Countdown to Galactic Alignment (repost)

The Mayan Factor: Path Beyond Technology by José Argüelles (Bear & Co.,1986) was one book that turned me on and boggled my mind for years. It was Dr Argüelles's brilliant interpretation of the Mayan calendar codes that alerted a large portion of the English-speaking world to the idea of a galactic civilization leaving durable clues for a future Earth humanity to decode and decipher, and which catalyzed what was popularly known as the Harmonic Convergence of August 16-17, 1987.

Mayan scholars have disagreed on precisely when Linear Time will end, as measured by the Mayan Sacred Calendar, or Tzolk'in. Some, like Argüelles and John Major Jenkins, have calculated that the final date shown on the Tzolk'in falls on 21 December 2012. Others, like Carl Johan Calleman, have deemed that reckoning to be inaccurate, announcing the End of Linear Time as 28 October 2011. Calleman may well be correct, but I prefer the poeticism of celebrating Galactic Alignment on the solstitial date of 21 December 2012. Not that it makes any huge difference to us.

Now what happens when the center of our Sun aligns with the Galactic Core? John Major Jenkins, in his seminal work, Maya Cosmogenesis 2012, asserts that the very heart of the Milky Way galaxy is a vast Black Hole - a Cosmic Cunt, in effect, the Mahayoni, Mystery of Mysteries, the Vast Vulva from which all Life, as we know it, originally issued. Each time Galactic Alignment occurs, a whole new reality is born.

I find that extremely exciting. Especially since Galactic Alignment is due within five years, whichever calendar date one prefers. Let's consider the implications of this phrase: A WHOLE NEW REALITY IS BORN.

Does it involve the death of the Old Reality? Or is it more of a cosmic-scale transformation, wherein the Old Paradigm is subsumed by the New Paradigm - just as maturity subsumes immaturity? Youth doesn't die in us when we become adults, it simply assimilates the new experience and, hopefully, gains wisdom.

Looking at the holographic world through the mainstream media filters of CNN and the BBC, it doesn't look like humanity is going to attain maturity anytime soon - not when we persist in squandering the bulk of our energy and resources in lethal brinkmanship and atavistic warlordism. The Military Solution, huh? Dissolution, more aptly. Win-Lose is a stupid concept, and No-Win is far worse. The only way to go is Win-Win.

Unfortunately, politics has never been a game of Win-Win, and few politicians make it to high office who sincerely believe that cooperation is a superior strategy to competition. In effect, the political solution does not exist, since it ultimately falls back on military might - brawn over brains, shock and awe the enemy into submission.

That leaves us only one option: quantum-jumping our own consciousness beyond artificial barriers and limits. In short, bypassing the corrupt priesthood and merging directly with God(dess)head!

How does one achieve this? Stay tuned and...

WATCH THIS SPACE!

Happy Solstice, Folks.

[First posted 22 December 2006]

PARALLEL LIVES REVISITED ~ AND HEALED! (repost)

MANY TIMES I’ve experimented with breathing exercises - only to find that, like Bill Clinton, I had trouble inhaling. Years ago when I was practising pranayama, a yogic breath control technique, I had to give up after a few weeks because my nostrils kept getting blocked.

Recently I came across a powerful Spherical Breathing Technique to activate the Light Body (taught by Drunvalo Melchizedek in his ‘Flower of Life’ Seminars): once again I was frustrated by the difficulty I had trying to breathe rhythmically. How was I ever going to master the didgeridoo - not to mention quickening my Merkaba vehicle of Ascension (by which means one may achieve full mobility through all the dimensions)?

And not too long ago a holistic healer friend had given me a deep massage, after which she had diagnosed a congestion in my diaphragm area possibly linked to a "past life" trauma. So you can understand why I was very keen to see if Pritamo* could help. She was staying at a mutual friend’s apartment, having just arrived from her native Italy via Pune, India - where she had trained for years at the Osho International Academy of Healing Arts.

Pritamo showed me a computer-generated leaflet listing the various therapies she was practising, and my attention was instantly drawn to a section headed: “HYPNOSIS FOR SELF-HEALING - a soft technique that induces deep relaxation, so that you can access your own unconscious.” Among the benefits of this particular therapy, Pritamo mentioned “exploring and healing past lives to improve this present life.”

Ha! This was precisely what I had been seeking for some time. Being the “new healer in town” Pritamo was only too willing to barter a 90-minute session for a fair report to anyone interested. Not that I minded paying the RM90 (US$25) fee, which I thought totally reasonable.

The next morning I showed up, prepared for anything. Pritamo said we would begin with a 45-minute Chakra Breathing exercise to open up and relax my cellular and etheric bodies. The vigorous process would also serve to clear my memory circuits of last week’s or last year’s debris. She put on a cassette and a quiet, authoritative voice requested that I focus attention on my Root Chakra while hyperventilating through the mouth.

"Don’t be inhibited," Pritamo advised, "and make as much noise as you like. Just keep your feet comfortably apart and grounded, freeing the rest of your body to move with the energy currents."

The dervish-like rhythms and calm, friendly voice guided me through each Chakra, as Pritamo accompanied me in the exercise. At the end of 45 minutes we had completed three Chakra Breathing cycles. I felt totally relaxed, even euphoric, open to and trusting of whatever would happen next.

After a short rest Pritamo settled me comfortably on a mattress, and proceeded to ease me into even deeper relaxation with her voice. In effect she guided me through a visualization wherein I “saw” myself lying peacefully in a pleasant meadow. Soon, she suggested, a beautiful, ethereal Guide will appear and beckon me to follow her on a journey down the corridors of incarnate time...

THROUGH A GOLDEN ARCHWAY we strolled, my Angelic Guide and I, along a paved path that stretched on indefinitely ahead. I could hear Pritamo’s gentle, accented voice, saying: “Keep walking until something appears, then pause and let the image form more clearly. Trust that it will have a special message for you, to help you accept and release whatever feelings arise.” Or something to that effect.

Without any effort the first image shifted into focus: I was looking at a very old and frustrated English gentleman, bent over in his rocking chair, experiencing the last moments of his life. A dull, heavy sensation hung over his chest: was it bronchial congestion? Or sheer heavy-heartedness, the fatigue of a soul worn out by struggle? I could feel his profound bitterness and pain, his terrible sense of despair and futility; above all, his sense of utter failure and isolation.

Details flitted in and out of my mind’s purview: he had been a swashbuckling, dashing Colonial Officer in British Malaya, a veritable Tuan in every respect. He had lived like a king and felt like a mythical hero. But then something had gone very wrong, and he found himself recalled to England in his prime: end of illustrious career, end of glorious freedom and unfettered adventure. He was treated with coldblooded, efficient formality and forced to retire with a handsome pension.

He could write his memoirs - and he did, but it left him dissatisfied and hollow. He had been so close to some incredible breakthrough... so very close to cracking the Mystery of the Ages and returning home in triumph, exalted and divine. His domestic life was a tragic farce. Friends and family had drifted further and further away - till at this final hour he felt completely bereft of warmth or hope or even the faintest memory of happiness. True, he had been a stalwart member of a Masonic Lodge - a lot of good that did him now. Nothing had value or meaning, nothing whatsoever, not even the prospect of oblivion.

My chest was heaving with the effort of dying. My angel gently put her hand in mine and led me further down the corridor of ghostly memories.

“Where are you now?” I heard Pritamo as from a great distance. “What do you see?”

“I’m a little girl of three or four. European, I think. Alone in a room, holding a toy. No one knows my thoughts. I am dying of a disease, I don’t know what. Asthma? Tuberculosis? There’s a light in my heart region. I feel totally calm and self-contained. Not sad, no self-pity. I know things other people don’t. I know I shall soon be free again, there’s great power and wisdom in my spirit self...”

My angelic guide and I move on, leaving the little girl with her dreamy thoughts and her very brief span on earth.

I see a white-haired, portly gentleman at the kitchen table, puffing on his pipe. Retired merchant, Italian, living somewhere in Greece. He has outlived his wife, and two of his five children. The others are living far abroad. He isn’t sad or afraid of death, which he knows is approaching very soon. He’s had a good life, good friends, good meals, and satisfactory family bonds. But somehow he feels cheated, disillusioned, abandoned by God. His private life as a mystic and scholar is known only to his colleagues in a secret fraternity. He has seen the group splinter into bitter factions, torn asunder by petty ambitions and betrayals. All the lofty principles of the ancient creed, the solemn oaths of loyal and faithful service to humanity... what a load of crap!

Is there hope for human beings on this earth? Probably not, but what the hell, que sera, sera and so on. Still, it’s very hurtful that life can play such dirty tricks on us benighted souls. What is left? Not much. A favorite pipe, dusty shelves of once so-precious books in a concealed library no one will inherit. Hello, Big G... where the hell are YOU?. He sighs and feels a black hole where his heart once was.

MY HEART! I can feel Pritamo’s energy soothing my etheric body as my chest convulses into a tight knot. Heart attack? Can’t breathe. A sour taste... no, a bilious, horrid, shattering sense of deep betrayal and broken dreams. I’m seated on my throne, clutching my belly in acute agony.

They have poisoned me. How? It can’t be... impossible! My queen, could she...? NO! Death, take me swiftly upon thy wings... I can see the carved pillars of my palace, barely a few years old, the patterns on the polished tiles. Pharaoh of the New Aeon, you have failed in your mission. What can save us now? Ha, I’m out of the crumpled fleshly body in my ka - my etheric double - floating above the earth, where my vision penetrates the future... please, 0 Great Ones, spare me this dreary sight! The darkness stretches before me without end: age upon age of tragedy and horror, a ceaseless nightmare of evil piled on evil. Massacres, famines, plagues, catastrophe... no light at the tunnel’s end! Spare me this accursed foresight... WHY? WHY?? WHY???

My ka has swooned with the impact of the ugly truth revealed: no Golden Dawn for humanity, not yet, not for a very, very, very long time. Hundreds, possibly thousands of years from now, perhaps... but two golden, shining beings have come to take me to a distant sanctuary, where my soul can heal. This place is not on planet Earth.

MY EYES SNAP OPEN in surprise. Pritamo waves her hands over my face, whispering that I should keep my eyes closed for a while longer - as my angelic guide takes me back along the corridor, past the events shown before, through the golden archway, and back into the green, sunny meadow where my physical body lies.

“Count after me,” Pritamo murmurs, “Ten-a, nine-a, eight-a, seven-a, six-a...” By the time I get to “one” she’s already up and out the door. “You take-a your time-a,” she says. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

“Thank you, Pritamo,” I say quietly, as we give each other a long, strong hug. The healing is accomplished. But it may take some time to filter through the molecular levels of my being.

-------
*The name Pritamo means 'Beloved.' Pritamo is a healer and therapist at the Osho Ashram in Pune, India.

NOTE: I prefer the term "parallel lives" to "past lives" since the linearity of time is essentially illusory. I'm more inclined to view "flashbacks" and "flashforwards" as crosstalk from different time-tracks occurring simultaneously and accessible from the core of one's being.

[First published in the New Straits Times, July 9, 1996, posted 14 April 2013 & reposted 2 May 2017 & 19 April 2019]

Deepak Chopra ~ The Future of Leadership (repost)

Commencement speech by Deepak Chopra delivered at Hartwick College's
2013 graduation ceremony

Today as you celebrate this major milestone in your life and commence a new stage of your life journey, I ask you to reflect on the gift of life itself. And life, in essence, is nothing but awareness. Furthermore human life, considered the pinnacle of biological evolution, is not just awareness, but self-awareness. Amongst creatures on this planet, we human beings are not only aware; we have the capacity to be aware that we are aware, to be conscious of our consciousness. In that self-awareness lies our potential and power to direct our own future evolution and the future evolution of civilization.

Biological evolution has been summed up in the phrase of "survival of the fittest", but with overpopulation and overconsumption of resources, the future belongs to "survival of the wisest". It is imperative for the future of humanity that wisdom becomes the new criterion for sustainable life on this planet. And wisdom is that knowledge that nurtures life in all its dimensions not only for us but also for the generations that follow us.

Today's age is frequently referred to as the Information Age. The hallmarks of this age are the gifts of science and technology that have created the miracles of molecular medicine, real-time imaging of cellular function, instant accessibility of global knowledge, and social networks. Yet despite this emerging global brain, paradoxically we are beset with the same scourges of war and terrorism, radical poverty in 50% of the world’s population, irreversible climate change, along with deepening social and economic injustice! Furthermore, humanity suffers from massive malnutrition in which half the world suffers from hunger and the other half from obesity leading to inflammatory disorders, increasing the risk of chronic illnesses including many types of cancer and cardiovascular diseases while the hungry die from compromised immune function and infectious diseases. The information revolution has not led to the wisdom needed to solve our world crisis in health and well-being.

If ever humanity had the power of mass self-extinction on planet earth, it is today. And if it happens will be because we allowed our emotional and spiritual evolution to be outpaced by the evolution of our science and technology. Nuclear proliferation, biological warfare, eco destruction, the extinction of species and the poisoning of our atmosphere, our rivers and waters and the very food that sustains our life and all life loom before us as imminent threats. But just as in other critical phases of transformation, while there is disaster looming on one hand, there is on the other hand the potential to create a radical reorganization into something much greater than was conceived of before.

Today, I ask you my young friends, you who are the future hope of humanity, you who are the future leaders of the world; today, I ask you what Mahatma Gandhi once asked, "Can you be the change you want to see in the world?"

In fact, there can be no social or world transformation unless there is your own inner transformation. Today, I ask you to face a fundamental truth. Today, I ask you to consider that there is no ‘you’ that is separate from the world. The gift of life, your own self-consciousness is your key to inner transformation and wisdom, and that in turn is how you will transform the world. Today, I ask you to acknowledge that you are the world and that your transformation of consciousness will be the future of the word. This self-transformation is the wisdom for our planet’s survival.

As I enter the autumn of my life and you the springtime of yours, I want to leave you with seven skills in self-awareness that I have learned and that I hope will serve you well no matter what profession you choose, or where your life and destiny take you.

Skill # 1 Become the best listener you can be. Learn to listen with the instruments of the body, the feelings of the heart, the logic of the mind and the stillness of your soul. As you listen deeply, reflect on the following questions: What am I observing? What am I feeling? What is the need of the moment? What is the best way to fulfill this need?

Skill#2 Bond emotionally with friends, family, professional colleagues and those you interact with daily. Understand that each of us is part of a web of relationships that is nurtured through love, kindness, compassion, empathy and joy. Emotional bonds create effective teamwork where nothing is impossible because you have a shared vision for service, contribution and success and because you complement each other’s talents and strengths.

Skill # 3 Expand your awareness by knowing that all human beings have a hierarchy of needs that start with survival and safety and progressively expand through stages that include love and belonging, true self esteem, success as in the progressive realization of worthy goals, creative expression, higher consciousness and self-actualization. As you expand your awareness learn to harness your spiritual gifts that come in the form of the powers of intention, intuition, creativity, imagination & conscious choice making.

Skill #4 Remember the importance of action. Learn to be action oriented and know that there is no power higher than love in action. Remember that love without action is meaningless and action without love is irrelevant.

Skill# 5 Assume responsibility for your own well being in all its various facets. Your well being encompasses every aspect of your life - your career, your social interactions, your personal relationships, your community and your financial success. Take time to rest and play, to be with your family and friends, to exercise and nourish your body with healthy food.

Skill# 6 Empower yourself with true self-esteem. Learn to be independent of the good and bad opinion of others. Recognize the power of presence. Do not allow yourself to be distracted. Know your life purpose and the contribution you want to make to society.

Skill # 7 Know your true self. Your true self is not your self-image that is dependent on the labels you and others have given yourself. Your true self is the innermost core of your being that is beyond all labels, definitions & limitations. All the wisdom traditions tell us that the human spirit is a field of infinite possibilities, a field of infinite creativity love compassion joy and profound equanimity. Know you can only give to the world that which you possess in that innermost core of your being. Remember that you will create peace only when you are peaceful and create a loving world only when you have learned to love.

I entreat you to not lose your idealism with the passage of years. That idealism is connected to your knowingness of the good that can be created and the power to manifest it. In you lies the potential for a more peaceful, just, sustainable, healthier and happier world. Remember that the goal of all other goals is to be happy. I am reminded today of an assignment that John Lennon was given by his elementary school teacher when he was seven years old. He and his classmates were asked to write a short description of whom they wanted to be when they grew up. John Lennon wrote down that he wanted to be always happy. When his teacher complained that John did not understand the assignment, John's mother told him to tell the teacher that he did not understand life.

But what do we really know about happiness? Recently there has been a lot of research on the dynamics of happiness. Most people think that if they are successful in achieving their goals or have good relationships or if they are healthy, they will be happy. In fact it is the other way around. If you are happy person you are likely to have healthy habits, and nurturing relationships and great success in life. Social scientists describe what they describe the Happiness formula: H=S+C+V

H stands for happiness

S stands for set point in the brain

C stands for conditions of living

V stands for voluntary choices

“S” stands for the set point in the brain and refers to our mechanisms of perception. We all have a semi-fixed place on the happiness spectrum based on our outlook on life. Happier people see the opportunities, where unhappy people see problems. The set point for happiness can be upregulated, or shifted toward greater happiness, through self-reflection on limiting beliefs. The set point determines 50% of our happiness experience on a daily bases. The ‘C’ in the formula is the conditions of living and refers mainly to material success and personal wealth. It determines about 12% of your daily happiness experience. If you win the lottery you will be extremely happy for a few months, but after one year you will return to your set point. Voluntary choices represents choices that we make on a daily bases. Choices for personal pleasure bring transient happiness, while selfless choices bring inner fulfillment through purpose and meaning, e.g. by making other people happy meaningful relationships bring more permanent happiness. So to be happy it’s fine to have material comforts around you, but that will only account for 12% of your happiness. To really be happy you need to expand awareness and overcome your self-limiting beliefs and then choose selfless actions, or ways to be of service to others. This leads to true and lasting happiness and wisdom.

Finally today, more than any other day, remember to be grateful. Gratitude opens the door to abundance consciousness. Express your gratitude today particularly to your parents, teachers and fellow students, all who have helped bring you to this threshold of life.

You are now ready to embark on the hero's journey, the hero’s quest. Good luck and God speed.

June 2013

[First posted 1 June 2013]

Are You A Starseed? Watch These Videos! (repost)

[First posted 9 May 2010]

I N T E G R I T Y : what is it? (repost)

Thinking beyond conventional or consensus reality… some philosophical notes…

1. At the age of eleven I became disenchanted with emblems of External Authority when my name was included in a list of "bad hats" or "undesirable elements"... and I was hauled up along with a dozen other kids, finger-wagged and then caned by the headmaster, who then proceeded to rub salt into our injured souls by forcing us to present a letter to our parents advising them to supervise their errant children more carefully! I knew then that little justice was to be found on this earth, for I knew full well that my only "sin" was being too talkative and cheeky in class - and that's only natural for any intelligent, high-spirited child.

2. Truth is, INTEGRITY is so rare on this planet it may be harder to find than a unicorn. We have traditionally depended on our culture heroes and our monarchs to be exemplars of and to establish standards of courage, nobility, and justice. However, our values are static concepts while actual life circumstances require dynamic responses – therefore the gap between ethical values and practical solutions tends to increase.

3. Look at the word INTEGER: a whole number; a number that is not a fraction; a thing complete in itself.

4. Consider the many layers of a personality: people wear masks, that often become ingrained as ego characteristics. Different faces for different situations, suspension of belief systems necessary for criminal behavior.

5. Case in point: Dr M as fire chief and arsonist, starting fires and putting them out because he’s obsessed with getting medals. Because their public and private selves are totally at odds, most public figures - especially politicians - suffer from an incurable form of Multiple Personality Disorder.

6. Duality, Unity, and Integrity vis-à-vis Buckminster Fuller’s dictum: “Unity is plural at minimum two.” Two sides of a coin, two ends of a stick. The loop that links beginning to end, ignorance to knowledge, folly to wisdom. The departure point from Singularity produced Duality or Polarity - Yin and Yang, Female and Male and bi-polarity is in itself perfectly neutral - neither "Good" nor "Bad" - until value judgments are superimposed over dynamic processes by those who would rule and regulate human behavior, setting themselves up as Archons (Judges) or Hierophants (Corrupt Priesthoods).

7. The Carrot-and-Stick management approach has its roots in Reward-Punishment behavior modification techniques and social engineering. If you behave well and obey the rules, you will be rewarded with eternal life in Heaven; otherwise you will suffer eternal perdition in Hell. "Good Behavior" as defined, of course, by a specially appointed committee - and Rules decreed by a Ruler or his/her representatives which cannot be questioned since all Rulers are of divine origins.

8. What if Punishment is abolished - or transmuted to Admonishment? Will HONESTY become the norm?

9. When we accept and begin to love all the aspects of our Ultimate Universal Self, it’s called Reintegration: regaining our Integrity.

10. How does “GOD” fit into a discussion of INTEGRITY? “GOD” as the Original Integer. Achieving integrity is akin to finding what we call God within us. The Lord or Tuhan then becomes our Core Self and that’s how we master our own destiny as individuals living consciously within a community of kindred souls.

[First posted 14 October 2011, reposted 3 April 2014]

From Manic Depression to Cosmic Rapture... (repost)

The Magickal Transmogrification
of Steven R. Schwarz

"Been there, done that: unemployed pantheist, provocative iconoclast, abusive solipsist, failed psychopath. I've stumbled on some knowledge the clever people forgot or lost or never knew." ~ Steven Schwarz

That's how Steven Randall Schwarz describes himself on his eclectic and always stimulating blog, Cosmic Rapture.

I don't recall how we first bumped into each other in Cyberspace - whether he stumbled on my blog first or vice versa - but it was love at first encounter. I instantly recognized him as a kindred spirit and thereafter we got into the habit of leaving encouraging comments on each other's blogposts.

Anyway, as though in confirmation of the soulular kinship I felt, Steven decided out of the blue in February 2012 to visit me - in the flesh, not astrally. He hadn't traveled in 15 years, he said, and was understandably nervous about the logistics of transferring the multidimensional bulk of his vast and unlimited being through what must have appeared to him like very minute apertures randomly scattered across the dull surface of what passes for 3D reality.

Nevertheless, he arrived safely through the frequency turnstiles that separate our bioregions (he lives in Sydney, I should add) - and chilled out at Magick River for close to two weeks. We spent hours sitting on my scenic veranda just drinking coffee and conversing about Life, the Universe and Everything. I wish Douglas Adams could have joined us. Perhaps he was eavesdropping from the astral, cleverly disguised as a green cicada or a cluster of cicaks.

From my perspective, it was an entirely historic (if not hysteric) encounter, indeed, an utterly cosmic reunion. Steven remembered me from the Big Bang and I recalled his role in the Lucifer Rebellion. You could say Steven Schwarz and I share quite a few mythic resonances. Steven's intrinsic seriousness (he's into quantum physics and Tibetan metaphysics) made me think of Sirius Black (a great wizard in the Harry Potter books) - why not? Schwarz means Black, after all. (Steven or Stephen, in case you're as interested in names as I am, means "crown" or "garland" which implies great accomplishment, glory or honor.)

Steven R. Schwarz, in any case, is undoubtedly one of the finest wizards I have encountered in recent lifetimes. His luminous intelligence and inventive spirit combine to produce a prodigious variety of artifacts - from quirky Edward Learish limericks and offbeat Ogden Nashian poems (labeled "vot could be verse") to darkly evocative abstracts in oil on canvas, vaguely reminiscent of Kandinsky. And, like Wassily Kandinsky, Steven Schwarz is also a gifted composer and musician.

Enough said! Hope you enjoy this delectable selection of lyrical, musical and visual offerings I found on Steven's fascinating blog...

Knights of Unrelenting Weirdness (now proudly displayed on my wall)

Palatable Nightmare of Varying Bluntness

one wonders why oneness

when the sum of the parts is more than the whole
and some of the parts want a starring role
one has a question, it's really quite small
for any who want to be One with the All
one wonders why oneness is set as a goal
one that one dies for, along with one's soul
a goal that's scored long after the game
when the self is forgotten along with the name
in trueness your youness is inside your head
and oneness and twoness is noneness: you're dead
for minus my myness my self can't be found
above in the sky or below in the ground
one and one's two, and one and two's three
I'll date myself before marrying me.
.......


DISCLAIMER: In writing the above, rhyming was a higher priority than revealing what I really think or believe.

the wolves that was

Once a month beneath the moon
their evil crimes recur
the wolves that was is incorrect
it is the wolves that were.

Not every wolf's a wary wolf
aware-wolf, as it were
but every wolf's a hairy wolf
with long and curly fur.

A werewolf's not a cat or dog
a mutt, a hound or cur.
He'll snarl and howl and growl a lot
but never bark or purr.

So if a werewolf lurks outside
be shaken but don't stir
everywhere where werewolves are
much bloodshed does occur.

That's why that we beware wolves
and few would not concur
it's bad to be where werewolves is
(wolves are if you prefer).

The wolves that was are wicked
with blood upon their fur
the wolves that was is incorrect
it is the wolves that were.

Shimmer in Dark Energy

Abodes of Foreboding

quack, quack, the frogs do bark

Facetious assassins deified
Insidious fedaheen exemplified
Qua?

Mutinous taxicabs glorified
Glutinous agglomerates gentrified
Quo?

Hellacious orthodontists stupefied
Stupendous dazzlement typified
Quid?

Dubious qualia emphasised
Golden marmadukes euthanized
Que?


Thanks to 'autotune' (vocoder) and a complete lack of singing ability, the so-called lyrics to the song confusingly entitled 'zombie bloodeater' are completely inaudible. Needless to say, when I wrote the words I was pissed out of my mind. So whether you want 'em or not, below please find the lyrics to 'drunken-hearted man'...

zombie bloodeater (drunkenhearted man)

Should be "drunken-minded man" but who cares
the main thing is no-one can even think of selling their wares
covered in vomit, sprawled pubes-up in a gutter
(and I don’t care what you mind about what I should or shouldn’t utter).

We all have our escapes, the question is from what?
Of course a drunken-hearted man cares not a lot
He's just some poor silly sod who's ripe for a fleecing
specially in an age of zero tolerance policing.

But what are we running from, I repeat my question
life, death, love, sex, success, what’s your suggestion?
Does it really matter? That’s another query
Though it's all the same to one who’s leery, teary, not to mention beery.

The fact is, there are many mansions in the third dimension
or the fourth, tenth, eleventh, twenty sixth, whatever your inclension.
(That should be inclination, and don’t I know it
but what do you expect from a legless drooling poet?)

So have another drink, tablet, joint, needle or snort
of whatever it is that’s your storm in any port
The creator doesn’t care if you lose a little grip
while your so-called awareness goes down with the ship.

(oh and BTW, just to confuse things still further, the lyrics as published here don't quite match up to the words as sung in the above video. Including the sequence of verses and lines within verses. The reasons are completely insignificant and insubstantial, not to mention boring. You don't want to know. But they do exist. There are reasons. And yes, they're pissweak. But still.)

Oh and here's a bit more: the description of the video in my YouTube channel:

Opens with 6 magi (not 3) attending the birth of a monster, the mother of whom is a very strange girl surrounded by singing eyes. Frightened by the magi, she takes her newborn to one of the two highest peaks in the land. From the vantage point of which she and hers enter a portal to forever and achieve immortality, mythologically speaking.


Oh and one more thing: I tried to get the YouTube caption/subtitle functionality to work but just could the fuck not.

Another Promethean Palimpsest

Ultramarine City

Voyage to Lemuria

Staring into the Abyss

[First posted 25 April 2012]

Music that has significantly changed my life...

1. Marche du soldat
2. Petit airs au bord du ruisseau
3. Pastorale



4. Marche royale
5. Petit concert



6. Trois danses (Tango, Valse, Ragtime)



7. Danse du diable
8. Great Chorale
9. Marche triomphale du diable

Ensemble de l'Orquestra de Cadaques
Dir. Vasily Petrenko


Igor Stravinsky - The Soldier's Tale (L'histoire du soldat)

Igor Stravinsky's life (1882-1971) spanned a world of musical change, and probably no other composer wrote in as many styles as did he.

His early compositions mirrored the nationalist ideals of his teacher Rimsky-Korsakov, but he quickly moved on to develop his own style. With his trio of ballets Firebird, Petrouchka, and The Rite of Spring Stravinsky almost single-handedly invented modernism. He later went through a neoclassical period, and finished his career embracing the serialism and twelve-tone principles of Schoenberg.

The Soldier's Tale comes from 1918, a lean post-war time when jazz was just beginning to emerge into the mainstream. Stravinsky was broke, deprived of his royalties because of the Revolution, and his other source of income, Diaghilev's Ballets Russes was also going through lean times.

Stravinsky invented a new style, pared down to essentials, in melody, rhythm and instrumentation. The Soldier's Tale is scored for just seven instruments: clarinet, bassoon, cornet, trombone, violin, double bass and percussion. The concert version also features four speaking parts, those of the Devil, the Soldier, a Princess and an unseen Reader. The Devil and Princess are also required to dance.

The story is a dark Faustian fable about a deserting soldier and the Devil who eventually possesses his soul. The soldier's violin becomes a symbol of both the soldier's soul and the Devil's wiles.

The story is based on an old Russian folk tale but the music is as far removed from Russian traditionalism as possible, making it a lesson for all cultures and times.

The most obvious sound here is jazz, a form of music that Stravinsky had never actually heard. He was familiar with it through scores that his friend Ernest Ansermet had brought from America.

Stravinsky also uses tango rhythms, marches, a waltz and a chorale, never faithfully but more as an artisan uses tools to fashion something new.

The Soldier's Tale opens with the "Soldier's March," a stiff parody of militarism, as befits a deserter.

Next come the "Soldier's Violin," rhythmic, repetitive, driving and typically Stravinsky. Then come the "Little Concert and Three Dances - Tango, Valse and Ragtime," the most musically elaborate of the works.

The Suite ends brilliantly with the "Devil's Dance," triumphant and diabolical. The violin theme now belongs to him and he owns the Soldier's soul. The Devil celebrates his victory.

The Soldier's Tale is a masterpiece of the miniature, dry and acerbic, dark yet witty, threatening but tongue in cheek.

There are lavish productions of The Soldier's Tale played by a full orchestra. To me, this misses the entire point. The starkness of the instruments, the dryness of the melody is what creates the mood of the piece.

[Source: The Good Music Guide]

Note: I shall forever be grateful to Peace Corps Volunteer Duncan S. Catling (who taught us English Literature from 1964-1965) for introducing me to the supreme musical inspiration of Igor Stravinsky. That's right, I started listening to Stravinsky as a horny adolescent and it has totally changed the way I view reality!

[First posted 19 March 2012]

PIRATES & PARASITES: DON'T LET THEM BRING YOU DOWN, FOLKS! (repost)

An old friend named Patrick with whom I recently reconnected after a long break sent me an email which concluded with the following sentiment:

Do you really think that this country will soon be rid of pirates and parasites? I think UMNO/BN is so entrenched that any alternative would be quashed before they get time to settle. I always say that this country has so much going for it, but it’s screwed up by politics. I should be careful with what I write for fear of getting a knock on the door by some unwelcome visitors...

It saddened me that Patrick is probably not the only one infected with this pessimistic view of the political situation. No doubt he thinks of it as "being realistic." The social circle within which Patrick moves is quite likely to share his cynicism as regards the possibility of genuine change. After all, they are mostly entrepreneurs, socialites, aristocrats and technocrats who have worked around the planet for decades as expatriates, getting paid in US dollars or euros. Whether they be based in Nigeria, Somalia, Zimbabwe, Burma, Dubai, Qatar, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Sri Lanka or Thailand, they are unlikely to be affected by the squalid conditions on the ground. Should massive trouble erupt at any point, they have the wherewithal to swiftly airlift themselves to safety.

Since Patrick happens to be someone I genuinely like, he deserves a thoughtful, well-considered response rather than a flippant brush-off. So I'm going to share my formal reply to Patrick with all of you through this post.

Dear Patrick,

I can understand where you're coming from. In fact, most of my friends and relatives who have, through their own efforts and resources, attained a comfortable position in the food chain will probably echo your views on the apparent immutability of the status quo. And by "status quo" I refer not only to Malaysia but to all of humanity on this fair earth. You might as well have asked:

"Do you really think that this planet will soon be rid of pirates and parasites?"

And my response to that would be an unequivocal YES. The reason I can state this with absolute confidence is simply because I have spent the last 45 years monitoring the frequency shifts in the human psychosphere and the dramatic increase in Schumann Resonance of the planetary electromagnetic field. In plain language, the planet is a living cosmic organism and it is evolving along multidimensional Fibonacci spirals of expanding awareness, carrying along the morphogenetic fields of all lifeforms - mineral, vegetable, animal, human, and elemental - embedded within its being.

Between 1952 and 1979 the Schumann Resonance (SR) of the Earth was measured at 7.8 Hertz. It began to rise up the scale and is currently between 12 and 13 Hz. Cutting edge visionary scientists like Gregg Braden say they expect the SR to peak at 13 Hz between 2011 and 2013.


What will happen to the botanical and biological lifeforms on the planet's surface?

Some plant and animal species will vanish from the third dimension while a few new ones will spontaneously appear. As for humans, a great many will be unable to recalibrate and realign their energy fields; these will succumb and descend into various forms of psychosis and pathology. The news will be full of deadly epidemics and outbreaks of irrational violence camouflaged as interracial and interreligious conflict.

For millennia the warlords have ruled this planet and they will be resisting their own imminent extinction by attempting to drag millions of other lives with them as they go the way of the dinosaurs.

Those who have learnt to trust their heart wisdom will have little trouble accepting the incoming frequencies, thereby accelerating their own awakening on the cellular, molecular, atomic and nuclear levels. Within the next few months (that's right, I said months, not years, not decades), even as the 3D Matrix begins to get more and more unreal, the ones who can maintain their emotional equilibrium and trust completely in the Unknown will find life becoming simpler and more exquisite. They will consciously acknowledge their own integral roles in the evolutionary passion play that will take us from micro to macro perspectives, and gladly celebrate their initiation as galactic citizens.

Institutions that have enslaved the human imagination for untold generations will crumble like stale bread, even as their adherents become discombobulated and turn upon each other in desperation and panic. Armies will exhaust themselves and disintegrate through meaningless combat even as deserters begin to outnumber combatants.

Congenital liars, hypocrites and deceivers will end up their own victims. Those that persist in assigning blame and scapegoating others will find themselves devoid of a following. Empire builders will weep as grandiose monuments to their own megalomania are reduced to rubble.

The status quo is static - and reality is dynamic. In a dynamic universe, status has no value or significance. However, humble virtues such as compassion, empathy, humility, and goodwill towards others will become the only accepted currency.

Creativity rather than destructivity will regain the upper hand.


The planet has been ruled by criminal syndicates for countless millennia. This was only possible during the Kali yuga, which has just about run its course. Only inertia and long-ingrained habit are keeping oppressive social systems in apparent operation. Secret police, spy agencies, covert programs designed to keep power in the hands of a plutocratic elite will be exposed as more and more whistleblowers begin to break free from their indoctrination and implants.

Evil cannot withstand the light of publicity and will evaporate under the burning sun of an enlightened humanity.


As the democratization of human communities begins to spread like wildfire, centralized government and ancient power cabals will weaken and die. The Anunnaki bloodlines that constitute all monarchies will either transmute themselves into a force for universal good - or be forever terminated.

Don't worry about Umno. Or the Rockefeller-Rothschilds. From a macro perspective they are merely small-time street gangs that will soon become fascinating exhibits in cosmoanthropological museums. So fear them not.

Above all, FEAR NOT.

And love, love, love with a heart made whole.

All this and more will come to pass. I kid you not, my dear Patrick.

[First posted 3 March 2009]

PRIMATE POLITICS REVISITED... YET AGAIN (& AGAIN)!

Recently a Malaysian friend residing in New York forwarded a rant from a fellow Malaysian abroad lamenting the rampant ultra-Malay racism oozing from the purulent pores of a few politicos at the Umno General Assembly. This was my email response...

Hey, don't get into fear over a bunch of chest-thumping primates and their monkey tricks. I assume everybody is a racist until they transcend the very idea of "race." Look at the Orang Asli. Lowest rung on the "economic ladder" - and even they call Indian people "Keling"! After 20 years I'm still "Cina" to them. Worse, a few dimwits have been coached by their Umno handlers to call me "pendatang" (immigrant). But they don't know any better. Most folks don't know any better until they've pulled the ethnic wool away from their eyes. The bad vision is called Cultural Imprinting.

Sure, every time I experience lousy work attitudes in corporations like Telekom or Syabas (the privatized Selangor water company) I joke about the fact that they're monoethnic (100% Melayu) outfits. Having grown up during the NEP years, it's hard not to feel miffed about racial quotas. Yet, when it comes down to interpersonal contact on a daily basis, I don't harbor negative feelings about Malays... or even the genocidal Israelis who are merely pawns of certain cynical and opportunistic elements amongst their own leadership... yup, just like the Malays!

What's been apparent to me is that among the Melayu, there's a great divide between the Anglophonic upper and upper-middle classes and the more plebeian post-kampong types. My English-speaking Malay friends are all pretty cosmopolitan and share most of my perceptions and values. However, the ones that suffer from chronic inferiority complex ultimately become aggressive as a way to compensate for their ego insecurities. Some end up holding positions in Umno - and that's when they turn into Bangsa-dan-Ugama (Race & Religion) extremists. They're really quite pathetic - no flag to wave beyond the mere fact of being born "Melayu" and "Muslim." Even so, they never question what it actually means to be "Melayu" or "Muslim." Indeed, the term "Malay" is so nebulous: the majority originate from Sumatra, some have Javanese, Bugis, and Siamese genes; others Chinese; many are descended from Arab, Turkish, and Indian Muslim traders - you won't find a more mongrelized genetic mix (except perhaps in Europe!)

That's why they cling tenaciously to the fact that the King of Melaka embraced Islam several hundred years ago (before that they were all vaguely Hindu, influence of the Srivijaya and Majapahit Empires). The same syndrome applies to the Khazars whose kingdom disintegrated around 1000 A.D., after their monarch had officially converted to Judaism in a political maneuver to sidestep Rome's imperialistic designs. Many generations later, the Khazar Jews became a widely scattered fraternity who told themselves that as Jews they were Yahweh's "Chosen" and therefore had every right to regard non-Jews as expendable and exploitable "infidels" (goyim, they called anybody who wasn't Jewish).

Interestingly, the Orang Asli have derogatory names for the Malays (originally they were all called dagang, traders): e.g., the Batek call them gob, and the Temuan, jobok. Other folks, in turn, called the Orang Asli sakai - pretty much the equivalent of nigger! That's true everywhere, people in fear label others: geeks, gooks, frogs, wops, micks, greasers, chinks, ragheads, squareheads, dickheads...

My point is: it's "normal" for insular communities to be innately or outwardly xenophobic. What do the Chinese call Europeans? That's right, Red-Haired Devils! So... why get worked up over low-grade displays of primate territoriality? That's the lowest common denominator of politics everywhere - it's the same in the UK, USA, Australia, Sweden, Germany, France.

And no matter how stupidly brutish the politicking gets, there will always be good, honest folks you can befriend who don't give a shit about your ethnicity. Let's celebrate humans who genuinely, passionately envisage heaven on earth, here and now, simply by allowing love rather fear to fill their hearts.

[First published 26 December 2006. Reposted 30 August 2012 & 28 November 2014]

Padmasambhava was charged with murder at age 10! (reprise)

Drama is the interplay of light and dark... and death is the shadow life casts. Humans are way too addicted to drama... and to rigid tradition.

Padmasambhava was only 10 when he was arrested and hauled to court for killing a 14-year-old boy with a stone aimed directly at his forehead. In his own defence the 10-year-old explained to the magistrate that his was an act of pure compassion.

A fly had landed on the 14-year-old boy's forehead, directly over his pineal gland. In a flash of clairsentience, Padmasambhava saw a unique opportunity to liberate two souls with a single transpersonal act.

Padma explained that he had recognized the fly as the reincarnation of a former human burdened with an enormous karmic debt, doomed to an infinity of sorrowful lifetimes.

The 14-year-old boy was poised to embark on a criminal career that would leave a long wake of hardship and suffering.

It was a one-in-a-billion chance to eradicate all their negative karma and liberate two souls from ignorance and countless horrors.

Without hesitation or malice, Padmasambhava picked up a stone and hurled it at the fly on the 14-year-old's forehead, killing both instantly and painlessly. As a living Buddha he had the authority and power to enlighten and liberate others. Neither the fly nor 14-year-old boy suffered but were, indeed, extremely grateful for the unique favor of instant liberation granted them.

The magistrate was thoroughly impressed with the 10-year-old murderer’s explanation and immediately acquitted him. But soon after that, Padmasambhava had to relocate from the area, not wishing to acquire a cult following or be challenged by competitive egos.

OM AH HUNG VAJRA GURU PEMA SIDDHI HUNG

[First posted 21 March 2019]

How about some pork with your porn? (repost)

It appears that in certain Third World countries with First World infrastructures, a sure way of finding yourself in prison is to publish pork-flavored porn.

Indeed, it doesn't even have to be real pork, as Alvin Tan (26) and Vivian Lee (25) recently discovered. You could post a photo of yourself enjoying some tonic bone soup and wishing your Muslim friends a happy breaking of fast during the month of Ramadan - and the assumption would be, because you happen to be of Chinese descent, you must be making fun of other people's religion by advertising the virtues of pork.

This perky young couple are enjoying some fried bean curd (or yu-char-kway) served in tonic bone soup

By now most Malaysians would have seen that ill-conceived photo of Alvivi (as the outrageous young couple call themselves) smiling happily as they dine on what looks like fried bean curd or crisp doughsticks (yu-char-kway) served in bak-kut-teh - a popular tonic bone soup made with whatever meat one fancies, though the commonest variety features various parts of a pig's anatomy. Some say bak-kut-teh is a genuinely Malaysian delicacy as the dish is apparently unknown in China.

I'm generally carnivorous myself - but if some militant vegan decides to post images of raw celery, carrots and beet on her facebook timeline, should I interpret that as an attempt to annoy me? I can imagine a hardcore vegetarian being repulsed by the sight of a sizzling steak, but is that enough reason to arrest anybody and accuse them of sedition? To make a huge fuss out of one's dietary taboos - whether based on religious dictates or personal preference - seems to me utterly absurd.

A year ago Alvivi raised eyebrows and blood pressures with their erotic blog where they had uploaded homemade videos of themselves having a romp or two in bed. For that Alvin Tan had his scholarship cancelled by the National University of Singapore (where he was studying law) and he and his faithful sidekick Vivian Lee subsequently returned to live in Malaysia. The couple has received an equal amount of brickbats as well as bouquets.

The more conservative were quick to condemn them for "bringing shame to their families." While many others openly expressed their admiration for the couple's derring-do and sheer cheek. I was among those who found myself marveling at these youngsters for having the nerve to act out what many people only dare fantasize about. They were, I felt, deliberately testing the limits - seeing how far they could go in their advocacy of sexual liberation and freedom of expression.

After all, it's no secret that at least 90% of the male population (the other 10% being congenital liars) - and perhaps 30% of females - regularly watches online porn. Before digital tech came along we had easy access to porn through pirate VCDs and DVDs. In my father's time, we had to be content with girlie magazines and naughty playing cards - unless we lived abroad in societies where commercialized sex has long been a major part of the national economy.

Compared to what is accessible online 24/7, Alvivi's homemade sex videos were amateurish and rated at most a single X, not XXX. What made Alvivi's porn blog titillating was the fact that they looked like the kids next door - and not some massive breasted Latina or Blonde shagging some black hunk with an 11-inch dick. Alvin Tan and Vivian Lee resembled a couple of energetic, fun-loving youngsters you might find yourself seated next to on the commuter train or at the cinema.

I was amused at the vehemence with which some traditionalists bayed for their blood. The overreaction was akin to witnessing a frenzied mob burn down a cinema just because someone had reported catching a fleeting glimpse of female nipples in some arty foreign film.

Stomping on a severed cow's head on 28 August 2009 to protest construction of a Hindu temple in their area

What is truly obscene, to me, is displaying the severed head of a cow - and even stomping on it - to express displeasure at the prospect of having a Hindu temple built in one's neighborhood. Not only is such a virulent species of intolerance intolerable in a multicultural reality, the act is akin to cursing the benevolence and generosity of Mother Nature - which is what the cow symbolizes in many ancient cultures, not just Hindu.

It all boils down to sheer hypocrisy. The same angry mob will then disperse and go home to download porn on their laptops.

As many have pointed out: if you serve the right political masters, you may screen pornographic material in a public place and get away with only a playful slap on the wrist. But if you happen to have the wrong skin color or religion, expect to have a whole library - or a 200-ton concrete structure - dumped on your head.

In a milieu where political correctness dictates that one is not allowed to use words like "dwarf" or "midget" in the presence of vertically challenged humans, being too tall can be deemed a punishable offence.

Trust the beansized-brain bozos in Umno to offer, as a possible remedy for cultural insensitivity, compulsory classes in Islamic civilization. Now if they had the good sense to be more inclusive and suggest that all civilizations are worthy of study, we would soon be enjoying heaven on earth.

Nobody likes having anything shoved down their throats. That's the clumsiest, stupidest and most obnoxious way of changing other people's mindsets. Young people will always gravitate towards ideas and information they find stimulating, exciting, funky, cool. Absolutely no way you can dig up a chunk of frozen mammoth dung and repackage it for the youth market as ice cream.

[First posted 21 July 2013, reposted 12 March 2015]