fly by

As newly born space seedlings, we fly into the sociosphere and psychosphere of Earth; we complete X number of orbits, then spin off, out and away again, enriched, battered, and transformed. While orbiting through this density, we absorb and reflect, continuously transmitting messages of our ongoing orbital impact to all and to the Source of our seedlingship. Then we leave. Mission fulfilled.

i know this

I know this: that we are the Cosmos Itself embodying, that the challenge of this age is to open to the voice and the action of the Cosmos that we are, to shed our simple little cha cha mind, our personal soap operas, our quest for security in a world on fire, and to open to our Larger Being.

the human guitar

Strut and fret: Characteristics of a guitar and of a human.

diaphor

We live in accord with the metaphors we have adopted. They now form the shaping of our consciousness. (Folk with differing clusters of metaphors find it hard to understand each other.) Few open to diaphor, the seeing through, the making transparent of metaphor, the widening and expansion of consciousness.

prancing on a pony

Every one of us has a story
of who we are, of what's going on.
Every one believes their story to be true,
other's stories as unreal, and give explanations
that convince no one but themselves
and their fellow story inmates.
Very few dwell outside of story.
The story of no story is still a story.
Few know how to just be
without prancing on a pony.
This is my story.

no problem

Whatever you believe, you believe, and as the current phraseology exclaims, no problem. As for me, I take things personally. God plays the scales on my harmonium and occasionally bursts into a symphony of joy. We merge and there is no we. No indulgence in self-exiled cosmosturbation.

Atom and Eve

Each of us is an Atom in the cosmic body upon the Eve of reconciliation.

Breaking Out of the Drain Suck Into the Radiant Sun

Consciousness is formed by life turning back upon itself, producing a reflection. A seemingly endless series of "selfies" begins. This is what is called the formation of the ego, of a separate self so sweet and so fragile, so self-condemnatory and self-justifying. If this is all that happens, the continuously reverberating self-gaze, this Narcissus, falls into a hypnotic trance and is bypassed by the ongoing flow of Life. All spiritual practices are designed to break one out of this drain suck, form a non-suck center, a center of balance and openness that radiates outward in all directions with simultaneous outflow and inflow. This "sun" that we become shines its light on everything without prejudice and simultaneously gives and receives with no or little effort on its part. We become an interflow, an interflow with a firm and open center.

spiritual energy

Spiritual energy is powerful. The spiritual energies of Moses, of Jesus, of Buddha, of Khidr who lived so long ago continue to reverberate, to circulate, to influence this very moment. We all have and are spiritual energy. What is spirit? Spirit is the Life Force itself, that which moves through and as all living things. And every "thing" is alive -- from the metagalactic to the subatomic. We humans appear to be the ones most aware of the energy we are, with the ability to transform its quality, to direct it. We have and are spiritual energy. We are embodyings of the Life Force itself. We are spheres of influence with the power to change all around us with the quality of our radiance. This is what we do. This is who we are. This is how we transform the world.

Evolve or die

We are somewhat intelligent apes who are conquering the earth and in so doing are destroying it. We must evolve or die. Either way we will not stay the same as we are now. Evolve how? Evolve a greater awareness of our interflow with all that is. And more than that, evolve a greater skill of relationship, of actively relating with all that is while doing no harm. A tall order for the crude consciousnesses of today. I see it in individuals, in neighborhoods, in communities here and there: this transformation of awareness and skill. Tough times ahead while those who refuse or are incapable die off and the ones of greater awareness move on.

Uprising

The uprising of the energies of Life have been in play for longer than any of us can remember or precast, beyond our scope, beyond our comprehension. The errant strivings of a relatively small number of fleshy bipeds will not divert its course. Life has birthed consciousness and consciousness will prevail. The humans that are the bearers and the radiance of this consciousness have the powers of Life with them and cannot be dissuaded, discouraged, or defeated. A silent evolution / revolution behind and above the clamor of the world. Awareness rising upward and outward grounded in the Origin.

On Christianity

Jesus is the bell star sounding the way for those lost at sea in the great flotational unfolding of the cosmos, of this universe which began its slow motion explosion some 15 billion years ago. Little blips having forgotten that we are the Origin originating, the Source sourcing, the Wellspring springing, turn to him, to his sounding. We shed all doctrinal clothing. He pulls open his chest and reveals his heart. We dive in, dive in to the heart of the cosmos. Ah! Now we remember, re-member. We are the community, the communal, one of the infinite number of centers re-presenting the Father, the Mother. We are the Father furthering, the Mother mothering. We swoop and dive like porpoises in the Infinite Bliss. We are the Bliss Itself.

Everything is Possibility!

Everything is possibility! Whether we dilute this to meaninglessness or amp it up to highest meaning is up to us. Everything is possibility!

our destiny is here

A prophet from yesteryear spoke it clearly: The medium is the message. The medium IS the message. And what is the medium, as we approach and are in the flashpoint of civilization, but direct access of all to all, of instant communication of every human on Earth who can gain access to one of the various forms of computer, whether in private possession or at local libraries. The medium, instant communication of all with all, is the message, the message to all humankind. We are in increasingly strong connection. Whether we use this connection to post photos of cats, salve our ego selves, delight in each other's accomplishments and very existence, spear perceived ignorance, post apocalyptic doom, or create a shared vision of possibility is up to us. The point is: the medium, this medium of instant shared communication IS the message. We are in communication. And at one of the most exciting and fearful and awe-full times on Earth. Our destiny is here, not even waiting to knock on the door or ring the doorbell, but is here, in this room, with us now.

Dear People of the Earth

Dear People of the Earth,

We have tried the world view where everything is seen as a product to be bought and sold. Everything. In this world view we chomp up the Earth and turn it into money. The trouble with money is that it is either almost indiscernible electronic blips or a form of paper that cannot be eaten and is even totally useless for wiping one's ass.

It is time we open to a different world view. One in which we see that we proud humans are not isolated protoplasmic blobs (IPBs) but are interwoven in the fabric and the destiny of all that exists. All. From the subatomic to the metagalactic.

Sincerely,
Your Pal
George

Two Consciousness States

Two consciousness states: Formational and Transformational. Formational consciousness is the continuous forming of self and world through self-talk (thoughts). Transformational consciousness is opening to the vastness, mystery, and ongoing Dance of That-Which-Breathes-Us. The first is for doing busy-ness as an isolated protoplasmic blob (IPB) with other IPBs. The second is becoming and being the Dance Itself.

consciousness transformation

The only way out of our predicament is through spiritual development or, in terms more palatable to some, consciousness transformation. First, you have to acknowledge, claim, own who you are. No hiding. Ruthless acceptance. Bare ass naked awareness. Notice your thoughts. As long as you keep thinking the same old thoughts, you will be the same old you. (Hence the old Zen saying I made up: How many times must you jump on a pogo stick?) Notice what your hands are doing during the day. As long as your hands keep doing the same old things, you will be the same old you. Notice your breath, your breathing in, the pause, the breathing out, the pause, the breathing in. Breathe out to the far horizon. Breathe in to your core infinity. As long as your breath goes unnoticed, you will be the same old you. Notice your attitude toward others, toward the day, toward life, toward this moment. As long as your attitude is negative, you will stay negative. As long as your attitude stays the same, you will stay the same. Notice the tightness of your jaws. Open and close and open your jaws. Make ludicrous expressions with all the muscles of your face. As long as your jaws stay tight and your facial expression rigid, you will be the same old you. Notice where you put your attention. Whatever you attend to, you become. If you keep attending to the same old things, you will be the same old you. There! If you want consciousness transformation, that should be plenty enough to start. 

Embodying

Run it up the chakra ladder: Hara - Heart - Head - Beyond. Then run it back down into your embodying. Be the whole ladder and move through the day.

Split Land and the Seamless Whole

The rules that apply in Split Land, the land of duality, of me versus you, of us versus them, and so on, do not apply in the Seamless Whole, the realm of the nondual, of the nonduel. But the principles of the Seamless Whole do apply in Split Land. Split Land is a subset of the Seamless Whole. Our physical bodies are residents of Split Land. Look at your opposing sides, your two hands clapping, your jaws aflapping. The Seamless Whole births Split Land. Split Land, no matter how much it stands on its hind legs and howls, is the lesser domain.

the truth shall make you free

"And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free," says Jesus. What is the truth? The truth is that we are Awareness. Awareness is grounded in the continuous Unknown, is a continuous unfolding. The Unknown longs to be known. The extent of its known-ness depends upon my and your Awareness. Or rather, the realm of our Awareness with which we identify.

For example, thoughts arise. When I identify, make myself identical with the thoughts, I restrict Awareness. With no clinging to thoughts, Awareness opens.

Awareness is composed of the dark and the light. Light arises out of the dark. Known arises out of the Unknown. We are the Unknown knowing, becoming known.

We are the light of Awareness arising out of the dark Unknown. The Unknown is closer to us than our very breath. We are the Unknown knowing. We are this Mystery endlessly repeating itself yet never the same. Jesus embodied this and told us this: "You are the light of the world."

We are the light of Awareness. The ways to dim it are well known. So are the ways to let it shine. "Deep calls to deep."

the monastic order of the cosmos seeing itself

Going by various names (scientists, seers, diviners, mystics, gnostics, shaman, priests), we are members of the Monastic Order of the Cosmos Seeing Itself. Why monastic? Because seeing requires a stepping aside from the usual preoccupations of humankind, a stepping outside of ordinary consciousness into vaster realms. 

Sitting around the Metacosmic campfire

Each of us is born into a story, a story that is told and taught to us directly or indirectly by the culture into which we are born. We are taught the significance of being a lump of meat wandering the surface of a beautiful but insignificant planet of a solar system which is a tiny part of a galaxy among countless galaxies in a cosmos which can be seen as one cosmos among who knows how many in a Metacosmos beyond our understanding.

We are coming out of an age of fooling ourselves into thinking that we ditched all such stories (which is just another story). We began telling ourselves that only matter matters, that if the meat senses and their extension through machines did not pick up on it, it does not exist. “I, meat, am the determiner that this is so!”

Most found (or are finding) that the meat story is way too small. So where to now? Many say tell me the old old story, meaning the one they were born into. We can never however slide into the skin of our previousness. Our consciousness is bigger than that now.

We have options. We can continue with looking to satisfy the meat, filling its orifices with pleasures, extending its protrusions into delights. Yet the meat gets old, decays, and dies. No matter, says the meat matter, we will ride this horse down to its bitter end. Stoic with as much jism as possible.

We can open to our tribe’s cosmic story, proclaim that one as the only true one, and ignore or actively denigrate the stories of all other tribes. We see that happening, even among those who pride themselves on being “scientific” or “atheistic” or “humanistic” and so on. Our tribe’s story is the correct story and if only we could get those other bozos to admit that. But we can’t, so we damn them to their misguided hell, wrap ourselves in our own sanctimony and go on our way.

The option I prefer, being the starry-eyed dreamer that I am, is for us to honor all the stories, to sit around the Metacosmic campfire and listen, truly listen, to each other’s stories. Listen as you would be listened to. We all spring from, are springing from, the same Source. When we listen to each other, we hear the Source sourcing. We hear a Metacosmic story that sounds so familiar, so family-iar.

we have moved

We have moved from "God out there"
to "God nowhere"
to "God in here"
to "God in here expanding outward"
to "God out there in here expanding outward."
More to come.

thought helmets

Each sociolinguistic community weaves a conceptual matrix. This web of words, of concepts, is a strong determinant of what we see as Reality. This can readily be seen when learning a new language. For example, the matrix or thought domain of English is different from that of Chinese. English divides the world into subjects and objects with subjects doing things to objects and objects objecting. Chinese regards the world as more of an interflow.

Each sociolinguistic community provides us with a thought helmet that puts bounds on our perception. We wear our thought helmets happily and do not understand why folk do not see the world as we do. We can even feel quite righteous about it.

Can we step outside the sociolinguistic community? Yes. A more relevant question is do we want to? We seem to love our hive mentality. Strong social pressures exist to stay within the community, to fit in.  This brings up other questions. Do we dare? Do we dare step outside? Take a fresh look around? Can we even do so? Is it possible?

Fortunately (from my point of view), stepping outside our thought community is a natural process. When we go to nature, we can let go of words. A walk in the forest, for example, can allow one to take off one's thought helmet. (Unless of course, you are yakking on your cell phone the entire time or checking your text messages.) A similar process can occur with sitting quietly, letting go.

We return to our sociolinguistic community with fresh perspective, new vision. Our conceptual matrix, our thought helmet is not so confining. We may even from time to time ride helmet free.

Vision

For the Great Imagination produces All That Is and we, being smaller downloadings of our Source, also possess imaginative powers. Our current civilization is a product of both the creativeness and the limitations of these powers.  Our vision, our imagination is both our downfall and our salvation. "Without vision, the people perish" is the message from our ancestors." When in doubt, go higher" is another old saw. I add to this: When in doubt, go deeper and wider. 

slam not another's story

What those who rail against the Bible may not understand is that the Bible provides and has provided over the centuries an understanding of who one is, the Tanakh (Old Testament) for the Jewish people and the New Testament for the Christian folk. This provision of a Psychology, of words and imagery that point to layer upon layer of understanding of one’s psyche, of one’s soul, is no mean feat. While superficial or crass understandings of its surface meanings led and continues to lead to hardhearted cruelties and ridiculousness, deep study combined with openness of heart produces marvelous radiance of thought, of heart, of action.

The same is true for those whose Book consists of Buddhist sutras, of the Qur’an, of the Tao Te Ching, of the Upanishads, of the Bhagavad Gita, of the writings of Rumi, of the Gnostics, of the Essenes, of all Great Poets, of those of Oral Tradition, and so on.

The point is that writings have been provided that help sketch out one’s place in the Cosmos. These writings come from our spiritual ancestors, those who gave attention to the realm of mind-body-spirit interflow, cosmic scientists, knowers, explorers, comprehenders of the spiritual world and worlds. It is difficult, if not impossible, to understand where we would be without these templates. One enters these realms and finds oneself to be more than a cipher in an economic system or a chunk of meat wandering the earth until death.

We are creatures who create story. Story tells us who we are, what is going on. Slam not another’s story. Bow and bless and fulfill your own.

salvation not required

Christianity, as a doctrinal system, falls prey to belief in a separate self. This is coupled with a belief in birth and death (rather than a broader and deeper understanding of continuous generation and extinction, an ongoing birthing-dying applying to all existing, not just humans). The doctrinal system of Christianity thus creates a problem: a separate self that is born and dies, a problem that must be solved.  Salvation is required. The separate self must be saved from death, must go on to a more fruitful existence (or else be damned).

When one does not posit a separate self (something hard to do in the dominant thought system of our nation, where divide and conquer is the rule, where individual units are given social security numbers and held accountable, where a separate self is considered basic common sense, where birth certificates and death certificates are the order of the day), salvation is not required. Here is no birth and death, only birth-and-death, ongoing continuous generation and extinction, rise and fall, exile and return. The Flow and the Flowers. No problem.

important

Feelings are a quality of imagery, of images.
If you wish to change your feelings, change your imagery.
This is important.

Dreams are a series of images
with an emoto-track accompanying the images.
When the images shift, the emotions shift.

Emotions are a quality of imagery.
A mage knows this. A mage is a master of i-mage-ry.
Control the images, control the emotions.

me

All is interflow. When “I” speak of “me,” the “me” is that part of the interflow that “I” claim. I stake my claim on this particular area of interflow and solidify it with the words and experience of I, me, and mine. This claim stake has been given legal rights and we can sue claim jumpers.

The interflow is different within each claim. Yet some claims have worked out a common agreement of overlap. This overlap has bounds however and if violated a me can accuse another of claim jumping. 

All is interflow. That which is beyond the bounds of the standard me has been called God, Mystery, the Absolute, the Wellspring and many other names. Some me’s are satisfied with this separation and live existence as an isolated me, relatively secure within their me-dom. Others seek to leap beyond the me-bounds and claim jump God.

In more gentle terms, at times the me-bounds dissolve and me opens to a wider, deeper, vaster experience with no thought of me at all.

our consciousness state

Some jeer at any idea of heaven or hell, but heaven and hell are right inside us, are our interior state, the state we are when relaxed, when no one is looking, when we are not putting on a show.

The body will pass away, but our interior state will not pass away. The so-called final judgment which is referred to in many cultures and civilizations across time is the simple, yet painful and humbling recognition of our interior state in exquisite detail. This is heaven. This is hell.

Yet it is not such a simple thing as one or the other. The realm of Consciousness is vast. The consciousness we are, the consciousness we even now continue forming, is but one hologram in this vast Holography, a dimensionality which ranges from brute insensitivity to active malice, from the dawning of awareness and self-love to Full Awareness and Full Love, from segregated exclusiveness to open radiance.

We place ourselves through our actions, our thoughts, our will in a certain consciousness state. This state of consciousness is our heaven and our hell. When the body drops, it continues. To elaborate on Mister Pogo’s wise saying, “We have met the Enemy and he is us,” I add, “We have met the Angel and s/he is us.”

We operate daily on this vast continuum of ourselves, from Enemy to Angel, from enemy to ourselves and all else to a radiant interflow of openness. Our choices each moment as to our consciousness state while in the body create, produce our consciousness state hereafter.

this life

As soon as one births a sound, a movement, or an image, a world is born in which one must live. Habits of thought are our prison. The only escape is through the birthing of new sounds, new movements, new images. Sharks forever swimming. Unless. Unless we open our hearts, our souls, allowing the continuous flowthrough of the Eternal Now. Embodyings of the everchanging Life Force.

learning how to die

"Keep one-point" is the most powerful and most essential practice taught me by a martial art teacher (Koichi Tohei). Keeping one-point has served me through my life and is now serving me as I continue learning how to die.

The one-point or center in the body is two to three inches below the navel and deep inside. One moves from one-point. This allows one to get out of the head chatter, out of entangling emotion, out of fabricated illusion and move with full attentiveness and clarity through life.

But how about through death? One does not want to stay attached to one's body. Where then shall one keep one's one-point? Where shall one center oneself?

I practice the answer to this question even now. I center in the Formless that is producing this form. Rather than being a body that is embodying the Life Force, I practice being the Life Force that is embodying. In other words, I am practicing dying before I die. I identify with the Formless rather than the form.

Where is my one-point? I center in the vastness that produces all that is. I hear comforting laughter and feel warmth and peace. Centering and opening. No attachment. Boundless capaciousness. As Stephen Levine put it, a spiritual being having physical experiences rather than a physical being having spiritual experiences.

awareness

Do you know what is true and real? Our Awareness. Not that with which we fill our Awareness. That comes and goes. Not our shrewd efforts to establish our ego stance as right and righteous and all else and all others as wrong. Awareness persists. All else flows in and out. Awareness is true and real. When we take our stance on what comes in and out of Awareness, we stand upon self-chosen illusion. Awareness is not even "our" Awareness. Awareness has no our. Awareness is.

bubble heads

Every individual thought structure produces and is produced by a potpourri of imagery.

Each thought community shares a common imagery.

Differences in thought communities are differences in imagery.

Each thought community believes its imagery to be the most accurate depiction of Reality.

Religions, philosophies, political persuasions, ideologies, science theories, and common sense are thought communities. Subdivisions exist within each.

Each thought community has its own criteria of proof.

Each thought community is both predator and victim of its imagery.

In other words,

Every human is a bubble head.

Every bubble head community shares a common set of bubbles.

Differences in bubble head communities are differences in sets of bubbles.

Each bubble head community believes its set of bubbles to be Reality.

Religions, philosophies, political persuasions, ideologies, science theories, and common sense are bubble head communities. Subdivisions of bubble heads exist within each.

Each bubble head community has its own criteria of proof of the Reality of its bubbles.

Each bubble head community both devours others with its imagery and is devoured by its imagery.

talking with my Doc

I went to see my Doc yesterday, a solid M.D. with an additional strong interest in the realm of the Invisible. We always yak a little about the cosmophilotheosophical before attending to the physical business.

He spoke today of the situation of humanity.

He then said, "I want to get a copy of a manuscript to you that someone gave me. It speaks of the Inner and the Outer, of our having an inner life and an outer life, and that the two are different realms. What do you think about that?"

I said that makes sense to me and that many folk seem to live in that dualistic state with its dissonance, troubles, and problems. Many folk seem to have that split consciousness, feeling themselves to be isolated protoplasmic blobs from the rest of All That Is.

He wondered if it had to be that way.

I said no, in addition to living in the Inner and living in the Outer, there is a third way.

The consulting room was silent as he waited to hear.

"One IS the Inner emerging into the Outer. One comes from deep within the All and emerges outward as the All. No separation. This is a state of consciousness that is Whole."

"How does this happen?" he asked with deep interest.

"For some, it happens to them," I said. "For others, it has to be sought and opened into."

"How do they do that?"

"The same method exists across cultures and across time. Sit down, shut up, let all drop away, all chit-chat of the mind. Become empty, quiet, and open. Awareness expands. Consciousness opens."

We sat quietly for a bit. Aware. Open.

We then attended to my physical manifestation.

I love my Doc.

the angel of your being

“And I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them”
(Jeremiah 23:4)

“For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.”
(Psalms 91:11)

The cross is an intersection of the above - below (vertical) and the past - future (horizontal). We are both on the cross and we ARE the cross, our heart at the intersection.

The horizontal is the plane of history, the endless treadmill upon which we walk our daily walk, the future coming at us and the past receding while we appear to stay at more or less the same position. The horizontal is the realm of society, of governments, of politics, of wars, and of trying to “get somewhere.”

The vertical is the realm of infusion of energies, of radiance which downloads and uploads from our Source; a radiance which not only calls us into being but which contains powerful information which we can receive according to our capacity for reception.

It is in this vertical realm that the “shepherds” and the “angels” dwell, energetic spheres of radiance proceeding from the Source of all Being, ever ready to feed us, to keep us in all our ways. Always ready to spring forth our independent two-year-old, we squirm away announcing we would rather do it ourselves. The perhaps startling news is that this is our self, our higher, wider, deeper self which, as long as we insist upon the exclusive reality of the horizontal world, we refuse to claim.

Each of us has an angel or a heavenly twin. “Has” is not the correct word. We “are” this heavenly earthly being. The angel of our being is in direct resonance with the Source of all Being. When this conduit is open, we are the Source sourcing.

A stepdown of energies occurs from realm to realm (the Kabbalah and Jacob’s Ladder are relevant here for imagery and depiction) so we don’t get fried to a crisp. (A fail safe mechanism also exists here: we cannot receive beyond our capacity to receive. And most of us are too stubborn to allow much.)

And what is the upshot of all this? Here is the entirety of the Jeremiah verse: “And I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them: and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall they be lacking, saith the Lord.”

Not too shabby. How does one access the vertical realm? By taking time to deliberately get off the horizontal treadmill. Find or create a quiet space and walk or sit, relax, breathe, and open. Your capacity to receive will enlarge.

the ledge of know

While most folk simply (or complexly) lead their lives, I want to know
1. How we know what we know,
2. Is what we know the Truth or Reality?

An interesting phrase "lead our lives" -- as if we are in charge, leading our lives around. Evidence shows otherwise. The brain knows what is going on before we do. The cosmos in which "we" are immersed interflows with the brain. "We" are the last to "know" what is going on. What we "know" is the story we create from the interflow of the Mystery which we both are and in which we are embedded / embedding (making our bed in).

How do we know what we know? We create story. Science story. Religion story. Melodrama story. Political story.

Is our story the Truth or Reality? Yes and no. A story is an overlay on Mystery, so no. Mystery creates story, so yes.

now is the time

Now that many of us have real-ized (made real) that all is interconnected / interconnecting, a next step is realizing that we ARE this interflow, that each of us (in addition to being a particulate running around playing our particle games) opens our awareness to the comprehension that we ARE what we perceive. Our consciousness takes an immediate leap of expansion. 

We are not sitting inside some kind of little robo-box trying to gain ascendance, power, superiority and security through manipulating our way through the herd of other robo-boxes. We are the Life Force, the Cosmos Itself embodying as this ever-changing form. If there is ever a Big Gulp, this is it.

We are the Cosmos with a social security number.

vision

Waking Dream: Vision of expansive Cosmos, no bounds. Soft golden glow. Cosmos flooded with information and understandings. Each of us receives and transmits within the range that we allow.

kinesthesia

We have two major kinesthetic senses. Gravity (.) and motion =>.

This is what we look like symbolically: (.)=>
Sometimes we become too (.) We call this depression.
Sometimes we become too => We call this anxiety or mania.
Health is the balance of the two.
Gravity in motion. Weight underside while on the move.
(.)=>

imagination

All is Imagination.
This does not mean Not Real.
This means Most Real.
Change the Imagination,
change the World.

***

We are the Imaginings 
of the Unimaginable.

adventures of a spiritual geek

I’ve tried to keep my mouth shut about my cosmogeek endeavors. I’ve seen people’s eyes glaze over. But here lately I’m not keeping quiet. A large part of it is I want to report back before I kick off. The geek speaks! How do I want to present several decades of data? Chronologically would be way too boring (for me, if not for you). How do I download this hard drive?

A definition common among self-identified geeks is: "one who is primarily motivated by passion, indicating somebody whose reasoning and decision making is always first and foremost based on his personal passions rather than things like financial reward or social acceptance…. A person with a devotion to something in a way that places him or her outside the mainstream. This could be due to the intensity, depth, or subject of their interest." –Wikipedia

My entire life has been spent, and no doubt will continue to be spent in looking to comprehend what it means to be a human, what it’s all about.

A fisherwoman told me the other day if you want to catch fish you have to know what they are biting. You match the hatch and the catch, she said. You find the hatch under rocks and logs. It’s not just lying around, she said. You have to look for it.That’s a useful metaphor for what I have been doing in my life as a CosmoGeek: turning over rocks in odd places. Trying to understand the hatch and what it catches, the bait-fish duo, then opening to comprehending the stream and its environs, the astronomical seasons, the astrological signs, the state and extent of the cosmos, and back to who it is holding the pole anyway? And wasn’t I, when it got right down to it, trying to catch myself? Well, I’m getting ahead of myself, but you see how it goes with a geeko mind.

While other boys were exploring four-barrel carburetors and/or the intricacies of the female anatomy, I was looking to comprehend belief systems, thought communities, religions, ways of life, philosophies, superordinates, supra ordinates.

Why, I pondered later, in the ‘70s, did R. Crumb’s Mr. Natural, when asked what it all means, reply “Don’t mean sheeit?” This puzzled me. Was this profundity? Or simply a casual tossed-off expression of a tortured mind? And if it don’t mean sheeit, what does it mean?

No one wished to talk about it.

biopsy

I was born into this world with a clear and open heart. I wanted to please the Large Ones, who seemed to know what they were doing. I found that some of them were ill of heart. Others were heart itself. I followed the heartfelt ones and kept a wary eye on the heartsick. I learned well and yet never totally adapted. My inner world with which I was born was different and I would not let it go, for to do so would be to die. I made myself proficient in all the ways of the external world: physically, mentally, emotionally, socially. I invaded the external world, opened into it and, as far as possible, did not let it invade me. I followed the inner laws and understandings. Doing so brought conflict with the dogma of external ways. At times I was lost with nothing to follow but the beating of my heart. I began to understand that I was being breathed, not breathing myself. I saw the interflow of all existing, seen and unseen. The boundary between internal and external dropped away. Awareness and understanding continue increasing. I see the earth vehicle, the physical body, beginning its demise. This is as it should be. I am graduating. On graduation day, I will leave this world as a clear and open heart, the way I came in, but different.

looking to express the inexpressible

Two major forms of human consciousness exist: quantitative (linear historical) and qualitative (beyond the conceptual domains of space and time).

Quantitative consciousness relies on an imaginative discernment of discrete quanta which follow each other in logical procession. Qualitative consciousness opens into a boundless realm  of the immeasurable: of Love and Truth and Beauty.

Quantitative consciousness believes in fact, not minding that facts are ephemera arising from one’s own subjective state. A person existing in quantitative consciousness lives in linear time, clings to history and its perceived ongoing march into the unknown as reality.

Qualitative consciousness lies beyond, within, and outside the bounded and limited capacity of quantitative consciousness. Qualitative consciousness is a deep and expansive visionary experiencing of that which brings quantitative consciousness into being.

Quantitative consciousness is the imaginary. Qualitative consciousness is the Imaginal.Quantitative consciousness is linear. Qualitative consciousness is holoarchical. Quantitative consciousness is historical. Qualitative consciousness is the eternal now.

Quantitative consciousness is so-called “normal” consciousness. Qualitative consciousness is so-called “transcendent” consciousness.

With qualitative consciousness, we live in a roller coaster ride of drama. With quantitative consciousness, we are always already home.

ice tray and templum

One form of consciousness attends to life in terms of pre-existing categories, like an ice tray with delineations into which water is poured. That which can take on ANY shape is given THIS shape and THIS shape is regarded as Truth and Reality.

Another form of consciousness allows life to disclose itself. Categories are loosened and released, axes for grinding are set aside. Contemplation arises: con-templum-ation. A templum is a clear open space in which one arrives with either a question or no question at all. One sits (or walks) quietly and allows disclosure, revelation.

Two forms of consciousness: one imposes itself upon the world and attempts to wrestle it into submission; one allows the world to disclose itself.

Ice tray and templum.

once upon a time

Once upon a time there were people on a planet. Each had a story of What Is Going On. Each of course thought their story was true and right. Squabbles resulted. They threw literal and metaphoric bombs at each other. Metastories began to emerge with such story titles as Members of the Navel Tribe, Embodyings of the Cosmos, and Get Back In The Soup. Each began to see their story was part of A Larger Story. What's that? How did it come out? Oh, it's still coming out.

On Thought Systems

If one is firmly anchored in the grounding of the Cosmos, one can readily move into the core of each thought system and adopt its energetic matrix without losing one’s cosmic center. One is thus “converted” to each thought system without becoming a member of its institutionality while simultaneously comprehending its depths and essence. This is what Ewert Cousins called shamanistic epistemology.

This is also what a certain type of therapist does on an individual level when opening into the thought system of her client. He becomes his client without losing his own core identity. (“Enter and blend” is the Aikido maxim.) This is partly accomplished through opening to the metaphor and imagery used by the other. S/he becomes empty so s/he may be full. There is nothing mysterious about this, though it is out of the ordinary. It is called Listening and Seeing.

Of course one can stay seated in one’s own home bounds without venturing out of one’s adopted thought system. This is not my choice nor predilection. My practice is to open to the thought systems of the world (religions and philosophies) and comprehend their depths and meaning.

Thoughtology

We consist of a continuous stream of thought packets, arising from our ground of being, bubbling up as if from a volcanic floor in deep ocean. The thought packets arise and disappear, unless we attach ourselves to them, call them our own, call them “me.” We then build a personality around specific thought packets, magnifying them, clustering them as if they are eggs in a nest which we fuss over, keep warm, and hope to hatch.

Each thought packet consists of three distinct but interwoven aspects: cognition or belief, emotion, and imagery. The thought packets to which we cling, disallowing their flow through, their going by, are formed into an identity composed of all dualities: belief - disbelief, strong emotion for - strong emotion against, images of salvation and of doom. We cling to this identity and will defend it to the death (which it is).

We call these favored and solidified clusters of thought packets our self. We make it inviolable territory and walk it through each day.

An alternative is to allow packet flow with no clinging. We are the volcanic floor from which they arise. We are the vast boundless ocean through which they flow. We are the cosmic sky above to which they rise and merge. We are this vastness with thought packets forming and unforming, arising and disappearing. No clinging.

burning

We burn for that which we do not have. This is a peculiar form of hell -- a small version. After we get it, we stop burning. Meister Eckhart says that what burns in hell is what we are not. When we are fire, fire does not burn us. When we do not open to the Mystery that births us, we burn. We burn in anger, in fear, in separation. We burn for That which we do not have. And yet It is here within us all the while. We are children of the Mystery, offspring of the Source. When we truly know that, identify with, become identical to that, we stop burning. We leave hell. The heat changes to Light.

Realms

Three Realms:
-- Realm of Surface Crawler Consciousness
-- Realm of the Imaginal, Mythopoesis
-- Realm of Mystery, Where No Words Hold

saboteur

Saboteur: one who commits sabotage, the throwing of a sabot, a wooden shoe, into the machinery. We have our own personal Saboteur, an aspect of ourselves, that keeps us from transforming. The Saboteur can operate at a physical level, but I speak here of consciousness change.

sui-cision

We are surrounded by mystery. Yet we each have de-cided, made de-cisions (made mystery smaller via in-cisions, incisiveness) to carve out portions of mystery into recognizable THINGS and live within this narrow world. We create, as individuals and as a society, a tomb in which we dwell. (To de-cide, in this sense, is a form of sui-cide.)

Most others around us agree that the world created by this de-cisive process is Reality, so we blithely continue in this self-hypnotic state supported by our culture and our local thought community.  Mystery dwells within the outer and the inner infinity which we are. And not just within. We ARE this mystery.

When we know this, the world transforms.

meta

Languages consist of words, images, and emotions. Each word produces imagery and emotion. This is true for both written and spoken language. A metalanguage is a linguistic attempt to describe IT ALL. 

When one zooms back far enough, one sees the existence of many metalanguages. Some are called religious, some scientific. Some are called spiritual, some material. Regardless of what they are called, they are a metalanguage.

In looking at the planet from the cosmos, one sees that each human is fond of a particular metalanguage. Humans group themselves accordingly, generally stay within their own language bounds. and if pushed become fierce defenders of their particular metalanguage.

From whence and where do these metalanguages arise? From the cosmos Itself. The cosmos births the Earth which births the humans who give rise to metalanguages. Metalanguages are the humans singing to the cosmos. In essence, metalanguages are the cosmos singing to Itself.

preparation for ejection

Since this vehicle is temporary, we may well prepare for ejection. Some say that the brain produces consciousness; end of brain, end of story. I say consciousness produces brain. The habitual thought patterns of the mind will continue. Now is the time to rearrange or discard furniture. Clear open awareness is the aim and the practice. Galeropsis: clear and cheerful vision. We galerope down the road without end.

banana

The culmination of all meditative practices: B.A.N.A.N.A. -- Bare Ass Naked Awareness Now Abiding.

death-and-life

We tend to think we are life and that death is our enemy. No, no. We are death and life together, as one. We are life-and-death. We are death-and-life. When we know that, we have died before we die. Now we fully live.

the other side

“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face.” (1 Corinthians 13:12)

We are already on the other side. The other side is here now. We live in this side, are enthralled by (made a thrall to) this side. Embodying produces this effect. We thrill to the body, as a body. A great journey, this embodying. Pain and suffering. Joy and bliss.

We are already on the other side. Attention, like a narrow beam of light in a vast room with no walls, does not let us see this. We attend to bodily existence. We joy in our attending. We PAY attention. Attention has a price. The price of not seeing.

We are already on the other side. We stop our narrow attending and open Awareness. Something is breathing us. We do not breathe ourselves. Something is giving us mouth to mouth resuscitation. This Something is the other side. When it withdraws, we withdraw with it. Even now, our every exhalation is Its inhalation. Our every inhalation, Its inbreathing breath. We are breathed by the other side.

We are already on the other side. The other side is as close as our very breath. Closer.

Face to face. The faces merge.

out of this quiet space all emerges

Images arise and disappear within our consciousness. Images of this person, of that person. Images of dream. Images of future hopes and past regrets. Images of personal triumphs and of failures. And so on. Images arise and disappear.

One form of consciousness is image attachment consciousness. Rather than let the images that arise disappear, we cling to them, to certain ones in particular. At those times we are effectively dead to the world around us. We ruminate like cows, belching up what was once chewed and swallowed, standing with unseeing eyes, chewing our cud. Velcro’d to our vomit, we are only partially here, if at all. Image attachment consciousness.

For clear seeing, non-attachment is needed. The images rise and fall, appear and disappear. We are aware of the images but do not get caught up in them. The images arise, give us their juice, their energy, their emotional surge that passes through us like an electric current, They move on. Non-attachment consciousness.

Yet a third form of consciousness exists. No images arise at all. One simply is. Right here. Right now. Now is all there is. No time-space. Fully functioning, wide awake, alert, aware. No bounds. The Silence out of which all arises. Silent consciousness.

Out of this quiet space all emerges.

fourth dimension

We cannot solve the problems produced by three-dimensional consciousness by staying in three-dimensional consciousness. We must open beyond space-time.

palingenesis

Our Fate on Earth is unfolding out of who we Were (and many still Are). Our Salvation and Redemption (two honorable words) unfold out of our moving to and unfolding from Higher Ground. Palingenesis, Born Again (three honorable words).

spheres of awareness

Rather than using the old ladder model of consciousness, in which the subconscious is below and the supraconscious above, you may wish to see yourself as a sphere of awareness with Awareness (the supraconscious) all around you. The semi-permeable membrane of the sphere you are allows Awareness to flow in, blocked only by membrane opaqueness which you have learned to produce so well. The greater the membrane transparency (diaphaneity), the greater the Awareness.

calling

I was born a sensitive, an empath.
Psychology called it hyper-vigilant.
The Marines called it necessary.
I call it capaciousness.

confluent

Reality is what we say it is. I say it is spiritual -- though that very word throw some (they throw themselves) into discombobulation. Spiritual: operating as a sphere of energetic energy radiating outward from a core, from a center beneath and beyond "I-me-mine" and its emotional slingings and graspings. Reality is that we are spheres of radiant energy within a vast arena that knows no bounds. All spheres interconnect, interflow like stars and galaxies in the cosmos. We are confluent, influencing the nature, the quality of It All.

consciousness mutation

A mutation in consciousness is going on. Human consciousness has been generally split into three sections which interbleed: past, present, and future. This three dimensional awareness results in humans often not being present, but entertaining themselves in non-existent realms they call into being.

This “entertainment” is both anxiety provoking and pleasure inducing. The physical body fluctuates in this self-induced pain-pleasure cycle as a result, not knowing that this sad and painful memory or this anxious future are not real. This is the old tri-state awareness that we as a species are leaving behind. 

The consciousness that is emerging, that has been emerging for centuries, first in a few individuals, then in an increasing flow, is fourth dimensional, beyond past and future, beyond space and time: the eternal Now. To live in (and more importantly, as) the Now is to live with full vigor with no self-induced hindrance.

Make no mistake. This is not the smug little three-dimensional self sitting snugly in the fourth dimension and looking to work the controls for 3D-self explorations. This is a radical shift in consciousness, called by some an orthogonal rotation in consciousness. One actually lives beyond space-time. One joins the new beings walking the earth.

One finds that there is no past, no future. Here is only Now. One has released all the baggage one has so carefully dragged around. Transparency occurs. Diaphaneity. One’s consciousness has no space-time bounds. Here is the Eternal Flow forever coming into being. One lives one’s life within a human society created by three dimensional consciousness while establishing by one’s very being a human society continuously being born through the Eternal Flow of Now.

One has become what I call a cosmic citizen.

transition

As one comes out of sleep into wakefulness, one hardens into the attitudinal frame one assumes and becomes for the day. Spiritual practice allows for both a slowing of the concretization and an increase in diaphaneity. Some enjoy the quickset into their long-assumed "personality" and its resultant obtuseness and give no thought to this remarkable skill.

symbols

As Henry Corbin points out in his deep and abiding commentary on visionary recitals (stories that show the path, the stages, the phases of spiritual birth and rebirth), symbols are not designed for rational explanations and their inevitable hardening into dogma, but for transmorphing into, merging, and becoming. One becomes the Cross. One becomes the Caduceus. One becomes the Tao Sign. In doing so, one has moved into invisible realms far beyond the world of so-called ordinary (ordinal, linear) consciousness into the Poetic, the Imaginal -- the realms the ordinary call phantasy and the unreal (if bothering to call them anything at all). Yet for those who have made the transposition, who have become those symbols of eternal energetic flow, for whom the ordinal is a desiccated cocoon they have shed, nothing is more real. One does not bow at the foot of a symbol and worship it. One becomes that symbol.

daring of spiritual adventure

I read some words by Henry Corbin a few minutes ago concerning the spiritual universe of Avicenna that appear to me to directly relate to the state of Christianity today. Here they are (I insert "Christianity" instead of "Avicennan" and "Jesus" instead of "Avicenna"): 

The future of Christianity "can be decided in a positive sense only on one condition--that the traditional philosophy, nourished on Christian motifs, shall not drowse on in the murmur of the old formulas but shall be capable of again daring, on its own account and in our present-day world, the spiritual adventure that Jesus himself dared."

helmet heads

If you slow down enough you will see that your thoughts are an overlay to what is.

For those who do not purposely meditate, this experience may come only in the morning upon awaking. At times, the process of "putting oneself together"is a slow one with a gradual understanding of who you are, where you are, and what your business of the day is. At other times, you may leap into your self suit immediately. In both instances you are re-inventing you, fashioning you into the fashion you have adopted and others expect. In other words, you put on the virtual reality helmet you wore yesterday, the one you have carefully and not so carefully constructed over the years.

This is self-hypnosis. We live in the world we live in as individuals and as a society because of the hypnotic state we have adopted. Of course we call this individual and mass hypnosis "Reality" and derogate anyone who sees otherwise.

We do not dare and may not even be capable of riding helmet-free.

little gods prancing

Each of us has a reality picture. Much of it is subliminal (below the light of awareness). We fit whatever happens into our reality picture. Distortions or, if you prefer, creative ingenuities occur. Perhaps even more disturbing is that we ARE our reality picture. [Kudos to William Gibson for the "reality picture" term.]

post-eden

It is not I think, therefore I am. Thinking is.
It is not I feel, therefore I am. Feeling is.
It is not I perceive, therefore I am. Perceiving is.
No self. We insist on "having" a self.
We tend to believe in this illusion.
We are an interflow of sensing, thinking, feeling, perceiving.
Self is an attempt to separate out from this interflow.
This is the Fall. This is the expulsion from the Garden.
Knowing that we are dynamic interflow is returning Home.

ancient wisdom

Ancient wisdom: The sun gives both heat and light. Our planetary sun is a representation of the spiritual sun, which also gives both heat and light.  Heat is the warmth of love. Light is the clarity of wisdom. Both are offered to us. Reception depends upon will and attention. 

transition

The Body is the Cocoon of the Life Force Spirit working its Work upon the transforming Soul. Our inner Life is our True Life and over Time we can see that now the Body is in the Soul. The Soul radiates out from the Body and is felt by Others. At some point we drop the Body and the Soul has even more Freedom to expand.

Birth Right

We have the sensory world, the world revealed to us by our physical senses, which is but a flickering in the deep expanse of the Infinite. We have presented to us the suprasensory world, the world revealed to us through Love. I use the words “revealed” and “presented” purposely. All of us see by the light of our physical senses. Yet this light extends into the darkness only so far, not very far at all. A greater realm of sight is presented to us and is ours if we but accept it and practice walking by its vision.

We move from sensory encapsulation, from tiny creatures blinded by our own light, to open radiance in which the entire cosmos becomes our home. We move from being creatures shining little flashlights in the dark seeing nothing but what the flashlight reveals to radiant beings in no need of blinding flashlights. We now see in the dark. And the dark is light, the light of Love.

I speak here not of physical love, though that has its place, but of celestial Love. The Cosmos is Love. And our Home is the Cosmos.

We move from being sluggish worms crawling the surface of the earth seeking what we might devour, seeing nothing but immediate gratification of need and want (what use can I make of that? how can this profit me?) to cosmic citizenry. The transition is more than from caterpillar to butterfly though that analogy has its merits. The transformation is from sensory being to spiritual being to celestial being. 

This is the Call being made. Transformation to that which we already are. The reclaiming of our Birth Right.

mythopoesis

Mythopoesis: the making or creation of story. I first came across the word in Darren Middleton's "Novel Theology: Nikos Kazantzakis's Encounter with Whiteheadian Process Theism" and in conversations with Bradley Olson.

Each of us is a receiver and creator of story. Each of us has accepted and refashioned a Story Of What Is Going On. Each of us is born into a story community. The story is told through the actions and the teachings of the community members. That story provides a basis for our being, for our consciousness, for our actions.

Some of us believe that story for the rest of our lives. Some of us rebel against the story and stay in continuous rebellion the rest of our lives, thus living in accord with the old old story of anticonformity. Some of us range out beyond the story's bonds and look to create new story: wider, deeper, more inclusive. These latter are the mythopoets of this day.

condensation

I seem to live in a micro moment universe of great vastness. All, all comes into existence and passes away, births and dies, rises and falls in and as this micro moment. All past, all future is here in this eternal now. I go about my daily business as this vastness condensing into human form.

talem eum vidi qualem capere potui

We receive according to our capacity to receive. We see according to our capacity to see. We receive knowledge, understanding, wisdom according to our capacity, our capaciousness. When full of ourselves, we have little or no capacity. Some of us decide to stay full of ourselves until the body dies. Others of us look to increase our capacity.

How does one do this? Through centering and opening, through mindful lovingkindness, through relentless surrender, through calm action. All eight practices increase our capaciousness and thus room for knowledge, wisdom, understanding provided directly by That which calls us into Being. 

clanking into the fray

We clothe the core of our being with plan and desire. We wear a cloak of expectation and should.  We do not hear the words: "Throw off all your clothes and trample them beneath your feet." We pitch little fits of exasperation, insisting on donning the latest fashion of ourselves. We refuse to stand naked and vulnerable and open. We clank around in our armor. Our souls chafe. At times, despite our best efforts, we fall into joy. Joy needs no protection, no garb. Joy is open radiance with no end. Until we end it and decide that we must "go to work" or "face the world" or whatever other hypnotic suggestion of containment with which we trance ourselves. No joy for us! We contract rather than condense. We protect ourselves by becoming more dead. We ward off the expected assassin's strike by stabbing ourselves. We put on our armor and clank into the fray.

more public art

We once made Cosmic Maps which included the Planets, Angels, the Names of God, the Elements. Now we have, this current society has, relegated those aspects of the Cosmos to the Museum of Incredulity. We now live in a Cosmos devoid of such beings.

We began to worship Number. We made Number the basis of all Things. We work for Number. We are paid in Number. Those who have the most Numbers are seen as having power. Everyone wants to be Number One. This is a view that will seem absurd to our descendants and is beginning to be seen as absurd even now.

My forecast is that Number will be teetered off its Throne and come crashing to the Ground of Existence. We are trying through Number to eat the Earth alive, to transform the Living Womb of our Being into Number, into ever more numbers which can then be traded for ever more Things which are constantly replenished by eating the Earth alive. In doing so, we are becoming numb-er.

What will replace the numbness of Number? Art. Ourselves as Art. Our lives as Art. Art performed publicly. This is already happening. As we awaken out of our numbness, we will discover that our Cosmic Map is that of a friendly Location more than willing to assist us in the Creation of our lives in the most Artistic way.

Replace your Autism with Artism. We are Works of Art, Plays of Art.

The folk who are painting a mural on a wall in our town gave me a little sticker that I stuck to the bookcase immediately in front of me as a reminder of the Motto of the New Cosmic Map:

More Public Art. 

the consciousness state of the world

Past symbols of consciousness have come down to us, or over across to us: Jacob’s Ladder on which angels ascend and descend, the Caduceus with its intertwined snakes of healing and their chakra points, the Star of David which is a Jacob’s Ladder without the angels and the rungs, the Kabbalah: the lightning bolt of the emanations of God, the Enso or empty circle which inflates into a sphere with no surface whose center is everywhere, and so on.

What is the symbol of today? A skateboard. A flat surface of small dimension that rolls along on four wheels in a more or less straight line that one pumps with one leg and allows one-leg standing while tuning out the world through earbuds while texting. It’s also good for breaking up concrete.

You may think this does not apply to you because you are older. Well, it certainly does. It is the symbol of the world today, of the consciousness state today. You have your little piece of the action you claim as yours and you stand on it and possess it and pump furiously on a horizontal line through the day headed for your daily destination of non-pumping. You keep your ears full of the daily chit-chat: NPR, Facebook, text messages, and all the other background music that accompanies your pumping. You use one leg of your dualistic split to stand on (your conservative stance no matter how liberal you are) and its other leg (your liberal or liberated leg) to pump furiously on a horizontal line to nowhere except pump rest. This is your consciousness. This is your consciousness state.

This is the consciousness state of the world.

journey

Each of us is born into a thought community.

We take on the thought system of that thought community.

The thought system tells us who we are, where we came from, what is important, how to live, where we are going.

Some of us stay within that thought system all our lives.

Some of us leave the thought system and adopt a different thought system.

The different thought system adopted may be that of another thought community.

Some of us then stay within the thought system of our new community.

Some of us who have adopted the thought system of a new community leave that community and open to a different thought system.

Some of us explore all thought systems and find a common underpinning to them all. If that commonality fits our experience thus far, we adopt that underpinning as the basis for our idiosyncratic thought system.

And so on.

We are born again and again. Unless we stop thinking and decide to stay where we are until we die.

dear unborn kin

Dear Unborn Kin, The people with money now own our government. The people with money now ARE our government. The money bubble will eventually burst. But this is the way it is right now. We with little money far outnumber those who own and make a profit off almost everything. We are hooked deeply into the system however and see no easy way out. We serve the Empire. Many of us act as if we don't, saying that we live in higher realms, but we still have to obey money flow and thus continue to be loyal servants. I hope by your time we humans have figured out a better way. I hope our overlords are off playing other games elsewhere. Or the market has finally crashed and money is worthless and they are on the streets like all the rest of us. Suffering either way. As for me, I appreciate the graciousness of the Cosmos. As one of those who lives in higher wider deeper realms, I know that everyone eventually gets their comeuppance. A higher law prevails. We keep lovingkindness, generosity, and open awareness in our hearts and refuse to be contaminated by those who do not. Blessings to you, Your Loving Ancestor

Cosmic Download: The Empty Circle (Chapter Twelve)

I follow a path that most will not even or ever consider, much less follow: the path of the empty circle, the path of becoming as nothing. Most, it seems, want to become something (some thing) or somebody (some body), not realizing that things and bodies are invented chimera doomed to dissolution. (My aim here is not to counter dissolution, which aim would be just another groping for false identity.)

The science path shoves aside the nature of the mind as of little or no importance and, at best, relegates it to a fog arising off the neural substrate which disappears when the meat rots. The religious path insists upon identity, proclaiming that those who follow the path (whether buddhist, christian, jewish, islamic, hindu, wiccan, republican, democrat, etc.) will be “saved.”

The two paths have in common the taking of a stance. The science path believes in sub stance. The religious path believes in supra stance. Each takes the circle of existence (circum stance) and fills it with their favorite flavor and their imagery of what is.

I hesitate to write about the path of the empty circle not only because to write about it I have to fill it, but because in writing about it the danger arises of it too becoming a path with ritual and rank and certificates of graduation with some being in the “in” club and giving each other the empty circle handshake and zooming off to the latest empty circle conference as advertised on the Oprah show.

Few have followed this path, become this path. I will point to some of them, their concepts and their lives.

My initiation into this journey began a few decades ago when I was told in no uncertain terms: “Confront the lion in his den. Accept the empty circle."

humanoid

There are those of melancholic disposition, back of hand to brow in fitful resignation and despairing fortitude. My disposition is more that of the sun with the shining of radiant energy in all directions, no holding back. Joy and exuberance come naturally. What can I do? I've tried depression, melancholy, angst, sarcasm, irony, irritation, the seeking of filling all bodily orifices with pleasure, power over, neurotic anxiety, detachment, smugness, superiority, inferiority, rampant political sloganry, buddhism, taoism, christianism, and all the other slots and holes the human pinball falls into and can stay in none of them for long. My nature is to shine in infinite space, no bounds. Radiance. I've tried and I have tried but there is nothing else I can do. I accept my fate with joy.

dear unborn kin

Dear Unborn Kin,

A few decades ago the culture of this time killed God or left Him alone in an abandoned room to die. The postmodern (as some call today's world) sensibility is to regard no one as having any greater understanding of the origin and purpose of life than Me. Me rules everything.

Now Me stands alone as an orphan of the cosmos seeking shelter where Me may. Me finds such shelter in the company of like-minded Me's. A campfire is built attracting other Me's of similar nature, mood, and circumstance.

Campfires have sprung up all over with one rigid requirement: I may group with You but no one knows better than Me. This is the cry and the necessity of the orphan, the cosmic orphan.

Many continue to regard themselves as Cosmic Citizens, as members of a group that never meets because always meeting. Even to name the group meets resistance for fear a church might be formed and the Cosmic Me be confronted with a Cosmic Other.

We humans are so fun.

Hope all is well there in the future,

Your Loving Ancestor

Cosmic Download: Duende (Chapter Eleven)

We respond to the deep song of our soul. We transform out of the ordinal everyday human-created world into the power of the cosmos that we are. Mysterious, unknown, even and especially to ourselves. Responding as song so deep within, the groaning and moaning of creation borning, birthing, exclaiming, shouting, sighing, deepening, releasing.

Duende. Spirit moving. Spirit on the move. Calling all to life and love, to pain, to the despair of a cup too small to hold the exuberance, the passion, the joy. 

The call. The calling. The how-ling of no why-ning, no caul.

Fluid cosmic streamings of the Alone birthing the Alone. Finding voice in all capaciousness, in all willing opening, fluting with all hollow reeds.

Intense spontaneity, spontaneous intensity. Synchronous and synthronous.

Interspiraling interflow. Wailing and weeping, chanting and singing, birthing and letting go. Allowing go.

Duende. Confronting the lion in his den and devouring each other whole.

Deep laughter bubbling from the Wellspring.

Cosmic Download: Space (Chapter Ten)

We generally think of space as empty. Not so. We are the ones who make it empty and dead or lively and dynamic. The space between two strangers withdrawn into themselves, wishing they were elsewhere, is dead space, at best sluggish and murky. When one notices the unobserving other, a dynamic unidirectional river flows through space. The other feels it, notices. The river becomes an interflow, then an ocean. The space between the two persons enlivens. No longer is there a between. Now it is an among.

Friendship and love are qualities of space. So is enmity. We affect the quality of space around us through emotional discharge. We create a certain atmosphere. This can be and usually is quite subtle. The red space of anger and the black space of despair are extremes. 

Many of us have a public face for public space. We don this face like a mask as we move into the world. The mask is one we have carefully cultivated. We have a different mask for different groups. 

We carefully orchestrate our facial muscles to (temporarily) fool ourselves and trick the other into our sociodrama. We do this without thought. The space around us and between us and others is no longer lively, creative, freeflowing and dynamic. It is a stage, a theater. We dominate the space and turn it into our own production. We entrance the other with our glamor. The space has become a spider’s trap for pouncing.

Not me, you say. But any time that we look at another with desire and intent, not necessarily amorous, we transform the space between us. Space is qualitative. Babies sense it. Dogs respond to it. Cats see it. We all feel the quality of space, the atmosphere of a room, the transformation of room atmosphere when certain folk enter or leave. 

We have a default space quality, a surrounding energy field that we create, fall into and wear through the day, transforming space as we go. The default mode we continue to choose affects our physiology, our breathing, our soul. Your default mode is YOU. Default modes of space transformation range from a self-created monster inflicting terror, pain, and suffering within self and others to an angel of delight and joy. Many seem to occupy a middle ground of bland indifference.

The spatial quality of ourselves and others determines our movement mode. We move toward and look to move into radiant space. We move away from and move against alarming space. We move with identical space, the spaces most like our own. 

We are space beings who think ourselves solid. Space calls us into being. Space is our home.

Cosmic Download: No Thing (Chapter Nine)

No Thing

Cosmic Download: The Circulatory System of the Gods (Chapter Eight)

A coming to awareness of the circulation system of diaphaneity, of transparency, in which we are all engaged, not just with humans but with the Entirety, was exampled in Chapter Seven: Circulation. Let us now open to the realm of the Imaginal, which is more “real” than many would imagine. 

We each have our gods. For some, the god is God: the One both producing and behind the Seens, the Scenes. For others of a less monotheistic nature, a god is an energy packet with perhaps and probably a human face: the face of one who walked the earth before or exists in the translucent reality of myth, of story. For those of a more prosaic nature, a god is that clung to in times of desperation. A god gives us energy, solace, and understanding.

The circulatory system produced when we invoke our god, when we open to personal relationship with the spiritual energy packet to which we have grown accustomed, involves not just the heart but one’s whole being. The heart is only part of the circulatory system, vital to be sure, yet of what use if it pumped energy into nothingness? 

The eyes of my god look deeply into mine and in doing so sends energy much as energy was sent from tree to us and us to tree as described in Chapter Seven. That energy moves down and through my energetic or spiritual body along definite circulatory pathways, down into the ground of my being which is also the ground of my god’s being and up through my god and back around to me so that one vibrant system comes into play, is established. 

But wait. We are not done. Now we reverse the flow. We send energy to our god. We are not followers and takers only but co-partners. We give. We look deeply into the eyes of our god with love and joy. We send energies of lovingkindness down into the crown of our god, through the body, and into the ground of being. It returns and moves up through me and is sent out again.

Both circuits, the giving and receiving, merge as one. Now energy is a freeflowing dynamic sphere. We are vibrant with life. We affect all that is. As Arthur Eddington once remarked: "When the electron vibrates, the universe shakes."

We are twins. My god and I are twins with one heart, one mind, one circulation system.

I can be religious with this, enclosing it within one system that has its doctrine and bounds or I can live life freestyle with the boundless openness of continuous transformation. My god(s) and I choose the latter.