An Apology

[SecondSun]

I would like to apologize for some of the things I have said in the past couple of days.

I am a marijuana addict and although I usually try not take myself seriously when I am stoned over the past couple of days I let myself go and started saying some of the most ridiculous things.

Please try not to take what I have said seriously. I was not in my right mind. I become very grandious and sometimes psychotic when I am stoned and I understand that it is not fun to talk to me when I am like that. I fear I have probably been permenantly written of as a lunatic by the moderator of this board and I accept that. I will make a point of not posting anything when I am under the influence and will make a sincere effort of listen to what others are saying when I do.

Again, please accept my apology. I feel very ashamed for making myself look like such an idiot.

Zach

[Manning]

For what it's worth, I didn't think you looked like an idiot, Zach. Blowing off a bit of steam, perhaps, but steam is steam. It goes away.

[SecondSun]

Thanks. Anyway. I have a lot of issues in my life and this board is probably not the best place to vent them. I think I took an interest in the whole 2012/dimensional shift concept as a way of ignoring my own issues and hoping that all my own problems would be wiped away by some kind of cosmic cleansing.

If there is a dimensional shift going on it would do more good for me to get off the internet and do something product for myself and my community.

[gone]

Everything is connected, brother. This is a good place to explore.

[Gift Horse]

wow.
Thanks for the apology and the explanation. If I was going to take some of what you said personally, I certainly won't now.
I think it took alot of courage to write an apology.
Stick around.
Like Gelfer said, this could be a good place to bounce some ideas around.
My advice,
be loving and gentle with yourself.

[John Jay Harper]

Indeed I want to second what is being expressed here now; compassion for our self. We need more self-love versus self-loathing before we will ever have enough to share with other folks on the planet in worse shape. Consider yourself "inititated" into the depths of the pain within our collective unconscious mind and its need to be acknowledged in public. Now, if we can only get this level of insight to surface in our corporate and government leadership, we just may have a planet worth saving too. Welcome back to the human race, but as I try to remind us all; it was the turtle not the rabbit that won in the end. Slow down, be good to yourself today: Eat more chocolate!

[Agent Smith]

no need to apologize, these people are chowderheads.

just refine your message, take what you've learned from this exchange, and experiement again.

there is no failure, there is only feedback (r.bandler)

...you may want to consider what the 'spirit of cannibis' is trying to tell you though... i went through a similar phase myself, and my hourly ingestion became more and more traumatic over a series of several months, until i was told in no uncertain terms that i didn't need it anymore... (i continued on for several more months, until my life finally fell apart, my paranoia was 4 dimensional, etc.... took me a while to sort that out, and then i was able to begin to make increasingly rapid progress.)

just a perspective...

[whitewave]

What's a chowderhead?

[silentwolf]

The term "chowderhead" refers to you being so thick that nothing gets through. I prefer the term "numbskull" in reference to myself, because sometimes it takes several bounces off of the brick wall before I realize what's going on.

Secondsun ~ it's cool, bro. Cannabis will do that to you after a while, depending on your reasons for using her. You might want to just back off of the usage, and when you do, pretty much pray to the plant. If you're having some trouble sleeping because you're not smoking it, make some bhang or emerald dragon and treat the Cannabis Spirit to a serious religious ceremony when you consume it. Ask the plant to just help you sleep when you consume it.

Something that Cannabis does is bring out what's in the person. The plant won't make you angry, but if you're already angry and hurt, it will drag it out of you. The plant won't make you self-conscious or paranoid, but if you already are, it will most certainly enhance it. If you have peace of mind and are generally attuned to things, Cannabis will bring that out in you as well. Look at what the Cannabis is bringing out in you.

An exercise you might like to try is to smoke a bowl, and sit there with pen and a notebook. Start writing down how you're feeling and what you're thinking. Do this over the course of a couple of weeks, and then sit down later and re-read what you wrote down. Try to understand why you were feeling like that, and what caused you to think what you were. It will help you understand your Emotional Temper ~ the way you respond emotionally to things you do and things which you encounter.

Alternately, you can just quit smoking and try to bury what you've been experiencing.

Good Luck!

[jezebelle]

Ahhhh, it doesn't matter what you do or do-not-do.
it's what's in-between
Awhare of itself watching. Dare we say.
I agree with gelfer's exploring
This is fun.
love, jez2

[Agent Smith]

yes imagine my consternation after years of trying 'break open' my hard head, when i finally discovered that i was full of bouillebase...

....it wasn't until years after i quit smoking marijuana, and taking hallucenogens that i was finally able to gain some proficiency at shamanic journeying, and various other things... many years of refining diet, health, fasting, and qigong...

[sidecross]

As an unapologetic cannabis user both recreational and now medical, you need to find another reason if you feel an apology is needed.

[silentwolf]

I agree with Agent Smith; I didn't start having any success with any magical practices, including qigong, until I stopped smoking ganja and taking whatever I could get my hands on. I also found the greatest and fastest success with Iron Wire Qigong after I stopped smoking cigarettes; smoking makes it difficult to perform any deep breathing exercises.

If you can't find a way to incorporate your ganja smoking and make it beneficial for you, then it is in your best interest to simply stop altogether.

[sidecross]

“…If you can't find a way to incorporate your ganja smoking and make it beneficial for you, then it is in your best interest to simply stop altogether.”

Terrence McKenna would chuckle at such a ‘knuckleheaded’ statement.

[Agent Smith]

...terrence mckenna died of 'pancake poisoning' (a personal friend of his told me this...)

Robert Anton Wilson once told the youngfolks and myself at a party we were at that at his age smoking the stuff was pretty rough, he prefered baking it into some betty crocker brownies... (those brownies might be more lethal than pancakes...)

still i'll stick by the ol' firesign theater credo...

"I am a Bozo, you're a Bozo, we're all Bozos on this bus."

[SecondSun]

Wow. That's a lot to respond to. I don't think I can get to everything but here it goes.

"Everything is connected, brother. This is a good place to explore."

Yes. In fact from reading people's resonses to my posts it seems like most people already are concerned about the enviroment and the possibility of wrecking the planet so much that we won't be able to continue living the way we do. So I don't have to act like I need to spread the word so much.

"wow.
Thanks for the apology and the explanation. If I was going to take some of what you said personally, I certainly won't now.
I think it took alot of courage to write an apology.
Stick around.
Like Gelfer said, this could be a good place to bounce some ideas around.
My advice,
be loving and gentle with yourself."

I will stick around, although I may not post as often.

"Indeed I want to second what is being expressed here now; compassion for our self. We need more self-love versus self-loathing before we will ever have enough to share with other folks on the planet in worse shape. Consider yourself "inititated" into the depths of the pain within our collective unconscious mind and its need to be acknowledged in public. Now, if we can only get this level of insight to surface in our corporate and government leadership, we just may have a planet worth saving too. Welcome back to the human race, but as I try to remind us all; it was the turtle not the rabbit that won in the end. Slow down, be good to yourself today: Eat more chocolate!"

I think, when you feel you have an insight that the world needs to have, you can get to a point where you desperately try to make people realize that they need to change. Of course this is counter to the principle of nonaction. Yes, the tortois always wins so I can put the pressure off myself to save the world.

"...you may want to consider what the 'spirit of cannibis' is trying to tell you though... i went through a similar phase myself, and my hourly ingestion became more and more traumatic over a series of several months, until i was told in no uncertain terms that i didn't need it anymore... (i continued on for several more months, until my life finally fell apart, my paranoia was 4 dimensional, etc.... took me a while to sort that out, and then i was able to begin to make increasingly rapid progress.)"

I'm afraid I know what you mean by "4 dimensional paranoia." There was a time, dec-feb 2004 infact when I actually thought that I had realized my five dimensional nature. I actually saw people who I believed were from another dimension. I talked to one of them. It was pretty trippy. The conversation went like this:

Me: What's your name?
Him: I don't have a name.
Me: Well, how long have you been here. (Cuz for some reason I thought he was a new arrival to this dimension)
Him: I've been here since the begining.
Me: Ok, well tell them that it's the sum of j^2 + j*pi + pi^2 for all j > 0. Tell them Zach told you. (This sum came to me on a mushroom trip and I thought it was important)
Him: I will.
Me: Does that make sense?
Him: Yes.

Then I left. It was fucking weird. He was this tall dread locked dude but somehow he looked wierd like he had more detail than a normal person. Now I think I probably hallucinated the whole thing, or he was just fucking with me.

Earlier, or later I can't remember the chronology of what happened during that period of time, I met these two people "Jesse" and "Jessica". I am normally very shy but for some reason I thought I should talk to them. We totally connected on this weird level. It was like we had known each other for years or in a past life or something. We decided to link arms and walk around town. Then Jessica told me to meet her in Eurika, on 4/20 in the redwood forest. I curse myself to this day for not showing up.

Then I ran into some people who I knew vaguely and told them that I had just talked to God and that the rainbow gathering would be in Eureka Cal on 4/20 in the redwood forest. The guy told me he loved me and I was on my way. Earlier, (pretty sure it was earlier) I met these people who were totally acting like they were tripping (or maybe I was tripping who knows) and they totally seemed like I don't know like they had just become enlightened. I can't explain it but these people, they were not like normal people, they were cooler than the coolest hippy, it was like they had totally disolved all fears and animosities. They were just chillin in the dark outside with dogs and glowsticks.

I had strange perceptual distortions where it looked like the world was being stretched out vertically and shrinking horizontally at the same time. This was "the wave." The universe was collapsing into a singularity.

At one point a friend told me "Don't get lost." As if I had something important to do and I should focus on my mission. Later he told me "becareful with the light, with respect to the other dimensions" (because he believed light traveled across all dimensions, so say you are up late in your room, some guy in another dimension could be totally pissed off cause he wants to sleep and you have the light on.

The idea was that there are actually concurrent realities right next to us that we can't see. There are higher beings who can see our dimension and also see into higher dimensions. They might reveal themselves to us if they wished but they would seem like normal people to us. They can't teleport but they can walk around the corner and totally be gone (because in actuality they walked off in some direction that you don't have access to) This also explained how Jesus was able to walk on water. He was actually walking on land but from the disciples perspective it appeared as if we was walking on water since they couldn't see into as many dimensions as he could. This is why they need faith to walk themselves. Because Jesus was able to take them by the hand and pull them onto the land that they could not see. When they lost faith, they fell back into the water. Jesus had a 5 dimensional (or more who knows) body while the apostles still had 3.

It was totally friggin crazy!

I'm probably commiting a mortal sin by even speaking what was revealed to me. My opinion is that I failed in my mission or whatever I was supposed to do and ended up getting plopped down in 3D. I'm pretty sure that guy I was talking to was my spirit guide. And Jessica was like my soul twin or something. But I didn't realize it at the time and I freaked out and ended up in jail.

So. I admit I'm probably completely a lunatic or schizophrenic or something but I tell you visiting other dimensions is friggin rad and you should all try it. You don't need drugs or anything you just need to develop your chakras and find a 5 dimensional being (hopefully friendly) who will guide you.

I am not making this shit up! This is honestly what happened to me! I admit that I probably halucinated the whole thing but I don't care cuz it was so friggin cool!

I didn't even know about the dimensional shift or 2012 when this happened! It was only afterwards that I found this board and tried to figure out WTF happened to me! I don't talk about this much because as you can understand it makes me look like a lunatic.

Anyway so that's why I said "real visionaries aren't on this board and they don't care (about this board)" because I believe there are people right now who have and are currently exploring other dimensions and totally waking up to new realities. I'm not trying to diss you guys but, seriously, have you guys seen marvels? I'm not talking about some ayahuasca halucination I mean like have you guys seen people who just totally walked out of the woodwork and then manifest a kilo of the sweetest buds out of thin air and then said "catch on the other side" and walked around a corner and he was gone in like thin air. Ok so this never happened to me but *this* is the kind of stuff that should start happening soon. People will just like become 5D and start totally chilling like nobodies business.

Anyway I'm not trying to say I'm special or I have any kind of secret knowledge because I don't know shit. Personally I believe I was given a chance to become 5D but failed. Anyway everything else is just speculation. Unless you have talked to extra-terrestials or know someone from another dimension or can manifest kind buds or something you really don't know what you are talking about. (when it comes to other dimensions at least... And I don't have a clue what's going on either!)

Anyway so I'm totally psyched about 2012 (unless it actually happened already and we are the leftovers...) but I'm not worried cuz we're all eternal anyway and will get another chance in like 1,854,234,651,234,564 years or something.

Anyway. Again I'm not trying to diss anyone or make myself sound important and I totally admit that this could all be a delusions but hey I'm ok with that!

Wow, ok so I totally didn't respond to all of you and got off on a tangent... Talk to you later.

Zach

[Agent Smith]

Zach, i haven't got much time to type right now, but i'll just tell you that i can totally relate.

for me, i would make up fictional beings, and then start having them manifest....

i can totally empathize with you.

.,..i'll also say that my 'otherworld' contacts were much stronger when i was a kid before i began using drugs... that's just me... i learned not to talk about it though.

[whitewave]

If we don't talk about it we buy into the mindset that says we are crazy. I think my communication with people here sharpens my ability to spread these ideas to other people. I want to share these ideas because I believe they are for the common good of humanity and the earth and for beings in other dimensions. I have found that If I present my ideas about the dimensional shift clearly and from in a calm state of mind they will be well received. I also try to communicate from the heartspace instead of from the mind. People feel the intention and respond to it in a positive way. If they don't, I let it go. Ranting and raving will only create adversaries for myself and my worldview--hopefully I have planted seeds.......and even when one knows that it is not the right time to speak, my presence speaks for me, affecting all those around me with what I embody. This is how I plant seeds when I decide to keep silent.

[SecondSun]

I keep flipping back and forth between being convinced that nothing I experienced is real and believing that there might be some kind of truth to it. Seeing is believing though. I don't want to spend my whole life chasing after extradimensional beings that don't even exist but at the same time I can't just go back to living a normal life. Somehow I have to make it work out. I need to believe in something but I just can't believe that what 80% of Americans believe is true.

In the mean time, even if none of this is true it is still fun to talk about and think about as long as you don't let it get out of hand.

I take it that some of you have had experiences, contacts if you will, and then either been told by others or decided for yourself that it was just a halucination or a sign of mental illness. Certainly we can't just go around talking crazy shit on the street without serious consequences (jail and mental institutions just to name of few) But at the same time, what I experienced was real for me. I can't just pretend that it didn't happen. "Sane" people can give you advice but since they didn't really experience what you experienced, how can you say it is really the best advice?

Personally I feel aliens are communicating with me when I smoke marijuana. Maybe this is bad thing but it's also what I like about it...

I'm sober now but when I smoke I think some of the craziest things.

Ok gotta go.

[Manning]

Hi Zach,
If you don't mind, I've got a few questions and some observations of my own to offer. I don't really know much about the drug aspect so I'll leave that to others to address if they wish to. I have read that cannabis has been identified as a trigger of psychosis/schizophrenia but I really don't know what to make of those kind of comments anymore since I feel forms of spiritual emergence/emergency are so poorly understood by the psychiatric community.

My own benchmark as to what is/is not acceptable would center around whether or not you find yourself wanting to hurt yourself or hurt others when in those states -- if you do, I would say that's a good time to get help. Otherwise, I'd call it personal explorations. As you can see, there are plenty of people here who are making those explorations for themselves -- some with drugs, some without.

Meanwhile, my question is... previous to the onset of those experiences had you undergone a period of stress or loss? Sometimes, stress or loss can be a triggering event in spiritual emergence/emergency. That was so in my experience and I'm always keen to better understand that experience for myself as well as the emergent experiences of others. Meantime, here's a few observations about your experience that might provide you with some insight. Feel free to take them or leave them as you see fit...

Zach: I think, when you feel you have an insight that the world needs to have, you can get to a point where you desperately try to make people realize that they need to change. Of course this is counter to the principle of nonaction. Yes, the tortois always wins so I can put the pressure off myself to save the world.

Identification with a messiac mission can be part of the experience of spiritual emergence/emergency. The strength of this attachment seems to vary from wholeheartedly believing you are a messiah, to identifying strongly with messiac actions, i.e., "saving the world". Ultimately, I would say the purpose of this event within an experience is to move you into a space of Christ Consciousness/Lovingness with the cosmos. Naturally, that's merely my opinion.

Zach: Earlier, or later I can't remember the chronology of what happened during that period of time, I met these two people "Jesse" and "Jessica". I am normally very shy but for some reason I thought I should talk to them. We totally connected on this weird level. It was like we had known each other for years or in a past life or something. We decided to link arms and walk around town. ... I'm pretty sure that guy I was talking to was my spirit guide. And Jessica was like my soul twin or something.

One of the characteristics of my own experience was encountering an animus force that I repeatedly identified with as a "twin". The terms Anima/Animus (http://www.voidspace.org.uk/psychology/jung_lexicon.shtml) are Jungian terms for the "soul image". Jung was fairly adamant that the soul image was contrasexual and is typically experienced via projection onto a member of the opposite sex. "Wherever an impassioned, almost magical, relationship exists between the sexes, it is invariably a question of a projected soul-image." If you had gone to meet her you may have found that the magic that was originally present between you wasn't present anymore. Her real gift/purpose in your life may have been to bring you into relationship with that aspect of your self.

Sometimes, these kind of experiences can become elaborate inner journeys that mimic the pattern of The Hero's Journey (http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/smc/journey/ref/summary.html). In my own case, my animus became my mentor/guide through that experience. It sounds as if Jesse [Was he the dread-locked guy?] may have served in this role in your own experience. Alternatively, he may have been a "Helper" -- someone who seems to appear at exactly the right time in order to provide some form of assistance to the individual undergoing the experience. You might enjoy reading through that summary of the Hero's Journey to see if any aspects of your own experience, or perhaps the entire experience itself, can be mapped onto that model of psychological growth.

Anyway, those were just a few themes that were similar to my own experience. If any of those rang true for you, you might enjoy the Shamanism/Schizophrenia (http://www.breakingopenthehead.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=12;t=000034) discussion in the Transformations topic.

Understanding the psychological processes running through my own experience helped me explain that process to others while reaffirming my sense that the experience itself was inherently productive -- it only "looks" crazy when it's not understood. The experience can be feared for the same reason.

Otherwise, I enjoyed reading the chronicle of your experience, particularly your presentation of Christ as a 5D being and "the wave" of universal singularity. I'm glad that you decided to stick around and share it with us.

[ April 26, 2005, 03:16 PM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[SecondSun]

Manning: Meanwhile, my question is... previous to the onset of those experiences had you undergone a period of stress or loss? Sometimes, stress or loss can be a triggering event in spiritual emergence/emergency.

Zach: Actually what happened was a friend of mine offered to let me stay at his place in Oregon (I live in Cali). I moved in with him, he eventually kicked me out because I made a mess of the place, invited people he didn't like over, and then went into his closet to get a stereo so I could listen to some music. He told me to leave or he'd call the cops.

Then I was homeless for a week and made a lot of new friends on the street. Eventually I told my parents and they sent me some money. I got a little apartment and let all my hippie homeless friends stay over. So it was like a 24 hour party at my place. I smoked pot almost every single day. Got drunk a lot. I gave all the money my parents gave me to my friends who needed it. I decided I should let anyone stay at my place who needed it and give out food/ganja whenever I had some. Some people were selling mushrooms so I bought about half an once and gave them to all my friends. It just made me feel so good to give these people what they really wanted, food, shelter, and sacrament.

It all started going wrong when one of my friends wanted to become my blood brother. He cut my wrist with a piece of aluminum can. There wasn't much blood but afterwards I became very paranoid that I might have contracted AIDS. This guy eventually told me that the reason why he was so fucked up on the inside was because he had been raped in prison and had killed the rapist with a pencil to the eye. To this day I don't know if I believe him but it certainly did not make me feel safer around him. Eventually I became so paranoid that he would either kill me or that I had gotten aids that I ran out of the house in fear. The cops picked me up in the graveyard where I had decided to get naked. I thought the universe was going to collapse and I thought I had to do something to save myself. I really thought I was going to die like Jesus.

Manning: One of the characteristics of my own experience was encountering an animus force that I repeatedly identified with as a "twin". The terms Anima/Animus are Jungian terms for the "soul image". Jung was fairly adamant that the soul image was contrasexual and is typically experienced via projection onto a member of the opposite sex. "Wherever an impassioned, almost magical, relationship exists between the sexes, it is invariably a question of a projected soul-image." If you had gone to meet her you may have found that the magic that was originally present between you wasn't present anymore. Her real gift/purpose in your life may have been to bring you into relationship with that aspect of your self.

Zach: Yes, I am pretty certain that the magic wouldn't have still been there. Still, I'd rather regret something I did do than something I didn't! Anyway this doesn't eat me up to much inside. I believe everything that happened happend for a reason and that if I didn't go it was because I was meant to do something else.

When I was younger I found Jungian psychology really empowering. It seemed to explain so much about the psychic that I had never been taught in school. (I discovered Jung one day in my HS library while avoiding studying for something or other) I grew out of it but I can certainy understand where you are coming from. For me Jung is a little to reductionist(?). The symbols are almost too concrete, too fleshed out. The experience I had was much more alien, much more strange than anything I had read in a book by Jung. I feel drawn now to, I call it alien psychology for lack of a better word. I feel like my experience was like seeing life through the eyes of a mysterious being far more complex than I could ever imagine.

The little bit of The Hero With a Thousand Faces, by Joseph Campbell, which I think you were refering to, that I had read previous to this experience definitely helped me make sense of things during the hard year afterwards as I pieced my life together.

One aspect of The Hero that Campbell talks about is the call to adventure. Not everyone gets the call but when you do you can either accept the calling and become the hero, or you can reject the call, run from it, and end up in a kind of screwed up situation. He talks about the story of Apollo and um, some chick that Apollo's after. The chick runs and Apollo turns into a wolf or something and the chick keeps running. She get's turned into a laurel tree, which the greeks considered to be very noble. She ran from the call to adventure and turned into a tree for it, but a nice tree none the less... I feel like I got that call and I am still afraid to fully accept it but I want to accept it and I don't want to turn into a laurel tree. I feel like right now I am building up my courage before I decide to go out on the road again and follow my destiny/bliss. I really feel the call to become a "holy man"... who are those people in India, who just walk around living off alms,,, sidhas or something... Or like become a traveling shaman or something like that. Nothing self important. I just want to travel somewhere where the energy is good and try to make a difference, find a community... Like Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction.... become a bum. :)

So that's my story and I'm sticking to it. It's been fun relating it. I really enjoy talk about it. When I got back from my little adventure in Oregon I wanted to tell all my friends every detail but realized that they probably wouldn't understand or fully appreciate what had happened. I didn't want to look like a crazy person. Plus I was in an intensive outpatient program and they discouraged the craziness so I repressed a lot of it for awhile. The thing is, I don't feel like I am broken. I have at times felt a lot of pain but I have always felt like that was because I was not focusing on my objective, because I was getting caught up with what my parents expect of me or worrying about what others might think of me if I really explained to them what was going on in my head. I have feared that I would never be accepted for who I am but I am beginning to understand that although many people would write off my experience as schizophrenia, that there are others who would embrace and even enjoy what I have to offer to their community...

Anyway I'm starting to ramble... Back to the point. Yes, I feel like if anything my experience has shown me my path in life. That it has opened doors to ways of living that I could only imagine when I was younger. I just need the courage to go through those doors, and the common sense to keep me out of trouble. (I have a problem where I become some open at times that I can get myself into trouble)

Anyway it was nice talking. I gotta go smoke a cigarette. I'm going to stay off of ganja for a little while (I'm broke anyway) but I look forward to talking to you guys about all this trippy shit.

Zach

[Manning]

Zach: It all started going wrong when one of my friends wanted to become my blood brother. He cut my wrist with a piece of aluminum can. There wasn't much blood but afterwards I became very paranoid that I might have contracted AIDS. This guy eventually told me that the reason why he was so fucked up on the inside was because he had been raped in prison and had killed the rapist with a pencil to the eye. To this day I don't know if I believe him but it certainly did not make me feel safer around him.

lol. Yeah, I think I can see how that could make a person feel not very secure.

When I was younger I found Jungian psychology really empowering. It seemed to explain so much about the psychic that I had never been taught in school. (I discovered Jung one day in my HS library while avoiding studying for something or other) I grew out of it but I can certainy understand where you are coming from. For me Jung is a little to reductionist(?).

There were two names that those who witnessed my experience labelled it with -- one was "enlightened" and the other was "schizophrenic". Both names frightened me because I didn't know what an "enlightened" person was supposed to be, nor a "schizophrenic" for that matter. At any rate, after the experience was "done" I began searching for answers.

My first glimmer of insight came when a friend recommended Campbell's Hero book. After that, I moved on to the Jungians and found that for the most part, they were the only class of psychology that could recognize a "break with reality" as potentially transformative and self-healing. Rather than denounce it as an indication of illness and pathology, they could interpret the experience as one that could be positive, productive, and life-enhancing. Everything else I read about schizophrenia portrayed a psychotic break as something I'd never recover from. The best case scenario they could present was a life of clinging to sanity via the help of various pills. I didn't feel I was truly schizophrenic though -- I felt something very important had occurred in that space, even if I didn't entirely understand it.

Since that experience I've continued to explore and learn, but some of my best insights have continued to come from the Jungians so they remain a real favorite of mine. R.D. Laing, Stanislov Grof, and more recently, David Lukoff (who had a psychotic break himself) are a few other noted psychiatrists who were willing to go beyond the pre-conceived notions and biases of what the "schizophrenic" experience is all about in order to see the spiritual aspect that is often inherent in the experience.

The experience I had was much more alien, much more strange than anything I had read in a book by Jung. I feel drawn now to, I call it alien psychology for lack of a better word. I feel like my experience was like seeing life through the eyes of a mysterious being far more complex than I could ever imagine.

My own idea of "aliens" centers around little green men. I don't get the impression that's what you're referring to however, but rather, something that could be called a "higher form of intelligence/consciousness". Am I hearing you the way you intended?

Plus I was in an intensive outpatient program and they discouraged the craziness so I repressed a lot of it for awhile.

I suspect that happens a lot. People seem to clue in rather quickly that compliancy is in order in an institutionalized setting. They do what they need to do to get out. There are probably some people who really do require full-time institutionalized care, but I suspect there are many, many others who simply need some support in understanding and integrating their own experience.

I have feared that I would never be accepted for who I am but I am beginning to understand that although many people would write off my experience as schizophrenia, that there are others who would embrace and even enjoy what I have to offer to their community...

I think if you can get with others who have had similar experiences it helps to balance out and normalize your own. Part of what happens in an institutionalized or psychiatric setting is that you're held at a distance. Rarely do others relate to you as a human being who's had a very powerful, often overwhelming, and frequently, transformative life experience. Instead, you become someone who's "sick" amidst the supposed "wellness" of everyone else -- it's as if you have a really bad case of cooties and others are worried they'll "catch" something from you. One of my favorite stories about R.D. Laing deals with that very aspect...</font> As the story goes, R.D. Laing was invited to tour a new psychiatric hospital.
A team of doctors proudly led him through the new state of the art facility and at one point, stopped outside a locked door. They indicated that R.D. Laing should look through the window in the door and when he did, he saw a young girl in her teens who had been stripped of her clothing and placed in one of those padded cells -- she was rocking back and forth. According to her doctors, she had not said a single word since she'd been placed there several months previously. They asked R.D. Laing if he had any suggestions for what could be done.

Without any further explanation, R.D. Laing stripped himself naked, entered the room, and began rocking in the same rhythm as the girl. In less than twenty minutes, she was speaking to him.

"I can't believe none of you thought of that," he later quipped to the team of assembled experts.</font>

[ April 16, 2005, 09:14 PM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[SecondSun]

Manning: Since that experience I've continued to explore and learn, but some of my best insights have continued to come from the Jungians so they remain a real favorite of mine. R.D. Laing, Stanislov Grof, and more recently, David Lukoff (who had a psychotic break himself) are a few other noted psychiatrists who were willing to go beyond the pre-conceived notions and biases of what the "schizophrenic" experience is all about in order to see the spiritual aspect that is often inherent in the experience.

Me: That's cool. I should check those authors out. I've heard of them before but never thought to read up on them.

Manning: My own idea of "aliens" centers around little green men. I don't get the impression that's what you're referring to however, but rather, something that could be called a "higher form of intelligence/consciousness". Am I hearing you the way you intended?

Yeah, that's not the kind of alien I'm talking about. Probably more like the alien inteligence that Terrence McKenna sometimes spoke of when refering to the eschaton... Definetly a higher form of consciousness or being. These beings were probably called demons or angels in the past. They exist side by side with us but ignore us mostly because they know better than to mess us up by revealing themselves to us. (that is if they exist at all) They are strange! All I can say is be careful! Some are helpful and some are just so weird that they might squash you like a bug (at least psychologically) if you don't watch out. Also, the DMT elves and what not, but I consider them to be more like cosmic termites, more of a nuisance than enlightening.

Manning: As the story goes, R.D. Laing was invited to tour a new psychiatric hospital. A team of doctors proudly led him through the new state of the art facility and at one point, stopped outside a locked door. They indicated that R.D. Laing should look through the window in the door and when he did, he saw a young girl who had been stripped of her clothing and placed in one of those padded cells. She was rocking back and forth. According to the doctors, she had not said a single word since she'd been placed there several months previously. They asked R.D. Laing if he had any suggestions for what could be done.

Without any further explanation, R.D. Laing stripped himself naked, entered the room, and began rocking in the same rhythm as the girl. In less than twenty minutes, she was speaking to him.

"I can't believe none of you thought of that," he later quipped to the team of assembled "experts".

Me: That's a great story. Yeah I think most people are freightened by schizophrenia, honestly. I think it's possible that people purposefully shield themselves from the schizophrenics world in order to protect themselves. "Could this happen to me? No, it can't hapen to me. There's got to be something fundamentally different about them. A biological disorder. So I'm safe, because I am sane and they are not." And then you give them medication which makes them more normal and less freightening. But I think when you approach them and allow yourself to listen to what they are saying and watch what they are doing you realize that they are really people like anyone else. They just have a very different perspective, even if a freightening perspective.

(Note: I do not mean to imply that forceful treatment is not necessary when a person poses a danger to themselves or others. But I think there are many schizophrenics in this world who get put in hospitols simply because the community cannot stand to see them pacing around the neighborhood, grimacing, and what not.)

Zach

[Manning]

Probably more like the alien inteligence that Terrence McKenna sometimes spoke of when refering to the eschaton... Definetly a higher form of consciousness or being. These beings were probably called demons or angels in the past. They exist side by side with us but ignore us mostly because they know better than to mess us up by revealing themselves to us. (that is if they exist at all) They are strange! All I can say is be careful! Some are helpful and some are just so weird that they might squash you like a bug (at least psychologically) if you don't watch out. Also, the DMT elves and what not, but I consider them to be more like cosmic termites, more of a nuisance than enlightening.

And this is something I have no experience with whatsoever -- but I'm sure you've already discovered, many others at this board have.

Otherwise, it's late and I do need to sleep sometimes. It's been nice getting to know you Zach, trippy shit and all.

[SecondSun]

Agent smith wrote: "Zach, i haven't got much time to type right now, but i'll just tell you that i can totally relate.

for me, i would make up fictional beings, and then start having them manifest....

i can totally empathize with you.

.,..i'll also say that my 'otherworld' contacts were much stronger when i was a kid before i began using drugs... that's just me... i learned not to talk about it though. "

These were not fictional beings on any account. It's not like I imagined them and then later had a halucination about them, they actually came out of the blue. It wasn't until after I had these encounters that I started to realize that normal people would not have behaved the way they did.

For example, the dread locked dude, the nameless one (not Jesse BTW). First of all, his appearance was human, but he was almost more human than any human on earth. He really looked like you might imagine God to look like. He had "dread locks" but really his hair was almost too complicated and tangled to describe. And then there is what he said "I have no name. I have been here since the begining." Why would any normal sane person say this. Now I do admit that it could have been a halucination, but this guy was just walking down the street when I decided to talk to him. It was very real.

How did your contacts manifest themselves? Did you hear voices? Did you have full on halucinations? Did you see them under the influence of drugs. Did the halucination look like the kind of thing you'd see on drugs or did it look completely real like any normal guy?

That's interesting that the contacts went away when you started using drugs. I think if you can make contact without drugs it's the best way. The way I imagine the action of drugs is that they can stimulate or even overstimulate your different chakras/brain centers and you might not be ready for that. I think that's what happened with me. The drugs opened up doors in my mind but I wasn't ready to walk through and ended up getting hurt.

[silentwolf]

Secondsun ~ Your chakras, what I see as chakras, have no physical counterparts. They are influenced by your emotions and the quantity/quality of energy (ether, chi, prana, orgone, all the same stuff) you have absorbed into yourself. Drugs cannot directly influence these energy centers. The purpose of a chakra is to motivate flow through the energy sphere portion of your energetic body, the sphere that many people refer to as an "aura." This sphere exists from what I have seen on three different Planes; the Material Plane, the Plane of Imagination, and the Plane of Emotion.

More than likely, those things that you saw are quite real, even if they have no Material Plane substance. However, it is possible that they were hallucinations as I understand them to be: a hallucination is a manifestation of the Plane of Imagination that you confuse with a Material Plane manifestation, and mistake for Material existence. It can be difficult at times to tell the two apart; PoI manifestations are quite "solid" and "real" in their own right, whether they are formed by yourself or by another entity and presented to you.

Insanity and sanity are difficult to define, and difficult to tell apart because any of us can be so steeped in delusion that we are unable to notice we are deluded. For this reason, I have defined sanity as anything that relates directly to the pursuit of the three Material Manifestation needs of physical comfort, physical nourishment, and physical reproduction. With this perspective, the pursuit of anything outside of these three things would be considered insane. I state this in my book, adding that the pursuit of anything Spiritual is an insane action. Prepare to accept insanity and embrace it if you actually wish to achieve any type of emotional pleasure in your existence.

Sidecross ~ Anyone who would continue an action that was injuring them both physically and emotionally after recognizing it as such is either stupid or beyond the capacity to help themself without outside assistance. You are ignorant as to what McKenna's response would be to this particular circumstance or my recommendation of not smoking ganja if it's making things worse on you. Furthermore, if you would recommend to a person to continue an action that is injurious to them with no beneficial points whatsoever, you're either an incredibly cruel individual or a complete and total fool. Your obviously self-ingratiating comment was quite nikin. (Woo! Balderdash vocabulary at work.)

[SecondSun]

Silent wolf wrote: Secondsun ~ Your chakras, what I see as chakras, have no physical counterparts. They are influenced by your emotions and the quantity/quality of energy (ether, chi, prana, orgone, all the same stuff) you have absorbed into yourself. Drugs cannot directly influence these energy centers. The purpose of a chakra is to motivate flow through the energy sphere portion of your energetic body, the sphere that many people refer to as an "aura." This sphere exists from what I have seen on three different Planes; the Material Plane, the Plane of Imagination, and the Plane of Emotion.

Ok so maybe drugs don't affect your chakras but they defintely affect your state of consciousness. Is this action merely physical? Why do people halucinate and experience transmissions/telepathy while on drugs? If this is not happening through our chakras then through what?

If it is merely chemical (and therefore an illusion created by the mind) then it would seem there would be no reason to believe that drugs can help us attain higher states of consciousness or understand ourselves/the world better. But isn't that what BOTH is all about, gaining wisdom from entheogens?

[sidecross]

“…Sidecross ~ Anyone who would continue an action that was injuring them both physically and emotionally after recognizing it as such is either stupid or beyond the capacity to help themself without outside assistance. You are ignorant as to what McKenna's response would be to this particular circumstance or my recommendation of not smoking ganja if it's making things worse on you. Furthermore, if you would recommend to a person to continue an action that is injurious to them with no beneficial points whatsoever, you're either an incredibly cruel individual or a complete and total fool. Your obviously self-ingratiating comment was quite nikin. (Woo! Balderdash vocabulary at work.)”

Your diagnosis that I am a case of ‘either-or” is absurd.

[MidnightDreary]

I mean like have you guys seen people who just totally walked out of the woodwork and then manifest a kilo of the sweetest buds out of thin air and then said "catch on the other side" and walked around a corner and he was gone in like thin air. Ok so this never happened to me but *this* is the kind of stuff that should start happening soon.Amen, brother. A-fucking-MEN! Regardless of whether or not this is possible, it certainly is the kind of thing that should be happening.

[Manning]

These were not fictional beings on any account. It's not like I imagined them and then later had a halucination about them, they actually came out of the blue. It wasn't until after I had these encounters that I started to realize that normal people would not have behaved the way they did.

When people have these kind of experiences I think a few things have to happen for them. The first is that they get through the experience, the second is that they return from the experience, the third is that they heal (if necessary), the fourth is that they be able to frame their experience into something that feels rational to them and could probably be accepted as reasonably rational by a number of other people, and the fifth is that they move on in their lives in a reasonably purposeful and productive manner.

That doesn't mean that they put their experience behind them or never speak of it again, but rather, that they integrate it into themselves, interweaving the personal lessons they learned from the experience into their daily lives.

For example, the dread locked dude, the nameless one (not Jesse BTW). First of all, his appearance was human, but he was almost more human than any human on earth. He really looked like you might imagine God to look like. He had "dread locks" but really his hair was almost too complicated and tangled to describe. And then there is what he said "I have no name. I have been here since the begining." Why would any normal sane person say this. Now I do admit that it could have been a halucination, but this guy was just walking down the street when I decided to talk to him. It was very real.

One possibility to consider is what you bring to the experience. For example, millions of people drink water every day. However, if you are dying of thirst and someone brings you a glass of water, that water (and the bringer thereof) transcends normalcy -- the water is now life-giving elixer and the person who delivered it to you is nothing short of a god. Yet, the water is just water. The person is just a person. What altered the experience from one of ordinariness to unordinariness was the extremity of your thirst.

In an altered state of consciousness, ordinary events can often take on supercharged meaning. Profound coincidences and synchronicities can be found, sometimes no matter where you turn. Whether the events themselves were "real" or not becomes irrelevant at some point -- what is undeniably real is your response to those events. So, I think that's a good wading in point. Not with, 'Was it real? Would it be real to others?' but with, 'It was real to me.' It's in your own response to that realness that your personal lessons and insights can be found.

Probably one of the most meaningful lessons in my own experience was awareness of the microcosm within the macrocosm. Essentially, my experience revolved around several "stories" nested one within the other -- at a certain point, that "story" went cosmic. I still can't necessarily articulate a great deal of what occurred at some of those "higher" levels, but I can map out the "lower" levels with relative ease now. Although I feel that my whole life was taking me to exactly that particular place, I can also point to a position on a timeline and say, "This is where it started, and this is why it started." Those explanations are rational to me and rational to others.

However, I'm also aware that there are multiple "levels" of experience that can be applied against any given occurrance. Right now, you and I are relating to each other through this dialogue. But on another level, we may be relating to each other in an entirely different way. I've also learned that contrary to what ever anyone else suggested at that time, that experience was not an end-point. It was a new beginning, and I still have an awful lot to learn. So that's what I'm doing. But I'm also attending to each of those levels to the best of my ability. My life is stable, I work, I raise a family, I pay my bills, I cook and shop and do dishes -- in other words, I also live an ordinary life within this level of experience.

[ April 17, 2005, 06:42 AM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[daniel]

hi secondsun,

thanks for elaborating on your own experiences in this thread - and thanks for the apology at the beginning.

Your experiences are not unique. Many people I know have told me of similar experiences, and I have experienced things that are quite similar (though not exactly the same). I think that such experiences are both catalysts for further growth and sort of tests. Part of the test is that you have to become mature enough not to get completely attached to the specialness of your story (for instance, thinking you have met the "real" visionary entities, and other people have not). Everyone who is evolving in this way is going through their own particular initiation process, shaped by their own karma and consciousness, revealing itself in its own unique way. According to the Sufi philosopher Fritjoh Schuon, the Sufi vision sees the world as a "divine play" of cosmic receptacles and divine unveilings. We are the receptacles, and the unveiling is now underway.

For one quite similar account to yours, check out a book by Timothy Wylie, Dolphins, Angels, and Extraterrestrials (I think that's the title - something like that.)

I also recommend McKenna's True Hallucinations - what is important for me in this book is the notion that the "other" reveals itself through the maximizing or intensifying of cognitive dissonance, until all of our mental categories collapse. This is what happened to him in the Amazon - and it seems to be the pattern also suggested by the crop circles.

Also check out Grant Morrison's account of his "alien abduction" account, which should be on-line somewhere.

more later...

[Manning]

Part of the test is that you have to become mature enough not to get completely attached to the specialness of your story (for instance, thinking you have met the "real" visionary entities, and other people have not).

Is maturity truly the issue? It seems to me that if you go through an experience that you've never experienced before and may not have even heard of anyone else going through, it's going to weird you out to a certain degree. As you encounter other people who have been through similar experiences there seems to be a natural tendency for that attachment of weirdness or specialness, (which Zach has already stated he isn't), to naturally drop away.

To me, it's not so much maturity (which implies a value judgement I'm really not sure any of us is capable of making) as much as it is setting. Against the backdrop of the Amazonian rain forest, shamanistic experiences are ordinary and commonplace; against the backdrop of middle-class westernized suburbia, they're an oddity.

[ April 17, 2005, 11:02 AM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[silentwolf]

Originally posted by SecondSun:

Ok so maybe drugs don't affect your chakras but they defintely affect your state of consciousness. Is this action merely physical? Why do people halucinate and experience transmissions/telepathy while on drugs? If this is not happening through our chakras then through what?

If it is merely chemical (and therefore an illusion created by the mind) then it would seem there would be no reason to believe that drugs can help us attain higher states of consciousness or understand ourselves/the world better. But isn't that what BOTH is all about, gaining wisdom from entheogens?Well Zach, I see it like this: the body is an anchor to this Material Plane for your consciousness. What you experience as "Zach" is the half-way point between reception and transmission ~ this why the deepest "you" is always an observer. When you take anything into your body, it modifies how you are able to receive and transmit signals. From this perspective, the entheogens don't actually alter your consciousness, even though we call it "altered states of consciousness"; in effect, they really modify your perceptions by changing the way you're anchored in the Material Plane.

Your body, the CNS in particular, is set up in such a way to attract awareness to it, filter it through its own perceptions, and then broadcast these perceptions back out to the point of origin. This is why you can be "knocked unconscious." When your CNS gets shocked, your awareness will be received in a different manner or not at all. All those little chemicals in your grey matter work like crystals in a radio; change them around a little bit and you start tapping into different channels.

You can switch channels without taking any chemicals into yourself with the proper techniques. All of these techniques, including using entheogens, are designed to shock your body and break it free of the normal, trained mode we tend to operate in. We by nature are fleshly beings of habit, and it takes something forceful to switch our receptivity off of the normal mode and into something that is less restricted. This is why you hear of people becoming "delusional" and "hallucinating" after periods of severe stress ~ the body transceiver is trying to change channels to relieve an energy pattern that will literally physically destroy it.

One of the reason that governments and leaders are against these changes in people is because it pulls people out of their set patterns, making them impossible to control and predict. You lose the bonds of control and slavery when you switch channels and enter a different pattern of action. To someone who is tied into the three "sane" ideals, these actions are completely bizarre and irrational. They cannot understand the process you're going through because only experience brings understanding, and they haven't experienced it yet. Control through medication is common because they're trying to stop the body's chemical ability to "change the channel" and pull out of their "work to earn others money and they'll give you a little share of the profits, and then you can just give them the money back to get the things you really need" channel.

You really are insane, Zach, but it's not a bad thing. At least you're free now, and mentally explosive enough for them to not really want to try modifying you to their needs.

[SecondSun]

Thanks Daniel, for the book suggestions. I think the hardest part of the experience is trying to figure out what I should believe happened or believe is happening to others who have had similar experiences. I feel tempted to believe that there are extradimensional beings out there who are helping us to some degree in the shift. Then at other times I decide that this is ridiculous and that everything I experienced must have just been an illusion produced by my mind.

It would be so great if we had a tradition of shamans or healers who were familiar on a personal level with these kinds of experiences and the difficulty in integrating them with our lives. I feel so cheated by the healthcare system. Here I've had an important personal experience and they deny that it has any validity.

Yes, I think there is a tendency for me to believe that what happened to me was real and that only a select group of people experience these kinds of things and that it is special somehow. I shouldn't discount others experiences simply because it was not exactly like mine. There experience was just as real as mine.

Anyway I'll check out the books. Hopefully they will provide some insight into the whole thing.

[Manning]

I think the hardest part of the experience is trying to figure out what I should believe happened or believe is happening to others who have had similar experiences.

It sounds as if you are applying the value of discernment. You might find it helpful to simply allow that that is what you're doing. Discernment means you might take some things on, both from your own experience and from the experiences of others, for the sake of examination and evaluation. Now might not be the time to put together a complete picture. You'll likely discard some aspects of those experiences and keep those that resonate for you as you move through that discernment/examination/evaluation process.

Forms of spiritual emergence that become spiritual emergency probably require a minimum of one year to integrate/heal from ... if you're in an ideal, supportive environment. If you're not in that kind of environment, (and most of us aren't), three years might be more typical. But it can take much, much longer. In my personal explorations, I've met at least one woman who took eighteen years to move through her own process. No doubt, that movement was complicated by the often well-intentioned, but ultimately, self-indulgent actions of the psychiatric community. The old adage, "To thine own self, be true," is worth packing in your kit bag. Learn from everyone, but don't feel obligated to accept that everyone has a lesson of personal value to offer. This is a good rule of thumb to hold of everyone you encounter from this point forward on your path.

[ April 18, 2005, 10:37 PM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[daniel]

maybe maturity isn't the word, but it is closer than "setting."

many people i know report periods where a series of occult or synchronistic events happen to them over a short period of time, and they begin to feel they are somehow in control of the process, that they are creating their reality. As soon as they become confident about it, the episodes cease - this is what one friend of mine called a "synchronicity drop."

having observed this phenomena in my own life, my feeling is that it does take maturity (not quite the same as psychological or emotional maturity, but similar) to not get too caught up with the events or attached to the magic, to feel that somehow your ego is manifesting the situations. If you would like the "synchronicity drop" to continue you have to stay calm and non-attached and humble about the whole thing - realize that it is not your consciousness or your plan that is running the show, but that there is only one consciousness (Atman), and it is also part of the same plan.

I have also learned that beneath the dreamlike chaos of such events one can eventually find the linking pattern which will show you what the particular contacts meant in connection with your particular life. It is as if you are being an occult riddle to solve through a series of clues. Rudolf Steiner wrote about an "occult language" that speaks in events - the difficult task is becoming skilled at reading the events while enmeshed in them or even long after. This does seem to require maturity.

[silentwolf]

I agree with you in part on that, Daniel. The ego is incapable of performing any type of magic whatsoever, aside from casting illusions upon your perceptions. Magic is performed by the motivation of energy by Emotional force ~ this is why emotionally disturbed people tend to manifest a lot of different effects around them unintentionally, like popping the tops off of shampoo bottles, bursting water pipes, creating rain indoors, and killing plants and animals with their mere presence. As long as the "you" is detached from your effects and you continue to maintain an appropriate level of desire, it is possible to manifest anything. The disbelief of the many towards this regard is the main barrier which stops the practice of the few; this disbelief in itself is a strong work of magic simply because of the detachment and the desire for these works to not occur.

A lot of people talk philosophically about the One without ever experiencing it themselves. This is why the old saying "Those who speak do not know, those who know do not speak," is so popular. Immersing yourself in the philosophies of those who have seen, those who profess to have seen, and those believed to have seen will not help you see for yourself. Only practice can bring you to that point...and where is this practice in the life of the scholar?

[Manning]

maybe maturity isn't the word, but it is closer than "setting."

Maybe we're speaking of two different things.

When you went through your experience it was planned, it was anticipated, and there were others around you to provide reassurance if it was required. It doesn't sound as if Zach had that kind of preparation or anticipation. Nor has he had the digestion time you have. I also don't recall you being arrested, feeling physically threatened by anyone who boasted about killing someone else (with a pencil through the eye), or having spent any time in a mental institution as a result of your experience -- unless you left those parts out of your book. The setting/backdrop of his experience has been different from yours, as well as different from mine.

[ April 18, 2005, 04:35 PM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[Manning]

"Those who speak do not know, those who know do not speak,"

Ugh. That's like this one...

Student: What does "enlightened" mean?

Master: If you have to ask, you don't know. But I do, so there! Na-na-da-boo-boo!

Sheesh! Talk about games in spiritual oneupmanship.

You'd think that someone who was enlightened would not only have the wherewithal to talk about it, but would encourage others to talk about it too. After all, if we're all "One" and the enlightened person is enlightened enough to realize it, why the heck not share the wealth? It all reminds me of this story told by Joel Kramer and Diana Alstad...

</font> In an article on "spiritual masters" (Omni, March 1990), a disciple of an Eastern guru recounted a vignette to illustrate how his master could teach a profound lesson in a few words.
The guru was having a temple built in his honor. Disciples from all over the world had come to the cornerstone ceremony with treasures, many of them of considerable value, to be buried in the large hole under the foundation. The narrator had been chosen as the first to deposit his offering in the hole. He describes how in his pride at being selected to be first, he chose a large rock and enthusiastically threw it in. He then looked at his master, who said to him quietly, "Too much 'getting' is going on here." The man concluded by saying: that his humbled ego became far wiser as a result of those few words.

For the chastised disciple, the guru's lesson was a statement that his giving was not pure enough. Another entirely different interpretation of the above scenario is possible: To have a temple built in one's honor and then to further waste valuable gifts by burying them to symbolize one's greatness is a sign of a monumental ego that has little constraint. One of the cheapest guru ploys is to make people feel inadequate by showing how their behaviors are tainted with self-centeredness-always an easy task. This guru, who was the recipient of all of this "getting, could not even share a little of it with his disciple without making him feel bad about himself. Perhaps the disciple's gift, a mere rock, was not grand enough. But since the guru is viewed by his disciples as a person beyond duality and beyond ego, they could not even entertain the possibility of our interpretation.

Consequently, the disciple entirely missed the real lesson of history: The guru's "getting" and self-enhancement are masked by images of enlightenment and selflessness and thus are made unconscious. Once his purity and hence superiority are taken for granted, it is assumed that he deserves to be "getting" precisely because he is thought enlightened. He can thus reprimand his disciple for the very activity he was involved in on a far grander scale without it seeming hypocritical. Who gets and who gives is never questioned because "spiritual" values mask what is really going on.

Oneness, Enlightenment & The Mystical Experience (http://www.american-buddha.com/oneness.enlight.htm#ONENESS,%20ENLIGHTENMENT,%20AN D%20THE%20MYSTICAL%20EXPERIENCE)</font>

[ April 18, 2005, 06:29 PM: Message edited by: Manning ]

[Agent Smith]

actually i've always understood it that 'those who know don't speak' for a variety of reasons usually along the lines of 'you'd never believe it anyway, till it's happened to you'...

...this has been my experience over the last year, when talking about things out of the ordinary to folks who said they wanted to know. they didn't want to know... they just wanted their egos validated, by hearing their own thoughts repeated back to them... a man can become a very rich parrot, and beloved holy man that way... (i've seen it happen)

...and i only talked because i wanted my ego validated by having people tell me how clever and interesting i was... which totally only cheapened the clever, and interesting experiences i had, for me...

who says the ego doesn't have it's own magic?

'synchronisity drop' can be explained very easily by most practicing magicians...'doubt', 'unconscious counter intention', etc.... while one is unaware that they are creating 'synchronisities' it's easy to slip one by the deep unconscious, when one steps up to the plate to take credit for it, even if one is completely consciously congruent about it, deeper unconscious counter intentions, sometimes culturally patterned (like karma, or 'selflessness'-how many gifted healers/magicians seem completely unable to use their abilities for themselves?) can skew things...

...ah, you'd never believe me anyway...

[Manning]

actually i've always understood it that 'those who know don't speak' for a variety of reasons usually along the lines of 'you'd never believe it anyway, till it's happened to you'...

That may well be, but not speaking because you feel you won't or can't be understood, or not speaking because you feel you won't be heard, or not speaking because you don't have the language to express those events, or not speaking because it feels too personal or sacred, or not speaking because it could bring harm to you or your loved ones, or not speaking because solitude has its own worth... this is not the same as not speaking because you know.

- There have been many who spoke who knew.
- There have been many who have not spoken, who did not know.
- There have been many who have not spoken who knew.
- There have been many who have spoken who did not know.

Speaking or not speaking is not what defines knowing. Knowing is what defines knowing, regardless of whether that knowing remains spoken or unspoken.

[jezebelle]

you know I love you guys . . . everybody.
I can put up with the slings and arrows of outragious everyday life, and know there will always be a sane idea being tossed about, here.
Nice post(s). Thank you.

[silentwolf]

I think the main point behind "Those who speak do not know, those who know do not speak" was to get people to shut the hell up and start doing. I personally only try to talk enough to either improve my own practice by engaging others, or to encourage others to practice. Yeah, I do enjoy having my ego stroked, because it feels good. Is that normal? Definately! One of the things about the nature of a human is that we form our perspectives by our ego, and our ego alters the way we interpret our perceptions.

I've seen and done a lot of crazy shit, but I don't like to talk about that because it gets people to start looking up at me, and expecting more out of me, and testing me, et cetera. I prefer to just walk someone through an exercise so we can see what they're capable of performing. I get a lot more joy out of seeing a doubter motivate energy around than I do when I show them a trick of my own...I guess the real trick is in getting these people to start practicing. That's why when I wrote my book, I intentionally did not reference myself until the very end, when I gave some encouragement; I didn't want myself to stand in the way of anyone's practice.

If you've seen "it" but you can't put it into words, and people wouldn't understand what you were talking about anyways, then you might as well just give them the same techniques that let you see "it" and watch what they can do.

[whitewave]

If you listen to your heart rather than your head, you will know when to speak and what to say and how to say it so what you are saying will be easily understood. When you try to speak the heart's truth from the mind, you end up confusing people. I witnessed this weekend working with the "famous" poet Li-Young Li. He got so caught up in the process of his brain as he spoke to us of where his poetry came from (something about the acausal nothingness) that he confused most of the people in the class who had not thought about any of the ideas we talk about here on the board (which was everyone but me.) It was strange sitting there listening to him--I could tell he had never read Steiner, for instance, and that he had hit a wall in his thinking that he couldn't go past because he was afraid of his heart. I could also tell that he was reaching toward an understanding of the concept of Logos, but wasn't letting himself go there because he believed so strongly in a completely random universe. I chose to keep silent because I knew that if I spoke it would be my ego speaking, namely because the class was not ready to hear what I had to say. I did give Li-Young a reading list after the workshop however. He's a powerful poet, it would be nice to bring him into the fold. I agree with Silentwolf that the best way to communicate is on the experiential level. For example, the week before I took the workshop with the yoga poet. He communicated all we speak of here through the gnosis of the body--he led us into these experiences through our breath. He didn't have to tell us anything. Maybe the issue is how we speak, how we keep silent. Maybe we need to remember we have many ways to speak besides our voicebox.