Both are equally important and true.
I will try to share my own perspective from my own experience, no books, no simulating another individual’s experience.
In response to the first question, “why my magic doesn’t work, what I am doing wrong”…
My distilled version is that all magic works but not as we imagine in a hollywoodian manner but more subtle… yes Dr. Strange is cool, nice effects, cool lights and CGI and in another reality, in another universe that’s totally possible, but we are not there yet.
How magic works (my perspective)…
First I regard magic as a less known piece of technology… not necessarily a full tangibile one to start with but more of an energetically based one… involving, thought, desire, emotion followed by a strong will and action to bring that vibration into manifestation… That’s how I see and understand magic, knowledge to interact with energies.

Following that idea which for me as an individual has become a fact, thoughts are energy, emotions are energy, ideas are energies composed from at least two other elements, vibration, frequency and magnetism.
Because I am a very stubborn individual I tried to reinvent the wheel (so to speak) choosing the difficult path because… I’m a male, designed for logic thinking searching for scientific facts so I used logic to define magic. Of course I am limited by my own experiences and knowledge but here’s how I feel, I think, I believe and I see it works.

When we have desires, when we have things that we like, we enjoy we love, we generate a high vibrational frequency which places us (as an entity) in a certain vibrational state, I feel myself floating in cloud 9 so to speak, a high emotional and vibrational state, which is wonderful, amazing, a nice place to be and in that state I will for myself all kind of stuff like abundance, financial stability, all these material things which allows me more freedoms.
In that state I wish I have more money, more source of income, more revenue streams… but what happens? Here’s the thing I have discovered for myself… I remember I don’t have all those freedoms, all these money coming my way and I call that the reality check and when reality sets in and I acknowledge that previous uplifting state was just wishful thinking and I look at the bills piling up… all of a sudden the cloud 9 falls apart and I crush the pavement of low vibe frequency and low vibration energies generated by worries, fear I have difficulties of paying bills and all sorts of down the drain emotions, ideas, energies…
Using the same analogy I was in cloud 9 and I wanted to have all those $$$$$ flowing my way… now I’m waaay below that state… operating on another level, another energy field, another vibration, frequency much much lower… so here comes the magnetism law I was talking about…
If I was to keep my high vibes up, staying in cloud 9, I would of attracted all that energy to match the energy and feelings I was emanating… now that I focused back on the lack of money, lack of abundance, lack of what I want to enjoy, the magnetism works here too so I will receive more lack of… because that is what I emanate… what you put out is what you get, what you receive…
Law of attraction isn’t it? For God’s sake yes it is… also similar with 3 fold law, The Rule of Three (also Three-fold Law or Law of Return) is a religious tenet held by some Wiccans, Neo-Pagans and occultists. It states that whatever energy a person puts out into the world, be it positive or negative, will be returned to that person three times.
Now, we understand the words…. but unless I didn’t experienced for myself now I understand the meaning too, the mechanics, the sense, the logic behind… It simply clicked in an unexpected way… deeper meaning.

Now I understand, I’ve reached the conclusion that I need to be in cloud 9 so to speak when feeling good and resonate at higher vibration for both instances of the manifestation, when I state the will and to receive it, to witness the manifestation of my magic otherwise the magic will happen, will manifest itself exactly how I desire and even more but it is not in my awareness, I am not on that level to be able to enjoy it, see it, witness it, to consciously take benefit of it because… I am way below that state.

What I also observed is the energy from which one is doing magic.
This is very important because there’s a detail many oversee … the energy from which, one is making a wish for example.
“I wish to have more money so I can pay my bills” is not the same as “I have enough money to feel all these freedoms I enjoy”

One is based on fear. I need to pay the bills so I need to have money.
The other is based on “I already have enough” … always when I feel I have enough I am in that superc cool position to offer the same energy to others.

For me makes so much sense even if my english is ducked up as it is and fluidity, syntax and grammar are off, I do believe some of you got a rough idea how …. hmmm, not magic but all reality works… because if I am to push the narrative a bit and expand the same ideas to the idea of building the reality we live in… all fits…
Yes, a few variables need to be taken into consideration like the colective agreements, the reality framework which has a set of physical rules we all need to obey so to speak, you know, time as a factor…

I don’t pretend I fully understand how this reality works but dang for me it is so cool to figure this out for myself, see all these in action, real time discovery and that’s the true magic I wish for everyone to experience.

It is a long text, a difficult one due to my lack of knowledge when expressing what I want to say in a foreign language but even so I do enjoy all these ideas, all these beliefs, all these experiences…

That’s the main reason for which I chose magic sigils because they represent all these experiences, all these reminders which can be used to push ourselves in that cloud 9 I was mentioning before and allow us to receive and witness the manifestation of our own magic. Where the focus goes, the manifestation goes.

Magic is not bs if you understand your own magic, your own process which doesn’t have to be similar with someone else’s process.
You all have your own magic and some of you do know this as a fact.