What Does This All Mean?

After all of this
years of working through the web of awakening
I am returned to the place I was when I first sensed the array of others who were themselves awakened.  I say this not as a boast, but as a simple and innocent knowing which I know is true; you can feel the whole of those upon the planet who are awakened.  You can feel through the myriad tangles of issues which merge into clusters like fruit or an emmanation of comon voice or chord.....in one corner, there is this one vast array of issues which create a given chord of sound which isn't even sound....but is an energetic emanation.  Perhaps you think this is silly or misguided.  Back then, I felt a different form to all of it.  It was less focused, more looking outward.   Perhaps that was just as I was doing.  But I think we are all doing it.  All of us awakening, looking in common ways which reflect the Collective Consciousness.  There are eddies and flows which do not strike me as harmonious to my own inner light, but they are nonetheless part of the larger All.  Within what I feel is like a broad net of scintilating light of souls, like a starlit sky, one can see how all lights are themselves connected.  All of life is connected, and those waking up within this matrix are connected.  At that time, a number of years ago, there was merely a feeling of potential. 

Looking back, things have changed.  There has been some kind of a burst within that has released some pressure, but the energy continues to build. Its just like an individual awakening, but on a much larger scale.  As a singular awakening, this energy builds until it breaks through one cognative barrier and brings the light of awareness.  A karmic thread is erased, the matrix begins to collapse.  But this is being done incrementally as it is happening in time as well as outside of it.  We are now building into a place where a broader awakening is occurring.  This will be a far larger wave than any before it.  How it manifests, I do not pretend to know, but I can sense within it, that it has changed a great deal in quality and size.  There are more here within it....shining their awareness outward in a way that they had not before.  These were those who had yet to awaken those few years ago....a sense I had of a pressure building.  the pressure was building within them....and once the pressure got sufficient in size, a whole number of people across the planet, no doubt, began to awaken.  Still more are awakening. 

Right now what I am feeling that is so significant is a much broader based level of awakening....but its not full kundalini....not yet.  These are a group of mostly younger people, a fact that I can feel through the character of their consciousness.  IN this time and place, there is a turn of mind and being that FEELS younger.  I can only go by what my instinct tells me.  These are people in the 20-30 year range, and while they have not yet felt the deeper stirring of kundalini, they are on the forward edge of it, are aware that there IS a matrix of sorts, that they have been living within it, and are living lives that are increasingly not the status quo.  They are still working and doing the things that they had always done, that they had gone to school for, but they know about awakenings, many of them, and many now understand that the matrix is a collection of old attitudes, efforts to control, and instead of buying what is being sold to them, they are now very rapidly coming to the sense that their own desire for compassion is being used for an entirely different purpose.  Since much of the matrix is based in institutional forms where individuals are brought into a unity, such as countries and philosophies, this has become a way to gather many individuals into one larger force to call for change.  The problem though is that the change being brought, these people are realizing, is NOT the kind of change THEY want. This will, I suspect, result in something very positive....it FEELS like this will result in people simply not going along with the status quo, and will in fact seek remedies for this wrong-action. What will happen, they will soon find, is that the system will NOT respond to their desire for change, at least not at first.  The old system CANNOT change since it is invested in a specific was of being.....and this is being supported by a very old guard of people still very much on the planet and in positions of power.  The answer will be in changing laws, and this will require having a stronger voice of change than the stronger voice of control.  It will also mean people who cannot be bought or put in the pocket of large corporate interests.  Already those who are not bought and sold who are active are side lined by the process.  This will only serve to sow seeds of knowing in those watching.  This is spreading, not like wildfire, but rather rapidly as each election cycle brings a more obvious awareness of what is at work.  It will reach a point where it doesn't matter if there is a conspiracy to hijack governmental institutions; these institutions simply no longer work for people and their growing need for freedom. 

There will be a great deal of frustration until these new minds realize the only way to change is form the inside out.  Some will enter into political life, others will infest the very institutions that have brought and still bring the control mentality.  Much of this will be peaceful, but there will be anger on the street.  In fact, I suspect that there will be a growing tide of anger that will come to be seen as a kind of rebelliousness.  I also think that governments are now at a point where they have prepared for this, knowing that where they were going in all of this was still more control and erosions of personal liberty and freedom....and the natural reaction would be anger and taking to the streets. But as all of this happens, the growing tide of awakening suggests a better way, a more peaceful way. 

People are waking up to the hoaxes that are being put out, and these people are not asleep, they are engaged, and will soon enough become more invested in their situation here now.  I suspect that what I feel are a group of people who are not invested in homes....they do not have a lot holding them down financially....and this is creating a feeling of devil may care.  They are more free to work for freedom than at any time in their lives.  I am not sure that any of this even needs to be a loud and angry event, but will more than likely express itself in being more aware of events AS THEY HAPPEN and realize what the agenda is for these large institutions. What I sense is a growing awareness....not a paranoid sense, but merely the result of having lived around it for so long.  What took some people years to question about 9/11 is now happening within days of things like the Kony effort, which now looks like a staged event to get people contributing money and allegiance to go in and catch someone in a country that just happens to have oil wealth and one of the largest cobalt mines in the world.  Mineral wealth.  Then suddenly the other invasions make more sense. 

This suggests some very positive thing to me.  It suggests to me that awakenings will continue to grow.  Some may not fully manifest as awakenings but may mean throwing off the lies told to them, seeing them for what they are.  Increasingly, the tables feel like they might be turning.  This is not an overnight thing....but is spreading.  And its very very hopeful.

Just as awakening begins to collapse the old matrix of beliefs within the individual, so too is there a larger collapse of the worldwide matrix....which is merely a series of beliefs and ways of being that have prevailed for a very long time.  These are showing signs of growing stale and old and people are no longer buying them.  All of this is not happening because the information war is being won by the alternative media that is on the internet, but because, more than anything, peoples tolerance for BS is wearing thin.  If the government were to stage a false flag event and no one came, how effective would it be?  It would be entirely NOT effective because in order for something to work, there has to be eyes on the screens listening and lapping it all up.  I sense this is not happening like it used to.  More and more, a rising tide of wiser souls is coming online.  All of this is going to take some time, but already the tide of energy has changed.  As more and more learn how to handle awakenings, it further burgeons still more awakenings in others.  As if by some ancient order, we are each being called by name to step into this current...almost as if this were happening in a very specific order....first me, then you, then that person over there....then that one and......

....and in this way, the saints go marching in. 

I look forward to taking another look in another year to see how the field has changed....and perhaps by then, events in the world will have developed in entirely unexpected ways....especially for those who serve the rapidly collapsing matrix of old karma and attachment to things that really are rapidly becoming outmoded and highly questionable ways of finding greater fulfillment...

Particle/Wave Duality

I don’t do a lot of reading on other traditions (this is changing as I do read bits an pieces here and there as I write my book) I have spent much of my life keeping away from such sources, and in the midst of what is happening now, that impulse I have had in keeping away from traditions has been made clear now.  It isn’t that I haven’t read up on some of the material, because I have.  I am writing this book and to some extent I have had to look into other traditions in order to highlight the process of how we can bias ourselves in the midst of awakening, which is itself an effort to continue to winnow the chaff from the wheat.  its not that other traditions are somehow false or incorrect, but that in most traditions bias enters in, and by being AWARE of how this happens, we can use the past as a way for understanding how we in the present can prejudice and blind ourselves to the potential that the moment has for bringing into the moment a new creation.  One of these that I talk about a lot is how we have swept the feminine under the rug.  This isn’t rocket science, and yet it continues in many traditions today because of the blinders that their proponents have.  I am not here to bash, but to winnow.  This is how we resolve into a similar way of understanding ourselves and  that awakened state that is our fundamental being.

As a result of my experience, I have seen how what I have been through applies to the notion of the particle and wave as a kind of image, a way of understanding.  Its simple, and it also can be observed in the physical and spiritual.  It also happens that the realm of the particle tends to be downplayed by many in the eastern traditions and you can see this reflected in westerners who have adopted the teachings and outlook.  However, I think something very important is being glossed over, and it will lead us to a more rapid state of healing if we can move forward in a more unified way within ourselves.  The particle or individual awareness is seen as transitory, while the wave, or “I Am” awareness is not.  This is the big me and little me concept, and the little me is considered to be part of the world of objects, of manifestation, and this is said to be illusion.  I think this is a mistake. As an artist, I know that our expression of our higher self comes about as a result of creation.  At the crossroads of the small and larger self, we can merge in acts of creativity.  The world came into being as the result of a creative act.  Children are born and lives are made possible through a creative act (lovemaking).  We bring our higher self into the moment when we create art….be it music, dance, sculpture, photography, painting, or any number of disciplines or forms of expression.  We also do this in non-art ways.  Its a fundamental part of who we are. And it is this part of us that seems to me to be glossed over by other traditions. In Christianity we are seen as fallen beings, unworthy of the kingdom.  In the Hindu, it is the false self.  This thread of loathing happens in subtle and overt ways, and we wind up missing something important in the process.  By learning to bring ourselves into a unity, we can utilize the maurity present in the wave to reform the particle self which some would say is transitory and only here when we are alive.  It misses the fact that each self created goes on to live and be beyond this life.  It also misses that the fundamental nature of consciousness is to create.  We can’t help but do it.  We actually experience incredible bliss when we create.  When we get great ideas, we feel a high.  When we are in the grooove and creating something new, we feel this bliss, even if its for a moment.  Artists live for this state, and they often describe them as “epiphanies” wherein they feel at once-ness with the world.  Time drops away as their hands make the shuttle fly or the paintbrush move.  The small and large self sync up and work together in a way that creates.  When we make love, we are filled with a delicious energy that can be released throughout our entire being, from body all the way to the tip top and outermost realms of our awareness.  Its electric and alive, and if you go through awakening its as though this seemingly transitory orgasmic energy becomes anchored in you as you teeter on the edge of its orgasmic potential in each and every moment that you are able to ride the wave that catapults your particle self and wave form self into a unity.

Much of this is what I cover in my book.  I think its important, and it doesn’t get talked about.  Being able to remove the things withing the smaller particle self in order that it can better rest atop the crest of the wave of divine potential is everything that my own experience is about.  At each step of the way I do not become some purer and purer being.  I become more aware of the tides, the winds, the passionate interplay of cosmic energy through all form, through the universe.  I can feel myself literally vibrate in bliss as I feel myself aware that it can be anywhere it wishes, can do whatever it wishes and yet, it is also here, experiencing what “I” am experiencing in this moment as I learn how to become untangled from those things that limit my experience of the bliss.  I feel the stag in rut, the ox pulling the plow, drenched in pure sexual energy as its seemingly lower nature is being harnessed by the higher self, the ploughman, to direct that powerful energy toward good…toward something meaningful and creative.  Maybe its tilling crops, maybe its creating a powerful art work, or an idea that will change how we do things technologically, or it might be unto itself as simply that powerful bliss felt in the moment, not needing to do anything but to simply BE this blissfield of masculine in the most ancient of dances.

As we learn how to heal, we will make a better place here, for as seemingly inconsequential as here might seem to some, for as illusory as here is, it still will hold a given vibration and stay there until we release those layers that we all hold.  As you and I and everyone else awake begins to shed those layers, we have a very real effect upon the rest of humankind.  I will say that it leads to more awakenings in others.  Seemingly invisible triggers or thresholds are passed and our awakening burgeons those of others.  It does so because we are all connected.  From the inside out this happens.  So as you shift and move and change, it also shifts the world of things inwardly.  Its as though your stuff, your karma, is a bag packed into a luggage hold in a giant ship. You remove that baggage or shift it in some way, and it might cause others to tumble down the giant pile.  It might only be a small change, but it affects the All.  As more and more do this, the whole picture changes.  Little wonder that awakenings now are becoming so much more commonplace. I think its a fabulous time to be alive.  A real corner stone events!  And to this end, we all can help each other with our own perspective.  We can all aid in spreading love and compassion, the bliss field that we are each experiencing and unfolding within.  And as we do this, we realize that all of this is a creation subject to FREE WILL.  Creation is itself a choice.  This is where the individual comes in.  This is not just nothing.  Its about learning about the consequences of our choices.  We could have wiped ourselves of the map with nuclear bombs.  Somehow, we have managed NOT to do that.  This was the result of many choices made over time.  As we evolve, still greater challenges emerge and we have to grapple with how we are going to deal with them.  What about GMO seeds and this whole problem of gene splicing that is entering so hot and heavy?  Will we allow this to go forward in a way that it threatens the integrity of the life forms that have evolved slowly over time in a dynamic system that has had millions of years tied up in it instead of a few years’ worth of pride and avarice attached?  Its all creative.  And in your own life there are choices made that have ripple effects, and what it is in you that leads you to those choices can also lead you to those parts that have blinders on, or that creates in a way that is less aware of the larger implications.  And it just might be that some unresolved hurt in your field simply limits your feeling that bliss in a clearer and more direct way.  This lead to the alchemy of the self, and I hope that I can be of some assistance in this regard.

Nemasté

©Parker Stafford

Coping With Kundalini II

With kundalini, you soon see how everything is connected.  You feel it.  You might even feel yourself becoming it.  The physical body is caught up in this trans-formative process, and there are some very physical things you can do to make its presence in your body easier to deal with.
I think that it depends on where you are in your process.  I lived with kundalini for about four years before things began to get difficult.  I certainly had some difficulty before then, but nothing compared to when I began to question my experience, which led to a deepening of the energy within me and this highlighted the issues within that had lain more dormant as the energy seemed to have a place to reside, but was, I think, coming up against strong internal resistance on my part, albeit subconscious in many ways, against its going deeper.  When I began to work on loosening blocks in a much more conscious way, life became very difficult because the inrush of kundalini through all these knots made things very painful.  I think its possible to live with kundalini but have its energy only go so far.  Its as though it wont go where it is not welcomed, and while some would see the coming of kundalini as nothing they ever asked for, it is my feeling that on a deeper level it was most certainly bidden.  I know that when I ask the energy to come on stronger in order to do some work, it does.  Sometimes it feels like it is kicking my behind, but I know that this pain or difficulty is merely lack of alignment to its perfect energy. I know that I did not have the trouble with adrenaline until I began working to remove blocks.  Only then did adrenaline rev up like nobodies business.  The effect that this has on the adrenals and kidneys is very real.  Some can suffer adrenal burn-out, and having adrenaline pumping through you in this way can be very wearing on the body.  This can be part of the trial by “fire” that many talk about.
 
To this end, there are things you can do to help support your body during this time.  One of these is simple, but very useful.  Its exercise.  During some of the hardest times with this, I had a bicycle that I would ride.  My bike is a mountain bike, so I took it off-road and rode up and down grassy hills around parks and in natural locations.  Instead of feeling totally jazzed, I felt a measure of peace after these rides.

One thing that was pointed out to me by a friend who had lived with kundalini her whole life and who was educated in eastern practices, was how the eastern cultures tend to have an alkalizing diet.  It is in these cultures that there seems to be the greatest awareness off and perhaps incidence of awakenings.  Is it possible that the by products of adrenaline,the fight or flight end of our experience, creates compounds in the body that serve to keep it in a frightened state?  A kind of chemical reminder that we are still very much swimming in the chemical soup of fear and the shadow side of ourselves?  Alkalizing the body serves to actually change the body from acid to alkaline.  Its totally unintuitive, but the results are that it does.  One way that I introduced this into my day to day regimen was to put two teaspoons of organic apple cider vinegar in water.  I eventually got to a place where I would just quaff a tablespoon of it straight with a good dose of water to chase it down. I tried to do this twice a day.  Another way would be to use lemon juice.  You can also make sure that you eat salads that have vinegar in them as well.  One things you will need to watch is how it might effect your digestion.  Normally stomach acid is very strong, but in some people who have problems with acid reflux, making sure you don’t aggravate your condition with the addition of more acid could be something worth considering.  The other side of this was how to help the kidneys, because it is the kidneys that are involved in the production of adrenaline.  One very good tonic is organic wild cherry juice.  It can be had as a concentrate added in the same way to water as the vinegar.  Take a few times each week, it is supposed to help support the kidneys.  At the core of this, though, is learning how to deal with adrenaline.

I am of the opinion that the reason why the adrenaline is there in the first place is because of an unresolved issue concerning fear.  Kundalini highlights this and builds on it in a kind of unmerciful way where everything is put under the spot light so WE SEE IT instead of just shoving it down.  We may not even know WHY we are shuddering from the adrenaline and having such a hard time of it, but I do believe that the whole purpose of the adrenaline syndrome is to learn how to transform or transmute it in the body.  This is huge.   HUGE.  Being able to figure out intuitively how to change this set up in your body, this end of the chemistry is a form of spiritual alchemy.  We can analyze it all we want, but ultimately it requires an ability to gain some control over our bodies and how they react to this chemistry.  Adrenaline, I suspect, is only part of the story.  In fact, I believe that my bliss is not simply a dopamine/serotonin cycle but a cycle of adrenaline as well.  Adrenaline mixed with dopamine gives me the “high” that feels perfect with kundalini.  I also suspect that most addictions to opiates (which are dopamine mimics) and to speedy drugs like cocaine and amphetamines (which mimics the adrenaline) are the inner yearnings we have towards trying to find a balance of them in our bodies, a subconscious effort to bring about a balancing of them, and thus a craving for them.  I think this MIGHT work in the beginning of using such outside forms of the chemistry, but it quickly devolves as it almost always does with addiction into something that wrecks health and life.  We recognize this chemistry, but learning how to foster it in our bodies is the trick. Its very much like learning how to ride a surf board.  Not too much forward, not too much back.  You have to be in balance on this mighty wave.  Its a kind of way, very hard at first, for finding that balance point where through feeling (feelings are the catalyst for all our chemistry internally I feel), we are able to steer our own vessels into waters that were entirely unknown before all of this took place.

So exercise.  In my case, I tried to really get my heart rate up.  It felt good to do this.  It has a way of washing away all of my concerns and plants me in the moment. Its also very good for you!
Movement is something I am dealing with in my book that has the same title as this blog, and in it I have observed through numerous traditions that movement, even ecstatic movement, serves an important function in the physiological connection to the effects that trauma has on the body.  As you awaken, I am sure you have discovered a whole new sense of sensing energy.  Things are much more apparent in this way, and you feel through the energy body to the point where you can feel others around you energetically.  You feel patterns of past trauma in others as energetic patterns that can be translated into etheric pain that gets referred to the body as well.  This is where extreme stomach tightness can occur, headaches, and pain in the heart or just about any other part of the body.  As a result, you can become more acutely aware of those issues you have in your own etheric body and which have become lodged also in your physical body since the etheric and physical feed perfectly into one another.  When I say “etheric” I mean energetic….and not simply the physical mirrors of this energy that express as our physical chemistry which I believe are themselves mirror of how we feel and are inside. But since all of this is connected, the body follows in lock step with the rest of the systems that its a part of.  Emotions certainly are lodged in certain energetic crossroads or funnels for cosmic energy.  We call these chakras. In each of these there is a slightly different expression of energy, much like how a rainbow is the result of all colors in visible light scattered through the use of a prism.

When I first began to do more conscious energy work, I was told that there was someone in my community who was an expert in his field that would be able to help me with my energetic blocks.  This was suggested to me by the gifted intuitive Alison Neville whose ability to “cold read” is amazing for how accurate she is in her work.  She told me as she read all of this that there was someone I needed to look for, she could read his energy but she explained it could be either male or female.  I would be looking for someone who had, as she explained “old man” energy.  This could have been a woman who had this kind of energy, but it could also be a man.  Whoever it was, this person was close and would be of help.

The very next day I was talking to a client who was having me make a hanging device for a piece of glass I had made that she bought out of a show I had had the year previous.  As we talked about this, she mentioned how she was doing energy work.  My ears pricked up, but knowing this lady, there wasn’t much about her that seemed masculine.  She had had a life changing event in her life that moved her towards doing body work, massage, and even hypnosis.  I would come to find much later that this event was a kundalini awakening.   At the time, though, she said nothing about this and then went on to mention as a final note to our conversation that she was attending a local Qi Gung (also spelled Qi Gong) class that was held just a block or two from my home.  She explained it was being taught by a fabulous guy who was a Naturopath, who had written one of the most complete and authoritative text books on the subject, and as part of his knowledge, had also gone to China to study Qi Gung as well.  As I listened, more and more, this “little man” who was middle aged but still fairly young, was sounding more and more like a possibility.

When I went to the next class that was held, I saw a little man who had a calmness and quiet to his demeanor. If there was a guy who fit the bill, this was it!  I followed along as we went through a whole series of moves in that first class.  For those unfamiliar with the discipline, Qi Gung is a form of movement that is a little like Thai Chi, but is a little more physical.  It means “energy work” and while very low impact, it does work the body but does so in order to not expend too much energy, but to help move and tone the energy body.  When in that first class, Robin, the teacher, explained how this type of work could be used to remove old knots and blocks. A light went off in my head.

Following the class something unexpected happened.  I thought maybe I might feel lighter, or some hitherto as yet known state of being might emerge.  I actually began to feel a greater sense of anxiety, a blanket of dis-ease came on, and I felt myself getting clammy.  I could feel a pressure in my head.  I didn’t feel all here.  I wondered if what I was doing was even good for me.  Alison would later explain that this is not to be unexpected.  This only meant that the movement was working, but I had a backlog of material that was being moved and this was creating some anxiety. This only meant it was working in a powerful way. 

I continued dutifully going to Qi Gong class.  I felt like all kinds of muck was being stirred up.  Adrenaline began to move very powerfully at a later stage in all of this, and I felt a little out of kilter sometimes.  My sense was that it WAS working, and it was during this time that I had some of the greatest changes in the way I felt.  I felt that this was the cure that would stir a feeling of sickness before the troubled energy would loosen within me.  Over time I found myself feeling much better, and through a series of events that took place that involved inner guidance, I had even greater movements of junk out of me.  One of these involved what I know to be an ancient angelic being who told me his name and explained he was a “seraphim” which I later learned through research, was a type of old Judaic angel.  Reaching into my heart center, he pulled something out of me that resulted in my feeling completely different.  in an odd turn of events, I would stumble across a nearly identical account by an early Christian saint from Europe.  All of this is described in the book and helps to underline the nature of energy as seemingly not solid but containing a very real, almost “concrete” identity.  Some of these patterns can remain in our bodies long past their due date.  Having them removed seems to be something that we are not adept at doing ourselves, but that through such methods as Qi Gung and ecstatic movement, can help stir the pot and allow these things to fall away naturally.
The now long lost Shakers who were a branch of the Quakers, learned to reach ecstatic states through a particular type of movement.  Animals utilize movement in response to trauma, and there are cases where before someone is healed of an old trauma, they go into a shaking fit.  I have been very lucky to have literally stumbled across incidents in books I was drawn to but didn’t know why.  In them, in an isolated paragraph not having anything to do with the role of movement in healing would be an account that the author felt he needed to share about how someone was healed of some past trauma from childhood.  Even the author himself didn’t make the connection, but the universe certainly made sure I saw the connection by bringing the very page I needed to see one night as I flipped through the book and opened it to the very page which I am relating to you now.  Interesting, too, since I was going to take the book back to the library because it hadn’t contained the information that I thought it might have, another “oops” in the life of someone lifting books from shelves in a somewhat random way.    While it all seems accidental, I have had so many of these accidents that I know that it has been an extremely effective way for me to do research, albeit one where I do not have to pour through books in order to find a given passage.  I just flip through, not realizing what is about to come.
And this, for as anecdotal as it might seem, helps to underscore a phenomenon many who are having awakenings will experience, and its something that you can utilize in your own life if you are willing to be open to the possibility, which is that the universe will bring you what you need.  A gifted intuitive might tell you about someone you have to find in your community in order to begin doing this important work only to have a friend call about something not even related and wind up talking about the very person who was mentioned just the day before.  You might begin to wonder how YOU can move through some aspect of this experience that might be causing your trouble only to chance upon a blog, or book, or a random conversation that leads to a friend giving you the phone number of someone who is suppose to be putting you in touch with a business resource, say, but who, in talking to them, happens to mention something that puts you in touch with a resource you might not have otherwise found that helps you with kundalini.  Or even some other aspect of your life…..

I am a firm experiencer of  "as you seek, so shall you find." Doors will be opened to you as you ask for them in the right way.  Believing in the possibility but not dwelling on it or anticipating their happening has always been the best key to their happening. In this way, they feel entirely effortless, and this is I think the whole point. Things can be much easier if you let them. If something is tripping you up, maybe some pain in your field is resulting in fear or hurt.  Maybe through movement or a simple act of forgiveness, you allow some long lost issue to simply drop away, one that had gone past its due date.  And as it does, the hurt resolves into its opposite, which is joy.  And love.  Being able to do this kind of work for ourselves is a profound act of love towards the self, the soul.  it seeks to make YOU right before trying to make the world right. Since the world IS inside of you, getting better inside you is a fabulous and very healthy way to find authentic happiness and fulfillment.

I hope you find the magic that is your own soul peering back at you through these marvelous events that are great gifts!

The Feminine Spirit (book excerpt)

The following is an excerpt on the role of the two energies of awakening; masculine and feminine and seeks to point out where even the teachings of Jesus contained them but were largely scrubbed from mainstream texts or were simply left out altogether by their authors because of their chauvinism. 

From Waking The Infinite

When you awaken, you realize the very act of this energy moving through you is this transcendent love, which is the embodiment of the trascendent in you. While I was never church-going or a big fan of Christianity, I understood THIS was what Christ Consciousness was!  Had to be.  I had to discard all those Sunday school notions of purity and piety, though....I don't think they were true....but was replaced with a much more realistic and believable indwelling spirit.  You begin to realize that this was never something outside of you but an integral part of your own experience, and further, is the result of something that is universal amongst all humans, despite religions, caste, or sex.   Further, The Gospel of Philip  points to how it was understood in his day that there was a feminine aspect of the divine and its role in awakening  when he said 

“Some said, "Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit." They are in error. They do not know what they are saying. When did a woman ever conceive by a woman?”

Philip was merely expressing what many already knew, something easy to miss in our current day when reading such a loaded passage as the one I have just shared with you…..which was that the Holy Ghost was known to be the feminine aspect of the divine,  and so the idea of Mary conceiving from a feminine force was absurd, and as Philip correctly contended, an error.  It looks like there  was an effort underway even then to sweep the divine feminine’s own validity under the rug in order to lessen it in the face of this new radical teacher named Jesus.  In our current day the divine feminine has not been swept under the rug but it HAS been masked in the same way that a ghost might be masked or is mysterious to us.  As time has gone by, the feminine aspect of the divine was increasingly set aside, denied or ignored until very few even knew what this anonymous seeming “holy ghost” was all about. We mention the Holy Ghost in rather vague terms.  It is an aspect of the deity, yes, but of what kind?  If God is the father, and Christ the child, then what is the Holy Ghost? Anyone?  Under a paternalistic  banner, the Holy Ghost was subsumed into the paternalistic view and the roots of the feminine were forgotten by many in the mainstream.  
This doesn't change the reality of the masculine and feminine dynamic in our spiritual life.  
The gnostics, long sidelined, knew and even practiced a religion that included both the masculine and feminine traits of the deity. By the time the Nicene Council was called, some of Jesus’ words were shortened to simply include “I am one with the Father.”  And yet, the voices from the past have not been completely silenced.  We have books where Jesus is known to have said he was one with both the Mother and the Father. These documents have come back to us at a perfect time, actually, a time when we are much more ready to move out of centuries of paternalistic control and embrace the larger reality of our spiritual selfhood.  The message, through the Nag Hammadi, which emerged from the sands of Egypt, has been revealed in a time when women have begun to see more and more rights afforded them, in a world slowly but surely coming to grips with issues of egalitarianism.    

In a text by Hippolytus that has suggested that there was a secret teaching of Jesus that he gave to Mary and his other followers, it revealed that the followers of Jesus prayed ‘From Thee, Father, and through Thee, Mother, the two immortal names, Parents of the divine being, and thou, dweller in heaven, humanity, of the mighty name . ..’ (Hippolytus (170-236 AD), Refutationis Omnium Haeresium 5.6). 

Its understandable how such teachings could have been lost.  They were lost because they were stamped out from the beginning.  What has been removed may be difficult for others to reclaim, absent an awakening where the truth becomes manifest within the self in a very simple and clear way. There was a very strong desire to try and demonize Mary, and when I grew up, Mary was considered a prostitute that Jesus turned into a follower.  In truth, Mary was more than that.  She was the wife of Jesus as the older documents, some which predate even the ones chosen to make up the bible, point out explained in various ways such as  “. . . the companion of the [Savior is] Mary Magdalene. [But Christ loved] her more than [all] the disciples and used to kiss her [often] on her [mouth]. The rest of [the disciples were offended by it . . .. They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Savior answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you as [I love her?]” (Gospel of Philip 63.32 - 64.5; Nag Hammadi Library p. 138) 

The Gospel of St. John describes the Holy Ghost as female explaining, "the Spirit of Truth whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Her not, neither knoweth Her; but ye know Her, for she dwelleth with you, and shall be in you."  In the Gospel of the Hebrews, Jesus is quoted as saying "Even so did my Mother, the Holy Spirit, take me by one of my hairs and carry me away to Mt. Tabor. Again, in the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus says, "My mother gave me a body, but my true Mother (the Holy Spirit) gave me life."  Even the early Hebrew Christians, referred to as the Ebionites, described the Holy Ghost as feminine.

In the Apocryphon of John, the author recounts a vision that he has had of Jesus shortly after his crucifixion.  John describes seeing a triadic being in the vision that speaks to him and goes on to recount the encounter of what Jesus’ spirit was saying to him, 'He said to me, "John, Jo[h]n, why do you doubt, and why are you afraid? ... I am the one who [is with you] always. I [am the Father]; I am the Mother; I am the Son."

Sadly, the history of the rising of the feminine in the Christian tradition was met with derisive and often calculated cunning designed to stamp out any suggestion that women were somehow on par with men spiritually. Bishop Irenaeus (ca. 140 - 203 AD) wrote about efforts to include women in the ritual practice of the tradition by taking and active part in them.  Irenaeus goes on to suggest that one man who has given women such a high position in the church must be involved in concocting aphrodisiacs in order to lure them into such practice! Marcus, the man in question, was seducing women into the church, using his powers on women like a sorcerer, bidding them to prophecy, and to be involved in all manner of things that only the men were considered able to do within the newly  formed church. (Irenaeus, Book I, ch. 13, § 1 - 7; Refutationis Omnium Haeresium, )

Sadly, by sowing fear, we play on the worst in people arousing fear and even hatred.  This is how nations are tricked into going to war with other nations, how one sex is caused to be seen as taking the fall for some past deed that explains why things are the way they are (supposedly).  Fear is used.  We must go to war with Iraq because we do not want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.  As we all know, the pretext that Americans were given for invading Iraq was entirely without merit, but the fear card played well in an across the board concerted effort to demonize and galvanize public support.  In the same way have people down through time sought to use these weapons for purposes of propaganda, to turn minds and hearts from their greater natures to a lesser one, one crippled by fear and made little by hatred. 

 The Gnostic teacher Marcellina claimed to be in possession of secret teachings handed down from Jesus to Mary Magdeline, and  if this seems exaggerated, consider that in the Gospel of Mary, shortly after the crucifixion of Jesus, Peter said to Mary, "Sister, we know that the Savior loved you more than the rest of women. Tell us the words of the Savior which you remember - which you know (but) we do not, nor have we heard them." Mary answered and said, "What is hidden from you I will proclaim to you."   So Mary begins to speak to them of the things that Jesus had spoken to her in private.  After hearing this, Andrew says "Say what you (wish to) say about what she has said. I at least do not believe that the Savior said this. For certainly these teachings are strange ideas." Peter then erupts in anger saying “Did he really speak privately with a woman, (and) not openly to us? Are we to turn about and all listen to her? Did he prefer her to us?’ Mary replies to him saying, ‘My brother Peter, what do you think? Do you think that I thought this up myself in my heart, or that I am lying about the Savior?’ Levi, who adds at this point a mediating principle in this interesting exchange says,‘Peter, you have always been hot-tempered. Now I see you contending against the woman like the adversaries. But if the Savior made her worthy, who are you, indeed, to reject her? Surely the Lord knew her very well. That is why he loved her more than us.’ (Gospel of Mary 17.18 - 18.15.). 

In yet another exchange between Peter and Mary, which occurs in the Pistis Sophia, Peter complains that Mary is dominating the conversation with Jesus while taking priority away from Peter and the other male apostles. He urges Jesus to silence her but he is swiftly  refused by Jesus! Mary admits to Jesus later  that she does not dare to speak to him freely because, as she explains ‘Peter makes me hesitate; I am afraid of him, because he hates the female race.” 

            It would seem that even amongst the followers of Jesus, there were tensions and egoistic struggles.  They had trouble believing that Jesus had told Mary all the things that she had expounded upon.  But this is not a singular expression in the texts, though, for Thomas was also taken aside by Jesus and told some things that the other followers were not told, and when he was asked what they were, Thomas deferred, saying that if he were to do that, surely the disciples would stone him to death.  What could have been so radical that Jesus could have told Thomas that he himself would not disclose it to even Jesus’ own followers?  Could it have been the role that both the male and female have in an awakening, what he called the kingdom? Could it have been simple truth that the people of that time simply would have difficulty in hearing?  Could it be the same fear of derision that Irenaeus heaped upon Marcus who included, rather than excluded the role of women in spiritual life?

©Parker Stafford

Coping With Kundalini - 1

One of the things I do is teach art to college students.  I am also a glass artist with his own studio, and in the midst of my own awakening I discovered just how useful creativity was in helping to remove blockages, knots, and all manner of problems that can crop up in the midst of these experiences.
I found that when I let myself go and become more fluid in my conception of new work, I felt better.  Looking back on it, I was helping to balance the yin and yang energy within me, and helping to build a more cooperative sense of self.  As I began to work in this way, I found that I ceased trying to figure it all out and simply felt as though I was being guided.  Sometimes when I just let the accidents happen, amazing things emerged.  Its easy for me to say an accident is just that, but I now know that this is one way for the universe to come rushing in.  We can set up all kinds of cognitive barriers around us without even realizing it.  Since my medium is so fast and fluid, this was perfect for having very sudden changes take place in the moment that might otherwise have to be planned out.  When I stopped trying to control things, something interesting began to emerge.

I began this by working with the concept of embodying the masculine and feminine in my work, to find a way to let those essences flow into being.  I began with focusing on the goddess.  I didn’t make figures out of glass, but I took what I already knew and began doing things I had always wanted to try but never told myself I had time for.  My vessels turned into the body of woman.  Lips, layers, deeper recesses where the great mystery lay.  I graduated the sizes and nested these one into the other.  They had an eroticism, a reference to the female body that expressed, I felt, the sensual flowing nature of that essential part of our experience.  I made them rich in color, mostly all were warm gold-based colors.  When I say gold, I actually mean the metal gold.  All colors in the glass palette are made from metals such as copper, cobalt, manganese, silver, iron, and gold.  Gold in this case creates what we call “rubies” which vary from reddish pinks to purples.  These are rich and warm, wine-like and powerful.  They are not bland colors but can reach incredible depth and sensuality.  These were perfect to begin working in this new way.  Expensive, yes, now that gold is rising in price, but very inviting and fabulous.  I was able to get my vessels to stretch into diamond shapes, no longer mere bowls, they became sculpture.  I didn’t plan too much, but made very simple choices of color and let chance take the lead.  Most was intuitive, and my own skill had to be present in order to make sure each piece was moved into the ballpark of where it needed to be.

About a month after I began working with this idea and seeking to embody it in the moment through feeling, I was approached out of the blue by a local artist to help collaborate on a piece she was making that was a bench….that was actually a sculpture.  In it, she had designed three pillars of wood that was like an upside down funnel, spreading outward from the top, a very masculine form.  Atop this would rest three glass elements that would reach into the sky to bring down cosmic energy, the grace of the All.  These, it was clear, were the feminine portions of the piece.  Womb-like, leaf-like, these served to bring down the universal force so that it might be anchored her on earth.  As I looked at the model for the piece and as we discussed all of this I was amazed at how aligned this artist was with the very same principles I had just a month before begun to work on.  More than this, I probably could not have been able to advertise for this job and have hoped for such an on the mark collaboration.
This, and work like it has hinted at the vast potential surrounding us when we begin to align with our larger purpose.  the Law of Attraction begins to work its magic to bring the most perfect things in with perfect timing.

As I observe the movement of kundalini within me, I know that what facilitates its movement is being more fluid, what I know to be a dynamic balance between masculine and feminine.  We are built, designed, to recognize the counterpart of us, to reach for completion and connectivity.  This is the essence of the experience.  As we can begin to merge these aspects within our own bodies, the light of awakening burns brighter.  We feel more unified, and we are happier.  We are taking the potential that these two energies have and bring them into a creative unity.  This is, I suspect, what some call “sublimation” which is essentially learning how to draw the energy of the bliss upwards through ones awareness ever higher.  I have some real problems with how this “sublimation” is described (partly that its seminal fluid that is pushed up the spine—-sorry—-but no, it just doesn’t work that way!), but I do think that by utilizing the vast potential, we can bring this limitless energy into the moment and create with it.  By keeping the energy moving and strong, the effect is that it works through the knots and hard places within us.  The more we let it flow, the more things will drop away.  Yes, its a kind of therapy I suppose you could say. But instead of meditation or prayers or postures, you are returning to a very fundamental state that is devoid of rules, regulations and even taboos.  The great thing about art is that there ARE no rules.  Perfect!  Since the energy can be so restless, this is perfect for bringing into a creative act.

I used to study what happens when we are creative.  Most people described it as a point where the left and right hemispheres both light up and begin talking to one another.  I think this is perfect because even our own brains seem to mirror the yin/yang of the universe.  One side is rational, another more feeling.  One is more solid and concrete while the other is holistic.  When we can bring both together, there is a flash of inspiration.  Isn’t this the same as the merging of the masculine and feminine energetically?  I think so.  And when I observe this in my students I find some interesting correlations.  When my students seek inspiration, they like to be alone.  This act is a very intimate one, one where they can’t be watched or bothered.  They have to have the freedom to play, to dream, to let that subtle dance within take place.  They don’t know HOW they do it, only that its IN them to do this.  And when they are inspired, it brings with it a bliss and a sense of connectedness.  This is one aspect of union, and it begins with the self.  The act of creativity is an act of union.  It happens when we make great art, or come up with new ideas in science, and it also happens physically when we make babies.
By being willing to carve out some time for yourself to be creative, I think that you will be able to find a way to cope with kundalini.  Being able to stretch yourself outward more, to flow, or perhaps to feel the masculine move more within you if you are very feminine, is a very good way to learn to deal intuitively with this process.  It is an act that is ultimately unifying, an act that helps heal separation of the self and help you to feel more at One.

Music can help change your brain chemistry and electrical output.  For the work I do I have discovered that I like very rhythmic music because it mirrors the rhythm of the turning of the pipe.  It somehow seems to help me get in the groove, lose myself, and find something else flowing into the moment.  It helps me to FEEL more clearly sometimes, more powerfully.  Most, though, it helps me to let go and Be. There is plenty of research that shows that certain rhythms are more conducive to alternate states of consciousness.  You will note that many shamanic traditions use certain cycles of sound that actually help in people moving into dissociated states, or trance states.  These states aren’t where you are no longer present, but where you can be powerfully present but not as engaged in ego and mind as you were before.  Some walls come down as you let yourself become seduced by how wonderful everything feels and the universe can’t help but peek through the edges as you give yourself permission to melt into it.  Knowing what works best for you will be a choice based on simple experience. I find that repetitive music can help, but the music has to change or else it feels….”blaaah” to me.  There has to be some variety in the piece.  It might be that something by Brian Eno, with his solid and nearly unchanging tones can go well with work that takes a long time to produce but also helps to frame a certain state of mind and keep you rooted in the place and state that you desire.  I think it has a lot to do with being able to mirror the music with the piece and what it embodies.  I knew a grad student whose studio was above mine who would listen to the same song literally over and over for hours….months.  He did his entire MFA show to the sounds of Prince’s one song….”I Would Die For You.”  I got why he used the song.  For him, it had all the right energy for helping him to reach the place he needed for his work.  I tended to try to keep a different schedule than him since I had heard enough of that one song.  Luckily he also would use headphones.

I have found that I no longer like to work alone.  I like what can happen in the midst of collaboration.  Each person inspiring the other, each coming up with things that might never have been tried, or considered. One person’s own strengths being augmented by and influenced by the strengths of another.  Its interesting how in the past I could not have done this since I had such a singular way of working.  Now, I find myself so untethered in some ways that I am ready to work in a more collaborative way with the right folks1  In one case, the universe brought me someone who said “create it….I have given you my thoughts, but take it and run with it!”  and so I did.  What marvelous freedom.  Having the right chemistry makes all the difference, which is why letting the universe bring you those people purely by “chance” and serendipity can be so perfect.

It doesn’t need to be art, though.  It can be ANYTHING that you find creative.  People who are system engineers find great creative fulfillment in finding ways to make a plant operate more efficiently, for example.  A mechanic might build a dune buggy, or an electric bicycle, for instance.  It could be that cooking becomes a whole new passion as you discover new flavors and ways of cooking you have never tried before.  Being able to make food that feels good to your evolving palette can be incredibly rewarding.  Might be that you become more sensitive to food additives, or allergic to foods you never were allergic to (both has happened to me since K began to move), and being able to choose the right things that make you feel better when you eat might be perfect all the way around.  Just being able to feed your friends could be the same as making a beautiful painting.  It might be that its more enjoyable when you can cook with others, working towards a common goal. you obviously need to be able to work in a kitchen with the right person who can anticipate what you might need or know when to stat chopping and let you get at the stove!

Whatever path you choose, learning how to bring the creative into your day to day will help to crunch some of those more crusty parts, and begin to allow a more rewarding flow into your day to day.
Its interesting that like how the creative moves in the studio and in me, so does the act of removing those hard parts of myself.  I don’t always know what I am letting go of, but the act of letting go feels about the same when I create as when I let go of some ancient karmic thread or other.  Its not NEEDING to know I think that seems to do it.  Sometimes I AM curious to know the source of a given issues that is falling away, and in those cases, I have been shown.  By that time, it was already being released and was gone, never to return.

I once was highly skeptical about art being a therapeutic device.  Now I am sure of it!
One final note, and an important one….  I think that its important that you work so that you do not feel funny or self conscious if you can’t draw perfectly, if visual art is what you decide to do. Its real good if you can adopt an attitude where you are less invested in an outcome and more invested in enjoying the activity.  If you can do that, it can be very helpful. Building a sense of expectation into the moment can sometimes make us feel limited, or freeze up some.  This is supposed to be fun!  Learning advanced techniques takes a long time to master, so be easy on yourself.   This is all difficult, and can take years to master.  It might be that you do work that doesn’t rely on your lack of skill with a given type of art.  What about making rich colorful fields of color, designs, or other ways of expressing? If you watch children making art, you realize that the guts of the operation is in how much fun you can have just MAKING the stuff!  Its only when kids start worrying about how they are able to draw hands or faces or people that they draw into their shell.  If you can create with wild abandon, you have a much better chance at creating something that you will feel good about and be more likely to return to.  Be loose, but be intense!