biomimicry

‎"Biomimicry (from bios, meaning life, and mimesis, meaning to imitate) is a new discipline that studies nature's best ideas and then imitates these designs and processes to solve human problems. Studying a leaf to invent a better solar cell is an example.

"The core idea is that nature, imaginative by necessity, has already solved many of the problems we are grappling with. Animals, plants, and microbes are the consummate engineers. They have found what works, what is appropriate, and most important, what lasts here on Earth. This is the real news of biomimicry: After 3.8 billion years of research and development, failures are fossils, and what surrounds us is the secret to survival."

[excerpted from Janine Benyus' Biomimicry Institute website]

uranus-pluto and material energy

"The Uranus-Pluto conjunction of 1705-16 coincided with the invention of the steam engine and the discovery of the use of coal for iron-smelting furnaces that began the Industrial Revolution and the age of steam, iron, and coal. The following conjunction of 1845-56 coincided with the discovery of petroleum oil as a fuel, a discovery that began the petroleum age whose cultural, ecological, and geopolitical consequences are still unfolding. And the following opposition of 1896-1907 coincided with the birth of the nuclear age with the discovery of radioactivity in uranium, the isolation of radium and polonium, and Einstein's E = mc2 formulation." [Richard Tarnas, Cosmos and Psyche]

reactor-free medical isotopes developed

always good to hear report of ongoing disentanglements between manufacturers of weapons-grade uranium and western medicine. isotopes are used to deliver radiation to direct targets from inside the body as opposed to getting radiated from the outside. unfortunately, the truth that there's no good use for radiation (or nuclear weaponry industries dressed in energy industry garb) is rarely reported...

"Medical isotopes could be made without a nuclear reactor"
Canadian researchers are racing to perfect a safe, clean, inexpensive and reliable method for making isotopes used in medical-imaging and diagnostic procedures.

piriformis or SI joint pain?

interestingly, the piriformis not only stabilizes the femur, its the key muscle responsible for the lateral rotation of the hip joint, meaning it's the muscle that allows us to open the groin and make ourselves vulnerable. i say interesting, because of how chronic we, the western population as a statistical pool, go into rigid spasm, locking down the front by seizing up in the back instead... humans. looking one way while doing another since, um, forever...

here's the best discussion i've come across on the guiding features that distinguish SI joint pain from piriformis entrapment of the sciatic... Piriformis or SI Joint Pain? by a Certified Advanced Rolfer...

on the uranus-pluto cycle

"The powerful wave of feeling that overcame the Legislative Assembly in July 1792 at the height of the democratic period of the Revolution, when the deputies suddenly surrendered their antagonisms and commenced embracing and kissing each other in tears of deep emotion, and that swept through Paris generally in 1792 had its counterparts in such events as the San Francisco Summer of Love in 1967 or the Woodstock music festival in 1969." [Cosmos and Psyche: Richard Tarnas]

URANUS-PLUTO decades: "repeated outbursts of mass emotions of great intensity; whether violent or libidinous, the dominant archetypal complex in each of these periods seemed to constellate sudden sustained outbursts of nonspecific emotional intensity and elemental power that informed and compelled human activity and experience on a mass scale." [ibid]

as above

Light Show In The Sky For October-November 2011
by Robert Wilkinson

Right now we have a great light show in the evening skies!

Mercury and Venus are both evening stars at this time of the year, and will be for several weeks to come. You can see Venus very clearly for the next few weeks just after sunset. At the same time, just below it you can see Mercury. The distance between the two will close between now and early November, when they will seem like "twinned stars" in the sunset sky.

Jupiter is about to become very bright as a "morning star" over the next month due to where it is relative to the Sun. It will be particularly bright in the Eastern sky at sunset during the coming New Moon on October 26-27, just as it will be every day through the time of the Moon conjunct Jupiter during the 19 Taurus-Scorpio Full Moon on November 10-11.

Very early risers will see reddish Mars in the Eastern skies from about 2:15 to 5 am from now through December. As the months roll on, Mars will be more elevated in the Eastern sky as the weeks move on, and by December Saturn will also be a "morning star" on the Eastern horizon beginning around 5 am.

All these times must be adjusted toward a couple of hours earlier in the Southern Hemisphere, since the Sun rises very early there in November and December. Anyway, a few things to keep in mind during the periods just before sunrise and just after sunset over the next few weeks. Enjoy the celestial light show!!

© Copyright 2011 Robert Wilkinson

distorted thinking (book excerpt)

15 STYLES OF DISTORTED THINKING

1) Filtering: You take the negative details and magnify them, while filtering out all positive aspects of a situation. A single detail may be picked out, and the whole event becomes colored by this detail. When you pull negative things out of context, isolated from all the good experiences around you, you make them larger and more awful than they really are.

2) Polarized Thinking: The hallmark of this distortion is an insistence on dichotomous choices. Things are black and white, good or bad. You tend to perceive everything at the extremes, with very little room for middle ground. The greatest danger in polarized thinking is its impact on how you judge yourself. For example, you have to be perfect or you're a failure.

3) Overgeneralization: You come to a general conclusion based on a single incident or piece of evidence. If something bad happens once, you expect it to happen over and over again. 'Always' and 'never' are cues that this style of thinking is being utilized. This distortion can lead to a restricted life, as you avoid future failures based on the single incident or event.

4) Mind Reading: Without their saying so, you know what people are feeling and why they act the way they do. In particular, you are able to divine how people are feeling towards you. Mind reading depends on a process called projection. You imagine that people feel the same way you do and react to things the same way you do. Therefore, you don't watch or listen carefully enough to notice that they are actually different. Mind readers jump to conclusions that are true for them, without checking whether they are true for the other person.

5) Catastrophizing: You expect disaster. You notice or hear about a problem and start "what if's." What if that happens to me? What if tragedy strikes? There are no limits to a really fertile catastrophic imagination. An underlying catalyst for this style of thinking is that you do not trust in yourself and your capacity to adapt to change.

6) Personalization: This is the tendency to relate everything around you to yourself. For example, thinking that everything people do or say is some kind of reaction to you. You also compare yourself to others, trying to determine who's smarter, better looking, etc. The underlying assumption is that your worth is in question. You are therefore continually forced to test your value as a person by measuring yourself against others. If you come out better, you get a moment's relief. If you come up short, you feel diminished. The basic thinking error is that you interpret each experience, each conversation, each look as a cue to your worth and value.

7) Control Fallacies: There are two ways you can distort your sense of power and control. If you feel externally controlled, you see yourself as helpless, a victim of fate. The fallacy of internal control has you responsible for the pain and happiness of everyone around you. Feeling externally controlled keeps you stuck. You don't believe you can really affect the basic shape of your life, let alone make any difference in the world. The truth of the matter is that we are constantly making decisions, and every decisions affects our lives. On the other hand, the fallacy of internal control leaves you exhausted as you attempt to fill the needs of everyone around you, and feel responsible in doing so (and guilty when you cannot).

8) Fallacy of Fairness: You feel resentful because you think you know what's fair, but other people won't agree with you. Fairness is so conveniently defined, so temptingly self-serving, that each person gets locked into his or her own point of view. It is tempting to make assumptions about how things would change if people were only fair or really valued you. But the other person hardly ever sees it that way, and you end up causing yourself a lot of pain and an ever-growing resentment.

9) Blaming: You hold other people responsible for your pain, or take the other tack and blame yourself for every problem. Blaming often involves making someone else responsible for choices and decisions that are actually our own responsibility. In blame systems, you deny your right (and responsibility) to assert your needs, say no, or go elsewhere for what you want.

10) Shoulds: You have a list of ironclad rules about how you and other people should act. People who break the rules anger you, and you feel guilty if you violate the rules. The rules are right and indisputable and, as a result, you are often in the position of judging and finding fault (in yourself and in others). Cue words indicating the presence of this distortion are should, ought, and must.

11) Emotional Reasoning: You believe that what you feel must be true - automatically. If you feel stupid or boring, then you must be stupid and boring. If you feel guilty, then you must have done something wrong. The problem with emotional reasoning is that our emotions interact and correlate with our thinking process. Therefore, if you have distorted thoughts and beliefs, your emotions will reflect these distortions.

12) Fallacy of Change: You expect that other people will change to suit you if you just pressure or cajole them enough. You need to change people because your hopes for happiness seem to depend entirely on them. The truth is the only person you can really control or have much hope of changing is yourself. The underlying assumption of this thinking style is that your happiness depends on the actions of others. Your happiness actually depends on the thousands of large and small choices you make in your life.

13) Global Labeling: You generalize one or two qualities (in yourself or others) into a negative global judgement. Global labeling ignores all contrary evidence, creating a view of the world that can be stereotyped and one-dimensional. Labeling yourself can have a negative and insidious impact upon your self-esteem; while labeling others can lead to snap-judgments, relationship problems, and prejudice.

14) Being Right: You feel continually on trial to prove that your opinions and actions are correct. Being wrong is unthinkable and you will go to any length to demonstrate your rightness. Having to be 'right' often makes you hard of hearing. You aren't interested in the possible veracity of a differing opinion, only in defending your own. Being right becomes more important than an honest and caring relationship.

15) Heaven's Reward Fallacy: You expect all your sacrifice and self-denial to pay off, as if there were someone keeping score. You feel bitter when the reward doesn't come as expected. The problem is that while you are always doing the 'right thing,' if your heart really isn't in it, you are physically and emotionally depleting yourself.

*excerpted from THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS by McKay, Davis, and Fanning. New Harbinger, 1981. These styles of thinking (or cognitive distortions) were gleaned from the work of several authors, including Albert Ellis, Aaron Beck, and David Burns, among others.

THE BEAUTY OF TOTALITY, by Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche

"Ultimate goodness is connected with the notion of ultimate joy without comparison to suffering. Out of that joy we begin to experience, visually, the beauty of the blue sky; the beauty of a red rose; the beauty of a white chrysanthemum; the beauty of chattering brooks; the beauty of the openness of the ocean, where sky and land meet; the beauty of sweet and sour; the beauty of music, high pitches and low; the beauty of experiencing warmth on our bodies; the beauty of cool air, which creates natural refreshment; the beauty of eating a meal when we feel hungry; the beauty of drinking water when we feel thirsty; the beauty of learning more things when we feel that we are not learned enough. I don’t want to paint a pleasure-oriented picture alone. There is also the beauty of your schoolmaster pinching you on the cheek, the beauty of being too hot on a midsummer’s day; the beauty of being too cold in the middle of winter—the beauty of pain as well as the beauty of pleasure."

"... it has been thought better to change the traditional title. LUST implies not only strength, but the joy of strength exercised. It is vigor, and the rapture of vigor. There is in this card a divine drunkenness or ecstasy. The woman is shown as more than a little drunk, and more than a little mad; and the lion also is aflame with lust. This signifies that the type of energy described is that of the primitive, creative order; its is completely independent of the criticism of reason. This card portrays the will of the Aeon." [Aleister Crowley]

"The difference between Crowley's LUST card and the traditional STRENGTH card can be illustrated by two formulas: that of St. George killing the Dragon, and that of Beauty and the Beast. In the STRENGTH card, St. George kills the dragon to save the damsel in distress, thus the woman and the beast are kept separate, and the woman is mild and powerless. In the LUST card, the woman herself falls in love with the Beast, and while in some versions of the tale the Beast becomes a man due to her love, in others the woman becomes a Beast as well. Thus, LUST relates more to the acceptance of the bestial lust and vigor for life, rather than the denial and destruction of its primal force." [Kim Huggens]

summary of the archetypes

the human ordeal of consciousness and willful achievement, well put by Robert Wilkinson in this summation, "Life energy is initiated in Aries, substantiated in Taurus, explored in Gemini, grounded in Cancer, renewed and creatively expressed in Leo, refined and ordered in Virgo, balanced in Libra, purified in Scorpio, expanded in Sagittarius, organized in Capricorn, solidified into a vision in Aquarius, and ended/perpetuated in Pisces."

mistress knowledge

biting off more than one can chew can be an endearing quality, except when the struggling chomper's a polemicist who's proving inflexible of the changes or recantations required by mistress knowledge, someone apparently unaffected by the evolving and starker clarity of self evident counter report.

a better man bows to the fullest complexion possible on his subject, a lesser one digs heels in on old decisions and biases, making a mockery of any system of investigation's ability to grapple with inconvenient facts. tut tut.

here's a link to the article,
and below a reply from James DeMeo, PhD,
Director, Orgone Biophysical Research Lab, Ashland, Oregon

ADVENTURES IN THE ORGASMATRON
How the Sexual Revolution Came to America
By Christopher Turner
Illustrated. 532 pp. Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $35.
REVIEWED BY CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

In the classic confessional memoir “The God That Failed,” Arthur Koestler describes some of the characters who made up the constituency of his Communist Party group in Berlin in the early 1930s:

“Among other members of our cell, I remember Dr. Wilhelm Reich. He . . . had just published a book called ‘The Function of the Orgasm,’ in which he had expounded the theory that the sexual frustration of the proletariat caused a thwarting of its political consciousness; only through a full, uninhibited release of the sexual urge could the working class realize its revolutionary potentialities and historic mission; the whole thing was less cockeyed than it sounds.”

Pausing briefly to ask oneself how the word “cockeyed” translates into Berlin vernacular, one next inquires how the theory could have been more preposterous than at first appeared. Apart from his life of tireless and sensational debauchery, Koestler himself was famous for hitching his wagon to various movements of the paranormal and the extrasensory; he might have been expected to give Reich’s oddball theories a try even as both men spun off from the dying planet of Soviet Communism. But what is extraordinary is the number of apparently level and careful people who, in pursuit of the better and bigger orgasm, were prepared to lower themselves into Reich’s jerry-built “orgone box” and await blissful developments. One is not so surprised to read of the enthusiasm of try-anything-once artists like Allen Ginsberg, Henry Miller, William Burroughs and Norman Mailer. But how must Albert Einstein have felt, while engaged on his two weeks of study of orgone properties? (He did at least conclude that the “box” was an insult to the laws of physics.) Did Saul Bellow not succumb to the queasy feeling that he might be looking like a sap?

... read the full book review here and below a reply to this article from James DeMeo ...

What a shame that you did not personally investigate Dr. Wilhelm Reich's biophysical work, before accepting at face value what the non-scientist faux-literary and travel-book author Christopher Turner, has pronounced in his deeply flawed and biased "Adventures in the Orgasmatron". The title alone should have given you some pause. But it is fashionable these days to always laugh at the poor sot in the stocks, whomever it might be, against whom we can throw all our emotional crap, like the Muslims throw stones at the Devil-pillar in Mecca. Everyone then feels so much better. Was that you?

To inform: I've investigated Reich's biophysical work over decades, including his orgone energy accumulator, and can personally report (and have done so in many published articles and books) that his findings are both sound and reproducible. Review these, for example:
http://www.waterjournal.org/volume-3/demeo
http://www.orgonelab.org/DeMeoEdgeScience.pdf
http://www.orgonelab.org/DeMeoToTSubtleEnergies.pdf

I'm not alone in that regard, of having replicated Reich's biophysics. Do you even know the published literature on this issue? Does any of that matter to you? Or must one have a big name, and big publisher sponsor an ad campaign and reviews for the Times to get your attention? Do you know anything about the history of scientific discovery, and repression? How the “mainstream” always goes with the reactionary pogroms against new discovery?

Turner surely knows the evidence in favor of Reich's biophysics -- he attended scientific conferences where such information was presented – which shatters his central thesis of "Reich the Crackpot". He deliberately does not mention any of it. He also fabricates a deceit against Reich, through a faux guilt-by-association with every kind of sexually-twisted example from the late 20th Century – also ignoring Reich’s frequent denouncements of the same.

You once wrote a book about Orwell, noting with accuracy something he said: "Lies of Omission are the worst kind of lie". Precisely because the ignorant won't even know they are being led into dangerous waters. That pretty much defines the Turner book, as well as what you just did, lending your otherwise good name towards yet another public auto-da-fe abuse of Reich's corpse.

Reich's work is a testament to the dangers of book-burning – I note, you said nothing about that. You might review my article "New Information on the Persecution and Death of Wilhelm Reich" to see how it wasn't the old "McCarthites" who engineered his death in prison, and the book-burning, but rather liberal-left-atheist Reds of various hues, including members of two notable Soviet spy rings. You can damn well read the article to learn the details. Here:
http://www.orgonelab.org/ReichPersecution.htm

This is doubly regrettable for you personally, because the orgone accumulator has a notable capacity to often (but not always) shrink tumors, reduce the physical pains associated with cancer, and stimulate a return of appetite, energy and vitality to those withering away, depending upon how far it has gone.

I'd always considered you a man of principle and decency, but this time you've gone way off the rails. If you can center yourself, and not merely react to my strong words, you might ask, just what is going on, and why, that people are so exercised after 50+ years after Reich's death, that they want not only to blame the worst aspects of the New Left sexual rebellion on him, but to also make yet another merciless round of "analysis" (eg, defamatory sex-smears and jokes) about the orgone accumulator -- which in spite of what the AMA or FDA might proclaim, is an authentic scientific and curative device!

Regards,

James DeMeo, PhD
Director, Orgone Biophysical Research Lab
Ashland, Oregon, USA

PS. For my several scientific books on this and related subjects, do an Amazon.com search on my name.

AURUM by Edward C. Whitmont, M.D.

excerpted from PSYCHE AND SUBSTANCE
GOLD is the metal of the sun. For untold ages, it has held fascination for mankind. Gold has been the "royal" metal furnishing the king's solar halos: their crowns. Universally it is a symbol of imperishable value. Even when gold no longer supplies the actual coinage it nevertheless continues to represent the basic standard of currency. Evidently the collective psyche harbours an unconscious awareness of a supreme symbolic significance inherent in gold.

In Hermetic tradition gold is held to be part of a cosmic "functional" triad comprised of sun, heart and gold as corresponding, synonymous entities. It is noteworthy that the sun rhythmically "pulses" in a way that is analogous to the heart. It contracts and expands about .002% of its diameter (or about 3K) in approximately two hours and forty minutes.

For alchemy gold represented the solar principle and the highest goal of spiritual transformation. ("Our gold is not the gold of the vulgar" was an alchemical saying.) Astrologically, the solar principle stands for the life will in the individuating human consciousness, the sense of self-value, honesty, responsibility, pride, willpower, vital strength and the capacity to exert control, all vested in the heart.

Among many Indian tribes the rising sun was greeted by breathing upon one's hand and offering one's breath to it as the source of life. In a more gruesome ritual, the Aztecs would tear out the living heart of their sacrificial victims, preferably prisoners of war or nobles, and hold it up as an offering to its "father" the sun.

These traditions bear witness to the deeply felt correspondence between the substance of gold, the sun and the sun-like organ, the heart. It is interesting in this connection that the center and source of consciousness as well as the life will were traditionally associated with the heart, the organ of feeling, rather than the brain.

Astrologically, our consciousness is seen as anchored in the two "lights," the assertive "greater light" the sun and the receptive "lesser light" the moon. Both are polarized by their "antagonist" Saturn, the principle of limitation, who rules the metal lead and the bony skeleton which defines and limits our existence in time and space. Under Saturn's influence the sun becomes "black," the sol niger of alchemy, representing decay, depression and death. Hence the goal of the alchemical opus was the transmutation of earthbound Saturnian stuff, of lead, into spiritual essence, into gold.

The sun is the center of our universe. But like human consciousness and human will, the sun is still subordinate to a higher center, the center of the galaxy which, according to newest observations, is a black hole: a mysterious entity in which time, space and substance as we know them are vitiated. Thus, the solar principle expresses also the problem of human individuality, balanced and polarized between life and death, between the dark mystery of the transcendent "center" above and the Saturnian limitation below, to both of which our light of consciousness and sense of individual life are subordinate.

As focal points of consciousness the sun and moon also rule our chief sensory orientations - the outgoing sun ruling the outer-oriented attitudes of smell (associated with Muladhara, the basic Saturnian earth chakra) and of vision. ("Were not the eye to sun akin, how could we ever behold the light?" -Goethe.) Hence gold affects heart and circulation, the bony skeleton (ruled by Saturn), eyes and nose. Correspondingly, the receptive moon rules the inner-oriented gesture of hearing; hence the moon, like permeable and receptive Calc. carb., Phosphor or Pulsatilla, has a greater affinity to the ears.

The pathology of Gold fits personalities of a serious, over-responsible and depressive character.

The solar types are would-be rulers, "kings," that feel actively responsible for the destinies of their "subjects" and for the burdens they themselves have assumed.

Usually, they are active and intrinsically strong people who feel they bear heavy responsibilities often experienced as overwhelming. Their pathology expresses the tension between their sense of responsibility, their will and felt call to control people and circumstances, as over the existential limitations they encounter.

Physically they tend to be ruddy, dark-complexioned, plethoric, active and strong, sometimes heavy-set. Or, the other side of the spectrum: oldish-looking, low-spirited "overwhelmed" children, often boys with atrophy of the testicles.

Responsible fathers or heads of families, (regardless of whether they happen to be males or female), effective business and executive types with strong willpower, they occupy highly responsible functions, and like the mythological Atlas who had to carry the weight of the whole globe on his shoulders, they frequently carry more than they can. Burdened by an often over-scrupulous conscience that overshoots the mark, and inclined to take matters too seriously, they tend to see predominantly the dark side of problems and of life. (Impressively enough, this is also a symptom of disturbed physical vision: seeing only the lower half of objects.)

They have a hard time tolerating contradiction. Yet they do not show their anger or worries, do not say much and tend to withdraw into solitude.

But swallowing rather than expressing their emotions intensifies inner as well as outer tensions, eventually to the point of explosive breakdown. To these situations they respond with self-criticisms, self-accusations, and heavy, often unjustified, feelings of guilt, worthlessness and self-condemnation.

Readily overwhelmed by a load that feels or actually is too heavy for them, they are given to anxiety and restlessness about trifles, about the future and about their health. They tend to feel neglected and deserted and become silently brooding, show aversion to other people including even their immediate kin, and tend to isolate themselves.

Ultimately this may lead to hopeless despondency, depression and despair, emotionally no less than physically (despair about pain), to a loathing of life and suicidal tendencies. Often these types may be found among seemingly strong and silent people who suddenly commit suicide.

Noise bothers them, but the solar types are uniquely sensitive and made to feel organically better from music. (Kent's repertory lists only Aurum and Tarantula under this rubric.)

Apparently, music conveys solar light and life strength. We are reminded of the Biblical image of King Saul having lost his connection with God and in deep depression: "... and whenever the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, David took the lyre and played it with his hand; so Saul was refreshed and was well and the evil spirit departed from him." (1 Samuel: 16, 23)

Apollo, the Greek sun god, is also a musician. Traditionally, from the sun issues the "harmony of the spheres," and Goethe opens his individuation drama Faust with the archangel's intoning:

"The sun sounds forth in ancient fashion
In brother sphere's competing song."

Like sun-kings, the Gold types feel oppressed mentally and physically when hemmed in. They have to be on the move and feel better by walking around.

Clinically, the Gold scope includes also ailments from anger, fright, contradiction and disappointed affection and unhappy love.

The aggravations at night, in the winter, in cold weather, as well as from heat, the desire for open air and improvement from bathing fit well with the solar pathology.

Strongly rooted in a sense of ego, Gold types have a great tolerance of alcohol and may drink a lot, but not like Phosphor in a search for easy ecstasy. Instead Gold types drink in order to temporarily lighten the burden of their worries and responsibilities. Yet, in extreme cases the addictive outcome is the same. On the other hand, like Phosphor the carrier of light, Aurum the solar principle and Sulphur the carrier of sol-sun are anidotal to, as well as in their pathology generating a susceptibility to, consciousness-lowering drug dependency.

reclaim somatic ground

if you can't afford psychotherapy and need to defrag, just stand naked in front of a fulllength mirror for more than a few minutes. the judgements and the assessment of body parts quiets down if you stand in that reckoning gaze with the self for long enough. then, as if by magic, the soft motherly animal forces of the earth start to rise in your perceptions and you startle to see your own body as a gentle beautiful flower full of light and story, just like every other body out there.

this kind of shift in the way we experience ourselves would take such stress off of our interfacing. we withhold so much of our own energies hating our bodies, it makes us weak and ineffectual. there's no benefit to be had, neither darwinian nor epigenetic, from self-hatred.

artwork by Arrington de Dionysos

animals touch their kind extensively and to their benefit. our denatured minds have so fucked us over in terms of our embodiment patterns and ways of interrelating between bodies, but the good news is we're becoming aware of our touch deficit and our lack of access to safe, respectful, nurturing touch.

ANAHATA

anahata
Excerpted from C.G. Jung's 'The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga' courtesy Gary Sparks

"Above the diaphragm you come into anahata, the heart or air center, because the heart is embedded in the lungs and the whole activity of the heart is closely associated with the lungs."

"When you have come into the whirlpool of passions, of instincts, of desires and so on, what follows after?"

"[I]n anahata they are lifted above the surface of the earth."

"[Y]ou begin to reason, to think, to reflect about things, and so it is the beginning of a sort of contraction or withdrawal from the mere emotional function. Instead of following your impulses wildly, you begin to ... disidentify yourself from your emotions, or so overcome your emotions actually. You stop yourself in your wild mood and suddenly ask, 'Why am I behaving like this?'"

"[I]n anahata a new thing comes up, the possibility of lifting himself above the emotional happenings and beholding the. He discovers the purusa [FN: the primeval man or ... the luminous man] in his heart, the thumbling, 'Smaller than small, and greater than great.' In the center of anahata the ... small flame means the first germlike appearance of the self."

"[T]ake a patient in analysis who has reached the stage of manipura, where he is an absolute prey to his emotions and passions. I say: 'But you really ought to be a bit reasonable; do you see what you do? You cause no end of trouble to your relations.' And it makes no impression whatever. But then these arguments begin to have a pull; one knows that the threshold of the diaphragm has been crossed—he has reached anahata. You see, values, convictions, general ideas are psychical facts that are nowhere to be met with in natural science. ... They become visible only in anahata. Now, according to tantric yoga, the purusa is first seen in anahata: the essence of man, the supreme man, the so-called primordial man then becomes visible."

"The next animal is the gazelle, again a transformation of the original force. The gazelle or antelope is not unlike the ram, living upon the surface of the earth—the difference being that it is not a domesticated animal like the male sheep, nor is it a sacrificial animal. It is not at all offensive; it is exceedingly shy and elusive, on the contrary, and very fleet of foot—it vanishes in no time. When you come upon a herd of gazelles, you are always amazed at the way they disappear. They just fly into space with great leaps. There are antelopes in Africa that take leaps of six to ten meters—something amazing; it is as if they had wings. And they are also graceful and tender, and have exceedingly slender legs and feet. They hardly touch the ground, and the least stirring of the air is sufficient to make them fly away, like birds. So there is a birdlike quality in the gazelle. It is as light as air; it touches the earth only here and there. It is an animal of earth, but it is almost liberated from the power of gravity. Such an animal would be apt to symbolize the force, the efficiency, and the lightness of psychical substance—thought and feeling. It has already lost a part of the heaviness of the earth. Also, it denotes that in anahata the psychical thing is an elusive factor, hardly to be caught. It has exactly the quality that we doctors would mean when we say that it is exceedingly difficult to discover the psychogenic factor in a disease."

"So the crossing-over from manipura to anahata is really very difficult. The recognition that the psyche is a self-moving thing, something genuine and not yourself, is exceedingly difficult to see and to admit."

"Each of the four lower centers has an element belonging to it—muladhara, the earth, svadhisthana, the water, then comes fire in manipura, and finally air in anahata."

gordian knots

whatever we really _are_ is the thing that's really beautiful about us. often we're blind to this aspect and so we rely on each other to reflect back at ourselves our own attractiveness! and then we pretend that the fineness we see in the world and in others isn't also in ourselves! that's a gordian knot, my friends.

the humans who don't buy into our rhetoric in a completely goodnatured way are also the people who don't want to loose the beautiful neutrality they can offer us. benefit of doubt, keeping neutral and optimistic, that's the fire between friends transmogrifying dross to gold.

there's no direct road to any gratification that doesn't turn to ash in the mouth. so be the road that runs everywhere and has nothing left to consume that isn't already embedded in its own nature...

MANIPURA

manipura
Excerpted from C.G. Jung's 'The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga' courtesy Gary Sparks

"[I]f you pass through that danger [the devouring quality or attribute of the sea] you reach the next center manipura, which means the fulness of jewels. It is the fire center, really the place where the sun rises. The sun now appears; the first light comes after baptism. This is like the initiation rites in the Isis mysteries, according to Apuleius, where the initiate at the end of the ceremony was put upon the pedestal and worshiped as the god Helios, the deification that always follows the baptismal rite. You are born into a new existence; you are a very different being and have a different name."

"[M]anipura is the center of the identification with the god, where one becomes part of the divine substance, having an immortal soul. You are already part of that which is no longer in time, in three-dimensional space; you belong now to a fourth-dimensional order of things where time is an extension, where space does not exist and time is not, where there is only infinite duration—eternity."

"[D]esire, passions, the whole emotional world breaks loose. Sex, power, and every devil in our nature gets loose when we become acquainted with the unconscious. Then you will see a new picture of yourself. That is why people are afraid and say there is no unconscious, like children playing hide-and-seek."

"A man who is not on fire is nothing; he is ridiculous, he is two-dimensional. He must be on fire even if he does make a fool of himself. A flame must burn somewhere, otherwise no light shines; there is no warmth, nothing."

"In manipura the ram is the symbolic animal, and the ram is the sacred animal of Agni, the god of fire. That is astrological. The ram, Aries, is the domicilium of Mars, the fiery planet of passions, impulsiveness, rashness, violence, and so on. Agni is an apt symbol. It is again the elephant, but in a new form. And it is no longer an insurmountable power—the sacred power of the elephant. It is now a sacrificial animal, and it is a relatively small sacrifice—not the great sacrifice of the bull but the smaller sacrifice of the passions. That is, to sacrifice the passions is not so terribly expensive. The small black animal that is against you is no longer like the leviathan of the depths in the cakra before; the danger has already diminished. Your own passions are really less a danger than to be drowned in unconsciousness; to be unconscious of one's passion is much worse than to suffer from passion. And that is expressed by Aries, the ram; it is a small sacrificial animal of which you don't need to be afraid, for it is no longer equipped with the strength of the elephant or the leviathan. You have overcome the worst danger when you are aware of your fundamental desires or passions."

SVADHISTHANA

svadhisthana
Excerpted from C.G. Jung's 'The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga' courtesy Gary Sparks

"[T]he next cakra, svadhisthana, must be the unconscious, symbolized by the sea, and in the sea is a huge leviathan which threatens one with annihilation."

"[T]his is the symbolism of all initiation cults: the awakening out of muladhara and the going into the water, the baptismal fount with the danger of ... the devouring quality or attribute of the sea."

"In the next center is the makara [crocodile-like creature / sea dragon, Encyclopaedia Britannica], the leviathan. So in crossing from muladhara to svadhisthana, the power that has nourished you hitherto shows now an entirely different quality: what is the elephant on the surface of the world is the leviathan in the depths. The elephant is the biggest, strongest animal upon the surface of the earth, and the leviathan is the biggest and most terrible animal down in the waters. But it is one and the same animal: the power that forces you into consciousness and that sustains you in your conscious world proves to be the worst enemy when you come to the next center. For there you are really going out of this world, and everything that makes you cling to it is your worst enemy. The greatest blessing in this world is the greatest curse in the unconscious. So the makara is just the reverse: the water elephant, the whale dragon that devours you, is the thing that has nourished and supported you hitherto—just as the benevolent mother that brought you up becomes in later life a devouring mother that swallows you again. If you cannot give her up she becomes an absolutely negative factor—she supports the life of your childhood and youth, but to become adult you must leave all that, and then the mother force is against you. So anyone attempting to leave this world for another kind of consciousness, the water world or the unconscious, has the elephant against him; then the elephant becomes the monster of the underworld."

MULADHARA

MULADHARA:
Excerpted from C.G. Jung's 'The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga' courtesy Gary Sparks



"So we are all in the roots, we are upon our root support. ('Root support' is the literal translation of muladhara.)"

"Therefore we may assume that the way out of our muladhara existence leads into the water."

"That woman entangled in the roots is just entangled in her personal life."

"[M]uladhara is here, the life of this earth, and here the god is asleep."

"Kundalini ... means to separate the gods from the world so that they become active ... ."

"[T]he convictions of the muladhara world are very necessary. It is exceedingly important that you are rational, that you believe in the definiteness of our world, that this world is the culmination of history, the most desirable thing. Such a conviction is absolutely vital. Otherwise you remain detached from the muladhara—you never get there, you are never born, even. There are plenty of people who are not yet born. They seem to be all here, they walk about—but as a matter of fact, they are not yet born, because they are behind a glass wall, they are in the womb. They are in the world only on parole and are soon to be returned to the pleroma where they started originally. They have not formed a connection with this world; they are suspended in the air; they are neurotic, living the provisional life."

"[I]t is utterly important that one should be in this world, that one really fulfills one's entelechia [the urge of realization, the gem of life which one is. Otherwise you can never start Kundalini; you can never detach. ... You must believe in this world, make roots, do the best you can ... so that [some] trace is left of you. For you should leave some trace in this world which notifies that you have been here, that something has happened. ... [I]f you touch the reality in which you live, and stay for several decades, if you leave your trace, then the impersonal process can begin. You see, the shoot must come out of the ground, and if the personal spark has never gotten into the ground, nothing will come out of it; no ... Kundalini will be there."

"[I]n muladhara we are just identical. We are entangled in the roots, and we ourselves are the roots. We make roots, we cause roots to be, we are rooted in the soil, and there is no getting away for us, because we must be there as long as we live."

"I want to call your attention to the animal symbolism of which I have not yet spoken. You know that the series of animals begins in muladhara with the elephant that supports the earth, meaning that tremendous urge which supports human consciousness, the power that forces us to build such a conscious world. To the Hindu the elephant functions as the symbol of the domesticated libido, parallel to the image of the horse with us. It means the force of consciousness, the power of will, the ability to do what one wants to do."

"[M]uladhara is the symbol of our present psychic situation, because we live entangled in earthly causalities. It represents the entanglement and dependence of our conscious life as it actually is. Muladhara is not just the outer world as we live in it; it is our total consciousness of all outer and inner personal experiences."

ALCHEMY

"The origins of alchemy can be traced back to Hellenistic Egypt. After the collapse of the empires of antiquity, it found safe haven in Arabic culture until returning from there to medieval Europe. Alchemists, sort of "pre-chemists," literally tried to turn some worthless piece of material into gold or another precious substance. They cooked, chopped, baked and prayed, recording their recipes in the symbolic language of a prescientific mind.

Jung studied their writings as metaphors to understand how the psyche tries to heal itself through transforming the difficult part of our personality into something of value and sustenance - through the inner healing process, in other words. Both the alchemists' imagining the goings-on in the piece of material they thought they were transforming and Jung's observing the goings-on in a psychologically transforming personality evidenced the creative, goal-oriented process of fragmentation and recentering." [J. Gary Sparks]

let's recognize the interesting promise breaking forth as jack layton returns to the elementals... suddenly, the old games are up. its why some are also extremely unnerved by the awakening, the false-ideology cessation.

with the passing of this political activist, the vulnerability but also our own power that he put us in touch with completely transforming us, we now live in a new order where we no longer need elections to defeat the wrong kind of government, we just need the ideas and humanitarian and mother-earth-friendly vision and legions of happy warriors, visible every day and in every way, constructively insisting on the better world we now know is distinctly canadian, and distinctly possible...

coverage of the funeral tends toward the given that Jack Layton's time was unfairly cut short. i have to completely disagree. i think Layton and the fates had an exquisite sense of timing. just look how fluently his death and our mourning experience are serving and co-creating this interesting promise of which i spoke. when you live devoted to a certain vision on mortality and morality based on the singularity of all manifestation, you want your death to count for something as well, and on that count, if jack layton did want, through his letter to canadians, to touch people sufficient to wake them up to pressing realities and their beautiful compassionate natures, his final hopes have borne fruit.

environmental sustainability that serves to end hunger and poverty. peace from violence and terror and financial crime. education, employment, preventative medicine, national health care, personal freedom, community responsibility, highest quality food and water supplies and support for progressive natural medicines, art and culture, these were just a few of the seed values jack layton worked tirelessly for. many canadians took great security from his presence in various tableaus of government. it meant at least there was one person they could trust to front these values at the table. now that he's gone and there isn't, engagements of citizen intelligence in the service of these principles might just hit an all time high. like the crowds called out when his casket came home, "Thank you Jack."

while i was walking back along queen street west from city hall, i was thinking, the mayoralty of David R Miller would not have been possible without the inroads plowed by Jack Layton... everywhere i looked in this city today, i saw the house that Jack built... xo