We want to work with our bodies and our genetics, to fine tune what is happening with intent. Yet Dawkin's concept of the body is ultimately mechanistic, that of a machine: "A body, then is not a replicator, it is a vehicle; vehicles don't replicate themselves; they work to propagate their replicators" (1989, p. 254). The replicators are genes that survive long enough to imprint their existence, to pass on a trait that keeps them viable (Dawkins 1989).

But is this paradigm of survival really what happens? Is this the sole reason of communication/transmission from cell to cell, to create a human machine that allows for the carrying of genetics? If this is the case, the DNA/RNA have accepted a bad deal overall. There's not much autonomy for them in the body. I find such an approach to be lacking, if only because it represents a commodification of genetics, a consumer mentality at work. The focus is on how one organism takes advantage of another, while offering little in regards to symbiosis or cooperative living. We aren?t looking to commodify ourselves, commodify our paradigms until they hit the commode, a waste tissue no longer needed.

If we settle for such an answer, the alchemy we seek to work is futile, because we are focused on survival and not on evolution. We aren?t agents of change for our bodies, so much as pawns for our genetics. The inner alchemy we seek to work with our bodies, with our genes, is one of intent, desire, and will. Still we shouldn't overly mystify DNA as occurs in the following passage: "It may be DNA that communicates to the magician in the language of synchronicities, confluence of life events, awakenings, satori, peak experience, and other occult events. DNA is implicit in the use of blood and sexual fluids in reifiying wishes, by the combination of the esctasis of orgasm or bloodshed with intent, along with our strongest magical link to our own beings, the little microscopic bits that contain the code for everything we are?"(Louv 2006, p. 263). The problem with such mystification is that it draws too heavily on the modality of traditional biology that argues that genetics determines everything, even how we adapt to the environment we live in. It suggests that magic is not an environmental force, but instead a genetic code, when in fact it may actually be both. It also leaves out of the equation free will, suggesting that even our occult experiences are coded into the genetic structure without any variability, which is rather dull, if that's the case.

Accordingly, for me, a different paradigm is in order. This paradigm relies on more than just the communication between DNA and RNA to construct a cell, or for the replication of genes. Rather, it concerns body modification and evolution, a willful change of what we have, into something better. It is also an acknowledgement of the role that the environment plays in genetics, something which has been ignored far too much within traditional biology.

Biophotonic energy and DNA are interconnected, and it is through this connection that I have done a lot of my magical workings with DNA. I?ve always noticed a sensation of light around the DNA in my visualizations. The light changes frequencies as the DNA is worked with. Interestingly enough, if DNA is unwound it emits more biophotonic light:

"It is known that when you apply a chemical called ethidium bromide to samples of DNA, the chemical squeezes itself into the middle of the base pairs of the double helix and causes it to unwind. Popp discovered that the more he increased the concentration of the chemical, the more the DNA unwound, but also the stronger the intensity of light. He also found that DNA was capable of sending out a large range of frequencies and that some frequencies seemed linked to certain functions." (Mctaggart 2002, p. 44)

DNA, in essence, acts as both a storehouse and emitter of biophotonic energy. That energy likely contributes to the genetic functioning of DNA, but beyond even that enables the magician to work directly with the DNA, and specifically the frequencies that the biophotonic energy emits.

DNA is understood as mainly conveying genetic information, but with my approaches to magic, I've never really approached DNA in that way. It?s always been my thought that DNA can be modified and worked with and that the environment plays a role in this (Note: When I refer to genetics and DNA and the idea that genetics can be changed I'm not referring to the idea of changing the number of chromosomes in your genetics, but rather to modifying and working with the genes that are available. The only way to tell a difference is through observing the body as a whole). Part of this mentality comes from my refusal to accept that I would always have to deal with the genetic aspect of my depression, but it also comes from my desire to experiment. In traditional biology the argument that has occurred is that the environment is shaped by genetics, "The doctrine of the extended phenotype is that the phenotypic effect of a gene (genetic replicator) is best seen as an effect upon the world at large, and only incidentally upon the individual organism-or any other vehicle-in which it happens to sit" (Dawkins 1999, p. 117). This doctrine unfortunately is quite unsound. It essentially argues that the environment is shaped by genetics, and yet fails to factor in how changing environmental conditions demand adaptation on a physiological level. Lipton aptly points out that genes aren?t destiny and that environmental influences including diet, exercise, etc., will have an impact on the genetics that influences yourself and future descendents (2005). In other words, genes do not determine the reality of our body.

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