Pivotal Moments in Life Series, first story

[I was backpacking in Scotland when a friend told me how to find Captain Billy and that he had a story that would fit well with my “Pivotal Moments in Life” series. His story is the first I collected for this project, and the one that propels me today to continue working on it.]

When I walked in the bar I could see him over in a corner table. There were several saltshakers in front of him and he was trying to balance one. When I called his name, he glanced up at me with squinty eyes, his head turned one way. He was a stocky fellow. His beard was scraggly, and his skin was an odd reddish gray color.

I told him who had directed me to him and he let out a sigh.

“Get me a bottle of whiskey, and I’ll tell you a story.”

Relieved, I went to the bar, procured the bottle and two glasses and set them in front of him. He poured and took a big swig before beginning. His voice was higher and more precise than I had expected.

“It had been a rough couple of weeks at sea. We hit a bad storm that lasted three days. When it finally let up the ship was pretty beat up. We took our bearings and set off for the closest port where we could get decent repairs. We were at it a couple of days when another storm hit and this one was much worse. We were lucky to get through it alive and when we took our bearings, we spotted land. The island was uncharted, but we decided to check it out, as our fresh water reserves were low.

“I took three of my crew in the boat and we headed for shore. When we got close we spotted what looked like a person sitting on the sand. As we got closer, I could see it was a child. When we landed, I went right for the child. It was a lad. He was looking right at me but made no sign of seeing me. He was the skinniest boy I had ever set eyes on. I could count all his ribs. He was wearing a tattered pair of shorts but no shirt. His skin was caked with layers of sand. I could see patches of red and black where the sand was wearing off, and I realized he had been sunburned repeatedly. I noticed some large shells by him with water in them. Realizing he must have found fresh water, I barked an order to my crew to go find the inland stream.

“It was as if my words brought him around. He looked right into my eyes with an intensity I had never before experienced. I quickly looked away so he wouldn’t see the pity in my eyes.

“That’s a lie. It wasn’t pity I felt but fear. Believe me when I tell you that in my many adventures I have seen things that a man shouldn’t have to see, and remained fearless. But that day I was scared, and to this day I can’t tell you why.

“The boy caught my eye again and spoke. There was the slightest of smiles on his face. These were his exact words. I will never forget them because they were emblazoned into my heart and remain there today:

Captain, left to my own devices I would act girlie, be cheered by the sun, and build sand castles.

“I thought the boy must be delirious, but he spoke with such precision as if he had been practicing the lines for months, and perhaps he had. I glanced up and down the tide line and saw the remains of countless sand castles, as far as I could see.

“You’ll be asking me what became of the kid, so I’ll tell you what I know. He had been the only survivor of a shipwreck three months before we arrived at that island, and his parents and three aunties were killed. A nice family adopted him and his new dad was a fisherman. I stopped in to see him a couple times, but he didn’t have much to say to me, and I could tell that his new family didn’t want me around, as I reminded them of things they wanted to forget. You can’t blame them for that. I heard a story that he ran off to go to sea at sixteen, but I don’t believe it. I suspect he went inland and got away from all that salt and sea. That’s what I would have done, had I been him.

“So you want to know how this has changed my life? In lots of strange ways. I look at things different. I may be seeing a sunset or an ocean liner, and the colors are wrong, or the size. I can’t rightly explain it. But mostly it’s people. When they talk I listen carefully, as if what they say must have some hidden meaning. Usually when people talk they have nothing to say. I know that. But I find myself listening all the same. Has it helped me? A few times it has. I found that women like a man to listen, and I have got close to some lovers I’ve had. But mostly, I end up avoiding people. Once in a while I think I see that kid when I know it’s someone else. I dream about the boy a lot still. I see him wake to the rising sun and turn his face to it, smiling. The sun that almost killed him! And I see him building those cursed sand castles, designing new ones every day, knowing they will be destroyed when the tide comes in. And I see him smiling when it does. And I see him at night, when the stars come out. He dances around the beach, cavorting around like a girl.

“The thing is, I haven’t been able to get the boy out of my head. He was a survivor. He found water and a way to carry it. He found food, at least enough to stay alive. He caked his body in sand to protect it from the blazing sun. The boy was barely eight years old. How did he do it? What was his secret? I ask the question, but I know he already told me. I just can’t understand it. Was he telling me he was happy? He was all alone on that God-forsaken island. How could he be happy? How could he smile at the sun that burned him? How could he keep building those blasted sand castles day after day and watch them wash away? And what in the hell was that girlie thing all about?

“Can you give me any answers?”

I took a drink of the Scotch whiskey and sighed. He had drunk most of the bottle and I had only a short glass. I had no answers for Captain Billy, so I thanked him, stood up and walked out of that bar. [5925]

The Golden Compass (review)

Phillip Pullman wrote a captivating trilogy called His Dark Materials which include The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Eyeglass. The first book was recently made into a major motion picture and so has gotten a lot of attention. The movie stars Nicole Kidman and it won the BAFTA film award for best special visual effects. Prior to seeing the movie, a friend of mine told me he would not see it because the author had an agenda of spreading atheism to our children and he could not support such a thing. I saw the movie but was unable to discover anything sinister about it. In fact I was so captivated that I decided to read the entire trilogy. This is, by the way, exactly what Catholic League's Bill Donohue has warned against. Our kids would be so enthralled by the movie that they would want to read the books and would get indoctrinated into atheism. Well my daughter did check it out from her school library but was little interested in it, but I was amazed by it.

My excitement grew throughout the books. The Golden Compass is so incredibly creative and fresh, in both the book and the movie forms. To bring to life the notion that our souls can live outside our bodies in the form of various animals, called daemons, is beautiful, delicate, and invigorating all at the same time. The character of Lyra is so captivating, yet her heroic adventures are so alien but feel so true within the heart. The Subtle Knife brought in such a believable character,Will. I have seen such self-sacrificing boys and girls inside of adults, those who fought battles that should not have had to be fought at such a young age, those who cared for parents and younger siblings with grace and strength, with resilience and power. Pullman understands so much about human life and about mythology and history. A knife whose blade is so subtle that it can cut through anything is of course the knife that separates you from me, me from myself. This is the Eden story. This is what we as humans chose, to quote Genesis, “the knowledge of good and evil.” By cutting up the universe into pieces, we were able to step into the world of polarity. God was able to see Itself. This is the so-called “fall from grace.” This fall from grace is of course our true grace, that which makes us human, that which makes us grownup. We are able today to look into the eyes of another and we think we see the other, but of course we get a glimpse of ourselves.

There are multiple universes, parallel universes, sitting on top of one another, unbeknown to the inhabitants. There are, of course, scientific theories and mathematics that support such an idea. At any rate, in the story, Will is able to use the knife to cut a window into other universes and then to step through.

In the third book The Amber Spyglass, Will learns that whenever he cuts another window, a way out is created for Dust (dark matter) to escape, thus robbing all sentient life of their very sustenance. At the same time, a ghastly Specter is created, one that literally feasts on Dust, but not on the Dust that floats around us, but the specified Dust within an adult being. It sucks the person dry of all which makes him or her sentient. It is the ultimate vampire, and, of course, difficult to defeat. It will literally eat an adult’s daemon, which is strangely the accumulation, the personification of Dust. Perhaps Dust is consciousness itself, God-energy.

Each new cut makes it more difficult to re-member our oneness. And yet, through an ironic twist, one window is allowed to stay open, and that is the window that Will cut to free the ghosts from the land of the dead so they might return to the oneness. The metaphor the “make-like,” as the mulefa would call it, is strained here, perhaps beyond the breaking point. So the knife itself is “willfully” so strained, and falls to pieces, thus permanently separating Will from Lyra.

But what disturbs me most is Pullman’s preoccupation with sacrifice. I think he gets the final sacrifice correct. Both Will and Lyra are willing to sacrifice themselves to come and live in the other’s world, but they both reject this sacrifice because they know it wouldn’t work. Each would be resentful of the other because neither would be complete or full. Each must live in their own world.

What I don’t get is the sacrifice of the daemon. In order to go into the world of the dead, Lyra (and Will too but he didn’t realize it) must leave her daemon behind. She must sacrifice her own soul in order to keep her promise. Of course she gets her soul (Pan) back and in a more powerful witch or shaman like way where he is freer to travel further from her body. However, there is something that is unsettling about it to me. This sounds too much like Kant for my liking.

There is a wonderful scene in The Amber Spyglass. (278) They are traveling through the suburb of the land of the dead, following a murky stream to Pullman’s version of the River Styx. They come across an injured toad. Tialys (the little spy) suggests they kill it to put it out of its misery, speculating that it is in pain.

Will says, “If it could tell us, we’d know. But since it can’t, I’m not going to kill it. That would be considering our feelings instead of the toad’s.”

Doesn’t Lyra do the same when she betrays her daemon, betrays herself in order to appease her own guilt in regard to Roger? Is this really a model to strive after? In my mind it doesn’t fit the theme of the book. To create the “Republic of Heaven” one must be honest with oneself, one must honor one’s own daemon. It is possible though that there is a piece here that I do not understand. The witch Serafina Pekkala explains that all witches go through this process as young girls. They leave their daemon behind but do not sever from it, and as a result, their daemon can roam further from them than other sentient beings. But I am not so sure that the witches provide very good role models either. They are fierce and jealous and have strange wars that make no apparent sense. When they offer themselves as lovers, they expect the man to comply, and if one refuses her, she feels totally justified in putting an arrow through his heart, as was done to Will’s father.

So I must remain unsatisfied in regard to the self-sacrifice issue. In regard to the God-issue, I am much more satisfied. Although Pullman does get just a tad preachy in the last few chapters, and the “Republic of Heaven” metaphor is a bit strained, the lack of a Creator fits well with my theology. According to the story, the first angel pretended to be the creator and set himself as the “Authority,” demanded to be obeyed and posed as Yahweh. We all know that god, jealous and immoral, vindictive and arbitrary. As Jung so aptly pointed out, Job revealed himself to be more ethical. The scene with the “Authority” aged and frail, sad and feeble, locked away in his crystal prison, was beautifully executed. He, like those he imprisoned in the world of the dead, is freed to spread his molecules throughout the universe. Pullman is critised over and over for "killing God" in the movie. Well first of all he doesn't kill off God but "the Authority" the God-imposter. The book leaves it open as to whether there was a creator or not. Even the angels do not know. I like that detail. For those who do believe in an after-life, it is refreshing to think that those on "the other side" may in fact be as clueless as we are about this question. I think the text will support the notion that Pullman, ultimately, showed "the Authority" more mercy than "The Authority" showed us humans. He has Lyra show empathy and pity to the aged creature. Lyra, the Liar, who becomes Lyra Silvertongue for tricking the bear who cannot be tricked, who later learns from the Harpy to tell the truth, is the one who shows pity on the Authority. And to that we must be thankful to Pullman.

Ultimately, however, I must confess to be disappointed by the third book. Pullman doesn't quite pull everything together. There are too many unanswered questions in my mind. All the talk and buildup to the necessity of Lord Asriel getting the knife in order to defeat the Authority is apparently dropped. The Authority doesn't need to be defeated because he is sterile, ineffective. The one needing to be defeated is his general Metrodon. And he is much too easily seduced by the beautiful Mrs. Coulter. She and Lord Asriel do sacrifice themselves to throw the powerful angel over the cliff into the abyss. Here is that sacrifice thing again. O.K. Perhaps that redeems them from the terribly abominable things they did to get the power they so much sought?

Going back to all the online criticism of Pullman and his work, what I don't get is that he is somehow promoting evil. We of course view the books through the eyes of Lyra and Will. Neither one is ever enthralled or taken in by Mrs. Coulter or Lord Asriel. Even though at the end, both Lyra and Will do fight on the side against the Authority, they never accept the idea that the ends justify the means. They would never go the way of Lyra's parents. The road they choose is an ethical one. They choose life, and to live it fully. They choose to refuse to put immediate pleasure and desire above the good of the community. But they have generally always chosen thusly throughout the tale. So it is certainly not a surprise to find them acting ethically at the end. And to do so without having to believe in a creator god is not so awful. After all they do have angels and witches on their side.

I have even read some online criticism of Pullman that he is somehow promoting irresponsible sexuality. This falls in the face of Will's father who refuses the overtures of a beautiful witch and ends up the target of one of her arrows because of it. Here is a guy who found himself in another world and could never return to his own, to his wife and child. A beautiful witch creature offers herself to him, no strings attached, and he refuses her. Will is impressed by this as he can return home and tell his mother that his father was never unfaithful. This is a promotion of unrestrained irresponsible sexuality? Give me a break.

And unless I am forgetting some important detail, there is no apparent creator god in the Narnia Tales either. So I really don't care if Pullman hates my beloved C.S. Lewis' work or not. Despite my criticisms of "The Amber Spyglass" he has clearly pulled off an excellent yarn. [5442]

Loss of Soul

Day 90, Year 0000 NE 0615

We have lost our soul as a nation.

There is a character from the movie "Brazil" (which has nothing to do with Brazil but was inspired by the song "Aquarela do Brasil") who is a torturer. He is a normal sort of guy. He stops to pick up milk after work, etc. but his job, day in and day out, is to torture people. He has a secretary who appears to be oblivious to what he is doing in his interrogation room, but of course she knows. She actually transcribes the screams and pleas made by the person being tortured.

This character ends up torturing a friend of his (of course it is nothing personal) who became a terrorist suspect when his name was incorrectly chosen by the computer because a fly fell on the mechanism as it was reading the name. But this is a movie, a very interesting but odd one by the way, which I would highly recommend at this time as it is eerily prophetic. But people don't actually live that way, do they? Especially not in this great country of ours that believes in human rights, that follows the constitution.

So what is movie and what is today's reality? We actually have (or rather had) video tape of government officials using waterboarding (that is an euphemisms if there ever was, even George Orwell couldn't have come up with one like that, it sounds like some sort of fun surfing thing). Why was the videotape made? Was it a training tape?

"Come on new recruits, we will have a short video today to show you some of the "harsh interrogation" techniques that you may need to use from time to time. But don't worry, this suspect is really a bad guy. He isn't even a Christian. This is the only way that we can talk to people like that. Besides, it's not like we are pulling off his fingernails or anything. Ha ha ha."

I can't help but think of the people around the torturers. The support staff. The mailroom people. The ones who bring in the pizza. The ones who make the lattes. The ones who fix the computers when they go down. Read on, for I will be appealing to you folks later.

Yukio Asano was a Japanese officer who used this technique on American soldiers during World War II. We tried the guy and sentenced him to 15 years of hard labor.

The government argues that the world is different now because of terrorism. "We have to realize that thee guys show us no mercy so we cannot show them any." What?

There is a scene from an episode of the early Star Trek. Kirk is on a planet and he asks the local government to help him get some information about his missing crew. He beams into the government office to find the guy in the act of torturing someone. He asks him to stop and the government guy tells him that he is only doing what Kirk asked, trying to get information. Kirk has a fit, but cannot do anything because he has no jurisdiction and doesn't want to start a planetary war. So he says, "I will not sit here and watch you torture that guy," and he beams out.

Now Congress is really upset that the videotapes of torture were destroyed. As they should be. But please, don't focus entirely on the missing tape. So is it that important to watch it? We know that the tapes are of waterboarding. We know it is torture. So prosecute people for it, whether we have the tapes or not. Our new attorney general is of course no help. But what did Congress expect? He sat there in front of them during the hearings and said he didn't have enough information to be able to say whether waterboarding was torture or not.

When will someone in the government have the guts to do what is right? I put out an appeal to all government officials. The secretaries like the character in "Brazil." The information shufflers. The pizza deliverers. The computer IT geeks. Someone, please steal some documents and go to the press. Sneak a flash drive in and stick it in your boss's USB port and dump in some incriminating information, then upload it to a blog. Read up about Daniel Ellsberg. It is possible to find that bravery within. Daniel Ellsberg was not any more special than anyone else. He was a person who found his own inner strength and courage to do what he knew he had to do, to find his own soul. He did it at great personal risk, and our country had a chance to get its soul back then. It can happen again. It is time to act.

There is a scene from the movie "Dances with Wolves" where our hero comes across a great expanse with bodies of buffalo scattered as far as the eye can see. (This was, of course, a depiction of our government policy of systematically killing hundreds of thousands of buffalo for the express purpose of genocide of the Indigenous population). His Indigenous friend makes a comment about how those who did this could not have had a soul. That was a time when we lost our soul as a nation. We are now at another such time. What can we do to get it back? I do not know. I sincerely hope that it is still possible. [4909]

Moral Absolutes

Day 53, Year 0000 NE 0410
I had a conversation recently with a few Christian ministers and learned something new. I do not know if my understanding is correct, but I think I have a new insight that I want to put out here and ask for feedback, because it seems to be important.

The problem that I have struggled with for a long time is to understand why folks on the "Christian right" have so adamantly and consistently fought against abortion, gay rights, and stem cell research, but are mostly silent on capital punishment, atrocities of war, and various governmental injustices. I just didn't make sense to me. After all, if they are against abortion because it is the killing of another human being, why aren't they equally against the invasion of Iraq or capital punishment, as both involve the intentional killing of human beings?

My error here was in thinking that those in the "Christian right" have a similar world view as mine. My arguments seem clear and reasonable from my world view. However, my world view is a particular view and is based primarily on some version or other of postmodern thinking. I do not claim to offer absolute truth or absolute values. I believe that we stand within cultural, familial and personal stories that shape our understandings of the world, and that the world itself cannot be known absent those stories. There are times that I have my doubts about this understanding as I delve more into spiritual realms. I am starting to believe that it may be possible to have a knowing about "what is" from outside of those stories or overlays, and that such a knowing may be a spiritual experience. However, even in such an instance, I do not believe that it is possible to take such insights and turn them into absolute truths for others, and somehow insist that they would apply to other humans.

My new insight is that those on the "Christian right" do not share a postmodern world view. This of course should have been obvious to be all along. It is not as if they have hidden this fact. However, one's world view tends to be invisible to oneself, and I am no exception. Even while knowing that another has different world view, I tended to present my arguments as if they shared some of my word view.

Now here is where I am on shaky ground because I an really only guessing, and I would very much love some feedback as to whether I am getting this right. Here goes: From the "Christian right" point of view, there are absolute truths and there is "right and wrong" that applies to all circumstances regardless of cultural or situational differences. This is true because these absolutes come from God, not human beings, and they cannot be changed.

This tenant is not simply one of many beliefs; it is the ground of their world view. It permeates all perceptions and understandings. What this means is that all experience must somehow or other adhere to this world view. Human experience that does not seem to fit this world view becomes basically invisible.

Once I understand this underlying story, then the answer to my earlier question becomes obvious. It is possible to say that abortion is always morally wrong. It is possible to say that stem cell research is always morally wrong. It is possible to say that sex outside of marriage is always wrong so of course homosexuality is aways wrong. Homosexual marriage must be opposed because it would challenge that in a fundamental way.

The commandment "Thou shall not kill" notwithstanding, it is much more difficult to say that it is always morally wrong to kill another human being. What about self defense? What about war? What about the state needing to punish wrongdoers? These involve adults dealing with other adults and one must get into some account of innocence and guilt, some assessment and judgment of the particularities of the situation. This is uncomfortable ground for those with a world view that attests to absolute moral values. One must search for the absolutes in the world. One finds abortion. It is easier to say that abortion is always wrong because one cannot argue that the being inside the mother has done anything wrong. Everyone must admit that this being is innocent. And of course most of those making this argument are men who will never have the experience of being pregnant.

Sexuality will of course be an uncomfortable issue to deal with from within the "moral absolutes" world view. Where can one find absolutes in this arena where there is so much variety of expression, so many cultural differences and understandings, so many powerful energies and emotions? One way is to confine it to the sacred bond of marriage and try to hold on to this as an absolute. Any sexual expression outside of this sacred bond becomes immoral. Let's not talk too much about what may be allowed within that sacred bond as that too is uncomfortable. Let's stick with what can be declared absolute. None outside of marriage. None. Declared by God. This is one absolute we can declare and hold onto.

Homosexuality by its very nature challenges this absolute in a fundamental way. If we consult with Christians who are gay, they tell us that their same sex attractions are natural and fundamental to who they are. So what does one do? In order to hold onto the absolutes, one must either call them liars, or that they have been brainwashed, or one must create some very convoluted arguments such as God is testing them to see if they can remain celibate all their lives.

From my world view this exercise seems odd and cruel. However, from the "absolutes" world view, to accept these contradictions is impossible without challenging the very fabric of their understanding of the world.

What I think is happening in this ever complex world, is that those areas where absolutes can be proclaimed are becoming narrower and narrower. In fact, they seem to be confined to areas of personal sexuality. In those areas where absolutes can still be proclaimed, one must focus ever more strongly. One must take a stand somewhere. The sacredness of the marriage bond is under attack. When I argue for the importance of a woman being abused to be able to end the marriage, the "Christian right" may admit to this but must see it as a bit rare and not to be focused on too much as it threatens the last vestige of a dying world view. To protect the world view is paramount and supersedes all else.

Rather than seeing the world as ever more complex, those from an "absolute" world view can argue that the problem is postmodern philosophy itself. Our children are not told what is right and what is wrong. There is too much focus on diversity and gray areas. We should get back to the basics. If they are allowed to think for themselves they will have no morality. If I argue the possibility of morality from a post modern perspective, this argument makes no sense. I must be fooling myself. Morality itself is defined from an absolute word view, and is claimed as belonging to that word view. My statement becomes a contradiction, a trick, a foolishness.

Now that I think that I understand these differences better, what to do with it? I do not know for sure. I suspect that this will help me to catch myself when I am making an argument that I think is so clever and obvious, but will not be, cannot be, seen as useful by someone who is coming from an "absolute morality" world view. So perhaps I will refrain from making such an argument, and instead find some common ground. We both applaud those who hold onto to their moral compass in the face of adversity. We both delight in the baby's cooing. We both enjoy the changing of the seasons and the beauty of this amazing world we share. We both stand in awe at an elderly couple who have held onto their love of each other through thick and thin. We both cry when we hear of those who have died in war. We both know something of the suffering of human beings. We both can learn to not take ourselves so seriously. We both can learn to laugh at ourselves.We both can learn to love when it is difficult to love. Perhaps we can even learn to love each other. [4564]

A Walk in the Woods

Day 26, Year 0000 NE 1430

Today I took a meditative walk in the woods. There was a light mist. The temperature was just a little cool. The canopy above was enough of an umbrella to keep out all but the most stubborn of rain drops. I walked slowly. I could smell the fecund ground covered with the autumn leaves that had already fallen on the trail, and the misty air.

I walked slowly and listened for sounds. There were no automobile sounds in the distance. I could just as well be in a place devoid of humans. Just when I felt the silence, it was broken by a fussing squirrel. I looked up and saw an harassing black bird fly away. The squirrel fussed a little more and was silent. Yet there was still a sound I could barely hear. There was slight movement in the trees and the foliage underneath. It was a slight sound, hardly noticeable but for the overall silence. It was the sound of the air itself moving ever so gently.

My breathing slowed as I took it all in. I could feel my feet touching the earth as I walked. The mind tries to fill in with chatter. I was aware of this and let it go. Next the body kicks in demanding attention. There is a slight uncomfortableness in the right shoe. There is a hint of gas in the gut. My balance isn't perfect. I let it all go as well.

I stop and stand still and look around. There are tree branches lying just over there that are telling me something. The way the branches are lying is communicating some crucially important message, but my mind cannot grasp it. I walk on a little further. There is a slight incline and I realize I am climbing ever so gently up. I notice another tree branch with a totally different message, equally ungraspable. It is time for another squirrel fuss, but this time I do not see the target of the chatter. Perhaps I am the target.

I breathe deeply and allow it all to enter into me. The path turns into steps, with wood carefully placed there to aid the traveler with each step. The steps are not uniform. Sometimes I have to take a long stride for each step, other times a short one. Sometimes my feet touch the ground twice in order to complete the step. I realize that I am involved in an ascension process and I am eager to continue. I reach the top and decide to descend. This is my life. Ascending and descending. Or perhaps the descending came first and the ascending second.

Finally, I am traveling light and full of hope. [4292]

Barbara With: Imagining Einstein

11:26 a.m. Day 5, Year 0000 NE.
I just have to add a postnote. I had the opportunity at the Quantum Leap to experience Barbara With. She recently published a book entitled Imagining Einstein. She is an amazing singer and she channeled Albert Einstein in Taos. I was in tears. These were tears of joy and hope for humanity. I would strongly recommend that everyone purchase her book. You can do so from her website: www.barbarawith.com. [4099]

First Entry in the New Energy

Date: Day 5, year 0000 NE (New Energy) 11:20 a.m. Central Time

I was unable to post after Monday the 17th due to being so caught up in the new energy and a certain sort of exhaustion. I am back in Iowa now and will share a few things. The New Energy really has a very different feeling to it than I have been used to. We are so used to the way energy works as a sort of push and pull. Everything is based on some kind of conflict. We tend to work at doing stuff. We reach for things into our life. We feel the tension of things and we react to it. We are constantly evaluating and judging whether things are good for us or bad for us, whether this person is going to help us or hurt us, whether this potential experience will be satisfying or unsatisfying for us and for others we care about. We do not think much about this as the overlays are so strong we just see this as our reality. How else could one interact with the world?

The new energy enters in a way that literally cannot be described. It simply is. It has no polarity to it. There is no tug or pull. There is no good or bad about it. It is pure potential. So how do I know I am not imagining it? Well I guess I am imagining it. It is about opening up my imagination, expanding my self in all directions, not just in this reality but in all dimensions and in all places throughout the Multiverse.

Trust in self is all important in this new way of being. Accepting all that is without judgment. Allowing in my deep breathe that which I choose to be in my life.

We are all creators. I am God also. You are God also. It is possible to claim my divinity while staying firmly grounded without judgment in my humanity. And I do mean every aspect of this human being that is me. Every single choice I have made. All the pain I have created as well as all the joy I have created. All the times I have done things that I judge to be miserable failures. Accepting those choices with love and without that judgment. It is how I got to this day. This moment is the moment I am in. I can breathe in this moment and bring in whatever potentials I choose to bring in. I can let go of whatever I no longer choose to have in my life. If I am tired of lack, if I am as Bill Cosby said "We weren't poor; we were broke," then I can bring in abundance. I might start with noticing the abundance of air that I have to breathe, the abundance of sunshine or rain. The abundance of people around me who perhaps love me. When a judgment or doubt or obstacle makes an appearance, I can totally embrace that energy for what it is. I do not have to deny it or pretend it isn't there and try to be positive. I can accept it and feel its energy and release it whenever I so choose. Perhaps I want to dwell around in it for awhile so that I can feel its full expression. Perhaps I want to feel depressed and negative for a day or a week or a month. I can experience it fully and accept it fully until I am ready to choose to release it. Whenever I am ready to do so, it will move back into "all that is" and return to the store of potentials.

We have stuff that we have been accumulating all our lives, and I would add, all our many past lives as well. If it takes a few years to choose to release some of it, then so be it. There is no time table. And I am not responsible for releasing anyone else's stuff. I cannot do so even if I wanted to. Perhaps I can be of some assistance for those who are ready, but there is no way I can do this work for any other person on the planet. If I try, then I am allowing them to feed off of my energy and in fact I am feeding off of theirs as well. The feeding creates drama, and the energies get to move around and play and create havoc as they do so. This is all OK as well. I am choosing however to step away from the drama and to allow the new potentials to enter my life. I am beginning to choose for myself, what I want to experience, what I want to surround myself with.

This is actually very simple, so simple it sounds silly to the mind. The mind could argue that what I am saying is nonsense. My mind loves the scientific method and this sort of experience cannot be tested using the scientific method. So it cannot be proven true or false. Perhaps that is a limitation, or perhaps it is possible to discover something that is not subject to the limitations of the scientific method. I have a strong love for my family. This love is not subject to the scientific method, and yet it is a very powerful influence in my life. I know this. I feel this. I cannot prove this. The new energy of which I am speaking is perhaps like that love. But it doesn't have the charge that my love for my family has. It is without charge. It simply is and I suspect it is much more powerful than we can imagine. [4097]

Taos: Last Entry of the Old Energy

9/17/07: 10:48 p.m. Mountain Time

The train has pulled into the Quantum Leap station. Twenty two chimes rang and with each chime, we let go of those issues/aspects that we chose not to carry with us into the New Energy. With each chime, we chose which aspects we will take with us into the New Energy. We are, of course, totally free to choose. Amir and Gerhard played guitar and drums and their music brought in the New Energy. We absorbed it completely into our bodies. We danced. We swayed. We felt it surging into our whole beings. From there it formed an envelope of power, and it erupted into the Universe. The New Energy is emanating from this little town of Taos, this powerfully historical town, right now. It will reach every being on this planet. It will stretch out in every dimension, through all the realms. It creates potentials for every being. These potentials are new; they never existed before anywhere in the Multiverse. The number and quality of those potentials are so great, it is limitless. We are all free to breathe deeply and to embrace any of these new potentials. Life on this planet will change. We will look back and remember that something shifted about this time. We will begin to think things, feel things, do things, experience things, that have never before been thought, felt, done, or experienced. And so it is. Welcome! [4052]

Taos Log: first entry

9/16/07: 8:39 p.m. Mountain Time:

All day journey from western Iowa to Taos New Mexico. Up at 6:00 a.m., breakfast and goodbyes, drive to Omaha Nebraska and do all the stuff one does prior to getting on an airplane. Who says one person can't make a difference? It was that one dude with the explosives in his shoes that created the energy that now means every person getting on a plane in this country gets to take off his or her shoes. I actually bought a $3 Godiva chocolate bar, and it wasn't very big either, but it was very good! Fly to Dallas and then on to Albuquerque. Meet up with friend and then drive to Taos. We took the scenic route and it took us almost four hours to do it. And it was gorgeous! The mountains and the rocks and trees and colors! Lots of interesting conversation. We talked a lot about trees as we have both worked with trees and have some understandings of their energy. A couple of cell phone calls from my partner and my daughter. We arrive and the energy of the guy at the front desk was wonderful. The guests are all friendly as we are all here to celebrate the Quantum Leap. (Link)

9/17/07 12:10 p.m.
We had the morning free. I woke up around 6:30 so it was too late to call my daughter who wanted to talk to me before school, as it is an hour later in Iowa. She left six messages on my cell phone. Now that she has her own cell phone it is easier for her to call. It was drizzling this morning. Since I had a rental car I decided to drive and find a grocery store. There are mountains in the distance and the color is very hard to describe. I guess I would have to say it was a gray-blue, but the thing is, it keeps changing shade subtly as I watch it. There was one moment when I couldn’t hardly tell the boundary between the mountain and the clouds which were almost the same color, perhaps a slight shade lighter. I stopped at Walmart and got a case of water, then to a grocery store for peanut butter, fresh bread, fresh fruit, one of those salads with the little package of salad dressing inside the bag, yogurt, and a couple of Amy’s frozen dinners. Then I stopped at a Dollar Store to buy a fork, spoon and knife. There is a refrigerator and a microwave in my room. I really want to have my own food for lunches rather than spend $12 to $15. The conference is only a hundred yards from my hotel so, after my journey, I went over and registered. I was greeted by one of the organizers with a big hug and welcome. It was so delightful. While at Walmart I did buy a little bottle of finger nail polish (Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear.) The shade is Hot Magenta. Hardly subtle. I painted my fingernails and toenails as I am wearing sandals. It doesn’t match my outfit but I am a bit new at this. I had some great conversations with several people already and the first gathering is at 1:30. (4039)

9/17/07: 6:41 p.m.
Today we had a channel from Tobias spoken through Geoffrey Hoppe. He spoke of the long journey we have taken together on the “Old Energy Train” and that the train is about to move into the New Energy train station. This journey started when we first decided to come to Earth and we have all had many lifetimes together with many adventures, many joys and many sorrows. He spoke of several major shifts in the past including one during the time of Lemuria and another during the time of Atlanta. Another happened around 63 BC and of course a major one 2000 years ago when Jesua arrived. He mentioned the early 1500’s and then the late 1800’s with the Industrial Revolution. The 60’s and 70’s was a time of expansion of the mind. The last ten years or so have been the hardest in some ways, as we have pushed ourselves to be ready for the next major shift in consciousness, and now we are about to embark on an adventure that has never been done before. He told us we can wait in the train station as long as we want, or we can jump on the next train, except it isn’t going to be a train. It is being invented as we speak by all of us involved in this process. Neither he nor any of the other angelic entities know where we are going or how we are going to get there. He calls it the New Energy but hasn’t defined it simply because we are all creating it together. One cannot easily talk about something that has never before been. He assures us that he and St. Germaine and the other angelic beings who have been working with us will be coming. We will embark together on this journey and we know not where we are going and we know not how we will get there. Sounds a bit crazy, doesn’t it? It is not a journey of the mind or even of the heart. It is a journey of all of who we are, of our whole complete divine and human nature united. Yes, it may be said that I too am crazy, because I actually believe this stuff. I feel it in a very deep part of my self. I am signing up for the journey! (4050)