Introduction

The word thelema (θέλημα) is classical Greek, signifying the appetitive will (desire) and sometimes sexual desire. In early Christian writings the word to usually refers to the will of God, but is also for to the human will, and also the will of the Devil.

In the Renaissance, Dominican monk Francesco Colonna wrote the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, in which the protagonist, Poliphilo, has two allegorical guides, Logistica (reason) and Thelemia (will or desire). Colonna’s work was influential on the Franciscan monk Francois Rabelais.

In the 16th century, Rabelais wrote two novels, Gargantua and Pantagruel, in which he featured a fictional Abbey named Thélème. The only rule of this Abbey was “fay çe que vouldras” (“Fais ce que tu veux,” or, “Do what thou wilt”).

In the mid 18th century, Sir Francis Dashwood inscribed the adage on a doorway of his abbey at Medmenham, where it served as the motto of The Hellfire Club.

Aleister Crowley (1875–1947) was an English occultist and writer. In 1904, Crowley claimed to have received The Book of the Law from an entity named Aiwass, which was to serve as the foundation of the religious and philosophical system he called Thelema.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the was a great deal of interest in the human will, with numerous books appearing and proposals for a psychology of the will. From various sources, magical to mundane, exercises have been written so that individuals may become aware, experience, and develop their will.

Psychosynthesis, a branch of Transpersonal Psychology, features the concept of will as a central function of the human psyche. Roberto Assagioli, founder of the Psychosynthesis movement, synthesized his spiritual wisdom with contemporary psychoanalytic and psychological knowledge, writing a book entitled The Act of Will. In this book, a culmination of Assagioli’s lifelong research into the Will, he proposed the Will Project to thoroughly investigate all aspects of the Will.

It is from these and other sources that the following exercises have been taken (some slightly adapted), and released into the public domain in an act of goodwill, that anyone interested in personal development may benefit from inclusion of these exercises into their daily life.

- The Editor

Note: Exercises are organised in the order they were ‘discovered’, not in any specific, ranked order.