a postcard to the exiles and vagabonds of TWI

[sirguessalot]

Hello, all. Todd here, taking a much-needed break from writing and travelling,

Thought I’d compose a postcard.

I hope you see this as irreverent & playful as I intended.

Just saying “Hello again. How are you? I am fine. Goodbye.” seems unworthy of y’all.

I lurk a bit & think about you guys a lot.

Always trying not to post so I can get other things done. ;)-->

Sometimes life experiences like GSC & TWI remind me of the Hotel California.

We can check out any time we like, but we can never leave.

I enjoy observing the subtle shifts & ripples in conversation that happen here.

& how sometimes certain moods & splashes seem to overcome the place all at once.

Its like watching how changing light causes all the sparkles to dance & shimmer even more.

btw – I know that sparkles & ripples are merely the surface of the deeper water y’all really are.

It looks like most of us have come to expect the circular discussions here, almost as if there is no other choice.

We become comfortable with our favorite whirpools & eddies of conversation.

I guess its why we hang out at the same caf?for its specialties on the menu.

We stab it with our steely knives, but we just

can’t

kill

the beast.

;)-->

So, we might as well be as naked-souled as we can while we’re “stuck” here, right?

& so here is my stabbing steely knife from afar, aiming at that same ole’ beast.

& as most of you know, brief & to the point is not a thing I am good at. Read slow?

But I will try my best (its not like your sitting there waiting for me to finish).

:)-->

---

“God” and “spirit” and their related words like “spirituallity” and “heaven” and “devil” are words I have come to loathe and love. And I’m sure it’s the same for a lot of us here. After all, we all perceive ourselves to have been burned by them, to some degree. Whether the brand stung us in the a$$ or in the heart, our mutual Wierwillian scar is the same shape.

Nonetheless, words like these are obviously very important to us. They push our buttons and stir feelings and desires that even consume our actions at times. Big deal. Such is life.

I have come to understand spirituallity as a science, more than anything, as opposed to mere dogmatic puppet-show cross-your-fingers religion. "True spirituallity" is an older science than what we call science today (but includes it, of course, like a baby brother). Modern science’s weaknesses (and strengths) are in its partial and incomplete methods. Reminds me of a polywog before it becomes a frog. But at least its no longer an unhatched egg (limited to worshipping the glow of the sun through the skin of its shell).

Spirituallity, in the end, it seems, is really based on mostly physical realities. Yes, astroLOGY, visions, dreams, angels and such--mostly physical phenom. And all that weird stuff in the Bible, as well as all that long laundry list of un-Biblical taboos we inherited from our patriarchal/agrarian views of yore. We just call them supernatural because the nature of them is beyond our understanding.

Against our will even, we will always remain embodiments of “God,” but our awareness may still be trapped in the outside world. Without an X-ray or a medical book or a surgeon’s knife, we may think there is no way to rationally see the depths of our truest humanity. I am not just talking about psychotherapy or some other science (as mucho important as these are), I am talking "old school." The “entering into that closet.” Returning to Eden. Entering the eye of the needle. Putting on the mind of Christ. Being born again. Being caught away to heaven. Yada yada yada.

Figures of speech can lead us farther than literal truth. That is, until we get there and realize that the figures of speech are literal truth. But first, for each of us, Babylon must fall. Paul’s mystery is a solvable one, and its NOT a one-liner. ;)-->

---

I probably seem to hint and beat around the bush about what I am trying to say, but that is because this forum is only a thin surface of our souls. A narrow slice of the human interface. And I am not that damn sure how to say things anyway, when it comes to “religious stuff” (which is why it takes so long to carve and polish a book on the subject, I guess). I would rather take my time and go conversational fishing and see what points draw a bite and then follow them, rather than, like a fool, try and empty the whole lake.

But to try and express my sincerity, I guess, I’ll say this. I believe there are "spiritual" methods, levels, stages, proofs, indicators, realities, experiences, disciplines, etc… which are so freakin “available” (to use another word-shaped scar), that they're available to a naked couple in the woods under the stars. No books or buildings or groups required. ;)-->

But the path is through experience and understanding, which we will never see much of if we hoard and protect our precious beliefs in a cave/egg. We cannot say, “I have not seen it for myself, so it is not true,” if we have never even honestly looked. Have you ever read about the Koran without a chip on your shoulder?

We cannot truly believe or disbelieve what we do not understand, anyway. We may dislike the words “magic” and “myth," but we cling to basically “magical” and mythical” ideas if we still think the totallity of “Godness” is somehow supposed to be beyond our puny comprehension. If we think the totallity of “Godness” is so big it is outside the realm of mundane experience. Indeed, we will remain broken, and trapped in the life of a “miserable sinner,” waiting, waiting, waiting in outer darkness.

If we still hate our enemies. If we still hate “the devil.” If we fear some most common things like pain (moreso than death, it seems). If scriptural racism binds our reading habits. If long foreign words and names limit our will to search out and find wisdom, we have not yet found that narrow path that we read about in the Bible. We find a comfy whitewashed sepulchre.

Now, I don’t write this solely to kick or punch, or look down on anyone. I try to know who and where I am not. But my life is driven by complaints, it seems. Its like smoke in my eyes.

Where there is smoke, there is fire. When the wick is too weighty, it smokes. When the flame goes out, the wick smokes. Which is why God loves the smell of smoke, I guess. The complaint is a prayer to heaven from a ministering angel, or a smoldering tongue of fire. Smoke never lies. ;)-->

My life is surrounded by complaining boomers, mainly. Always has been. I have a huge generation of them over my head. And I work in retail, selling collectible status-symbol Christian art to patriotic Christian American boomers with lots of money. 90% of my employers and fellow employees are over 50. I live in a city of many inlaw uncles and aunts. And here, where I cut my teeth on trying to leave our first Hotel California, most of you are boomers.

And so, there are hundreds of such voices I hear in my life, and behind the sounds of the words, there is a form of smoke. The most common denominators that people seem to lack shows mostly in their eyes, and in their buying habits and styles, in the way they speak to me and each other. They are either fed up with the idea of spirituallity, or call something spiritual that is not, really.

And not only when they complain and b1tch and p1ss and moan, do I see smoke, but also in those open-souled moments, where they reveal the treasures of their hearts. These moments are rare, and I try to seek them like a child on an easter-egg hunt, but when stalking colored eggs through the grass, its hard to avoid the turds, ya know what I mean?

---

Now, where the heck did I leave that point?

Oh, yeah.

Spirituallity and related stuff we like to argue about, complain about, and become enemies over. The complaints directly related to physical things, such as money (or lack thereof), health (or lack thereof), time (or lack thereof), meaning (or lack thereof). Even the feeling of love.

And so, of all the souvenirs I have seen, I send this, in hopes of trimming your wicks:

Put your Bibles down for awhile. All your prophets are dead. If you still cling to them, you have not yet graduated from the laws of letters and paper and dead wood pages. If you are blinded and bound by its crusty canon, you have not yet come out of a scriptural cave (which is fine, the process of birth involves a cave too, right?). Put your money where your mouth is. If the devil still haunts your world, you have not yet overcome him and found the love of God. If you cannot see the light from the east*, you cannot see eastward to Eden or the sunrise or Christ. A hot hellish flaming sword that turns every way keeps you from returning home. If your faith is so precious it justifies all kinds of violence and killing or condemnation or rage or beastial self-preservation, you might want to take it out and smash it to pieces again and again til you find pure gold. If the voice of God is found nowhere outside of the Bible’s pages, you might want to look at the brick in your hand and use it for the cornerstone it was meant to be, rather than setting it down and refusing to build anything on it. Or worse yet, stoning harlots and sinners and publicans with it.

*By light of the east, I am talking about where "the sun" always rises, all the ancient sciences and concepts of things like meditation, yoga, reincarnation, Taoism, Hinduism, enlightenment, astrology, evolution, mysticism, Abraham, kabbalah, tantra, Melchizadek, 3 wise men, yada yada. And not the pop stuff either, which has invaded the west (though that seems ok too). Metaphysics and new age have a bad stigma attached, because, well, they are just words, and everything good has its sycophants.

When it comes to the divine mind, east meets west just fine. Jesus said so himself, right?

---

Now, if you loathe the Bible or spirituallity because of all those who have “taught” you what it says and then their methods broke into pieces, you might want to pick it up again (if you want, or if you can - there are many other good books, too). But if you do, pick it up with new eyes. Less serious or urgent than ever before. We can stop looking for accuracy. Look for the language of light and form and color in scripture, and how they make connections to sciences both ancient and modern. I just hate to see a good book get a bad rap for no reason.

In the end, all scripture is a joke, anyway. But we treasure good witty jokes as well, no?

Strict semantic laws suppress higher thought processes. But the ephemeral is not disturbed by such laws, just as air is never harmed by a sword. For the mind to become breakable and bendable like the wind or the waves (without fear or hatred or pain or change) is a gift and a blessing. We can laugh at mountains and fortresses and locks and keys and lions' teeth. This is how scripture can be read. It does not have to be so damn important or right.

Forget what the mainstream Bible fans keep saying about their God (at least take it with a grain of salt). Forget the specific names used for all the important people in it. The Bible is about generic things like peace between neighbors of all faiths, methods of happiness in spite of our pain and stupidity, sweet and important dreams and visions, physical disciplines that cause true love to form within your heart, the experience of boundless and nutritious practical wisdom and liberation from mortallity and the source of our complaints.

I know. I know. It sounds like the very same **** every huckster like VP says, but I say it now without “the VPishness” or his selfish and selfishness generating meanings. Besides, it is already yours, alone, inherent, in the dark. It always has been. I can neither sell it or give it away. All I can ever honestly do is point at it. And the best way to point someone to their divine form, is with a mirror and a light (thought a prism).

The Bible (and other scriptures of sacred language) is full of solvable riddles and mysteries and beautiful demonstrations of the follies of man’s most basest desires (such as the infamous O.T. “puppet show” about some of the worst laws and things you can possibly impose on each other and ourselves. ;)--> ).

But its not the only thing written by the hand of God. Or the only scriptural demonstration of folly. The world and history is full of mountains of enlightening scripture. Just try not to look solely at the modern religions who hold them hostage. There are many ways Christ comes as a thief in the night. Sneaky as a snake in a tree, he is. I've read many eastern, southern, northern and western scriptures lately that say the same thing as Peter, Jesus, Paul, etc... Sometimes even better. Big deal. "God" never shuts up anyway. Or stops shining. Never has. The divine mind isn't suposed to be picky, right?

---

Finally, for those who are sick of all the details of methods and practices and levels and stages of growth and such, and that veritable mountain of information and fat claims and spiritual commercials and soundbites (like my own post ;)-->), I am sorry. I don’t blame you. But I do bring you good news. The best news of all, it seems. My favorite part.

The Way -->, The path to happiness -->, The Stairway to Heaven -->, Yada yada yada...

...Is within you, right where you are at, right now.

Yeah, it sounds trite and/or generic. That's because words alone are empty (especially at this really globally muddy point of human/english history).

What I am saying is, YOU are the apparatus. You youself ARE the stairway to heaven.

Jacob's ladder in within you. You can climb it, naked, alone, and in the dark.

And it is also most scientifically and experientially provable. Demonstrable.

Beyond religion. Beyond cold-hard science.

When certain wonderful things begin happen within you, its kinda hard to doubt or ignore.

This is why its called a "witness" (to use yet another harloted mystery term).

We can testify of an actual demonstrable experience we initiated.

The physical human form itself is made in the form of the “divine” (the true).

Like Leonardo's Vitruvian Man.

Evolution climbs and is always wiser. And has brought us “here” perfectly.

Our very DNA is wise as a serpent. Its the storybook that keeps on learning.

The firmament between heaven and earth is not “out there,” but the surface of our own skin.

The little door to heaven is within. Which is why Jesus called it "small."

The "stairs" are already just there.

Not because someone made them up and gave them names, but because many loving masters have counted them and had to call them something. And regardless of whether one uses celcius or fahrenheit, the length is the same.

The apparatus of Christ is not something you have to have installed by the “holy spirit.”

The new birth is a birth of understanding of what we have always been, not some glowing ectoplasmic injection from on high.

Understanding it comes by experience, not faith.

And these transformations/experience happens WITHIN your body-mind.

Unmistakable at times.

Thunder, lightning, earthquakes...within.

The actual mediums of spiritual enlightenment is stupid little things like light, sound, air, water, fire, stone, wood and electricity. Nothing more, nothing less.

After all, all that you think and feel in your heart and head is made of these same basic things.

No?

What are your thoughts made of then?

Magic?

But there’s a few bummers in this old generic spirituallity.

Mortal pain does not go away. It just becomes bearable.

Wealth does not poor in like rain. It is redefined by our happiness.

But health? Absolutely.

Miracles? Wonders? No doubt in my mind.

Sacrifice? No longer begrudgingly, but with joy and tears, like we all wish we could.

And true Love? Most of all. Love for self and all living beings.

Beyond what we have often come to expect of ourselves.

We can be done with simply explaining and trying to translate spirituallity and/or God.

Be done chasing higher things and being chased by them.

Christianity has it backwards, it seems.

The return of Christ is a spiritual reality.

The new birth is a physical one.

After all, even light itself is just a thing to behold. A thing that is.

Even true love is a real and tangible thing that moves atoms.

---

Ok, I am going to try to be done with this thread and the poetry of it.

And you should know me by now.

I have probably repeated myself a few times, and said some things flat out wrong or stupid.

Slap me upside the head with them, if you like. I’ll try to laugh, clarify, whatever.

Complain. Cuss me out. Call me a fool or a heretic. I can elaborate on any of it.

But its not like I’m gonna make this thing hundreds of pages long.

Tho I do plan on hanging out a few days, talking about spirituallity if there are any takers.

See who freaks out.

See who falls asleep.

See who smiles.

Its all good.

Bottom line (if there is such a thing), is seek the foundation OF yourself, FOR yourself, until "self" is consumed and beautified, and no longer weighs on you as much as it used to.

Christ (the divine form) is already within you, right?

It IS you. Always has been.

A wind giant. And a bumblebee star.

The entire universe was modelled after what you already are.

Here are some priceless practical things I have found and practiced that are too damn simple to seem important, which is where God likes to hide all his secrets, it seems. ;)-->

- To feel and see and know God requires practicing greater and greater periods of isolation and stillness and silence (yes, meditation, mainly – just about any school of it) The still small voice cannot be heard through all the usual chatter of our troubled minds. So learn to shut up your troubled mind, even if it takes hours of sitting there). Practicing things like inner silence can be like a torture chamber, but it pays. I can't say this enough. Meditative practices are the ground that spirituallity grows in, in every scripture and spiritual tradition in the world.

- Fall in love with your breath and learn how to breath with your entire body-mind. Yogic types of breathwork is the same Holy Breath Jesus taught his students. Oxygen is an inward tool for many many wonderful things.

- Think of food as medicine/poison. Your ability to think and understand is affected by the food you eat. Every cell is replaced by what you eat, and believe it or not, your mind reaches from your skull to the tip of your spine. A healthy body is a healthy mind.

- There are thousands of genuine spiritual teachers out there today who can help. Visit, but do not stay. There is a smorgasboard of spiritual disciplines and methods outside of the religion that fathered us. If we can only get over the taboos and “wierdness” of it. Our edge is defined by what is too weird, it seems. Take classes. Read books. Push your own personal spiritual comfy zone.

- Whatever inward disciplines you find, practice, practice, practice, like you are learning the guitar that you are. The sooner you get sounding like crap out of the way, the better.

- And put your favorite numbers for spirituallity down awhile. Because all of them are good.

For we all exist in oneness. We are one, whether we like it or not. Within and without.

And we are all dual. There is a line that splits us in half. But we can get stuck on mere duality.

And we are all truine, like a mother child father. But we can get stuck on any kind of trinity.

And we are all subject to gear after gear after gear of seasonal fourness and cycles. But we can be stuck in it.

And we all have a fiveness that evolved into a thumb. But we can worship the image of the beast.

And we all have a sixness, or sextuallity, where two triune beings intertwine. But we can get stuck in it.

And we all have a seveness, like a caduceus, or a brass serpent lifted up to heal. But we can even get stuck in this.

And when we reach the end of our spectrum of being, we simply find ourselves on another octave.

Eightness is a bigger oneness all over again, in both color and sound. A wonderful redundancy factor.

Like how the 9-month process of gestation and birth of our body is repeated with the conception, gestation and birth of our human soul (via understanding).

But our manifold natures, our Christ natures, our deepest natures, continues to evolve and diversify from octave to octave, beyond all numbering, but the spectrum of "we" is always simple enough count ourselves out, Alpha to Omega, on our own fingers of we have to.

Most of all let love be your compass.

It is the most reliable needle you have.

You can feel when it is off the mark.

Besides, all paper maps have dragons on the edges where knowledge stops.

So polish your compass and use it to find your way home. NOT somewhere new.

With love,

Todd.

(In case anyone is interested, I just posted more on these subjects on a thread by Pat S. in the "About the Way" forum entitled "Good Spirits and Bad Spirits).

Edited July 3, 2004 by sirguessalot

[dmiller]

quote:

---

Life experiences like GSC & TWI remind me of the Hotel California.

We can check out any time we like, but we can never leave.

---

Boy "ain't that the truth"! -->

Now -- I'll get back to the rest of your post! :)-->

[year2027]

God first

Hi Todd

I enjoy every word

thanks with love Roy

[Square Peg]

Todd,

So good to see your thoughts again! My inner musings have been running along the same lines - at a much more primitive level. One hard to put into words.

Alas, I'm just another aging boomer.....

Just remember this is the time of life for us where we re-examine so many aspects of our being. Gail Sheehay (sp?) wrote a book about it years ago - "New Passages". Be gentle with us. ;)-->

Now, as usual, I'll have to go back and read your post again. Thanks for dropping in.

[def59]

That was some postcard, maybe you should take a break from the postal service ;)-->

[sirguessalot]

Def, you crack me up. Perhaps you should post on every thread but this one to make it go away again. :D--> Besides, it is a message. This is a message board. I only called it a postcard for funzies. Maybe you can tell me what you would like me to chop out of my letter to make it shorter. :P-->

Square Peg, I hear ya. Be gentle with the boomers. It is a very sensitive time in life. When bitterness sets in, towards self, mostly. Though it comes out in other ways.

And as much as I see the boomer generation as having ignorantly screwed a lot of things up for my generation, and reaping what they sow as they age (poorly too, I might add), I believe the boomers hold the keys to the future for us. The early bitterness of my generation may blind my generation to this fact.

On a drier note, re: gentleness. It is the 5th order of spiritual fruit (which we eat), and miracles are the 5th order of spiritual manifestation. Miracles are literally massaged into being. Sudden miraculous changes are brought about by easing force onto the right pressure point. Miracles come about by feeling around with your eyes closed until you find the tiny hardness that blocks the stream of energy. Once that cornerstone of hardness is eased gently out of the way, the dam breaks, and what happens next is a miracle of the body, heart and mind. Its like knowing exactly what pebble to move to make the mountain dissolve and fall into the sea.

---

Ok. Looks like no one wants to play any new games. :D-->

Guess I'll see ya next time. :)-->

Edited July 4, 2004 by sirguessalot

[year2027]

God first

Hi All

The word vagabond sure fixs me after trig and during trig

During my years in the Way rulership I was like a vagabond but now I feel like I am no longer without a home

The spirit is my home and this spirit lives in Radcliff Ky which is in the belly of God

with love Roy

[cheranne]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR> Life experiences like GSC & TWI remind me of the Hotel California. <BR>We can check out any time we like, but we can never leave. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>Boy "ain't that the truth"! --><BR><BR>Now -- I'll get back to the rest of your post! :)-->

that song also reminds me of the same thing,i didn't think anyone else thought that too! what a nice surprize..bring your alibias(where were you for the last 10 years or so your employer asks? Mirrors on the ceiling(we all look the same likeminded believers) Pink champange in ICE (a nice looking sedative to freeze dry or brainwash your MIND)aka PFAL!WE are all just visitors here of our own device(we didn't mean to stay or join it just happened we couldn't find our way OUT!)

In the masters chambers we gather for big feast(rock of ages at vpw farm)we stab it with our steely knoves but we just can't kill the beast(thinking we are attacking the beast we are working for the s.o.b.

Last thing i remember i was running for the door had to find the passage back to the place i was before. SHEEESH.......even nw that gives me the creeps.

I found it easier in my therapy to use music to try to explain twi sometimes it cut the edge off the anxiety i would have(hey whatever works right)

and as i write this i am thinking of people that will come to this site in the years to come and maybe they won't feel so alone in this like i did when i tried to find the place i was before...but YOU CAN CHECK OUT AND LEAVE(BUT,IT TAKES TIME FOR YOUR MIND TO FOLLOW!)