Foundations: The Lone Practitioner is the first book of the Magical Knowledge trilogy, a series that takes the reader through the twists and turns of serious magical study and practice. Written by Josephine McCarthy, one of the world's leading magical adepts, Foundations provides a basic training in the necessary skills, contacts, and foundational practices for lone practitioners studying Western magic. She also details some of the rarely tackled issues and problems that face the serious student of magic, offering advice and reflections based on her forty years of practical work. This book follows no specific magical path; rather it reveals the layers of consciousness that lie beneath many paths, along with the various techniques, powers, and dynamics that underpin most Western Mystery schools and Western magical systems. The reader is shown how ritual actually works, what an inner contact actually is, how to make visions work, how to turn an object into a magically charged implement, how to start reading Tarot, how to clean and protect themselves, and most importantly of all, how to spot the bullshit. Josephine McCarthy has been teaching Western magical forms in the US and Europe since the early 1990s and has authored numerous books on magic including The Exorcist's Handbook, Magic of the North Gate, The Book of Gates - a magical translation, and The Work of the Hierophant. She is also the author and director of the free and extensive self-study magical training course Quareia, which can be found online at www.quareia.com.