"Many individuals stand up and declare an idea that is "destined to be a movement". Many of these individuals end up just sitting back down. A few begin showing signs of a movement, but turn around and sit back down as well. Out of those many, a couple will succeed on their mission. They will demonstrate a level of enginuity, and enthusiasm to make their idea a movement. " Rev. Eric T. Schuetz

Are you a dreamer or a visionary? Do you live your dreams or do your dream live you? Everyone has thoughts about what life could, should and would be and it´s important to ponder these things because from these we get new ideas and life no longer follows the same old boring patterns. If our dreams become visions which then reach out into life and transform it we become visionaries! But then we can forget the grounding of life, we get lost in our dreams, the insubstantial misty thoughts that are anything we want them to be except real!

One symbol that I find inspirational for this is the pentacle, in the obverse. I have five words or "IN´s" for each element, so earth is Instinct, water is Intuition, air is Intellect, Fire is Intent and Spirit is Inspiration. There are two more "In´s" that I shall describe later.
Usually the pentacle is point up, spirit reaches into heaven, air and water reach out the sides and fire and earth reach down. But I find this to be ungrounded because here heaven and earth are separated into dualistic thinking. But that´s the problem of many religions and spiritualities, they seek "God", heaven, meaning or truth outside of mundane life. This is for unhealthy, unreal dreamers, not visionaries.

Taking the pentacle again we can put the spirit point down, bury it in the ground. This means to me that dreams or Inspiration are grounded, that they have real expression, they are not delusions that lead us away from the vitality tha is life. At its sides are Intellect and Intuition tthat support it like struts either side. Then there is Instinct and Intent, these are raised toheaven where they commune with "higher" realities. The sixth "In" is the Individual which lays within the pentagram at the centre, where it is sustained, supported and protected by the other "IN´s".

In some schools of thought this symbol is often seen with a horned animals head. We humans are just animals with basic animal needs, food, air etc. Now the mouth "feeds" off of Inspiration but only when it is grounded in the Earth. The ears of the animal are Intellect and Intuition, they are our tools of perception. Then the animals horns, Instinct and Intent are raised to the heaven´s fending off useless pipe-dreams. Here is the balanced and healthy human animal, where heaven and earth are married and not separated. This gives us our seventh "IN", Integrity. A life with Integrity in a healthy, happy and balanced one.

Here we have an image to help us make our dreams and give them reality and meaning. If we feed ourselves only with the basic necessities of life we become empty shells, devoid of meaning and if we forget these in favour of dreams then we become nothing more than empty visions. But if we can align these two, seek Integrity then life becomes something good and healthy.

But what´s important isn´t the symbol, I was just using that to convey a point (or five ;) ), so I leave you with this thought,

May Instinct sustain you and not constrict you,
May Intuition guide you and not confuse you,
May Intellect give you sense and not ignorance,
May Intent be strong and not burn you,
May Inspiration manifest potential and not empty images
And may Integrity flow through the Individual in health and balance.

“Human beings think of the gods as havng been born, wearing clothes, speaking and having bodies like their own. Ethiopians say the gods are black with snub-noses. Thracians say they have blue eyes and red hair. If cows and horses had hands they would draw pictures of the gods looking like cows and horses!” Xenophanes

“Personality is a limitation; therefore God as we understand Him has no personality. Prayer is our address to God. How can we address someone who has no personality? I address God as if He were a person, though I know that he is not.” Tolstoy

What happens when impersonal objects are given a human form and personality? What happens when a mountain, river, ocean, famine or art are given the history of a human life?

Humans are naturally a species that creates and follows reason. Within the habitat of the human mind values and meaning are as real as the flesh and bones that contain them. But outside of the human mind there are no values or reasons for anything, they just are and anything from stars to atoms, chromosomes to computers, mythology to science are all subject to the same callously indifferent laws of creation, evolution and destruction.

But humans are still persistent in finding out what makes the universe tick, the whats, whys and hows of things. These details are important because they are part of what make us human and give us a unique advantage over our environment. Of course, in the past when logic could not read all the information humans had to fill in the gaps with things more easly understood, like human nature. Winds became cheeks that blow, celestial objects were born and died cyclically and ancestor spirits spirits lived on throught the landscape.

We now have gods that govern human activities like healing, art, industry, law, cooking, cleaning etc and more wild gods for the landscape, seasons, fertility and so on. Human gods, those that govern human culture and civilisation are easy to understand as their realms are in the human domain and so represent human conventions easily.

More wild divinities that represent qualities throughout Nature and Cosmos are beyond human conventions and so when they are given human form their images are unconventional, insane and even sinister. Their actions can be alien, their intent fickle and illogical. Perhaps a mountain shelters and nurtures a tribe but then it spews forth hot lava that wipes out a village. Or maybe another tribe suffers from drought, and then they are given rain which quenches their thirst but then they might be drowned. The gods, the Forces of Nature can seem more like temperamental children than sophisticaed intelligences.

Some religions may admit that their gods are as limited in understanding and ability as humans, they themselves may be just as fallible and mortal as us. But other religions will argue that their God or gods are infinitely all-loving and infallible which a limited human mind would not grasp. Logically speaking this may be possible as the finite human mind can only percieve reality in fragments, so anything infinite will not be percieved so a personal, infinite Being could be justified no matter the atrocities of the world since their actons would be beyond any models of human logic thrown at it.

That aside, to me the gods are symbols of reality that represent anything we need representing. The human mind is equipped to understand some things and not others, so sometimes we need artficial ´delusions´ like the ones religion gives us to placate an unsettled mind. In the mean time we need not be constricted by these ideas but should try our best to use them as spring boards so that help us to grow and evolve.

May the gods, God, Goddess, symbols, archetypes, ancestors, forces of nature, demons, angels, art, science, Truth, Love and Life BLESS YOU!!! :)

"Hoof and horn hoof and horn, all that dies shall be reborn. Corn and grain, corn and grain, all that falls shall rise again." Pagan chant

"A Crus Salus" (From the Cross, Salvation) Motto on Brough coat of arms.

Although I'm a Pagan, the image of Christ on the cross is still evocative and reminds me of many things like natures cycles or "heroic resignation", not just death and guilt. It is so much more than a man-god dieing for sins, though for most people that is its essential message. From the moment we are concieved we are destined to die. It is as if we are all on a cross waiting to die because, essentially, the act of living necessitates death.

In the cross is the limitation of the world, each end can represent an element; earth, water, air and fire or to put it scientifically solid, liquid, gas and energy. Our forms cannot exist in any other way, scientifically speaking. We are 'hung' if you like on this body of solid, liquid, gas and energy. Though we have to ask what is it that hangs on the body? Some would say the soul, the thing that contains the inner experience, thoughts, feelings, memory, personality etc

I don't believe in a personal survival after death. My soul has the same laws and limitations as the body so when my body dies my soul dies or at least disintegrates. The body and soul are both limitations for something else to be 'hung' on and are both subject to the same laws of the growth and decay of life as it changes.

Consciousness then, the centre of experience hangs on body and soul. I do believe that there is something more to consciousness than being a product of chemical reactions within the brain. I believe it has something more primordial and eternal to it. When we die our consciousness, the I AM without this or that, the Here and Now without there and then returns to a 'sea' of consciouness. This is our source, God where all things are condensed from into a form and finally dissolve back into.

Going back to Jesus on the cross who is said to be God incarnate, in this case consciousness incarnate, we have a symbol where human and divine meet. Human being the horizontal line and the Divine being the verticle line. It is as though our divinity hangs on the cross of our humanity.

Now as a Pagan, the most important part of its symbolism is the image of life and death it conveys. It can most definately be related to both the agricultural and sexual aspects of fertility. First of all it reminds me of a wheat stalk that carries ripe seeds. The stalk has died, it is no longer needed but in its place it leave's seeds that carry it's life essense. These are shed into fertile soil. This also has phallic connotations The penis stands tall and erect, carries it's seed, then as it reaches its climax, drops the seed in 'dark moist soil' and relaxes. It's job done, it retains its former more docile form. Ejaculation has been termed the 'little death' in some cultures for they believe that when you lose sperm you lose life-force and come nearer to death.

Here's another image that connects death and sex. A Samhain, a time to contemplate death and the ancestors, there is reproduction happening. Animals like sheep and deer reproduce. Stags are ready to mate, they've grown their antlers to fight off competitors and attract mates. At this time when the world goes into winter, leaves die and fall and some animals become dormant. When this season where stags and hind mate is over, the stags antlers fall off. Again the image of something tall and strong meets it climax and falls or 'dies'. So here, symbolically at least, the connection between death and sex is shown.

Once again going back to Jesus, his rabbinic career found its climax in the crucifixion. There's build up as he tours round teaching. Then he was prosecuted for what he'd been teaching so he was crucified for it. Here is the climax of his teachings, what his teachings brought him. But as with all things in Nature that wasn't the end. His corpse was laid to rest in a tomb, or a womb if you like, where after a time he resurected. And so the seed arises after it's been planted and the sperm too arises after a fashion.

Sacrifice
Life is sacrifice.
Death of soil, life of grass.
Death of grass, life of grazer.
Death of grazer, life of hunter.
Death of hunter, life of soil.
Thus balance is sustainedCircles go round,
Life is sacrifice.

I sacrifice my time and gain space,
I sacrifice my space and gain time.
My sacrifice a trade.
Sacrifice the currency of life.

I offer up my life,
I sacrifice it to the world.
All that is me is disseminated,
Shared throughout the vital flows of earth,
Rivers of ecological merging and diverging.
I am not lost
Though my form is gone,
My essential unity found,
Illusory isolation banished forever
And I live on,
Sacrificed.
Copyright © 2005 by Adam Brough

"Most people never realize that the purpose of intoxication is to sharpen the mind." Aghori Vimalananda

A curious quote and not something easily understood on face value. I did hear a theory once that modern western civilisation was created through alcohol. It may seem strange but think about it, creativity is something that comes spontaneously, something without conscious effort. Alcohol loosens that conscious inteference to let the subconscious express itself. So our inventiveness may have come about by having alcohol in our diet!

Some examples without alcohol; Einstein came up with some of his greatest ideas, not by laboratory analysis but by aimlessly day-dreaming. When I write poetry, usually it comes best when I don't have any intent about it. In fact times when I'd quite happily sleep I can't because there's so much "noise" in my mind, it has to be written down!

Going back to alcohols hand in western civilisation; we've also got a huge complex culture surrounding alcohol itself, we have the institutions of bars, clubs and pubs, there are many different types of alcohol and different ways to serve and drink alcohol. Nothing quite as complex as a Japanese tea ceremony but complex nonetheless like the symbel ritual of Theodish and Asatru or the more modern drinking games.

Alcohols become such a cultural influence it's given birth to Alcoholics Anoymous, which isn't just a group of alcoholics getting together and talking about their problams but it also hase the 12 Step system, which has a spiritual aspect to it. But this goes against the above quote. AA is about people who want to remain sobre because they cannot control their drunkeness not about reaping the benefits of a drunken creativity.

We should also be careful of our state of mind. An ex-girlfriend was talking about mind altering substances and how if you're in a bad state of mind then any drunken, hallucinatory or 'high' experience will be a bad experience. For this reason and also seeing the effects of alcoholism I do not use alcohol or any substance to compensate for my emotions, instead I prefer to sobrely deal with them.

Perhaps to sharpen the mind means that people who are able to consciously indulge in drunkenness and fantasy and consciously detach themselves from it at will are the ones who reap the benefits and have the "sharpest" of minds. They do not drown the rational mind in emotions nor do they suppress emotions with rational analysis, they balance it.

Much like einstein, he didn't permanently day-dream. One moment he'd analyse, he'd then take a break and day-dream where his E=MC2 bubbles up from the subconscious. Here his rational thinking had sunk it to be processed without rational interference so it could have a more organic, active form. Then of course with this he'd go back to his rational thinking to give it more rational sense.

This is the same process as my poery writing. I like to fill my mind with info and when I've got something really interesting I read about it then put it down. Later it'll "bubble up" again where I can use the right words to express it. It's like the info gives it a bone structure then the more spontaneous subconscious part of it gives it muscle. Without our bones we'd be like living jelly, without muscles we'd be, well dead...

Another point to make about fantasy or drunkeness is that is that humans have developed a psychological need for fantasy. For all the rational atheists preaching about objective and logical truth we still have this inbuilt desire for fantasy and ritual. But if we indulge this too much we live a useless delusion. What do we do?

Well like Satanists we can allow our selves an "Intellectual Decompression Chamber" http://www.dpjs.co.uk/idc.html Some Satanists being objectivists also recognize humans are a religious animal, where we need some sort of ritual, magic, fantasy, dogma and meaning in our lives. To deny this is a kind of emotional suicide, a most unhealthy act. So to satiate our religious desire AND not fall onto the path of delusion we can allow ourselves Anton Lavey's Intellectual Decompression Chamber, where you indulge in consciously contrived delusion allow some moments for ritual and fantasy before returning to sobre consciousness.

There's the norse god Odin that can teach us a thing or two about this. To gain wisdom he made a sacrifice. That is in exchange for wisdom he had to sacricfice an eye, like he's taken out one sobre 'outward' looking eye to gain an intuitive 'inward' looking eye.

So what I think is that drunkeness or delusion isn't sharpness in itself but a tool to aquire sharpness of mind, much like rough sand-paper creates smooth wood, or how smelly poo can make a colourful and fertile garden. I like ritual, I like mythology and the feeling of 'sacredness', why shouldn't I use those? But i do, and from it I gain not just 'good feelings' but also a sense of community in group rituals, there's also the fact it can convey the sense of something sacred, magical and meaningful and these are I think, important for our psychological welfare.

Note: I've confused some concepts because of the limits of language and because different people apply different values on them, like magic-mundane, fantasy-fact, delusion-knowledge, unconscious-conscious, intuitive-intellectual, irrational- rational. Some of these overlap and some of these don't, but they all have a parallel in one way or another.

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"Everyone sits in the prison of his own ideas." Albert Einstein
"A man's character is his fate." Heraclitus

I do sometimes wonder if Free Will is actually free. Here we are creatures influenced by our "ideas" or "characters". That's hardly freedom is it? Sometimes I can try all I can to choose the 'right' thing but sometimes, just sometimes, I fail. Not by choice, simply because I'm limited to my nature. Sometimes it feels like I can flick a switch inside me where I can turn on and off things like memory, emotions and thoughts, but not all the time, I don't have the freedom to completely become another person and do other things.

There's something in my mind that I can't quite figure out about free will. Where does it come from? I mainly associate this problem with Chaos and Order. Now Order is completely mechanical, completely predictable and has no room for variation. And yet like Will it has a direction and focus.

What about Chaos? Now some say that this gives us the capacity for choice. There is no mechanics, there is no predictability, and infinite room for variation. But I still remain unconvinced. To me Chaos equates with completely spontaneous randomness. That is something that is not controlled nor predetermined, so this has no room for choice either.

If we had none of what Heraclitus called character, maybe that would be freedom. We'd have no conditions and infinite potential and yet that would mean there is no control, just randomness. Whereas Order or 'character' is conditioned and directioned like the Will of Free Will but is so rigid that it allows no variation, so I can't see where choice comes there either.

Yet humankind has evolved to percieve itself making 'choices'. Everyday I seem to make choices between one door or another, between toffee or mint icecream. I make my choice but then after reflection I'm unsure where it came from. Was it a predetermined desire or a completely random act where no thought determined it?

I think I would say that Free Will is a combination of Chaos and Order, Free=Chaos and Will=Order. I could still be wrong, there may be another alternative where 'choice' transcends the polarity of Chaos and Order, but because of the limited condtions of my mind I just cannot see it clearly.

Of course now I'm thinking pragmatically. None of this really matters, if I knew one way or another then that knowing would make no difference at all. If we don't have choice, well that's that, no choice. But if we do, well, we do and that's that too. Still the knowledge of one way or another isn't really an advantage.

The bottom line is that I percieve myself making choices, so I'll carry on with this awareness, whether illusory or not and carry on with my life as responsibly as I can and maybe, just maybe I could become the wiser.

"You may be dissapointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don't try." Beverly Sills

"Feel the fear and do it anyway." Anon

That about says it all really. There are times in life when you've gotta take the plunge, no matter the state of your confidence.
It's nice safely bumbling along through life but if you get stuck in a rut, sometimes you've gotta move beyond your fears and find new avenues in life.

"The beautiful thing about learning, is nobody can take it away from you." B.B.King

Another fantastic quote. WE CAN ALWAYS LEARN!!! Cool :)

This faculty seems almost as universal for life as death. Physically, emotionally, intellectually and spiritually there's always learning.

Right from the beginning DNA has, by trial and error, been learning what combinations work the best. Looking around at Nature we can see it has learnt vast complex multitudes of genetic variation!

Or emotionally. We learn what upsets us, what makes us happy, we can find us what works best and worst for our emotions. Although more emotionally aware creatures can create emotional traps for those less aware. For instance I go into a field of sheep and walk with a bucket of feed and usually this will get them interested, or if I yell and run at them they'll run away. I can do this with my dog, in subtle ways I can influence what she does but making her interested, altering my voice or my body language. On the other hand my dog's learnt how I tick and can pull 'puppy dog eyes' or be annoying to evoke or provoke a reaction lol.

Intellectually there' lots of facts and figures we can learn about, lots of things to measure and define, almost without end! And what with the human capacity for the imagination we can create things for other people to learn about; tools, stories, art, culture, the list goes on.

Also spiritually. Well this is a rather obscure subject. Noone really knows what it is or at least don't know how to adequately explain it. Each culture, subcultrue, subsubculture, and even subsubsub etc has a complex (or simple) system of symbolism, meditiation, ritual and belief, it's hard to pin point. BUT there is, once again, the possibility to learn! We can sift through the ideas and experiences of many people and compare it with our own with some idea, intuition or otherwise of what spirituality is.

And then who knows what other levels and arenas of learning there are?! It could go on for eternity! :O Wow, now there's a thought!

So, learn, learn and learn! Whether by education or experience, learn!

"The best life is spent preparing for death." Plato
Not very optimistic or comforting, so why say it?
Pretty simple, all life eventually dies, there's no avoiding it. If you have a problem with death then you have a problem with life. Noone living, leaves life alive... and we've all got to leave!Maybe death is the meaning of life, not salvation, or worshipping Allah or even biological reproduction, as these experiences aren't even that universal within life! In a world where death is so universal it's only sensible to contemplate and prepare for death.

Now this doesn't mean we should commit suicide. I'm not, life's too interesting! No, death comes whatever, suicide or not so there's no need to commit suicide. Personally I'd much rather die after a long and complex life that cut it short.

I've heard it said that we start dieing the day we are born. It's like we've been given a death sentense from birth. The only difference between "most people" and those who ARE on death sentence or who are terminally ill is that "most people" are less aware of their mortality.

Death is the ever present, silent companion that makes life real. Imagine immortality, without death. It would be dull and boring. It is mortality that makes life intense and vibrant instead of the same dull grey forever. Paradoxically those who are acutely aware of death can find a new zest for life not found when blind about mortality.

Another quote comes to mind though I don't remember who said it "Live each day like it's your last."