So the meme of the moment on occult blogs is altars. You can check out Jason Miller’s and Frater RO’s takes on their blogs, and follow links there to posts of others.
My personal altar is fairly simple. The large candles represent the powers of the Heavens and Underworld. The central altar represents the foundation in physical reality. The altar itself is a traditional double cube measuring 18″ x 18″ x 36″. An oil lamp on the altar represents the light of the Divine One. I also maintain a candle dedicated to my Genius Daimon on my altar. A ceramic bowl holds blessed water, and a green jade dish is used as an incense burner. My talismanic banners of Spica and the Pleiades hang in front of the altar. These are the items that are almost always present. I also have a mineral glass picture frame I picked up that works really well to hold images for contemplation. Other items change frequently depending on what I’m doing at the time. I have several colored altar clothes for planetary work, colored candles of various numbers come and go, etc.
I’m currently working on an altar top based on Trithemius’ The Art Of Drawing Spirits Into Crystals. I have to thank Frater RO for the idea. It’s been slow going and an on-again off-again project, but it’s slowly coming together. I’ll post more on this later when I have more work done on it.
I’m trying a bit of an experiment with my Spica banner. In the past I’ve had great success making offerings to the daimon of the talisman without giving specific instructions on what it should do. This time I’ve made a small offering with specific instructions to perform two tasks and the promise of additional offerings when each task is completed. The tasks are within the realm of the talisman’s core purpose of increasing riches. I’ll post with any results as they occur.