Gnosis — The Magical State

Chaos magicians use the word gnosis for a state of single-pointed, altered awareness in which the critical, doubting mind falls silent. In that window a sigil, image or intention can be "fired" deep into the psyche. (The word is borrowed from Greek, where it means knowledge; it is not the same as the Gnostic religious movements.)

Spare described a method of exhausting the body and mind until a moment of "vacuity" — emptiness — opened up. Later chaos magicians sorted the routes into two broad families.