Book #2, Never Published- For Melinda C.

Engaging Our Launch Sequence In Life

We have arrived at the 50th anniversary of this amazing Apollo 11 mission!

“We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people. For space science, like nuclear science and all technology, has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for good or ill depends on man, and only if the United States occupies a position of pre-eminence can we help decide whether this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war. I do not say that we should or will go unprotected against the hostile misuse of space any more than we go unprotected against the hostile use of land or sea, but I do say that space can be explored and mastered without feeding the fires of war, without repeating the mistakes that man has made in extending his writ around this globe of ours.

There is no strife, no prejudice, no national conflict in outer space as yet. Its hazards are hostile to us all. Its conquest deserves the best of all mankind, and its opportunity for peaceful cooperation may never come again. But why, some say, the Moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask, why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?

We choose to go to the Moon! We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win, and the others, too.”

—-President John F. Kennedy, September 12, 1962

One of the greatest inspirations to the human imagination is the contemplation of, and then the preparation for, the launch of a new mission into the mysterious and the unknown. Can we become curious, and then obsessive, about a higher potential for our lives than we might be currently experiencing and expressing? Does the thought of newer, more diverse and healthier possibilities for life stir deep desire for change for all of us who continue to suffer and struggle?   Do we dare to “shoot for the moon”, or should we just remain tethered to our launch pad, and accept a grounded life experience for the rest of our Earth time?

This book is not for people who want to stay grounded and unconscious. Instead, it is for those who want to understand why they are not experiencing freedom and joy, while soaring upward into new dimensions of being and doing. I address our personal and collective consciousness, the impact of religous thought upon society and the individual, the potential for both dysfunction and recovery, as well as our attempts at connection with humanity’s highest potential. I point out the darkened movements of human energy that have become the underlying foundation for “toxic masculinity”, a name coined to encompass all that is detrimental to the male version of the human spirit.

I discuss at length the Common Knowledge Game, which refers to the process by which we all share reality, yet also may become imprisoned by the way that we form words, ideas, and judgements against our self and the other, while attempting to maintain society’s often times twisted notions of what normal social connections should look like,  These life lessons were not gained in a classroom, or sitting at the feet of an Indian guru. My experience, and resulting wisdom, is derived from an immersion into real life, through work, love relationships, friends, family, and my healing response to past self-destructive attitudes and behavior..

In 1962, President Kennedy proposed a great adventure for America. I ask that the reader substitute the word “mind” or “the interior dimensions of our selves” for the words “moon” and “space” in the President’s quote, and thus create a new proposal for another fantastic voyage to the center of our self.  I use the Apollo 11 American experience of a moon landing as a metaphor for what we all might accomplish, should we each strive to place spiritual integrity, wholeness, love, and truth into our own spiritual rocket engines as fuel

Never forget the old aphorism:

“as within, so without”

because the trips that we take into both the outer and inner spaces are intimate traveling companions on the same unpredictable journey through life, eternally being two sides of the same divine coin that humanity has been minted from.

High Flight, by John Gillespie Magee Jr.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, –and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of –Wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air…
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark or even eagle flew —
And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

Let us all now prepare to slip these surly bonds of Earth!

Think you can , think you can’t. Either way, you are right!

—–Henry Ford

Our Three Stage Vehicle

Argue for your limitations, and they are yours!

—–Richard Bach

Those who are permanently grounded in life, and not even aware of their limitations, are the truly unconscious ones of our world. Yet, what about those individuals, and the society’s that support them, who finally become aware of their limitations, and then argue for their continuation? This resistance to change is the friction in life that becomes the foundation for chaos, and most personal and social disease.

For those who choose to awaken, our launch day has arrived.  Today we can all become spiritual astronauts and be launched into higher energy orbits by our own healing, insight, and awareness.  It remains up to us as individuals to start our own unique “launch sequence” into the exalted spiritual orbits, and this has always been true, regardless of the status of our national leadership, or the particular religious path that we are, or are not, currently following. Many individuals and small groups of people have been embracing healing changes and spiritual awakening since time immemorial, though, collectively, our country currently appears to be resistant to initiating its launch sequence towards healing on international and national levels

Our “launch pad of life” is the current conditions under which we are now living, and all of our individual and collective dysfunction. The resistance to healing has resulted in a marked increase in anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and mental illness in our general population, for both men and women. Simultaneously there is also an epidemic of white middle-aged American men dying at earlier ages than would be statistically forecast, for at least the past 25 years. And the two years following the US Presidential election has revealed the appearance of a burgeoning divide between major elements within the population, and the behavior of the new President has certainly added to the collective stress and worry. Trump related extreme anxiety strikes our nation, or TREASON for short, and this phenomenon has made its mark on the national soul, though his “base” continues to delight in the POTUS’s ‘in your face” hostility and dysfunction..

Mr. Trump is not the cause of the national crisis.  Our president is only a manifestation or symptom of a national disease for major blocks of people who feel that they have been neglected, ignored, or persecuted.  Many people on either side of the divide have felt that way most of their lives, and they continue to self-diagnose and treat themselves for their own stress, loneliness, and anxiety.   It is dangerous behavior to self-medicate, and much too easy to choose the immediately available remedies of drugs, alcohol, and/or awkward and outdated political and religious ideologies to treat symptoms of our national disease.  I have witnessed mental illness, religious fanaticism, rigid fundamentalism, self-destructive addictions, and the early death syndrome of the white American male through many of my co-workers, friends, family members, and acquaintances, and, even through myself.  I have developed a few insights and observations over the course of my life, and those insights complement my efforts to bring healing to personal and to national wounds.

Our lives may become a “Miracle Experiment”, in which we attempt to penetrate our cultural conspiracy of silence, the conspiracy that keeps mankind imbalanced and diseased, and prevents humanity from achieving its collective potential. Note that I indicate that we may penetrate the conspiracy of silence, rather than dispel it, as the power of the collective experience still dominates human consciousness. Our lives will not have been lived in vain, however, if we become part of the massive movement to heal the American soul.

During the course of my work career, I was a mail clerk, maintenance mechanic, electrician, computer engineer, and instrument and electronic technician. I assisted in the building and subsequent technical support of the operation of multi-billion dollar chip fabrication plants in Oregon, and maintaining the pumping and delivery systems of the entire fresh water supply to the City of Portland, among many other less economically significant endeavors. I learned not only how to put people and material together to get a desired result, but also how to troubleshoot and repair systems that have become defective due to wear or poor initial engineering. I worked in a male dominated industry, and I had the privilege of working with many top notch men over the course of my career. The best managers balanced the need for productivity with the needs of the people performing the work, and I walked that balance beam as best I could.

As both a manager and a worker in the field, I dealt with cooperative and productive workers, but I also was to encounter innumerable damaged, broken, and even dangerous men, and I sometimes struggled with engaging with them directly, and meeting their needs. With the vast personality differences distributed throughout our industry, employment could be both extremely challenging and fulfilling as we all attempted to navigate the often times turbulent waters of male dominated work experience..

I would frequently wonder how any work gets successfully accomplished, especially with the diversity of interests and conflicts in philosophies and mutual negative personality assessments that characterized the crews that worked with each other. The desire to continue to eat and to prevent one’s homelessness through retaining employment motivates most socially distressed and diseased people to avoid physical violence with others. Fortunately for the peaceful and the non-violent employees, the need to eat by the violent ones exceeds the need to beat others, most days.  Many of these intellectually and emotionally challenged workers continue to resonate with Donald Trump’s personality defects and spiritual poverty, and celebrate it as if it were their own.

The unconscious men tended to be minimally cooperative, overly competitive, antagonistic and verbally violent, misogynistic, judgmental, hateful, superstitious, jealous, racist, misanthropic, and abusive, both within the workplace and at their homes,  Several of these victims of their own unconsciousness were to become murderers, sexual perverts, child abusers, wife beaters, thieves, liars, cheaters, saboteurs, suicide victims, heroin addicts, alcoholics, and, generally,  the “six-o’clock news” worthy characters.  These are the men that may appear to be permanently grounded in a dangerous, collective unreality of fear, hatred, and mutual distrust.

As a result, I did not leave employment and enter retirement with a balanced, healthy attitude towards much of the male population, so I began to troubleshoot and repair my own life system.  Why was I not able to soar to great spiritual heights with many of my male compatriots while still employed?   What might have been my role in the proliferation of disease and enmity within the work environment?  Can I successfully search for higher degrees of understanding of myself and all of our fellow males, our beloved females, and the healing potential for all of us, including the planet Earth?  And, why were so many of my male friends and acquaintances dying so young? Finally, what was the true relationship of the overall dysfunction within our culture, and within the toxicity of the male mind?

The lunar orbiter/landing craft of our 1969 moon landing utilized a three stage rocket booster to get it into space.  Coincidentally, it has been proposed by others that the human being has three potential stages of consciousness, the unconscious stage, the aware stage, and the self-aware stage,  I utilize this three-stage model to represent the potential for growth and evolution of human consciousness, though there are other accepted models of more complex natures available for understanding. Without all of these stages of the rocket booster, or of our collective and individual spiritual evolution and unfoldment, our transcendence of the boundaries of planet Earth, and our egos, remain only an unfulfilled dream, and we would have no hope of reaching the promising new frontiers.

In the first stage of our unfoldment as human beings, we spend most of our time in the unconscious state, and we are chained to life’s launching pad.  We are basically living life through our habits of thought, without a second thought about their ultimate source, or our subsequent behavior inspired by those inchoate impressions.  Relationships are more defined by power and control issues, and passive/aggressive styles of interaction predominate.  Fear, isolation. or tribalism and following the herd, superstitious reasoning around hope and faith, social insecurity, chronic emotional illness and scarcity consciousness, and a disconnect with nature and the resultant lack of connection with Earth and nature are the dark results.  There is little sense of curiosity, awe, mystery, and wonder while remaining chained to this state of being.  Suffering is our present and future experience.  We pursue pleasure to excess, as we neglect the healthier needs of our bodies. We may even attempt to destroy our lives and/or the lives of others through actions motivated by our chronic despair,  We are consumed by our personal sense of self, and our often falteringly attempt to preserve and protect it, most times at the exclusion of all others unlike ourselves. In this first stage of our unfoldment, humanity forever exists on the launching pad of life, while never fully engaging the launch sequence for the truth of existence, with its spiritually empowered expression.

While in the aware state, which is the second stage of our unfoldment, we may begin the “launch sequence” for our rocket ship of life, and engage in more conscious behavior such as self improvement and personal goal setting and achieving. We still are influenced by the opinions of others, though we are starting to tune into our self. This second state of human evolution does not supply all of the conditions for transcending the self and its limitations, though it gives enough insight to indicate that a change of heart can be a desirable outcome.  Hope and faith take on a different meaning for those in the second stage as from those still stuck in the first stage, because now hope and faith become expressions of a more conscious personal intention.  We now believe in the possibility that we can actually transcend ourselves and our problems, and we start drawing our resources together in anticipation of the beginning of the greatest adventure that life can offer.  We become sincere in our desire to improve ourselves, and to  reach out, however falteringly, to make amends to those we may have harmed while in our unconscious state. We begin to open our hearts to others, and desire to help those who may be less fortunate.

There is now a lot of activity around the launching pad, and in the second stage of our unfoldment, we become willing to leave the safe confines of our lives and set our intention for exploring the unknown. Our “higher power”  gives us hints that we have access to a much greater wisdom and power. We may continue to believe that we are not worthy, or we may still be a little overweight with hubris, either of which delays our launch date, until the weather conditions improve.  We are beginning to see that the boundary between self and other is a lot vaguer than we ever thought possible.  We accept personal responsibility for our thoughts and actions, and become concerned about the influence of our behavior on others. We might wonder what our next step in life is at this stage, which starts catalyzing that spiritual rocket fuel in our souls.

The third stage of our  unfoldment is the self-aware state, which is achieved once one has not only left the launching pad, but has also transcended the boundaries of the historical self.  We can now soar into the new, unexplored mysteries of human spiritual potential and love for all being, human, animal, and the whole of the planet Earth.  We see that, in our true essence, we are a hologram of the whole, and our intentions now carry the need to protect, honor, and enhance the health and well-being of the totality of life, and not just that of our family, friends, neighborhood, country of origin, or species.. We become consumed by our impacts upon the world, and upon each other.  A driving question of existence becomes how we can be of greater service to the ignorant and/or less fortunate among us, including the animal world.  We are no longer consumed by our personal sense of self and what others might think or expect of us.  Personal suffering is transmuted to compassion and empathy, and we have the experience of transcendence and mysticism.  Our higher power is no longer a theory, but a living, breathing reality residing in our hearts.  We are now rocketing into a new dimension of being.  From this exalted position, all that we see, and ever will see, unto eternity, is ourselves, and our primary action in this world is to bring more love to our Self.

Why would anybody ever want to become more consciously aware as a human being? Why would anybody ever want to explore the unknown and unknowable within one’s self, and leave the safety and security of all of one’s accumulated life experience? Why would anybody ever want to begin to question, and, potentially, then abandon, all of one’s personal knowledge, especially the memories that lead to one’s suffering? Why would anybody ever want to commit several thousand hours of their valuable time in reading about religion and spirituality, enhancing introspection, developing intuition and insight, making amends to ALL people and institutions that we have harmed through our ignorance, improving the mysterious practices of both meditation and prayer, and exploring new meetings and workshops with strangers?

Why would anybody ever want to develop the intention of transforming one’s life so as to be happier, healthier, and better connected with the greater meaning and purpose available? Why would anybody ever want to undertake the epic journey of transforming oneself, and being reborn into a new reality where the will to live and prosper is an innate part of being? Why would anybody want to take up the spiritual mantle of all consciously realized human beings who have ever lived, and attempt to carry that energy forward into a new, unique life experience, while blessing other people’s lives, as well as one’s own?  Why would anyone ever want to rocket themselves into another, infinitely more expansive vision and dimension of existence?

We have been called to be the “truth tellers” of the world, which releases us from the bondage to the past and the unhealthy conditioning that keeps unaware people eternally chained to the launching pad of life.  The following book is the story of my own preparation of my launching pad for spirit, and may it bless each of us in a way that benefits the most of us.  And, even if our own life appears to be the only life to be positively impacted by our own unique hero’s journey, that is MORE THAN ENOUGH.

Every great dream begins with a dreamer.  Always remember, you have within you the strength, patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.

—–Harriet Tubman

Quick Fix, Anyone?

Maybe I should carry a skateboard rather than a spare tire? It is MacGyver time!

A “quick fix” is a name for an easy remedy or solution, especially a temporary one, and which typically fails to address underlying problems. Shallow, incomplete, unsafe, and/or wishful thinking are the sources for these solutions, and they are usually fueled by political, spiritual and economic opportunists. Like with fad diets and self-help books, if we start with a shallow mind with little stomach or intention to change, a quick fix solution sure looks good on us for a little while. It is like buying a new outfit and strutting around like we were like the vacuous king in the fable of the Emperor’s New Clothes, hoping that we might capture the other’s attention and approval, even while becoming fearful of being called out for that foolishness by “the innocent boy”.

What is next in the queue for us, drive through healing? How about five minute meditations for transformation and prosperity? Have you considered that new diet that guarantees weight loss and immortality? Or, I am sure you have seen a thousand different variations of books that promises that all of your prayers will be answered if you would just pray the one special way offered by the starving author?.

If we do not understand the system that we are trying to repair, we are only introducing more chaos into an already unstable process, and we risk introducing further damage to, or the complete destruction of, an already compromised life. We need to proceed carefully and consciously as we look for the causes for our individual and cultural distresses. Before we repair any complex system such as our life, and our society, we must intelligently and logically troubleshoot it with the best tools and techniques presently available.

Troubleshooting Logic and Techniques

The desire to fix a treasured object that has been damaged, or to bring a cure to a child’s disease is a manifestation of love. Love must be the guiding light while anyone facilitates repairs and regeneration of any broken person, place, or thing. Bringing a hammer to a situation that requires a jeweler’s screw driver is a typical overreaction, and is self defeating and reveals a life looking for greater sensitivity and insight into itself. It is our desire to repair and improve, not damage further and destroy, so a conscious process must be undertaken to initiate repairs to a malfunctioning system.

Troubleshooting is a form of problem solving, often applied to repair failed products or processes on a machine or a system or even a human life. It is a logical, systematic search for the source of a problem in order to solve it, and make the product or process or person operational again. The first step in good problem analysis is to describe the problem completely. Without a problem description, we will not know where to start investigating the cause of the problem. Is it a systemic failure, is it limited to just one component, is it transient or constant in nature.

This step includes asking ourselves such basic questions as:

What are the symptoms?
Where is the problem happening?
When does the problem happen?
Under which conditions does the problem happen?
has the problem been occurring in others not physically present?

What Are The Symptoms?

When starting to describe a problem, the most obvious question is “What is the problem?” This might seem like a straightforward question; however, it can be broken down into several other questions to create a more descriptive picture of the problem. These questions can include:

Who or what is reporting the problem?
What are the symptoms and feedback messages?
How do we fail? For example: loop or repetition of unnecessary or unwanted behavior, hang or quitting or stopping before a process is successfully completed, performance degradation, incorrect attitude.
What is the affect on all relationships?

Where Is The Problem Happening?

Determining where the problem originates is not always easy, but it is one of the most important steps in resolving a problem. Many layers of (mis)understanding can exist between the reporting and failing components of the personal system under review. The supporting society, family, and network of friends are only a few components to be considered when we are investigating problems.

Is the problem isolated and specific, or common to multiple arenas within life?
Is the current environment and understanding capable of being supported by a healing intention, or are broader, more encompassing changes necessary?
Are reports of problems originating within the self, others, or a combination of the two?
Are there currently cultural power brokers attempting to dictate the way life’s route should be traveled?
Is the source of the history of the problem purely an individual one, or universal in its expression?

These types of questions will help us isolate the problem layer, and are necessary to determine the problem source. Remember that just because one layer or part of our self is reporting a problem, it does not always mean the root cause exists there.

Part of identifying where a problem is occurring is understanding the environment in which it exists. We should always take some time to completely describe the problem environment, including the historical mindset, its present understanding, all corresponding intentions, and biological health information. Confirm that we are operating within an environment that can be of support to us, or that, conversely, we can give support to, as many problems can be explained by discovering understandings and agendas that are not meant to run together, or have not previously been successfully used together.

When Does The Problem Happen?

Developing a detailed time line of events leading up to a failure is another necessary step in problem analysis, especially for those cases that are one-time occurrences. We can most easily do this by working backwards –start at the time an error was reported (as exact as possible, perhaps using the timeline approach), and work backwards through available memory and history. Usually we only have to look as far as the latest event that we have experienced conflict or despair, however, this is not always easy to do and will only come with practice. Knowing when to stop is especially difficult when there are potentially multiple layers of dysfunction, each with its own diagnostic information. The intersection of society with the individual always creates multiple layers of interaction and mutual expectations, with the potential for far more “failures” than “successes”.

Does the problem only happen at a certain period of one’s life?
How often does it happen?
What sequence of events leads up to the time the problem is reported?
Does the problem happen after an environment change such as after creating new friendships, getting another job, or moving to a new neighborhood?

Responding to questions like this will help us create a detailed time line of events, and will provide us with a frame of reference in which to investigate.

Under Which Conditions Does The Problem Happen?

Knowing what else is happening at the time of a problem is important for any complete problem description. If a problem occurs in a certain environment or under certain conditions, that can be a key indicator of the problem cause.

Does the problem always occur when performing the same task?
Does a certain sequence of events need to occur for the problem to surface?
Do other aspects of our lives fail at the same time?

Asking, then attempting to answer these types of questions will help us to explain the environment in which the problem occurs, and correlate any dependencies. Remember that just because multiple problems might have occurred around the same time, it does not necessarily mean that they are always related. Are we ready to fearlessly search for the root causes for our individual and collective brokenness, or are we just looking for justification to stay the course, and continue on without any self-examination and desire for change?

Chaos, Order, Christianity, and Insanity

Our Sacred Mother Earth

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? — 1 Corinthians 3:16

Now the natural man doesn’t receive the things of God’s Spirit, for they are foolishness to him, and he can’t know them, because they are spiritually discerned—1 Corinthians 2:14

These two statements from the New Testament of the Christian bible have powerful universal wisdom built within them, and they point to the foundation for the healthy,aware, and infinite living potential for mankind, as well as why most people do not experience their highest nature. An aspect of our conspiracy of silence also parallels our collective ignorance towards matters of the Spirit. If we don’t develop the language and form a culture that supports our healthy growth and development as human beings, we won’t be able to create a stable container for our changing life experience, and we won’t consciously pursue our spiritual potentials. The silence is deafening, because we can’t speak the language that we have not yet developed or adopted as our own.

Prolific writers, shamans, mystics, and sages of all eras and lands have grown to understand that the potential for human consciousness is infinite. We have seen that the more that we write, the more that there is to write. If our curiosity has not been stymied by religious conditioning and/or personal trauma, the more that we learn, the more that is revealed that we do NOT know, thus creating the urge to learn more. The more that we make “conscious contact with a power greater than ourselves”, the more enhanced and empowered our personal and world views can become.

Throughout recorded history, both Mother Earth centered pagan practices and other less grounded forms of spiritual understanding that we now call religion have been the philosophical guiding lights behind bringing people together to explore the human potential for spiritual awareness, healing, and growth. Yet, as a collective body of experience, culturally institutionalized religion acting through ignorant, hypnotized adherents can also become a source for human evil when their fear, ignorance and superstitious understanding creates traumatic engagement with the world..

Yet, mankind forever has access to infinity, and to its own noble, “divine” possibilities, and is not dependent on religion to deliver salvation to itself. A realization comes to the few that there is no teacher, leader, or prophet who can do this work for us. We are personally responsible for creating the conditions whereby wholeness or healing becomes possible. We must all work out our own salvation, for nobody is going to do it for us, regardless of the dogma one might be adhering to. There are those who awaken, and finally realize that, in the absolute, all that we see, unto eternity, is our expanding, evolving sense of self, and it is UP TO US as to how to best express our own unique, evolving perspective of the absolute truth of being and existence. Yet, these awakening individuals are not yet the majority of humanity, and religion and modern spirituality must continue to exist to support all who have not yet made their own conscious contact with infinity, or the “God” of their and/or their culture’s understanding.

Evolutionary growth is the action of creative insight upon previous knowledge, with the intention for systemic improvement. Mankind has reached the stage of evolution and stability whereby the capacity for contribution to the human race’s evolution by “co-creating with God” is an expanding reality for the present, and future generations of mankind. Science continues to show the way, exploring, then defining, new methodologies for tuning up humanity’s genetic code for better health and higher intelligence. Science has discovered that the introduction of human stem cells into a diseased human body gives our medical profession the capability to return life and function to dying or diseased aspects of the human body, as well. Technology now provides to each human citizen the capacity to receive information at the speed of light, and access it anywhere on our planet by their own hand-held phone.. Science and technology continues to improve artificial intelligence and robotics, to assist mankind in its search for higher levels of efficiency and productivity as we manage planetary resources to be utilized for the betterment of humanity. And, some billionaires, and elements within certain computer chip development research departments, are studying potential methods for transferring or merging human consciousness with a new generation of computers, such as the newer quantum computers presently being developed. Science now considers immortality a possibility through the merging of our soul with our technology.

It is fair to assert than the possibilities for science and technology are infinite, and have the potential to ultimately work directly in tandem with the concept of “God” whose creative and healing potential once solely dominated mankind’s expression of hope and faith for its continuing prosperity and survival. Due to global warming, as well as diminishing resources, a new world order is coming into view. It is now strongly encouraged by reputable scientific experts that all cultures, all nations, and all peoples come together into an agreement to reduce global carbon dioxide emissions, as well as protect rainforests and other natural resources so as to best serve the continuing health of the planet, and all of its diverse population, be it human, animal, insect, or plant. So, science is now a most important part of our collective global awareness, providing data and insight for better ways to co-exist, and co-create, with all life upon our sacred planet Earth.

Modern world society is an amazingly diverse blend of humanity, with its human populations assembled together into unique blocks of cultural, geographic, and, in some cases, spiritual identities. .Yet, with the shared threat against all of humanity from the effects of global warming, the entire planet is coming together, regardless of their differences, to work towards planetary salvation. We need not either fight or run away and hide from each other, if we can keep the channels open to dialogue between all impacted parties, and all work together towards implementing a world-wide solution to the threats against all of us.

It is imperative that the blocks to change are examined by all of the human race, and the resistances to positive, healing change are addressed and ameliorated, both within all of the diverse regions of the world, as well as within their political ideologies and religious belief systems. Some religious communities are out of touch with the natural world and its problems, like the backward elements of American Christianity, which still supports the wayward American president’s intentions to ignore the Paris climate agreement, and real world threats that global warming presents to all nations of planet Earth.

World society, collectively, spends millions of hours every year observing itself, and developing better ideas for ways to manage the human resources that it is comprised of. Society continues to work towards more efficient and equitable distribution of resources, to the extent that the most powerful of that culture, as well as the prevailing political agendas will allow such activity. Religion continues to work towards the “saving or redemption of the soul”, especially within the Judeo-Christian based philosophies, yet this body of thought spends insufficient time in introspection and examination of itself and its historical, collective beliefs in the ways and manners that modern society is forced to do.

There are many religious and spiritual traditions present in the world today, and I now mention the practice of Buddhism as a reminder that there are other productive paths to the spiritual goals that humanity sets for itself. Most Buddhist traditions create lives that are characterized by the study of sacred texts, meditation, prayer, group rituals, and heightening self-awareness, especially of the limitations of the human mind and the false sense of self it creates for us. Buddhists embark on the path towards enlightenment, or enhancing the awareness of the life beyond the limitations of the human self. Buddhist practices have the intention and effect of eliminating most blocks to the revelation of man’s most fundamental, noble nature. Yet Buddhism, Christianity, or the rest of the religious beliefs, must remain aware of and give attention to the reality that is revealing itself RIGHT NOW. The present CANNOT clearly be intelligently looked at solely through a clouded lens from the distant past, and religion needs to work in close conjunction with the most recent developments that science and technology has revealed, or risk the continuing the loss of relevancy to all sincere seekers of truth.

Society and religion both play to humankind’s basic fear of chaos and death. Yet they also play to the needs to not only be part of a social group or network, but, for many, to feel connected to a greater vision for life and expressing it in a more loving, meaningful manner.. For the religiously inclined, there may even be an intense interest in the possibility for transcending death, or for the continuation of life beyond the grave in some sort of life in a “heavenly realm” or through the experience of reincarnation (but not through technology!). Both structures of human creation continue to exist to help facilitate the need for protection and care for oneself, one’s family, and all others within the group, while the individual’s within the group develop their own human potentials.. With this kind of stability, each member of the society is enabled to wrestle with the historical challenge of finding one’s own unique place in both the “civilized” world, as well as their place in the infinitely more mysterious, complex and vast, unexplored portions of our exterior, and interior, universe

There can be an enormous disconnect between becoming civilized and acculturated within any social group, and thus following the particular educational, political and religious path(s) sanctioned by that society, and that of sensing, addressing, and attempting to meet our own or our entire planet Earth’s evolving physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.. The “letter of the law” as stated by the Ten Commandments has a specific intention to keep the herd from self-destructing through trampling itself by the chaos created by “uncivilized” behavior. Yet, there are those who seek a higher law, or order, to bring to their lives and to the lives of all others, the order that their experience of the “love” that is revealed through the eruption of truth and healing within consciousness. For that “spiritual” desire or inclination to come to fruition within the supporting community, there must be at least the minimal adherence to the established order and laws by self and others within the community. Otherwise, the evolving person may face indifference, abuse, retribution, persecution, prosecution, excommunication and/or exile for not “fitting in” with the status quo…

Society has its need for order, and minimal chaos, and sets up its own rules and laws to help maintain stability. Religions also have their own understandings and agendas for establishing and maintaining order within their limited understanding of “God’s kingdom”, though in American society and Christian religion there are many commonalities and overlaps of intentions. The historical overlap of Hammurabi of Babylon’s law code of ethics (supposed channeled to Hammurabi from his culture’s God Shamash) and the Ten Commandments of the Jewish Torah or Christian bible (supposedly channeled through Moses from his understanding and connection with his culture’s God, Yahweh) of around five hundred years later is a fundamental case in point, and indicates that humanity has the capacity to share in a “common knowledge”, while not being required to share the same language..

There appears in history true “common knowledge” that binds people together in an understanding as to how to best behave to maintain social order in the community. The internal dialogue and control that the common knowledge stimulates is quite similar in nature to Freud’s concept of the “super-ego” that is embedded within human psychology. The powerful “common knowledge game” (extensively developed in chapter 8) is practiced to extremes by both society and religion, keeping people thinking and acting in the same socially approved ruts or patterns of behavior. Virtually every member of a long-term community share in a “common knowledge”, and this shared information functions to make the community more self-regulating and more self-controlled. which typically serves best the interests of the status quo. A society just can’t have a policeman in every house, or on every corner, and “common knowledge” fulfills that function. Can you imagine trying to drive through the downtown of a busy city without all drivers participating in common knowledge about driving laws and etiquette?

Some people within the community seem to naturally entertain a spiritual and material prosperity consciousness, and are less self-absorbed than average. They have somehow come to know that not only are they alive to serve their own needs, but to be of service to others in need, as well. These people may appear to be better aligned with the statement of 1 Corinthians 3:16. And, based on some interesting studies on human development, they may have had a happier gestation period in their mother’s womb, and/or more emotionally intelligent, conscious parenting during the first several years of childhood. For others, they may entertain a scarcity consciousness. Their nature, may also have been heavily influenced by a combination of conditioning of their minds beginning in their gestation period, and, potentially, for early exposure to both the damaging aspects of unconscious parental practices and to a damaged society.. The induced trauma may create a personality that is much more fear-based and “self-conscious” and may not be so inclined to be “service oriented”. They may be better aligned with the “natural man’ referred to in 1 Corinthians 2:14 of the Christian bible. The truth is that both energies are present in all human beings, in unique proportions.

In almost all human beings there exists the fear of rejection, which includes rejection by our own self, our families, our culture, our religion or, even, our concept of God, and we all develop our own unique mechanisms for dealing with that fear. There are the “IN” groups, which are usually for the few and the elite, and there are the “OUT” groups, which are for the many and the mediocre, when its comes to social bonding and the circles of relationships that are eventually created and maintained within a community. We tend to associate with like-minded people, and most of us participate in experiences from both grouping categories. How well we conform to expectations of others may determine which group, or on which tier within a group, we will be accepted.

A community member may be motivated to engage people with enhanced people-pleasing attitudes and behaviors thus suspending or hiding beliefs and behaviors that are not acceptable to the group while trying to fit in. There are many who actively engage in some passive/aggressive behavior that helps the individual appear to be conforming to group expectations, while being only grudgingly compliant and internally resistant and judgemental against the expectations and norms of others . This combination of factors may contribute to the development of many of the diseases of the bodies and minds of members of the community, including overeating and obesity, crime of all types, loneliness, suicide, and mental illnesses of all types such as depression, drug addiction and alcoholism.

We try to find security through others’ acceptance of us within a new community, or we maintain connection within a existing one by obeying the established rules for inclusion. Humanity resides on a spectrum of willingness to extend love to others through providing care and service for their fellow man, depending on the individual’s nature and/or family training. Society and religion tends to honor those who appear to care the most about others, or who have not only found a way to bring the most goods and resources to themselves, but who have also found a way to share their resources. Religion really likes the rich members of society who are either naturally philanthropic, or have eventually evolved into that understanding.. Through tithing, religion hopes to encourage those of more limited means, those on the other end of the prosperity spectrum, to share their resources for the common good of the community.

Sometimes, to be a successful member of society, it is acceptable and normal to take the “every man for himself” approach to life. A common refrain from this core group of humanity is that we all must “lift ourselves up by our own bootstraps”, or “save our own asses”. This philosophy of personal empowerment and “rugged individualism” is still alive and well in today’s fractured society. Many of those who are considered “conservative” in their thinking tend to track to this direction. Proponents of this way of thinking tend to reject the social agendas and government programs that serve the poor and disadvantaged, especially those targeted for other races, ethnicity or religious persuasions, and they are not so welcoming to strangers such as immigrants and new community members.

Yet, in the “liberal” tradition of societal thinking, the idea of universal love and service to all, especially those considered “poor” in nature, is readily entertained. Religion tends to honor those who are willing to reach out from themselves, whether they feel spiritually and/or personally empowered or otherwise, and help those who are less fortunate than themselves, and offer assistance, spiritual or material. One could say that the “liberal tradition” parallels Christian theology better than the “conservative tradition”, especially if one is well versed in the message of Jesus of Nazareth.

The majority of members of any religious community, Christian or otherwise, tend to, at least in the first stages of their spiritual unfoldment, cling to the stories and heroes of their tradition, and do not yet have a real, meaningful relationship to the truth of their being, and to the being of all others. Yet, while they wait for their “miracle”, they still have the physical and emotional support of fellow members of their congregation. They have not yet had a personal experience of the truth that exists beyond their limited sense of self, and their concepts of time and space. And, for some, the community will remain the only connection with a “higher power” that is achieved. In the first stages of our spiritual unfoldment, seekers after truth and love tend to look outside of themselves to the religious texts, leaders, mentors, rabbis, ministers, or gurus to help guide them toward that mystery known as “God” or “Love” or “Truth”. A tension arises for those brave souls whose search for truth must, for a period of time, take them outside of the safe confines of their religious group and its history, to find their own pearls of spiritual wisdom..

Problems inevitably come to the person, and to the population cluster the person belongs to, who perceives that the society and the religion in which he/she are now participating in has failed to meet its minimal obligations to their human spirit. Yet, this dissatisfaction is eternally part of the evolutionary, and revolutionary, cycles of life, with its principles and processes which support mankind’s continued existence and the potential for evolution, while hinting at the source for our hope for some form of a healing spiritual or societal transformation. There must be a dynamic tension between what is perceived to be true now, and the eternal unknown, with the unknown being the space that “God” originates within and operates through.

Institutionalized Christian religious understanding remains eternally resistant to evolution, or to change, because change is threatening to its established order, as, according to the bible that they quote from, “God is the same yesterday, today, and forever”. Yet, the people making that association may well be “the natural man” , the very people who we are warned about in first Corinthians. We first have to overcome the ignorant and superstitious traditions of our religion, which opens our minds up to the minimum spiritual discernment necessary to even understand what “God” might be, or how we might access the “powers of God”. Then, we might finally be able to have a “mystical event” or a “spiritual experience” and personally experience what was really meant by that biblical statement “God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”

One great example of spiritual misinterpretation is within the book of Genesis. The book of Genesis in the Old Testament shows, at length, the process of mindfulness necessary for mankind to bring better order out of the chaos that naturally arises through the evolution of consciousness. Each human being is required to witness the world, and create internal pictures/images, words, and stories to best represent what they witness in the “outer world”. Literally, each of us is responsible for “creating the world” that we witness, at least the internal world, and world view, that becomes our own unique “internal” representation of the “external” universe. And, we will never find peace, or rest, until we have created an optimized, enlightened world view, and act consciously out of that spiritually evolved structure and narrative.

Yet, the “natural man” does not understand the book of Genesis, instead thinking that the story is a factual account of the creation of Earth, when in fact it is both an instruction set and an affirmation of the value and function of insight and mindfulness towards creating our own individual consciousness. Yes, humanity has the innate, though undeveloped capacity to create in the same image or likeness of, or as an identical expression of, a more truthful, love-inspired, reason-inspired “God-centered” consciousness..

It has been said that the Christian bible was written both to entertain the ignorant, while pointing to the truth, in metaphorical form, for those with discernment could understand and apply within their own lives. In our minds, we have created both the categories of the “entertained”, as well as the “enlightened” ones, and it should be noted that both descriptions applies to all of us, with each of us having our own unique proportions of each quality..The stories in the bible, or any religious text, are static in nature, yet we, as human beings, are a dynamic energy manifestation of the universe, and subject to enormous change. And as the individuals change, so must their collective stories eventually change. Ultimately for unity and healing, our collective and personal myths and stories must change, the closer that we get to the truth of being. If love is our compass, our stories have to be continuously updated to reflect the latest messages from the “Great Unknown”, for, by their very nature, ALL OF OUR STORIES SUFFER FROM A LEGION OF FALSEHOODS, and need to be continuously updated to reflect the newly revealed or discovered facts (see the latest scientific advancements and understandings, for example). The “Great Unknown”, and unknowable, not only does not recognize our stories, but also does not hold us prisoner to a static understanding of ourselves and our relationship with God and Truth. Religion is designed to do a fine job of that, however.

There are, literally, millions of victims of religious hubris and evil, and their stories painfully reveal where religion has brought harm, destruction and death to all who do not strictly adhere to their codes, or were innocent victims of patriarchal sexual abuse or white supremacist missionary zeal. Shame mongering and ostracism, excommunications, inquisitions, crusades, witch burning, book burning, incarcerations and other hateful and hurtful behaviors have characterized the church’s response to threats, criticism, or new ideas over their history. There remains sexual perversion institutionalized within the Christian tradition, with legendary failures at attempts to accept, understand and control the sexual activity of humanity. This tradition has wrought predatory and sexual evil upon innocent woman and children by the Christian missionary/ministerial presence in both indigenous and foreign lands and now even within our own country, and is now well documented, and continues unto this day. The present-day Christian attitudes towards homosexuality are not supported by any of Jesus of Nazareth’s teachings, and instead reflect back to Old Testament times when it was acceptable to harshly judge against many types of human sexual behavior and, thus the seed story for ignorant Christians was created that allows their tribe to persecute LGBTQ’s. I only hope that the Christian church has benefited more people than it has harmed over the two thousand years of its existence.

Jimmy Carter, a true manifestation of the power of love.

Too much of American Christianity or “religion” in general, appears to be only the elevator music playing in the background while their bad boys and girls continue to misbehave, justify each other’s bad behavior and “forgive it” if it serves their immediate needs to affirm some sort of intention for unity. They tend to celebrate their special, if not imaginary, tribal relationships and connections with their “Santa Claus God”, while judging against others not of their mindset, and lording their pseudo-truths over all others not presently included in their minds, and lives. What unrepentant boy or girl would not want to belong to a club like that? They tend to cling to their mythology and their misunderstanding much like the 2nd Amendment gun fanatics, and woe to the person who tries to talk reason to either group of people, and try to convince them that there is a better way to understand life, and to live. It sounds like their spiritual house could use a different leader, or a different understanding of their present leader, to help in its evolution towards a more loving, spiritual order.

All manners of illusion can be created with the marriage of religion with society’s need to stabilize and govern itself. This is a historical problem, with similar aspects occurring in other religious offerings from other cultures, and it dates back to prehistoric times. Humanity resides on a spectrum of understanding, with the vast majority of “religious adherents” living in relative measures of ignorance and superstition, while engaging with others as part of their social/spiritual community. One of the functions of any community is to provide a measure of safety and identity, while giving people an opportunity to share in an enhanced vision for life, even if they are so spiritually, morally and ethically damaged that they choose not to fully adopt it. Because of the stage of consciousness that they presently occupy, too many “followers” seek only the safety and security in their own, or their tribes’ misunderstandings. All too often, the adherents are both victims and enforcers of the Common Knowledge Game, a phenomenon describing how our culture and our desire to fit-in and win approval can nudge us into accepting as fact those ideas that should have required more examination and potentially, wholesale rejection of.

There is no shortage of “fundamentalists” who abide by this mind-numbing, old wayward saw::

“God said it, I believe it, and that is all there is to it”.

There is no greater block to spiritual evolution and understanding than cultivating a closed mind, but structured religion shuns the “unknown” and tends to create and promote the acceptable verbal pathways for communication and “understanding” for their “God”, or that which remains incomprehensible by most human beings. Yet, to question the church’s, or the religion’s, authority to define that which remains undefinable, opens one up to extra scrutiny, and the potential for adverse judgement, rejection, and exile from the religious community. Conform, or be shunned, become driving forces for those seeking enhanced social/spiritual connections not presently being promoted from within the tribe. And, one’s sexuality better be expressed through acceptable avenues, or watch out! Tow the line on that one, or be the victim of spiritual abuse like sexual orientation conversion therapy, or become the object of judgement, hate, derision, and exclusion..

Christian religion, in addition to giving hope for transcending death and the human condition, has been used as a form of state sponsored propaganda and control for nearly 1700 years. It is an interesting inverse relationship that exists between human curiosity and its potential for revealing the individual’s innate potential for spiritual healing and freedom, and religious indoctrination, with its superstitious reasoning, dogma, propaganda, and mind control. The latter tends to produce lives dominated by fear and guilt-based attitudes, negative judgements against all others unlike themselves, herd-like behavior, and reduced levels of individual freedoms, resulting in an unwillingness or inability to search for and find one’s own unique answers to the questions of life.

An interesting experiment to perform, for the curious ones, is to interview a diverse blend of Christian adherents and see if they are interested in understanding the process by which the “present version” of Christian religion was created and became a state-sanctioned religion. I remain amazed and enlightened by the resistance I have encountered over the years of Christian religious “fundamentalists” to this line of questioning. One would think that everybody would want to understand the very history and ground of consciousness that is fundamental to their particular religious philosophy, but many do not. The truth is threatening to those whose unconscious minds remain married to a lie.

Christianity began to flourish through the actions of a Roman leader, Constantine, and his spiritual seeking mother, Helena, in the fourth century AD. In the fourth century, the mass murderer and evil Roman ruler Constantine saw the need for a drastic change in the way that Rome was philosophically structured, and proposed the establishment of a state-sponsored religion. Yes, this Constantine was the same criminal that was to become Saint Constantine. Constantine was the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity. Although he lived much of his life as a pagan, and later as a catechumen, he joined the Christian faith on his deathbed, being baptized by Eusebius of Nicomedia. He is venerated as a saint by the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches. This shows, how a person can have his life and image “rehabilitated” even after death, and create more idols to worship, more superheroes of the faith around which understanding of their religion can be further wound. If a human being is “sainted” or worshiped as a savior, their status is no longer open to being questioned, and any who dare to ask questions are subject to severe punishment, and, in some cases, death.

In third and fourth century Rome, there was a wealth of diverse pagan, religious and spiritual inclinations and traditions practiced by Constantine’s citizens, with none apparently providing any collective cultural healing/unifying message. He was to eventually organize and convene a “religious convention” He literally forced thousands of spiritual leaders of that time to help design, accept, and spread a new religion, Christianity, with many new defining dogmas that would help bring his people back under some measure of control. Constantine had feared the further loss of his power, as the Roman empire continued its slow collapse, and he counted on a new state religion, Christianity, to help hold the fraying strands together of his dying civilization.

Of course, the Roman Empire continued its collapse, yet Christianity was to grow exponentially in power and influence over the next several generations.. This was the continuation of an epoch of time when patriarchy remained firmly entrenched in the world’s understanding of itself, though the pagan understanding outside of structured religion balanced some of that out with their more earth friendly/woman centered understanding of life. The concepts of God as “father”, and God’s only begotten son being the ultimate spiritual power helped to carry non-pagan, religious patriarchal understanding forward. It is enlightening to read the religious texts which are used as the vehicles for historical transmission of many of those agendas, as well.

Constantine, a pragmatic leader, knew the power of organized religion to keep people under control, people whose lives tended towards chaos and unconsciousness and who were inspired by fear and awe of powers that they did not yet understand and didn’t believe that they have innately have access to. Constantine was well aware of the message presented by 1 Corinthians 2:14, and knew that the power of the human need for social conformity with its common knowledge game would keep most of the ignorant and disempowered citizens under some continued, and enhanced measure of control by the leaders. This now included the ministers from their old religion, who were now converted to “Christianity”..

Constantine chose Jesus of Nazareth from among 25 different “prophets” known to that era, as Jesus’s teachings encouraged enhanced community connection and the potential for the healing of relationships the most, and his mother was already enamored with the man and his whole philosophy. She had followed Jesus of Nazareth’s teachings for years, and traveled the Mediterranean world seeking sacred artifacts from Jesus’s life. Constantine and Christianity became mutually supporting and sustaining, while providing a new cultural format for the continuation of both the supporting government, the society it ruled, and the new religion.

Constantine knew that it is much harder for the citizens to reject the message of an honored dead person, especially one who fantastic legends had already been created around, than it had been to reject the power and authority of a leader his subjects had already lost respect for. He needed, in effect, to design a leader with even more authority and power than his own, who would not be threatening to Constantine’s continuation of power. and link himself positively with this new spiritual leader, who just happened to be dead, of course. The stories that were created to enhance Jesus’s standing in relationship to God, or to the ultimate power, by association were now helping Constantine attain a more exalted status with the Roman citizens. This sounds like the modern equivalent of Evangelical Christians associating Donald Trump with Jesus Christ and God’s will, doesn’t it? Trump signing bibles for tornado victims in Alabama in March of 2019 was quite the hubris by Trump, and showed impoverished spiritual understanding by the recipients

Many of the uncorrupted aspects of Jesus’s teachings did survive the Constantine conventions’ editing, manipulation and outright bastardization of facts and history. And, many of the stories written about Jesus were NOT canonized and included in the newly created bible, which indicates that this leader needed to keep a philosophical agenda and form of a cultural control story foremost in the adherents minds, to keep them, more or less, in resonance with Constantine’s underlying intentions, The neglected gospels that reveal the more mundane nature of Jesus’s life, such as him being both a husband and a father, were omitted. In reality, Jesus “rose from the dead” after his crucifixion only through the stories that were told about his life and his teachings. There were no great publishing houses to distribute the new bibles, and the common folk were not necessarily great readers and frequent visitors to the library, so minimizing the length of their new religious tome was certainly important, as well as making sure that there was a consistent interpretation from all of the new bearers of the new state-sponsored religion.

One great example of this is the story of the Prodigal Son, which did end up in the bible. Jesus told the story of the “prodigal son”, which happens to be the truth about not only our lives, but of Jesus’s life, as well. As real life human beings, we are born “the natural man” who has no clue about ultimate reality, and the individual’s relationship with it. We all are the “prodigal son”, until a deep desire to find and experience the truth develops within us. This was Jesus’ evolutionary, and revolutionary path, as well. You won’t hear that truth being revealed in church next Sunday though. Many Christian congregations spend too much time adoring and worshiping their “golden calf” rather than doing their life’s real work, and evolving to become the best version of themselves..

To this day, much of Christianity still parrots Constantine’s intentions, and spends too much time promoting and claiming spiritual superiority for their prophet Jesus, while imbuing Jesus with supernatural qualities, and a unique history, MUCH OF WHICH NEVER HAPPENED. Add this to the LIE that Jesus was immaculately conceived, and was born enlightened, and that his body could be revived, or resurrected, after his death on the cross. This creates an IMPOSSIBLE chasm for potential followers to cross. Those who profess to be followers of Jesus, will magically overcome this separation by claiming God’s grace and forgiveness through the “sacrifice” of God’s only Son. Wow, for a God that is One, there is only one “Son/Daughter” anyway, which is the totality of God’s creation, including our planet, and ALL ANIMALS upon it. Can a human being be so self-centered that they think that the human race is the center, and the point, of all creation, and that only the image of a man must represent the truth? Just looking at our present state of world ecology and its affairs gives the tragic and sad answer to this question. Yet, if religious adherents reading this story had “spiritual discernment”, they would see that Jesus’s story is a symbolic/metaphorical representation for the capacity that we all have, when we seek healing and spiritual connection. We all suffer immensely just for being human beings, whether it is from the hands of others, or from our own ignorant, self-defeating choices, though we can rise from the spiritually dead and be “resurrected into a life imbued with love, new meaning and purpose”.

The story of Christianity is an amazing, conflicted story, which, after 2000 years of being told, still brings a measure of hope for a large sector of the human race. .Substantial parts of it’s theology remain out of sync with the laws of nature and modern scientific discoveries, though many of these incongruities and discontinuities can be healed through spiritual discernment. Much of Christianity still resides in the “old days of superstitious and supernatural reasoning, earning themselves a collectively perceived “lack of relevancy” by many younger thinkers, as well as maturing pilgrims. No wonder there now are millions of ex-Christians seeking a deeper, more profound personal experience of Love and the truth of being, based on a more evolved understanding that present-day Christianity presently does not encourage or endorse.

Our Christian culture has created philosophical and psychological problems through its worship of a prophet who is also purported to be the “self” of our God, the “self” that we have all lost, and are now seeking through our present religious pursuits. This can be quite crazy-making and temporarily sets all of their adherents onto a path of a form of culturally sanctioned schizophrenia. Yet, what can Christian religion possibly do about that now, especially since throughout the history of mankind’s presence on planet Earth we have not fulfilled our potential? If we can’t find our way on our own, we need to find a living example or role model that we can really identify with and want to emulate. But we do NOT need to hero worship, which creates an unbridgeable divide between our greater good and our present bad, and gives us the excuse not to attempt to cross that self-created gap into our own unique promised land.

Religious reasoning and oxymorons

One of several practices of Christianity that are worth continuing in earnest is forgiveness. Understanding what forgiveness entails can be contained within a book in itself. In its most simplest form, forgiveness is only the willingness to see a difficult situation through a new lens of understanding that will bring connection back to those who have become divided. But, any religious philosophy that that can allow a former Liberian war lord, who feasted on the live, beating hearts of human babies, to be “redeemed” is worth examining. Check out war lord “Butt Naked” and his horrific story when you can. If he can give his life story a happier ending than he deserves, what does that say about the power of forgiveness? Had Liberian authorities followed “Old Testament Ten Commandments understanding”, this broken man would have been executed, which would have been considered a reasonable punishment by the majority of humanity. I will provide no commentary on potential legal, moral, or ethical questions that “forgiveness”, especially in situations that this kind of expressed brutality and evil, brings up. Shall we follow the absolute laws of the Ten Commandments, with the historically mandated punishments, or pursue an evolving understanding blanketed in love and compassion, as pointed to in the New Testament of the bible?

Does a consciously aware and evolving human being need the continuing presence of a church or church community? That is the question each of us must ask ourselves. When two or more are gathered together in the name of some greater truth or principle, the extra energy can be palpable, as if it is being generated by the presence of two similar intentions. which can carry enormous potential for power, spiritual or otherwise. The structure that a church or religion provides is not required for an enhanced spiritual evolution, however.

Truth requires the overcoming of fear, and an innocent heart and open mind to recognize it. Truth, if truth erupts within an individual’s mind, is foreign to our mind and our normal experience of reality and it’s appearance IS an apocalyptic event. If one is not disoriented and shocked by the exposure to the fullness of truth, then one has not really experienced truth. Truth does not need religion to create or support it, but religion needs the truth to bring healing back to itself from the self-generated diseases of its man-made misinterpretations. Without truth, religion will continue to devolve into the tribalistic buffoonery that presently characterizes the political elements of that philosophy..

The truest test for Christianity that there is, is how well do those who profess a belief in “Christ’ adhere to this passage from John?

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love.

– 1 John 4:18

In America, we do not have a national religion, though to listen to certain Christian propagandists and politically biased promoters, our democracy should be infused with more “Christian ideals”, “ideals” which may not support the collective good of humanity. The US Constitution was crafted with the parallel ideas of protecting the citizens from both overzealous governments AND religions. Our American society is presently not under attack from Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Atheists, or Agnostics, but instead by unconscious, wayward Americans, some of which practice with a corrupted form of Christianity, which exposes potentially dangerous issues for all of us. Judging as incomplete, diseased human beings all those who are part of the LGBTQ community is self-defeating and hateful. The now-common pseudo-Christian siren call of saving an unborn baby is NOT EQUIVALENT to saving the planet, PERIOD. Our unborn human babies ARE NO MORE SACRED than the unborn babies of dolphins, whales, elephants, baboons, or other sentient life, and we hear too little from this philosophy about protecting their rights, as well. Their other ignorant, divisive arguments are legion in number, and will not be addressed in this writing.

Those religions who promote fear have failed at their most basic task in life. Members of these tribes are just more relatively unevolved, ignorant power hungry, fear based broken human beings, though still ONE with the rest of us, which is this eclectic package of damaged goods known as HUMANITY..

Who is responsible for bringing order out of this chaotic scrum of humanity?

Rather than just asking the dead and living icons of wisdom the questions:

“What would Jesus do?” What does the Buddha say about this? What is the latest statement from the Dalai Lama?

We should be asking of ourselves, while in community:

“What will we do?”

And we should ask of ourselves, in the privacy of our own mind:

“What will I do?”

My response to that question is to first save the world from aspects of my unevolved self, while encouraging others to do the same, which is the beginning of the opening of the spiritual doors to infinite love, healing, and transcendence. In truth, there is no “you” to attack, or to support, as there is only one life expressing through the many, with billions of human beings looking through their own broken kaleidoscopes of perception, and thus spawning all manners of mistaken judgement of others, those non-unified, scattering parts of their fragmented self. “You” can never be real, but it certainly can be entertained as an incomplete, ignorant concept within one’s own mind, or the collective mind that mankind shares through its conditioning, education, and historical ignorance.’

Throughout my early life, I had a revolving door relationship with Christian religion, with the doors of their edifices usually vigorously striking my backside.. Now, my personal religion is not an institutionalized understanding of historical or spiritual texts, but it is much more present moment and personal. My adult religion is that I must protect at all costs the sacredness and health of our Mother Earth. I must respect all of life, denying dignity to none. I must bring no conscious harm to self or others, encourage all others to do the same, and to give the love and support for all of life, including all animals, plants, and insects. I must bring NO HARM TO ANYONE OR ANYTHING, lest I bring harm to all. The one is the many, and the many is the ONE.

To support the planet, and to enhance my search for truth, I practice meditation, mindfulness, insight, and I perform personal inventories, and make amends, according to the needs revealed through honest and integrated self-examination and evolving spiritual intentions. To the best of my ability, I see things as they are, and if certain aspects of myself or my life, and the life that I share with the rest of this planet, needs to be changed, I work towards that transformation. I have seen the toll that human suffering has placed upon our world, and I work to help heal the diseases of the spirit, such as alcoholism and drug addiction, which contribute greatly to the problem of darkness and despair within humanity. I continue to support the indigenous people’s of our continent, who were sexually and culturally abused by Catholic priests and white supremacists in generations past. I celebrate my connection with Mother Earth by spending enormous amounts of time outdoors immersed in nature, and I am a devoted wilderness hiker. I continue to spiritually and financially contribute to many, many ecological and social justice orientated foundations and charities. I feed the birds, squirrels, opossums, and raccoons that frequent our home, and I do not use pesticides or chemicals OF ANY KIND on our plants, including weeds.,

I choose, at this point in my life, not to align myself with any group of practicing Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, Hindus, Buddhists, Pagans, Atheists, or Agnostics. I continue to reject exclusivity, which is endemic to tribalism, isolation, bullying, indifference, and false judgements. I continue to embrace inclusivity, which points to the foundation for collective healing. Those whose isolating philosophies motivate them to take up arms against their fellow man, are actually taking up arms against love, and our potential for healing. Those who greedily exploit the planet for its resources and its sacred life are hurting and exploiting all of us, and are the source of a great evil. Too many religions are unfairly critical and/or disempowering of one’s gender, sexuality or place of birth or ethnicity, creating yet more unfortunate opportunities for evil to prosper

“If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite”––William Blake

It’s always good to be reminded that all of humanity is still in the middle of a big, never-ending conversation, with many voices and opinions on what both our history was and what our human/spiritual capacities once were, what is possible for us now, what we could become in the distant future, and what we should not be, or should have never been. There are over a billion different possibilities for intelligible sentence construction using all of our words in the English language, as well as over a trillion different possibilities for story creations, so we need not be limited to the stories that now dominate our collective discussions, no matter how worshiped they may now be.

“Have you noticed how little space we have in our brain? It is cluttered up, full with so many thousands of things; it has very little space, if you take a journey into yourself. Empty all of the contents that you have collected and go very, very deeply, then there is that vast space, that so-called emptiness, that is full of energy, and in that state alone there is that which is most sacred“—–J Krishnamurti.

What should be our world’s religion?

“To save your world, first, strive to know your real self and then do it’s unique work”.

Some spiritual theories about our distant past indicate that mankind once enjoyed a pure relationship with Reality and Love. In this telling, mankind fell from grace, and, sensing its loss of true identity, began the eternal search for its lost self, or homeland, its original “Garden of Eden”. Most modern-day thinkers do not buy the theory of mankind’s original “purity” or innocence, or the concept of “original sin”, and instead posit that we all must work hard, and consciously evolve, to find our spiritual homeland. They stress the need for insight, meditation, prayer, and acts of conscious service to our fellow man. It is important to note that many Buddhists, Tibetan or otherwise, may spend over 100,000 hours of meditation, prayer, and spiritual practices over the course of their lives. The same can be said about many monks and seekers from the Christian mystical path, who also tend to isolate themselves from the scrum of humanity while they attempt a more complete union with the purity and wholeness (holiness) of their “beloved”.

If the truth were really known, all of our worship, meditation, contemplation, and philosophies may be attempting to redirect our minds back to our pre-conscious state when we were in our mother’s wombs, which may well be the original “Garden Of Eden” state of being. I have little desire to crawl back into my mother’s womb, but there is benefit in returning to, or experiencing, a state of consciousness where the impacts of our life history are temporarily suspended, and where perfect peace and joy coexist with our present moment awareness.

. It is also important to note that the latest studies on human babies and maternal attachment theory indicates that by the proper and timely exercise of “extended physical presence” in human babies first two years of life, parents can create more stable, less anxious personality matrices in their children. Children could be much less emotionally needy, damaged human minds, thus preparing humans for better physical and mental health, while encouraging a more natural, spontaneous reaction to the Spirit. Perhaps by changing our culture’s haphazard parenting styles to more conform to the latest studies, we can save people from the experience of feeling out of touch with our real self, and instead, to find, and eventually to Be The Health, that a firm relationship with this style of parenting is reputed to provide. Yet, these studies may also be promoting a new variation of the “Garden Of Eden” fantasy, and take energy away from the need for all of humanity to become more conscious and caring in their movement through every moment of their life.

Our world needs a new religious mythology, a new story that brings hope for the entire planet and its inhabitants. We need a new paradigm that honors planet Earth as the sacred foundation and provider for all our lives and needs. We need a new Ten Commandments that re-establishes mankind as the conscious, loving caretaker of the planet, and loving, caring stewards for ALL of the life upon it. We must reach beyond the limited boundaries of our religions and their belief systems and prophets. It is time to stop fighting about which religion has the greatest prophet, and about the sundry details of a prophet’s life that was lived a thousand or more years ago. It is time for all of us, to search for our life’s truth, and bring a higher measure of healing and love to our world. It is time to convene another spiritual convention akin to the one held in Constantin’s time, to develop a collective theology that is more inclusive, loving, and mutually supporting. We need a new story that recognizes that the story teller, and the listener, are more sacred and precious than the story being told ever could be. This is a nearly impossible task, yet it is REQUIRED that humanity begin to undertake this historic mission. To do nothing is to resign ourselves to living lives solely dependent on historical misunderstanding, and experiencing lives that continue to fall short of our human and spiritual potential, and, collectively, descending into deeper levels of chaos and collective suffering..

We, as a human race, will always have our members clustered in groups along the entire spectrum of spiritual potentiality. We, as a human race, will always have the spiritually and materially poor among us, and it remains our responsibility to reach out and help each other, on this side or, the other side, of the ocean.. We, as a human race, also need a new common knowledge. We can create a new world religion, based on a new world order of inclusivity, sharing of resources, reduction of population, and loving service to our planet Earth and to ALL of its life. To survive as the human race, we must bring peace to our minds, and love and healing to our world. To not do so is to support collective insanity, global destruction and suicide.

All that we will ever see, unto eternity, is ourselves. We will either ascend onto our “God” and explore and actualize our infinite potential, or we will remain tied to the past, stagnate and descend into chaos with the continued destruction of our sacred planet Earth. The truth is that our future will continue to be a tension between both possibilities.

How again, shall we see ourselves today?

Can We Better Understand Our Human Brain and its Function?

Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”

― C.G. Jung

We are magnificently complex, beautiful, and mysterious beings with potential access to infinite levels of understanding and existence. Our human biology is the result of the billions of years of evolution of our planet Earth, and all life upon it. To better understand ourselves as human beings, we need to better understand how our brains and our bodies interact, and how the whole system supports the consciousness that we associate ourselves with. It is a vastly complex subject, and I will take liberties by simplifying descriptions presented by neurobiological authorities, while dismissing theories based upon superstitious, ignorant interpretations and understandings of the world’s religions.

We all have three brains – our head brain, our heart brain, and our gut brain. The three brains are like an orchestra, with the entire body being controlled by fifty to a hundred billion neurons cooperating to produce a harmonic symphony – harnessing together an ever-changing network of neurons that work in a complex synchrony. For the purposes of this section, I will mainly focus on the “head” brain. Individual human beings with good brain health have access to three brain centers within the cranial cavity, where the “head” brain resides. For the sake of simplicity, these three brain-based dimensions fundamental to modern day human experience will be called “left brain”, “right brain”, and the “reptilian brain”. Our left brain is verbal, analytical and social. Our right-brain is intuitive, holistic, creative. Our reptilian brain is involved with fundamental drives related to thirst, hunger, sexuality and territoriality, as well as habits and procedural memory, like putting your wallet in the same place every day without thinking about it.

In the past, brain science has stated that emotions are controlled by the right side of the brain and logic is controlled by the left side of the brain. It turns out that it’s more complex than that, especially when it comes to emotion in activities where the whole brain is engaged, such as music. The conventional and generally used theory about the brain is that the brain is divided into two sides when it comes to controlling different aspects of human behavior. The right side of the brain is the home to emotions, intuition, creativity, art and music whereas the left side of the brain logic, language, reasoning, analysis and math reign supreme.

Evolutionary understanding of the brain divides higher brain function in terms of our mammalian natures, and lower brain function in terms of our reptilian nature. The paleomammalian(old mammal) brain, including the hypothalamus, hippocampus, amygdala, and cingulate cortex, is the center of our motivation, emotions, and memory, including behavior such as parenting. The neomammalian (new mammal) brain, consisting of the neocortex, enables language, abstraction, reasoning, and planning. The reptilian brain, the oldest of the three, controls the body’s vital functions such as heart rate, breathing, body temperature and balance. Our reptilian brain includes the main structures found in a reptile’s brain: the brainstem and the cerebellum

Despite this general assumption of how the brain is laid out, the interrelationships between all of the facets and components of the human brain are variable. Different parts of the brain may overlap and share duties because the brain believes there may be similarities between two different tasks. Keep this fact of overlap in mind, especially considering the fact of that we also have a “heart” and a “gut” centers, which directly impacts how we interpret and interact with life, as well. The left brain is an immensely important co-creator with the other two functional cranial brain centers, as well as the “heart” and “gut” body-based brain centers. It uses language to formulate a commitment to behavior consistent with the intuitive frameworks that we may entertain. This left brain ability to think and speak in words, combined with a right brain sense of wonder about how things work, enhance our potential for higher intelligence and creativity.

The right brain intuitively seeks out integrated patterns of meaning as a framework of understanding that we implicitly relate to. We had to develop a right-brain intuition about how experience is ordered so we could provide for our needs. Our right brain intuition might be the source of humanity’s search for cosmic order, as well.

The “third brain” or our old brain, affectionately referred to as the reptilian brain, is anchored to our evolutionary history, and has four hundred million years of evolution behind it. It emotionally fuels our thoughts and behavior on the one hand and it assesses our performance on the other. In so-called healthy people, thoughts and behavior intuitively seek an emotional balance between these higher ordered facets of human neurobiology.

The latest studies in human neuroscience shows that the brain is primarily an organic predictive machine, as well as our commonly known and universally utilized tool for awareness and goal setting and achieving. The brain coexists with and is interdependent with the mind, which reductionistic materialists believe to be only an epiphenomenon of our brain and its biology. However, non-materialistic, spiritually inclined antagonists postulate that the mind, or consciousness, is the primary causative agent, and capable of both transforming and transcending matter and the human brain. The “truth” has not yet been conclusively determined, yet the philosophies of the potential for “free will” orbits around consciousness as a causal agent

Prophecy fulfilled

It is the brain’s predictive aspect that may be of highest interest to those studying the self and attempting to access the higher levels of consciousness supported by our spiritual nature. By becoming more consciously aware and mindful, and rejecting materialistic belief systems, we can improve our conscious access to greater wisdom and more of our innate spiritual assets than present day neuroscience and genetic history might indicate that is available or possible. Neuroscience has shown that the old adage “shoot first and ask questions later” literally describes the predictive action of the brain’s attempts at processing and understanding information. The brain is continually engaged in prophecy, anticipating reality and promoting its own predictions, rather than just sitting back and being an idle witness to life and its manifestation. It continuously offers up it’s own theories as facts, and only questions itself when huge cognitive dissonances occur. If we are attempting to avoid suffering and/or death, it certainly makes sense that our brains would anticipate dangers and try to avoid them or reduce their potential negative impacts. But it is also true that if we want to avoid suffering, and/or death, we need to anticipate the cumulative long term impacts of our short-term responses to life.

According to “predictive coding” theory, at each level of a cognitive process, the brain generates models, or beliefs, about what information it should be receiving from the level below it. These beliefs get translated into predictions about what should be experienced in a given situation, providing the best explanation of what’s out there so that the experience will make sense. The predictions then get sent down as feedback to lower-level sensory regions of the brain. The brain compares its predictions with the actual sensory input it receives, “explaining away” whatever differences, or prediction errors, it can by using its internal models to determine likely causes for the discrepancies. For instance, we might think we are looking at a rope hanging from a tree branch, yet as we approach nearer to it, it moves in an unexpected way, revealing it’s TRUE nature as being a snake.

The prediction errors that can’t be explained away get passed up through connections to higher levels as “feedforward” signals, rather than feedback, where they’re considered by our higher intelligence, through the brain’s cortex, as something for the system to pay attention to and deal with accordingly. The internal conceptual game is now about adjusting the internal models, the brain dynamics, so as to eliminate or suppress future prediction errors.  If we have become committed to finding the “truth” about any new situation, then we must postpone making conclusions about the “outer world” and all of the “you and they” objects of attention that we may be trying to understand. Every prediction about “you” or “they” can never be one hundred percent accurate in this new moment, for by ascribing static perceptual assessments to a dynamic life expression potentially, the object of perception is held to a past description and imbued with qualities that may not conform to it’s real nature in the present moment (don’t get bit by that misidentified rope hanging from the tree branch!)

It is imperative that our responses to life do not result in brain subroutines and theories that might protect us in the short-term, while being inhibitive or even self-destructive in nature over the long haul. Taking alcoholic drinks or medications to reduce stress in the short term becomes the source of a greater potential for diseases such as chemical dependency, cancer, and/or liver damage over a longer time period, for example. Modes of religious understanding that our ancestors have passed forward to us may keep us fitting in with and supported by the crowd within the fundamentalist church that we now may be attending, while keeping us relatively more fearful, close minded, spiritually and emotionally inhibited and limited, and/or even imprisoned by an outdated understanding.

Fear is biologically driven by heightened lower brain activity of the amygdala and the hippocampus. The fear response circulating through those functional brain centers can be a programmed response from accessing painful memories from either personal experience or from its training through its educational and social support networks. Fear would steer predictive trends and errors towards the need to maintain self protection and safety, to the detriment and potential exclusion of other, more appropriate intelligent, relevant, and productive approaches to any new situation, such as the practice of inquisitiveness and curiosity. Yet the brain instantly offers up it’s own convincing judgements, and is probably obeying a hard-wired instinctual self-protection and preservation command which promotes it’s own interests above all else. The truth is that the scientific method is a more rational way to approach most new situations, where enhanced interest, uncertainty and non-attachment to outcomes becomes primary guiding principles for observing and learning from life.

Until we examine the full contents of our minds, and the collective mind of mankind, we will be plagued by the multitudes of mental illnesses that parade as our unexamined fears, hatred, shame, lies, ignorance, and aspects of superstitious reasoning. These unhealed drivers will operate behind the scenes, and have dramatic and tragic effects effects upon our perceptions and the course of human events and history. Peace of mind, like love, and God, comes to live within our self, once we refuse to access the historical lies that limits mankind, and sets mankind against itself, by no longer creating or supporting ideological impediments to a more sublime presence. While we continue to make internal assessments that the world is threatening and unsafe, our “predictions” remain our self-fulfilling prophecies, unless and until we set out to prove otherwise. If our brains are ” hard wired” to insist on telling the self what the world is, then our minds must insist on telling the brain what the brain is, and what its limitations are for assessing the world with truth and understanding.

If our predictive models support continuously attacking our self with the effects of stress disorders and poor self-esteem, or defending our self against the perceived attacks, potential or otherwise, from others who we feel may not have our best interests at heart, then our prophecies will co-create conflicts with others and road blocks on the highway of Peace. For some of us, our insecurities drive us to attach our self to a person, place, idea, or thing, in the hope that by clinging to others and/or to their ideas, our own greater good may be assured. To function at the highest level, we all need a sense of safety, or we will constantly be seeking protection from the external “threats”. By the limitation of our life experience to preconceived notions of what fulfillment might be, and just following techniques for how others have been promoting its attainment, we tend to neglect our own unique process for finding truth and internally unwrapping the creative gifts within us, gifts which deliver insights into how to best assess and order reality and continue on a happier, more peaceful life journey.

Biologically, at a cellular level, our bodies are programmed through antibodies generated within the immune system to fight viruses and bacterial invaders.  The “us versus them ” antibody dynamic has an evolutionary history that predates human consciousness by hundreds of millions of years, and it has served all of life fairly well, yet provides no real biological “road map for peace”, other than through the destruction of all cells unlike its own. Problems arise when the antibodies fail to recognize a deadly invader, they overreact in the face of the milder ones, or they attack healthy cells. Any of these “failed” immune system responses results in potentially fatal threats to the body.

One cannot help but notice the functional similarities between the “unconscious” action of antibodies within the body, and habitual and/or automatic responses of the mind to perceived threats, when the fear generated “fight or flight” responses to abrasive stimuli inevitably arise. Does the power of a new truth, or a change in perception become the equivalent to a “cognitive antibody” in its conscious impact upon mental viruses such as lies, ignorance, or superstitious reasoning? In any “us versus them” dynamic, the brain works overtime defining the “us” and the “them”, with the expectation that “us” will have priority in safety and security computations. It has been speculated that our consciousness may actually be derived or evolved from our biological and social need to survive in groups and to defend ourselves against attacks, and our brain minds may be the evolutionary leap to a higher level manifestation of our immune systems, which now has an enhanced connection with the nervous system and the brain, and almost miraculously, a connection with other humans through thoughts, language and “prayer”. And yet, even the brain’s evolutionary advancements does not preclude the possibilities for failed responses to life, with self-destructive and/or other-destructive activity in the face of non-threatening or misunderstood environmental interactions..

What we aren’t aware of, we cannot change. Enlightenment is a name that can be used for the ending of the process whereby the immune system of the mind no longer wrongly attacks itself or any other sentient being, or attaches itself to a person, place, or thing in the hope for safety or salvation,. In the recognition that “you can’t be real”, the “you” being an internal assessment projected from my mind and my brain’s expectations into the world that I am fighting or defending myself against, the brain can rest long enough to witness what might really be “out there” as the “you”, or objects of consciousness. In the realization that all that I ever see, or will see, unto eternity is myself, then my perceptual ” antibodies” will no longer be generated in consciousness, and sent out in self-destructive or other-destructive patterns of influence.

Peace is a manifestation of the order created by finally witnessing the unbroken wholeness of life, and finding our unique place within that unbrokenness. Yet, the experience of Peace is neither automatic or natural to mankind, or to be gained by just anyone of sufficient economic means, nation of origin, religious affiliation, or the proper alignment of the stars at our birth. Our planet Earth’s present day ecological collapse and the economic imbalances within society can be traced to outdated and inaccurate political, social, and religious maps of shared reality, and the corrupted predictions that arise from them. The historic internal maps that mankind accesses through collective consciousness tends towards affirming confrontation and conflict, with peace the name given to the gaps between he inevitable expressions of bellicose behavior.

We can witness the unbroken whole, and be a thriving part of it, when we liberate ourselves from fragmented, defensive, and selfish reasoning and desires. We only need to develop insight into ourselves as to how we create and view reality, and the way that we name phenomenon, and how those new names become integrated with our pasts to become part of the fabric of our conscious being. We must see beyond our internal conflicts, those both culturally sanctioned and shared with others and those created through our own limited thinking, to finally find a fundamental ground that supports a greater good where higher orders of truth, love, and peaceful intentions becomes the fundamental nature of our journey through the rest of our life. From this enlightened foundation we can build more accurate, updated models of prediction for our collective brain and mind, which eventuates in better religious, philosophical, political, and economic systems.

How did “that” get in there?!

“Being male is a matter of birth

Being a man is a matter of aging.

Being a gentleman is a matter of choice”

—Vin Diesel

There has been much discussion in the last several years about the differences between men and women.  Books have been even written claiming that the sexes are from different planets, figuratively speaking.  Men and women are two sides of the same coin, and though they do not have identical physical gifts, both sexes have access to the same intellectual,emotional, and spiritual power.  Each sex has accepted different cultural and family roles over countless generations, and therein lies the obvious distinction between the sexes,  Yet, both sexes must walk hand in hand, as equals to and helpmates to each other, for our world to survive and prosper.

It is beneficial to provide some information about the physiological similarities and differences in the brain between men and women, and how we process information and express ourselves, as a result of those differences and similarities.  It is important to also note the power of cultural conditioning through wayward religious agendas and misunderstandings already integrated within the followers consciousness, as well. I will post some quotes from the Old and New Testaments of the Christian Bible, to show how men have attempted to suppress the nature of the feminine, both within the women in their lives and culture, and within their own “masculine” minds.  Both of these factors have ultimate importance in the Common Knowledge game, a socialized process that provides the basic foundation for perception within our collective consciousness, and unconsciousness.

It’s no secret that boys and girls are different—very different. The differences between genders, however, extend beyond what the eye can see. Research reveals major distinctions between male and female brains. Scientists generally study four primary areas of difference in male and female brains: processing, chemistry, structure, and activity. The differences between male and female brains in these areas show up all over the world, but scientists also have discovered exceptions to every so-called gender rule. You may know some boys who are very sensitive, immensely talkative about feelings, and just generally don’t seem to fit the “boy” way of doing things. As with all gender differences, no one way of doing things is better or worse. The differences listed below are simply generalized differences in typical brain functioning, and it is important to remember that all differences have advantages and disadvantages.

Male brains utilize nearly seven times more gray matter for activity while female brains utilize nearly ten times more white matter. What does this mean? Gray matter areas of the brain are localized. They are information- and action-processing centers in specific splotches in a specific area of the brain. This can translate to a kind of tunnel vision when they are doing something. Once they are deeply engaged in a task or game, they may not demonstrate much sensitivity to other people or their surroundings.

White matter is the networking grid that connects the brain’s gray matter and other processing centers with one another. This profound brain-processing difference is probably one reason you may have noticed that girls tend to more quickly transition between tasks than boys do. The gray-white matter difference may explain why, in adulthood, females are great multi taskers, while men excel in highly task-focused projects.

Male and female brains process the same neurochemicals but to different degrees and through gender-specific body-brain connections. Some dominant neurochemicals are serotonin, which, among other things, helps us sit still; testosterone, our sex and aggression chemical; estrogen, a female growth and reproductive chemical; and oxytocin a bonding-relationship chemical.

In part, because of differences in processing these chemicals, males on average tend to be less inclined to sit still for as long as females and tend to be more physically  impulsive and aggressive. Additionally, males process less of the bonding chemical oxytocin than females. Overall, a major takeaway of chemistry differences is to realize that men at times need different strategies for addressing stress and anxiety issues than women.

A number of structural elements in the human brain differ between males and females. “Structural” refers to actual parts of the brain and the way they are built, including their size and/or mass. Females often have a larger hippocampus, our human memory center. Females also often have a higher density of neural connections into the hippocampus. As a result, girls and women tend to input or absorb more sensorial and emotive information than males do. By “sensorial” we mean information to and from all five senses. If you note your observations over the next months of boys and girls and women and men, you will find that females tend to sense a lot more of what is going on around them throughout the day, and they retain that sensorial information more than men.

Additionally, before boys or girls are born, their brains developed with different hemispheric divisions of labor. The right and left hemispheres of the male and female brains are not set up exactly the same way. For instance, females tend to have verbal centers on both sides of the brain, while males tend to have verbal centers on only the left hemisphere. This is a significant difference. Girls tend to use more words when discussing or describing incidence, story, person, object, feeling, or place. Males not only have fewer verbal centers in general but also, often, have less connectivity between their word centers and their memories or feelings. When it comes to discussing feelings and emotions and senses together, girls tend to have an advantage, and they tend to have more interest in talking about these things.

While we are on the subject of emotional processing, another difference worth looking closely at is the activity difference between male and female brains. The female brain, in part thanks to far more natural blood flow throughout the brain at any given moment (more white matter processing), and because of a higher degree of blood flow in a concentration part of the brain called the cingulate gyrus, will often ruminate on and revisit emotional memories more than the male brain.

Males, in general, are designed a bit differently. Males tend, after reflecting more briefly on an emotive memory, to analyze it somewhat, then move onto the next task. During this process, they may also choose to change course and do something active and unrelated to feelings rather than analyze their feelings at all. Thus, observers may mistakenly believe that boys avoid feelings in comparison to girls or move to problem-solving too quickly.

These four, natural design differences listed above are just a sample of how males and females think differently. Scientists have discovered approximately 100 gender differences in the brain, and the importance of these differences cannot be overstated. Understanding gender differences from a neurological perspective not only opens the door to greater appreciation of the different genders, it also calls into question how we parent, educate, and support our children from a young age.

There appears to be a physiological reason in the brain for why men and women see life differently from each other.  Men and women tend to process information and emotions somewhat differently.  Women tend to think more globally, and outwardly network with others, and also within all centers of their own brains, better than males.  Yet, there are aspects of many styles of processing available to both men, and women, depending on their own internal natures, and intentions.  And, through proper training, intention, and insight, men can actually process information and emotions in more intelligent, balanced, loving manners.  And men can become much more interested in, and sensitive to the needs of others, and their own emotional needs, if this becomes a conscious intention for them.  Studies have also shown that the internal nature of all brains can be changed, even after one reaches adulthood.  Men can become much more “feminine” in the way their brain processes emotions and information, showing the powerful transformative force that conscious “nurture” has upon “nature”.

Our collective consciousness in the USA has most of its historical religious foundation in Judeo-Christian values and ethics, a decidedly divisive understanding for living life which continues to directly impact our moral, religious, ethical, political, economic, and judicial processes.  I will not be quoting from the Islamic tradition, which is a huge misogynistic oppressive spiritual environment for women, or the Buddhist, Hindi, Taoist, Confucian, or other foreign originated philosophies and religions in the following discussion, though works from many of these thought systems are relevant.  The Christian bible will be quoted from, with the intention of showing how the Judeo-Christian ethic can predetermine collective understanding of the relationship between men and women.

Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man.
—-1 Corinthians 11:9

To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”
—-Genesis 3:16​

For man was not made from woman, but woman from man.
—-1 Corinthians 11:8

Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives,

1 Peter 3:1

The women should keep silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be in submission, as the Law also says. If there is anything they desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

—–1 Corinthians 14:34-35

I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.

1 Timothy 2:12-14

The bible has so many revealing statements and texts about the subjugation and disempowering of women, all in the name of maintaining “Godly” relations.   The Christian bible is replete with aphorisms and statements relegating women to the background of the “church”, and in all relations with life.  This oppression of women, and repression of so-called “feminine characteristics” within the male have been historically inculcated into the history and traditions of so-called “religious people”, and it reflects in the diseased and imbalanced relationships between some Christian and Jewish bodies of thought, and the world in general.

These religious principles have also become established as conscious, and unconscious, norms for perception within the collective consciousness of America, and mankind in general.  Just having a political and philosophical need to keep the church and the state separate is not quite enough, apparently, to establish healthier norms for relationships between the sexes.  And, an unfortunate and dangerous outcome to this division between the man and woman is that the man is unconsciously conditioned to see the ‘feminine” aspects of himself in an objectified manner, and tries to oppress, control and dominate those aspects, emotions, and tendencies as if those parts were his “Christian wife”, rather than integrate them into a complete holism within himself.  To the extent that the American toxic male continues to be a success in this activity, is the extent that misogyny, sexism, dominance over women, intolerance towards the needs of the innocent or the oppressed, and repression of his own divine nature, continues to be rampant within himself, and within the society that he occupies.

The order is rapidly fading. And the first one now will later be last, for the times they are a-changin’.

—– Bob Dylan – “The Times They Are A-Changin’”

There is a time and a place that our world civilization is reaching towards, when the energies of the male and the female become more balanced and mutually integrated within the entirety of humanity. There is a time and a place when male repression of the divine aspects his own feminine nature ceases, and he is able to reach wholeness. There is a time and a place when male oppression of the female spirit in all others will end, as well, and men will finally welcome the sensitivity, empathy, caring, and compassion that the divine feminine offers to all. There is a time and a place when all of mankind will finally experience itself as balanced, healed, whole individuals, having respect and love for all of life, be it male, female, animal, plant, and even the Earth itself..

There is a difference between the brains, and the lives, of men and women, boys and girls. It is time to understand and love those differences, effect personal change where relevant to incorporate more of the positive aspects of the other sex’s perspectives, embrace and love the similarities, and work with each other towards the conscious healing of the oft-times fragmented contentious relationship between the sexes, as well as the troubled, tragic relationship between man and his consciousness, Nature, and the Earth.

The Black Box

Each and every one of us has the capacity to be an oppressor. I want to encourage each and every one of us to interrogate how we might be an oppressor and how we might be able to become liberators for ourselves and for each other.

— Laverne Cox

Sir Isaac Newton developed this basic understanding for closed systems

In science, computing, and engineering, a black box is a device, system or object which can be viewed in terms of its inputs and outputs (or transfer characteristics), without any knowledge of its internal workings. Our unexamined minds are like black boxes as described in such engineering thought experiments. It is common knowledge that humans have vast orders of unpredictability built right into their own life system “black box”. Yet, according to Cambridge Analytica, and other propaganda theorists, it only takes fifty items of data about each human being to accurately predict how they will respond to various stimulus, including which presidential candidate that they will vote for. It has become “common knowledge” among politicians, religious leaders, and corporate leaders as to how to most effectively control populations tending towards chaos and indecision by using these principles of engagement.

Because the majority of mankind chooses to ignore its heritage and not develop the mind that supports a loving order of reality, the inner workings of the mind become a “black box”, which in its unconscious state tends to respond to benign or new stimulus with fear and desire rather than love and wisdom. Irrational fear and selfish desire detour our intelligence onto paths of chaos, uncertainty and incomplete and ignorant responses to life.

What are some of the hidden factors within the “black box” of human experience.that contribute to our response to all of the cultural stimulus within our lives? And, if our “black box” is Pandora’s Box, it is time to think outside of the box!

I have identified five interrelated and interdependent factors:

1). The Common Knowledge Game (CKG)

2). The Uncommon Knowledge Game (UKG)

3). The Common Unconscious Knowledge Game (CUKG)

4). The Lemming Effect

5). Patriarchy, as expressed through present day toxic masculinity.

The Common Knowledge Game (CKG) is a new name for a form of consensus social understanding that has been used since humans first became verbal and capable of using more than just body language to communicate with their peers. The Common Unconscious Knowledge Game (CUKG) has been with us from the beginning, as well, and points to the subconscious domains of human psychology, and is similar to Freud’s concept of the id. The CUKG points to the underlying undeveloped and/or unexplored areas within human consciousness, and the Uncommon Knowledge game has residence in the human heart and soul with its desire for universal love and transcendence.

The Lemming Effect has also been with us from the beginning, and its most powerful energy takes the form of peer pressure. The present toxic state of mankind has been created by the effects of the weeds of toxic masculinity growing indiscriminately through the CKG, the CUKG, and is often expressed through the Lemming Effect. Toxic masculinity is a variation on patriarchy, and has no relationship with the UKG, as one exists at the exclusion of the other. Toxic masculinity is not a force for ultimate good, and is a defining boundary condition for the resistance against living a healthy, whole, balanced, sane, woman and Earth friendly life experience

The common knowledge game is a phenomena well-studied in the last generation by Nobel Prize winners, mathematicians, and New York Times best-selling authors and philosophers. It has been used to help understanding why humans make the decisions that they do, and to anticipate what future decisions might be. An offshoot of this is called “gaming theory”. What has not been adequately developed is its unconscious component, which is the Common Unconscious Knowledge Game, an area where hidden pain and suffering, instincts, intuitions, and archetypes rule, and which also informs and drives all unenlightened human thought and behavior, in co-creation with the CKG. The combination of patriarchy, the CKG the CUKG, and the related Lemming Effect, has been called many other names by seers and seekers over the millennia. The word “Maya” has been given as the name from Hinduism and Buddhism for the tendency to both individually and collectively create a fragmented perceptual universe, where in truth there is only the unity of the Universe. Unity, or spiritual oneness, is another subject, being the most important aspect of the Uncommon Knowledge (UKG) Game, which points to our spiritual evolution and all relevant teachings associated with our transcendence.

In the Uncommon Knowledge Game teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, he mentions that

“My father’s house/mansion has many rooms“

“My kingdom is not of this world”, and

“be in the world, don’t be of the world”

which are pointers to the fact that there are two possibilities for living, in CKG and CUKG experiences as a sleeping being in a dark, disfigured world, or as an awakening being in a multi-dimensional human relationship with infinity, as experience through our Uncommon Knowledge Game. The sleeping beings are those who live in the world of Maya without being aware of the illusions of thought that dominate their minds and lives. The awakening ones no longer are subservient to values of patriarchy and toxic masculinity, which are primary support pillars for the CKG and the CUKG.

This adaptation and acculturation processes of the CKG, CUKG, and the Lemming Effect has become so ingrained in consciousness, so accepted, so standardized, so normalized that the individual who even casually practices their dark side continues to contribute to the collective imprisonment of all of mankind through this process.  The principles of toxic masculinity dominates the CKG, the CUKG, and the Lemming Effect, which will help the reader understand at a deeper level why our society has become so corrupted by our wayward masculine energy.

The CKG, the CUKG, and the Lemming Effect informs our understanding of our own lives, how we see others, and how to use it’s often times twisted knowledge of poor self-esteem and negative judgments of others to help inform our decisions about actions we can take in our own lives.  The CKG and the CUKG can provide to us both a blessing, and a curse, depending on the messages that we mine and successfully apply to our lives from conformance to its social principles.  But, regardless of the messages that we mine, we are still directly influenced by ALL messages, no matter how much in conflict that they may be with each other, until we have had enough insight into this process to heal ourselves of unconscious adherence to its often times confusing, conflicting principles.  We each have an internal pendulum which swings gently, or erratically, between all of the poles, and our shared consciousness reflects those sometimes divisive inner rhythms.

Effectively, there are two sides to the CKG.  What sets up the darker side of the CKG in our minds and hearts is continuous internal access to our negative assessments, or judgements of others, and of our self, both of our physical form and our spiritual essence.  These negative assessments also include our perceptions of what we believe others think negatively about us, as well, which is another self-defeating component of the CKG.  This becomes one of the pillars, albeit a dark one,  for the CKG, and the reason for the spiritual imprisonment for all of us. What might set up a liberating side of the CKG is the potential energy of a shared belief that we are all good people at heart, and/or that we are all practicing the spiritual understanding that the word “namaste” represents..  These internalized collective beliefs are social processes of consciousness that may become culturally inculcated into our awareness, and thus we all might share  in the benefits, and the detriments, of collective consciousness as well as collective unconsciousness.

An item of information is common knowledge if all of the relevant citizens of a community know it to be so (it is mutual knowledge) and all of the citizens know that all other citizens know it and all other citizens know that all other citizens know that all other citizens know it, and so on. This is much more than simply saying that something is known by all, but also implies that the fact that “what is known by me” is also known by all, etc.  Thus, common knowledge implies not only that we all know some piece of information, but can also be absolutely confident that the rest know it, and that the rest know that we know it, and so on.

I first consciously encountered the darker side of the CKG in my employment with the US Postal Service during the time period from 1975 to 1985.  There were several  boundary conditions of the Common Knowledge Game for my continuing employment with that agency.  Many of my co-workers, as well as myself, worked there because we felt that we could do no other work, and that we did not have the skills, qualification, competency, or motivation to try anything else.  Everybody knew that truth including members of the management team, not only about our selves, but also about all of our co-workers, which in turn, was what the co-workers understood about each other, as well.  It was part of shared story that we told to ourselves and joked about with each other on many occasions.

In addition to the CKG, many of us also shared a common foe, chemical dependency, which adds several critical internal self-defeating calculations to the CKG. These baseline understandings helped to define my relationship to the Post Office career, as well.  I really enjoyed my time working as a machine clerk, however, as the fast pace of the job, and the fact that it was a lifetime guaranteed job,  kept me from feeling too bad about my personal and employment decisions.  Even though I felt “trapped” by my own insecurities and dysfunctions, through the use of drugs and alcohol I found a way to sing in my cage often enough to delay the inevitable crush of despair that was to follow in earnest later on in my career after I joined the sorting machine maintenance department.

Consider the example of a sexually abused woman, say, a woman abused by a powerful man while she was in high school or college.  There are many “common knowledge parameters” to be considered here, but the following are several items to consider, from the women’s perspective:  Depending on her religious upbringing, she may believe the following about herself:

(In the CKG understanding of reality, we should begin each one of the following statements with “Everybody knows that . .) .”.

1).  I must be subservient to the male, whatever he says, I must obey.  I dare not raise my voice against any man

2). I will bring shame to my family by being truthful, so I must keep silent about the abuse.

3). Nobody would believe my word against a powerful man, so I must keep silent

4). I should have known better than to wear that dress, or to place myself in such a defenseless position.

5). I should have known better than to be in this person’s presence, and it is my fault that I was attacked

6). If I speak out against this man, I will be crushed by him, and be considered a whore, or a person of poor morals by others.

And on and on it could go, the foundational logic embedded within the common knowledge game that would keep a woman silent in the face of sexual abuse by another.

Consider competitive work environments where there are several jealous office workers seeking to demean a common foe, be it a boss or a motivated co-worker, through practicing racism, sexism, religious persecution, etc. This can be several human beings practicing typical mutually inaccurate assessments of a party not currently in their presence, also typical of what happens in big companies, politics and Donald Trump style “tweet attacks” , high school, or in church. The participants will not attack unless they are sure that the other will attack at exactly the same time, as nobody wants to be the lone attacker, becoming vulnerable and thus expose their own intent for aggression. This is indicative of the “mob mind”, and how it acts in the real world. The first person sends out a “feeler” (verbal exchange of internalized culturally inculcated thought process) to the other parties with the message “You know, I am really unhappy with Mr. X, he is problematic.” Yes, we warm up for the attack, by gently degrading the third-party, while awaiting the others reply within the group physically or emotionally present, which, hopefully affirms our intent. Our verbal or written means of attempting to communicate with the other “attackers” may be misinterpreted, so we initially have no collective security in adopting an “attack mode”. If however, the message of attack is received simultaneously by others within the group, which it does in “common knowledge modes of thought”, then the attack is on. Note that all parties already know the message. They all knew in advance that the “other attackers” had the message as well, because it is COMMON KNOWLEDGE that others share at least some of their negative perceptions, and they will attack the other, because they always have before, and they have already prepared their internal fortifications, as well as their “verbal and social weapons” for such an experience.

This is the classic attack/defense posture or mechanism that the entirety of the human race is now participating in. Anybody who has worked in the construction trades, or in work areas dominated by men, know this process quite well. The terms repartee, badinage, bantering, persiflage, etc. are the kind names given to this culturally accepted, and sometimes revered process, whereby we “lightly and without intentional malice” impugn the dignity and reputation of others, through pokes at each other. We call this “humor”, and some may feel almost hurt when others do not engage in this behavior with us. This has been an accepted standard of behavior, though we are finally awakening to darker aspects of this by identifying hostile work environments, and instituting regulations for reducing persecution, racial discrimination, age discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual discrimination in the workplace.

In schools, the wimps, greasers, jocks, nerds, eggheads, goths, transsexuals, homosexuals, hippies, outcasts, or whatever name that defines the “out group” outside of the popular, socially accepted standards of behavior that characterize a grouping, can be quite susceptible to aggression, antagonism, and bullying.  I think that everyone who has attended school has had experience with this phenomenon.  There only needs to be one in an “in” group, in the presence of others from that group, who may want to impress their peer group, and they begin by attacking a member of the ‘out” group.  It may be only verbal, or it can be a combination of both physical and verbal, but the rules of engagement have already been worked out generations in advance of any new bullying behavior.  It follows standards paths of aggression, hostility, belittlement, and debasement, and somehow the aggressor becomes elevated in stature, at the expense of the victim.  Of course, these are the same behaviors that get translated into our adult life as racism, xenophobia, and the callous judgement against the poor, old, disabled, and the rest of the compromised members of society, that our conservative leaning politicians and wayward POTU$ continue to try to abuse and deprive of health care and welfare.

Human appearance certainly figures strongly in the CKG and CUKG, and the Lemming Effect, especially in regards to sexual intentions for males viewing females, and females viewing males. It might not be especially surprising that evolution wired the male brain to find attractive bodies rewarding, but this unconscious fact is another pillar within the CKG and the CUKG. Watching a curvaceous woman can feel like a reward in the brain of men, much as drinking alcohol or taking drugs might, research has revealed. These new findings might help explain the preoccupation men can have with “checking out” the figures of all women that they encounter. Shapely hips in women are linked with fertility, peer acceptance and overall health. As such, it makes sense evolutionarily speaking that studies across cultures have shown men typically find the hourglass figures quite sexy and worth extra attention.

Guys who check out the sexy female models in magazines have more body-image problems than those males who do not, as well, so curiosity may lead to some forms of suffering. While it is fairly well-known that women feel worse about their bodies after viewing other “more attractive” females. guys apparently take the same knock after perusing the images of lingerie-clad women. The researchers have found that by looking at idealized, sexualized women, guys feel inadequate because they start thinking they need to measure up on the attractiveness scale to snag such a mate. Men make the inference that in order to be sexual and romantic with women of the similar caliber they see in magazines or on the internet, they also need to be attractive.

Women find similar optimally female human bodies as attention-grabbing, but for different reasons. Women size up other women in an effort to determine their own relative attractiveness and to maintain mate guarding. In other words, insecure women must keep their mate away from optimally designed females. Thus, the intersections of the worlds of both common and unconscious knowledge rules our experience in human sexual interactions.

Be aware, once again, of what the “common knowledge game” really is, at least for my new interpretation of it. Briefly, it is the process whereby we have internalized the verbal understandings of all others, whereby ignorant, judgmental, limiting, obfuscating, damaging, soul-destroying concepts of self and other are “socially acceptable” modes for assessing and understanding the self, and the other. This are internalized, and socialized, and this “knowledge” becomes a collectively shared experience. And, we all know that everybody else knows what we know, while we know what everybody else knows.  Within the Christian churches with backwoods understanding, we are all “sinners”, we are “corrupt”, we have no hope for “salvation”, etc. unless we believe a certain way, and bow down before certain philosophies and religious and political leaders.  Who wants to be damned to hell for eternity for not following the religious path?  Everybody knows that everybody knows that HELL is where you go when you disobey the laws that are represented in the bible, or expounded upon by the minister.

Through a process which has existed since verbal consciousness first formed in humanity, we develop verbal constructs to represent the outside world in our own internal universe. Yet, none of these internalized assessments are 100% accurate, NOR COULD THEY EVER BE, even though the entirety of human consciousness now shares in the illusion that what they do represent what is actually “out there” as represented by their current misunderstanding of their fellow human being, and their current relationship to the other (“the finger pointing at the moon can never be the moon”). And what exactly, does despair, optimism, faith and hope look like? We chase their true meaning with our words. How can our infinite spiritual heritage ever be adequately measured through words?

We use verbal constructs to oppress, repress, and deny the other, all the while unconsciously honoring the culturally inculcated process of mutual oppression, and repression of feminine energy and the Divine. We are all potential scapegoats for “the other”, especially when collaboration in a process is not a value, and much of our energy may become directed to prevention of us from becoming blamed or accused of behavior everybody is already responsible for, with or without us, anyway. PROJECTION IS PAINFUL, and we all feel its wrath from time to time.

Our culture shows many examples of this process playing out in movies, on TV programs, and, of course, we all experience this in our day-to-day lives, as we interact with our social and cultural environment. The implications are vast, and insidious. Please consider the following excerpt from the movie COOL HAND LUKE

Captain: You gonna get used to wearing those chains after a while, Luke. Don’t you never stop listening to them clinking, ‘cause they gonna remind you what I been saying for your own good.

Luke: I wish you’d stop being so good to me, Cap’n.

Captain: Don’t you ever talk that way to me. NEVER! NEVER! [Captain hits Luke, who rolls down the hill to the other prisoners] What we’ve got here is … failure to communicate. Some men you just can’t reach. So you get what we had here last week, which is the way he wants it. Well, he gets it. I don’t like it any more than you men.

The “failed” communication of the Captain to Luke is the basis for the successful communication of the Captain to the prisoners: subvert my rules and you will be crushed. The brutal message is made in public, not so that all the prisoners can see what happens to Luke, but so that all the prisoners can see all the prisoners seeing what happens to Luke.

In environments like prisons, the education system, the military, and larger groups up to, and including, American society, behavioral decisions based on private information (“I saw Luke beaten down for breaking the rules. If I break the rules I might get beaten, too.”) are almost always weaker than behavioral decisions based on Common Knowledge (“Everyone knows that if you break the rules like Luke you will be beaten down. Why would I even think about breaking the rules?”). The latter has more binding power, because, in effect, the prisoners themselves end up enforcing the warden’s (or society’s) rules. Even if you privately believe that you and your fellow prisoners could make a break for it, so long as you believe that “everyone knows” that you will be punished for breaking the rules, then you do not believe that you will receive any support from your fellow prisoners (fellow citizens, or friends). It is irrational to even raise the subject with your fellow prisoners, as you will mark yourself as someone who is either too stupid or too dangerous not to recognize what everyone else knows that everyone else knows. And because everyone is making a similar calculation, no one ever makes an escape attempt and the Common Knowledge grows stronger over time, as does the no-escaping binding attitudes. This is why the Captain goes to such lengths not just to punish Luke for his escape attempts, but to break Luke, and not just to break Luke, but to break Luke as publicly as possible.

A variation of the Common Knowledge game appears in a story first presented in ancient times.  Plato has Socrates describe a group of people who have lived chained to the wall of a cave all of their lives, facing a blank wall. The people watch shadows projected on the wall from objects passing in front of a fire behind them, and give names to these shadows. The shadows are the prisoners’ reality. Socrates explains how the philosopher is like a prisoner who is freed from the cave and comes to understand that the shadows on the wall are not reality at all, for he can perceive the true form of reality rather than the manufactured reality that is the shadows seen by the prisoners.

The inmates of this place do not even desire to leave their prison, for they know no better life. The prisoners manage to break their bonds one day, and discover that their reality was not what they thought it was. They discovered the sun, which Plato uses as an analogy for the fire that man cannot see behind. Like the fire that cast light on the walls of the cave, the human condition is forever bound to the impressions that are received through the senses. Even if these interpretations are an absurd misrepresentation of reality, we cannot somehow break free from the bonds of our human condition – we cannot free ourselves from phenomenal state just as the prisoners could not free themselves from their chains. If, however, we were to miraculously escape our bondage, we would find a world that we could not understand – the sun is incomprehensible for someone who has never seen it. In other words, we would encounter another “realm,” a place incomprehensible because, theoretically, it is the source of a higher reality than the one we have always known; it is the realm of pure Form, pure fact.

Because of the Common Knowledge game, there is enormous power in making a public spectacle out of information, which is why our local and national news, especially those tainted by the present day propaganda generators (see Fox News and Sinclair Broadcasting), Presidential Twitter posts, terminations from employment, public humiliations, coronations and executions (remember Timothy McVey?) alike are carried out in front of live audiences, posted to Facebook, broadcast through Twitter feeds, and/or are televised.  This lesson in behavioral influence – the crowd doesn’t just need to see the event, the crowd needs to see the crowd seeing the event – is why religious revival events, rock concerts, and so many of our modern social institutions – from political campaigns to American Idol – are staged in front of live audiences. When you sit in front of your TV set and watch, say, a national political convention, you are infinitely more engaged with the event when you see a crowd than when you don’t. We can’t help our self. It doesn’t even matter if the live audience is faked and we know that the audience is faked … have you ever listened to a sitcom without a laugh track? It’s just not as funny. The fact is that humans are social animals. We are hard-wired to look for and respond to Common Knowledge, and smart people – from political leaders to religious leaders to business leaders and concert organizers– have taken advantage of this for years.

What happens in the diseased family structure (alcoholism and drug addiction, physical and sexual abuse, psychological abuse of all types) in many situations of discipline and control exactly parallel the common knowledge game? Eventually, the children learn not to attempt to act out, or break free from, the oppressive qualities of an abusive parent, or parents, their church and its interpretation of “religious thought”, and their educational experience. Breaking the spirit of the abused child, and making sure that other members know that such “punishment” will also come their way keeps children under control, but also victimized, and traumatized. Children entering the school system where bullies are allowed to run free get to experience this process once again, in a bigger social setting. And, children who attend a church where the dignity of the individual is constantly degraded through their religious philosophy (you are a sinner, you always have been a sinner, and unless you believe the way we do, you are evil, and doomed to an eternity in hell) also will feel the horrific abuse of the COMMON KNOWLEDGE GAME. If any of us were to speak out against our oppressors, we will be punished severely, and we will be smacked down, and “roll down the hill” just like what happened to Paul Newman in the movie Cool Hand Luke. The character Luke, like all of us do frequently, gets smacked, and we are roll down the hill and confirm everybody’s bias, until we come out from under our oppressors.

There are two great acts of insanity that members of our family, and our culture, engage in, which are integral to the Conspiracy Of Silence, and the Common Knowledge Game of human perception:

1). There is the perception that if an authoritative political or religious leader or family member brings harm or damage to another, the victim must have somehow deserved it, and they should not expect an explanation, change of behavior, or apology from the aggressor. In fact, the victim of the aggression will be judged and punished even more harshly by calling a foul, or claiming harm, from the offensive behavior.

2). There is a perception that we all are of questionable origin, and value, except for, maybe, our self, depending upon who we are unfairly comparing our self to. This is a classic component of the Common Knowledge Game. Depending on the needs of the tribe we belong to, and how much we are acculturated within the group, we may devalue our self and all others, until we heal, and find our own unique voice and true value.

The mind must be clear so that the heart can hold others near and dear..

Our COMMON KNOWLEDGE GAME keeps all of us in some sort of order, albeit one that affirms the false truth that we are all broken human beings, with our only hope for salvation lying with chaotic, and insane, orders of unreality that continue to be inculcated into our collective consciousness. In other words, unless we march to the drummer of our religious and cultural past, we will be judged, persecuted, marginalized, and otherwise thrown to the wolves, with little hope for our own redemption.  Woe to the brave individual that strikes out on his own,  and attempts to find a new way of being in this world of chaos, distraction, and torment.

The Lemming Effect

A person who has thoroughly investigated human collective consciousness would find that there are many unconscious or unwritten rules for engagement between all members of society, in addition to the conscious and/or written ones.. The unconscious rules have been with us from the beginning, well before the introduction of mega-cities and civilizations, when mankind first falteringly attempted to both explore and to define inner experience. The conscious “rules” or laws have been developed over the last two hundred or more generations with the intention of establishing and maintaining the best order and harmony for the ever enlarging populations congregating together into the structure of cities or settlements. Hammurabi’s code of conduct and the Ten Commandments of the Old Testament are two great examples from our distant past of the documentation and implementation of rules defining acceptable conduct. The human race may continue to evolve in spirit and in truth as long as it is able to provide a minimum foundation of safety and security for all of its members, so it is important to remember that not all requirements to conform are misguided or evil in intent.

A great allegory for the social behavior of humans is that of the story of the life cycle of some populations of lemmings. Lemmings are little rodents that live near the cold northern Arctic regions.  They are focused animals by nature, meeting only to mate and then going their separate ways, but like all rodents, they have a high reproductive rate when food is plentiful. When population density becomes too high, some of the lemming species migrate in large quantities and since they can swim, they choose to cross the water in search of a new habitat. Lemmings have been known to follow each other as they plunge off the edge of cliffs into the water below. Even though lemmings have been found to be “swimming migrants” rather than victims of collective suicidal ideation, the myth of mass suicide is still called the Lemming Effect.

Regardless of the lemmings real intentions, the lemming story has become a metaphor for people who go along unquestioningly with a group, with potentially dangerous consequences.  The “Lemming Effect” is an innate psychological phenomenon, a survival trait, an inborn instinct in the majority of people. We see this happening in many occurrences from bad collective investment decisions such as the dot com boom of the late 1990’s, craving the latest Apple I Phone releases, excessive alcohol consumption at a party, following theological assertions such as “the blood of Jesus is the sacrifice to God that saves our soul”, to modern day automobile and fashion trends.

This Lemming Effect enables entire segments of a society to lose their sense of judgment and the application of personal wisdom all at the same time.  It can be linked to the “mob mind” phenomenon inherent within collective consciousness itself. Anybody who has witnessed a Trump rally understands this mindset, and the participant may feel threatened, or even be appalled by such crowd behavior if not presently an active member of the violent tribe.. If you have ever been a member in good standing in the problem drinking division at the local bar, you have intimate understanding of the suspension of wisdom and good judgement with your drinking decisions, as well

We are all alive today due to the self-organizing principles of life itself. In manufacturing and industrial processes, in our planet Earth and its journey through the solar system, and even in the human mind, we bear witness to the wonders and mysteries of self-organizing systems. The human brain has evolved into a capable predictive mechanism since the introduction of language as a tool for communication. Words are used for the measure of our experience, and are now our primary avenue for communication with each other. Words are forever containers for energy, and are not the actual energy itself, being only pointers towards that energy. Yet the introduction of words into the conscious void of the ancient human being must have been the most transformational, apocalyptic event in human history, probably being more important than the harnessing of the power of fire and water for the creation of the conditions for safety, security, and even society itself.

The development and the evolution of human language itself has had the effect of bringing the hope for new or enhanced order to the chaos inherent within the unconscious human experience, at least through the structure of words used to represent the world that one is experiencing. We only need witness the “committee”, or the “monkey mind” operating overtime within our minds while it unsuccessfully tries to make sense, or bring order, out of the background chaos forever present in our lives. Those who are neophytes in meditation, and even some of us when troubled by current events, experience this hyperactivity and perceive it as a block to peace of mind. In truth, this internal mental chaos, when reinterpreted, becomes a gateway or portal to be passed through so as to access deeper, more peaceful and benign regions of our spiritual identify.

There is an interesting interpretation of the Pauli Exclusion Principle which carries great relevancy to our understanding of the word. The Principle simply states that in our effort to describe or define any particle, or object, or to establish its exact location in the universe, we can never know all of the characteristics of the object of observation at one time, such as its angular momentum, direction, speed, and mass, being limited to three out of the four descriptors. Like our imperfect attempts at locating a particle in space, our words, literally, are our sincere, though incomplete, collective measurements, or representations, of reality, or our theories for how things now are, or could become in the future. We attempt to measure and locate eternally elusive phenomenon, and our words are perpetually in a state of “catch up” with an ever-unfolding new reality.

If establishing or maintaining order is our concern, we can effectively channel all relevant knowledge into intelligent systems of control that will maintain maximum stability wherever necessary, but only under those conditions where we understand most or all of the variables.. The basic process control theory underlying all modern industrial and manufacturing systems has an equivalent in the human mind, where we use feedback and feedforward information loops for refining and maintaining order (mindfulness, personal inventory, and meditation). For humans, though our primary system of control is through the laws of our society and of our religions, we have not yet developed the understanding of all of the boundary conditions for our human experience. Humanity’s egregious blunder has been in attempting to bring stability to itself while disregarding the laws of our spiritual heritage and of Mother Nature, which mankind continues to ignore, at its own peril. The instability introduced into our collective Earth life system by humanity’s ignorance of these laws will not be correctable until we humble ourselves enough to learn from our mistakes, be they theological, philosophical, religious, economic, ecological, or social in nature.

The nature of self-organizing systems is that once the quiescent point (also known as the Q point, set point, the functional operation level, the balance or the homeostasis point) has been altered, the system naturally seeks a return back to its native state, or “normalcy”. For our human experience, this may be both a blessing and a curse, depending on the “state” to which we are being returned back to. Typically, if we stretch a rubber band, and then release it, it returns to its original state. But, if we have stretched the rubber band too hard and too often, the rubber band loses its elasticity, and will never again return to its original state. A human being who has been stretched beyond their capacity through excessive stress, anxiety, and/or addictive behavior cycles will NOT be returning to their “normal” state, once it is recognized that the “normal” state was, in fact, an unhealthy, abnormal state of being in the first place, which in turn led to the creation of their present chaotic mindset..

For our planet Earth, this may mean ridding itself of any or all offensive life forms that threaten its very existence, and that continues to drive it out of balance with itself. The time intervals for finding a new, or returning to an old, “set point” that indicates a healthy life is far different between an individual human life and the life of planet Earth. The Earth may take thousands, or millions, of years to return to or reach its optimal state, whereas the evanescent ones must act immediately and decisively, lest we not live long enough to witness any real healing progress.

A life out of balance means that not enough knowledge has been uncovered, or applied, to guarantee harmonious system operation. And it is of ultimate importance to realize that, in the end, the human race is not the determiner of what homeostasis is for the world, as that has been established through many billions of years of its evolution and, thus, its changing relationship with itself and the rest of the Universe. It is also of greatest importance to realize that no man, or woman, is an island in this vast universe, and that our perception of harmony and balance is inextricably intertwined with the rest of humanity. No matter how healed, balanced, or empowered we believe that we are becoming, we are eternally linked with the rest of humanity, and the universe, in our attempts to create order or balance out of our own unique versions of the collective chaos known as human knowledge. The temptation to follow the herd, or to swim with the lemming, is built right into the foundational nature of our socialized existence.

We don’t realize how often our decisions are based on other people’s behavior. Lemming effect depicts a negative side of the conscious following of the crowd, especially when following leads to falling off the cliff. In real life situations it could mean losses of money, self identity and slower spiritual development. As it might sound easy to grasp the concept, it is difficult to notice in our own actual behavior. Moreover, social togetherness is sometimes very pleasant and valuable, for instance at a rock concert where one man starts to dance, then few people join and once the critical 10-20 people threshold is passed, massive amounts of people may join the dance.. It is a pleasant example of a positive manifestation of the lemming effect. It is all part of the process of making our unconscious parts more conscious, which must also bring awareness that mass behavior does not always result in positive experience for the individual.

Lets take the stock market dot-com bubble implosion in 1999-2001 and a recent real estate/collateralized debt obligation bond fiasco in 2007-2009, which also caused another stock market crash. Many investors were too emotional, irrational and instead of conducting the research themselves, followed the commonly accepted level of valuation. Believing that our world is always operating effectively and efficiently in short time periods results in the lazy approach of following what others do. A take away from this situation is that we each must remain vigilant in our awareness, and that we cannot walk individually, or join in the stampede as may be the case, on the same path as the others and be guaranteed that we will retain our integrity.

From a spiritual development perspective, following the masses could mean loosing our individuality, feeling anxious, uncomfortable and discontented. For instance, if the most popular educational program in universities happened to be engineering and we choose engineering while ignoring our true desires, this could lead to some serious cognitive dissonance. The supporting rationale that we have the best grades and this career would please our father the most may lead in unhappy directions. Many of us fail to perform sufficient research of what studies would fit us the best. Our choices could result in the premature termination of our studies, or worse, finishing the studies and then having to be retrained to work in a different field. I have pointed out a very real phenomenon here, as my educational life was directed through this very same unconscious process.

The lemming effect is not that far from pleasant, life affirming social togetherness, but the effect has some potential negative effects that we need to be aware at all times. It is healthy and wise to participate in social movements, but we must not lose our heads in the emotions. We must be critical of the movements of the crowd that are going against our vision and values. Also, we must do the research, and even experiment with unpopular ideas, before deciding that any massive new movement is for us. It is important not to ignore the “leading edge” movements, because accidentally standing on the way of the movement could bring harm to us or others. On the other hand, we could have a very good experience with the lemming effect, if played well. This is one of the aspects where an aware individual can play the common knowledge game and “lemming effect” to maximum personal benefit, without changing the collective rules of engagement. Our politicians, marketers and advertisers, and religious leaders have harnessed the power of the “lemming effect”, and our entire world civilization continues to be manipulated, for good or for evil, by these practitioners.

I dare not leave this subject without the presentation of an amazing, though disquieting, theory of human population control. We have an immune system which is automatically activated to fight and neutralize any invader into our body. Our minds work on a similar level, as it attempts to fight and neutralize any offender who threatens our safety, security, or peace of mind. Our planet Earth, or Gaia, also is a vibrant, living being with almost infinite potential to bring forth new forms of life into the universe. And Gaia has its own innate power to bring balance back to itself, with unexpected consequences in store for our unwary, overpopulating human race. It is not a stretch of reason to assume that whatever consciousness Gaia may be infused with may interpret our reproductive over exuberance as indicative of the presence of an imbalance within its own energy field, and make attempts to correct it.

Our planet Earth is now engaged in balancing itself and its energies, just as it has for billions of years. Though it may not have consciousness of the same nature as humans (the mind of the immortal, and the mind of the mortal, do not have a lot in common), the self-organizing principle of this vast system includes the elimination and/or balancing of all forces that do not positively contribute to its life and further its evolution. The human race, due to overpopulation, has brought great imbalances to planet Earth. Some experts believe that we may have ten times the amount of humans on our planet than our planet can sustain in harmony. The stress being generated in the mind of man by this overabundance of humanity may well be part of the self-protective mechanism of planet Earth itself. Humanity has captured a piece of Universal consciousness, which includes planet Earth and its collective awareness (see Teilhard de Chardin and his Noosphere concept). Our collective desire to go to war, to kill each other, to commit suicide, and/or to not generally thrive as a collective, may well be the Earth, acting through human consciousness, to bring healing to itself through the removal of damaged parts of itself, at least enough to bring balance back to the Earth. The Earth is, basically, eternal, as far as we are concerned, and is PRIMARY here, while the human race presently has little conscious presence in eternity. Our own Armageddon may well be written right into the operating system of Earth consciousness as it brings stability back to itself through all of its agents, be it earth, air, sunlight, fire, or water, and its almost infinite expression of flora and fauna.

Without harmony and peace, no homeostasis around a healthy operating point is possible.

Anyone care to take a plunge into the water from a cliff, or go for a long swim? Like lemmings, we are all migrants, albeit spiritual migrants, until we find our unique spiritual home. Once we have found our truth, we may follow our heart and our intelligence, and if that means following the herd for the moment, so be it. But if it means leading the herd, or even leaving the herd for a time, we must be ready to answer the call, as it may lead to all manners of healing and spiritual prosperity.

Toxic Masculinity And Defender Dan

Defender Dan

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”

― C.G. Jung

Guns, gold, greed, gonads, and girls. . . . how much is enough, American male?

In the 1950’s and 1960’s, America’s economy was booming, and our country also grew into its role as world policeman, which followed its involvement in World War II. As a country, it was pleasant to think of ourselves as the defenders of freedom and liberty, and the liberator of the damned, especially after its world saving performance of WWII.

The Defender Dan story serves as an allegory for my understanding of the American male experience of the brain and its function, and the “Baby Boomer” generation in general, of which I am a qualified member. I have inserted a picture of Defender Dan, a toy machine gun which was produced and marketed in the 1960’s, and which continues to carry immense symbolic value for me.

Defender Dan was a plastic and metal representation for a powerful tool of war, and served our culture’s need to normalize and promote aggressive role playing behavior for males. This machine delivered simulated death by plastic bullets, and was a manifestation of the cultural perception that a need for such violent toys existed.

The promotion of the use of these toy weapons happened concurrently with the execution of the Vietnam War, but one can review history to see that in each era that there has been war, there has also been toy guns made available for children.

These toy weapons represent our culture’s unconscious support for common knowledge based attack/defense postures and the mutual bullying behaviors that frequently appear in human relationships. Symbolically, these weapons helped to prepare our male population for continuing as unconscious human beings, who, when feeling threatened, would rather “shoot first, and ask questions later”. This toy perfectly represents the tool for manifesting that intention.

Men, especially those from lower economic and educational backgrounds, were to be enforcement agents and soldiers for war, for our American economic and philosophical imperialism. Psychologically susceptible American boys, through the practice with and the use of such toy weapons were being prepared to continue in their father’s footsteps. Our leaders stressed that our international bullying behavior was intended to enhance world peace and protect individual freedom and liberties.

The clinging to and the use of “adult versions” of weapons of war by spiritually underdeveloped citizens such as white supremacist terrorists, shows the power of the potential for evil arising from excess fear and the perceived need for protection from the effects of one’s errant philosophies.

My physical relationship with Defender Dan began in 1968. At that time, my mother worked at the Oak Lodge Fire Department as a dispatcher. The department had an annual toy drive, where they collected and distributed donated toys to disadvantaged children within the local community. One of the toys donated was called a Defender Dan Machine Gun. It was not a new toy, as it had “minor damage” that made it an acceptable toy only for a boy, and a father with mechanical skills, who might be able to troubleshoot and repair it. It was reckoned that there would be a real disappointment to a family if the toy was given to them and they could not fix it, so the toy was pulled from the pool of gifts. My mother asked for it, and she was “gifted” with the defective toy, which she gave to me for a Christmas gift..

I was thirteen years old at the time, and when I opened up the gift at Christmas, I thought that I might be a “little too old” to be receiving and playing with a toy gun, even one as massive as this huge gun. I mean, this thing took up a lot of space (as do hurtful and self-destructive and other-destructive thoughts and judgements within our minds)! It was quite an intimidating looking piece of hardware. I set the machine gun up, and proceeded to fire about 20 plastic bullets at my sister (also symbolic of the fact that all war is fratricide) before the gun jammed up internally, and it would only misfire after that. Some friends of my parents showed up with their teenage daughter to visit, and it was then requested that I move the machine of war to the basement, much to my sister’s and to my parent’s relief..

I was confused as to what was expected from me. Why was I given something to play with that had known problems? Didn’t I deserve something that was new and perfect? My dad was disinterested in helping me fix it, and, in fact, he was not mechanically inclined enough to offer much help. I certainly did not have a fully developed skill package in troubleshooting and repairing this fairly complex mechanical system, but I liked a good challenge, and I thought that this endeavor might be worthwhile.

Ann C., a daughter of the friends of my parents, came downstairs to talk with me, while her parents continued to talk with mine. I tried one final time to get Defender Dan to work, but I could not get it to function properly and with consistency. I began dismantling it, trying to understand how it worked so that I could find the problem and attempt to repair it.  And I also thought that I might be able to impress Ann just a little bit, if I were to succeed in fixing the machine.  Dad came downstairs and saw the gun parts spread all over the basement floor, accused me of destroying the gift, and then proceeded to remove his belt, and whip the hell out of me, right in front of Ann. That one hurt a lot of different ways, for sure.  In one sense I succeeded, because I am sure that the sight of a thirteen year old boy getting his ass beat with a belt was impressive. I was horribly shamed, with the feeling of shame not being unusual to me.  Defender Dan, and all of the supporting behavior and attitudes behind its existence, was to become synonymous with fear, and shame, in my own mind.

My response to my father’s attack was to give up troubleshooting and repairing the toy. I did not treasure Defender Dan, and after my initial attempts at its repair failed, and my father’s shaming behavior, I took that as further affirmation of my lack of competence and value, so I took a hammer to the toy, smashing it into smaller, more useless pieces.

“Some men just want to watch the world burn”,

and this is one example of that principle in action, and why it arises in the first place. I placed the heap into the garbage can, while trying to forget about my latest “failure”. I then moved onto the next challenge facing me as a thirteen year old young man, which was to come up with a good story that might prevent another beating.

Designers and builders of machinery , or creators of ideas or new forms of art, are encouraged and empowered by their society and their own “creator within” to bring into the world of form their latest creations. Creators are happiest when they actually bring something new, or an updated version of the old, into the world. With the power of creation carrying us across the ocean of life, we can’t help but use that power to make idols, icons, and images that represent that which we are grateful for, or what has given us protection or sustenance. I am sure that fathers over the history of humanity have given crude versions of their primary tools of trade or weapons of war to their boys since the idea of gifting first arose. And, the father encouraged the boys interest in protecting himself, his family, and in a more recent evolutionary development, even his ideology. Yet I have to wonder how giving the gift of fear, isolation, shame, aggression, and the potential for violence is really the highest quality gift that our “creator” has to offer to us

Each human child is dependent upon the quality of love, safety, and prosperity of the family household, and these are primary factors that greatly influence a growing child’s evolutionary path through consciousness. The parents are by intention also designers, builders, and co-creators of the early life and consciousness of the new child, even if it is the DNA that determines a greater portion of the heritage. My father spent five years at a local university learning about psychology, child development, logic, philosophy and religion, and yet his successful mastering of these subjects in school did not translate into insight as to how to best parent his children. My mother studied Dr. Spock and others, yet did not develop the insight necessary to know that placing a blanket wrapped crying baby in a car in the garage at night until dad left for work so that he could sleep missed the bulls eye for perfect child care by the widest of margins. All creators strive for perfection, and most parents are no exceptions, yet that desire for excellence is difficult to identify in dysfunctional families, especially by children who were negatively impacted by chronic parental mismanagement. Victims of wounding carry the pain well into adulthood, and even unto death, in situations where the trauma is never made conscious or gets addressed in a loving, healing manner.

I never have met the lucky ones who had the perfect birth, infancy, and childhoods. Like me, childhood was probably a mixed bag for the majority of people on this planet. And, there are a few of us who were born physically handicapped, and it leaves us to wonder why human biological creative energy manifested itself in such a unique way. These physical handicaps are visible to all who look their way. And, those who transcend their physical handicaps are honored for their courage, and their achievements in life. Yet, what about the rest of us, who may have been born with another type of handicap, a handicap of the human spirit, caused by a diseased culturally inculcated consciousness?

I might have been born with a predisposition towards an overly ignorant, fearful mind, or those deficiencies could have evolved from my parent’s faltering attempts at nurturing. I do know that I was handed and told to repair a ‘defective piece of equipment” over the course of my education as a young person. Just what was this “defective piece of equipment” that I am referring to? Of course I am referring to self-destructive mental programming created through societal, historical and genetic predispositions , cultural conditioning, individual and collective ignorance, and all vitriolic, bullying, war-mongering behaviors.The “piece” consisted of poor self esteem, and a sense of being ignored, undervalued, and lonely. I was hyperactive, restless and discontented, and I suffered from a feeling of not being heard or fully accepted as a child. I would let the immune system of my mind run overtime, resulting in excessive attacks against myself and others, and excessive posturing in passive/aggressive approaches to insecure and troubled relationships

My parents and my culture made their compelling arguments for trying to convince me that their paths and understandings were righteous, and I just needed to become mature enough to understand and find where I fit in this challenging place. All that I know is that the world sure appeared to be a fucked up place. And those who have successfully adapted to this fucked up place sure don’t like to be told the truth that they are also living in a fucked up place, and that their adjustments with and accommodations to the fucked up world keep the world, as well as their own puny little life, all fucked up, whether they are aware of that fact, or not..

My parents and my culture told me to become the best person that I could be. Yet, they insisted that I make do with their conflicted standards of understanding and behavior, adapt to it somehow, and to live my life with it. I could also try to “fix it”, if I had the time, inclination, and courage to learn more about it, interact with it on a different level, and become a conscious witness to its healing evolution. I have written extensively about toxic masculinity, and there is a direct relationship between the damaged American male, and the incidence of gun marketing, distribution, sales, use, murder and terrorism within our country. Enough is enough, my fellow male (and supporting female) citizens who are hypnotized by the destructive potential of their judgements AND their weapons of war and by the extremists that so effectively promote twisted values to our diseased society.

The floodwaters of gun violence have been created by the unleashing of weapons upon our society by the twisted advocates of the 2nd Amendment, gun manufacturers, the NRA, and insane minds who understand nothing but fear, self-preservation, and hatred. It is impossible to save ourselves from the ravages of flooding brought about by the dam of public mental health bursting, so why don’t we work on preventing the dam from bursting in the first place? Human and Civil rights are not equivalent to gun rights, period, and, in fact, supersede all philosophical claims to dominion by extremist gun rights advocates. The 2nd Amendment has been fine tuned by neurotic, overzealous gun rights advocates to promote ideals not conforming to a rational, effective approach to gun safety and ownership. Gun violence against innocent Americans is NOT SUPPORTED BY OUR CONSTITUTION, no matter what those who blindly support the 2nd Amendment claim. No individual is a militia, no matter how megalomaniacal they may be, and it is utter nonsense that paranoid people use that as an excuse to stockpile weapons of mass-destruction.

This is not a political statement to me. This is a statement of common sense, law, reason, and love. Those who “politicize” this issue with divisive, hateful reasoning, form their deadly alliances around their fears, and this prevents our society from healing. It is up to us to challenge these defective ideas in open forum, and to vote out of office all politicians who support politically sanctioned mass murder,. It is time to strictly regulate or ban the weapons used to assault our families, our own bodies, and our sensibilities, and it is time to change the dirty diaper that characterizes much of masculine thought in our country..

An American society dominated by the self-destructive and other-destructive fantasies of sick minds, (including the ultra-conservative “Christian followers” who believe in Armageddon, and who are doing everything in their power to create the conditions for it), have created this unsafe, upside down world where weapons of mass destruction are worshiped as tools of freedom and safety, rather than being seen for what they are, which are tools for murder, propagation of fear, bullying, and self-righteousness.

Freedom is not preserved and protected through the threatened use of lethal force of one citizen upon another with guns. Freedom is preserved and protected through the understanding that the enemy lies within our own consciousness, and then healing our world through insight, and the cultivation of collaboration, unity, justice, and love. To the extent that Christian America believes in their weapons, is the extent that they do not believe in their supposed Christian ideals, period. The ultra-conservative “Christian” gun promoter is a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and should be recognized as such.

Time to listen up, America. Time to shut up, NRA, and the politician’s feeding at their troughs of gun violence, death and insanity.I just have to wonder when terrorism will hit these individuals in political power right where it hurts most, and then they can finally decide that their pro-gun, pro NRA positions are steeped in insanity and nonsense. When they start to feel the pain of the rest of our country, then they will act on behalf of gun control, rather than obfuscate the issues while monetarily profiting from our suffering, as they have in the past. People that profit from the deaths of innocent civilians are worse than terrorists. Why does America support domestic terrorism? Do we understand that our culture is disfigured, diseased, and in need of dramatic change? Guns kill people, and the people who supply guns to people KILL PEOPLE.

There are those who prefer to gloss over the darkness in our society, and call the evil, bullying, and cruelty by names other than what represents the truth of the matter. Learn to recognize these people, and remember that in any coercive society, including Hitler’s Germany, these types of individuals were part of darkness’ support network, whether inadvertently by their own ignorance, or intentionally by their own malevolence.

I have spoken out against guns and gun violence since 1980, and my voice has been drowned out by those who speak louder than me. Now, I am starting to believe that the silent majority is finally going to assert itself, and our country steer towards more rational approaches to gun ownership, and control. Our culture is INSANE, as are the people who support the unfettered DISTRIBUTION AND SALE OF GUNS AND AUTOMATIC WEAPONS. Once again, their specious reasoning and heartless, hollow arguments are filled with holes, the bullet holes of death to our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

NRA and the politicians who do not act to reduce the proliferation of automatic weapons are sponsors of national terrorism. Just how many automatic weapons does it take to make you feel safe? It is just that many weapons that it takes to make you unhealthy, insane, fearful, and outside of the picture of potential national healing. Gun violence directly stems from a national mental illness, and guns are never the proper medication to alleviate the symptoms.

Atomic weapons don’t kill people, people kill people.  Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. These are equivalent arguments, only differing by the degree of devastation that their use creates. Attitudes don’t kill people, people kill people. Anger, hatred, war, and despair don’t kill people, people kill people. Whatever position that one attempts to strike, the fundamental fact remains that people are the source of all of the attitudes, conflicts, hatred, fear, and other forms of ignorance that predicates the need for weapons of war, be they mechanical or philosophical in nature. Does the chicken or the egg come first? That is an invalid question, because both the chicken and the egg are the effects of consciousness, though they both have a direct relationship to each other. Consciousness is both causative and fundamental,

As a world civilization, we try to regulate our atomic weapons, yet we let other weapons of mass destruction run free. Would you allow the arming of groups of mad men with nuclear weapons (white supremacists like our POTUS or Kim Jung Un notwithstanding)? We all must be protected from the atom bombs. We all must be protected from the guns that are designed for and used to kill people. It is impossible to protect us from all of the bullying lunatics out there in the world brandishing their weapons of mass murder, so we must act rationally, and decisively, to thwart the self-destructive and other-destructive tendencies of unevolved, fear based males. We don’t allow children to drive cars, which are dangerous in their immature hands. Men who think they need guns to protect themselves from philosophical extensions of their own fear, ignorance, and hatred are also children, and should be treated accordingly.  Politicians who cater to children deny the ability of the culture to accept and adopt more rational, healing approaches to the historical and cultural predisposition to male violence.

Automatic weapons are the tool of choice for mass murder and oppression now. Those who support the use of automatic weapons, are unwitting dupes for an evil that far transcends their limited understanding. It continues to be the time to turn these “swords into plowshares”, and create and enhance the conditions for honoring diversity and brotherhood between all peoples and nations. It is insanity to continue the proliferation of weapons of war, and there is NO sound argument, to continue distributing them in our country, as well. There sure are a lot of weak arguments, however, and the wayward pseudo-religious people and politicians who have failed to create the conditions for peace and safety within our society need to grow up, and assert what is true and right for humanity, and not what is right for ideologues and the immature male elements within our world culture. Have you ever tried to take a favorite toy away from your son? It continues to be hard to separate stubborn boys from their murderous toys.

Disempowered males identify themselves with weapons of war, giving themselves a sense of control over a life that they feel is threatening to them, and which they feel ill-equipped to deal with in a rational, even spiritual manner. Weapons of war are men’s spiritually impoverished substitution for true individual power, If we love ourselves, and our fellow man, we have no need for weapons of war, PERIOD.

Lenin wrote, “When it comes time to hang the capitalists, they will vie with each other for the rope contract.”

When it comes to time for human beings to murder and kill each other, they will clamor for the rights to own guns and ammunition to do so, and, in darkened America, they will point to misguided interpretations of the 2nd Amendment. Just like many wayward Christians point to passages in the bible to justify continued judgement, evil and hatred against others not of their tribe, sexual preferences, or unlike themselves in other ways.  My heart breaks, and goes out to the victims, and the victims families, of the massacres in America, Sri Lanka, France, New Zealand, and elsewhere.

The eternal fires of evil are always being fanned, and uses our weapons of war to accomplish its goals. It is sad, tragic, and, at times, evil that gun toting bullies determine the rules for engagement with the world.

It is time to grow up, and become part of the healing process of the human race. It is time to stop letting the unconscious male children run the world into ruination.

Men, as a collective, would rather have our neighbors, wives and children assaulted, raped, overdosed through drug use, or murdered through gun violence, than make the necessary changes to our culture, and to our hearts and soul. We need more women in positions of power and influence, and men need to get in touch with their potential for toxic behavior and attitudes, and begin to make necessary course changes in their hearts and souls

The rate of gun deaths in the United States rose in 2016 to about 12 per 100,000 people, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report released in late 2017.  That was up from a rate of about 11 for every 100,000 people in 2015, and it reflected the second consecutive year that the mortality rate increased. Men, as a collective, appear helpless as to how to address the problems of violence, addiction, and failed families and successfully find solutions.  Continued insouciance and/or reluctance to face problems places our neighbors, wives and children at higher risks of being assaulted, raped, overdosed through drug use, or murdered through gun violence.  We must make the necessary changes to our culture, and to our hearts and soul. We need more women in positions of power and influence because of their ability to think and act globally, and more men to integrate more compassion, insight and mindfulness into their behaviors and attitudes, and together begin or continue to make necessary course changes in all hearts and souls.

A rational human being would posit that ALL rates are unacceptable, and that the American culture needs to treat ALL conditions seriously and equally. Why are we so self-destructive and irrational as a culture that we allow gun violence, sexual violence, and drug additive violence to continue against our fellow citizens? You already know the answer, and it continues to propagate in the genitals, and the damaged minds, of many men in power.

Collectively we really are not a very religious nation, let alone a “Christian nation”.  This may not be a bad thing, taking all factors into consideration, especially the spiritual destruction that our supposed “National Religion” has experienced through recent political raping and pillaging. I believe that much of Christianity is in hibernation in this country, and in its slumber has been taken over by politicians and zealots intent on the disfigurement of our society, through contortions of our nation to conform to their own dark, superstitious, and selfish needs and agendas. These economic and political bullies continue to co-create an imbalanced, disfigured world where economic and social disparity reigns supreme, and where violence and mass murder have become culturally acceptable byproducts of the need to serve their own conscious desires for self-promotion, corporate welfare, as well as their NRA masters. Little do they understand, that these are also unconscious desires for their own self-destruction, and the destruction of all others unlike their own mistaken understanding of their selves.

I am not an American Christian, nor have I claimed to be since 1987.   I am appalled and disgusted by those in political power who profess a belief in Christian religious ideology, and go ahead and rape and pillage America in the name of their corrupt Gods of power, hubris, death, and greed. .I follow the directions that Truth and Love create for me in my life. I am not afraid to confront darkness, wherever it might appear, in the Church, in the NRA, Congress and in the White House, in our corporations, in my family, or even if it is within my own mind and heart

What is the true source of your fear, those who stockpile weapons, cultivate hate and discontent, and fear monger?  Patriotism does not support terrorism, Christianity does not support gun violence and terrorism, and true patriots, be they Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, or atheists,  do not get confused by this

If these latest assaults against our Spirit has not brought us to tears, if we are not impacted by all gun violence, then all is lost for us, and I am sad for all of us, and for the people who count on us. We can’t make America safe or great, by blindly following the idiots that profit from our own self-destruction

Thoughts and prayers ALONE are for those who can’t or won’t act.

I want people to ACT, while your thoughts and prayers keep you spiritually in the game, and acting courageously against the oppressors and the evil-doers in Congress, the White House, automatic weapons manufacturers, distributors, and vendors, and the NRA

Jesus, in whatever form he spiritually exists today would take his “spiritual sword”, and hack the ideas behind 2nd Amendment hooligans to pieces. If you are seeking for guns, and for weapons of war, you are not seeking for peace.

Holster that weapon, partner, and start working for real, lasting peace!

That is what Jesus would do.

Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world
(of guns, greed, gonads, or gold) gives, give I unto you. Let not your
heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. —-John 14:27 (NT)

—–Jesus of Nazareth,  and every sane human being left on this planet.

Freedom. liberty, and justice can not be preserved and protected solely through the threatened use of lethal force of one citizen upon another with guns. Freedom is preserved and protected through the understanding that the fundamental enemy lies within our own consciousness, and then healing our world through insight, and the cultivation of collaboration, unity, justice, and love. To the extent that Christian America believes in their weapons, is the extent that they do not believe in their supposed Christian ideals, period. The ultra-conservative “Christian” gun promoter is a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and should be recognized as such.

I wrote this chapter as a direct reaction to my relationships with my father, my father’s and my male friends and acquaintances over my lifetime, and my employment experience while working with toxic men in the electrical trades from 1987 to 2016, and at the US Postal Service from 1975-1985. The historical legacy of the American white man, and his support network of unconscious, disempowered, fearful and/or cowardly family and community members, continues unto today. America has normalized that which should never have been acceptable. How can we possibly “make America great, again”? Greatness only comes after we, as a society, face our collective darkness, cease our threatening or bellicose behavior against all we disagree with, acknowledge the damaging impacts of our fears on others, makes amends to ALL we have harmed, and find integrity, and stay on a more humane path in the future.

The foundational consciousness that spawned “Defender Dan”, and which contributed mightily to the development of my young mind, continues to energize citizens into unhealthy attachments to their own weapons of war, be they philosophical or physical in nature. With the collective normalization of destructive behavior and attitudes that have become historically ingrained within consciousness, the deferral of sound heart sense to irrational fears has dictated the continued need for and proliferation of all such weapons of death, bullying, and control. For me to disassemble and examine the Defender Dan unit, and then to attempt to reassemble it into a higher functioning manner, was symbolic for and the prelude to the search for healing for my own loneliness, shame and fear-based mind through recovery endeavors in adulthood.

I long ago made a decision to lay down my arms.

The world will never be completely safe, until everybody else does so, as well.

Some Men Just Want To Watch The World Burn

I have made a personal acquaintance with the American equivalent of the Hindu God, Lord Shiva, the god of Destruction. Of all the “gods’ that the human race consciously or unconsciously worships, this aspect of most American male egos needs some dissection and examination, so that the entirety of our human race will no longer be hypnotized by its apocalyptic spell.

The unconscious male, Christian, American, Russian, Muslim, Jew, or whatever label you like, is the seed bed for true terrorism in our world.  Our president, Donald Trump, carries this damaged archetype within himself, while much of the entire world continues to suffer from other nationalistic leaders and their sycophants who are coming under this toxic, dangerous spell..  A person just does not support or incite hatred, violence, or racism, without having some sort of unconscious death wish for self, and/or for others.  The forest fires that hate’s arsonists light up, end up torching the criminal’s back yard, as well.

Some men just want to watch their worlds burn.

I will submit a great series of exchanges between Alfred and Batman (Bruce Wayne), from within the Batman movie, the Dark Knight, showing how the writers caught the very essence of the “God of Terror” that lives within us:

Bruce Wayne: [while in the underground bat cave] Targeting me won’t get their money back. I knew the mob wouldn’t go down without a fight, but this is different. They crossed the line.

Alfred Pennyworth: You crossed the line first, sir. You squeezed them, you hammered them to the point of desperation. And in their desperation, they turned to a man they didn’t fully understand.

Bruce Wayne: Criminals aren’t complicated, Alfred. Just have to figure out what he’s after.

Alfred Pennyworth: With respect Master Wayne, perhaps this is a man who you don’t fully understand, either. A long time ago, I was in Burma. My friends and I were working for the local government. They were trying to buy the loyalty of tribal leaders by bribing them with precious stones. But their caravans were being raided in a forest north of Rangoon by a bandit. So, we went looking for the stones. But in six months, we never met anybody who traded with him. One day, I saw a child playing with a ruby the size of a tangerine. The bandit had been throwing them away.

Bruce Wayne: So why steal them?

Alfred Pennyworth: Well, because he thought it was good sport. Because some men aren’t looking for anything logical, like money. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with.

SOME MEN JUST WANT TO WATCH THE WORLD BURN.

one can see a phenomenon that our culture rarely speaks about, because male patriarchy creates the propaganda that dominates and interprets what is the truth,  attempts to control and distort the discussions, and reaches and distributes the final conclusions to all those under their hypnotic spell..

Within all men lies the seeds of the destruction of our very planet Earth. It has been given many names over time, but the end result is that when men are stressed at a high enough level, we will consciously self-destruct, including other destruction, through wars, terrorism, ethnic cleansing, or religious persecution.  If we perceive others’ creations, or our own creations are imperfect, and no longer deserve our love, respect, and support, all manners of darkness is possible.  Also, we will self-destruct through unconscious means, through adherence to our lower tribalistic tendencies, and greed, lust institutionalized hatred and fear as we victimize and pillage the planet Earth, and all of its sacred inhabitants, to meet our selfish, self-serving agendas.

A rational, introspective, evolving human being would use our imperfection to hone our insight into unfolding a higher reality within ourselves, but for most men, such a change is threatening, and healing is regarded as a threat to our very being. I let “healing” chase me through the gates of hell, to Death’s actual doorstep, and only when I made a decision to change the way i look at life, could help come my way.

Yes, the collective insanity of the American male (perhaps the world male) is on display right now. Only those men in denial, or with limited awareness of self and other, would ever deny this fact.  Or men who full well know what is going on, and want to “get theirs while the getting is good”, at the expense of everyone else.  The President has called climate change a hoax invented by China and pledged to take the U.S. out of the Paris climate change agreement, while a recent U.S. government report suggests that global temperatures will rise by 4°C (7°F) – “and that there is nothing we can do about it, so we might as well carry on pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere”.

Cue in all of the murder/suicides, alcoholism, drug addiction, alienation, child abuse, homelessness, monetization of humanity for the benefit of the few, and, ultimately, insanity, global warming, extinction of species, and we see the dark aspects of the world we now live in. This unspoken internal terrorist is the ultimate bullying behavior that we consciously, or unconsciously, utilize as men, when we have had our egos threatened, our basic needs unmet, and no other safety outlets perceived.

Only desperate, disconnected human beings would place their faith in this century’s versions of the anti-Christ. Trump, Steve Miller, Putin, Pence, and the other horsemen of the Apocalypse  have their plan for ascendancy after they deploy their self-serving, wallet fattening, Apocalyptic Insurrections.  Their alliances, direct and otherwise, with Russia, with American Christianity, and with the NRA, should make any American feel like it is time to revolt against the self-destructive corruption in our leadership.

Make America Great Again?

I am not an American Christian, I am appalled and disgusted by those in political power who profess a belief in Christian religious ideology, and go ahead and rape and pillage America in the name of their corrupt Gods of power, hubris, death, and greed. .I follow the directions that Truth and Love create for me in my life. I am not afraid to confront darkness, wherever it might appear, be it in the Church, in the NRA, Congress and in the White House, in our corporations, in my family, or even if it is within my own mind and heart

An American society dominated by the self-destructive and other-destructive fantasies of sick minds, including the ultra-conservative, cultural suicide promoting “Christian followers” who believe in Armageddon, and who are doing everything in their power to create the conditions for it, continue to promote this unsafe, upside down world where weapons of mass destruction are worshiped as tools of freedom and safety, rather than being seen for what they are, which are tools for murder, propagation of fear, bullying, and self-righteousness.

The NRA is a front organization not only for Russian propaganda, but far-right fanaticism and the movement towards collective self-destruction by the American male.  I will now make another quick diversion into the darkened American Male underbelly of guns and gonads  Toxic masculinity, toxic capitalism, toxic religion and the NRA’s ideas around guns, are filled with holes, BULLET HOLES. I have written extensively about toxic masculinity, and there is a direct relationship between the damaged American male, and the incidence of gun marketing, distribution, sales, use, and murder and terrorism within our country. Enough is enough, my fellow male (and supporting female) citizens who are hypnotized by the destructive potential of their weapons of war, and by the extremist hooligans that so effectively promote their value to our diseased society..

NRA prayer:  THE LORD’S PRAYER (corrupted)
Our father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name,
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven
Give us this day our daily munitions, and forgive us our poor marksmanship,
While we plot our revenge for the real or imagined trespasses of others.
And lead us not into temptation to be at peace without automatic weapons,
But deliver us from evil with our sacred AR-15’s,
For thine is the kingdom, the firepower, and the glorious gore of death, forever.
Amen

Politics, Insanity, guns, and religions, is an open marriage made in hell.  Satan smiles at one of his greatest creations.
Why are these evil cults of hatred, or religions tax exempt, and supported by Trump and other toxic Americans?

The hypocrisy of it all, Donald Trump and his violent, gun hoarding and toting gang of NRA supporters, will not even attempt to control the spread of weapons of war and mass destruction within our own country, yet he vainly tries to control the impulses of other countries.

Trump says that Jewish synagogues should have armed guards at the doors.  What kind of insanity is this?  Trump saying that he would run into a “shooting situation” even if he did not have a gun after the Florida shooting sounds almost consistent to me. He runs into intellectually challenging situations all of the time, with half a wit and no sensibility at all.  His play is always to hate, deception, and demagoguery.

This is the same guy that avoided the Vietnam draft with a five deferments, one for a “foot disorder” or “bone spurs”. Little did anybody know that the “foot disorder” was just that he liked to put his foot in his mouth repeatedly.
Is there no sanity at all left in our leadership? Why are automatic weapons required for a sane society to operate effectively?. Age 18, 21, or 101, nobody needs weapons of mass destruction and murder PERIOD, except for our military, or spoiled gun hoarders, bullies, and murderers.

What is the true source of your fear, those who stockpile weapons and fear monger? Patriotism does not support terrorism, Christianity does not support gun violence and terrorism, and true patriots, be they Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, or atheists do not get confused by this.  Jesus, in whatever form “he spiritually exists today” would take his “spiritual sword”, and hack the ideas behind 2nd Amendment hooligans to pieces. If you are seeking for guns, and for weapons of war, you are not seeking for peace.

Finally, this self-destructive Christian Armageddon theology — a literal belief that certain actions Trump has promoted since the beginning of his presidency, must happen before Jesus will return to reign on Earth — is called “dispensational pre-millennialism” and it is not the quirky opinion of some isolated church. Although the majority of Christians do not share these views, versions of dispensational pre-millennialism dominate American evangelicalism, and Mike Pence is riding shotgun on this collective stagecoach ride to hell..

It originated as a small movement in the 1840s, but by the 1970s, millions of evangelical and fundamentalist churchgoers had embraced some form of it. Dispensationalism was popularized in a best-selling book called “The Late, Great Planet Earth” by Hal Lindsey:“ and later, in the 1990s, it reached an even larger audience through the “Left Behind” novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. The theology spread via Bible camps and colleges, through theological seminaries and revival meetings, in films and videos, by Sunday school materials, and in daily devotional guides — all teaching that the end of the world was near, and that Jerusalem was the physical place where this apocalyptic drama would unfold.

If you know evangelicals, chances are very good that you know this theology, whether you believe it or not. You cannot avoid it. And if you hear the President of the United States say something about Jerusalem, you take notice. Especially when that President won 81% of the white evangelical vote.  When the President issued his order, I was not the only person hearing echoes of dispensationalism. Robert Jeffress, one of Trump’s evangelical advisers, declared: “Jerusalem has been the object of the affection of both Jews and Christians down through history and the touchstone of prophecy.”

Other evangelical pastors and teachers also praised the action as “biblical” and likened it to a “fulfilled prophecy.”  While that may sound benign (or perhaps nutty) to the theologically uninitiated, they are referring to the “prophecy” of the conversion of the Jews, the second coming of Jesus, the final judgment, and the end of the world — the events referred to as the biblical apocalypse.

I doubt that President Trump could explain dispensational pre-millennialism. I doubt he knows the term. But his evangelical supporters know it. Some of his advisers are probably whispering these prophecies in his ears. Trump might not really care how they interpret the Bible, but he cares that white evangelicals continue to stand with him. Moving the embassy to Jerusalem is one way to affirm his commitment to these evangelicals — reminding them that he, Donald J. Trump, is pressing biblical history forward to its conclusion and that he is God’s man in the unfolding of these last days.

Some men just want to watch the world burn.

When hatred gets redefined as love, cultural schizophrenia ensues. Welcome to the world currently being re-created by Donald Trump, some dark monied billionaires, backward elements of the Christian Evangelical movement, and many members of the far right conservative movement, and their propaganda, lying, and corruption of thought.

Why do we continue to try to paint the house, when the foundation is on fire?

Life is always a self-fulfilling prophecy, we just may not be sure whose “self” that is being fulfilled, however!.

What if our life is fulfilling just the prophecies of our religion and culture, rather than that of our true self?

While unenlightened forces dominate human consciousness, oppression and repression are born and nurtured, and indifference and hatred grow exponentially.

This creates more damaged human beings, who continue to overpopulate this planet.

The fate of damaged people is to continue to damage themselves, each other, and the very planet that supports and sustains them, until they find their self and its truth.

Find the self, and the life that has a great future, and discard the one that will die with our rotting civilization.

Life is a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I see a great future for our planet, if enough of us break free from the effects of the collective oppression by others and, ultimately, the repression of our Spirit.

This moment, I am free.

I want to watch the world burn, with LOVE.

To Re-Imagine Our Journey Through Consciousness

Let us all be the best that we can be. Let us all “lose our minds”, and find our truth.

It is what it is, but it is not what it seems

—Paul Hewson

We all love a great story  Those who have developed real insight into the story, and who can both translate the essence of an experience and convey the emotion of all of the participating characters through words, become the raconteurs of our culture.  These honored story tellers may become famous and beloved novelists, musicians and rock stars, ministers, writers of religious stories and texts, comedians, and playwrights.  The story may be about a personal or historical event, and it may be real, or fiction, but as long as it entertains, it will keep our attention.  As all of the best story tellers know, it can be important not to let the truth get in the way of telling the best story, especially if they are trying to keep our attention.

We all create stories around our individual lives, and around all of our relationships with each other, and with the world.  We also listen intently to the stories told to us  by our parents, our teachers, our religions, our history, and our society about who we are, who others once were or now are, and who we might aspire to become.  Many of our stories, both individually and those created by society for us, are steeped in illusion, ignorance, half-truths and outright falsehoods.  Far too many stories are just illusory dramas about our attempts to control others, and, sadly, our failed attempts at control over our own lives and our emotional experiences around all of these intersections, and collisions, with each other  But these stories have an amazing hypnotic appeal, especially to those who have not undertaken the process of insight and healing.  At some point in our lives, each of us must begin a “search for truth”, lest the entirety of our life experience be lived and experienced without true integrity, the potential for healing and completeness, and the best alignment with reality.

Some aspects of life just seem to elude our ability to effectively communicate around them, and never get incorporated into our personal stories, and thus add to the collective conspiracy of silence.  Also, other people’s stories and garbage gets back-filled into the holes and empty spaces within our own stories,  becoming embedded within us, and adding to our internal confusion and chaos.

Life was never an easy journey for me, and had it not been for some deep need to understand my dysfunctional process, and try to find the underlying truth amid my personal chaos, I would have long ago passed away, silenced by the disease.  Some wounds are so deep, and primal, that just pasting new names onto aspects of the disease and creating new stories are not enough.  But it is each of our responsibilities as conscious, or semi-conscious, human beings to bring our personal truth, and our stories, no matter how incomplete they may be, to the collective experience, including our family, our friends, our co-workers, our neighbors, and our religious and political leaders..

Names and stories are only a convenience for communication, and are never comprehensive and inclusive enough to completely reveal the true natures of what they were created for in our minds to represent in the first place.  The process of naming is the way that our consciousness weighs and measures new forms of life, ideas and experiences, in the attempt to insert the unknown and the mysterious into a present context for understanding, which becomes the latest iteration of our “story”.  Naming tends to attach a dynamic process to a fixed point in time and space, always with a past frame of reference, and thus permanently lodges it in the past, where only the whispers of ghosts of our history still exist..

The act of creating stories and context, and just being conversational about the details of life does not dislodge the detritus from our field of consciousness. The Devil is in the details, figuratively speaking, and if our need is for change, we need to find a way to see under the vast matrix of details that only float on the surface on the mind .  We who still choose to name processes and create stories must also have personally explored and experienced the movements through consciousness, and found the way to the Silence at the foundation of our being.  Otherwise, the process of naming, and the resulting stories that arise from naming, are just more intellectual knowledge and entertainment for a superficial mind, and will not pry open the healing doors to insight and wisdom.

“Once I had asked God for one or two extra inches in height, but instead, he made me as tall as the sky, so high that I could not measure myself.”

—Malala Yousafzaia

The intellectual and the atheist, though possessing finely tuned minds, can never explore the mystery, and the depth, of the human soul, and comprehend that we all have a connection with Infinity.  The willing explorer of the new paths of consciousness or the mystic both have access to the limitless territory of the Spirit, and will soar to new heights and see the sights rarely seen by the rest of mankind. “

I did not develop verbal abilities until relatively late in my childhood  My sister reports that she spoke for me until I developed the capacity, or  inclination, to speak.  Once I started talking (close to age 4) I proved that I had the capacity for speech, and A LOT OF IT.  My father wondered, at times, if I would ever shut up.  I  proved to be quite precocious, once I engaged my verbal skills.  I remember that I would start talking about things that were around me, giving new information that my parents had no knowledge about.  My parents thought that there was no way for me to know anything about what I was spouting off about, so I was mostly ignored.  But I can remember how good it felt to be talking, and sharing the excitement of the magic of words exploding in my mind!

I intuited quite early that built-in to the very fabric of words is an access to imagination and knowledge beyond the word, or sequence of words, spoken.  Looking back now, I can see also the incredible capacity of the human mind to represent the real world with words and internal imagery, as well as to create false realities while remaining utterly convinced of their “truth”, even in the face of non-supporting facts.  I can remember as a young boy around four years of age having a doll named Percy, who spoke with me at times, and even spoke to me once over the telephone.  Percy was to me what “God” was to other innocent children, a reassuring voice that would speak to me, and remind me that I had value.  I almost had my sister convinced of it, as well, and she was almost six years old at the time.  So, illusions can become contagious, if not recognized, and reigned in early.

So, what is truth?

Sometimes, we must remain open to a mystery that far transcends the simple explanations offered by our past and our culture.  I have extensively explored many of our culture’s, and my own, misleading, false, and self-destructive stories and realities. I have also made conscious contact with many amazing, life-affirming truths. I am both an individual person and a collective, acculturated human being, and these two aspects of myself are now constantly adapting to all stories which carry meaning and the potential for healing

In some of the early times of my life,  prior to my addictive cycles, I carried with me a sense of isolation, depression, and a strong feeling of anxiety around the unknown.  From 1971 through 1987, as a practicing alcoholic and drug addict, and mentally ill human being, I lost most of my remaining freedom of choice.  I belonged to the “death wish core group” of Americans, who lived lives of desperation,  addiction, suicidal ideation, and mental illness.  We all sought an early death, either by our own hands, through our addictions, or by the poor health and relationship decisions that we continued to make.  Many of us could see the insanity of those still claiming for themselves good mental health, while the choices of all of those supposedly healthy people of the world continued to bring the promise of the destruction to our planet Earth.  While we contemplated our own end, we witnessed a world in the midst of its own collective march towards suicide.

The story of Armageddon, as both an individual and as a collective event, becomes very real to those trapped by their own illusions of powerlessness, helplessness, and despair.  We are the loosely knit tribe most susceptible to the oppression by others, and the repression of our selves.  We are the prime candidates for political and religious propaganda.  We may seek a new tribe that gives us a sense of safety and purpose, even if our own anticipated benefits come at the expense of other innocent people or groups.  We have become limited caricatures of ourselves, as we continue to play to stereotypes that those in power have thrust upon us.   We do not have the emotional and spiritual intelligence to discern what is true, and what is false, about our selves.  The stories that continue to be told to us keep us connected with an extremely limited view of “our people”, all the while keeping us disconnected from our own true natures, and more realistic stories of ourselves.

A spiritual awakening process beginning in 1987 was the start of my own exit from the chaotic mindset that characterized my life up to that point.  Since 1987,  I have chosen to live life more fully, with enhanced personal awareness, good health, honest expression of all feelings, joy and happiness the majority of the time, and almost continuous sobriety.  My own living, dynamic story has become forefront in my mind, and having examined my life to its deepest core, I have seen what the source of my own spiritual disease and despair was.  And, I finally found a way to describe the foundational dynamics of both personal and collective consciousness that contributed to my disease, and to all of our suffering.  I need no longer be an unwilling participant and just another silent partner in the conspiracy of silence.

John 1.1-From New Testament Of Christian Bible

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Yet, another layer of the Conspiracy of Silence exists around the Divine, Higher Power, God, or Truth.  Organized religions, intellectual savants and those parading as atheists, and political powers all too often obfuscate the truth that underlies all of our existence. When Pontius Pilate asked Jesus

“What is truth?”,

Jesus, as the story goes, could only be silent in the face of the greatest power of the day.  The question “What is truth?” was intended as mockery, and that principle continues to this day. Speaking truth to power is not an easy or automatic proposition, no matter how enlightened one might appear to be.  Truth is more like a continuous rainfall upon rocky mountains.  It does not immediately displace all of the sharp, dangerous edges of eons of ignorance, but, over time, it finally erodes the roughest of terrains, and exposes the deeper layers of existence where a new level of experience is to be found.  Those who are not patient will be mortally wounded by thrusting themselves too aggressively against our human monuments to stupidity and ignorance that often act as the controlling religious, political, and economic powers within civilization.

Those who touch the Infinite relate back to the world the ineffability of the experience, though they have been deeply impacted by that contact.  The universe of Spirit defies rationality, though it will eventually speak intelligently through the healed human mind.   First, the mind has to be properly prepared, and then it must be willing to communicate, no matter how mighty the struggle may be  to interpret or express its energy.  But if the mind is overburdened by education, knowledge, religious and cultural inculcation, the Infinite will be speaking through distorted measures of reality, creating illusion, deception, and delusion.

LDS–White Jesus Approved

A look at Joseph Smith and his revelations, and the LDS movement that subsequently arose from this process,  is a great example of the corrupted marriage of spirituality and truth with hallucination and delusion, producing its inevitable spawn, toxic religion and cults.  This type of spiritual corruption only further confuses and alienates those seekers of a deeper truth that are still in possession of keen wits. Would anyone like a serving of golden plates, from which the “Book Of Mormon” is based upon, or Jesus appearing in the wild west of America, say, two thousand years ago?  The sirens of my “bull shit detector” continue to go off loud and clear, whenever I hear these stories.  And don’t forget to tithe your ten percent, or your next of kin will hear about your “lack of faith” at your own funeral (yes, I witnessed this in an abominable eulogy at a funeral for a co-worker, who had committed suicide).  Like our mothers sometimes said:

“Oh, and always wear clean underwear in case you are in an accident! “.

It is time for the Church of the LDS to change their dirty “underwear”, because their delusional stories have created quite the mess in human consciousness, and this philosophical buffoonery is an accident waiting to happen to all of its adherents.  The Church, and its community of well-meaning human beings,  may have done a lot of good over the years, but that has to be balanced with the corruption in consciousness itself that this tribalistic cult creates and maintains.

On June 1 of 2018, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – or the Mormons – will celebrate the 40th anniversary of what they believe to be a revelation from God.  This revelation to the then-President of the Church Spencer W. Kimball – which is known as “Official Declaration 2” – reversed longstanding restrictions placed on people of black African descent in the church.  I believe this history illustrates the struggle the Mormon church has had with racial diversity – something that the church leadership still grapples with today.  Racism, patriarchy, sexism, misogyny, fantasy, and errant nonsense are built right into the very fabric of this corrupted belief system.

All religions promote the hope that humanity has a capacity for love and healing.  The simple truth behind Christianity and all true religion is that humanity has a divine heritage, while still struggling with a human experience.  Ignorant Christian philosophers,scholars, and ministers continue to interpret and promote the Word as having its expression only through Jesus Christ.  In their minds, humanity remains relegated to outcasts from the “Garden Of Eden” and we will all remain on the outside of the universality of our divine heritage and potential for eternity until Jesus is accepted as our personal savior.  There are many other errors in spiritual discernment in addition to this one that continue to be propagated, especially all of the nonsense that is promoted around the concept of Armageddon.  This is important, because these beliefs contribute mightily to the Common Knowledge Game of human perception, which is the socially and culturally inculcated system for assessing and judging against all others unlike the observers.

Most of the world does not hold the belief in Jesus as the Savior, though many of us have been victimized by those with such a vision!  With our American judicial and political processes still impacted by, and in some cases dominated by, so-called “Christian ideals”, it is easy to see the potential for collective persecution of and discrimination against those not conforming to these ideals and dogmas.

Much of our American religious landscape remains dominated by blind adherence to  patriarchy, which manifests through toxic masculinity, toxic capitalism, and toxic religion. Their misogyny, white supremacy their outright hatred or indifference to others unlike themselves, greed and rampant selfishness, and self-destructiveness, and all of the planetary destructive evil are manifestations of divisive, ignorant intentions.  When the writer quoted from in the Bible proclaimed that we “be fruitful and multiply”, that writer did not intend for our race to become a planet ravaging virus, through overpopulation, pollution, extinction of 1000’s of species, genocide, religious persecution, greed, and competition, yet our race has been fruitful, and multiplied our collective darkness and evil exponentially.

Prosperity theology is a religious belief among some Christians, who hold that financial blessing and physical well-being are always the will of God for them, and that faith, positive speech, and donations to religious causes will increase one’s material wealth. Prosperity theology views the Bible as a contract between God and humans: if humans have faith in God, God will deliver security and prosperity.  The doctrine emphasizes the importance of personal empowerment, proposing that it is God’s will for his people to be happy. It is based on interpretations of the Bible that are mainstream in Judaism (with respect to the Hebrew Bible),though less so in Christianity. The atonement (reconciliation with God) is interpreted to include the alleviation of sickness and poverty, which are viewed as curses to be broken by faith. This is believed to be achieved through donations of money, visualization, and positive confession.

Our blind adherence to our soulless Capitalist economic system is a force that must be reckoned with.  With capitalism now married to corrupted forms of Christian religion, we end up with Corporate Religion, whereby sects of American Christianity celebrate wealth and fame, and goad their members towards rampant materialism, all in the name of God’s prosperity..  These mega-churches with ministers, such as Joel Osteen, set the tone and the pace for self-glorification, materialism, overpopulation, and the continued destruction of our planet through their adherence to the Prosperity Gospels.  Prosperity is oppression, when we see the long-term effects of focusing wealth and planetary resources into the pocketbooks of fewer and fewer people, in manners that tend to increase profits and visibility for the unconscious adherents of the new Corporate Religion.  This competition for resources continues to cause our Earth to suffer, while the few prosper.  There is abject spiritual and intellectual poverty imbued within a philosophy that celebrates prosperity as a manifestation of “God’s reward for the good”, and is indicative of a arger poverty that has overwhelmed our nation, and our world.  We all need umbrellas to shield ourselves from the “golden showers” of “trickle down theories” that follow such megalomaniacal visions of privilege and power.

The fundamental oppressive force in the human universe is not our wayward religious, political, economic, or social agendas or systems, however, as the fundamental problem is within the human mind itself. Jesus Christ would be crucified again (and, in fact, the Truth continues to be sacrificed daily), and Muhammad and the Buddha, were they alive today, would be ignored or attacked, in today’s diseased, divisive, dark money controlled political, social, and religious climate. Some say that it may be time to PUNCH A NAZI, in whatever form it takes, but it is best to first master the Nazi within our own minds.

A new story needs to be told by each and every one of us, as our old stories are killing us,  both individually, and collectively.  We need a new world religion, one that honors ALL life upon the planet, and the very planet Earth itself, as our Lord and Savior. We must have a story that allows for each being to have the opportunity to live in peace and harmony, and to share in the benefits of an evolutionary consciousness.  We either grow together as a race, and as a planet, or we will not survive as a species, and, potentially, we may destroy the rest of our supporting animal species, the environment itself, and the planet.

Punch A Nazi Sign at June 2018 Portland, Oregon Rally for Immigrants and their families

“if you tell a big enough lie, and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed”.
― Adolf Hitler

If we tell a lie often enough, we are prone to start to actually believe it.  All of the internal defense mechanisms are engaged to support the story and to maintain the lies existence, and the corruption that living a lie creates can become part of our nature.  Be careful out there, the world, and our minds, can be a dangerous place. Unlike TV entertainment series, where the programs have the potential to resolve the contrived issues  before the ending of the weekly show, life carries our issues for prolonged periods of time, sometimes whole lifetimes, if we do not find a way to dislodge our lies, and our stories of disease and dysfunction from the cells of our bodies, and from our consciousness.  There is no freedom to be found, if we do not first see that we are trapped.

We all need a bigger story, with more heart and healing, higher accuracy, and maximum inclusivity! Pay attention  to all of our stories, many of which  have created quite the mess to sort through.  Constantly question reality,, search for available facts, and learn not to unconsciously accept statements from authority figures.  “Reality” many times, is only someone else’s opinion about “what is”, so a cautious, probing mind, not rushing to simplistic conclusions, or susceptible to popular suggestion or hypnotism, is required to maintain, or re-establish, personal integrity, healing, sanity and reason.

What is “reality” and who am I?

Watch out, for more stories are always forming around those questions!

I am what I am, but I am not what I seem

It has been a great challenge and adventure living this life. It has also been a great fulfillment for me to have lived long enough and to have become articulate enough to be able to put into words my unique experience of life. I attempt to bring into the verbal universe my extended journey into the mystery of human consciousness, and its corruption by those with selfish and self-destructive agendas.  Finding my unique story, and finding the supportive silence underneath that story, is the journey of my salvation, the hero’s journey towards healing and integrity.  Buckle up, fellow travelers, the ride is going to be rather turbulent at times!

.To “follow new paths of consciousness”, while knowing that all objects of consciousness, or the “you can’t be real” phenomenon sets up quite a transformational dynamic within consciousness. If “you” can’t be real, then everything that I associate with “I” is preeminent. Every time I identify with a person, a process, or a place, I have created either a “new path of consciousness”, or I have reaffirmed some older, more familiar, potentially worn out path that I have already been traveling upon.

.”I am an electrician”, or “I am an alcoholic”, or “I am a son of Beryl and Corinne Paullin”, or “I am full of shit”, or “I am a lonely, isolated person”, or “I am angry with X,Y, Z”, or WHATEVER I associate my self, my “I am” with, either continues my path in old directions, or creates the imperative to create new words, thoughts, and experiences around a new direction. I could just as easily say “I am no longer traveling old paths of consciousness”, and then STOP thinking time-based thoughts, and rehashing and rehearsing old memories, to create a new life experience for myself. I would then have to trust in a “Higher Power”, “the Unknown”, and/or “the Mystery” to create my new “timeless self” in each unique moment. This is MUCH EASIER SAID than done..

.Some may call this process “forgiveness”.

I call this process penetrating the conspiracy of silence with my miracle experiment.

Please, save your self.

SATAN’S GREATEST TEACHING (told by Jiddu Krishnamurti, original source unknown)

Satan and his main disciple were drifting above the planet Earth, and observing all of the activities that were of interest, while his student learned some more of the great lessons of the truth of the Dark Master.  One of their journeys  brought them to a single man standing in an open field, who looked up to the heavens, with a look of great relief and joy upon his face.  As Satan and his disciple looked closer, they found that the man was holding something in his hands, hidden under his shirt, close to his heart.  The man hurriedly walked back to his home, protecting his find from the scrutiny of the outside world.

The disciple asked Satan:

“What do you think that this man has found?”

“Oh, he has found Truth!”,

replied Satan, with a satisfied look on his face.

“But Satan, how can you be so happy?  Should we not be terrified by this man’s revelation?  This could spell the end of your rule over our earthly kingdom!”

“Hush, my student, and listen closely.  We are about to help him organize it”

Watch out for those bibles and religious texts, they are all not what they seem.

Please, save yourself.

Thoughts And Prayers

In prayer it is better to have a heart without words than words without a heart. —Mahatma Gandhi

Our brains have incredible capabilities, and their co-existence with the human mind creates an infinite capacity for human experience. One of the more profound abilities of the brain is its capacity to be a predictive mechanism.  This capacity coupled with the minds intention helps with goal setting and achieving, in addition to serving as our avenues of awareness of self, other, and the environment around us. Prayer is a verb referring to the action of an internal desire or movement of consciousness to access a ‘higher power or energy” to help with goal setting and achieving, or becoming aware at a deeper, more profound level of a connection with Spirit.

“Prayer” is a term typically used by religions and their adherents indicating an inherent potential or a capacity of the human being to make a “conscious contact” with a benevolent higher power or energy.  Prayers can be almost epic in length, while some prayers are as simple as an utterance of “thank you”.

The purest intention for prayers, though, are when we have totally relinquished our ego demands, and have surrendered our will, and all of our hopes, dreams, and intentions, to the moment, to an internal silence.  Those who can “let go of the controls” find another energy arise in consciousness, where miracles have been known to arise from.The intention behind these connections is to help guide and influence one’s own life and agenda, or to have one’s will shaped to align more with the intention of their higher power.  There may be “black magic” behind some prayers, which is the hope that some greater good avoids certain groups of people or individuals.  But, usually, prayer is the desire to bring oneself into a higher alignment with the underlying spiritual essence to life, which will, hopefully, result in better health, well-being, and in some cases, better material success for the subjects, and objects of prayer.   Will this “higher power” ever make its presence known, or make an intercession on our behalf?  It depends on whether we are attuned to the possibility of such an experience even happening in our lives, or in the lives of those we love.  Otherwise, even when such “miracles” occur, they will be interpreted in terms of other, more “reasonable” or mundane explanations.

All I know is that when I pray, coincidences happen; and when I don’t pray, they don’t happen. — Dan Hayes .

One story really stands out from the electrician apprenticeship program that I attended from 1988-1992. Gary Johnson was another apprentice in my class, and he, at times, appeared a little distracted and dull. I knew that there was more to him than that, though I never really positively acknowledged him outwardly. One day we were scheduled to take a very important test, one which would determine if we would successfully continue in the program, and eventually finish with our electrical license. For some reason I felt an intense desire to pray for Gary. This was not a typical activity for me, praying for anybody, let alone somebody that I did not know well. After the test, Gary came over to me, and asked me .

“Bruce, why did you pray for me before this test?” .

“Gary, you ask a very challenging question. How could you possibly know of such a thing happening?” .

“Bruce, it is none of your business how I know. Thanks for thinking of me, and praying for me, though.”. .

“Gary, sometimes things just happen that we witness, and that neither of us have any control over, I think.” .

Nobody, I mean NOBODY, could have known that I was praying for Gary, including him. . Once again, as I look at my history, I am in awe of the miracle underlying life’s Mystery

Gary is center left, with me looking at him

Gary died the following year, after we had all graduated from our apprenticeship..  Gary’s sensitivity towards me and my “prayer” may well have been because he was close to his own death, unbeknown to both of us.  Impending death, and death itself, has been known to unlock all manners of mysteries in human consciousness, and the interconnection between all beings. .

Are we all connected? What was that ‘prayer’, and is prayer as mysterious as it seems? To talk about prayer, is to talk about non-verbal and verbal communication.  “Prayer” is a word that points to something so simple, normal, and natural, yet the word also points to a much greater potential for shared reality than most people understand, or realize. And no, prayer is not a beseeching or a begging from some sort of Santa Claus God for something that we don’t already have, though there are 10,000 books already written about prayer indicating as much. There is so much cynicism and skepticism about prayer from non-Christians and atheists, and that negativity exists for good reasons.  As it is said in the recovery movement:

“Prayer, without constructive action to support it, is a dead prayer”.

Prayer is an internal affirmation that we attempt to make external, and real for ourselves and others in our lives. There is a band of frequencies in the spectrum of universal life force where humanity resides. It has been called by many names, but the name that I now hold onto is the human morphogenetic field. Our minds already arise from this base, or fundamental ground, of being or existence. Through “morphic resonance”, a term coined by Rupert Sheldrake, we naturally can access all of these frequencies. We must discern which ones to attach our life force energy to, and which ones to avoid. We all have access to these frequencies together, as a human race, thus the incredible potential for overlap of experiences, and the sharing of healing, insight, love, spiritual power, and understanding at the most fundamental of levels.  .

One of the levels of awareness has become known as the human mystical state. “God Consciousness’, “Christ consciousness’, or the “Buddha Mind”, are names given to this sublime state of being, along with several other monikers, depending on the culture and the point of history where this is being defined and described. This energy field is the same energy that Jesus accessed, and that Saint Paul on his road to Damascus experienced. It is a non-verbal state, though the human race certainly spends a lot of time trying to bring that experience back into the verbal world of incomplete and fragmented concepts. Our attempts at communicating with others are well-meaning but often times inane and insane attempts at measuring the immeasurable.

Our culture is perceived to be immeasurably enhanced , and the awakening elements of the human race give great tribute to those who continue their attempts to bring this energy to mankind through their music, poetry , art, science, teachings, story telling.and other verbal contrivances. The energy exists above and beyond the word, and its limitations, yet needs a verbal bridge back to the mind of the human, who has become lost to its influence while under the sway of the day-to-day hypnosis that living in the world of words supplies. The Garden of Eden is eternally lost to the person who lives in the past, while being defined and entertained by the verbal constructs around his history and experience. The Unknown, where “God” resides, becomes a source of fear for those who are addicted to their personal and/or collective stories, with their verbal structures of ignorance, isolation, hubris, and self-centered behavior. Those who finally touch the Unknown, are changed, yet lack the power to bring that change to others, though they can now send out their “waves of positive influence” or prayers, if you will. They only can point to where the Truth lies, which is the real power of the word.

The word itself is not holy, or spiritual, but the state of being pointed to is where the real power remains. All of the religious works ever presented to the human race are but pointers to the truth, with no innate capacity to impart the truth on their own. Prayer that starts on the verbal level and only stays there will have the characteristics of an affirmation, or part of the goal seeking mechanism of the human mind. Prayer that reaches the great Unknown, where the verbal machinations finally cease, will be blessed by that “carrier wave” of spiritual energy, thus have the potential for greatest power, healing, and connectivity.

The eternal struggle of man is to find their own unique way to quiet, or liberate, the mind, without damaging the mind in the process. The quiet mind is how to open the internal window to infinite spirit, which will blow into the inner window in its own unique time and manner. Who, or what, gets blessed by that blowing wind of spirit is primarily out of our conscious control, but, oh, how some people claim to “have the power”, and sell people on their own self-righteousness. Answered prayer appears to be a “miraculous intervention”, and proof that certain individuals or groups have a special, or developed, connection with their God, Lord, or Higher Power.

My “prayers” have never resulted in any miraculous healing of others. But, I have somehow connected with people on a mysterious non-verbal level, whereby I can sense what is going on with another, or that another can feel my “positive intention” for them. Apparently, I have the carrier wave connection, and some data is transferred, yet shamanic powers, or healing of the bodies of others or similar events have not occurred through my efforts. The only body that has ever been healed through my “prayers’ is my own.

There is a secret here that FEW can hear.  We can’t heal others, but we can bring a measure of healing to our self.  If our understanding of our “self” is inclusive of others, then our “prayer for our own healing” WILL HAVE POSITIVE IMPACT on all those who we consider “part of our self”. When Jesus stated that we should be “praying without ceasing”, the truth is that we are continuously praying, anyway, whether we are conscious of that fact, or not.

Recently, an acquaintance of my wife died at the age of forty-eight years.  Somehow I knew that she was near death, and, yet, I felt powerless to do or say anything about it.  She was a successful doctor practicing in Texas, loved intensely by all of her patients, she had two incredible children, and she was moving into a beautiful new home.  Yet, I knew that she had been contemplating suicide, even though she had never directly communicated that fact to anyone else, save my wife, who she called her “angel” when Sharon helped her at a low point.  There were several clues available, and I did not act upon them.  I did not feel that I had the right to intercede in the affairs of a person who I did not know well.  My awareness was right on (the preparation for prayer), yet my action was not, thus this becomes a great example of a “failed prayer”.  The results of this “failed prayer” left me heartbroken, but also quite motivated to find a better way to express whatever wisdom or insight comes my way about others,  or about the collective experience that we all share.

Our minds are continuously generating thoughts, which sometimes appear random in nature, or not of our self.  They might be spawned by our overall attitudes towards our self and towards others, and towards “the big picture”, and they might be spawned by our involvement with the common knowledge game of collective consciousness. These thoughts either can go out to “make the crooked places straight”, and co-create some new or reaffirm some existing order, or they create new layers of chaos and confusion in the collective and personal life experience.

Using insight gained from understanding the Common Knowledge Game, we can finally comprehend one of the more insidious aspects of prayer that has taken over much of our collective experience of humanity.   Our thoughts and prayers are an innate part of the conspiracy of silence, for, no one will ever know what we are truly thinking of, or whether prayers are effectively transmitted and received by us. Those who ‘pray” to their unknown “God” or some deceased prophet, or even those who “think kind thoughts” without sharing their own unique healing WORD live in a personal world of their own creation, with insufficient connective energy to effect change in self or other.

To change the world, first, change the self. We must find our own unique healing words and create stories with them, exercise our spiritual fitness through our language, story telling, and effective action in the community, and then witness the unfolding of a newer, more loving reality.

Mind, by James Allen (As A Man Thinketh, 1902)

The Master Power that molds and makes,

And Man is Mind. Evermore he takes the tools of thought And shaping what he wills,

Creates a thousand joys, a thousand ills.

He thinks in secret, but it comes to pass

Environment is but his looking-glass.

Our lives, and the lives of all of humanity, are the answers to our collective, and individual prayers. Our present day laws and attitudes are a direct result of our “thoughts and prayers”, so there is MUCH work yet to be done.  Our present day world reflects its immature response to its own limited understanding of its needs.

BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU ASK FOR!

Be grateful for the good that can be shared.

As a human race, all that we will ever see, unto eternity, is our Self. Can we see our Self with love and compassion today?—–Bruce Paullin

We all have access to infinity, and to each other, on levels that the conscious mind does not understand. The truth about each individual human life, and the collection that is called humanity, is that the sum total of all life influences each other directly and dramatically. Each moment of each day, our collective consciousness rains down upon us (or erupts within us) a wealth of information, and reaches our minds and “hearts”. We receive this information through the training, education, parental upbringing, media and news, the overall witnessing of life, our “dreams” and personal insights, as well as through some less obvious and poorly known and misunderstood means.

Artist’s Conception Of Life Energy Field

Each of us is both a receiver, and transmitter, of information. We tend to believe that the information that we are passing is exchanged solely through our words, and our body language, yet there is another level as well, a level that remains poorly understood, ignored, or even denied..We all have access to “extra sensory perception”, yet risk ridicule from many sources, including those scientifically inclined, should we ever experience its mystery and claim it for ourselves. Each of us has a life energy field, which has not yet been detected by science, but certainly has been detected by the sensitive beings within the shamanic tradition, as well as within the mystics of the human race over the aeons of the existence of life. This life energy field, or in Rupert Sheldrake’s terms, the morphic field, is the field that we not only radiate, but that we are immersed in from the collective, interacting fields of nearly eight billion other human beings now living, as well as all humans and precedent life that has ever lived.

Let me bring this discussion home for just a moment. On Sunday, March 17, 2019, I went to play cards with my friend Jim Hussey. While playing, I noted that I felt a blister forming on my forefinger on my right hand. I thought to myself that there was no way I could be developing a blister, because I had not done any work with my hands. Well, at that very moment, Sharon White was at home working outside around our home, and she had developed a blister, and noted it at the same time that day (6:00PM) that I felt the blister forming on my own finger. Coincidence?

Two years ago,in January of 2017, I started having seizures, and felt the presence of a golf ball sized black tumor in the left hemisphere of my brain. How on earth could I detect such a thing within myself without a MRI machine? I feared that I might be “losing it”, or even about to lose my own life, and was afraid to tell the doctor about it, though I mentioned to her that my dying father may well outlive me. Yet, on March 5, Marty Crouch had a major seizure, was hospitalized, and was diagnosed with a brain tumor the exact size, and in the same location in the brain as I detected within myself. And, when he described his seizure to me, I was struck by how similar his experience of the seizure was to my own. I told Marty that I felt that the black mass represented death itself, and that I hoped that it was not predictive of his immediate fate, or my own. When Marty had surgery to successfully remove the tumor two days later on Friday, the black mass from my own “life energy field” also disappeared. Marty was to die several months later, after a dramatic decline. Coincidence?

Two years ago, our dear friend June Thomas was visiting her brother Dale in Medford, Oregon. Dale was very sick at the time. In a Friday evening dream, I was in an unfamiliar bathroom, and I had fallen between the toilet and the wall. I was quite distressed in the dream. That next morning, Sharon and June talked on the phone, and June told her that Dale had fallen between the toilet and wall, while she watched helplessly. Coincidence?

Coincidences happen, and our eyes start to open to our long neglected truth. The more that we are receptive to that part of us that is truly unknown, the more we awaken to another possibility of our being. Whatever it is, and whoever it is that we are in consciousness, we also exist less consciously in realms where we have always been connected with our higher power, yet we did not yet know how to express its unique energies..

The common bond to these experiences is my empathy and love for all three people, even while they went through their own unique version of suffering. Empathy, compassion and love are the portals through which to receive the mysterious, higher level energies from our spiritual heritage. We are all connected at a much deeper level than we realize, yet we still can make this experience a more conscious one. Up to this point, I have not yet been able to apply this gift in any meaningful manner to help the human race, other than my willingness to write about the much greater undeveloped capacity of our human mind, heart, and soul. Learning to separate out from that energy what is mine, and what should be mine, from the vast sea of others’ real life experiences, as well as their expectations and beliefs can initially bring fear and a sense of being overwhelmed. And, many of the people troubled by psychosis, including variations of paranoid schizophrenia, suffer from the inability to bring order out of the apparent chaos of many overlapping realities. Yet, that understanding of the information that we consciously, or unconsciously, share with each other may well be the key to ultimate transcendence for the human race.

I don’t see our medicine and technology catching up with our innate, though neglected, abilities in that area. It is finally starting to become “common knowledge” of the importance of searching for wholeness while undertaking any important medical treatments or processes, as these endeavors complement and work synergistically with western medical approaches to healing and cures.

Theoretical physicists are now understanding that there are possibilities for alternate universes, as well as enhanced connections with the one we all currently reside within. I am saddened that mankind is becoming increasingly dependent on its technology for communication, while not concurrently developing the sensitivity to connect with the “energy” that we all share in, and with which we communicate with each other continuously. Our technology, especially the hand-held media devices that we use to entertain and hypnotize ourselves with, only serves to continue the energy of the past, without offering alternatives to the present collection of corrupted choices that humanity has seemed eternally resigned to make.

Science, though able to define relationships and the laws that dictate behavior between all observable, and quantum, phenomenon, are only now beginning to understand the ramifications of the real law of our existence, which is “all that we will ever see, unto eternity, is ourselves”. Science provides laws for what we see, yet, unlike enlightened spirituality, provides no laws predicting or supporting what is possible for humanity. Quantum mechanics will not be understood fully until the self-centered perspective towards infinity is replaced with the understanding that the collective, as well as the individual, is present in each of us, in each moment of existence. The impacts that we all have upon each other are not yet fully understood, yet prayer, meditation, and mindfulness prepare the mind for the unknown, where all true creation springs from. It is a much more collaborative effort being a human, and any other form of life on this planet, than our minimally conscious minds understand at this time. Ultimately, science and religion, medicine and technology, will all be united as manifestations of mankind’s expression of true being.

All of our “thoughts and prayers” have the potential to be of life-affirming value, yet their authority pales in comparison to the power of the underlying, unconscious intentions and manifestations of our collective consciousness and collective unconsciousness, and the infinite variations of potentially dangerous, unenlightened energies within it. I have seen that there are multitudes of suggestions and temptations floating around in our collective consciousness, and far too many of them revolve around diseases of the body, diseases of the mind, and rejection of our spirit of love. Yet,within that misunderstood and mysterious energy field, lies an infinite potential for healing and transformation, as well. The path towards conscious awareness, and “miraculous healing” includes sorting out what are our true thoughts and intentions from the collective stray noise of the human energy field, and how we can protect ourselves from all of the dangerous frequencies that we all tune into, intentionally or inadvertently.

Can we experience a spiritual apocalypse where we accept a new way way being, of seeing life, and finally remove ourselves from the limitations that our time based thinking has created for us? Can we come from a place not from our conditioned backgrounds, our upbringing, our wounding as children, our PTSD as adults, or even our most educated, intelligent parts of our training? Will we allow for ourselves the immense uncertainty, and the ultimate privilege, of accessing new paths of consciousness where love, empathy and compassion are our eternal companions? Will we allow our energy fields to resonate with the highest potentials for human experience, to even approach that of our purported divine nature? If we could move past our collective, and individual, discomfort we might learn something about empathy and compassion and mercy and justice, and even connect with a majesty and a miracle that far transcends our limited vision for life. We might finally know “God”, “Buddha”, Allah”, “Vishnu”, “Shiva”, “Krishna”, “Jesus Christ”, “Mohamed” and “Our Self” not as separate concepts, but instead as all part of a great holism.

To not do so is to continue our collective misanthropic experience of war, hatred, enmity between nations and peoples, destruction of our sacred planet Earth, economic inequality, racism, misogyny, diseases of all manners and types, and mental illness. We are free to choose what energy to manifest, and to access. If we do not want the damaged, diseased status quo to continue unto our collective Armageddon, then we will all make necessary changes to the paths we are now following, and/or we will follow completely new conscious paths of experience..

For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind. —– Isaiah 65:17

Always remember that WE are the “I” in Isaiah 65:17, when we finally make conscious contact with the ultimate truth of being and existence.

I have attempted to “capture lightning in a bottle” by articulating this message. May each of us never despair of our faltering attempts to reach towards this infinite energy and to express its love and wisdom. To have a better life, we have to access new parts of our infinite self, and travel on new paths of understanding. A primary law of consciousness is that “we find what we are looking for”, so make sure to look for what we really want, and not fall victim to the suggestions of others that don’t always have our best interests at heart.

Very truly I tell you, whoever makes conscious contact with the truth of their real self will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because we are all birthed from infinite power. And the miracles that we perform are to bring the highest glory to our lives, to the lives of all others, and to the transcendent energy from which we have arisen.——-Jesus Of Nazareth, from John 14 12:14, (spiritually reinterpreted).

When we decide to no longer be the victim, we can finally be the victor. Life can be lived on wider and wider frequencies of energy, where meaning, personal value, and loving service to others will bring to each of us all of the resources that we will ever need to live a successful life.

Can anyone conceive of the life where our hearts are opened so wide, that we literally feel like they will explode from all of the love that we now are able to share? Can anyone conceive of the life where our possibilities for understanding and experiencing more of the mysteries of the infinite nature of the interior universe finally becomes common knowledge?

We must not give up before the Miracle appears in our life, and in all of our lives which are impacted by our own.

Can we envision a more challenging, yet beautiful experience for ourselves, and for the planet?

What better reason for living can there possibly be?

For those who have made it this far in this work, together we have attempted to troubleshoot and repair a damaged system, to prepare for our launch into the GREAT UNKNOWN.

The GREAT UNKNOWN is calling us to itself.

The GREAT UNKNOWN is calling us home.

If you have not already, please initiate your launch sequence! You are about to undertake the journey of a lifetime.

Prepare yourself, for you are about to land in Eternity.

Please, save yourself.

“Houston, Tranquility Base here.  The Eagle has landed.”
—-Neil Armstrong, July 20, 1969