In traditional usage a sigil refers to the signature of an angel, demon, or other entity in pictorial form. In the context of modern chaos magick it refers to a symbolic representation of the user's desire or desired outcome.
We will cover two simple methods of creating your own sigils. The first has roots as a modern practice tracing back to Austin Osman Spare, an early 20th century artist and occultist who pioneered some of the practices of what we call 'chaos magick' today.
The second method utilizes a 'magic square' to aid in drawing a line-based sigil. Included will be a magic square using the English alphabet, although historically Hebrew or other languages were used to craft the signs or sigils.
To start the sigil you must write out a word or phrase. Traditionally it would begin with something along the lines of "This is my wish" or the more magick inclined "This is my will", followed by the desire. For the example below this is left off, being implied by the phrase. We will use the phrase "Love myself", the desire to love oneself more. Normally one would use all capital letters, so in our example "LOVE MYSELF".
The next step is to eliminate repeated letters: "LOVE MYSELF". Doing so we are left with the letters "LOVEMYSF". Optionally you could also remove all of the vowels to simplify the derived sigil even further, "LOVEMYSF", leaving just "LVMSF" .
Now we come to the creative part of the sigil design. Combining the letters into a single symbol - a sigil. Letters can be rearranged, rotated, combined, and modified. Letters that may resemble each-other such as a "W" and "M", possibly even "E", could be crafted once to represent multiple letters to simplify the design. Flourishes or other additions to the sigil are not only acceptable they can help create a more dramatic looking sigil. Below is an example using "Love myself":
Great artistic ability is not required, sigils in this context are personal and for one's own use, simply work out one or more combinations until you arrive at one that is aesthetically pleasing to you. Practice several designs. Sigils will be used in later workings but the ones you design at this time can be set aside for now.
As per Wikipedia, a magic square is:
"In recreational mathematics and combinatorial design, a magic square[1] is a n × n square grid (where n is the number of cells on each side) filled with distinct positive integers in the range 1, 2, . . . , n2 such that each cell contains a different integer and the sum of the integers in each row, column and diagonal is equal.[2] The sum is called the magic constant or magic sum of the magic square. A square grid with n cells on each side is said to have order n."
While the design, or discovery, of different magic squares can be fascinating in and of itself, we're concerned with one particular square with an order of 5, that is 5 x 5 cells1. Specifically the square pictured below:
This particular magic square has a magic sum of 65, but for our purposes the fact that it has 25 cells is what is important. We can map the alphabet (minus one letter) such as the following:
To create a sigil from the magic square we draw each word, or the entire phrase, connecting the letters at points, angles, or curves. We can substitute the letter "Z" with another letter if needed, such as "X". Below is an example using "Anarchy-X":
For a phrase, each word could be converted into an individual sigil and then the sigils combined into a unified symbol. As with the method based on Spare's work, additional flourishes and embelishments can be added to create a more visually interesting sigil. When tracing the lines between letters any portion of the cell containing the letter can be used as the 'point' and doubled-up letters can be traced using curves or angles within the cell.
Below the words "Will", "Love", "Myself", "More" - from the phrase "I will love myself more" - are combined into a larger and more complex symbol:
Again work on several different designs to practice. For more of a challenge incorporate appropriate alchemical signs or symbols as well. Here I've incorporated 'Mind' or Mercury: ☿ ,'Body' or Salt: 🜔 , and 'Soul' or Sulfur: 🜍 . Once you feel comfortable using this method set aside the sigils you've designed for now. Later, as with the previous method's sigils, you can use this type for other works and workings.