Reincarnation Illustrated

If you ever meet a Hare Krishna devotee pushing books on a street corner, this is what you will hear about karma and reincarnation.

And this is what they forget to tell you when they are recruiting you into the ranks — until it's too late... Caveat emptor!

"I'm a tweet wittow biwd in a diwded cage; Tweety'th my name but I don't know my age. I don't have to wuwy and dat is dat; I'm tafe in hewe fwom dat ol' putty tat."

That just about sums it up. Tweety knows the deal.

On Approaching Alternative Dimensions

A stairway I would often climb up to one of the hills of Varshana in Northern India
back in the days not so long ago; Varshana is one of my favorite spots in the Vraja area.

A befitting follow-up to yesterday's off-beat blog on Enter Planet Zorgotron, I am sharing the notes I sent to a friend who wrote in and asked for my angle on the Manual of Steve Bohlert (of Universalist Radha-Krishnaism fame) for entering the utopian world of Radha-Krishna featured extensively in the writings of medieval Gaudiya Vaishnava mystics. Subtitled "Create yourself in an idealized identity",  Steve looks at meditational methods for entering a particular alternative dimension from a fresh and pleasantly fluid angle.

I have myself been an intense practitioner of the method up until late 2007, when I made the call to expand my inner domain from what I felt was a rather restrictive model for an ultimate reality presented by the orthodox tradition. It had become too anthropomorphic for my taste; feeling a need to travel deeper into transhuman existence from the abodes of personal gods, I embarked on a journey of my own through the Buddhist world and beyond, leaving behind the specifics of the utopian otherworld favored by the esoteric Bengali Vaishnavite tradition.

Steve is definitely onto something there with his meditational approach, contra the orthodox and often stiff methods found among the traditional teachers in India, as they often brush aside the mechanistic aspect of the entire process in favor of counting on descending grace and automatic revelation alone. (Which for the record I'm uncertain was the sole intention of the medieval authors, and as much is evident from their writings for a meticulous student with a broad understanding.)

From a quick read of his short manual, it's evident Steve has a good grasp on the aspects of mental fluidity and the individual's input as crucial factors in entering new dimensions of experience and interaction, and further seeks to give it a more universal context, which I find commendable — even while he retains it in the general religious framework of the tradition, which I am not that big on as I find it too narrow for a frame of existential reference.

Reality is inherently subjective, and more so in the domain of individual mind and consciousness. If you have a wish for entering alternative worlds and dimensions by meditational effort, whether it's the Radha-Krishna department or any other transhuman world, you will need to develop your skills of concentration, spatial visualization, projection, and psychological insight to a high degree. Such skills are highly useful in any field of endeavor, and as such "in this endeavor there is no loss or diminution"; they are in fact something I intend to write about in more detail myself when I get an opening to put more of my head's contents on cyberpaper.

The bottom line as I see it is that if you want to have any level of certainty over your internal evolution, you will need to understand how things function, over and above the grace factor that religions frequently depend upon as the sole saving factor and means of spiritual evolution. If god gave us methods for attaining his dimension, I'm certain he also intended for us to understand how his methods work as a precursor to attaining the level of existence he inhabits, in particular in preparing to share of his (or rather its) level of multi-dimensional and all-encompassing consciousness.

Enter Planet Zorgotron | Strange Dreams

This is not Planet Zorgotron. It's a cool image I stole from Dave's collections.

I have no idea what it really means, but it's definitely in the right dimension.

I had the strangest dream last night. I was hopping around a planet inhabited by gargantuan cybernetic mutant insects that were generally somewhat disoriented. One of them was more of a humanoid type with long grasshopper legs that let him do crazy long-distance kung-fu sweeps. He soon became a pal of mine and helped me nail down some of the bigger bugs that cluelessly bugged around with their mechanical telescopic extensions.

For some reason I decided to call the place Planet Zorgotron. Woke up in the morning with a big grin, racing to a meeting as I had inadvertently slept in. I can still see the creatures quite clearly if I close my eyes. Must have something to do with the ongoing Internet Industrial Revolution hype and the fact that I watched the jungle slug episode of Stargate Universe before I crashed last night; or otherwise the waiter dropped something very strange for cloves into that glass of hot whiskey I had last night to brush off the cold as I was heading home.

For those of you who were wondering what's been up with the long silence in the blog again; as you can see, it's business as usual and nothing out of the ordinary. I'm still mad as a frog, and evidently going up in the world.

Season's Greetings - Shades of Yule

☆ ☆ ☆ Season's Greetings  ☆ ☆ ☆

from the Grizzly Grizmas Grinch! 

Relativist Revealed as Embodiment of Evil (DP)

Dissociated Press
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Dark Northern Forests

When rumors about the evil in the fundament of a Finnish freak thinker began to circulate in early October, few could guess just how on the mark the suspicions were. Sources have since confirmed the actuality of the allegations, fueled by a surprise discovery of incriminating photographic evidence on a perfectly peaceful Sunday afternoon. In the shocking photo below, he is seen measuring the sum total of the fibers of his being.

This shocking photo was taken by an unsuspecting amateur photographer,
who was studying the life of frog philosophers at the local village pond.

According to a U.S. based team of professional psychopathologists and forensic experts, this unsettling photo is undeniable proof of the presence of evil in his fundament. Suspicions of evil first began to rise with his obstinate unwillingness to accept any one point of view as absolute or clearly eminent, and the subsequent refusal to conduct himself according to rules and rituals derived thereof. His sympathy for Pyrrhonism, an early Greek cult of Satanistic thought, has since been confirmed.

Dubbed a cancer to be denounced vehemently by ideological professionals, his brand of thought advocates an ideology where nothing is certain, and everything is perpetually open to question. According to a spokesman of the Church of Absolute Truth, "The very thought of having no absolutes to comfort ourselves with is abhorrent, and a direct slap in the face of all organized religion and established ideology."

That notwithstanding, the former Hari Krishna Guru figure has garnered some support from audiences bent on decadence and moral turpitude, eager to legitimize their ambivalent approach to the very foundations of life and human society. According to sources, he is currently in hiding somewhere in the dark forests of the northern hemisphere, developing an underground laboratory with a team of quantum scientists to prove once and for all "that nothing is certain, and everything in a perpetual state of quantum uncertainty." (DP)

On Ideological Fundamentalism

I've had my fair share of encounters with the polarities of rigid absolutism and objectivism on one side, and flexible relativism and subjectivism on the other, and have eventually come to see the light that lets all flowers bloom. While it's not a popular position to take among the followers of one tradition or the other, I haven't heard the likes of the following statement I came across yesterday even from religious fundamentalists, at least not in so many words.

"I recognize the evil in your foundation and your arguments are saturated with it - and it must be denounced vehemently because it is a cancer out there."

No doubt, relativism can strike an annoying chord in the ears of those who would rather believe their model of understanding is a de facto theory of everything, both in the realm of religious dialogue as with anything else featuring strong ideological convictions. That it is annoying is rather an understatement, for it's downright threatening, inasmuch as it suggests the possibility of tearing down the precious walls of absolute opinion built and maintained by generations of adherents.

The above citation becomes doubly curious over the fact that it was addressed to yours truly in a discussion that had absolutely nothing to do with poking the holy cows of any flavor of religious fundamentalism, but rather in the course of an attempt to discuss a purely secular (and not even political) theme with a person sporting a long academic background. A world where ideologies are juxtapositioned in such a radically condemning fashion is a world gone sad and sour

I suppose ambivalence can be threatening, but really it is only from a state of ambivalence that something truly new can evolve. Rigid ideologies, even while they may serve a purpose, are almost invariably antithetical to the progress and evolution of human understanding, shunning as they do the prospects for discovering solutions outside the established framework. All the while, doubt remains one of the most powerful tools at our disposal in our quest for knowledge and understanding.

This idolatry of human mental constructions is perhaps the single most devolutive force in the history of mankind with a long and devastating track record of stifling, oppressing and persecuting those discontent with available solutions, seeking to cross over the establishment to the undiscovered land. The problem started with Adam and Eve grabbing a fruit off the tree of forbidden knowledge and receiving a due punishment, and has really only grown worse ever since.

The Broad Way That Claims No Authority

The Tao is broad; you can move far to the right and to the left; and still remain within it. Millions of living beings live on it, depend upon it for their existence; it accepts them willingly, and claims no authority over them.

The Tao accomplishes its tasks, and claims no credit. It clothes and feeds the living beings who live on it; yet it imposes no obligations on them, and expects no gratitude from them.

The Tao desires nothing, so it may be called small. Yet since it claims no credit, imposes no obligations, and expects no gratitude, it should be called great.

— Tao Te Ching #34