The Crafts: Wixes, Spells, and the Weaponized Placebo Effect

Yeah, I don't plan on doing that again. It felt invasive, especially when I found out I learned things I wasn't supposed to know about. Mostly related to her spiritual/emotional state and issues going on in her life at the time. It was cool to meet her guardian guy, though. He gave me some good advice and I kind of look up to him now (in relation to the guardian stuff, not the vindictive stuff) even though I haven't had contact with him since.

She wasn't cruel--she was protective and would get carried away with that. She was new to Wicca and was overexcited about the idea of being able to have a real effect on something. I don't think she ever went through with cursing anyone, though I'm pretty sure she did do a number of positive spell things. I gave her a lot of talks about karma.

That is nice to know! We're not in the house anymore, no.

 

Yeah, thats a good point; wicca is probably a lot of people's first introduction to this sort of thing when they dont grow up with it; that probably explains a lot. Children and all. /shrug

 

Mention of karma makes me want to write up like...An explanation of how karma works from a Theravada Buddhist perspective. At least as I know it. Gods that would take time though. Especially in terms of how to organize it.

ALSO OTHER PEOPLE WITH VIEWS ON KARMA SHOULD EXPLAIN THEIR KARMA.

And whine with me about the stealing of my shit. Stop stealing my shit. You can take my shit and work on it and so on but for the love of Guanyin and her 1000 arms please research. Argh. ARGH.

 

Also now I feel weird because Wicca was not my first introduction to this stuff and I largely have no idea what is going on when people talk about cleansing and rocks and drawing down the moon (is that even the right term. i do not know but it was something like that). I just sit in my corner being very confused. Would anyone have any suggestions on reading regarding the, I suppose, more mainstream magicky type things that I know nothing of? Just out of curiosity. Nice to read up on things even if I won't practice them more than likely.

 

hmmm, I see.
that sounds...somewhat similar to my experience with lucid dreaming, though I've always assumed it was some form of astral travel while I was sleeping (yes, I believe in astral travel, yes, it's a little strange, no, I don't really have much proof of it beyond my belief and my lucid dreams). that's interesting that some of it has crossed over into IRL, though, the only things that have crossed over into IRL for me are when I traveled to other people's houses--which is always a weird feeling, but one of my friends called me the next day swearing up and down I'd been in her house last night (even though I'd never told her about the lucid dreams or the travelling or anything) and I had already remembered a dream in which I was in her house. it had seemed rather mundane compared to where I usually went, but it was an interesting experiment. in any case. yeah. that went off on a tangent. wow.
it's interesting that you have that kind of lucid dreaming. like, that seems somewhat similar to mine. the only other person I ever met who had lucid dreams had them all about her past and stuff, nothing involving travelling or anything like that.
I'm curious about guardian spirits; do you know anything more about them?
my skills are more focused on fighting, keeping things from sensing me if necessary, sensing my surroundings, and. er. this might sound weird, but essentially possessing people in the place that I've gone to. it's wrong and it feels weird and I don't do it much, I only do it if it's really necessary.
also I'd be very interested in an analysis of dream control. you should definitely post that or send it to me or something. actually, I'd like to hear more about all of this, even if it takes forever :P

yeah, after that whole thing with the ouija board, I'm never touching one and my dad promised not to touch one again either.
but wow, ghosts are definitely a thing with you, that's interesting.
I've always attracted ghosts, if that makes any sense? god, it feels dumb to be saying that, but, like, every house we've lived in, there have been ghosts, but never one...quite so vindictive as her. I'd offer her name that she gave me but I'd really rather not say it; I'm a little leery of saying names and accidentally summoning something. mostly because I do not want her back.

 

Yrwys is so hard to say though! :D

Seriously, i can see where that'd be hella frustrating. Its not like western philosophy doesnt have the idea of you reap what you sow; its the whole basis of the wiccan "an it harm none" thing, and plenty of other people have talked about the same idea in other contexts. Itd be nice to have a compact way of talking about that that doesnt steal a word for a related but really distinct thing. :/

Edit: wicca wasnt my intro either; it sounds like it wasnt for quite a few people in this thread! You're in good company, so please dont feel bad. :)

 

Sorry! My understanding of karma is probably not very accurate. I don't mean to steal anything. :c

I think of karma as: If I do bad (jump to conclusions without doing my research, hurting someone in any way, causing harm, will for negative things to happen, etc), it increases the chance of bad things happening to me and can mess up my attempts to do something that would have positive results for me. If I do good (try to make those around me happy, do the best that I can, protect what I can protect when I can protect, value the lives of all people even if they're people who don't value mine, take care of myself and understand the difference between being good and being a doormat, don't forget to water the plants, etc), it helps to keep bad things from happening to me or increases my chances of being able to do things that would have positive results or me or can maybe even encourage good things to happen to me.

 

It is not so much that I feel bad as that I feel weird and rather lost at times. Because wow an entire paradigm I know like nothing about.

And yes it is very frustrating to come across the karma thing. I don't mind people incorporating karma into their religious practices. I just kind of mind the whole appropriating of shit from the Indic religions thing. So basically the people who just carelessly pick and choose things with little research. That is what bugs me. Because, yes, Guanyin is super cool and would be entirely fine with more people respecting and venerating her and she is always looking for more people to help and teach but. She is a very distinctly Buddhist goddess with very distinctly Buddhist views. She can't just be taken out of context and treated as a generic mercy goddess or, heaven forbid, a mother goddess. I've yet to see the latter view thankfully. Thankfully.

Parsley don't worry. I'm not grumpy at you specifically? If you are worried about that. Just THOSE PEOPLE. WITH THEIR GUANYIN STEALING WAYS. Anyway...From my stand point that is how karma works in basic. Karma means action. Every act we make is karmic because well...It's an action. Karma isn't formed just from physical movement but also speech. Now all actions, karmas, have their resulting fruits, vipakas. The vipakas are your karmic results.

So let's say we have a man who shot someone. Just because he wanted to steal something from that person. Shooting the person for money is the act, the karma. Now years down the road the man is out and about and he gets run over by a truck and that is his vipaka in this scenario. However vipaka isn't 100% totally determined. Because you keep performing more actions which in turn make more fruits. You also have to consider every other living thing in the world, all of which have their own karmic strains. It's exceptionally complicated but at its most basic there is a karma (action) and the resulting vipaka (fruit). So let's say the man went out and he did a bunch of charity work and such. The good vipakas he earned from that charity are kind of drowning out the negative of shooting someone. So he still gets hits by a truck but he doesn't die. He just gets fucked up and stuck in the hospital for a long time.

For a bit more fun you can perform four kinds of karmic acts. Unmeritorious, meritorious, null, and Enlightenment karmas. Unmeritorious acts are bad ones. Meritorious are skill and good acts. Null ones are just neutral acts. Picking up a pencil is a null karma usually. Enlightenment karmas meanwhile are what the Enlightened use to live through their final lives. All karmas save the fourth type generate the corresponding vipakas. The actual vipakas themselves are based off the action itself, its context, the intent behind it, and the immediate result of the action.

If anyone is curious about things and how I frame them feel free to ask questions. I'll try and answer them as best as I am able.

 

Somebody remind me to talk about the curses I've seen second hand when I'm not exhausted. Peru has a flourishing black magic trade for very strong curses, creepy shit. It's the reason my family started carrying amulets with them all the time.

 

I don't do astral travel, I don't think. Nowhere I go seems to be in our world. I just get summoned a lot to other worlds/universes to protect people or fix situations. I kind of accidentally made a name for myself and started being considered a "god" in my dream cannon. It started soon after I became fluent in the dream language, proficient in scan, and had this huge fight with some jerkwad who could manipulate time. I first encountered him in a clock tower over a city. He made me watch him slaughter each person in a city of people over and over and over until I sensed how he controlled time, waited for the right moment, and used his ability against him by making him continue to reverse until we were back to when he first confronted me. Then I shoved him and he fell out of the tower. I still regret resorting to that, but I didn't have the ability to match him as his equal yet at that point and I knew it wouldn't kill him. He became my only reoccurring dream character. A year after that incident he showed up again and used mind control to make me tell him where my family was and then had me lead him to them with the understanding that he would kill them. I didn't managed to break out of it until we were already there. The following year he showed up again, this time he looked like black fire that was billowing in a way that defied gravity. He infiltrated my dream with a dream character of his own and used her to trick me into being cornered into a room with nobody to protect (I'm much more powerful when I have someone to protect). He came toward me with the intent to take my ability to lucid dream away. I aborted the dream and woke myself up, but was in a terrified panic for ten or fifteen minutes after. He didn't show up again after that year.

Wow, I rambled. Anyway, a while after my first encounter with him I had a dream where a man called me a god. This really upset me--I didn't think I was anything like a god and hearing someone in my dream say that felt like I was being so pretentious. I told him I wasn't a god--I was a dreamer. He said, "That's what you might be to you, but to us you're a god."

I didn't get it until I started encountering other gods and found out it was pretty much just a title for someone with abilities and awareness above a certain level. Also, there are tons of them. I'm pretty sure that the jerk was one and defeating him during our first encounter (or maybe learning his time control) could have been the final thing I needed to gain the title. I don't think I'm very high ranking. I've come across all kinds of deities since (mostly trickster gods for some reason and they're usually chaotic butts who can be helpful or hurtful depending on what will be more interesting to them at the time). I keep logs of deity encounters if they happen since they interest me. They're distinctly different from other dream characters. One interesting thing of note is that the titles and classifications deities have aren't related to their abilities or anything intrinsic to them, but are, instead, entirely dependent on their actions. I've met a plague goddess who doesn't actually like hurting people, but she did a thing once and now she's stuck with that as her title in the world I "met" (via her alter, which worked kind of like a two-way radio for me to talk to her through after I sacrificed a jelly bean to her...I know that's silly, but it's what I had on me at the time) her on. She was so happy when I asked her to help me protect someone.

Rambled again. So. Yes. I get summoned a lot in dreams and that's the cause of a lot of my traveling when I don't just decide to go to another world and do so. One thing I hate, though, is when people who summon me just see me as a tool for them to use and order around. Rude.

It is fun to go back to old locations when I can. I've come across people who recognize me on a few rare occasions, but I meet so many new people all the time that they're either only vaguely familiar to me or I don't recognize them. It doesn't help that they can be a lot older than when I first met them if I do see them again or they've traveled to a new world and I don't even have that context clue. I'm also kind of a famously self-negligent goddess. I went without a body for about ten years before trying to use one again and I never remember that it needs to be cared for if I stay in a place for years. During my first month or two of trying out bodies again, I forgot to eat or sleep for so long that I couldn't really do much. Another god found me, turned into a dog, turned me into a puppy, took me into a tire under a collapsed part of a building, and made me sleep until I recovered. I've also gained a...friend(?) or two who have decided it's their business to teleport to me if they hear that I was an idiot and tried to put a protective barrier around a third planet in a row (sorry, can't hear your lecturing right now since my organs and stuff went away in places to be used to fuel that dumb decision that I can sense you lecturing me about). I'm not a very responsible goddess, but I have a pretty good success rate at protecting my charges. :D

My friend knows much more about them, but there are a few different kinds I've heard of.

1. Dream guides can be interpreted as guardians. Depending on whether you interpret them scientifically or spiritually, they're either an aspect of your subconscious mind that helps you figure out dream control and can answer questions you have about yourself or they're
2. Guardian spirits like my friend's are assigned their person or pick them as a kind of apprentice. They protect the person while teaching that person how to protect themself. My friend's case is weird since her guardian spirit got a crush on her and is now kind of also trying to woo her into dating him after she dies. Based on the "after she dies" part, I'm guessing they're kind of like ghosts or spirits? In before this question: he doesn't mind her dating in this life as long as he approved of the guy she dates. He has been known to do IRL bad things to her dates who he doesn't like (not completely provable, but there's a lot of circumstantial evidence).
3. Spirits who only step in to help in extreme situations (see: That story I recently posted about the ghost of my uncle)

That's pretty much all I know and can think of right now, but I know there are a lot of other types out there.

I possess people all the time. It's usually not a full possession unless they need god-mode levels of assistance. I usually just hang out in them and observe until I'm needed. Sometimes they're aware enough to sense me. That can be fun. I like to banter with my charges (and with my subconscious because we have an ongoing sibling rivalry-type thing going on). c:

I'll go find it for you and see if I can clarify it.

Tbh, dream control is one of the only things I consider myself to be good at (I am hard on myself), so I love to talk about it. I don't know that I'm "good" at being lucid since I don't really need to try to be anymore. Dreams feel completely different than waking--gravity is different, the way things are sensed with normal senses is different (I have so many fun dream experiments that have to do with this), I have a freaking extra sense I don't have in waking and that's a huge giveaway, etc--so it's incredibly rare for me to mistake the two.

Good plan! They've always creeped me out.

Yeah. I'd rather that they weren't since they're one of my biggest fears. :T

It makes sense. I'm sorry that happens to you and that you got stuck with a vindictive ghost, but I'm glad that most of them aren't like that. :c

Don't say it. Names have power. I know that sounds silly and superstitious, but that's a huge rule of my dreaming--I don't give my name in a dream or in any supernatural situation. I go by "Wanderer" or "Guardian" or something in the dream language or even the name of one of my OCs but not my given name. Gods and dream characters who can use scan like to try to find names, in my experience, so they'll be able to gain the upper hand in a confrontation (be it a tense conversation, competition, or a fight). That is one of the first things I learned to protect from the "scan" of others. The jerk was able to control me by using my name. I don't want something like that to ever happen to me again. I also don't want to take the chance that the same thing applies to waking.

 

Also, I feel like I need to clarify that the title of "god" in my dreaming is given to anyone above a certain skill level, but indication of higher ability after that is communicated in the dream language and has no verbal equivalent that I can easily translate. Being a "god" pretty much means I'm considered by my dream characters and subconscious to be someone who's very good at dream control, sensing, etc. It doesn't mean that I'm anywhere near the level of the gods from waking legends and mythologies. It just means that I'm better than most people. Maybe think of it as being like getting a PhD in waking. Not common, but not super uncommon either and some people with PhDs end up growing to be more knowledgeable in their fields than others with the same PhD.

 

I swear, you would make at the very least the best background character for a fantasy story.

Time for a Mohs scale of polytheism, perhaps?

 

That's actually pretty much how I consider waking life gods, actually (being a Mohs 8 atheist) - "gods" are spirits that have elevated themselves to a certain point in power and lore, and there's nothing aside from that setting them apart from other spirits.

 

Gods yes. I just want more scales and lists and shit. Clearly why I became Buddhist. It is the religion of memorizing lists and charts and categorizing all the things.

 

that's actually very cool!
I'm sorry you had to deal with a jerk like that, but I'm glad you did what you did. and I'm sorry he threatened your family, and did all that. are you all right after that?
it's interesting that they consider you a god; that makes me wonder if the people we consider gods are just more powerful dreamers associated with helping out with certain things. it's an interesting theory.
also, while it is good that you are good at protecting your charges, please take care of yourself and do not accidentally kill yourself.
I still call it astral travel because I can go to places in our world, but...more often than not I don't. actually, I seem to go to a lot of...war-torn places, which is uncomfortable and used to be frightening before I got more used to it. they're very firmly not in this world, though, for the most part. I usually do things while I'm there, like help people or fight on a particular side or something; it's not a choice so much as a....'I think this is what I ought to do because of a certain sense I'm getting from it' kind of thing? does that make any sense? I don't really directly choose where to go; I just wake up there and know what I have to do, and that's sometimes when the whole possession thing comes in; early on, I couldn't make myself be seen by people, and I couldn't interact with stuff beyond me, for some reason, so I had to take control of someone else and...basically use their body as a way of carrying out what I 'felt' I was supposed to do. now, though, I'm much better at making myself known and seen and touching stuff without having to borrow someone else's body. I was a bit rude in my early days; I just kind of barged in and latched on to a body with little regard for the person in that body, and I imagine I left them somewhat confused and such.
I've also traveled to empty worlds before. those are sad places, and that's actually one of the places she (the aforementioned ghost or whatever she was that my dad apparently accidentally let into our house) trapped me in, and I had to fight with her to be able to return, and ever since then empty worlds scare the shit out of me because I'm always afraid she's going to show up.
I've never met anyone who knew me, although some people have recognized that I'm there and seem to know of me, and of late people seem to...almost recognize me when I show up? it's getting to be a little odd. someone actually spoke to me recently, though I don't recall what they said because I have a crap memory; but it was something along the lines of being glad I showed up, which was...unexpected. I'm not used to people knowing who I am or anything, especially since I almost never go to the same place twice. I haven't really made any friends or anything though; there is one recurring person, but we're not so much friends as cautious acquaintances. I have made several enemies, though, that's always fun; there's two boys, the aforementioned she-ghost or whatever, and then another girl.

interesting! dream guides sound interesting, guardian spirits also sound fascinating. it would make sense for them to be ghosts or spirits or energy beings (if you would like an explanation of what this means in my personal theory I can give one). I've heard of spirits helping in extreme circumstances before, but never the other two. I'm going to see if I can find anything more on this subject because now I'm interested.

see, for me, it's usually a full-one possession where I just kind of...come in and take over with zero explanation, borrow their body to accomplish what I need to do (I always borrow someone who's already involved in what's going on or is the person who needs my help or is at least close to what's going on), and then leave when I'm done. and it just felt....weirdly wrong and invasive to be borrowing people's bodies for a personal purpose and then just leaving. I can't figure out how to make them be aware of me, though, so I can't exactly explain "Hey I need to borrow your body for a minute to fight these people over here, that cool?" luckily I don't have to do it much anymore because I've gotten better at interacting with stuff around me and the like, but the early days...oof. lots and lots of possession-y stuff.

that sucks that you're hard on yourself :c I am sad to hear that. you seem like a super kick-butt person, in a good way.
and yay, yes, if you can find it and clarify it for me please do, that would be lovely of you!! :D

yeahhhhhhh I don't even know why my dad messed around with ouija board again :/ the last time he screwed around with one of those as a kid he got his friend sent to the hospital so I dunno what he was thinking, and now that I firmly believe they are not malarkey I am never ever touching one. they creep me out, just because of their potential for summoning Bad Shit.

ohhhhh no I'm sorry! :c it sucks that they are one of your biggest fears.

I'm glad it made sense! I am very tired and I do not know if I am making sense anymore :P it's all right. to be totally honest, I've never been entirely sure she was just a ghost? I label her a ghost because that's what I always assumed ouija boards summoned, but she had...powers and stuff that I would not expect from a ghost. although maybe that's just me, and ghosts can be that powerful, but I don't know, because she literally followed me into a lucid dream where I was in an empty world, and then she trapped me there. I don't know if ghosts can do that.

and yeah, don't worry, I won't say it. that's the whole reason I'm leery about it; names definitely have power. that's always been a big rule of both my dreaming and my real life; don't give away your name to things that want to hurt you in real life, because they can do serious shit with that, and same goes for my dreaming. it's just a generally bad idea in dreaming to go by your actual name or let people find it. so for me, because the power of names applies/has applied to both my dreaming and my waking worlds, I am just very wary of saying her name, for fear that it will summon her back here or something else. names definitely have power and I will never use hers.

 

And I thought my degree of dream-control was good o.o I'd probably be terrible with remembering all the things I'd need to do to protect myself and stuff, so I guess I'll just be happy with being able to force myself awake in bad dreams :)

 

I'm okay. I don't like to think about the beginning of my first encounter with him, but everyone ended up being fine due to the rewind. The people in the second encounter weren't my real family--it seemed like he was just trying to prove that he could have done it if he wanted to. I think he was pissed that I managed to beat him during our first encounter when I was so much weaker and not even a deity. It made him look bad and he held a grudge.

I dunno. I'm not sure that my dreaming has any impact outside my own mind. It could easily just be personal training stuff. Most of what I deal with forces me to decide what kind of person I want to be and stick to that. Lots of morality situations, integrity situations, situations where I need to decide whether to protect someone else or myself, etc. The hardest are the situations where I need to figure out if what I think is right for someone or a city or a world or a universe is what's really right for them/it. Is my version of good their version? What, exactly, am I trying to purify in a place and would purifying it have detrimental effects? What other stipulations should I put onto a barrier that expels and/or rejects those who would do harm? Do I leave the barrier or have it go down when I leave? Should I step in and protect this one person or let them try to figure it out on their own so they can grow from the experience and become stronger? At what point do I step in? Can I help them in a subtle way that wouldn't require any obvious assistance? How should I best punish these idiots who thought it would be a good idea to steal from someone with a god classification? To answer that last one: I chose to make it so that the letter "T" appeared on their foreheads in a calligraphic font, and it wouldn't go away until they returned what they stole. c:

Death isn't that uncommon for me. |D
I get lectured about this a lot. I can almost always just make another body and continue on. Self-sacrifice in dreams isn't a big deal to me. My motto for a while was something like, "They only have one life, but I have many. It doesn't matter if I die as long as I can keep them alive."
Again, I'm pretty well known as being self-neglectful in dreams since I see dream bodies as being more like changes of clothes than something irreplaceable as a real body. My dream bodies also change a lot since I don't really have a very strong sense of what I want to look like or what I should look like in dreams. My gender, sex, appearance, weight, height, and age all change pretty often. Sometimes constantly. It can confuse dream characters sometimes when I do it without thinking.

Ah, okay. I guess that makes sense. I can't remember ever having a dream that took place in a location that exists in waking, so it's hard for me to imagine it. I think it's really cool that you can. :D

I've been to a number of battlefields myself. They're rough.

The "I know what I'm supposed to do here, but I don't always know why" thing is normal for me too. When I first enter a dream I get an info dump from my SC (subconscious). Sometimes I can catch it sending the info and I either just aceept the info and go, request more, or snark at it and tease it about its story telling or something like that. Usually I snark because it's my SC and that is the appropriate reaction.

I've learned to not accept the info I get right away since the person who requested my help isn't always right about a situation. I tend to aim for peaceful outcomes when possible and try to mediate (Ex: Purify the area and make 'em talk it out while they're high on positivity. other Ex: Save everybody. Just everybody. Freeze time and don't let anyone hit anyone else. Everyone misses and gets tired and gives up. This is very tedious, time consuming, and mentally draining but kind of hilarious.). I've also seen some situations where things aren't as black and white as they appear to be (Ex: The "enemy" isn't actually attacking even though their actions seem to suggest they are. Dream places, people, and things are all weird. IDK what I'd do without scan.)

I'm really curious to hear what you mean by "empty world."

If people can see you when you don't have a body, then it either means you're visible or that person can use scan. If they can use scan, then they can probably use other kinds of dream control too (though not always).

Sounds to me like you're starting to make a name for yourself in your dream cannon. :D

I know that feel about almost never going to the same place twice, but still having people recognize you. It seems like it's not super uncommon to go between worlds and times and universes. Also, DCs (dream characters) probably like myths just as much as we do in waking and they spread just as quickly.

I'd be curious to hear about your reoccurring person.

Oh, wow! What are your enemies like? How did you make them, if you don't mind my asking? I've only ever had the one reoccurring one and he only showed up those three times once a year for three years.

I'd like to hear about this, yeah!

Let me know if you find anything! I have a lot of resources on dream guides (I know some of the people who literally wrote the books on them because I accidentally befriended people who are famous in LDing circles and science. Whoops?), but not a lot about the others.

Ah, yeah. I've done that a few times and I agree that it makes me feel guilty for doing it.

Aw, thanks! I'm trying to beat myself up less, but I'm a bit of a perfectionist and that's been hard to overcome.

I found it and I'm working on it! It turned out to be just as unclear as my friends said. Nice going, younger me. |D;;;

Ohwowholycrap. o__o;

It's okay. I'm starting to get used to it (or so I try to tell myself). |D;

I don't know much about Ouija boards, but I think you're right about them summoning spirits. IDK for sure, though.

That description of your ghosts is a big part of why I'm afraid of ghosts, actually. I'm terrified they'll do stuff like that. Danger to my mind/spirit is much more frightening to me than danger to my body. o__o;

Yeah, sounds good. I didn't used to believe the name stuff until the jerk used mine against me. Now I'm very careful about it.

 

It becomes intuitive over time and a lot of what I do wasn't learned because I wanted to--it was self-defense stuff that I had to learn to deal with nightmares.

Also, I classify being able to wake up from dreams at will as its own category in my list of the four most fundamental dream control abilities. Props to you for being able to! I learned a lot of the dream ability stuff I know because that used to be something I sucked at.

 

When I was a kid I learned that blinking woke me up. As time went on I got better at knowing when I was in a dream and now in most cases if i feel scared or don't want to stay I just focus on forcing my eyes open and it works :) neat trick to be able to do.

Before this I thought NOT dreaming lucidly was rare, a lot of mine seem to be exploring or whatnot. I've actually had a dream where I knew i was supposed to do a thing... because dream logic said so (you know when you start a dream and you know background stuff, yeah) and I didn't feel like doing the thing so i flew off to go explore a distant mountain....and then it woke me up because i guess the subconscious was not amused :3

 

@alex I found the thing. I tried to fix it a little in an attempt to make it clearer. One trouble with explaining it is that most abilities are combos of the bottom three I listed. For example, scan would be both awareness and manipulation since a more detailed scan requires that the user messes with the subject's data/essence in some small way to gather information and, as a result, often leaves some behind much like a hacker might (or so I've heard--I don't know much about programming). Let me know if there's anything about the list that's still unclear or if you'd like to know where I think a certain ability would fit into this. Also, I classify most methods of destruction as manipulation since something is almost always manipulated in order to cause destruction.