Sigil

A sigil is a glyph created by a magic practitioner for the purposes of honing intent and allowing others to reuse the constructs involved in a ritual. They are a convenient way to tie a complex energy concept to a simple action.

For some, it's a bit like adding a web-page to your shortcuts. You simply scribe/draw the sigil, and the effect you've attached to it happens. This allows the user to condense a previously complex operation (such as opening a series of planar gates ) to a single action.

For others, sigils must not only be drawn, but charged. This may be done in a number of ways; many involve burning the sigil at the end.

Creating a sigil is generally done in one of two ways. Either the user will receive insight into the sigil design and purpose as a random/predestined event, or they will know what they want and work out the sigil by a process of intuition and imagination. A sigil generally has meaning only for its designer/user, any further meaning attributed to it by others can be considered a side effect of their belief in the designer's authority.

Austin Osman Spare (born 1886, died 1956) first described the creation of sigils in his 1913 work, The Book of Pleasure (Self Love): The Psychology of Ecstasy.

Grant Morrison's pop magic has an introduction to the way he does sigils.

Sigil Creation
There are multiple ways to create a sigil, often depending on the tradition or individual's beliefs. In sigil magic, it's often recommended that the practitioner forget the original intent on the sigil to keep the conscious mind from ruining the effects through doubt or expectation.

Letter Obfuscation
This is perhaps the most popular method because of how easy it is to do without extra tools.
 * 1) Write down a short phrase indicating your intent in all capital letters.
 * 2) Remove any duplicate letters by crossing them out.
 * 3) * Some variations of this technique also recommend crossing out vowels. The more letters left over, the more of a challenge it may be to fit them all together later, so it's up to the practitioner's discretion.
 * 4) Take the remaining letters and try to fit them together into a single symbol. Overlapping similar parts of letters is recommended.
 * 5) Optionally, clean up the sigil by stylizing it to remove any trace of the original letters. Some like to use this step to simplify the sigil down to one or two strokes, though it's not necessary.

The symbol at the end is the symbol to use to work with your intent.

Magic Square
This method works by first making a magic square with the energy of the planet corresponding to the intent, then using alphanumeric assignments to dictate how to draw the resultant sigil.