Note of Caution: You should be aware that even so much as writing this article has proven to be very disruptive and problematic.  If you are particularly sensitive to negativity, I would suggest that you promptly mark this entry as read (assuming you use an app like Feedly) and move on with your life. I'll be discussing some pretty negative stuff here.

You're welcome to stick around and read through this, but if you do, it may spark off some pretty noticeable changes.  Proceed at your own risk.

Still sticking 'round?  Ok, down to business....

In response to a series of questions a long-time client of mine has posed, I have decided to talk a bit about shadow work, the associated risks and implications, and the possible benefits of doing the Work. Herein will be a few methodologies that one can use to engage their Shadow and progress past their limitations.

Before I start, I must stress that this Work is FAR more dangerous and advanced than anything I've written about previously - hence the warning at the top of this post. This isn't stuff you do for fun.  It isn't something you do out of convenience either.  Its something you do when you don't have a choice.

We're complicated creatures, and there are times that we seem to be half angel, half demon.  We've got a side of us that wants to lie, cheat, steal, murder, rape, drink, and drug ourselves into a stupor.  Its dedicated, in many of us, to taking the easy way out and gets a thrill out of harming someone else in the process. We've also got a side to us that's good-natured, caring, compassionate, loving, and aspires to doing good deeds for the benefit of others. Its a lot like the story of the two wolves, pictured below.

We're all different, and some of us have an easier time tapping one of those wolves over the other.  That's natural and normal, but it just because its the way of things doesn't mean that you're doomed towards dealing with one specific side.

In the end, its a bit like dealing with the angel on one shoulder and the demon on the other. (Much like Kronk in The Emperor's New Groove)

In the Nature VS Nurture argument, the eventual realization is that our leanings are a product of Nature and Nurture, and as a result, eventually choice has a great deal to do with it.  In my experience, I have found that strength comes from being able to utilize the powers of both sides while still keeping them in balance. This is why we have rites like the Banishing Rituals of the Hexagram, Middle Pillar, grounding, and centering exercises.

Most everyone is familiar with the "Holy Self" or "Higher Self" in one form or another - some even go so far as to call it the "Holy Guardian Angel".  The other half isn't really talked about.

Your shadow, on the other hand, (also known as your Evil Genius, Evil Daemon, or doppelganger) is the part of you that's typically kept deep inside of you. It serves the functionality of a spiritually alive storehouse for all of your worst traits, your fears, your insecurities, It represents the abused, the liars, the broken, and the incomplete.  The shadow is comprised of pure, unadulterated fucked-upedness, and working with it is often one hell of an unpleasant ride......

Your shadow makes even the denizens of the Qliphothic shells look cute and cuddly - this is doubly so if you've been through extreme trauma in your past.

Working with one's shadow, however, can be very fulfilling when one's reached the appropriate stage of awareness and ability - knowledge of and communication with your HGA is mandatory. Mastering it does have its benefits, though mastery of one's shadow is an ongoing process that is repeated as one lives his or her life.  Its a set of practices that can, eventually, lead to some amazing realizations about one's self and the universe around them, and, as a result, be a major reservoir of power that can be tapped on demand.

Below is a ritual format through which one can connect to, work with, and overcome the portions of their shadow. It follows a strict flow and I would not recommend straying from it, lest you endanger yourself.  The sigils for each part of the shadow self can be found at the bottom of this article, and I would suggest that you only utilize one at a time.  Do not draw them unless you intend to use them.

1. Provide offerings to your guardian spirits
   
   By this point, you should have a pretty decent handle on the nature of your guardian spirits, both local and ancestral, as well as the allies you've cultivated through your ongoing spirit work.
   
   
2. Perform an Invocation of your Higher Self
   
   By this point, you should have your own method for getting in contact with your HGA/HS for ritual use. Proceed with it, as you will need the essence of this portion of you present to balance out the extreme negativity that will be raised as you progress through this rite.
   
   
3. Draw the sigil for the aspect of your Shadow that you intend to invoke
   
   You will need to use consecrated parchment paper for this purpose.  I would suggest that you trace out the sigil, then pray over it to empower it.
   
   
4. Prayer to the Keystone
   
   The Keystone an entity I've worked with for quite some time.  Its purpose is simple: to watch over the keys so that they are not accidentally activated through tracing them, visualizing, etc.
   
   Keystone, bearer of possibilities
   Stir, waken, hear, and become available to me
   I invoke thy name and call for thy presence
   Stand alongside me as I work through the Umbric Keys
   Face me so that I might face my Self
   
   [Seal the invocation by tracing a lemniscate in the air]
   
   
5. Evoke or invoke the Shadow's aspect
   
   How you proceed here is up to you.  Evocation tends towards being gentler than invocation, but invocation will allow you to do more than simply wrangle with that aspect of your Self.
   
   
6. Complete the rite and dismiss all invoked forces
   
   Dismiss that which has been conjured and ground yourself in the manner of your choosing.
   
   
7. Deal with the outcome of the rite
   
   If you did the work right, you will have stuff to deal with.  You'll learn about certain things that motivate you, how to diffuse your temper, etc.  That's the real reason behind this work, after all.  If you should need help, which you may, you'll want to reach out to me through my contact page.

If you choose to follow this path I've laid out here, good luck.  You will need it.

As mentioned previously, should you need help, feel free to contact me.

Regards,

SE

In response to a request from a long-term client of mine, I have decided to share a means by which one might reach and commune with their "higher self".

Without going into the specifics of just what that is, as its been rehashed all over the interwebs, this post is to serve as a brief how-to....that is all.  You, as with all magical work, assume all risk, liability, etc., as connecting with one's Self isn't exactly an easy path.  It will shake things up - if it doesn't, you've done something wrong.

The sigil you see below is a key of sorts.  Its purpose is simply to rend the veil such that you have the ability to connect with and perceive your Self as a separate entity so that you can work with it.  You will need to have a basic understanding of sigil magic, astral projection, creating sacred space, etc. to use it effectively and safely.

You will need to claim the space around you, make it sacred, banish all of the larvae and the like that typically hang around, invoke whatever Gods make you feel safe, and then utilize the sigil as a key to the astral.  Project into and through it to connect and commune.

I would recommend drawing it on a piece of cloth using your own blood, or perhaps a scrying mirror.  The former method will allow you to reuse it as you see fit.

This will likely stir strong emotions and desires in you, so be prepared and don't undertake this if you're troubled, unwilling to do the work, given to bouts of megalomania, or any other such sociopsychological malady. Be aware that this working will attract attenton from spirits, so you may have spirity nasties show up and try to siphon your energies after the fact, so diligence is required. This isn't something that you do out of curiosity and then give up on, so bear that in mind.

Happy Hunting.

SE

Greetings, dear readers.

Recently, I had an incident that occurred with a client which prompted this post alongside a slight change to how I do things with clients. In short, this was a situation wherein there were too many hands in the cookie jar because the client in question decided that it was pertinent to hire three or four other workers alongside me, despite our conversations about how it was better to avoid complicating things.  It dawned on me, as this was occurring, that he had little to no idea of why this can be an issue, so I thought I'd talk about it here.

To start us off, think for a moment about working in a  kitchen with others, as that's something we've all done.  What happens when you add another person to the group working on cooking a meal? The room gets slightly more crowded with each addition of a new body.  Even when doing prep work, each person needs between a foot and a foot and a half of elbow room, not counting the counter space, to say nothing of the cook, whose likely wandering around the kitchen.  When you've only got 6 or 7 feet of counter space on each side of the kitchen, with an aisle that's ~3 feet across, that space gets damned crowded.  You've got people running around with knives, spices, meats, veggies, hot pots, boiling water, and Gods know what else; the area quickly becomes a hazardous sight.

Magic's really not all that different.  If your life is the stew and the sorcerer's the chef, its up to the chef to season the stew to provide you with what you ordered (the magical result).  If I am seasoning the stew, I have a pretty good idea of what spices I need to add, and what prep work I need to do. If you start adding other chefs to the mix, soon its going to become an incomprehensible mess, as I don't have the slightest idea what the hell the chef to my right is doing to the stew.  He's probably adding spices I'd never thought of with impunity, totally unaware of the fact that the meat in the stew is intentionally flavored a specific way.

To drop the metaphor and get down to brass tacks, in essence, when there are too many folks doing magical work at one time, the situation can get incredibly complicated.  The fact is that every working I do changes fate ever so slightly...when I'm the only one fiddling around, I can do this with a fair deal of control.  That's no longer the case when you have one other spirit worker doing work concurrently. Adding more to the mix only further complicates the problem.

That being the case, its not an issue if you hired someone to do the work prior to getting me involved, so long as they've already done their work.  Its also not an issue for you to hire someone a few months after I've done the work if the case is not, Heavens forbid, resolved.  But for the love of all that is holy, do not hire someone else while you're having me do the work. It'll likely become a convoluted mess and have really crappy repercussions in your life.

Granted, with that said, there's some flex to this "rule".  The fact is that some magical work is incredibly touchy, and other types are really rather cut and dry, for the most part.  Love work is naturally a pain, and everything's a balancing game, so that's a terrible time to add confusion to the mix.  Uncrossing and blessing work, however, is very direct...its simple, and generally, there's not a heck of a lot of confusion that can be caused.

Just do bear this in mind when you're either doing work for other people or having work done for you, as I'd hate to see your result get dorked up because of impatience or indecisiveness on your part.

Cordially,

SE

Greetings folks.

Over the past few days, I've found myself deep in thought after going about my usual client work, personal practice, and devotional work.

It's occurred to me that spiritual work is often a cosmic game of "Telephone".  "Telephone", for those of you caught unawares, is a childhood game wherein the party at the front of the line comes up with a sentence or phrase, tells it to the person next to them, then the recipient does the same and so on and so forth down the line.

Those of you whom have played the game I speak of know that the sentence or phrases starts out as something as simple as "Johnny's mom is also the doctor" and ends up as "Mom's Johnny is also the proctor" at the final person of the game. So too is this the case with client work, I find.

I am frequently approached by folks who either do not speak English or speak it as a second, third, or fourth language; frequently, they encounter the same troubles shared by their brethren from English-speaking countries - they are unsure how to put their concerns and wants into words which will then be clearly understood by someone like myself.

This brings us to a rather awkward point in a relationship, as its difficult to understand just what it is that we're being asked to do when we miss important contextual clues.  This is doubly true when it comes to interacting with spiritual entities, as not only do they not speak our language, but they also tend to sense our emotions, our sense of purpose or lack thereof, our thoughts, our confusion, and so on.  With this truth being as present as it is, we encounter a new difficulty; not only must we understand the goal of our friend, client, partner, spouse, or ourselves, but we also must be able to communicate those goals and intentions effectively to the spirits we conjure.

Language, being a finicky beast at the best of times, is something we must strive to understand intimately if we are to do this effectively; furthermore, we must also understand the language of the spirits we intend to work with.  Sometimes the language is verbal and literal or it can be written and symbolic or any means and methodology in-between.  Each of us is different in how we best perceive and understand the world around us and the spirits we work with, command, and/or serve are no different.

Not only we must understand how to communicate ourselves effectively, but we also must learn to listen to the people and the world around us.  Perception is the key to greater and deeper understandings, and that starts at home with the ones we love.  We must hear them out first if we wish to understand what the Gods and spirits tell us through speech, song, dreams, movies, games, situations, and so on.

With that said, happy hunting and blessed learning.

SE

Greetings, ladies and gents.

With the first week of the preparation for the Work coming to an end, I thought I'd post an update on where we stand, the number of people involved, any actions needed on your part, etc. for the sake of clarity and communication.

As it stands, we've got 33 folks signed up, and sign-ups have been coming to a stand still.  This isn't quite the turn out I was hoping for, so with that being the case, the work will be potent, just not as much as intended.  That being the case, I will make some slight adjustments to ensure that this gets plugged in at a "higher level" of spiritual activity; doing so will certainly help to make this Work manifest at a faster rate.  With that said, sign more folks up!  Keep them coming, even if you're just signing up family members. I know that this blog receives hundreds of unique visitors in a given day, so to you folks who are on the fence, there is no way you'd not benefit, on some level, from this.  So sign up! :D

With that, I'm getting pumped up, and I've woodburned the seal to be used during the Work.

The above wodburning is the completed Seal to be used during the working on Wednesday, and its already abuzz with energy, as I'm sure you an feel from the picture.

I've been getting emails asking what the "rules and requirements" are of this Work, so I thought I'd talk briefly about it.  Really, you don't need to do a damned thing if you don't want to...aside from signing up, anyway.  If you aren't signed up, you won't be included...that part of things is pretty simple. However, with that conveyed, you can do some stuff to allow the Work to take hold.

The easiest way for you to do this, if you are magically-inclined, would be to invoke the essence of the Work using the picture above.  If that is not something you're able to do, just meditate upon the picture.

Otherwise, any questions, ask them here or on one of the other threads about this, and I'll respond.

Regards,

SE

'lo my friends.

I hope this post finds you well.  As of late, I've had a few thoughts percolating about in my brain, and this one seems to be most urgent; in this post, I will be speaking on the subject of a meditation technique I learned recently.  This particular meditation comes from the Vajrayana school of Tibeten Tantra, and is geared towards helping us to understand ourselves on a deeper level, thereby allowing us to cultivate a sort of situational awareness.  This particular form of situational awareness centers around detached attachment and attached detachment.

To preface this entry, we, as human beings, tend to be ruled by emotions, so we don't usually put ourselves in the other person's shoes and endeavor to understand where they're coming from or see their other motivations.  We get lost in the moment, and then react on impulse, and this tends to get us into some really rough situations. The following meditation can be used to help cultivate the ability to interact with others without getting too terribly worked up about it.

That said, to understand the intention of this meditation, you must first understand and accept that every one of us is a multiplicity.  We are made up of different selves who are all interacting on the day to day, each of which are interconnected but different.  For some of us, there are wrathful selves, overly sexual selves, impish ones, and so on and so forth; these parts of ourselves, when uncontrolled and unrecognized can cause some major issues.

To do this, you will wish to get comfortable in a room where you won't be disturbed.  You're welcome to change into a robe, perform this naked, light incense, play music....do whatever it is that gets you comfortable and ready for extended periods of meditation.  When ready, close your eyes and focus on relaxing your body's muscles, piece by piece, bit by bit, so that when your muscles have unwound, you will be ready.

Begin to contemplate the different things you feel, and listen for the parts of you that cry out for attention and acknowledgement as you detach your focus from your earthly body.  Don't fight the meditation; just let those entities come forth, and as they do, acknowledge them.  If they seem unusually troubled, you can try talking to them and see what they say.  If you'd like, you can negotiate with them or find out what will help level them out, but do not get too attached to any one side of you.

This may be difficult at first, but eventually you will learn how to let this come easily.

With that said, do NOT attempt this meditation if you are not of sound mental and emotional health! This may exacerbate those issues, as this meditation has been known to cause some emotional discomfort; this is normal, but those who aren't mentally prepared could be damaged.  This serves as an initiation of sorts, and is the basis for more advanced forms of magical praxis.

Enjoy!

SE

'lo ladies and gents. hope this post finds you well.

As some of you are aware, over the past few months I have been in the midst of a less-than-amicable divorce.  While, ultimately, the end-result would be a good thing for me, being caught in the thick of things really didn't do me any favors.

The stress caused by the proceedings was severe enough that I lost control of most of the things directly pertaining to my own sphere.  I was still able to do plenty of work for clients, to impressive effects, but still I was left holding the proverbial bag until I got my $%*# together. As a result, for a time, things got more than a little crazy and chaotic in my sphere....I'd have bouts of bad luck, strange emotional problems, and various irritating minor frustrations cropping up. It was never anything particularly severe, but each of those "bricks" built up a rather impressive wall that was becoming difficult to break down. 

The act of getting my $%*# together involved working with Cassiel, in fact, as He's an angelic force associated with the sphere of Saturn.  Saturn being known for its ability to remove obstacles and set barriers, I've learned that the spirits therein are often uniquely skilled at making you own and take control of your mess....

..Well, that was just what I needed, and its exactly what happened.  In doing so, I learned something that I thought I'd share here.  My work made me realize where things had gone wrong: I had lost control of myself and my sphere by and through my own loss of faith in my abilities and skills. For a time, I questioned everything about me, everything that had happened between myself and my ex, was filled with doubt, and, perhaps most importantly, filled with a great deal of anger.

This period of internal dissolution and aimlessness had me so focused on trying to regain control by dealing with the little nonsense that I didn't realize, for a time, that all I needed to do was take up the wand and sword, so to speak.

The long and short of it is this: for "regular humans" (ie, folks who don't attempt to control the manifestations in their lives), losing control can lead to bills piling up, additional stress, problems at work, relationship issues, so on and so forth. The thing is, magical folk aren't really that different; our issues just happen to be compounded by our magical praxis.

Up until the point at which we lose control, we are spending inordinate amounts of time working with spirits who become participants in our kingdom.  As they gain our respect, so too do we gain their's, and as a result, like any friend, many like to try to help out.  Directing that help is important, as otherwise they don't really have a means of understanding what we want. Nevermind the influences of those less-than-savory spiritual forces who've been waiting for our loss of control to do what they want to do.

In essence, your spiritual kingdom becomes anarchy because everyone's rowing the boat and nobody's steering.  The act of taking up the wheel and being a taskmaster where necessary helps set our course aright, so its something that really cannot be overlooked.

Just my 2 cents.

Regards,

SE

Greetings and happy Monday, ladies and gents. I hope this posting finds you well, or at the very least, awake and functioning.

In my wanderings, ramblings, gnosis, and the latent digestion of such things, I've come to a greater realization with regard to how our folk affect us.  We often spend a great deal of time interacting with others and we often take more than we'd like from people.  This function is something that's programmed into us at a biological level, as evidence by the fact that we even respond to how other people's hearts are beating.  The links for such studies escape me at the moment, but sufficed to say, we are much more intimately linked than we like to admit.

We end up mirroring people we respect as a result of our focus on what they represent to us.  We instinctually try to live up to the ideal they tout in order to become better in their eyes, and that can be a dangerous tendency.  When someone is sufficiently strong-willed, they can project a great deal onto others and do a ridiculous amount of damage to that individual.

Its not at all uncommon for a mental patient, for example, to project his or her disease/disorder onto the doctor or that individual's spouse.  I saw and experienced this firsthand as a child, when my mother's erratic behavior and lack of moral limitation "infected" my father.  Not only did I witness him changing over the years, but I confirmed these changes with my family after the fact. Apparently, before he married my mother, he had a slight "bad streak", but it was never particularly volatile or violent.

We see the same tendency in schools, as noted by my significant other (she's a teacher); when a smart kid hangs out with the would-be thugs, the smart kid's test scores and schoolwork suffers.  If that same student suddenly starts hanging out with a bunch of nerds, his scores improve.

In short, our values are ultimately set by the clan we interact with. If your friends, wife, husband, girlfriend, boyfriend, or some other such individual or group is intensely negative, you will behave the same way as a result of your interactions.  This may not be true initially, but eventually your Will will break down and you will fall in line with your pack.

The same interactions and changes occur with those of us who are religious, spiritually inclined, or to those of us who practice some form of magic involving interacting with spiritual forces.  Our very interactions with those spirits, for weal or woe, changes us on some level.  They, very literally, become a part of  our life and our worldview, changing us from within even if we don't expect it.  Its not particularly abnormal for a practicing mage's IQ to be raised as a result of working with planetary intelligences, for example.

I've personally experienced this over the years, as working with Zazel, for example, has helped me to become better at discerning limitations, exposing them, or strengthening weaknesses, even if this wasn't the goal of the work.  It fits perfectly with His Saturnine nature.

That being the case, we can respond to this external stimuli in a couple of different ways; we can either use this to our benefit, or we can try to run from it and become a hermit. I would suggest that we should use this tendency to our benefit rather than pursue the goal of shielding ourselves from influences from others.  It is, ultimately, futile to do so, as we're trying to escape biologically-programmed functions which help us to interact.

I would recommend that you surround yourself with successful folk that you can look up to and interact.  I'd also recommend that you take it a step further and actually work with spirits that will benefit you in such a way.  If you're looking to cultivate a sense of inner peace, either work with Shiva and Ayra-Tara-Ma or have someone else do the work for you. Just bringing an entity into your sphere can have far-reaching effects for the same reasons listed above.

Furthermore, cut the bad apples off the tree.  Make the sacrifice and move on with your life if someone isn't benefiting you.  Don't sit their and stew; it WILL come back to bite you if you don't heed this advice.  Compassion is great until it drags you down; if it does, it needs to be managed like any other emotion or instinct.

The TL:DR version of this is illustrated pretty well by Hopsin in the following music video:

The long and short of it is that in order to grow, we have to cut loose the anchors that hold us down.  If you want to get somewhere in life, make whatever sacrifices you need to, so long as they'll actually get you somewhere.  If that means that you need to ask for help, realize this and then make it happen.

There are plenty of resources, spiritual teachers, spirit workers, teachers, therapists, business contacts, and potential friends who can help you to change your life for the better.  All you need to do is reach out and work to make that occur.

If you should desire such assistance, contact me and we'll talk. If you're not sure what to do about your situation, but just want to do something general to help fix it, I can probably assist.

Take care and thank you for reading.

Regards,

SE

Ave, my friends.  As always, I hope my posting finds you well.

A couple of weeks ago, I got word from a client and friend of mine that some recent work I had done for her led to some striking paranormal manifestations.  Here are her words on the subject:

"since you did the ritual work for me, i've been seeing things in my room. it's difficult to describe, but it's like i'm seeing glimmers of spirits or whatever they are all over in here. no audible sounds, just visual. sometimes it's in the form of a light, sometimes a shadow. i'm a little confused, didn't know if it might be related to the ritual. this is something that is completely new. the most prevalent was something small (and a light form) move across the keyboard of my laptop while i was using it. it was very clear and made me jump when i saw it."

Given her reaction to these manifestations, I thought that I should share this information; these sorts of things do happen.  Sometimes they're striking or startling, so if you're going to study and practice the Art, expect that this can happen to you.  This result was simply from doing a bit of work to bless her; more potent rites have even more potential for this sort of thing.

Take care,

SE

Greetings once again, dear readers.

A conversation with a member over at EM finally sparked my desire to write this post that's been floating around in my brain for ages (thanks for the motivation, by the way!). As one'd guess, I get a great many contacts from  people asking for help in getting jobs; its almost a daily thing, in fact.  That being the case, I thought I'd create a post specific to making oneself marketable, as this is of great import when attempting to gain employment.

Before I really get to the nitty gritty details, I should note that, as mentioned before, I work as a software administrator and have been doing tech work for years. I've also worked retail in the past, trained new employees for the past four years, and sat on interview boards, so I can give you a reasonably good idea of what hiring managers are looking for, as well as give you advice on how to be just that.

Experience is, as one'd expect, of great import in any industry, regardless of credentials.  So much so, in fact, that its more valuable than years of schooling; its becoming more and more frequent, in the USA, that people are being hired into jobs that provide 40-80k a year without a college education.  If you get your foot in the door, its a great way to gain access to opportunities that will open the door wide open for you.

In the conversation with the gentleman I mentioned above, we spoke on this with regard to retail experience.  He had approximately 5 years of retail experience, but unfortunately, even if you're in the retail industry, that's not so valuable anymore. It seems impressive on paper, but it isn't anything special anymore, as for the past 10-15 years, its been increasingly common for kids to start working at the local mall, outlet store, home depot, or other retail outfit.  They usually they start at 15 or 16 years old and stick to it through the remainder of middle school and high school.  Their reasons aren't always the same, but in the case of my girl's students, a pretty significant portion of them have such jobs.

If 5 children per class have such a job, with some of the medium-sized schools will have up to around 200 students who are doing this.  With how many schools are in most states, that's 2000 students or more who have retail experience.  If they stay in school and the retail job through middle and high school, that's 6 years of work experience, resources, and contacts.  That means that these kids are essentially ahead of any of their peers that didn't have such an experience, as far as work is concerned.

They essentially move to the head of the interviewer pool by default, as such work experience it makes them stand out even if it doesn't apply to what they're trying to do (if you're a parent, I strongly suggest that you make your kid start working ASAP; they might hate it at first, but it'll benefit them in the long term).

This, of course, brings me to my next point of bettering your skills constantly and making sure that your resume reflects this. Every time you apply to a job they get a soft copy.  If your skills haven't improved any, the hiring manager probably isn't going to be all that interested, as you're not working on anything of worth; in short, you appear lazy and your resume gets trashed.

The best thing you can do is branch out your skillset. If you have aspirations of doing something techy in the future, spend time taking free classes on things like web design, using Microsoft Office effectively, understanding SQL, and so on and so forth. Those things look great on the resume, as even though they are actually outside your discipline, it means that you can work with people who do know those programs and functions intimately; that makes you a more valuable asset. It also shows that you are intelligent and have a drive to learn more on a daily basis; its hard to come by a better employee.

Finally, ensure that you speak well and understand, on some level, multiple cultures.  This is a widely overlooked skill, but if you know the religious views, political ideology, or cultural views of the interviewing manager, you can adjust your tactics to coincide with this. In essence, you could kiss up to that person and be mostly aware of what they might want, making your attempt to manipulate them more effectively.  Keep in mind, I use the word manipulate here because that is exactly what you are doing.

Once you've done those things, all you need to do is be attentive, use the appropriate magical means to make it all work according to your plans, and you should be able to land any job that's within your grasp with relative ease.

Regards,

SE