Religion and Insanity
1. Mother Eagle
A friend of mine is getting into angels, and I don't know what to do.
The problem is that for the last several years, my spiritual path has been about more openness, more sensitivity, and more awareness to the subtle shifts of energy that otherwise escape our notice. Beginning on my first meditation retreat, years ago, I've learned that the reflexive doubt and cynicism of which I have been so proud – and which are such fixtures in contemporary literary culture – are often not the sophistication they pretend to be, but instead are a defense mechanism, bespeaking not cultured sophistication but shame, fear, or even ignorance. I've learned this through my own subjective experience and through conversations and interactions with other people: what seems to be analytical cleverness is often a kind of cowardice.
So a cultivated openness – not erasing doubt and judgment, but suspending them long enough for experience to really unfold – is the key. Significant shifts do sometimes occur. Only a few years ago, for example, I asked myself whether "energy" was real, or nonsense. But then, a while later, while working with Body Electric massage techniques, I experienced it myself: how, with my hands inches above my partner's body and with his eyes closed, I could cause "energetic" changes in his body. I moved, and he moved; I concentrated energy, and he shook. Weird, yes – perhaps so weird that, as one of my editors once told me, I lose credibility by talking about it. But it is also a phenomenon with no other explanation that I've been able to generate. I still don't know what energy is, but I know that there is more to heaven and earth than is dreamt of in scientific-materialist philosophy.
But openness still has its limits. As my excursions into the New Age progress, I've met weirder and weirder people (many of whom post here at Reality Sandwich!). Usually, that's a good thing; the world would be a lot better off with more weird people than more normal ones, and "weird" is often a reduction of "wise." Other times, though, weird is just weird. I find myself having moments a bit like the scene in Augusten Burroughs' Running with Scissors, when Dr. Finch, the oddball psychiatric Svengali who acts as a surrogate father for Burroughs, says that the shapes of his bowel movements are messages from God. We've wondered about Finch's sanity throughout the book (and film), but in that moment, we realize that he has been nuts all along. In a narrative searching for a sane center, Finch reveals that he isn't going to be it.
So, when my friend tells me that he's communing with Mother Eagle and reading Tarot cards, I don't know what to do. On the one hand, I want to be open. On the other hand, I don't believe in the things he believes in, and don't see how a sane person – by which I do not mean someone who adheres to conventional modes of thought and behavior (since those may well be insane) but someone who is able to distinguish fantasy from reality, truth from falsehood – could believe in these things. Of course, reality may well have many planes and aspects, and it may well be that what some materialistic psychiatrists call psychosis is really just a better sensitivity to those other planes. It's also true that even the weirdest of weirdos is different from a psychotic person who doesn't get out of the way of buses, or can't put on clothes. Perhaps the fear of "insanity" is really the fear of enlightenment. But at the very least, there seems to be something important lost when reason is demoted too much.
Moreover, what's really the difference between unreflexive belief in Mother Eagle and unreflexive belief in the dogmas of fundamentalism? Of course, the major difference is that few New Age practitioners are ethnocentric or violent. On the contrary, they love all spiritual practices – darshan, deeksha, davening, whatever – because these practices are understood functionally, in terms of what they do for the self. Non-mythic religion generally avoids the problems of violence and ethnocentrism that seem an inexorable part of mythic religion. (On the other hand – those peaceful New Age meditators? Watch what happens if you move their sacred yoga mat.) But even if we set aside the dangers of myth, there's still the beliefs themselves.
2. Don't worry – it's just an archetype
Spiritual, esoteric, and religious believers often make two kinds of unusual claims: 1) those fly in the face of evidence; or 2) those that seem to trust direct experience too greatly. The first type is more typical of traditional Western religion. For example, Rev. Ted Haggard, before he stepped down as president of the National Association of Evangelicals amid accusations that he paid a man for sex (repeatedly, over a period of three years – and did crystal meth to boot), told Barbara Walters that heaven was a real, physical place, beyond the known universe, where you could eat all you want and never get fat, and where there were mansions for all the faithful. Such ideas, like the belief in a physical Devil (held by 70% of Americans, according to Pew Institute surveys) or the notion that Christ will appear on Earth in the next 50 years (held by 50%), are so tied to supernatural myth, superstition, and unquestioned traditions received from authority, and so contradict our best available evidence, that modern and postmodern people can easily raise their eyebrows at anyone who hold them.
The second type is more typical of esotericism, neo-shamanism, and entheogen-influenced spiritual paths. Here the problem is not too little evidence, but too much reliance on a certain kind of experience: subjective, empirical experience. It goes like this: there is an experience of Mother Eagle, therefore there is Mother Eagle. There is a vision of something, therefore there is that thing. There is the sense of certainty around a particular idea, therefore that idea is true.
On the other hand, some spiritual practitioners today, as well as non-reductive scholars of religion, often take a different approach. They attempt to preserve the integrity of religious belief even while dismissing the actual contents of those beliefs, or interpret mythic language in non-mythic terms that renders it scientifically okay. As Maimonides observed 850 years ago, the genius of religion is that it works on multiple levels. Yes, ordinary people really believe the myths – that there is a Mother Eagle out there, or a physical place called Heaven, and a creation of the world in seven earthly days – and that helps them to order their lives, be more ethical, and have a sense of the sacred.
Philosophers – that is, those of us with the privilege and aptitude for reflective thought – know that these myths aren't literally true, but that they still contain important truths which, when reduced to concept, are hard for most people to wrap their heads around, or care about. Thus all myth can be stripped of its dubious truth-value, and be appreciated for its deep power to inspire.
So, following Maimonideanism, or modern Reconstructionist Judaism, or Unitarianism, or countless other thinkers and movements who have sought to demythologize religion while not dismissing it either, Mother Eagle isn't really a being out there, with a consciousness and a self. She's an archetype, a representation of something deep in our unconscious. Likewise, it's not that the Tarot cards are really magic. They just give our deeply skilled intuition a structure in which to operate.
The question is simply one of interpretation. Anyone can have a religious experience. But, as Ken Wilber develops at great length, that experience will be interpreted according to one's stage of intellectual/emotional development. We just have to acknowledge that similar experiences will be interpreted in different ways – and, if we're Wilber, own up to the fact that some interpretations are indeed better than others.
Fair enough in theory, but put into practice, there are at least three problems with it, at least one of which, I think, is fatal.
First, that Mother Eagle is an archetype may be what my educated, sensitive friend believes, but not what many (maybe most) believers really believe. The difference was fine for Maimonides, who was content to let the masses have their interpretation, and the philosophers have theirs (while, to be fair, advocating education for all, so that all could become philosophers). But does it really make sense to share a common vocabulary for such different phenomena as beings floating in the ether, and archetypes in the mind? And do I really want to quiz my friend on where he is on a Wilberian spectrum of theological sophistication? Isn't that a bit arrogant – or at least alienating? Am I supposed to keep checking up on him, to make sure that he doesn't really believe what he's saying?
Second, to do so could be quite destructive as well as rude. Functionally speaking, it's possible that myth only works when you do believe in it, when you make a commitment to it and say: well, it's possible that the world operates according to wholly scientific-material principles, and it's also possible that it operates according to mysterious spiritual ones – and I commit to the latter. And not spiritual in the way I usually refer to it – not in the sense of "waking up to the miraculous truth of ordinary experience." But spiritual in the juicy, mythic way – with Mother Eagle and the rest as actual energies both "out there" and "in here." You have to really believe this stuff – even if, from my still-stuck-in-skepticism perspective, you seem totally nuts. That's when myth really gets going, and how evangelism gets out the vote.
Third, and most problematic, is that the "insanity" of religious experience – a term I am using, loosely, to refer to delusion, confusion, and loss of touch with reality – has less to do with dogma than to the weight given to subjective, generally non-rational experience, and the disconnect from reality that that seems to indicate.
This is the point of Sam Harris's observation (in Letter to a Christian Nation) that "if someone told us that God spoke to them through a toaster, we would conclude that this person is insane. I fail to see how the presence or absence of the toaster makes a difference." That is, even without ludicrous notions of a physical heaven where the saved eat cupcakes while the damned burn in hell, there is something about the religious experience itself that seems to bespeak a break from reality.
Which, given what most mystics say about the truthfulness of our concepts of reality, may be exactly what they want.
3. Are You Experienced?
What Western Buddhism, neo-Shamanism, the New Age, evangelical Christianity, and Jewish Renewal all have in common is that, unlike traditional Western religion, they are tied to subjective experiences. Whether interpreted in terms of myth or not, whether mysticism is a mindstate or an encounter with God, these forms of religion are experiential in nature. The "sense of unity," the Holy Spirit, conversations with angels – these phenomena differ in theology, but all weight the impulses of imagination and intuition over the hard data of the rational and perceptual faculties.
We may not like to acknowledge this similarity, but once one strips out the content of the myth, the experiential reality of the evangelical and the experiential reality of the Buddhist have more alike than not. Yes, one ascribes the experience to Christ, and the other purely to the mind – but both give weight to experience over apparent, conventional understandings of how the world works. For example, when I am on retreat, and observing how all the habits of the mind are thoroughly impersonal, I know, with a certainty, that the idea of a separate self is an illusion, and that this consciousness does not belong to "me" in any meaningful way. It occurs here, in this brain, but its contents are wholly borrowed from stuff outside. The sense of certainty is the kicker because it's that sense that we're told to trust.
And more than that, if I admit it, I feel a closeness to some kind of larger consciousness, access to an internal wisdom that feels as though it, too, comes from "beyond." Above all, I feel ease and an overpowering love. It scares me, in my rational, normal state, how in love with God I can become. Because that love, that "sense of closeness," all of it, no matter how I try to cleanse it of myth, is still a subjective experience that seems difficult to distinguish from madness.
So then, with whom do I have more in common – the Evangelicals who trust their inspiration, or the literate atheists with whom I like to go to dinner? Really, I and people like me are split down the middle. I am aligned with the atheists on matters of science and cosmology, but aligned with the religionists on questions of spirit and subjectivity.
Maybe that's why I feel myself increasingly distanced from my angel-channeling friend – because he's not split down the middle, but has instead gone over to the other side. Or rather, he's gone to a side, as opposed to my have-my-cake-and-eat-it-too perch, astride the fence of doubt. With my meditation practice, I can feel grounded anywhere – but perhaps that sense of grounded-ness prolongs my indecision. Whereas, if I trust my experience, then I, too, must admit that I am on the side of the Tarot cards, the evangelicals, and the New Agers – without all their myth, but necessarily open to the possibility that the myth contains deep and useful symbolism for the unconscious mind.
And why, exactly, do I not believe the myth? Because it is more accurate to interpret my mystical-shamanic-contemplative- entheogenic experience as a mindstate, and condescendingly look down on the 90% of the people in the world who mistake their mindstate for a real, live deity? Is that really wisdom?
From each side – the mythic-religious one, the non-mythic-contemplative one, and the materialist one -– everybody else looks insane. Who's more nuts: the Orthodox Jew who believes that God, the creator of Alpha Centauri and the Virgo super cluster, wrote a grammatically bizarre and narratively confusing text – or me, who thinks that Judaism is somehow important even though 90% of Jews think that I've got it deeply wrong? Who's more nuts: the guy who gets off the treadmill and gives up on conventional success – or the businessman who spends most of his waking hours chasing money and possessions? Which is more nuts: the retreat center or Wal-Mart? The ashram or Le Cirque? The church or the television? I can make pro- and con- arguments for all of them, and all of them are internally consistent, and externally nuts. Is it all just a matter of taste which insanity you choose to embrace?
The trouble with non-mythic, it's-all-an-archetype contemplative practice is that, unlike mythic religion, it postpones forever the need to make a choice. You don't have to believe in the parting of the Red Sea, or the apocalypse of 2012; you just go on meditating. And yet, what religion most teaches, ironically, is the importance of choice. As Pascal formulated it, the question is not whether belief or unbelief are coherent – both are – but is rather which world one chooses to inhabit. And in making that decision, criteria other than truthfulness are required: personal satisfaction, peace in the world, ethics, meaning, joy.
In the spiritual world, there's a cute saying that "Dancers look insane to people who can't hear the music." In the mythic religious world, that's a truth claim: that there is music, that it's not just our imaginations. There are angels, demons and forces beyond our ken. But even without those mythic claims, it is still a strong notion: that even if any interpretation of the mystical mindstate is imaginary – that is, even if God (or the gods, or goddesses) is just in my imagination – life is far richer for living a richly imaginal one. Yes, it's a bit like psychosis, but so is dancing, right? Shaking one's hips to some melody, rhythm, and tone? What's the point of that?
I hear those voices a lot, every time I get on the literal or figurative dance floor. But if I want to enjoy myself, I try to turn them off and hear the music instead. This is the call of the circle against the line, the spiritual against the secular, the sexual against the proper: it is the Presence, and She knows how to shake it.
The irony for me is that, in trying to avoid making the "insane" choice, I'm driving myself crazy. I don't know which part of myself to trust, and so I flit from side to side, occasionally admitting that I am a mystic, then backing up and making sure everything has a rational, scientific explanation. Going on retreats to have deep insights – and they are not really experiences, like drug states, as they are times when the mind is quiet enough to see clearly – but then coming back and doubting those experiences, or reducing them to phenomena of the mind. Back and forth.
There is, obviously, a time for both: a time to deconstruct, and a time to dance. But one thing I know that I'm tired of is this attempt to have it both ways, or make it just a matter of balance, or have some of each. I've grown tired of what looks like indecision, and it's a cop-out. Real spiritual growth, and real mainstream success, requires commitment and choice. Pascal was right, but he didn't say how hard it was to look behind at what is lost.
I find myself envying both my friends who've dived into the chaos of the spiritual imagination, angels and all, and those who have become householders, professors, and rich. Whereas I keep trying to have it both ways, still waiting for the thunderbolt to knock me to, or out of, my senses – once and for all.
An earlier version of this essay was published in Zeek: A Jewish Journal of Thought & Culture.
Images by Orly Cogan, courtesy of Zeek.
- 5-8-08
- Jay Michaelson's blog
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Comments
Very good article!
I am of the opinion that each sees their own truth. I've stopped worrying about trying to stay "on the fence". A rational, analytical mind is just as susceptible to personal bias and wishful thinking as any other mind, otherwise there would be no need for peer review of scientific papers.
So as the cliche goes, "follow your heart". There is no such thing as absolute truth, at least not amongst humans.
"The lips of wisdom are closed, except to the ears of Understanding" -- The Kybalion.
I don't have a decision or answer.
I and four others are presently holding the question: "How do we live mythic lives while maintaining naturalistic commitments?"
We're not aggressively persuing it this instant, but we will be relatively soon.
We simply do not have an answer. I suspect that it's not really a fence; That we're missing something really crucial that can open the door. See also: The Scientific Fairy.
WoooooooW
I'm amazed
Thanks for putting it into typed words.....
i don't know..... i don't know....i don't know
Chau chau
Which World to Inhabit? & Thoughts on the Approach
The question of "Which world to inhabit" is great; I think there's room for world construction here.
I'd rather not be the people who believe they are talking with angels, nor would I like to be the people who are just trying to get more money or live a mainstream life.
What I'm looking for is a new sidestream, a vision of a grander life and society. I'm committed to making it real.
Secular humanism is utterly inspiring and pays only lipservice to arts and imagination. We need transcendental vision we can work towards, like they do at the Federation of Damanhur.
Applauds
Very nice to see a balanced approach instead of the usual predigested 'ultimate truths'.
Cit: "So a cultivated openness – not erasing doubt and judgment, but suspending them long enough for experience to really unfold – is the key."
Participating observer. It functions very well on many levels.
"There is a vision of something, therefore there is that thing."
A vision of something is just that: A vision of SOMETHING. It takes a lot of experience to find your feet out in the visionary business, and premature interpretations can be problematic, as you pointed out yourself.
"But does it really make sense to share a common vocabulary for such different phenomena as beings floating in the ether, and archetypes in the mind?"
General semantics could be a startingpoint.
"I am aligned with the atheists on matters of science and cosmology, but aligned with the religionists on questions of spirit and subjectivity."
I understand your anguish about it. I felt like that for 30+ years, until I found a syncretistic answer, which satisfied myself. It's not my intention to preach still another 'ultimate answer' here, only to give you hope of finding your own 'theory of everything' eventually.
I'm impressed by the clarity of your article. A real breath of fresh air.
General semantics
General semantics could be a startingpoint.
I'm curious -- Could you elaborate on what you mean here?
One thread goes that choice of language and metaphor are highly consequential, and also arbitrary. So re-envisioning the scientific and daily worlds in non-industrial/corporate language may be fruitful.
I'll bet with a focused question and focused thought, meditation, and action, we could find a lot of things that could be tried, that haven't been tried before.
re: General semantics
General semantics was actually a kind of philosophical, epistemological effort to make language a well-honed tool. Created by a pole, count Korzybski.
As I understand it, the idea is to try to use language as a precise set of symbols, preferably describing things in a way free of vague associations. If f.ex. someone says 'God' it could mean so many things, that further communication and understanding could be zero.
We have also the growing problem in our information technology society, that language can become something by itself. We can 'invent' words, klichées, sentences, which really don't mean anything, but which can be used in a manipulative way. Ex. "Historical inevitability", "it is scientifically proved", "it is written...." etc. How can a "soul" or a "subconsciousness" be demonstrated? (I'm not saying that souls or the subconscious don't exist, I only reject them being served as ultimate truths without some examination or openness for alternative models). We shouldn't be prisoners of language; language should be our servant.
Some of the zen-riddles use a kind of general semantics for a basis. "What is the sound of a one-hand clap?"
Cit: "I'll bet with a focused question and focused thought, meditation, and action, we could find a lot of things that could be tried, that haven't been tried before."
Exactly what I mean by a syncretistic approach. It can be very rewarding.
there is no fence
I'm not sure there's much value to the question, "is it real?"
William James started me on this in The Varieties of Religious Experience, which deals quite a bit with this subject. I'm grossly paraphrasing, but I think the main thrust was that we can learn more about a person and their belief if we just assume the experience is always real. Better yet, just drop the real/unreal duality from your consciousness. Everything I confront is real; if it is not real, then it will never enter my consciousness anyway. Is God real? Sure, I can experience that. I can also experience angels, aliens, fairies, gnomes, demons, whatever.
When you ask if something is real, you take a step back from the issue and essentially engage an abstract conversation--how do we even define reality? Are we talking independent existence? Such a thing may not exist, even for ourselves, if you follow quantum mechanics! Nevermind the angels, perhaps we are not real! You really can't get past this last point with any certainty, and if we can't even verify our own reality, then there's way we can verify the existence of anything else. My real point is, we gain very little by this question of real/not real. It's a lot of mental somersaults, and sure they can be fun, but it's not very fruitful.
You can skip that discussion and simply ask, What are the angels teaching you? Why am I confronted by gnomes? To say they aren't real does nothing to address whatever has brought them to your attention.
Instead of asking if something is real--and believe me, I've faced some things I would've never thought "real" a few years back--I now ask what lesson the experience holds for me. Real or unreal, I don't care--I walk away a little wiser.
synchronicty
Just felt a nice synchronicity through your comment here... not sure what I means totally yet but I thought I'd pass it along. Keep up with the writing on the wall as who knows how it effects us.
Peace
All bridges can be rebuilt.
are we ever alone? if our future intentions had eyes
Infinite Peace and possibilites.
Getting lost in words
Cit Michael Matejka:
"Real or unreal, I don't care--I walk away a little wiser."
If nothing is real or unreal or you don't care about it, doesn't that include wisdom also? In relationship to what non-existing 'reality' can you walk away wiser?
"....you take a step back from the issue...."
What is this issue, we've stepped back from?
"how do we even define reality?"
This is an example of semantic misuse. You want the definition BEFORE evidence/not evidence. No wonder you seem to be stuck inside your own small solipsistic bubble.
"Are we talking independent existence? Such a thing may not exist, even for ourselves, if you follow quantum mechanics!"
Quantum mechanics doesn't imply anything like that. It's talking about manifested existence and making a few guesses as to the rest, without going too far into transcendence.
But you ofcourse have a right not to believe in or search for reality, when it comes to the point.
cjmoore. Would you say, that there are still the possibilities of SMALL choices, even if chance or fate generally decides your life.
analytical style
No resolution here
re: Gepeto
Your cit:
"The fact is these "higher modes of consciousness" (whether real OR imagined) are not very helpful in getting by & maneuvering through the workaday week."
Einstein's original more mechanistic cosmology seems to describe macrocosmos quite well, and quantumtheory describes microcosmos equally well, even if the two systems are in some disagreement.
Generally it can be said, that some of the human belief-systems can be correct and functional as restricted and localised 'truths'; they describe their own area well enough, even if they don't always are reconcilable at first sight. But they can get us through normal life as it is.
As I said in a former post, I have to my own satisfaction made such a belief-system reconciliation in form of a syncretistic 'map', which I, as far as maps go, trust enough to use for further exploration into the real territory, where experience awaits. It encompasses both 'higher' and more ordinary aspects of life.
To make such a syncretistic map can be difficult, and requires some personal changes on the way, but it is possible.
Finally I can only repeat the old warning: The map is not the territory.
Anyone mistaking the map for any kind of reality will never get much result. 'Reality' is too big, and maps too narrow; so maps need revision ever so often as experience grows.
Jumping off the fence
I used to have a grandfather
Grandpa Pat
From Ireland
Some say he was booted from there
because he was IRA
Some say he designed
The McDonald Arches
Married my grandmother
After my real grandfather had died
Anyway when I was child
We had this metal fence
And he'd pick me up
And put me on it
And I'd balance myself the best I could
He'd say "Jump Peter"
And I'd jump off the fence
Into his arms
And he'd laugh and laugh
And then put me on the fence again
And this would continue
Until he grew tired
And he'd walk away
With his black pipe
Sticking out the smile on his face
Then one night he died
Nobody in my family ever really talks about him
But I still do
Today is part of forever.
Concerning Reality and It's Many Adherents
I am mostly critical of your use of the term "reality." This is an abstract term that can remain ambiguous until the term is defined. I detect an assumption in your reasoning that may indicate that you view reality from a strictly objectivist perspective and view spirituality from a strictly subjectivist perspective. Yet, this may be a false dilemma. You assume that subjectivism is inherently void of reason when you describe it as a "generally non-rational experience," while it may be more accurate to say that you do not agree with the reasoning of a metaphysical subjectivist perspective.
There is another related point: our definition of reality is continually changing. Even when we rely on scientific-empiricist training and mathematics we find our conception of reality disintegrate before our eyes. The very practice of science demands it. The world was once flat and yet now physicists hypothesize that we may live in an 11 dimension universe that could feasibly include aspects of reality that we are physically unable detect and yet still effect us.
The dichotomy between "the spiritual and the secular" is a false dilemma of your own creation similar to the false dilemma between "the spiritual against the proper" which you describe in the same sentence. The entire article seems to reflect this conflict. Many people have reconciled these differences and it has added to the richness of their life. It sounds like a difficult transition for you.
You also mention the role of myth in religion and how "belief in a physical Devil or the notion that Christ will Appear on Earth in the next 50 years are . . . tied to supernatural myth, supersistion, and unquestioned traditions." I don't doubt the potential contribution of myth, superstitious thought, and tradition to the phenomena you describe, but I worry that their role may be exaggerated. Europe, a bedrock of Christianity, has shown a growing trend toward atheism and agnosticism that may suggest a link between a higher standard of living and the tendency toward a critical, informed, and reflective population.
I also think there is tremendous value in giving our "deeply skilled intuition a structure in which to operate." Ideally, this would occur within the fertile ground of an inquisitive mind. Myth, insight, deity, and ritual can all be used as memetic devices that have pragmatic value and profound implications.
Point by Point
This is the point of Sam Harris's observation (in Letter to a Christian Nation) that "if someone told us that God spoke to them through a toaster, we would conclude that this person is insane. I fail to see how the presence or absence of the toaster makes a difference." That is, even without ludicrous notions of a physical heaven where the saved eat cupcakes while the damned burn in hell, there is something about the religious experience itself that seems to bespeak a break from reality.
Sam Harriss observes nothing. He creates a fabricated instance that is easy to attack to lend credit to his own argument. You may believe that the religious experience suggests a break from reality, yet this is mere opinion.
The "sense of unity," the Holy Spirit, conversations with angels – these phenomena differ in theology, but all weight the impulses of imagination and intuition over the hard data of the rational and perceptual faculties.
Are not entheogenic experiences an example of a perceptual experience?
For example, when I am on retreat, and observing how all the habits of the mind are thoroughly impersonal, I know, with a certainty, that the idea of a separate self is an illusion, and that this consciousness does not belong to "me" in any meaningful way . . . The sense of certainty is the kicker because it's that sense that we're told to trust.
The quality of certainty seems to conflict with the quality of skepticism that you use to describe yourself.
90% of the people in the world who mistake their mindstate for a real, live deity?
Cite your source.
And yet, what religion most teaches, ironically, is the importance of choice.
Can this be a moral choice instead of an ontological/cosmological choice?
Spirit in a Natural World
We need Spirit because we are drops in an ocean of love; This is true regardless of how the idea reduces, even the starkest of skeptical rationalists would say, "I have a heart," and refer to something other than cardiac muscle.
We have matter, and some matter has mind, and within the mind (psyche) there is a fountain of health, which is spirit. It is like a fountain in a garden in a world.
That spirit comes out in a lot of ways, (bringing with it health and joy,) two of the many of which ways are imagination and reason. I see reason in the nobility of the scientific quest, the longest sustained meditation into the nature of physical reality.
I think imagination is something of a lost child these days. Reality Sandwich is, I think, part of a response to that.
I was inspired by the comment that focused on play, above. I really do think that we should live imaginatively and fancifully; I know in my own life, that's exactly what I need to do, at least.
Prior I might have said, "How can you imagine, when people are suffering?", but tearing down someone's fun doesn't seem like the way of spirituality. Falco advised me, "Pain is never spiritual." I don't think that this is the worship of felicity over responsibility, and I think that (again) zezt is right: there is such a thing as making ourselves miserable.
I'd like people here to be more reasonable, but can I inspire them to be so? I want the mainstream to see the amazing spiritual possibilities that the imagination has to offer, and to live by them; But I think that the mainstream will only take it if scientific understanding is understood and honored, at the same time. The hivemind of the mainstream is just too smart, it'll see through anything otherwise.
A nice honest article
What I read here, is someone who loves a friend, but where the friend is going: unknown. It somehow makes me think of the Andy Griffith Show. Poor Andy. Surrounded by some very odd people, but somehow, Andy maintains the local harmony. Accepts the people, but obviously has some other principle of judgement they seem to lack.
Yet he still throws some of them into jail....sometimes without actually locking the cell door.
I think that speaks of simple lovingkindness but also a practical sense of "normalcy".
We're all trying to cope. Or should I say, we are all coping the best we know how. We are all subjects of the environs of our present world. "Environs" always includes not just the physical facts related to our physical senses, but also and maybe more importantly the actions of others stimulated by their beliefs. Or, perhaps more accurately, compelled by such beliefs. Or maybe even "belief" is not that important compared to "feelings" and reactions to feelings as products of held "thoughts".
As someone with great respect for the depth of analysis of "thought" by John Dewey, I think it ligitimate to consider that "thought" itself is a form of "dis-ease". It is an element of our conscious experience that we have to "deal with" as emblematic of a "problem" or challenge to what otherwise would be perfect silence in our mind, and a sense of peace and harmony.
In Isaiah, 30:15, he says: For thus saith the Lord I AM, the Holy One of Israel; In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength: and ye would not.
I, for one, am of the opinion that this rich literature of the seers was about Consciousness, and the stories of the most successful of these seers were those who held faith in that Consciousness rather than the dogmas or "received" traditions of people who tried to "interpet" the impulses of consciousness in ways amenable to their private or personal aims.
For some, consciousness itself is too common, just a form of "insanity" and rules and laws have to emanate from some other definite "authority": some person or some literature or system of rulers whether kings or "experts" or "priests" and so on. So these would simply categorize your doubts as just "invalid" or a form of "apostasy". So they are defining consciousness? They are denegrating your only known fact: your own consciousness.
It is no sin to have doubt. It emanates from our only directly known thing: our own consciousness. I think it IS a sin to denegrate our native consciousness. To respect it in all its permutations is the only possible work there is. It is what Isaiah said was the thing to "return" to. To "rest" in it, in silence or quietness, is a our "confidence" because, with time, we can assimilate the impulse of It's answers or attitudes, than enable us to either to "judge" rightly and fairly or at least be able to cope with it.
We may not come away with certainty. Just knowing there is a problem, as yet unsolved, but still a puzzle unsolved, keeps us from burying it whereby it can, so ignored, become some form of "cyst" that will grow, proliferate and destroy our sense of peace or maybe even our very lives.
The power of silence is in resolution of questions inserted into our otherwise quiet minds. We ask questions, and yet more often than not, we don't wait for answers or the output of our own consciousness. Recursiveness. Instead we are continuously using the proposed thesis inherant in the thought to produce other thoughts, and this is an exponential process proliferating "either/or" or "this and that" and "Ys" in the road, and "what is right, what is wrong, what is true, what is false?" Simple solution: just shut up and rest in "I AM", and trust your objection.
Or what? Is there something wrong with you that isn't also wrong with that other? Or do you suppose you are unique, and they aren't? Personally, I think insanity is a form of addiction to certainty about "thoughts" as opposed to the only thing we really can be certain about: consciousness. We are conscious. There must be something wrong with ourselves when we put more faith in a simple "thought" that can only exist in the field or container that we call consciousness and then completely disregard that "container" our "darling" (as David called it), our "soul". Consciousness is our soul. Some may superpose on that experience with names and forms and attempt to externalize it and so reduce it to a kind of idol. Your friend wants to be an "eagle" or an "angel". But, for me, to think of consciousness as less than the Almighty, and Only, and the Good and Truth is a form of insanity. And, of course, to believe others don't also have this very same thing, is also a form of insanity. It has no basis.
Again, I think it valid to question systems of thought. Especially when by means of such systems, behavior is unkind, unfair and ostensibly untrue or unfactual. Thought is a disease if it interferes with the peace that must come from the only thing about which we can be certain: consciousness. There are obviously different varieties of expression of this "That", but we only really know what we have, and to disrespect that: tragic. Consciousness is our real "father and mother". The source of everything else. So I say, love and honor your consciousness, don't bow down and worship outside things. Love it most of all, and regard and love others as you do yourself. Simple. Inherant and truly perfect in a truly mathematical sense. Our problems are always reducible to the ways we deal with others, otherwise, perhaps, there never would be anything but the singularity of but you yourself: I AM, and none beside you. Ego is good, but ego is also the greatest evil when all must bow to our particualr system of ideas. So the intruduction of a buffer-system, that provides punishments or constraints of behaviors that cross the line is the external resultant of personal self-restraint or permissions.
Your piece tells me you have normal and rational doubts and are protecting your own domain. Resort to "tarot" cards, the received terminologies of "belief systems" as some form of "truth" is just another form of idolatry, a form of disrespect to the language of our own consciousness, which rules everything, ultmately, and which some day will visit each of us at the last hour, and say: why didn't you listen to me? Then the collected lessons will armor us against future mistakes in what or whom we trust. Live and learn is an axiom that can't be contradicted. From this alone, I derive the concept of reincarnation, because no limited life-time can possibly result in some "infinite" and "eternal" or final "judgement". An "everlasting reward" has to devolve in treasuring something we have no need to resort to others to have: our own consciousness.
=========== Letter writing is still the most potent way to raise the consciousness of elected representatives: it's a record they cannot ignore and cannot say they were unawar
Perfect discription of hell
Hi Rogerscott
some nice posts you placed. You only said one thing, I'm a bit sceptical about. Your opinion on thoughts.
I believe, that automatic, repetitive and unreflected thoughts are very destructive for our consciousness/awareness, but correctly used thoughts can be a very efficient tool for many things (though not replacing awareness), if we can learn to make them work in tandem with emotions and body.
I neither share the scientific obsession with intellect as our highest talent, nor do I have the new-age anti-intellectual attitude (making new-agers the dumbest people on this planet next to religious fanatics).
Most things work differently in or out of context. So body, mind and heart together can be an excellent combination.
Thanks! made "perfect" sense to me
(to Don Shake)
I've had many experiences and ponderings similar to the article and your reply just "works" for me. Thanks so much for posting it.
Ah ha! experience
:-) No, I'm just a very busy person lately and have little time to write more than a few lines. I use tarot on occasion and a pendulum. (the pendulum works better for me actually ever since I constructed an alphabet chart).
Don's reply literally gave me an "ah ha!" experience and I wanted to acknowledge that. But I have little time for more exposition.
It is likely that you are seeing something in Don's post that I am not.(and vice-versa). As the saying goes...perception is reality.
Mad hermits and that ilk
Cit Don Shake:
".....the acceleration, and momentum, of change at this time does not permit the perfection of a single scheme for self-orientation."
I kind of retired from 'modern' life 30+ years ago. It's been beneficial for me, but I'm absolutely not crusading for such a change.
"It is my contention that ALL such methods become obsolete the moment they are incorporated into practice"
If I understand you right, we are in agreement. In former posts I have stressed the secondary importance of 'maps', once you start on the territory.
Great Musings....
Thoughts are things, tools
I'm cognisant of the theory that there is no "thought" without language, about which I have serious doubt. What is imagery? I could have been more specific than I was, and realize what I wrote might have been interpeted as my saying I believe our ideal or "normal" state is one in which we are not thinking or processing the information that is our environment or milieu. That would be rather the same, would it not, to coma or perhaps autism?
Thought is as essential as it is unavoidable. I just don't have to "eat" the thoughts presented to me, since they might be poison to my soul. I take the same position that Jay does: my entertained thoughts seem to have a life of their own, and I don't by any means think it is the sole product of my own soul/self: I absorbed it from the world. So I rely on my soul to say: I hate it, or it agrees with me. I think that is a healthy form of "ego". It's discernment, it's judgement, maybe just "taste".
Johnnymoniker noted a kind of confusing sentence by Jay I'm specifically referring to here:
"I know, with a certainty, that the idea of a separate self is an illusion, and that this consciousness does not belong to "me" in any meaningful way".
I see that as a typical thing that we have in self- reference, if by what Jay said meant he knew he was "entertaining" them, did not give birth to them from within. It is as if a thought system asks us to play a role to accomodate their existence, but we really know, "but that's not ME".
I referred to the thesis of the seers that when thought is not recursive to one's own consciousness as originating from the deepest currents of our own consciousness, we are basically being double-minded in holding them. And there is a real danger, as I see it, in being "possessed" by a thesis or system of thoughts that does not admit of self-refernce as the real ultimate authority. To have to always refer to "divination" tools, flipping coins, or looking for outward "signs" or "omens", is a form of self-disrespect and ultimately a form of hypnosis, as I see it.
It may be that using cards, maybe even playing solitaire let alone something supposedly more "message-rich" that tarot is supposed to be, can aid one to become more inward and so find a state of reflection that represents peace of mind to the user. It would be my concern to ask: when a stream of images arise spontaneously in your inner vision, without resort to cards, do you pay attention to them? Why would anyone regard with higher respect the external cards and ignore the message of their own stream of consciousness? And in the case you lose your cards, and maybe are alone in a dire situation that calls upon some judgement, will you be prepared to act? Maybe the five seconds that it takes wishing those cards were around can make the difference between life and death? or something worse.
So I think the Boy Scout's motto: Be prepared has, inherant within it, a form of independence that takes recourse first and foremost of that which you have even when you are naked and alone: your own consciousness. Sounds like a broken record, I know, but so important do I see this point to be.
So, therefore, I see the tarot and all forms of divination as simply lengthing the path of decision that could have been attained in a single simple step; and the use of tarot is not much different than the materialistic method of seeing truth only the product of the laboratory or the test-tube and use of computers to do the "really hard math". If mankind had not had some better or more efficient method than recourse to these outer things, they never would have developed to a stage where such tools would have been seen as useful inventions. The danger is in becoming slaves to such inventions. I just don't see anything attractive in seeing my own consciousness talking to me as if from without. Maybe the next step is to see "I AM" as some "body" distinct and away from me, and so enter into another form of idolism such as we've seen in the i-am- movement. And for those folk, evidently "St. Germain" knows more about their own consciousness than they do, and the same might be said about Moses, too, or Jesus, even, though with the latter, only through completely ignoring his obvious iconoclastic reputation. A priest- craft usurped the message of Jesus which is otherwise completely one of self-confidence and rejection of all forms of outer worship.
And I think the message of consciousness to seers is just that very thing: you have no need that any should teach you, you have one teacher, even consciousness (read I AM). And to give some purely logical relevance to this statement, let me digress to say something about "Christ" or "Mashiach" or "Messiah". According to the language used by the Hebrew/Israelite seers, there was actually only one "anointed" to rule: I AM, who lives in the People. "I AM alone is savior, beside I AM, there is no 'god'." Then there arose a system of judges who were supposed to be cognisant of the chief aims of Consciousness, I AM: lovingkindness, fairness and truth or right-use-ness. That is the definite bottom line of all the seers in the literature of the Hebrew/Israeli/Judaic system. As I see it, this became a system of idolized thinking that completely lost sight of the inward confidence I referred to above. It is not unique to any one culture or race of people, but the language and terms in themselves talks about something completely impossible to idolize: consciousness. Amongst other literatures, only the Upanishads maintain the purety of thought I think I perceive in the origins of these idols we call "religion". A family tradition became a state-approved form of tyranny and it amazes me that today with our current state of enlightenment otherwise, we can still see people becoming enslaved to thought systmes out of fear to be critical of them. You cannot be judged for doubting. It's also fair to try things out, and if it bears fruit, follow it to a good result. Other-wise, wouldn't it be foolish to continue?
I also think it logical to consider that there is probity to the concept of a "world mind" or "psychic" collective. A mish-mash of the half-truths and mixed truth and falsity that represents a form of insanity, the idea that started this thread.
We have to have some faith in ourselves in order to be able to resist the injection of this potential vitriolic mishmash from altering our sense of peace and security or self-confidence. If it didn't occur to one spontaneously, I believe, it might be taken with a grain of serious salt. I take the position of Spock: 'I don't reject it out of hand, I take note of it without necessarily understanding it.' Maybe later it will be relevant. I just don't "buy it", and just adopt it because someone has told me it worked for them.
For me, there is a reliable criterion for judging this profusion of different thought systems: We all know it. It is love, kindness, fairness, the ability to judge with this filter or "walls of brass", spoken in the poetic language of the seers. We know what "That I AM" (Yah) of the Hebrew/Judaic literature is said to have thought of recourse to "diviners" and those taking recourse to "the dead": not to be trusted, misleading. "I AM" didn't like any such thing to stand between ITSELF and the body/thinker or "outer man" (Adam or clay self). And the first rule after insuring self-reference was: love or honor your father and mother. I think Moses was thinking very clearly when he put that first. I also think it refers more to I AM than our physical parents, but it what we might call an Interface principle (sandhi in Sanskrit). It is a crux or threshhold principle that marries the within with the without and has respect or regard for both in a special balance.
The language of consciousness is not limited to some limited number of "sign". I don't say this from "secret" understanding, or some form of initiation in the "arcane" arts or revelation as imposed from without. I have confidence in the truth of this by simply knowing that my consciousness never compelled me to any idea that "64" was special, or "seven" or "12" or what have you.
Two, now that's special. For my money, Two had to come first, then maybe one. Why do I think that? Nothing metaphysical, nothing arcane: I had two parents. And even if I was an only child with but one parent, I'd still be able to count that high: me and the one who loves me. Otherwise, the two who loved me and brought me into the world, not being able to really see "one", myself, til I became the typical ego-absorbed teenager with all knowledge. And maybe even more "sophisticated" a realization is unavoidable: two is the common number because we can see in this very thread its essence: thought and consciousness in which it takes place. Or thinking and feeling. Two is primal, good and full of ordinary meanings we might lose if we were to become obsessed with "one" or "three" and all the myriad of other numbers. But if the dogmas associated with "number" had not been attempted to be injected into my mind, I probably would never have given "number" any regard at all. Its only relevance is argumentatively oriented here. We all know these things without ever having to give them names or accentuation. It is a thing we live, not something to give our lives to or somehow enshrine. As soon as we enshrine it, it becomes an idol, and so dies.
We absorbed and counted on the reproduction of what gave us life: My mom and dad. So marriage or a mate is a logical consequence with subsequent proliferation of that love towards children and their children. Thank goodness this could occur without some "indoctrination". Imagine that!
I note that in the lore about "Krishna", the adored avatar of millions in India, it is said he (and his brother: Baalaram) "completed their education and mastered the 64 sciences and arts in 64 days at Avantipura". And this is relevant to everyone how? outside Indian culture? I don't denegrate that culture. It is simply irrelevant to me and I don't feel compelled to take it up in order to make sense out of my life and culture. And I'm sure it maybe so for Hindus because such is part and parcel of the milieu of mom and dad. Should this dogma of the tradition of Krishna were associated with the need for ritual sacrifice of parents, I'm sure it would be a short-lived tradition. Akin to the cultures of Meso-America that involved human sacrifice. Instead, because parental love and respect is tied to these lore, the lore live on, despite their obvious meaning is completely a matter of "arcane" stuff. Remnants of a former science? Maybe. Interesting, maybe useful someday in a detective-mystery kind of way, but not "essential" to daily life.
Them one of us here counts the "strands" of DNA (in man) as 64, (actually, "codons", not strands, and a codon is a triplet of DNA bases that are used to copy or transcribe into amino acids, the basis of proteins) and the "I-Ching" as possessing 64 hexograms. Fine. These observations can carry something forward that might be very important in ones self culture. For Jay's friend, the "Mother Eagle" being is also meaningful and evidently an obsessively important thing.
I think it conceivable that this represents a simple regard for "the mother principle" that has almost completely disappeared from the received traditions. A culture of "male-centric" usurpation of the language of the "I AM" that ignores the facr that the literatures' references to "I AM" has female features in balance with the male features if we include them. "El Shaddai" can be read "The Breasted Power" or the compassionate one. Maybe the symbol preserved in Shaivism, half-man, half-woman "father-mother" is a remnant of recognition of this simple "two" fact I refer to as my "native" recognition of the highest principle. But, in the bottom line, symbolism, reduction of practical action to external ideas usurps something very simple and accessible to us without reading. Our mother's love, whether organic or adopted, is as nothing deliverable by any literature or system of imperfect "thoughts" or ideas. Maybe that "mother" or "father" is found in literatures, but this potential must be in the very consciousness we have without money, or price.
=========== Letter writing is still the most potent way to raise the consciousness of elected representatives: it's a record they cannot ignore and cannot say they were unawar
Flotsam and Jetsam: noted
Jetsam is stuff thrown off a ship that is in dire straights and considered not as essential as the ship itself. Maybe even useful things otherwise. Flotsam is stuff that collects on the shores or in gyres. Any old thing. So, my jetsam is your treasure you found on the shore and use with joy. Go ahead. I'm glad its of use to you. Sorry you are offended by my rejection of your chosen cargo. I still respect you and your ship. Or, should I call it your methods of navigation or means of getting your bearings? I still wish you a safe trip.
=========== Letter writing is still the most potent way to raise the consciousness of elected representatives: it's a record they cannot ignore and cannot say they were unawar
Crutches
There are some questions, it's legitimate to ask. F.ex.: Is universal existence an expression of ultimate reality, or is it a corruption of ultimate reality?
The answers arrived at will be personal maps (verifiable through exploration of the territory). As such, any map is a system of individual thoughts, feelings etc.
Rogerscott; it seems to me, that you also present such a set of thoughts in your posts. You have thoughts about thoughts. You stress the importance of distinction between possible poisonous thoughts from the outside and your own 'I AM' consciousness, which you believe has an intrinsic ability to evaluate truth.
This appeals to me, though I would use a somewhat different way of saying it. But then you go on by using old testament philosophy to support your point. And later you return to one of your favourite themes in your posts, love and respect of parents (and family), which you expand on and seem to build some 'truths' around. By using the old testament and by introducing your own ideas, you come out neither better, nor worse than the rest of us.
You ALSO have a belief-system, and my guess is (sorry if I'm wrong), that it's based on universal existence as an expression of reality. So you believe it functional to 'follow the flow', you don't need crutches like divination or whatever to grow or get answers.
I see the basis of existence from the 'corrupted universe' point. And I certainly need all the help I can get to find answers, as the universe in general isn't helping me. Quite the contrary, for me the mechanisms of the universe are made so, that it will be extremely difficult to find any answers.
So while I don't use Tarot (have tried, wasn't me) or I Ching (I liked it), I'm all for using any crutches, I can find (tested pragmatically). And even if I didn't use any, I wouldn't find them offensive. To my knowledge Tarot- or I Ching users don't make bids for world domination or burn people on fires.
It is NOT my intention here to discuss, if your, cjmoore's or my beliefsystems are correct or not. Only pointing out, that you, Rogerscott, use a belief-system, where you sometimes draw too far-reaching consequences (I would be the first to admit that weakness on my own part occasionally, so do not feel, that I'm out to get you. I like parts of your posts).
A question: Do you see the 'I AM' as a transcendent experience?
A reply...sorta
If anyone really wants to know what I have to say on this topic, or the reponse I was going to post, they can email me at: rsc@navi.net and say in the subject line: missing post.
I don't think it's fair to Michaelson to just divert it too far away from his contribution. I enjoyed it, but think now we are talking about an entirely different format for discussion. ---------
I apologize for roiling
Again, this thread started to be about "dealing" with people who bring a language to us that seems outside our "comfort zone" or relevance to our research into what our conscious experience really means or what it can be.
Maybe I broached too much about what "turns me off". I don't have any doubt at all it is within the power of my consciousness and, I believe, each and all's consciousness to manipulate cards or any means whatever to get a message to "us" or our "outer" perception. I simply said it seems a longer path than necessary. I'm a minimalist. Maybe a fool in the estimation of others. Maybe so. My choice. My path.
My last post was placed because, in response to monkeyblood, I did engage in a "flow of consciousness" response to his request to explain my position. It was verbose, and probably much of it a rationalization for insultive language that, I acknowledge, isn't called for if avoidable.
There's no ligitimate excuse for insulting other people's sensibilities or chosen tools for exploring the thing I exalt: consciousness.
In speaking my mind, however, maybe insult is unavoidable if I am allowed to speak my mind. Right? Or what?
Can I ask?: am I so divorced from my inner access as to require a dependence on outer mechanisms? Can I say?: I dislike the concept of divorce? I love my soul, the only thing I know: my own consciousness. If I need to use ANY mechanism outside my native awareness or body to know my own innermost, doesn't it imply I am somewhat estranged from that?
As a researcher, I know there are mechanisms that may extend into practical forms with reproducible results that we might call "mystical" or at least beyond the "gross" sciences. But my experience lead me to reject on reliance upon them on the same grounds: what need? The exact same principles operative in them externally exists in my own body. Ergo: trash can.
It doesn't mean such mechanisms can't work. I never said "it doesn't work" or "can't work". If you wish, in another post, I can delineate a lot of the research that I have only summarised by a conclusion called "my choice" and which some have taken as an "insult" to their practice or "way".
I merely maintain that resort to such has a higher likelihood to regret than reliance on a simple self-reference. In the latter, if I err, I still went by my own self. In the former, I might end up blaming the card-dealer or those who advised me to use cards to talk to myself. In my way, I'm alone to blame. In your way: I may curse you and maybe all the world of inventors of a mechanistic approach. And such blame would be mistaken, but in my way, the odds are more favorable for "self ownership". The path back into self is shorter one way, longer in the other. I acknowledge in both is only one source of ligitimate attribution. I have chosen a short path to kicking myself.
I don't advise anyone. I only tell the truth: what I do and what I don't do. What I prefer, and don't prefer. You do what you will. I have no control over what people will do with my example, and I am not responsible for what they do with it. Still, I'm not about to put my life under a bucket because in talking about it or simply living it might "offend" others.
I think whatever means you may choose to use to "know thyself" has a ligitimacy none have the right to abrogate. Did anything I say really abrogate anything or anyones' rights?
I'm insulted, too. I'm insulted by "doctors" and the thought construct within which they function, and the ostensible power or image of their "techniques" and "prognostications" have on their patients or "customers". It is a form of hypnosis. These "doctors" use "highly advanced scientific" mechanisms to give them confidence to say to patients and their families: you are going to die or to their loved-ones: your loved one is going to die. The mechanisms say so! Maybe they are just thinking about odds and statistics and have no concept of a "higher power" that is only active when thought of or believed in. They end their day happy with the dollars accrued by applying and plying their "trade". That they have done "what they could".
These "authorities" have great faith in their methods. They proliferate their "faith" and impose it on their patients and their patients' families consciousnesses. This becomes a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy of doom that they call being "practical" and "efficient" and "realistic" and all based on use of mechanistic "sciences".
Excuse me if I take access to Tarot and Tarot experts as akin to access to so-called "doctors" or "healers" of any kind and the materialistic "health" industry whose faith in their form of use of mechanism and conclusions based on such as "materialistic". They are not "masters". They are speculative, and limited. Fine. I'll rely on my "speculative", my "limited" instead. That way I won't have cause to blame another.
They are all ultimately still embedded in the "mortal concept". I conclude their conclusions are wrong, or simply something I don't want, I don't like. Whatever their abilities.
I'll do what I do, and what I do wrong, I take as my lesson. You do what you do, I'll not put you out of my heart. I'm not in your culture. Mind if I talk about my way? Take it or leave it.
I didn't want to really go here, but since you seem to want to hear it, may I say: you asked? My answer.
There are ligitimate grounds, in my experience, for the faith that "all things are possible". We can transmute our bodies and our circumstances. We can't impose such advantages on others. We have ligitimate reason on empirical, theoretical and scientifically established grounds to say things can be much better and we can "see good in our own flesh". The consciousness from which this wish arises may be deemed "transcendent" but it belongs to a ligitimate hope grounded right here in this world by definite actions. Consciousness is only transcendent, for me, if it means the merging of the material and the spiritual in everyday life. Naked born, naked leaving, but for me, if not body and all, some mistake was made in the process. I blame myself. Not lack of cards. All the "signs" are in my heart. In my my eyes when closed or open. I'll plug my ears, hold my eyes shut and plug my nose, seal my lips and stick my tongue into the roof of my mouth, if need be, to get the information I need. I'll never resort to cards or dice for my self-knowledge. =========== Letter writing is still the most potent way to raise the consciousness of elected representatives: it's a record they cannot ignore and cannot say they were unawar
Ahemmm
Dear Mr. Michaelson: Thank you for honestly navigating the muddy waters of a hidden world jam-packed with possibility and, for lack of a better word, magic. Methinks we all over-think this. Should we take our cues from little kids who say the darndest things without guile or judgment. Sure would make life more fun if we just accepted that some of us have imaginary friends.
Relax
Hey Jay. I love your piece! It feels like a lifetime of insight condensed into a few paragraphs. I am amazed at the clarity you bring to the table. You covered the whole damn thing...!
A few thoughts on your thoughts,
You write: “It scares me, in my rational, normal state, how in love with God I can become. Because that love, that "sense of closeness," all of it, no matter how I try to cleanse it of myth, is still a subjective experience that seems difficult to distinguish from madness.”
You also write: “Functionally speaking, it's possible that myth only works when you do believe in it, when you make a commitment to it and say: well, it's possible that the world operates according to wholly scientific-material principles, and it's also possible that it operates according to mysterious spiritual ones – and I commit to the latter. And not spiritual in the way I usually refer to it – not in the sense of "waking up to the miraculous truth of ordinary experience." But spiritual in the juicy, mythic way – with Mother Eagle and the rest as actual energies both "out there" and "in here."
Why would you have to commit? What is wrong with miraculous truth of ordinary experience? Why only fall in love with the mystical? The distinction is your mind. Maybe Mother Eagle is the future to come. We can dream but it takes time for dreams to manifest in the physical world. Take Jules Verne for example. He saw helicopters and submarines long before they were invented. Or anyone that has any idea for that matter. It takes time to materialize. We cannot simply think things into existence (well, not yet at least…). We have to use perseverance and effort to get there. So how could Mother Eagle materialize? Perhaps through the building of a better world. Mother Eagle and other such visions are our deepest hopes and dreams in disguise. But if we get lost in them we loose our power to materialize them/manifest them. After all, is there no meaning at all to our three dimensional world of matter? Is it only to be transcended? I think not. I think it is to be embraced. Therefore, Jay, I think you are correct not to loose yourself completely in the mystical experiences. You are correct to have them and then analyze them. But maybe you shouldn’t be so hard on yourself. Play with it a little more. It’s not so serious. Why should it be? We don’t necessarily have to crack the riddle of life, we can just see this story to the end. Accept and surrender.
You go on saying: “Which is more nuts: the retreat center or Wal-Mart? The ashram or Le Cirque? The church or the television? I can make pro- and con- arguments for all of them, and all of them are internally consistent, and externally nuts. Is it all just a matter of taste which insanity you choose to embrace?
Yes, I believe it is. You are so right about any insanity/sanity entailing the possibility of being internally consistent. We can make anything seem true if we only believe in it. I jump in between different realities and have discovered that neither one is true in an ultimate sense, they are merely different expressions of the One. It´s just that some of them make me feel better than others so I choose to embrace the ones I like but without judging the rest. So I guess maybe it does come down to a choice in the end but the choice should not be forced, but rather the only one left. There is no hurry. Let life choose for you.
Thanks for a wonderful article and thanks for sharing your inner thoughts.
SugarMag
Wow
End of Faith?
My entire point is about "faith", but that faith is in my own intelligence. I don't understand the derision or "ahems" about what I've written about this.
I happen to think that life is enough of a mystery to justify research. My experience has shown that use of "eloptic devices" or throwing bones or ouija or reading "tarot" are all worthy topics of research.
And in so saying, I am not "equating" them as "all one ilk" or trying to desparage them or the people who have researched them or applied them with "faith" or with "practical results".
For me "intelligence" or the "scientific method" doesn't simply equate to a materialistic equation or some closed-minded conslusion.
The intelligent method I refer to must take into account some rather extraordinary phenomena. I am highly congnisant of the tendancy of so-called "pure scientists" to reject non-reproducible phenomena to "rejectable error" category and "coincidence" or some form of fault in the application of strict method of examination.
As part of my life-experience, having grown up in the scientific method and with faith in intelligence as the dominant "paradigm" and with no pre-conceived ideas about deity or religious dogma (thanks to our parents) I decided to investigate the "paranormal" because it was something that troubled me, being so prevalent amongst the thought of people I encountered in daily life outside our home.
I was actually shocked to hear of the religious dogma about Jesus being "nailed to a cross". Why? Because of my naievity about history: I doubted they had "nails" that far back. I had no grounds for thinking this way. I was in the first grade, about 6 years old, and felt my first inkling of scepticism. My next bout with this was due to the same kid telling me about "God" being with everyone. I never heard of "God", and had a problem with an individual who had so many bodies. The "kid" was a "Catholic", and here I was, trying to process this with no "catechism", no pre-formed indoctrination. I was a "clean slate" and had these questions as a result.
Well, one thing lead to another, and perhaps with some impetus from the "new age" movement of the 60s and 70s, decided I had to dispense with these doubts en toto or investigate them as a ligitimate material for application of my own intelligence to make an "estimation of the situation(s)".
As a result of digging in and applying my intelligence to these issues, I was lead to a reading material that was highly influential in the "metaphysical sphere".
Coincident with this, I was exposed to a scientist who showed that "telepathy" was objectively and scientfically demonstrable as a fact.
As a result of this perhaps I was able to resist the tendancy to come to any conclusion about any systematic "thought structure" that applies to either a religious dogma or "faith" in such things as Tarot cards or "ouija" or "bone tossing" or such quasi-scientific mechanisms as a "Hieronymus" device (eloptics). I and personal associates investigated the works of Reichenbach, Abrams, Lekovsky, Reich, Krafft and all manner of "edgy" investigators into the realm of the "subtle" energies and the possible links of such to how different methods of garnering information or linking consciousness to the material world might work.
As a result, I have been able to keep my mind open as to whether or not such things as "Tarot" and other mechanisms might have some probity. I have also been able to see that all such mechanisms devolve upon internal processes that relate to choice and deciscion.
We have a fear of certainty and a dependence on it at the same time....or visa versa...it is so highly individualistic. I just want to make something very clear about my own first hand experience about this: I know we do not know how such things as Tarot or Naadi palm-leaf reading work in anything like detail. I do know they all depend on the intermediation of a user. We, anyone, CAN safely conclude that any material-mediated devices such as these only yield information to a conscious individual who reads it. The Tarot is interpretive-dependent. The Naadi-leaf-reading is supposedly also highly interpretive, but yields names and exacting details. In the same way, Eloptic-mechanisms also supposedly give very exacting details that are checkable.
Let that be as it may: they still require a human intermediary. It seems to me the human element is obligatively subjected to "mechanism" and the mechanism is "defended" and the potential of the "human" left conclusively as impotent without such means.
Well, some say to me, what about "remote viewing"? Here we have a subtler, but equally "external" concept about "faith in intelligence". Do you want to remote view? And did your wish come true? Most will resort to their "paypal" and invest in one or another different resources claiming to be able to teach you all about that. The thing that is easily missed here is in the very terms themselves "remote view".
What do I think? What do I know? How do I get at what I know, what do I need so as to know what I think? What is "imanent" viewing? What is "self-viewing"? But such things are usally associated with the terms "god", "enlightenment", "powers", "siddhis" and a thousand and one other terms that are invested with self-disapproval and self-defeating implied "conclusions".
Just being conscious that you are conscious CAN be deemed as enlightenment AND enlightening: a continuous process that has to be pursued and focused upon with no outside intermediary to "get" what someone like me is talking about. I understand what others are talking about, but what I'm talking about is evidently seen as "dissing". I don't choose to use "imported" terms like "Eagle-Mother" or use "Tarot". I want to know my naked and world-ignorant self. But that isn't good enough for some evidently. They want "more" or other meanings, other things to be imported. Fine. Do the work to incorporate these vocabularies into your construct. In my "lab", I prefer to investigate the stripped-down version of research.
The hardest thing is evidently to just be quiet and accept the naked choices we make with no outside intermediation. I see the trend of resort to outside mediation as much more susceptible to "pollution" or dilution and distraction. I know the adage: 'no man is an island'. We do need each other. I simply think while we need each other, we don't need each other's methods or chosen ways. My "insanity" is mine. Simple as it is.
Can You Be Proven Wrong?
Jay wrote: I lose credibility by talking about it. But it is also a phenomenon with no other explanation that I've been able to generate.
Our thinking and beliefs have enormous power; it's not surprising that most people who you do Body Electric massage on will feel energy. They want and expect to feel it.
As you yourself do the message, you want to believe that you have special energy. Any observation that can be interpreted according to a story in which you control this energy makes an impression. The observations that go against your beliefs, wants, and expectations are ignored.
You end up believing in the special energy of your massage, much like Hillary continues to believe she'll be our next president.
It's not so difficult to test whether your speculation is accurate. Indeed, it's already been thoroughly tested. The power of belief has been demonstrated over and over. Are you willing to test your speculations in a way that has even the POSSIBILITY of proving that the real power comes from belief?
The beauty of science is that it provides a process that can show our beliefs to be wrong. Merely following ideas that you want to be true provides no such feedback. The most interesting line of inquiry is, "What do I want, and why?"
Stuart
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/
I Have Spent Most of My Life
Reality
respond
Suspension of judgment