Outrage Overload

Original Photo from Liber

The world is an angry place. This is another barrier that tends to keep people from exploring the space between, allowing themselves to drift into the world of spirit, and projecting their consciousness. Anger itself is the enemy of understanding. It muddies the mind with no purpose.

Right now we're angry at greedy bankers and investment hustlers. Last year in the U.S. it was the illegal immigrants. The focus changes, but the drumbeat of trouble and blame never stops.

On the TV and radio, on every station you have opinion makers of every stripe telling you who you should be angry at and why. All this anger changes nothing. It can't because anger is not an action. It's a reaction and a distraction.

Outrage sells commercial airtime, it releases chemicals in the system that we've not only grown used to, some of us are actually addicted to them. We need anger, fear, and violence to maintain the distorted chemical stasis our brain has gotten locked into.

Those chemicals, just like a drug, prevent people from thinking clearly, and prevent people from taking a longer view. Even when you're no longer thinking about the latest outrage, your body is still experiencing the impact of those chemicals. They are destabilizing and crippling.

I'm not trying to say it's an intentional control mechanism for the masses, but it perpetuates inertia. This cycle has been going on for most of recorded history. The only thing that changes is the face of the enemy, be he a large or small one.

Correct action is required for change to take place. If we were to take all the investment shysters and their banker bosses and put them in prison today, a whole new crop would spring up overnight. The problem is not a handful of criminal, or criminally incompetent money men causing glitches in the system.

The problem is the system.

The investment professionals, in their subconscious, were doing the right thing. We highly reward people for collecting money, regardless of the human cost. At best we offer a pat on the back to people for doing the right thing. More often we just call them fools.

For most of these finance experts if they had refused to go along with the policy of making risky bets they would have found themselves on the street, unable to find work in their field, unable to pay their mortgages and feed their families. In our culture this may be the penultimate punishment, second only to death.

Whether what they did was wrong or right is not the right question. We already have the answer. The question we should ask ourselves is how do we fix the culture, so that this doesn't happen as an unavoidable part of a malformed system. That, however, is a subject for someone else to take on.

If you wish to explore the inner world, and the world of spirit, you would do well to extricate yourself form this cycle of blame and outrage. Your body can't relax and your mind can't focus properly after being bombarded with anger, fear, and blame.

If you want to actually change anything in this world you will also have to extricate yourself from this limiting mind set. Outrage is disabling. It accomplishes nothing, but requires a lot of energy to maintain.

As much as being informed is a good thing, being overloaded is bad for you and those around you. Being driven to unreasonable emotional responses by the information you receive can be quite dangerous.

The calm mind can see solutions where the angry mind only sees red. The still mind can see all aspects, where the turbulent mind only sees the single wave of thought that's drowning it. You cannot find spirit by flailing angrily in the dark.

Yogi Levitating

In ancient times 'scientists and engineers,' if you will, created objects which would do miracles, cry blood, light up, even speak in some cases. They were oftentimes very complex creative deceptions, worthy of praise in their own right, except for the designed to deceive the masses part.

These miracles attracted followers to their temples. There was a lot of competition between the various cults, so they needed increasingly spectacular displays to keep the people in awe. Early Christian churches mostly used relics of Jesus and later bones and clothing of saints to draw people to their congregations.

This sort of madness still goes on today, though no one likes to admit it, it just takes on different forms. For example, this Yogi levitating.

Hard Rain

Years ago, when I was first starting out in the working life I did a job that really stuck with me. It was a contract we had related to the national Christmas display in Washington, D.C. There is a group that meets every year, long before the season actually begins, to decide on all the particulars of decorations and festivities associated with the official celebration of the holiday.

Basically, at the time, it was a gaggle of snooty little old fine Christian ladies and a single, apparently mute man who was in charge of the mess. My job was to report the minutes of this all-important meeting, so that it cold be preserved for posterity. You can probably still find the work product from it on Lexus Nexus filed under, "Who Really Cares."

That same year there was a man in the news named Mitch Snyder, also a fine gentleman, if a bit radical and perhaps slightly mad. Mitch Snyder, and the Community for Creative Non-Violence, took it upon themselves to advocate for the homeless. They wanted more shelter, an abandoned building, some space that was going unused, whatever they could get to keep people from dying on the street.

The homeless, a large and growing segment of the population at the time, were people that no one else seemed to care for, unless they made the streets dirty, or otherwise offended decent people.

A main concern among the moneyed was that people might wander through their neighborhoods on their way to the shelter, and that was highly unacceptable. Mitch was on a hunger strike, in the hospital, 85 pounds, and we were quite concerned that he would actually die before the powers that be took notice.

So these fine Christian ladies sorted out their color schemes, caterers, decorators, and the like, tweeting like a little flock of birds over their seed. Then the conversation randomly turned to Mitch. Poor Mitch, starving himself, in the hospital, on a deathwatch, trying to force us to do what's right.

When I heard them bring up his name I was certain they'd have great empathy for his cause, after all they were well-bred, exceedingly Christian ladies. If their religion didn't soften their hearts to the misery of others, certainly some kind of noblesse oblige would kick in and make them act properly. I was naive then.

'What about that Mitch Snyder? Do you think he'll come out and ruin everything again?"

"They won't put up with it this year. They'll arrest all of them before they get to the park."

"The park" in this case was Lafayette Park, or Needle Park to the locals, where the addicts would hang out and fix right across the street from the White House.

The ladies began to chuckle and cackle at the thought of a mass arrest of the handful of individuals who care enough about the least among us to stand out in the cold and should, futily, at the White House.

"I hope he just dies," another chimed in. "It would serve him right. He's only doing it to get attention."

At this point I had tears forming in my eyes. Overly sensitive, they have a name for this condition in the DSM.

There was sound agreement around the room, except for their man-boss He looked at me as if to say, 'they don't mean it. They just don't want anything to mess up their little party.'

"He probably will. Have you seen him? They're trying to get to the president, and I'm sure he won't give in on this one. I mean, if he does he knows they'll just do it again next year."

The ladies laughed together at the starving man, and continued their conversation as they left the room. The meeting was over. Their boss gave me a sideways, shamed, wordless look as I packed up my equipment.

Mutated duality, the pretense of a loving faith that covers heart of steel. We've taken spirituality as a fashionable bit of clothing, or a tasteful accessory for our mental wardrobe.

I couldn't help but think of the Bob Dylan song Hard Rain - 'Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughing.' I still wonder when that rain is going to come and wash away this malaise.

Mitch Snyder committed suicide in 1990. Frustration got the better of him. He expected more from the world than he could squeeze out of it.

There's a surge in homelessness going on now. People are losing their jobs, because people can't afford to buy things, which will cause more people to lose their jobs - it's a downward spiral.

I wonder if this collective pain will force people's hearts to soften a bit, or if it's just a another swing in the cycle that we'll learn absolutely nothing from.

The Vortex

Interesting bit of video here. Stan Grof, one of the founders of transpersonal psychology, talks about altered states, journeys in consciousness.

He begins this segment talking about the vortex. This is very true for the decent into an altered state, in my experience.

Once you reach a certain level of relaxation and focus you are drawn in, pulled down into darkness until you reach a kind of threshold and the images begin. There are often several additional experiences of falling into various layers of the inner world.

Much like waking life, I don't seem to have the choice to just return to normal if it's not all enjoyable. It's as if the task must be completed before it will let me go. Only when the journey is finished can I try to analyze, and figure out what was supposed to be learned from it all. I don't know if this is true for everyone.

Do You Suffer From Noise-Related Stress?

A lot of people go through all of the meditation techniques and breathing exercises and still find they can't relax deeply enough to achieve an altered state, much less project their consciousness. If this is true for you, I suspect you may be suffering from chronic noise stress.

Traffic, noisy offices, children, neighbors, television, any number of environmental noises combine to cause stress. Your body releases chemicals to cope with this stress and can continue to release them long after the noise has dissipated. Some of us spend our entire lives with some level of ambient noise, even leaving the television on when we sleep.

Noise stress can make you irritable and, of course, make it harder to relax fully, but it also reduces immune function. Noise can literally make you sick. It reduces your memory capacity, impairs your ability to concentrate, reduces productivity in an office setting, and can even lead to sexual dysfunction.

If you're having trouble relaxing, turn the sound down in your everyday life. Take control where you can for your own well-being, as well as the health of those around you.

Read more about your body's reaction to stress and noise-related stress at the Franklin Institute

Circle of the Nines

I just love a riddle, some enigmatic statement that causes me to dig through all manner of unrelated information, and fit together pieces that probably don't fit. It's like creating abstract art, or a mosaic, usually with history. The nine brothers have not let me down in this vein.

It's kind of logical, being that three is seen as a perfect, and somewhat magical number. It is representative of completeness. You have maiden, mother and crone; birth, life death; father, mother, child, and so on. There are many triune/trinity structures within our belief systems, and it's easy to see why. It's remarkable how many groups of nine there are from the ancient world. I suppose if three is perfect, three threes are beyond perfection.

The Greeks had nine muses.

In pre-Buddhist Tibet there were nine creator-gods, mountain gods worshiped by the people then which are now Buddhist guardians.

There have been nine avatars of Vishnu. It has been predicted that the tenth will come at the end of the Kali Yuga, which is our current phase. The length of this Kali Yuga is in dispute.

In Egypt there were the nine plagues we've read about in the Bible, which can be categorized into three groups of three. There were also nine greater gods of the Egyptians.

The Olmec, and the Maya following them had nine gods for the nine layers of the underworld. The Hero Twins defeated these nine, returning First Father's remains to the world to be buried in the ballcourt, and then rose into the sky to become the sun and the moon.

There's an intriguing proposition that perhaps First Father is to be born again through the dark rift, at the coming turn of the wheel, if you will. At the last turn he died and was taken into the underworld, so as day follows night this seems to make some sense. You have to stretch your imagination a bit, but it's an interesting thought.

These nine layers of the underworld make me think of Dante's nine circles of hell, each progressively more miserable than the last, to coincide with each increasingly more egregious grouping of sinners cast down to that level.

I don't think any of the nines I've found are the nine brothers Whispering Crow was talking about, but it's been a nice trip around the block for my mind, so it's time well spent on the puzzle in my opinion.

The nines are a wonderfully interesting labyrinth to be lost in. They seem to show how ideas are echoed through human consciousness, with each groups perception reflecting a slightly different view of the mutable thought form. People who have never met often have the same idea. Inventions are frequently thought of by more than one person simultaneously, or close thereto.

The Universe repeats herself, not only in nature, but in the minds of men also.

Akashta - Almost

Beyond the field of flowers I talked about last time there is a huge, magnificent library. I'd liken this place to the notion of the Hall of Akashtic Records.

I should say that what I've read from others, Edgar Cayce for example, does not entirely jibe with what I've experienced. I'm not certain they are precisely the same thing. The idea is similar however.

The library is populated with caretakers, or assistants. They are all very, very pleasant to talk to and have a kind of strange radiance to them, like you might imagine guardian angels only without the wings and such.

If you need anything at all, they will gladly help you.

The visual representation of these caretakers brings to mind the idea of the Great White Brotherhood, or Great Brotherhood of Light. This "Brotherhood" is an occult myth created by the Theosophists and later embraced by Aleister Crowley.

Myths are an important tool for increasing your following, and adding a bit of mystery flavor to your creed. Perhaps it's not quite so cynical, but I can see where it would be helpful to have a council with every so-called prophet in the history of organized religion as your source of authority.

I don't accept the suggestion of ascended masters, generally. It reinforces the idea that you should look outside of yourself for truth.

I firmly subscribe to the belief that the truth does not wait for you in the words or thoughts of some other man, living or dead, but in your own heart. Anyone who tells you otherwise, in my strong opinion, either has an agenda or has impaired judgment due to many hundreds of years of brainwashing.

Don't get me wrong, the ideas proposed by philosophers of the past and present may have great value, if what they had to say expands your mental horizon, holds some fresh perspective, or not yet thought of truth for you personally.

Beyond that, historically speaking, the purpose of prophets has been to make profits for the group that holds up their thoughts as gospel, and slaves out of those who blindly follow.

Off the soapbox, and back to the library.

There are all manner of documents here, tablets, books, scrolls, and even documents in a medium that I cannot find an earthly analogue for yet. The undefined ones seem to have some sort of crystalline structure, and light up when you touch them, it's quite bizarre.

The documents themselves contain all of the events in the various lives of individual souls. Unlike the flowers, from which you would get an overall view, these records are very specific. They detail not only the action taken, but what the individual was thinking while acting, and what the follow-on reaction, or outcome was and so on.

I can't say how much arbitrary access might be given to these documents, as I haven't spent very much time here. I don't know that you can just go and learn about random individuals, like the field of flowers. Generally, as I understand it, you come with a specific question and are led to the records that contain information pertinent to your inquiry.

The information comes through in a stream of thought, like a short mental film where you can see not only the actor acting, but exactly what they were thinking at the time. It's very quick, though not quite instantaneous.

I have read people making references to "reading" the Akashtic records, and having difficulty seeing the writing, which gives me more reason to think this is not the same place.

The caretakers here know me by name, though I've rarely been here. It's very interesting, like going to meet old friends who you don't remember, but they know you very well. I imagine this is true for everyone who comes here.

I cannot tell you what lies beyond this library, I've never been able to go there. In trying I always find myself in the Plane of Forms.