Magickal Record 03-29-07

Apologies for the silence.  Besides burrowing through the stages of insight, I’ve been contemplating some new subjects for the site, as I’m starting to feel as if I’ve exhausted some of my characteristic obsessions for the time being.

   In any event: on monday, after several hours of exquisitely agonising observation of fundamental suffering, I seem to have crossed into the insight stage of equanimity, as I feel mostly relaxed and calm without even trying most of the time right now. Every day or so, I fine tune some observations, and last night I found that I was observing the three characteristics ( non-self, suffering, impermanence ) in my sleep, which ought to be a good sign. 

  One of the things that debunks the delusion of self is realising that the sense that most people have of a ‘watcher’ inside ones head or somewhere thereabouts, is really just a set of sensations like any other, and not somehow separate, special, watching, or in control of other sensations. The idea that your sense of self is not really any different than the sense of your foot, and that neither one is the seat of awareness, is kind of odd, yet  this is a doorway to liberation. When I actually observed this yesterday ( as opposed to merely working it out intellectually, which is fine, but useless for real insight), my mind was apparently so shocked by that, it spend all night trying to find a new reference point, even interrupting my dreams in the process.

   It’s very uncomfortable to notice the moment to moment convulsion of awareness that causes you to twist your perception around into a sufficently tight knot that you don’t notice that you are not in fact seperate, but part of everything. If feels like a muscle spasm in your brain. And you do it almost every single moment of the day.

   When you notice this clearly enough to see that it really sucks and that it’s crazy and you’d be much happier if you quit doing it, you get to become enlightened. Simple as that.

   As  a minor digression, anyone who thinks becoming enlightened automatically bestows psychic or siddha powers is probably slightly confused. They do seem to interrelate but the intention to do one does not necessarily lead to the other or vice versa. I think it’s just when you stop the mental twister game in your head, you have all these other limbs free and extra attention to like, levitate your begging bowl or stop bullets in the air and shit.  More on this at a latter date, obviously.

   I resolved to raise the standard for my flexibility training again. I look like a tool at the gym, but I could kick most of their asses, so fuck em. You might wonder what the big damn deal is about being flexible, but it just so happens that I started with a martial art back in the day that is founded on exacting postural training that really confounds most white people who use chairs and toilets with seats and stuff. A few degrees of rotation in your neck or hip might not seem like a big deal but when someone is swinging a naginata at you, which is a six foot staff with a three foot razor blade on the end, it might be more clear. Not that I actually do that, but that’s what it’s designed for. Wooden swords hurt enough already anyway.

 Next week is the start of our advertising at the clinic, and I’m manning the phones most of the time, so It’s long days on the meditating bench next to the phone I guess. When I’m not helping diabetics whose legs are rotting off, or the usual spinal distortions masquerading as ‘stress’.

   The diet goes well. I usually get in one huge bowl of green stuff every day, and a couple snacks. My energy is coming up steadily. How much of that is good cardio and how much good mineral intake is not clear, but I don’t really need to know.

 As for this site, I’ve got lots of balls in the air, but here’s a quick update:

   Augoiedes: One more and that’s done. I’m holding off till this fruition is really to drop. Maybe another couple weeks at most? Hard to say.

  Mosaic Effect: Always good for whatever I feel like talking about. I’m still open to requests. I’m thinking of taking a detour into some futurist stuff.

 Evolutuion by the Numbers: I’m sure there will be some new ones here and there to fill the gaps, but my main impetus is pretty much done by number twenty or so. Most people seem to realise that all you really need to do is one or two of them, so piling on more and more is kind of sadistic.

  Systematic for the People: I kind of got bogged down in the systems theory stuff. It all kind of sounds the same after a while. It’s not all the same, but it’s hard to make the language pop. My original plan was to go to 18 in that way but I may boil it down to another few, and then change tack again.  

  Magickal Record: It’s done when I’m done.

Goals List:

 -sustained effort in insight and concentration practice.

-raise the bar in flexibility training

-kung fu training outside

-incrementally improve alkaline diet

-new mic ( yes really)

-prep for a one week straight water fast

-clean your fucking room

-clarify new directions for the site

Magickal Record 03-23-07

Sometimes things have to get worse before they can get better, in which case things have gotten better, and will continue to do so.

   My vipassana practice has taken on a tenor of more or less continuous pain. The fundamental delusion of being a separate and permanent self has revealed itself as untenable, but there is not yet enough fundamental insight to unwind the knot, and it’s agonising, nauseous side effects. Just as with my bout of insanity some months ago, the only thing that helps is trying not to feed crazy or delusional thought patterns.

  In this case however, crazy or delusional, means anything that happens to probe or refference the sense of being an “I”, so oddly enough my only refuge is either in the deepest samatha jhannas I can manage( usually the 4th, but occasionally the 5th or 6th) , which I have been doing consistently for hours a day all week, or ‘selfless’ behavior, such as healing, doing chores for people, or getting involved in ‘spiritual’ activites. Anything where I can avoid thinking about the agonised deteriorating illusion of a self. Kind of like having a tooth pulled over the course of  several days.

  As I fine tune the level of clarity and precision I need to resolve this unpleasant debacle, I have nonetheless accumulated some interesting but incomplete insights which do seem to help. It’s one of those things where you have to sit with the pain and watch it impartially until you have one of those ‘hitting yourself in the head with a hammer’ moments, and realise it would feel really good to stop. Right now I can see my head, and I can see the hammer, and I can see myself swinging it, but none of them clearly enough to completely identify their relationship to each other.

  In the buddhist model all this leads me to believe I am ocilating somewhere in between the insight stages of re-observation and equinimity, which indicates  a more sustained push yet of insight practice is needed, along with some fundamental acceptance of my life ‘as it is’.  Surely if this keeps up I will be willing to accept just about anything to make it stop, and I suppose that’s the point.

 As grim as all this sounds, paradoxically, it’s not so much a problem anymore. I hit bottom earlier in the week, and since then it’s a simple resignation to persist in practice and endure the discomfort for as long as it takes. There is no chance whatsoever I will park in this state or regress. So even if it’s it’s slow, progress and fruition is assured.

   On the more mundane side, it appears our business is going to fly a while longer, and it’s not all on my shoulders either. Hoo-ray. Another cash infusion from heaven keeps me solvent long enough to see if the massage business is going to pan out for me right now.

  And my alkiline diet is coming along nicely, my fridge is fairly swimming in green stuff. In fact, it’s even green plant stuff.  My colon thanks you for your moral support.

 My flexibility training is very gratfiying as well, mostly because stretching is a lot easier in the 2nd jhanna, which is one of those secrets sadhus tend not to share cause they’re busy smoking hash all the time. Imagine that.

Updated goals for the week:

-at least three hours of seated insight or concentration practice every fucking day, before I die of horror.

-stretch my neck and inguinal area in jhanna states.

-perfect my weightlifting form

-alkaline diet

-get a new mic

-fast one day just water

-clean up my room, already. it’s spring for fucksakes.

-create something for the site every day, even if it’s crap and I throw it out right away.

Augoiedes Finale 2 of 3: Flowery Atomic Heart

   Rounding out my other discussions of concentration practice, we traverse such things as tantric iconography, nirvikalpa samadhi, how to not flame out like a rock star, and how to turn the thwarted idealisation of oneself into a working facsimile of the holy guardian angel.

 podcast page

Direct download: flowery_atomic_heart.mp3

We can build this muthafucka… we have the technology.

a sacrifice

rejoice brothers and sisters

you will not be able to sleep through this

the rock and the chain and the lightning

and the boot on your neck forever and ever will not let you sleep

through this

through this

you will not be able to step out on the commercial for a diet pepsi
cause diet coke dissolves your teeth brothers and sisters

you will not be able to talk about how the system is breaking down
and the incompetency butts head with criminality and you wonder when
someone is going to start

doing all the things they told you they would

even your parents did not do all the things they told you they would

told you they could

cannot even save themselves, and they said they could save you?

there is no percentage in this for the willfully stupid

you will not be able to turn your eyes to the ground and kiss the
feet of your oppressor

no matter how much you might like to

no matter how funny you think it might be

to crush beer cans against your head

and eat the shit of people who cannot even face their own dogs

NO!

you will not be able to pretend that revenge of the sith is return of
the jedi, and that smoking a joint is communing with the force

you will not look around and suddenly find that it has been done
for you

no amount of crying and raging, no emoting of any kind will cut any
ice in the hood we are going towards

your excuses will always be excuses, no matter how much you’d like
them to be reasons

rejoice!

do you see it?

do you see it?

in the wilderness, in the gutter, under the cushions of your couch
while kenny dies for your sins week after week?

while everything worth living for is ground up to fertilise a poison
garden for rapists and liars and butchers

and it’s only funny till it stops being funny, and it only stops
being funny long enough to set up another punchline

oh yes

it is always this time, always too late, always too early

and even you, will one day unfurl that banner

and those hooks in your flesh,

function youserve, that substitute that isn’t really a substitute
anymore

those barbs in your flesh will not let you sleep through this

cause it’s running a little bit hot tonight

and the irons and the whips and clamps that hold everything you
think you need

it’s impossible to choke yourself to death with your own two hands

but it’s very possible to learn how to never quit trying

while the sorcerors who beat at the gates to a place they can never
go, smeared in the blood and shit of little ones and stacks of money
balanced on the ends of their erections

they preach the false return

what the fuck did I just tell you about the return?

and as long as you’re laughing you think that makes it okay?

as long as you’re in on the joke it doesn’t mean it’s not still on
you? always been on you?

will be on you until the sky cracks open and god folds the world up
to try again

the host will ride you down alike alike

the sword of the rider will cut you down alike

because a little man, in a little blue suit

has been painting you, a drop at a time,

and everytime you say there’s nothing you can do about this stain
until you almost believe it

and almost believing it is almost good enough

REJOICE!

REJOICE!

because you made this hell

you made it impossible to sleep through

you made it unbearable to forget

unthinkable to condone

unimaginable to contribute

any more

any more

because without this it is all for nothing

without these little men and their little games you would have
nothing

without your delicious apathy and complacency there would be nothing

without the stinking sorcerors and their lies you would have nothing
except your smug ascent into the light

without the millions, yes millions of dead babies crying forever and
ever for you to help them you might have gone back to whatever it is
you think you were doing

but we both know you weren’t really doing anything

right?

without the helpful staff of your private dachau, you would have

no ashes to paint your face

no skins to dress your naked shame

no bones to haft your dagger and swords

and no blood to paint your banner

REJOICE OH CHAMPIONS OF THE LIGHT!!!

REJOICE IN THE HOUR OF OUR GREATEST FAILURE!

REJOICE IN THE HOUR WHERE VICTORY BECOMES INEVITABLE!

for only when all else has failed

will we clear the final path

the path of the true return

The Mosaic Effect 29: Together We Will Live Forever

By popular demand, we bring you an interpretation of “The Fountain”.

Reincarnation vs rebirth, the neurogenetic drama of humanity and the earth itself, true love vs dependency,  James Joyce and Finnegans Wake, concentration unto madness, and the immanent vs the transcendent.

podcast page

Direct download: TME29-Together_We_Will_Live_Forever.mp3

Tattoo some tree rings on your arms and get down for tai chi in space, kids.

Magickal Record 03-16-07

Right. Enough Bullshit.

  Took me a little longer than I was expecting to kick the bug out of my system, but with the aid of some good quality vitamins, I believe that’s that. My own fault for going off them in the first place.

  So it’s back to the gym today, and kung fu tonight. Have to remind myself to get some other training days going outside in the warmer months. It’s not really feasible to perfect the skills in a couple hours a week. 

 Alaina’s away for a week so I’m taking the opportunity to hide out at her place and hopefully get some things done on the cushion, as it were. I keep getting peeks at some new territory meditation wise but it’ll require some sustained effort to camp there.

  I’d almost forgotten how irritating it can be to live with other people, even if you never see them. I was an only child with few friends so I’ve never really been comfortable in the presence of other people for long periods. Even when I like or even love them, it tires me out something fierce.

  When she gets back we’ve agreed to do an as close to all alkaline diet as possible for a while, as an experiment if nothing else. Meaning mostly green veggies and whatnot. I’d turn into a zombie with no animal protein so fear not for me lapsing into the vegan holy man category. I have enough dubious spiritual distinctions already to answer for.

  The coherent ideas are back, after they’d retired to the country for some fresh air and sunshine. I’ve decided against getting my home computer up and running again, at least until I can work out this latest fruition. Office work is one thing, but it too big of a distraction otherwise.

   The ‘business meeting’ at the clinic is in a couple days, and if nothing else I’ll be able to determine my working strategy for the next couple months on the basis of that. I may end up working in a spa this summer. Not ideal but still serviceable.

Goals for the next week:

-at least three hours of seated insight or concentration practice every fucking day

-stretch my neck and inguinal area twice a day rather than just once, as I do now.

-perfect my weightlifting form

-alkaline diet kicks in next week, so shopping is in order, for like, food and stuff.

-get a new mic

-fast one day just water

-do as little talking as possible, and definitely no shit talk or swearing.

-create something for the site every day, even if it’s crap and I throw it out right away.

Evolution by the Numbers: Number Sixteen

number sixteen: doing it feels better than not doing it

In any practice, especially practice like we do here, there will be days where it feels like shit. There will be days where you’re too goddamn tired. There will be days when you can think of a million other things that seem a lot more important, or at least more urgent, which is a much different thing.

There’s nothing wrong with not being able to do the things you love all that well all the time. What’s really corrosive to your soul, however, is knowing it’s important, and then lying to yourself about it, so you don’t have to try. So you don’t have to suffer the sting of thinking how shit you are.

The hidden message of this is to stop thinking of things in this way. But the one you can take away right off the bat, is, it’s better to do it, even if it’s crap, then to live with the scars that come from not doing it. If it’s important, if you really want and need to do this, then accept it, live with it, and commit yourself to it. Don’t backpedal and tell yourself stories when it turns out to be a painful sometimes.

If you want to master anything, you have to treat it like a master does, and the secret every master will tell you is, you have to show up, even when it’s a waste of time. Especially when it’s a waste of time.

Evolution by the Numbers: Number Fifteen

number fifteen: abandon comfort

almost by definition, the ideas of growth and evolution are antithetical to any notion of comfort.  Any area in which you are content to simply wallow in an established state of affairs, is one where are not pushing yourself.

The area of physical and mental activity which is your normal or current comfortable domain is almost certainly some minuscule slice of what your total capacity for free action actually is.
Which is not to say that you must never enjoy a rest or some luxury now and again, and it’s hard to find something that can’t be put to some constructive use, or interpretation, but again, it’s a matter of intent. If you’re out to kick back, veg out and stop thinking, questioning or watching, you have Lost the Plot.

Augoeides Finale 1 of 3: you don’t have to live like a $%#@ing cockroach

In which I pinch some conceptual structure from the buddha in order to pull it all together.  Enjoy my convalescent,  semi-fevered ravings on virtue, plato vs aristotle, why rationalisation is bullshit, and living a human life. And since I’ve mentioned it so many times; how to find out what your own values actually are.

 podcast page

Direct download: AUGF-_dont_have_to_live_like_a_cockroach.mp3

Magickal Record 03-09-07

well. that’s another week of my life I won’t be getting back.

Much of my practice has stagnated, partially because of an ill-advised binge of internet checkers, of all things, partly because I’ve been feeling a bit sick, and partly because I’ve realised if anything is going to get done vis a vis the clinic I’m involved in, it’s business practices, decision making and whatnot, I’m going to have to do it mostly myself. While I was doing security work, and assuming it was getting along satisfactorily, the real situation has been a combination of naive indifference, and benign neglect. So it’s roll up your sleeves for interminable meetings, green meme hand wringing, and attempts at financial success through the grace of god. Sounds ludicrous? So it should. It did to me too, when I realised this was the ‘business plan’.

Anyway, I’ve probably backslid in my insight practice to a somewhat less pleasant stage of agitation and irritating vibrational phenomena. I spent much of yesterday night trying to make that up, and get back to where I was, which is close to ‘fruition’ as it were.

Part of that is coming to a certain level of acceptance with my situation, and the basic facts of life in general. It’s one of those classic ‘ you can only move from where you are, not from where you aren’t ‘ kind of things. I have no fear of the truth. I just need to find it first.

There’s no point thinking about stage 5 of the alchemical intiative, when stage 2-3 is faltering. Build a realtionship with reality, kids, it will do you well.

Luckily, money continues to fall from the sky. I wouldn’t want to build a lifestyle on it, but that’s pretty much what i’m doing right now. I have turned from the David Blaine of occultism, into the Cosmo Kramer of occultism. Such is my burden. Quiet dignity is my only option.

The gym is a highlight. I didn’t get into it to look better, but it’s nice to see that I do. That and either I’m getting a lot stronger, or I’m just using what I’ve got in a more coordinated fashion. Bit of both I guess. My cardio training approaches the level of ascetic mortification. But you gotta discharge the stress somewhere, might as well be in the gym.

My work on this site is faltering as well, mostly for lack of a coherent idea. Not lack of ideas, i have plenty of those. just a certain level of cohesion which ‘my mind’ seems to lack in general right now.

dietarily, I’m doing somewhat better. I’ve been doing a mineral supplement consistently twice a day, and it seems to have helped. More water though. I’m sweating a lot lately.

Got some new glasses, which I’ve only needed for about a year now. Let this herald a new aeon of clarity.

and the updated goals list, of course… 

-one hour of just jhanna, seated, every day

-another hour just vipassana, every day
-take my ordination test

-stretch my neck and inguinal area twice a day rather than just once, as I do now.

-perfect my weightlifting form

-clean up my diet definitively, so as to remove my recently acquired allergies and maintain good energy levels ie; eliminate bread, dairy, pesticides, additives and whatnot as much as possible. eat more fresh food.

-get a new mic

-fast one day a week

-stop swearing altogether, except for artistic usages.

-assess my material possessions and dispose of anything extraneous asap.

-create something for the site every day, even if it’s crap and I throw it out right away.

-get a cellphone to receive calls for the clinic, prefferably one I’m not paying for..

-get the website up to a traffic level where ads and donations are a significant portion of my income ie; post something every day, for starters.

-variously, attract business propositions on the basis of my work here.

PERDURABO!!!