Donald Michael Kraig

Donald Michael Kraig was an American occult author and teacher best known for Modern Magick: Eleven Lessons in the High Magickal Arts (1988), one of the most widely used hands-on instructional texts in contemporary Western magic.

Structured as a graded course of eleven lessons with practical exercises, daily rituals (such as the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram), record-keeping, and progressive skill-building, the book translated the Golden Dawn / Regardie system into a clear, secular-friendly, do-it-yourself curriculum that an individual could work through without a lodge or teacher.

Kraig’s contribution to the lineage is pedagogical: he democratized and standardized the practical teaching of ceremonial magic for the modern self-directed student, much as earlier figures systematized it within orders.

His step-by-step, exercise-driven format—emphasizing daily practice, the keeping of a magical record/journal, and gradual development of concentration, visualization, and ritual skill—mirrors the structure of modern self-improvement programs and connects ceremonial magic to the broader self-development culture.

By making the techniques (visualization, banishing, energy work, ritual) approachable and reproducible, Kraig is an important node in the late-20th-century mainstreaming of magical practice and its convergence with general personal-development methodology.