Her yoga instructor was considered one of the best in the country. Indeed, he portrayed himself this way for as long as he could hold out, but his imbalances ate away at his ability to wear that mask, the mask of the sanctified. He grew into an abusive teacher who had sex with his students, […]
She came to talk at me about her spiritual journey. I write about the spiritual, I talk about it, I live it, so we must be in agreement about the importance of everything she’s found along the road of her life. Often, there is a great disconnect with people who are interested in certain topics. […]
We have all heard variations on the adage, “That which can be given can be taken from us.” When it comes to matters of spirituality, we apply this truism as a motivator to find every important thing within ourselves, believing that what is found within cannot be taken. But there’s a catch: even those spiritual […]
He talks about all of the magical things that come to him during meditation. He’s a visionary, he says, piercing the veil between worlds in the multiverse and bringing back magical practices, which he spells, “magickal”. He says all of the right things, the things his listeners want to hear, but he does so trepidatiously […]
He was a studious orator who told awe-inspiring tales of how neglected “paranormal” aspects of reality might work. In part, he based his assertions on the mythologies of heart cultures, including Hawaiian. Before him sat a Hawaiian woman who was keeper of the knowledge of her ancestors. She was excited to share what she knew […]
He came to tell his life’s story, a discussion, he said, but a monologue in actuality. There was no discussion, just him talking and me—an object in front of him—listening. His experiences were spectacular in how they hit every major science fiction and New Age theme he had ever studied. Aliens, he said. The notorious […]
We create our own reality. A favorite refrain of too many people I’ve met in and out of the New Age scene. This idea of the universe as a wish-fulfillment machine is the pseudo-spiritual version of the mechanical universe with you as its center. It’s a hedonistic fantasy, nothing more. Buying into every medical cure-all […]
She told me about dark sorcerers controlling the hearts and minds of people. They steer societies from another plane of existence. She fights them with magic while awake and in dreamtime. She’s certain they exist, she explained, because elders from multiple indigenous nations speak of them and because she’s clashed with them in dreams. From […]
“All we can do it point at the moon,” he liked to say, paraphrasing the old Buddha wisdom. If the moon is enlightened mind then the pointing to it represents words an enlightened one speaks to indicate it is there. Enlightened mind is the enlightened “thing” to be experienced. The words are just words and […]
She told me she understood what I was saying—that the root of all fear is the fear of death—but that for her it was not true. Fear of death fled her during an experience that occurred between clinical death and medical resuscitation. In that experience she stood as a soul in a tunnel of light […]