In the midst of revising Babe in the Woods I came across a quote from Emerson that might almost be a commentary on our political season, and certainly is a commentary on our times. Written in August 1847, if you can believe it.
The Superstitions of our Age:
The fear of Catholicism;
The fear of pauperism;
The fear of immigration;
The fear of manufacturing interests;
The fear of radicalism or democracy;
And faith in the steam engine.
The other day, I sat down and sketched out the books I have written and those I have yet to write, and came up with the following list. This ought to keep me busy.
Titles of books not yet written are in [brackets]
Messenger George Chiari in Tibet learns about inner worlds
Babe in the Woods Angelo Chiari in Virginia does an Open Door
[Conspiracies of Men and God] George and Angelo fight to defend the C.T. Merriman Institute from a conspiracy to destroy it Continue reading Proposed future production
Sure, it’s going to be easy to mock. You can imagine the strange people who are going to show up to stand in reflected moonlight — there is a reason, after all, why mentally disturbed people are called loonies (luna-ies, so to speak). But I find this idea fascinating, and if the collector weren’t so far away, I’d visit. It will be interesting to see if anything comes of it. (I was amused that the author — or perhaps the editor — felt compelled to include a scientist’s statement that there was no scientific evidence of effects — of something that hasn’t yet been studied!)
Moonstruck flock to Arizona light collector
Wed Dec 5, 2007 9:12am EST
By Tim Gaynor
THREE POINTS, Arizona (Reuters) – Financial advisor Jaron Ness stands in the cool desert air waiting for the clouds to clear and the moon to rise.
As the conditions come into alignment, he steps into the path of a cool blaze of blue-white light bounced off a wall of highly polished parabolic mirrors five stories high.
“It feels magnetic,” he says, turning his hands slowly in the reflected glow of the light from the almost full moon.
The young professional from Colorado is among a growing number of curious people beating a path to this patch of scrub-strewn land out in the Arizona desert to bask in light from the world’s first moonbeam collector.
Continue reading Moonstruck flock to Arizona light collector
When a man of wisdom speaks, and his words continue to ring true after more than half a century, maybe it would be a good idea to listen. This is from “A Study in the Process of Individuation,” in Carl Jung’s The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious.
Conclusion
Our series of pictures illustrates the initial stages of the way of individuation. It would be desirable to know what happens afterwards. But, just as neither the philosophical gold nor the philosophers’ stone was ever made in reality, so nobody has ever been able to tell the story of the whole way, at least not to mortal ears, for it is not the storyteller but death who speaks the final “consummatum est.” Certainly there are many things worth knowing in the later stages of the process, but, from the point of view of teaching as well as of therapy, it is important not to skip to quickly over the initial stages. As these pictures are intuitive anticipations of future developments, it is worth while lingering over them for a long time, in order, with their help, to integrate so many contents of the unconscious into consciousness that the latter really does reach this stage it sees ahead. These psychic evolutions do not as a rule keep pace with the tempo of intellectual developments. Indeed, their very first goal is to bring a consciousness that has hurried too far ahead into contact again with the unconscious background with which it should be connected…. Continue reading Jung on terrorism and awareness
Amazing hypocrisy on China’s part. They no more believe in reincarnation than they do in political or economic liberty, so they attack the Dalal Lama for violating “the religious rituals and historical conventions.” This, after they have spent half a century actively trying to elminate both! This, after they arrested (and for all we know killed) the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama who was recognized by the religious authorities, and put in their own. This, too, after they passed a law saying that the Dalai Lama would have to have official government approval to reincarnate! Idiots.
This from the Independent: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article3187092.ece
China furious at Dalai Lama plan to name successor
By Clifford Coonan, China Correspondent
Published: 23 November 2007
China has accused Tibet’s spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, of violating the religious rituals and historical conventions of Tibetan Buddhism by suggesting he might appoint a successor before his death instead of relying on reincarnation.
Beijing’s latest broadside against the Dalai Lama is a sign of heightening tensions between the central government and the man Tibetans see as a god-king. While reincarnation sounds like an esoteric concept to those of other belief systems, it is a deeply political issue in the isolated Himalayan enclave.
The Dalai Lama said Tibetans would not accept a successor who was selected by China after his death, prompting an angry response from Beijing. “The reincarnation of the living Buddha is a unique way of succession of Tibetan Buddhism and follows relatively complete religious rituals and historical conventions,” said Liu Jianchao, a Foreign Ministry spokesman . “Dalai’s remarks obviously violated the religious rituals and historical conventions.”
Continue reading China furious at Dalai Lama plan to name successor
Last April I posted, in ten installments, some great stuff I had gotten from my friends upstairs in January, 2006 over the course of a few days. I recently pulled up the ten posts, removed headers and continuation lines, and concatenated it into one long file. (It’s easier to read one file, I think, than one after the other in the archives of several months ago.)
I will be glad to send the file in response to a request via email to muddytracks@earthlink.net.
On this Veteran’s Day, a somber note.
I asked a friend who is a decorated Vietnam War vet what he thought of my blog entry, “Aanenson’s Sacrifice,” knowing him as a lifetime soldier who speaks from experience, and a good enough friend that he would tell me what he really thinks.
I have to agree with his conclusions, except perhaps that I am less judgmental about the American public. Betrayed by the “news” and entertainment media and by the politicians, and by so many factors conspiring against them learning what is really going on around them, they are as much sinned against as sinning. To expect the American people today to understand the causes and effects of the American Empire is to expect the German people of the 1930s to have understood the causes and effects of the Nazi empire. Some few do, most don’t and can’t really be expected to.
In any case, I share with my friend his grave view of our current prospects. Saddest of all is that such dark use has been made of the willing sacrifices of so many soldiers who only wanted to do the right thing. Continue reading Betrayal