NOTE: Blogspot blocked my Visible Origami blog because they said it had "the characteristics of a spam blog." funny stuff. So, I am posting the next Visible Origami post here and will remove it once the robots at Goggle figure it out.
Of all the subjects that interest me, none hold such a fascination as metaphysics and the area of occult history. Metaphysics deals with first causes; the subjects of being and knowing, what is real and what is not. It’s often theoretical as opposed to strictly empirical. It should be understood that these two touch and that the one side is well aware of everything on the other side while the other side is generally only aware of itself.
Occult history and recorded history differ remarkably in their view of what happened and why it happened. Occult history, according to some, is precise in its recollections while recorded history is, more often than not, a revision and a fabrication. It is fabricated and constantly revised to serve the designs of those who seek to have humanity serve them; as slaves, as canon fodder, as experiments and for any purpose they may wish to employ humanity in.
A number of readers have wondered why I bother writing about socio-political and cultural issues. They wonder why I’d spend my time hosting a blog like Smoking Mirrors or Reflections in a Petri Dish.
Some writers, who labor in the field of metaphysics; whether it is in a clinical or a religious sense, will tell you that the manifest universe isn’t real. They posit that this realm, which the physical senses interpret, is no more than an illusion. There are sound arguments for this. Certainly those who have activated certain yogic senses or awakened siddhis can testify to the impermanence and insubstantial nature of the manifest world. Some of them can move in and out of it at will and perform acts that defy explanation by empirical scholars. However, if you have ever tripped and fallen while running on the sidewalk, you know that this world can seem very real indeed.
This is why some of us write about life in areas that hold less interest for ourselves and our readers than the more rarified areas of a more permanent existence. It’s about the pain.
Most of us do not possess yogic senses or awakened siddhis. Most of us cannot move in and out of this world at will or perform acts that defy explanation by empirical scholars. Most of us are trapped to a greater or lesser degree by real and assumed responsibilities, circumstances and ignorance. Telling us that there is a brighter world beyond might well be true. I am certain it is true but... how does that help us here?
Most of us would help an animal in difficulty; brake or swerve to avoid it on the highway, would help another person according to our ability or feel distressed if we could not. Most of us have some good advice based on past errors of judgment, experienced or observed.
If you have studied history and observed the events of your time; if you possess objective awareness you can see personalities and patterns and how they conspire together to create the conditions we are in. It becomes increasingly clear that humanity is divided into various groups with different intentions and agendas. These groups have remained static across the span of history.
There are those whose intention is to profit from the needs, appetites and gullibility of their fellows. There are those who wish to help their fellows. There are those who are only concerned with themselves and their families. There are those who are ignorant and those who are very clever and they can be found in all of the groups I have mentioned. There’s no point in going any deeper into the minutiae of this. The complexity of the human heart is beyond the scope of this brief essay.
Sometimes life on Earth is not as difficult as at other times. Sometimes it seems as if the majority of us have gone mad or fallen into a sullen despair. No matter how good or bad it gets, somewhere the good life is flourishing and somewhere there is Hell on Earth.
One might well know that this is all temporary. One might have the knowledge and resources to insulate themselves from the trials of the day. But if one is a human being they cannot fail to be aware of the pain and suffering of others. Suffering comes from ignorance. If it is possible to remove some degree of ignorance from the lives of those suffering it would, for some of us, be a worthy cause.
Sometimes the predators among us are very deliberately focused on increasing the ignorance of the population to serve their interests. It is hard to imagine that so many people cannot see that this is happening at this time. I assure you that it is. A small minority of ill made men and women are very intently at work on increasing human ignorance and suffering. They have a large support base of lesser informed souls who have been seduced into believing that they may increase their own fortunes by supporting the ends and intentions of the powerful few. Some are motivated from greed and some from other drives and some are only very stupid and confused. The aggregate collection of these groups in a common purpose makes for a dreadful state of affairs.
In occult history there are many occasions when nothing could be done; when events had to play themselves out. During these periods, many wiser minds withdrew from the chaos and waited it out. At the same time there remain those who were compelled to oppose, by word and deed, the evil machinations of the twisted few and their hosts of ignorant armies. Imagine how black it would seem if not for the voices raised against this terrible empire of lies.
It could well prove futile and quixotic. There is slander and acrimony all around for any who dare to dispute the lies and challenge the powerful. According to many who have left the record of their words and thoughts upon the scroll of history, it isn’t about winning. It’s about striving for the light. It’s about knowing what the right thing is and making that your sole purpose for carrying on. It’s about the useful ignorance of ignoring the seemingly insurmountable odds and living and working for the greater good regardless of the personal cost.
It’s about sealing your ears to the mocking wind of all the little voices singing in the mutant chorus of the deluded and deceived. It’s about being honest and true in the face of every lie and outrage leveled against you. Evil cannot win. It always defeats itself. It is the very nature of evil to consume itself and fade away. We triumph, quite simply, when we endure. The bright unquenchable spark of our higher nature cannot be defeated by the collected darkness of the entire world. This is something occult history has shown and which metaphysics proclaims. The movie is not greater than the screen upon which it is shown.
We may be deluded ourselves. We will, not infrequently, make mistakes. We will fall and we will despair and we will struggle all the while... but as long as we are honest with ourselves we will provide a telling counterpoint to the insanity of the day.
It isn’t about marching into Rome at the head of a victorious army. It isn’t about laurel wreaths and a cheering crowd. It isn’t about celebrity and awards; a place in history, a big funeral with somber eulogies and a large headstone. It’s about telling it like it is and putting it on the line and not being discouraged at the difficulty of the times. It’s about striving for the light so that, just possibly, against all odds, you just might let some light in.
'Listening to God in the Morning' is track no. 13 of 13 on Visible's 2007 album
'The Sacred and The Profane'
Lyrics (pops up)
7 comments:
You are on fire baby! But this fire doesn't singe, sting, or burn. It's like an inviting campfire that illuminates, and warms both body and spirit, and inspires storytelling and song.
thank you
this is particularly yummy:
"It’s about telling it like it is and putting it on the line and not being discouraged at the difficulty of the times. It’s about striving for the light so that, just possibly, against all odds, you just might let some light in."
:)
and it's especially what this soul needs to re-call and re-member. I'm re-fueling.
ta mucho, annemarie
this little light o' mine, i'm gonna' let it shine...
We all walk through the same minefield of lies and fear and merchants of snake-oil (whether metaphysical or literal). We all have the same array of information available to us to help us navigate this dangerous place, though we often have to dig a little to find it, hoping we don't uncover something that will blow us to bits in the process.
So, why do some people discover that love and compassion are the map and compass that point the way through this minefield, yet just as many, or more, conclude they don't need a map at all and proceed to stomp right through it until stopped by the inevitable karma of their actions? The mangled and bloody bits of bone and hair scattered in plain sight along the road were warning enough for me!
We had, more or less, the same set of data to draw from; the same Saturday morning cartoons while growing up, the same so-called "schools," the same drugs (recreational or prescribed), the same just about everything. Of course, I am writing about those who are from the same cultural place/time as me, but these observations seem to apply to any group of people from the same place/time. Like everyone else, I faced the same forces that would increase my ignorance instead of understanding, but I dug deeper (and have never stopped, actually) and some chose not to. Why this happens is quite a puzzle to me, and begs many questions of free will, among other things.
I suppose it has something to do with being seduced by the material world, which makes a path of self-discipline and contemplation appear impossibly arduous, or just, like, totally lame. But still, why are some seduced and others not? Is it something fundamental in our personality that determines this or is it our luck in having one day read the right book or talked to the right "crazy" homeless guy? Figuring out the Secret Formula that determines how we choose our path would certainly help to encourage brighter choices, seems to me. And once the path is chosen, we must then figure out how to endure it!
For what it's worth, I just saw a 30 minute animated film from 1987 that touches on the theme of triumph through endurance in a way that left me speechless. If you haven't already, whoever you are, you must get and watch "The Man Who Planted Trees" as soon as possible. If you've put up with reading this comment this far, I guarantee that film will move you like few ever have, if the time is right. For me, it renewed my committment to my personal vision, which had almost died on the very same day I saw the film, in one of those startling synchronicities that blow all the fuses in one's mind. Ten years of frustration and failure evaporated in the brief span of a 30 minute story. That was two days ago. The world looks much better to me today, though I remain aware of the work that still needs to be done, and of the pain to come. It's all part of the fun, I suppose.
-The Village Idiot
Village Idiot. I want to set up a blog for you and Joy and Tony and Erin and a few other friends..... what do you think?
Damn, I mean AnneMarie and other friends. Well, you know what I mean. It would be very nice. I think people should really hear you people.
Hi Les,
This is weird.
I am a new reader of your blogs, by about a week, and this is my first-time comment. First I want to say how much I enjoy the fresh and direct style of your writing and expressions. And your songs. I encountered your website via a post at the Truthseeker blog, which was about your recent “… False Flag Coming” article. I am totally enthralled by the lyrics of “Iridescent Dreams”. I was so interested in your writing that I went on to explore your other blogs and websites too. You are very creative and talented. I am a non-institutional believer in Jesus. If you have read much in the New Testament on the life and teachings of Jesus, and obviously you have, it may not surprise you that I feel a lot of similarity with you in most of your sentiments and attitudes. I haven’t read many of your articles yet, but “Riding In My Cliché” somehow caught my attention. Pure platinum.
Now about what’s weird. A couple of days ago I was writing a friend. As happens often to me in writing, I get carried away and wind up writing a lot more than I meant to, and decided it was too over the top to send her. So I saved and then closed the file. A few minutes later I checked your blog to see if you had a new post up. And you did, of course, that being “The Long, Hard Struggle for the Light”. I read it and I thought, WoW. Not only because of your writing, but because of the wavelength synchronicity of your article with the little unfinished essay I had just been writing myself only minutes before.
I read earlier your encouragement to someone to go ahead and share their thoughts. This is already getting to be a long comment. I know it is outrageous to make it insanely longer yet, but you or your readers might find the complimentary synchronicity interesting. My sincere apologies to all for posting an article within a comment a thread. I hate it too when people do that. I PROMISE, IT WONT EVER HAPPEN AGAIN. Les, please remove it if you find it is too out of order, and no hard feelings. This is just a rough draft, but here it is as I wrote it immediately before reading your article:
I WAS RECENTLY READING a biographical sketch on William Blake. It occurred to me that beneath his dissident eccentricity, he was basically a simple, sincere, and good hearted man. One could wish and even naively suppose that it is that such is the same with most people. But if we look around us objectively, we soon discern such is not the case. For only a minority really seem to care about the well being of others. Especially if it may mean some disadvantage to them. People are like this, not because it is the inescapable quality of human nature. They are like this because either they have not learned any better, or else, having learned, they have chosen to disregard the higher path for paths more appealing to the lower aspects of human nature. Such is human nature, but not inescapable human nature. We can, and we do, choose. However, some have just not yet really perceived the light, but perhaps will when they finally see it, and recognize it, will accept it and love it, and ultimately conform themselves to it. Because they receive it. Others may never perceive the light, because they already love the darkness. They have rejected the essence of the light without having ever tasted it, or experiencing its reality. They may be able to conceive of it, but they cannot perceive it because they are already too given over to the lower aspects of their human nature. Generally, we all have those aspects. Higher and lower. We choose which to ‘feed’ and feed from. We cultivate some of the aspects of our nature while we deny, suppress, or neglect the others. Within each of us is both good and evil. This is the mystery of humanity. Some, having finally perceived the light, may taste it, and even receive it, but at last may turn away from it, because they have greater desire for the lower elements of our human existence. Having known the light, they reject it, in favor of gratifying the more basic aspects of the human nature.
Some people might be described as drifting in the shadows. They have perceived and tasted the light, and now they neither receive it nor reject it, but have a double minded desire for ‘all good things’. They deceive themselves that they can go in opposite directions at the same time. That they can serve two different masters, so to speak. They delude themselves that they can actually pull it off. Perhaps the majority of people who ever come to know the light, actually remain here in the shadows. Wanting the sublimity of the light, but not being enough enthralled by it to completely turn away from the enticements of the darkness. Such people may eventually like to convince themselves that they are actually in the light, and that the light and the darkness are complementary opposites, and so it is actually good to remain in the shadowy realms where light and darkness mix. A different kind of “Twilight Zone”, in which they wish to make themselves comfortable. Of this condition Jesus said, “broad is the gate and wide the way that leads to destruction, and many go in thereat. But straight is the way and narrow the gate that leads to eternal life, and few there be that find it.” Many people get the misunderstanding that Jesus is talking about religion here. But if you learn more about the teachings of Jesus you come to understand that “eternal life” is the light, and the light is love. Total darkness is malicious selfishness. The shadows is wanting to ‘be nice’ to others, but still have everything else you want too. Some people mistakenly call this being “good hearted”. But it is in reality hypocrisy. It is an empty shell. Better than darkness perhaps, or perhaps not. Because it a falsification of the meaning of the light. The incomplete that is the enemy of the fullness. Coming to the full light is to lose yourself in the rapture of doing good unto others, even to the extent that you sacrifice the emoluments of this world, while holding your eyes steadfastly on the world to come. The full light is a straight and narrow way. It leads to the center and every way deviating from it will lead somewhere else.
I think most people don’t realize how antithetical our corporation dominated society really is toward the higher values. Oh yes, there is no shortage of lip service to those values. But the main thrust of our culture is increasingly to the opposite effect. Despite the so-called liberalization of our times, as compared with former times, is not the overall effect of modern western society on the human soul still as appalling, and in some ways even more so? I mean think of television, electronic sensory overstim, and massive alienation from nature by techno-industrial modernization, mechanization, and automation. There was a time referred to as the Dark Ages. But I must ask, is our age not dark? Here we are in the age of science, technology and conquest capitalism of the corporations. And here we are sleepwalking our way to the eschaton, largely by dint of the powers of science and technology as combined with the ruthless rapacious ethics and efficiencies of said corporations. What do they care about the individual human? About love, sorrow, tenderness, hopes, fears. To the corporations these are only levers of manipulation for the use of the astute. And that is what reveals them for the incarnations of hell that they are. Corporations, and the ghouls who commandeer them, care only about $$, which is nothing more than quantified power. Power over materiel, power over people, power over life, and ultimately over all creation and existence. In their relentless, inexorable quest for first obscene profits, and then mad power, the corporations, individually and collectively as the military-industrial complex, know no limits of conscience, for they are automatons, and thus cannot harbor conscience any more then they can experience emotions. The profit mandate is ultimate, and threats to the maximization of this prime purpose are the only restraints they respond to. This is why some psychologists recognize in typical corporation operations the very same motivational and behavioral patterns of the sociopath. They care only about themselves. Even while they may go through motions and generate communications to appear otherwise.
Perhaps the worst aspect of this whole morass is that in their all-powerful status the corporations wield powerful control over the minds and perceptions of the masses. This is both by default and also by deliberate and meticulous design. First, the human mind has always been subject to the state of awe. We are awed by great and supreme things. Any ‘great’ thing, in fact, evokes a sense of wonder in us. ‘Great’, that is, in the sense of magnitude, and NOT necessarily in virtue or goodness. This is perhaps man’s great undoing. We are more awed by a rich man than by a good man. By a Bill Gates or Rupert Murdoch than by the quiet old lady who is the picture of humility and giving only two dollars to help someone else, even if it is the last two she has. We are more awed by the ‘Philanthropists’ immortalizing their own names in ostentatious foundations, which they endow with billions, while remaining ensconced in their fortresses of wealth, with plenty more where that came from. And so we are awed by multi-billion dollar mergers, and by the Fortune 500, and by the lifestyles of the rich and famous. By hall-of-famers, stars and celebrities of any kind. We are awed by size and weight and heavy hitters. In our capitalist society this means big corporations. And cultural awe leads to cultural imprinting. If awe means anything, it means attention. The culture pays attention to the objects of its awe, and so observes and ultimately learns the ways of conduct of it’s gods. Wherever there is worship, the values of the ‘god(s)’ are ultimately insinuated into the value structures of the worshipers.
new essay here
http://smokingmirrors.blogspot.com/
Thank you for this. I feel so affirmed in my conclusions. Encouraged or as annemarie said-refueled.
Love to you. Boy some of your honesty must have singed the eyelashes of one of GOOGLE billionaires. TEE-HEE TEE-HEE!! SPAM???? If only. Wouldn't you love to find your computer laden down with words os wisdom and random acts of kindness?
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