7 posts tagged “mayan calendar”

“Every act of creation is first an act of destruction.” - Pablo Picasso

Much is being written about 2012 and what changes that year will bring. The Mayan calendar and various other religious and spiritual prophecies have seeped into popular culture to the extent that much of the world will be holding their breath on December 21, 2012 at 11:11 PM Universal Time, like Y2K to the umpteenth degree.

I have often been asked what I believe will happen on that day, if anything. The way I see it, it is already happening; we are already knee-deep in the preamble web of events, from which the tendrils of our future will be created. Whether as a result of ancient prophecies coming to pass, our having to finally take responsibility for the excesses of the past century, or simply the full-blown noospheric power of the expectations of millions of psyches, 2012 promises to be a banner year.

Whatever the cause, I must admit to a sense of further quickening. Terence McKenna is likely smiling knowingly from Somewhere, as the lines on the graph of his Timewave Zero theory march their way towards the 2012 zenith. I believe we are now witnessing the rapid spiraling of current crises and scenarios into some terrific opportunities for nefarious solutions by our world’s elite, not to mention the documented potential for spectacular destruction within our solar system. Whether these events will happen, much less converge exactly on that 12/21/12 date, or even within that year, I could not say for sure, but the timing is notable.

Frankly it’s coming so fast and furiously right now that I can barely keep up with it, as the same quickening seems to be happening in my own life, on smaller scale, in some kind of ironic, synchronistic testimony to the scalable unified field. I simply don’t have time to write about it as I would like, because I’m so busy living it. Perhaps we all are, in our own ways, navigating the Eschaton, whether we believe in it or not.

We are certainly being inundated with a constant banter, which perhaps attempts to instill fear, though ought to only keep us focused and alert. Economic crisis, world currency, new world order, world war, civil liberties, socialism, artificial intelligence, nonlethal weapons technology, seed banks, UFO disclosure, 2012 solar cycle, prophecies, earthquakes, volcanoes, sustainability, self-sufficiency, gardening, alternative energy, free energy, consciousness shift, revolution, evolution…truth does seem to be stranger than fiction these days.

Another resonant topic which continues to haunt me is Planet X or a binary star/sister sun theory, though I cannot provide substantial third-dimensional proof, enigmatic Vatican probes and Antarctic telescopes notwithstanding. The only shred of mainstream scientific evidence could be that our ‘global warming’ phenomenon seems to actually be happening across our solar system, not just on Earth. Polar ice continues to melt, but Jupiter’s great red storm is shrinking too. Still others say we are headed for another ice age. How about this radical take at Rense: Evidence of Solar Manipulation and Solar Changes?

What doesn’t seem to be up for debate is the fact that our Sun’s behavior can be worrisome. Many of the ancient prophecies seem to include mention of the Sun, and/or other planetary movements, such as the Mayan belief that the 2012 date indicated the end of the time of the Fourth Sun, and the beginning of the world of the Fifth Sun. In Revelation 6:12, the sun turned black after a great earthquake. Other ancient prophecies, including the Koran, the Norse Ragnarok, the Egyptian Ipuwer Papyrus, the Kolbrin Bible, North American Indian prophecy and many, many other books in the Bible warn of a future time of destruction during which the earth will burn and shake violently. I enumerated many of these in my book in the chapter, Destruction by Fire. I noted the strange recurrence of these similar warnings across time and culture. Here’s a good overview of the Mayan calendar and the solar cycles.

Strange ancient hieroglyphics, now discovered in widely diverse locations around the globe from Colorado to Yemen, Australia and South America, all seem to be referring to “some event, possibly related to the Sun, which was prophesied to change human civilization.”

Currently our Sun is in a period of extreme quiet, with the lowest sunspot activity in nearly a century of recording, the great calm before what is now expected to be a great solar storm in 2012, when the sun reaches the apex of its 11-year cycle. Due to the weakening magnetic fields around both Earth and the Sun, it is expected to be more ferocious than usual. A recent report on severe space weather and its potential economic and societal effects has been making its way into the mainstream media. One can now find various releasing hair-raising alerts in this regard, one after the other.

From the Telegraph: Scientists are expecting a more intense solar cycle this time around. Jimmy Raeder, a physicist with the University of New Hampshire, explained it is “because the Earth’s and the sun’s magnetic fields will be in sync at the cycle’s peak, expected in 2012, that will cause an influx of solar particles”.

From NASA: A Giant Breach in Earth’s Magnetic Field, “NASA’s five THEMIS spacecraft have discovered a breach in Earth’s magnetic field ten times larger than anything previously thought to exist.” At first scientists couldn’t even believe it. Themis is working to determine the severity of the expected upcoming solar storm,and the magnitude of effects it will have on our electronic grids and satellite systems.

In December of last year, from Fox News: Powerful Solar Storm Could Shut Down U.S. for Months. Another recent Fox News report with physicist Michio Kaku is frighteningly clear. WATCH IT. I am familiar with Dr. Kaku and his calm intelligence, and this seems almost outrageous coming from him. He claims he and his fellow scientists made a mistake, and that the 2012 solar cycle will be far more disastrous than previously imagined. Wow.

Here’s a real doozy of a doomsday scenario recently outlined by New Scientist: Space storm alert: 90 seconds from catastrophe. Or how about this from the Daily Mail, Solar storm could cause planetary disaster at any time, warn scientists. A Danish study has even concluded that the earth’s magnetic field is impacting our climate. All this, and CNN is still debunking 2012 as a meaningless popular culture meme? Well, which one is it??

Australia is adding a new magnetic field observatory to study the weakening field and hopefully gain warning of an imminent polar reversal. Meanwhile check Spaceweather.com for news and updates. NOAA provides current solar data, and here’s their solar activity monitor. Here is their space weather prediction center. And the seed banks continue to be made ready by 2011.

Here’s a YouTube video of Jay Weidner at the recent 2012 conference talking about the sun’s reduced heliosphere and an inundation of radiation from the center of the galaxy by 2012. The warnings, he explains, are important, but he also separates himself from the ‘gloom and doomers’ by expressing that this change could be seen as an opportunity, even if it was forced upon us.

I find myself agreeing with that. Using a pending Apocalypse as an opportunity is the essence of Surfing the Tao. Whether anything will happen in 2012 or not, current world events are forcing us to take a hard look at how we are choosing to live on this planet. There are of course many people who are too conditioned to the trees to even notice the forest, much less discern any correlations and make adequate preparations within themselves. But more people are growing vegetable gardens this year than ever, and companies are even running out of seeds. Murmurs of alternative energy solutions are louder than ever. Communities are turning inwards for solutions, as well we all should. Networks espousing such thoughtfulness, teamwork and sustainability are springing up everywhere. Whether it’s to prepare for the End of the World, or just the end of an unsustainable world of bad habits, it’s all good.

Many believe there will be a shift, whether wholly on this day or as a beginning on this date (or perhaps now already started, to be completed then) from the third to the fourth density; in other words some kind of shift in consciousness, or dimensions. Of this possibility I have also received a kind of inner confirmation, though it remains nebulous as to what, how, where, and when. People seem to have their own theories on that, to be sure. Love is key; true unselfish compassion is essential, and perhaps if we can cultivate that, the rest will come. Personally, I suggest the teachings of Jesus remain the best wisdom to follow in that department, whatever your religious or spiritual beliefs, if any.

Indeed we are very much affected by magnetic fields; would a significant change in the field give us just what we would need to reach Beyond what we think of as reality? A “perfect storm” indeed perhaps? Creation from destruction? I might like to posit one additional intuition here as well. I have always felt that this ’shift’ might also either require, or gain a significant boost, from some sort of technology, yet to be pinpointed. I’m not sure why I think that, or what it is, just the idea of some kind of portal, stargate or even shield has continued to nag at me. Call me crazy, but I think there are a lot of puzzle pieces still out there. Just take a look at the megaliths around the world. Seems a bit too contrived to be random. Anyway just a thought.

Whether events converge to create the perfect storm in 2012, or simply give us the perfect opportunity for a positive evolution, the best advice I can give is pay attention. Be prepared, but not fearful. Keep your ear to the ground, and use your inner discernment to find the thread of truth.

And love your neighbor. You might need him one of these days.

Prevent trouble before it arises.

Put things in order before they exist.

-Tao Te Ching #64

Recently I had the good fortune to come across a copy of Nassim Haramein’s DVD set, “Crossing the Event Horizon.” I would highly recommend a watch to anyone looking for an excellent interpretation of concepts ranging from Unified Field Theory, fractal geometrical realities, and the torque of spacetime, to crop circles, the pyramids, ancient calendars and our place in the universe. Four DVDs span over six hours of material, much of it Nassim’s own entertaining presentation of his brainpopping theories, with some special features worth investigating. His website, The Resonance Project, also contains a lot of his research, papers and articles, a trailer of his DVD and a preview of “The Power of Spin.” You can also join in his monthly teleconference calls.

I give him credit for puzzling together his theories from hard physics, pure brainpowered revelation and no doubt plenty of inspiration from the Ether. His background is unique, and given the state of our current orthodox scientific community, which seems to progress with the speed of a glacier, the new ideas he’s brought into dialogue are refreshing and invigorating. I can only imagine what his theories could bring in terms of changing our reality – from the expansive way we understand creation and our very existence, to how we live our everyday lives. Understandable why he appears on this video which won the One Minute Shift video contest.

The double torus he talks about, based around the tetrahedral and cubeoctahedral geometric structures, is well founded in hard math, and can also be found discussed in terms of sacred geometry. There is a ringing of truth somewhere in my spirit, which may explain why it’s called The Resonance Project. The idea that creation is literally spun around in a sort of double-donut shape around a center vacuum, escaping from the center ‘white’ hole and winding around the outside to be sucked in by the other side’s black hole, simply makes sense in some profound way, particularly the additional torque or spinning motion that he postulates may provide an explanation for the movement of everything from galaxies and subatomic particles, to spacetime itself. This Coriolis Effect resultant of the gravitational and electromagnetic forces at work, when balanced creates a golden spiral or phi ratio. These concepts are finding their way around the noosphere in various forms and via various paths; Richard Merrick wrote a good article about these theories over at Reality Sandwich. The black hole/white hole idea is something I mentioned in my book four years ago, albeit nowhere near this level of thought; somehow it resonated with me (no pun intended), as I imagine it could be related to the ancients’ concepts of reality itself. As Nassim says, it explains why and how the Universe is both expanding and contracting at the same time. It explains where the energy is coming from. In fact it may explain the very meaning of life itself, the existence of the Universe and the enigma of the void of subatomic space. As above, so below.

In the beginning was the Tao. All things issue from it; all things return to it.”

- Tao Te Ching #52

After this new information began to seep in, I started to wonder what implications this would have for consciousness itself, so I wasn’t too surprised to find this radio interview. It’s clear Nassim also can’t help but realize the amazing possibility that consciousness plays an important role in the fundamental structure of spacetime. Kudos to him; though I’m sure it must be why orthodox science is not so quick to accept such new ideas. Unfortunately in orthodox science, genius is often recognized much later, but for those of us already out here on the fringe, it is a very welcome development. I keep thinking about our alignment with the galactic plane on the winter solstice in 2012, which I’ve mentioned here before, the end of the Mayan fourth sun on that date as well as our current place along the precession of the equinoxes: just now beginning to enter the Aquarian age, beginning the Great Cycle anew, and again.

Is the ancients’ concept of the Great Ages perhaps a more complete wisdom than we realize? Could our very state of consciousness be poised to transverse some integral dimensional edge along this Great Donut of Enlightenment? Are we about to enter the Event Horizon?

Nassim Haramein himself said, “”Everything we see in the Universe is the infinity of the energy density of the vacuum in various scales. The biological resolution is the link between the large and the small. You are the event horizon. Instead of seeing yourself as an insignificant little dot that means nothing to the Universe, you start to see yourself as the center of creation. Everyone else is the center of their Universe as well. And thus we are all equal and we’re all one.”

“Scientists say that time travel could be a reality in just three months.”

Notwithstanding that unapologetically paradoxical statement, one cannot help but entertain vivid Dr. Who fantasies of a blue phone booth swirling and landing in the neighborhood. Is it really time?

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in CERN, Switzerland, the world’s largest particle accelerator, is set to be activated in May of this year. Scientists imagine it could reveal the shape of alternate dimensions. That is exciting enough when one considers other recent news that the Ophiuchus cluster, at the heart of our galaxy, is emitting highly energetic X-rays which has turned it into a giant particle accelerator. If our relatively tiny model is expected to reveal such powers, what could Ophiuchus bring?

Many alternate researchers like John Major Jenkins believe our alignment with the galactic plane on the winter solstice in 2012, a once-every-26,000-year-event, will somehow enable a transformation of consciousness. Could these Super X-Rays be just what the Doctor ordered in terms of opening stargates to the next dimension? Have science and spirituality come close enough for us to sense some kind of truth to that?

And if so, what should we think of the news that some Russian scientists suggest that the scientists at CERN, in their endeavor to create micro-wormholes, or ‘mini’ black holes, could instead have built the world’s first time machine? They posit that time traveling is only possible as far back as the point of creation of the first time machine. That would make 2008 “Year Zero”, and we could see visitors from the future begin to appear. With Ophiuchus in mind, the musings of the Daily Galaxy give me pause, “Even the most massive human experiment is a pale imitation of the galactic-sized particle accelerators that fire cosmic radiation at us daily, and with all that high-energy activity in the sky if techno-mutants from the year Q4099 did want to invade they wouldn’t have to hang around supercooled Genevese caverns to do it.”

Indeed. It’s quite possible we are already entertaining travelers from the future, and simply don’t know it; one need only consider the Butterfly Effect or various temporal paradoxes to understand why. Posthuman Blues had this to say about the mainstream skepticism of time travel, “Stephen Hawking has used the same argument. If time travel is possible, he maintains, we should see a steady influx of “tourists” from our own future. This reasoning is easily as limited as the assumption that ET visitors will “land on the White House lawn” if they happen to visit.”

Some claim to have accidentally slipped through time. The Philadelphia Experiment was supposedly haunted by timeline inconsistencies, and the Montauk Project contains similar claims. Here’s another interesting article about a temporal vortex discovered by scientists in Antarctica. For more about the possibilities of time travel, watch this excellent lecture by theoretical physicist Paul Davies. The bending of space-time and the illusion of particle physics in the first place beg our attention, and that of our greatest scientific minds.

One wonders if there really will be any sort of great change on that winter solstice moment in 2012, or if we are perhaps already beginning to feel the effects of a gradual transformation, as we move closer to the alignment. Perhaps the news at CERN is no coincidence in terms of timing. We’ve grown more willing to entertain the possibility; whether in terms of science or spirituality, we are in fact energetic conduits of consciousness, and our location in the galaxy could fast-forward our readiness to explore new territory and open the door to the unknown. A Kean Eye suggests galactic ‘thought particle accelerators’ explain the recent exponential growth in science and technology; I think that sums it up quite nicely.

On the other hand, it could be the key to our undoing as well. I couldn’t help but notice that Project Camelot’s article on 2008, which mentions time travelers as well as the mind-blowing chronovisor, stated that, “According to Dan Burisch, in testimony which we regard as credible, the future humans’ best evaluation of the catastrophe which befell their ancestors (i.e. us) was that it was caused by micro-wormholes in space-time which caused effects which were inadvertently and devastatingly amplified by man-made stargates and time-portal ‘Looking Glass’ devices.” They are assured that the devices in question have been disabled, successfully averting that catastrophic timeline.

Of course one does not take Project Camelot’s words as gospel; even they caution against that. However I do pay attention when I just happen to stumble on the word “micro-wormhole” more than once on the same day. And I will continue to pay attention to the news out of Switzerland this spring. Our future is fragile enough as it is.

“I believe that the World Wide Web is, as a matter of fact, the noogenesis of the noosphere.” - Ralph Abraham, The Evolutionary Mind (1988)

Lawrence Hagerty wrote in The Spirit of the Internet,“…the Internet is not the noosphere. It is merely an infrastructure that is now available for the noosphere to use.” Hagerty goes on to profess, “I believe that the Internet is serving as just such an attractor, or basin of attraction, drawing the Earth’s most creative minds into a synergistic union out of which a new form of human consciousness can arise from the wells of chaos.“

The noosphere is a term created by Jesuit priest/radical thinker Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, whose ideas were frankly force-fed to me in college in the eighties (I happened to attend a Jesuit university where he was practically worshiped as a god). For that reason perhaps I wrongly assumed his teachings were more widespread than they actually were at the time. But I find no uncertain irony that his ideas continue to haunt my own delightfully synchronous journey towards Singularity.

Not the technological singularity of Ray Kurzweil; I’m talking more about what’s happening over at Reality Sandwich, and other important, alternative think tanks of our time. “New science” is termed thusly because, reminiscent of Capra’s intuitions of decades past, scientific discoveries are merged with new (and perhaps very old) interpretations of consciousness. This is how it should be; the Newtonian universe must ultimately be discarded in favor of the quantum discoveries that tickle our brains, easing us into new frontiers of existence, consciousness and human evolution. The homo cyber I find mentioned here and there, if left alone in the wilderness of pure artificial or mechanistic intelligence, would be the unfortunate result of not taking the final step of this process. Like refusing to take the red pill, our psyches would be left to rot inside the prison Matrix of third dimensional space-time. “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy,” reminds Shakespeare.

The Internet may be Noosphere 1.0, a precursor to an enlightened state of consciousness; or perhaps, Noosphere for Beginners, or Noosphere for Dummies. Though arguably a creation of Big Brother’s sinister and eavesdropping omnipresence, the Internet is also being used, perfectly a la Tao, as a vehicle to transmit thoughts and ideas in preparation for a purely telepathic noosphere. The next several years its role will be vastly influential in terms of the global progression of consciousness, and I urge all to participate as they can until then (or until the government curtails this freedom, much as it has done with suppressing entheogens); but at some point, perhaps soon, the circuits and transistors will go the way of the covered wagon. Many of us will leave our electronic devices abandoned on the beach as we eventually look up and realize the great sea of enlightenment and oneness is before us, and go in for a dip – never to return. The key to ridding ourselves of the shackles of this reality is love, pure and simple. Love is the thing no machine can transmit; love is the unique trait, or ability, that will catapult our transformation from homo sapiens not to homo cyber, but to homo luminus.

The minds at work on the great consciousness project at this moment are alive during this time not by accident. They are all Surfing the Tao though they may not be aware of it. We are all giving what we have, and taking what we need, in some kind of post-modern, spirit-driven, psychedelic communistic mind trip, hastened by our collective visions of 2012 and beyond. Hagerty calles it entheospace; I might describe the sensation as a sort of dreamstate, finding oneself floating down a river of consciousness, gently colliding with others riding down the same stream in a kind of synchronistic, fractal pattern of atunement, as we all slip closer to the great sea.

Daniel Pinchbeck’s first book was entitled, Breaking Open the Head – which I mention here not for its particular content, which is a mind-expanding examination of the entheogenic experience, but because it so aptly illustrates my own particular state of being.

My own head cracked in college, during several misguided entheogenic experiences. I discovered Terence McKenna, but as far as spirituality goes, I was definitely a seeker who didn’t really want to spend any time looking.

This all changed in 1999. The previous fracture, which had begun to scar over, was rent asunder, and a torrent of new knowledge and higher frequencies began to stream in. I will only say: the true masters are truly hidden. And it is meant to stay that way, for now, perhaps because actual participants can often teach each other more in the beginning. But I was urged to continue meditating, and before long I had what Neil Kramer over at The Cleaver might call a fourth dimensional experience.

Without any entheogenic aid, I crossed over into the void. Suddenly, I Knew.

There are no further words for what I experienced. The language simply doesn’t exist. But it changed everything I knew, all that I was. What followed was years of reading, researching, listening, loving, meditating and change. Many of the books that appeared as if by magic I have listed here. My intellectual side was frustrated, but my spirit was at peace for the first time I can remember in my adult life. The end result of that was, I wrote a book, which was really just a cathartic expression of my overwhelmed psyche.

My own path is still guided by amazing synchronicity and coincidence. I find it startling how often I find articles written about the very subject I had been ruminating about. How I discover brilliant minds have already found answers to the questions I have been asking. How so many of our paths are beginning to converge on the Great Path. Spirituality, Taoism, 2012, eschatology, Planet X, the Matrix, conspiracy, sinister agendas, alien technology, symbology, synchromysticism, mind control, electromagnetism, alternative energy, quantum physics, plasma physics, torsion physics, entheogenic-inspired thought and conscious enlightenment, ecocentric living, — the puzzle pieces are coming together rapidly. I cannot explain how I know what I Know, yet I will say; the quickening is upon us. The noosphere is coalescing. The Puzzle of Being, and the question of consciousness, is in the process of being realized by a vast cadre of psycho-cryptographers.

The great irony is, I sense, that this enlightened, super-charged, noospheric state of being is and has always has been, here and now. This ancient Way that has been lost during our fall, over perhaps hundreds of thousands of years, is now being quickly rediscovered, picked up and dusted off as some kind of primordial reflex to protect ourselves from what we subconsciously know is coming. We are remembering, so that we will survive.

I remember Y2K. Regarding expectations for 2012, the intensity of thought, intellect, spirit, and energy now in 2008 is somewhat on par with what happened the months previous to Y2K. And we have nearly five years left. What incredible postulations, theories, discoveries, transitions, realizations, opportunities, manifestations, creations and expectations will surface between now and then?

And what will happen on December 21, 2012 at 11:11 universal time? That remains to be seen; but to prepare for either global catastrophe, psychedelic wormholes or simply more life as we know it – the only answer is, and always will be: love, peace and harmony.

Sometimes I wonder how I find what I do here online – and when I do, I wonder what else I’m missing. I’m only one person. Only one computer. Only so many hours in the day.

If you’ve made it this far, please consider leaving a comment here regarding what author, what religion, what spiritual path, what thinker, what scientist, what discovery, what issue, what website, what experience – what ANYTHING that has made a difference for you on your journey.

Give what you have. Take what you need.

As it acts in the world, the Tao

is like the bending of a bow.

The top if bent downward;

the bottom is bent up.

It adjusts excess and deficiency

so that there is perfect balance.

It takes from what is too much

and gives to what isn’t enough.

– Tao Te Ching #77

Journalist Daniel Pinchbeck, self-proclaimed cynic and son of Beatnik parents, transversed the realms of the psychic and the psychedelic, as well as his own personal drama, to bring us his version of the Eschaton in his book 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl. His scholarly prose is punctuated with radical, apocalyptic refrains which underscore his own revelations as to the immanent arrival of something both terrifying and wonderful. If he is correct, our near future contains the potential for both catastrophe and conscious enlightenment, a view I happen to share to some extent.

Whether this transformation will occur in one simultaneous event on December 21, 2012 remains to be seen. However Mr. Pinchbeck threw himself to the wolves in this book, revealing not just his own relationship issues, self-doubt and twisted shamanic journeys, but a full-on prophetic experience of Quetzalcoatl himself and a vision of our future perhaps only a very small handful of people are willing to consider.

He calls this book an “extravagant thought experiment”, explaining his dual lines of investigation from philosophical groundwork to his own “process of discovery”, which led us from psychedelic trips all over the world, to crop circles, alien abduction, occult manifestations, time vs. consciousness theory, global environmental and economic collapse, and back to his own frustrating and comparatively two-dimensional Manhattan habitat. Through these various means, he points out our general unwillingness as a species, in these post-modern times, to recognize the ever-increasing void of spiritual awareness; our cultural blinders have rendered us more or less incapable of recognizing the signs of our own imminent demise, which come to us through journeys into a level of consciousness few seem prepared to take.

While his writings and experiences differ greatly in style, organization, and attitude, I found the skeletal framework somehow reminiscent of my own, as if there were some great field of knowledge to be tapped into whose messages are passed on through one’s own particular experience, research, circumstances, filters, lexicon, allegory, etc. – the flesh, as it were. Granted, the subject matter stems from the same genre, though our intentions are arguably dissimilar; however I couldn’t help but notice how much of this work resonated with my own in Surfing the Tao. After much agonizing over whether to share what I found to be synchronous lines of thought, I have decided to note some here humbly, knowing my own self-published, obscure volume will likely only make it into a handful of minds. I ask the reader not to misinterpret the following as any folly of ego; I recognize my own small work can never be compared to Pinchbeck’s literary talent, however critiqued he may be. I do this only in the spirit of noticing how similarly the Tao can touch the thought patterns of an open mind and heart, and that the synchronicity of it all could raise a few eyebrows as to what may or may not be truer than we realize…

DP: “Throughout my early life and into my thirties, I lacked a metaphysical view of any sort.” (p. 19) AVM: “For the first thirty-odd years of my life, I wandered in ignorance.” (p. vii)

DP: “…I concluded, sadly, that our current civilization is not a machine built to last. (p.8) AVM: “As time and technology progresses, general knowledge is actually regressing…A system based on money instead of love will eventually falter.” (p.7)

DP: “…the modern materialist sees myth as antiquated and simpleminded – at best, metaphoric or symbolic.” (pp. 9-11) AVM: “..we have been taught to think of the ‘gods’ as mythological or symbolic…”(p. 31)

DP: “…a text can only act as a scaffolding of concepts, a ladder for others to climb.” (p. 15) AVM: ““Though some texts can be used to help guide us, no one ever entered the actual ascended state through the pages of a book.” (p. 210)

DP: “Real knowledge of what I am saying must be earned, and lived, by each individual, in his or her own way.” (p. 15) AVM: “This is a highly personal experience…little things will pop up in everyday life that will start to ‘prove’ it to each person in their own way.” (p. 14)

DP: “Few of us have time to make our own investigation of such abstruse realms as psychic research – and why would be bother, when our ‘experts’ assure us they have the situation wrapped up?” (p. 38) AVM: “…those who control the leading educational and intellectual institutions of our day have settled on the general public view of non-supernatural evolution…Many would rather accept the lives they have been taught…and not bother with anything more.” (p. 5)

DP: “…modern physicists…were surprised…[to find] that matter was largely composed of empty space. At this quantum level, physicists discovered that their attempts to measure the phenomena they were studying affected that phenomena…” (p. 47-8) AVM: “…inside an atom, there really isn’t any substance at all; just tiny sparks of energy…physicists are surprised to discover you can’t measure sub-atomic activity without influencing it.” (p. 15)

DP: “I found that attuning myself to synchronicities…required the development of a kind of intuitive skill…some of these synchronicities involved conjunctions between personal episodes and world events that seemed to me both numinous and inexplicable.” (p. 55) AVM: “My life became filled with so many bizarre synchronicities and small daily miracles that few people would even believe them.” (p. vii)

DP: “It is only as a fully self-reflective individual consciousness that one can make the choice, out of free will, to reconcile with the Divine, through sacrifice, or supercession, of the ego.” (p. 117) AVM: “Choose love: use your free will to seek His will, and soon it will coincide with your own and your life will be truly blessed.” (p. 20)

DP: “In the popular culture of our secular age, the gods, demigods, fairies and gnomes of the old mythic realm have returned as extraterrestrials.” (p. 121) AVM: “Author John A. Keel wrote in his work Operation Trojan horse, “The UFO manifestations seem to be, by and large merely minor variations of the age-old demonological phenomenon.” (p. 50)

DP: “According to this hypothesis, Christ ‘redeems’ us only when we follow his lead. We still have to save our own souls.” (p. 117) AVM: “It is a bit of a paradox – we must first save ourselves, by refusing to be fearful, and maintaining a positive state of mind.” (p. 199)

DP: “Our conventional notion of history, like our conventional understanding of space and time, supports a linear, evolutionary and causally deterministic view of events.” (p. 189) AVM: “Most people alive today probably think our world is just the result of natural evolution…” (p. 1)

DP: “As represented in the Tai Chi symbol, one pole does not negate its antipode, but reflects and includes it.” (p.209) AVM: “Yin and yang are not opposites – yinyang is the essence of the oneness of all things.” (p. 28)

DP: “The superstrings, quantum jumps, and wormholes through space-time described by contemporary physicists might prove the basis for shamanic techniques of visiting other realms…” (p. 245) AVM: “The passageways between [black and/or white holes] are referred to as wormholes, gateways through space/time…This concept mirrors our ancients’ views about our reality [re. origins of ‘the gods’.]” (p.42)

DP: “’EVERYTHING IS SAFE IN GOD’S HANDS.’ This telegraphed answer [to a question regarding the fate of humanity] was startling – and reassuring…It has liberated me from fear and anxiety.” (p. 259) AVM: “God’s plan is great but complicated…only know that He loves us and everything will be ok in the end…Stop worrying…never give in to fear.” (pp. 250-1)

DP: “As it says in the Tao Te Ching, ‘Non-Tao is short-lived.” (p. 375) AVM: “’That which goes against the Tao comes to an early end.’ - Lao Tzu” (p. 14)

DP: “Such a shift would not be the ‘end of the world,’ but the end of a world, and the opening of the next.” (p. 15) AVM: “Far from being the end of everything, this event could trigger our ascension into a higher realm…” (p. 249)

But whereas many of my own thoughts seem mirrored in his book, I found it interesting how his own particular circumstances, and journey towards this consciousness, manifested in such different ways. While I’m no stranger to psychedelics and have indeed had some prophetic experiences thereby, my most profound revelations were actually not drug-induced but rather brought about during moments of startling clarity during deep meditation. What truth I believe I stumbled upon comes from within; our own atoms already contain the necessary ingredients for wisdom, transcendence and enlightenment. Mr. Pinchbeck does not hesitate to tell of his terrifying psychedelic foray into the realm of the trickster daimon and the occult; he does indeed admit the inherent dangers therein, “The initial visions had been seductively Luciferic.” (p. 72) While he does admit the inherent dangers of the “daimonic reality”, I might suggest the best protection there, as anywhere, is love. And love is something he seems to have struggled with, on a personal level, throughout – though he does recognize the necessity and power of positive thinking, something he was not afraid to comment on during a recent and much-discussed argument with Whitley Strieber on his radio show.

But he is on a very different journey than I am; for many, psychedelics offer a way to, in Pinchbeck’s own words, ‘break open the head’ in a way they might not otherwise be able to, in a world that seeks to keep this kind of knowledge hidden. Certainly one cannot help but be mystified by the profound and strikingly similar types of inferences made by the likes of McKenna, Burroughs, Narby, Pinchbeck himself and others in these altered states. To seek knowledge of another realm, consciousness or dimension, you have to somehow travel there.

Towards the end, Pinchbeck shares the transmission he received from Quetzalcoatl. I read it umpteen times, my sense of discernment on high alert, as if searching for a way to Know…I am left with the overwhelming sense that he did intuit truth and wisdom, the sort of truth one gleans from Knowing with the Spirit; in the intellectual world, nothing like this could ever be proven. I suffer the same dilemma. Somehow I find solace knowing that if these revelations indicate mental illness according to western psychiatric theory, at least I would be in good company in the psych ward. So, knowing how difficult it is to write about these things in a secular materialist culture, he does win my respect and admiration for even coming out with this material. As I said before – the wolves are eager to tear it apart, and he has laid bare his jugular, “Even if it required isolation from the mainstream, I preferred to sacrifice my beliefs and preconceptions, along with the comforts and status they afforded, rather than cling to a set of inherited values that I increasingly suspected to be false.” (p. 40) At the risk of repeating myself, again I find evidence that our many diverse paths have the potential to converge onto the Great Path – that singular Truth of Being which seems to so deftly escape our waking consciousness.

2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl was published in hardback in 2006 and paperback in 2007. Mr. Pinchbeck can be found online at Breaking Open the Head, Reality Sandwich, Whole Life Times, featured in a video at Postmodern Times, his Amazon blog and MySpace among others.

Does our sun have a sister star?  In his 2005 book Lost Star of Myth and Time, author and amateur archaeo-astronomer Walter Cruttenden pushed the envelope of accepted astronomy when he theorized that our own Earth is part of a binary star system.  Cruttenden’s video based on that book, The Great Year, narrated by James Earl Jones, is an excellent summation of this theory.  As Executive Director of the Binary Research Institute, Cruttenden continues to research “evidence of astronomical cycles of time known to cultures throughout the ancient world.  It is Cruttenden’s belief that the myth and stories depicting a repeating cycle of Golden Ages and Dark Ages may have a basis in fact, due to the alternating stellar forces that affect Earth as our solar system moves in a 24,000-year binary (dual star) orbit.”

The Great Year references the 24,000-26,000 year cycle of time during which our solar system completes its precession through the equinoxes.  Generally considered to be more important to astrologers  than astronomers, there is evidence that many ancient cultures  were aware of precession – which suggests that not only is civilization is far older than is now accepted, but that awareness of this cycle may be more relevant than we presently understand. According to Cruttenden, we are mid-way along in the cycle, apsis having been around 500 A.D. and periapsis not expected until 12,500 A.D.   He suggests our very consciousness is affected by where we are along the path, “Both the ascending and descending cycle are made of four “ages” analogous to the four seasons: the two poles are the dark age or winter of man, called the iron age by the Greeks and Kali yuga by the Indians; and the age of enlightenment or summer of man, called the Golden age or Satya yuga...” 

Cruttenden  theorizes that this vast cosmic cyclical dance between our sun and its supposed sister, a distant and probably very dim brown dwarf, is what actually causes the precession of the equinoxes and our elliptical amble around the heavens.  I found it most interesting that the math surrounding our planetary wobble can be explained and simplified if a sister star is part of the equation.  A similar theory has been suggested by Richard A. Muller; this binary sister is also known as Nemesis or the Death Star, whose cycle of destruction is counted in the millions of years.

When I considered a theory about a rogue member of our solar system, the first thought I had was about Planet X.  Could this sister star be Zecharia Sitchin’s Nibiru?  Sitchin talks in terms of a 3600-3700 year cycle for Nibiru, however, which is at odds with the 24,000-26,000 precession (the natural harmonic ideal from quantum math is 25,920 years); also according to Cruttenden this sister star is about as far away as it can get at the moment.  One researcher, Burak Eldem, wrote a book 2012: Appointment with Marduk in which he suggests the orbital cycle of Planet X (“Marduk”) is actually 3661 years and that it’s scheduled return date is indeed 2012.  According to Eldem and Wikipedia, “3,661 is one-seventh of 25,627, which he believes is the total time span of "Five World Ages" according to the Mayan Long Count Calendar. The last orbital passage of Marduk, he adds, was in 1649 BC and caused great catastrophes on earth, including the Thera eruption. Sitchin has recently put forth his own date in the year 2085 for the next passage of Nibiru, but the date most talked about is 2012, which marks the end of the Maya calendar.” 

In my recent post on 2012 I cited a USA Today article which stated, “On the winter solstice in 2012, the sun will be aligned with the center of the Milky Way for the first time in about 26,000 years. This means that ‘whatever energy typically streams to Earth from the center of the Milky Way will indeed be disrupted on 12/21/12 at 11:11 p.m. Universal Time,’[journalist Lawrence] Joseph writes.”  Some believe this shift will affect our consciousness.  For example, researcher David Wilcock remarks that at the end of each 25,920 year cycle there is a frequency or energetic shift, “the Earth and Solar System’s position relative to the Galactic Center has a penultimate effect upon the hyperdimensional physics of its systems.  When we conjoin with the Galactic Center, a flood of energy is received – energy that fundamentally changes the vibratory rate of all bodies of matter in its vicinity.”  He posits this would cause our consciousness to vibrate from the third dimension to the fourth.

Rumors swirl that the Vatican has a secret space probe called “Siloe” (which by the way is the name of a pool outside Jerusalem where Jesus gave a blind man his sight) used to monitor anomalous celestial bodies approaching the solar system via a secret telescope in Alaska.  Researcher Cristoforo Barbaro claims a Vatican secret service insider gave him video of a rapidly approaching body, presumably this “Planet X”.  Another rumor suggest that technologies such as chemtrails and HAARP could interfere with our ability to raise our consciousnesses, as the Powers-That-Be are perfectly aware of what’s coming and don’t want to lose their cattle; but this is another post.  Still others claim global warming, the increase in frequency of volcanic eruptions and earthquakes, and the sensation of ‘quickening’, including the debated increase in the Shumann resonance,  is actually due to the approach of this rogue body. 

The synchronicity found in all of these tidbits is startling, however there are still questions.  If Cruttenden and others place us barely out of the ‘dark ages’ of the Kali yuga, or even still in it, how is it that yet others claim this amazing transformation is just around the corner?  I’m also curious about any relationship between Planet X and a potential sister star; not only does the math work out, but it seems that binary star systems are actually quite common Out There.  It’s hard to know for sure what is really going on – but rumors of Vatican involvement raise my eyebrows, as does the evidence of cyclical catastrophes from archeological records.  There is enough to warrant further investigation; I feel there are some important puzzle pieces still missing.  Everyone has their own interpretation – one would be hard pressed to read even just all the books out there on Planet X.  We must listen to our spirits and pay attention when truth rings its bell, but also not panic or rush to judgment.