes up the Wiccan's world. Each relates to one of the points of the pentagram and one of the sides of the Witch's Pyramid. The Witch's Pyramid is a model that helps us to understand how all of the different parts of the magickal process of raising and sending energy interact. In Full Contact Magick, I've developed this even further with a model that I call "Magickal Artillery." I've put a lot of new perspectives like this into this book to encourage the reader to develop their own perspectives and find their own path.

If you already have a Book of Shadows, Full Contact Magick will show you how to personalize it to maximize your magickal power. If you don't, my book will serve as a manual to help you develop one. Either way this book will make you more effective.