Thursday, August 27, 2009

Taking the Future Exit

We have all seen the painting done by Michelangelo on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Some of us have seen it in its original location and some of us have seen the painting but all of us have seen it a time or two here and there. God is extending his hand to the ‘generic’ Adam and Adam is extending his hand as well. Their fingers are nearly touching. Art is not truth but great art is suggestive, indicative and pointing toward the truth, much as the hands are reaching in the painting.

God is not an old man with a white beard. However, if he wanted to be, that would be immediately so. God is a serpent. I took this painting and had my head super-imposed over Adam’s head for my album, God in Country. In my version, God is extending a guitar. I’m rather fond of this variation. After all, I am Adam, as are you, and the condition indicated in the original is an ongoing and enduring state. God is reaching for us. All of us are reaching for God but have encountered confusion as to what it is we are reaching for. We find that out when we gain possession of whatever we were reaching for and very quickly learn it’s not what we were after. This is why all of the possibilities and acquisitions of the rich are reduced to ashes in their mouths. They know they didn’t get the item and one of their chief satisfactions is your belief that they really did get what they were after and what you were after too.

Because we are already rich we seek to manifest the material expression of it. Because we are already powerful we wish to be in a position to demonstrate it. Because we are already famous we seek celebrity among our fellows. These are just some more confusions in the myriad confusions that toy with us on the road to nowhere. We have it partly right in the same way that desire is the agent of God’s will.

Just as we mistake what God is and who we are, we mistake everything else by defining it according to what we want. Adam translated means, ‘namer of things’. It stands to reason then that the first step on the path is the deep seated conviction of, “I don’t know.” The next step is the deep seated conviction that ‘everything is under control’.

Attempting to employ these profound truths leads to more confusion because there is a definite difference between intellectual and visceral understanding. You can say, “I don’t know” all you want but you still think you know. You can tell yourself everything is under control all day long but you still think it isn’t. Some of this is tied in to free will and some of it is tied into the root apprehension of our atavistic or primordial fear. Our deathless being is in a temporarily mortal state. Our job is to become consciously immortal while still in the body but... there are all those other things.

Whenever we think of God, or whatever you want to call it, we think of something apart from ourselves. Whatever efforts we might make following this initial error will come to no positive end. God apart is useless. God apart is actually what we understand as the Devil.

We’re told we have to strive hard. We are told to pray without ceasing. We are told to practice the presence of God; to live a moral life, to be generous toward and forgiving of our fellows. Some of us try in many different ways to apply these and other modalities to the purpose of union but we don’t get anywhere. The fact is that it is impossible for us to accomplish it. We cannot do it. It has to ‘be accomplished’ within us. This is the meaning hidden in The Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus and in all scriptural works. Like the bat shit annoyances of Zen and the ‘not this’, ‘not that’ monkey mind dance, the answer is as confusing as the koans. You have to try with all your might and then you have to give up. The purpose of all the effort is to prepare the ground for deeper surrender. This is the purpose of our failures.

Everybody is worried about what’s coming soon, except for those who are dreaming in Disneyland or collecting trivia in the hope that knowing a whole lot of useless things will cause someone to fall in love with them. We are all operating under false pretenses.

Consider this,

You purchase an outfit you think someone will like. You add on the accessories. Maybe you are after someone who is aware of designer labels or maybe you are zone specific and you want a sports model; a metrosexual model, a country model, a Christian or Muslim model, an attractive model or just your regular runway model. You tailor yourself to appear to be what you think they would like. It’s a little like baiting a hook. You want to capture and have someone that fits a profile. You get your hair done. You get false eyelashes and you paint yourself to look like an urban evening clown. All of this is a form of pretense, which is intended to conceal what you normally are. Both of you run into each other dressed as someone else and that’s just what you get. Happy now? Now you have two people with someone other than the commercial indicated.

It’s impossible to conceal ourselves forever. The initial face we proffer is gradually replaced by the face of our habitual nature and sooner or later the face that appears under stress or while in danger will reveal itself as well. Passionate relationships are generally doomed unless you are courting the divine. They certainly fade. Only friendships endure.

We worry about the future without tumbling to the fact that what we are is our future. Whatever catastrophe the world has in mind, it always considers this first in respect of individual cases. People will take Tarot cards and try to use them to predict the future. The purpose of the cards is meditation to adjust the future. Why would you want to predict something that you can be altering with every breath? All of these things tie into our ‘wrong approach syndrome’. Just as you can’t take anything material with you when you go, you can’t enter the presence of the divine with any extraneous personality models, tics and eccentricities or add-ons, cosmetics or camouflage. These things need to be stripped away and suffering will do that. The whole game is engineered to show us that we are helpless, whether you are Alexander the Great or just you.

If you are sincere and determined you cannot fail. When you do fail you will be in that state of surrender. Original life generally ends with the death of childhood and all the time following is either repetition or a struggle for regenerated innocence. Most achieve senility; some achieve the illumined child like state. Every condition in life imperfectly mirrors what should be with a bad copy. Senility as opposed to regenerated innocence and... you can find many parallels. Consider that the Dark Lord made orcs as a perversion on elves.

I’m not a very good guitar or piano player. My grasp of foreign languages is terrible. When I think of all the things that I can’t do well, I always have to stop long before I’ve completed the list. I’m not very good at a great many things but I do seem to be persistent about connecting with the divine. Truth be told, none of these other things have ever been that important to me and that’s why I’m not very good at them.

The divine knows more things about us, that we are unaware of, than the things we are aware of. We put more time into impressing our fellows, who are busy doing the same thing to us (all while each of us keep glancing at ourselves in the mirror), than we do at our real work. Nature is watching us. The hidden kingdoms are watching us. Aliens in space watch us like we were reality TV, which we are. The animal kingdom watches us and there’s quite a list actually. For those who are engaged in the only real occupation, every one of these kingdoms is engaged in assisting us. Otherwise they are opposing us.

It is never a good idea to pursue the things of the world instead of the enduring truths that hide in the foliage. It is especially not a good idea now and that is why it’s so hard and why there is so much magnetic attraction of images and objects resounding upon our appetites and desire body. A portal is opening. It has been a long time coming and it will be a long time gone. Whatever may or may not be coming is unimportant. That’s just scenery through the train window.

The key thing to remember is that the character in the painting who symbolizes the ineffable is reaching and wiser minds had better be reaching too. When the visible realm is engaged in major readjustments it is a good idea to have an invisible friend.

Visible sings: God in Country by Les Visible♫ I Need More Light ♫
'I Need More Light' is track no. 4 of 11 on Visible's 2001 album 'God in Country'
Lyrics (pops up)

God in Country by Les Visible


The New Shangri-La.

37 comments:

Visible said...

I've been told Nina's blog is gone. Does anyone know anything about that?

Anonymous said...

I like the cover (as well as the song) of "Axis: Bold As Love."

I've pointed out to many many people that cover, what it really is. That cover they've looked at for decades yet never really seen.
That song they heard a hundred times but never really heard..

Way too many had never noticed Arjuna down there talking with his chariot driver.

(just ask the Axis, he knows everything)

su said...

I was just going to ask you what was happening.
Nina, calling Nina.

Anonymous said...

"When the visible realm is engaged in major readjustments it is a good idea to have an invisible friend."

Do the "visible readjustments" have something to do with your kidney stone adventure?

Yesterday there was a comment or two about synchronicities. Interestingly I had just last night opened my copy of "The Emerald Tablets of Thoth the Atlantean" which I believe is one and the same as the Hermes you mentioned today. I guess that means I should work my way through this small but wisdom packed text.

Thanks to you, or is it, Thanks to the visible aspect of myself, for guidance along this challenging trek.

Jim

rj dewhurst said...

Dearest Les,

I love your latest columns, the spiritual insight is bracing, warm and unforgiving. As you know -- the absence of desire is nirvana -- not some superstore in the sky.

And of course any "personified" God is the devil. Why? Because the true GOD desires nothing. He is everything already.

The Universe's true God is the underlying intelligence that created and breathes through the universe. And you are part of that grand creation. And God breathes through you 24/7 whether you like it or not. Therefore you are that THAT when all the illusion is removed. It is a very easy thing to love when you realize that breath is everywhere you look -- grander, smarter and eternal. A man who thinks he is God in the face of that is worse than a fool.

Don't hang up your spikes just yet Les -- You are one of my last remaining sixties soul brothers... We were-- are -- The Brotherhood of Light -- but to wait for the people is folly.

You must lead them with grace, humor and fun. The anti-war movement was not what it is represented as.

I lived in Cambridge in the mid-sixties and Tim Leary was a very real presence, as was Jim Kweskin and others. They said to reject materialism, bond together in love and everything else will follow.

The first demonstrations in the Boston Commons were less anti-war, and more anti-materialism and to get people out, the organizers rolled five pounds of weed into joints and hippie girls with flowers in their hair danced through the crowd tossing out free weed. The first "gathering" had 500 people -- when word of the free weed got out, the next gathering had 10,000.

ur the sirius dog poet and I love you for that...

I WANNA BE YOUR DOG!!!

Keep on, keeping on...

RJ

kikz said...

jim, et al...

for an even more ... concentrated distillation of the emerald tablets...

may i suggest 'the kybalion'.

free, online & in entirety...
w/no 'purchase oneness' buttons ;)

The Kybalion
http://sacred-texts.com/eso/
kyb/index.htm


enjoy:)

nina said...

Oh thank you thank you thank you so much for your concerns. The blogs are back. Intact. All is well.

I thought of you Vizzy, believe me, surely the eblogger orcs had gone in during the night and done wicked things, but sigh, after wheedling with my settings and upping the megs, I'm confident it was my own technical error and sincerely apologize to all for the weirdness experienced.

About your post today, so wonderful, it takes us coincidentally secular into the popular layout for megabox-super markets. You can usually find the produce section first, GM yes, but reminiscent of nourishment for the body. As you travel into the middle aisles, it is anticipated the consumer will become increasingly convinced they need canned and pre-mixed GM foods to overflow from their own home larder, especially in a worsening economy. You should leave now, but the lure of potential desire unmet pulls you deeper into the far aisles where the real dirt is stacked to the florescents - its a wonder to behold - sodas, chips from every corner of the planet, refrigerated cases jammed with someone who is supposed to be your grandmother's box dinner, your greatgrandfather's, the sausage maker, hotsealed Italian sweet sausages. They figure if you make it that far, they've got you good now. Go! Go! Glazed, wandering, cart pushing, you enter the costume department where all the disguises for the representative-self are dangling in abundance. Fake hair. Hair colors. Disposable razors. Patterned leggings even! Eyebrow stencils. Oooooo, wet lipsticks in squeezable tubes. At the far end of this aisle your eyes might catch site of the in-store liquor section, saving it for future reference. Get out now! But still, you wheel on, landing on the other side of enhancements directly into the Grand Finale, the Pharmacy. How much false desire do those floor to ceiling shelves hold? If you don't have a ticket, none of its for you. Those burgerclerks in doctor costumes hold the power to deny or hand it over as they please. I told you, you should have left. You can't get out of this place without crashing into Kaluah as you limp, elbow to elbow through the cashier lines. So we do our best to be good and put the cart away properly in hopes the parking lot cameras see us a good citizens, loving them, loving their God. Never spit your gum out on the pavement. Leave good footprints and drive PC.

Love, nina

PS: Thanks for saying something about the blog problem. Love you always. Love you too, Susu.

Anonymous said...

Nina's back - but have noticed this happening to many blogs of late.
Their "trial run" for this Fall?
Of course one day we'll wake up and there will be NO blogs.

nina said...

Anon, I can't discount that possibility especially in light of Les's ongoing problems. We really don't know until the two by four makes sure we know.

Anonymous said...

pure love and the finding that it is every where all the time.The opening of that place inside of ourselves that recieves it constantly,and the allowing it to fill up all of the time forever more and the knowledge that when in that state that was the purpose, no one can take that from us only ourselves,constantly surrendered to it because that was the only thing that ever was that is our guide our truth our peace our best friend our every thing,did the fish know this a long time ago,is the sea made of this,is this why the dog remains so loyal to try and teach his master about this,is this what the trees have been practising all of them years,are the mountains talking to each other every day about this,I wonder?for sure when a man finds this place that is the death of wickedness and the birth of life as it should be the determination to walk that path forever more perpetually what ever situation he finds himself in, the preparer of physical death and the beauty of physical life.peace and harmony to all neil

Anonymous said...

Remember, if life proves too confusing...

The bad guys are the squares

The good guys are the rounds.

Let's start rolling...

RJ

Anonymous said...

Well I am so glad that that they haven't pulled the plug yet. I can see them now, all giddy with anticipation of pulling that plug. All wrapped up in a power trip deluxe.

No worries, when the time comes, we will still be communicating... :)

It has been quite a race but truth, light and love are pulling ahead.

Amicus

Anonymous said...

Great column Les,

I think humanity for the most part has lost sight of what's really important. When we are born into this world, we are at the truest form we can ever attain as being pure of heart, and not having any pre-assumptions of other humans.

At that point, there is nothing but love eminating from the heart of that individual, and is sending out the purest form of positive vibrational energy that connects him or her to the rest of whats good in this multiverse.

Before our societal brainwashing, the materialism, greed , and corruption is nonexistant, which now stands in our way to reach out for our destiny as a human race.

We need to step aside from all this drudgery, and slow this wheel of time down to a momentus pause, and watch the system humans are so caught up in dissolve into the smallest of interstellar particles while humantiy reaches a new way of existing in the cosmos, whether it be now, or eons from now, it will happen regardless.

We are but an infinitesable spec in the universe, sitting on a wondrous blue planet, that is for now sustaining our energy. If humans would only understand that what we have here is but a miracle of the universe. It could come crashing down upon us in a single blink of an eye. Time to enjoy planet Earth, and live as one entity connected with it.

Les, keep trying to touch us with your message, its what humanity needs to hear, for if we are created for a greater purpose, we need guidance to get there!

TimeTraveler

A.Mouser said...

Nice peaceful piece.
Thank you.
Mouser

su said...

Neil,

"True love is simply space with a fullness of awareness".
Nirmala

Anonymous said...

Whoa! and I thought that pic was
each saying to the other,
"Pull my finger"

And each failed.

Anonymous said...

thank you Nirmala,I try to be their all the time but have'nt managed this yet,I was just letting my thoughts go a little bit as les's page allows me to do this. I try to learn from this awareness it fills me with so many questions and fills me with so much compassion and love for my fellow man woman,you have to understand we are all at different stages in our awareness you are obviously a very wise person like les and most of the other people on this site I hope one day to reach this and be able to transmit love to all, all of the time so I am sorry if I come across as a bit of a fool but I am still learning. peace neil

Anonymous said...

Remember

The object of "their" game is to square the circle

In order to crush the squares it is necessary for the circle to twist itself in half

This holistic sacrifice is rewarded with the crushing of the square

and the Egyptian symbol ANKH for infinitite consciousness

CRUSH ALL SQUARES

In grokking loveness

RJ

Anonymous said...

Hi Y'Al --

I just tried that infinity twist thing on a very damaging box that my mother left in my head many years ago.

First I coiled around the box with an "oreo borax" -- then I concentrated all my energy on the very center of the box

then I did the INFINITY TWIST

AND THE BOX POPPED JUST LIKE A ZIT!

Thanks -- you guys are the best!!!

Sue Mare

Peter Dyaus said...

I wonder if anyone is doing some sort of global mantra/chant project. (I'm sure it's been done before.) The thought just popped into my head now for some reason. Les, what do you think of that? Would you be interested? I'm thinking about something which would destroy the ego-psycho-sociopathic tendencies, individual and institutionalized...or make them moot, neutralize them...I don't know what else to say.

Hank said...

I have thought many times in recent years, while looking at a child in a moment of wonder or joy, that I would give a year of my life to have that level of innocence back for just 30 minutes. To be reconnected with our original state of grace, where we were the center of the universe, and we had an innate understanding, while possessing nothing save ourselves, that everything was the way it should be.

Our connection to god was unadulterated then, and our knowledge of something greater than ourselves was immutable. We had a way of connecting with the warmth of a summer day and the blueness of the sky that, in light of all we have unlearned since, eludes us.

It seems strange sometimes that we have to unlearn and reach for something we had when we got here.

There is so much truth in your contention that there is no real happiness that comes with the attainment of material wealth, and that most of those that do, are either liars, or are too stupid to figure out that more of what they already have too much of isn't going to make them happy. They pretend to be happy, because they bought the lie, and don't really know what will make them happy. They have been so consumed with satisfying their material gluttony, they simply don't know there is any other way, and don't have the courage to admit that they don't know. They have no clue that happiness lies just the other side of I don't know.

They never find god because they never find self, and I believe it is the discovery of self and the fact that god resides there that brings happiness. The realization that what most search for all their lives, is right there in the mirror, and has been all along.

I think I'm going to go outside and see how blue the sky is, and let the sun shine on my face. Peace and happiness my friends.

A.Mouser said...

The jig is up.
The music has ended but the people are still moving on the dance floor.
BUT at any moment one of them will cock his ear and notice the music has stopped - and he will stop moving.
This will trigger all the dancers around him in an increasing radius to also stop moving.
Within seconds of the first person on the musicless floor to stop dancing to music which is no longer there - the whole room will cease moving and every eye will search out the band who has now put down their instruments.
WE ARE JUST ONE DANCER AND SECONDS AWAY FROM THE END OF THIS FARCE.
Mouser

Visible said...

New post up-


Two Reflections.

Anonymous said...

Peter (Pitar), as you know, there is not a solitary moment when the Mahamantra ceases to be chanted on earth or in all the heavens.

Anonymous said...

Amerika is just another Terry Schiavo on life support until the fedmart funny money tubes get pulled out. Saw "The Grapes of Wrath" videos/stories @ Guardian UK -- as WRH said, 'something you'd never see in the US media....' Route 66 and the rotting, dead Heartland, cackling crazed woman living in a ghosttown. Happy Motoring forever!
Is that whisper the Ghost Dance?

nina said...

...Truth be told, none of these other things have ever been that important to me and that’s why I’m not very good at them...

I've lost count how many times I've reread this essay. You are an extraordinary communicator. And you might just be the best at reaching out to others in need.

Anonymous said...

LES
Les,

this exquisite poem was left for us earlier

Did anyone notice?

ANONYMOUS LOVE

pure love

and the finding
that it is every where
all the time.
The opening of that place
inside of ourselves
that recieves it constantly,

and the allowing

it to fill up
all of the time
forever more

and the knowledge
that when in that state

that was the purpose,

no one can take that from us

only ourselves,

constantly surrendered

to it
because that was the only thing that ever was

that is our guide
our truth
our peace
our best friend
our every thing,

did the fish know this
a long time ago,

is the sea made of this,

is this why the dog
remains so loyal
to try
and teach his master about this,

is this
what the trees have been practising
all of them years,

are the mountains
talking to each other
every day about this,
I wonder?

for sure
when a man finds this place
that is the death of wickedness and the birth
of life as it should be

the determination

to walk that path forever more
perpetually
what ever situation
he finds himself in,

the preparer of physical death
and the beauty of physical life.

peace and harmony

to all

neil

9:52 PM

lOVE 'YA NEIL
SORRY ABOUT CHANGING YUR SPACING
HOPE YOU UNDERSTAND

Anonymous said...

thanks who ever spaced that properly ...peace neil

Visible said...

There's a new Smoking Mirrors up-


A Fly on the Wall of a Cosmic Nightmare's End.

Peter Dyaus said...

Anonymous: I most certainly did not know that. Thank you.

Anonymous said...

"Srimad-bhagavatam 1.1.14 states:

'Living beings who are entangled in the complicated meshes of birth
and death can be freed immediately by even unconsciously chanting the Hare Krishna Maha-mantra,
which is feared by fear personified'.

Visible said...

New Reflections in a Petri Dish up


The Burrowing Cockroach in a World Gone Mad.

Anonymous said...

Les
Yes have I come to be a lover of his will. I can still will and plan out events and actions but only if I do so with intent and love by his will. This is hard, to say the least. I go to fast and its the devil and my hands this world moves me with. Not bad either but a loop of material time, the circus! Can I learn from that? Yes but I think I know the real reasons but Im looking for others to shore up the ends? "God" does this but, unseen. He is nearer to the heart and black self then the face and hands. He can be in form not known at first and may speak though others, but than so can we. Hard Aaaah.
LeMat

starsgoblue said...

I love this paragraph:

"Because we are already rich we seek to manifest the material expression of it. Because we are already powerful we wish to be in a position to demonstrate it. Because we are already famous we seek celebrity among our fellows. These are just some more confusions in the myriad confusions that toy with us on the road to nowhere. We have it partly right in the same way that desire is the agent of God’s will."

I think your writing is spectacular.

gap said...

Have you read The Shack (by William P. Young)?



You might like it.

DumbGoyNot said...

At first I tried reaching my friends and loved ones with the truth by using the soft-sell approach, then gradually I got more and more blatant about it, to the point where now I'm purposely trying to piss them off in an effort (a seemingly vain effort) to get them to pull their heads out of their asses and to take a look at what's really going on.

DumbGoyNot said...

I started to read 'The Shack' and had to forego it because I saw it as nothing more than a long (very long) and boring platitude written by a guy who's inspiration was the desire to make money.





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