The Shadows on the Wall of Plato's Retreat.

If you knew what was really going on behind the veil of appearances; if we knew what reality was as opposed to the perception of reality, it would be easy to assume that the world was insane. As insane as this world may be, it is possible to live in a state of sanity amidst; a place where what happens is different from what usually happens. Things may burn and melt, crumble and explode on the usual level but blossom into flowers on another; a bar fight may take on the appearance of a dance and a war become the shifting of a dragon in his sleep.

Until recently I took a few things personally that I didn’t understand essentially. I looked at the world and saw things that were wrong; that looked wrong to me. I lent my voice to the force of changing them, often in a shrill and cumbersome language. I thought my part in being a soldier fighting the good fight was to draw attention to inequities and inconsistencies and to point the finger of shame at the robbers, reavers and rapists of the world. It may have just added to the noise on the highway.

As I have more and more been able to turn the focus of my efforts upon myself, I have come to see more clearly the value of certain tactics over others. I note that in this most dangerous of all traffic zones in Europe that I seldom see what others tell me is constant. I’ve noticed the absence of all manner of annoyances that I have been told are here and there; I don’t encounter them.

I’m thinking that if you or I or anyone were to want to change the world it wouldn’t make any sense to try unless we could bring about ‘effective’ change. We’d have to be changed ourselves first and then that change would alter the mix automatically; in the specific and in the general.

I like to think myself into the center of the atoms that compose this world and all that is in and on it; into the spaces between these atoms; into all the centers and spaces of the whole. I like to expand and then contain the whole within my certain awareness of it. I like to unite with the integral force that maintains it until there is no difference between it and me. The thing itself is conscious, just as I am. I am conscious of myself in it and it is conscious of me in it as part of everything that it is.

Weaving the hate one perceives with the Love that one feels, you gain both the rose and the nitrogen source needed to feed it. I have discovered in a small way how to use evil instead of opposing it. Any philosophy, discipline or religion that does not contain within itself the seed and the flower of a simple and certain liberation is a pointless exercise. It’s the very masturbation that Onan got slapped down for.

This thing called ‘ageless wisdom’ is called that for a reason. Ecclesiastes and other sources will tell you the same thing. Wisdom doesn’t change. You might say that wisdom is perfect recollection. There isn’t anything new and it is the truth of this that makes all of these ‘so called’ New Age practices seem so bogus to the discerning eye. You are further informed of their bogus nature by the fact that they charge money for them. Not only will the truth set you free, but the truth is free except for the price you pay in experience to discover it.

Successful proponents of the New Age also like to turn themselves into Gods living in splendor attended upon by fools. The same can be said of the traditional marketplaces of religious artifacts and epitaphs someone has convinced you will serve to pay the ferryman. People set themselves up as teachers and create industries built on personalities, when the only important thing is the degree of light shining ‘through’ them and the only thing important about that is the light itself. Real teachers, without personal agendas and possibly without even the personal knowledge of relative values; because they don’t make such distinctions- are much more likely to be defamed because they aren’t part of the big marketplace of deception. Ignorance wars against truth because Truth challenges its survival simply by existing. Ignorance has no effect on the Truth but it can affect the collective mind that fears its own individual exposures. Ironically, everyone stands naked at all times; however they may believe otherwise or speak against the evidence of their senses- until some innocent points it out, like in The Emperors New Clothes.

It’s certain that you can’t appreciate the act of getting clean until you have rolled in the mud. The wages of every promiscuous excess follow on the heels of the action. The results of jumping off a cliff can be logically reasoned or intuitively grasped. One doesn’t always see the cliff in fact. Some of our constant activities are so cloaked in a collective misinterpretation that we think the dead moths at out feet are scattering leaves.

The benefits of abstinence over excess are more problematic. The draconian mind of forced dogma-fed justification brings on the Inquisitions and witch-burnings, The Crusades and the crucifixions. Common excess coarsens ones nature and yet one is told if he were to persist in it he may become wise. Misdirected abstinence leads into terrible confinement and horrible crime.

We hear about The Whore of Babylon and The Beast and The False Prophet; of which there are many variations on a common theme. We don’t seem to understand these things in real time. Even with the presence of obvious deception on all sides, the greater body chooses to be deceived. What is is made to appear as what is not. What is not is made to appear as what is.

I can’t know of course, but I assume that everyone who has found the fountain has become a spout. Given the exhilarating massage and radiant, transformative consistency of such a state, it seems likely that such persons would have little use for trappings and possessions, or much of anything. It seems likely that such persons would usually be quite private except where destiny has chosen them to be a showpiece. Given the nature of the thing itself, it stands to reason that whoever has encountered it would be compelled to give it away; the waters of spirit freely given, so to speak.

Given that there is a priceless matter that can be apprehended and shared, it stands to reason that everything else would be of no matter beside it. It stands to reason that it would also stand in direct contradiction to the world and would be mocked and trampled were it not so well hid and protected. It also stands to reason that since such a priceless matter does exist that merchants everywhere would proclaim their possession of it and picture it with a buxom scantily dressed lady sitting atop it. It would be beaded with condensation as it would glow with warmth. It would be both fast and luxuriously slow. It would be all the things that it is not. It would be the constant companion of the rich and the powerful and it would be the object of infinite value sought by all. But it freely runs in the gutters, is vibrant in the air, is everywhere and nowhere and is certainly not the product or possession of merchants, the rich or the powerful.

Whoever has it, or knows of it; knows what it is, even if it appears at some small distance yet. Whoever has it possesses both wealth and power unequalled in this world and would certainly have no need of anything else. They might live well. They might enjoy all manner of things in passing, but pass they would. It’s not all that hard to tell the difference between the shadow and the light.


P.S. I know I am behind on my emails- I'm surprised I got this up today since I composed it outside of my usual morning routine...just a tad busy right now. Hang in there and I will get to you all in the next 24. Warmest of Regards.