Bhikkhu Parasamgate dropped by a few days ago. He’s a self-styled monk, whom I hadn’t seen in a while. He brings a bag, a bedroll, and goes around the country staying with people – usually for about a couple of weeks. He’s very low-maintenance. Provide him with access to a bathroom, kitchen, and a space [...]
Archive for the ‘Consensus Reality’ Category
The Nidana Cards: A Buddhist Oracle
Posted in Astral, Consensus Reality, tagged Buddhism, causation, dependent co-arising, divination, nidana, oracle, qaballah, tarot on March 5, 2012 | 12 Comments »
Wood, Paper, Stone (a story)
Posted in Consensus Reality, tagged awakening, Dorje Shugden, enlightenment, fiction, Meditation, short story on February 26, 2012 | 5 Comments »
The Mayan Long Count calendar was about to expire – most likely because the Mayans hadn’t lasted long enough to add a few more cycles – but, among the esoterically-inclined, it was decided this meant 2012 was the end of the world. There was scant evidence, yet, manifestly, a lot of people wanted something to [...]
Deconstructing the Male Orgasm
Posted in Consensus Reality, Etheric, Meditation, tagged Daoism, ejaculation, male sexuality, orgasm, tantric sex on January 17, 2012 | 12 Comments »
Ejaculation and orgasm are not the same thing. To many men this may sound incomprehensible, but I’ve been amazed to discover that not only is it true, it’s also easier than I expected to separate them from each other. For solid evidence that coming does not entail spurting, a little human anatomy comes to our [...]
Ghost Hunting (a story)
Posted in Consensus Reality, tagged fiction, ghost hunting, paranormal investigation, short story on December 19, 2011 | 3 Comments »
We were near the end of our friendship, but I couldn’t see it. Zeff still seemed cool and dangerous to me, the way he rolled his ciggies, and how he drove that boxy automatic his uncle left him, with its disability badge still on the windscreen, which meant Zeff could park anywhere. We sometimes cruised [...]
A Conversation Between Worlds?
Posted in Astral, Consensus Reality, tagged ghost, life after death, Mark L. Cowden, Northern Ireland's Greatest Haunts, spirit, spirit communication on December 5, 2011 | 14 Comments »
Mark L. Cowden is the author of Spirit Voices: The First Live Conversation Between Worlds, a book that ought to be causing a stir on the paranormal scene. Cowden specialises in audio technology, and in this capacity joined the Northern Ireland Paranormal Society (now renamed ‘PSI Ireland’). Members of the team, including Cowden, featured in [...]
Superego: Secular and Spiritual
Posted in Consensus Reality, tagged castration complex, ego, religion, Sigmund Freud, spirituality, superego on November 21, 2011 | 5 Comments »
Id, ego and superego: components of Sigmund Freud’s famous topography of the psyche, so well-known I won’t rehearse the basics, but will focus on perhaps the least-understood element: the superego. Fundamentally, it allows us to view our ego as an object, from which it gains its traditional role as our ‘conscience’. The superego is the [...]
A Defence of Synchronicity
Posted in Consensus Reality, tagged Carl Jung, paranormal, psychokinesis, Stephen Braude, synchronicity, Unus Mundus on November 14, 2011 | 6 Comments »
Stephen Braude is a philosopher who was written extensively on the paranormal, ever since he witnessed close-up, whilst working on his PhD, a table levitating clean off the ground. Braude’s books are dense and analytical, but he gives his ideas a more populist airing in The Gold Leaf Lady And Other Parapsychological Investigations (Chicago & [...]
What Are ‘The Men In Black’?
Posted in Consensus Reality, Meditation, tagged ego, Nick Redfern, paranormal, Rudolf Steiner, The Double, The Guardian of the Threshold, The Men in Black (MIB), ufology on October 24, 2011 | 6 Comments »
Mainstream culture adopts esoteric ideas only in ways that reflect its assumptions. From the gnostic idea that reality is a prison constructed by a malevolent demiurge, for example, we get a film like The Matrix (Wachowski, 1999). The film falls short of its apparent gnosticism because, on closer inspection, reality and the matrix are pretty [...]
The Erotic Source of Mysticism – and Other Postmodern Bollocks
Posted in Consensus Reality, Meditation, tagged academia, Alan Moore, eroticism, Evelyn Underhill, Jeffrey Kripal, Meditation, mysticism, non-duality, postmodernism on October 11, 2011 | 27 Comments »
I listened to a radio interview with magickian Alan Moore, and my heart sank when he said: ‘I have never in my life seen an objective truth’ [1]. And it sank further when I encountered similar sentiments in a book by the writer and professor of religious studies, Jeffrey Kripal. I loved Kripal’s most recent [...]
Tarkovsky-Wordworth
Posted in Consensus Reality, Drift, tagged Andrei Tarkovsky, Irthlingborough, Irthlingborough iron mine, Irthlingborough railway station, post-industrial scenery, William Wordsworth on August 1, 2011 | 1 Comment »
The Influence On Childhood Of Post-Industrial Scenery I bring to mind the ancient bridge of stone In Erdiburne, my birthplace’s oldest name, Spoken by Norsemen who arrived in boats Up the quiet channels of the Nene With dragons’ heads for prows and sporting hats That no doubt had great big horns sticking out. But this [...]