An Integral Overview of Channeling
by Paul M. Helfrich
October 31, 2007

I have studied the channeling phenomenon for the past ten years. The main thing I have learned is that channeling is not a phenomenon in the singular sense, but rather an umbrella of related phenomena that have been with us for thousands of years. As such, to better understand what channeling is we need to explore the wide range of human abilities involved.

Let's begin with a little history. There is a premodern tradition known by many different names that dates back to the earliest written records, as far back as the fourteenth century BCE, according to transpersonal psychologist Arthur Hastings:

[The] term channeling …is current, but the process has been called prophecy, oracle, revelation, spiritual communication, possession, and the inspiration of the muses. The Biblical tradition in Judaism and Christianity says that the prophets received and spoke the words of God. Today, there are many individuals who speak words that are said to come from disembodied teachers on other levels of reality. The process, though not necessarily the content, appears to be the same.¹

This tradition is still with us today. According to anthropologist Michael Brown even though modern, "Euro-American Culture is unusual in its unwillingness to grant dissociation [channeling] an honored place in the human experience,²" it has "moved from the gilded ashrams of the West Coast to the living rooms and offices of the American Heartland. On the way, it has shed some of its sensational qualities in favor of a more muted approach to personal insight. It is now a well-established form of religious exploration that is likely to be with us for a while.³" Transpersonal psychologist Jon Klimo concluded that, "Since 1986, channeling has reached into the grassroots. It has entered the popular vocabulary. Channeling now is part of current mainstream consensus reality.⁴"

Next, we need a working definition of channeling. How do these postmodern scholars define it? Brown defined channeling as "…the use of altered states of consciousness to contact spirits-or, as many of its practitioners say, to experience spiritual energy captured from other times and dimensions.⁵" Hastings defined it as "…a process in which a person transmits information or artistic expression that he or she receives mentally or physically and which appears to come from a personality source outside the conscious mind. The message is directed toward an audience and is purposeful.⁶" Klimo defined channeling as "…a process whereby someone appears to serve as a conduit for information, messages, and guidance, or for energy of a healing capacity or a spiritual quality, which appears to come from a non-ordinary source.⁷"

Our integral approach acknowledges that these are all "true but partial" perspectives, so we want to include them all. I should mention that some don't like the term channeling, because they find it too narrow. However, until something better emerges, I'm going to stick with the term since it has found its way into popular culture as Klimo suggested. For instance, during the 2007 World Series, one of the color commentators said that a particular pitcher was channeling another pitcher (who was still alive)!

Seen in this light, is it possible that there is a natural, healthy, and dissociative "intelligence" that exists but has been forced underground for hundreds of years in the premodern and modern West? Given the postmodern advances in research methodology now available in Ken Wilber's integral metatheory (that I call AQAL-5⁸), a more comprehensive study of channeling may offer a radical new way to enhance human potentials, creativity, problem solving, and therapy.

In this context, I view channeling as its own intelligence in terms of how Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner defines it. Gardner is best known for his work on multiple intelligences first published in Frames of Mind (1983). His current definition of human intelligence is "…a biopsychological potential to process information that can be activated in a cultural setting to solve problems or create products that are of value in a culture.⁹" The key thing is the inclusion of the brain-mind connection in relation to a collective, cultural context that includes services such as problem solving, healing, therapy, invention, artistic expression, etc. as well as products such as books, music, movies, and so on.

The cool thing about Gardner's work is that he developed his theories as a brain scientist, seeking the connection between what he calls "brain modules" that affect various functions like speech, emotions, language, mathematical skills, inter- and intra-personal skills, etc. So his research is not limited to psychological abilities, but also how the brain-body works in relationship to the mind. These are key relationships to factor in when studying channeling through an integral lens.

Next, based on the work of Klimo and Elias, channeled by Mary Ennis, we now have a much better understanding that channeling cannot be limited to just deep trance channels like Jane Roberts, but also includes a wide arrange of abilities such as conscious and open channeling. So we're dealing with a wide spectrum of expressions or types that can generally be considered channeling, and Klimo and Elias have provided a way to organize them. For example, Klimo outlined a rich taxonomy of channeling.¹⁰

• Conscious (intuitive, telepathy, clairaudience [sound], clairvoyance [visions], clairsentience [conceptualization]).
• Unconscious full-trance, possession.
• Sleep and dream.
• Automism (a variant of conscious, but includes kinesthetic expressions of automatic writing, painting, and musicianship, Ouija board movement, pendulum movement).

Types of Sources (secondary persona):

• Discarnate spirits of "deceased" human beings (the largest category).
• Past-lifetimes.
• Advanced human beings (e.g., highly evolved spiritual teachers).
• Non-humans (e.g., "aliens," spirit beings, angels, gods, archetypal energies, akashic, higher self).

Types of channeled content:

• General intuitive feelings of loving presence and support.
• Personal messages and guidance.
• Detailed descriptions of an "afterlife.
• Information about the past and future.
• Artistic material (e.g., literature, painting, music performance and composition).
• Healing and medical material (e.g., Edgar Cayce).
• Scientific or technical nature.

As seen in Klimo's taxonomy, channeling covers a broad spectrum of dissociative phenomena ranging from the proximate self¹¹ being consciously aware of a "secondary" creative source (e.g., bodily, linguistic, musical, artistic, etc.) all the way to the manifestation of an autonomous, secondary proximate self replete with unique cognitive, affective, moral, interpersonal, etc. traits and memories (what Seth called a bridge personality and Jane Roberts called a personagram). At this end of the spectrum, the primary proximate self has little or no memory of what occurs (i.e., the role of amnesia is an important consideration).

Next, Elias presented a typology of what he calls energy exchanges, which is his term for channeling as an interaction between the proximate self and another soul or essence line. He also uses the families of consciousness typology introduced by Seth in The "Unknown" Reality, Vol. 2 (1979) to outline different types of energy exchanges.¹²

Sumafi = interaction/communication in the form of spoken or written language.
- "channeling"
- automatic writing
- "The Sumafi concern themselves with the least amount of distortion. Therefore, the Sumafi shall engage THIS particular phenomenon and no other."

Milumet = interaction/communication with mystical beings via altered states and dreams.
- angels/heavenly "beings"
- other "beings of light"
- other-dimensional focuses
- "speaking to creatures and audibly hearing a creature speak to you within a language that you understand"
- "speaking to a tree [or other plant life] and the tree speaking to them"

Gramada = interaction/communication within dream states and inspiration.
- connecting with original knowledge via dream states and conscious acts of inspiration

Vold = interaction/communication in the form of hearing voices.
- audibly hearing "other" voices (example Joan d'Arc)

Ilda = interaction/communication to promote "legends of encounters of unusual origin or unusual factors."
- interdimensional focuses
- extraterrestrials
- dragons
- leprechauns
- other "imaginary creatures or beings"

Sumari = interaction/communication with conventional psychic phenomenon.
- "channeling"
- automatic writing
- Ouija board
- séance
- astrology
- tarot cards
- psychic readings
- crystal balls
- all types of similar "tools that [people] view to be beyond themselves, outside of themselves, offering themselves information that they may not normally access."
- "Psychic phenomenon is their forte."

Tumold = interaction/communication within energy exchanged through other physically focused individuals.
- speaking and listening to objects, vegetation, elements (wind, fire, water, Earth)
- significant difference between belonging to:
shamans, witch doctors, witches ("they do not hear voices as other individuals may, but they receive the information.")
- being aligned with:
concern themselves tremendously within physical focus in the area of healing in all of its aspects - physical, emotional, mental, spiritual.

Zuli = interaction/communication within physical forms.
- "within the expression of physical form, not only of human physical form but of all creatures and also of your vegetation, they may see elements within the expression of the physical form that shall offer them information."
- bodily expression (whirling dervishes, dances, other rituals)
- vegetation, trees
- rocks
- "rituals of creatures, as [in] mating rituals"

Borledim = interaction/communication with children.
- children's "invisible" playmates

Notice the similarities between Klimo's types of channeling and Elias' energy exchanges. While not exactly alike, they cover very similar ground, and outline wide range of abilities.

The main reason to present all this information is to show what a narrow definition many people have of channeling. When we look through the eyes of Wilber, Gardner, Klimo, and Elias we begin to sense that there is a much wider range than just a deep trance or conscious channeler. For example, in the Tibetan tradition there are dream channelers called tertons that access mind treasure (called terma, gongter). These adepts learn to "receive" detailed teachings and accurately translate them from dream into waking state. Exemplars include Namkai Norbu's Dream Yoga and the Practice of Natural Light (1992) and Andreas Doctor's Tibetan Treasure Literature (2005). After reading these books, I realized that Klimo's "sleep and dream" channeling and Elias' Gramada energy exchanges helped to situate the type of channeling described.

So this is a brief overview of some of the research I've done in the past ten years. It has been recently intensified by the fact that my partner-in-time, Joanne, began to channel in April, 2007, and I have had the privilege to intimately observe her behavior and development. It has also further motivated me to continue to expand my own definitions of what channeling is as well.

Therefore, I believe that channeling may be better understood as its own developmental line or intelligence per Wilber's, Gardner's, and my own work that exists in a wide spectrum of states and stages. In terms of states, we include deep dissociation and secondary personalities (trance channeling) on one end, and mild dissociation and enhanced creativity (conscious and open channeling) on the other. In-between is a wide array of expressions or types (e.g., Klimo's and Elias'). In terms of stages, we need to factor in the seedling, sapling, and tree nature of all development in the physical domain. This means there will be immature and distorted translations during the beginning stages, so that's now predictable and therefore not a reason to condemn, but to nurture and develop, just like any ability (writing, playing music, sports, mathematics, engineering, etc.). Once we begin to factor in and create a matrix of all the different types within the many states and stages, we begin to see a much bigger human canvas upon which channeling may develop.

However, we also need to consider the healthy and pathological extremes of the above types, states, and stages. The healthy end of the spectrum presents minimal ill effects to the primary proximate self and body, while the pathological side presents a dysfunctional splintering of the primary proximate self that incapacitates basic survival (e.g., hygiene, nutrition), emotional (e.g., relationships), and mental (e.g., job/role) needs. By necessity, then, we must factor in the role of various dissociative identity disorders in relation to channeling. For example, The American Psychiatric Association (2000) defines four categories of dissociative pathology: dissociative amnesia, dissociative fugue, dissociative identity disorder, and depersonalization disorder. The International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation (2007) defines five kinds: depersonalization, derealization, amnesia, identity confusion, and identity alteration. These "true but partial" perspectives are important as well.

In summary, to better understand what channeling is we need to consider a developmental matrix of types, states, and stages and related health and pathology along the way. As always, with any channeled artifact (books, music, painting, inventions, etc.) it is the utility and cultural propriety that determines what is useful in terms of Gardner's products and services in a cultural context. What works in North America may not be worth a dam in the Serengeti, and vice versa, so there is a wide range of possibilities, contexts, and perspectives to continue to explore.

Unfortunately, in the West this intelligence has been driven underground by what Wilber calls the "disaster of modernity" - the rise of scientism, in which the "value sphere" of scientific method and production became valued as the only way to know what's real and true. As such, many postmodern and integral thinkers now understand that the creative, intuitive, feeling-based baby was thrown out with the superstitious baggage of premodern value systems. Along with that baby went any deep understanding of Consciousness or Spirit, but that's another essay.

As our planet continues its evolution, the complexity of current problems facing us can certainly benefit from this repressed intelligence being adequately studied and applied in the West. As Einstein said, "The significant problems we face can never be solved at the level of thinking that created them." To which I would add the level of channeling that created them as well, since channeling, like all developmental intelligences studied by Gardner and Wilber, unfold in seedling, sapling, and tree stages and may include pathological extremes.

Once we better situate our understanding of what channeling is, and the integral approach of Ken Wilber is a great tool to do just that, then we can better identify and authenticate this precious gift moving forward.

I want to finish this short overview with six examples of channeling that we nurture and study on NewWorldView. The following video clips show a wide array of how this intelligence manifests. And just like no two people play a Beethoven sonata, hit a baseball, or cook the same way, no two people will channel the same way. Also, keep in mind that they represent only two of Klimo's four types of channeling and two of Elias' nine types of energy exchanges. So what you are about to watch features examples trance and conscious channeling, which are two of the most popular and prevalent types today.

Note the difference between Jane, Mary, and Serge's personality, speaking style, and demeanor and Seth, Elias, and Kris'.

Jane Roberts and Seth (1:59)

Mary Ennis and Elias (3:54)





Serge Grandbois and Kris (3:42)

The above three are considered trance channels in which a fully formed secondary personality comes through during an altered state.

Joanne Helfrich and Rose (1:50)

Emmy van Swaaij and Defrene (also Sumari singing, 3:59)
(Note the similarity between Emmy's personality, speaking style, and demeanor and Defrene. Also note the use of hand-signs.)

Lynda Dahl and Michael Steffen work a Ouija Board (3:41) (Note that Lynda is really following and Michael is leading. He can work the board by himself but prefers the connection with another.)

The above three are considered conscious channels in which their main personality does not fully dissociate or "step aside." However, until further research is done we won't know the extent of what state changes occur as they channel. From experience, I know that Joanne, Emmy, and Michael are in a light trance state, but still present to varying degrees. However, only Joanne is able to interact directly with Rose in her mind while channeling, though she is still in the early stage. More research is required to know if these are preliminary stages that Joanne and Emmy will pass through.

In closing, I hope this essay served as an introduction to what channeling is in practical terms through an integral perspective. Still it is much more than the examples of trance and conscious channels above. We are only beginning to adequately map out and study the incredible array of abilities listed by Klimo and Elias. I also hope this essay inspires others to recognize how this intelligence lies latent within all of us, and may be further developed through practice and application. It "takes a village" or "community of the adequate" to provide a safe and nurturing environment for those just starting out like the one at NewWorldView.com. Please join us there if you are interested in exploring these wonderful abilities.

Endnotes:

¹ Hastings, A. (1991). With the tongues of men and angels: A study of channeling. Orlando, FL: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, p. xi.

² Brown, M. (1997). The Channeling zone: American spirituality in an anxious age. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, p. 19.

³ Brown, p. 6.

⁴ Klimo, J. (1998). Channeling: investigations on receiving information from paranormal sources. Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, p. xix.

⁵ Brown, p. viii.

⁶ Hastings, p. 4.

⁷ Klimo (1988), p. 899.

⁸ AQAL stands for all quadrants, levels, lines, states, and types. I use the "5" to show that it is the fifth and latest version of Wilber's metatheory. For more information see Helfrich, P. (submitted). Ken Wilber's AQAL metatheory: an overview. AQAL: Journal of Integral Theory and Practice.

⁹ Gardner, H. (1999). Intelligence reframed: multiple intelligences for the 21st century. New York, NY: Basic Books, pp. 33-34.

¹⁰ Klimo, J. (1988). Channeling research: A Progress report with recommendations. Proceedings of the International Conference on Paranormal Research. Fort Collins, CO: Colorado State University, pp. 894-9.

¹¹ I use Ken Wilber's definitions of the self. The proximate self presents the "I" or self-sense in relation to the "me" or distal self, and the "I-I" or ever-present Witness. Together, these three form the overall self. The proximate self shows development, however, "the overall self does not show a sequential or stage-like development." ~ Integral psychology: consciousness, spirit, psychology, therapy. Boston, MA 2000d, p. 34.

¹² Ennis, M. & Helfrich, P. (2001). essence families; energy exchanges (Dream Walker interaction). Retrieved October 30, 2007 from, http://www.eliasforum.org/digests/essence_families_energy_exchanges.html

The Fall of Colors
by Shirley Hadley

The sun rose upon the horizon
Of my mindscape. Foggy banks
Settled down, resting gently upon
The sea's breast. Luminescent
Electric sounds of color, shimmered.
I waved my arms, to test the air
To see if now was the time to
Set myself free….in flight.

I slipped gently out of my body…
Made of stones, dirt and wooden
Ashes, particles and waves of energy.
I moved gracefully among the clouds,
Drifting through indigo….floating amongst
Ruby, scarlet, shares of white, flames
Of light, burst into sight.

The fall of colors, slide past my form.
I found myself hanging there on the branches
Of a windswept tree. Only a few leaves
Remain…bare and naked…
I am transformed. Evolving soul…
The seasons comfort the earth….and me.
Natural cycles, spin like never ending circles.
Networks of emotion joined together,
Designs of infinite patterns.

I choose this time, this season, to emerge…
Into magical reasoning.
A birth of enormous meaning, a strand
Of consciousness, woven together.
The fall of colors slide past my form.

Death Is Watching
by Bob Makransky

When we listen to sounds, we can distinguish between two phenomena: "sounds" and "listener listening to sounds":

"Sounds" is when we are hearing all sounds indiscriminately, like a tape recorder does; when all sounds are impacting on our awareness with equal vividness.

"Listener listening to sounds" is when we are focusing on one specific sound, and the other sounds are in the background of our awareness. That "listener listening to sounds"- that focus, or sense of there being a detached perceiver there who is perceiving - is what magicians call lower self. At least, that is what dies when the person's body dies. When there is no longer a sense of a separated perceiver perceiving, when everything is impacting upon our awareness with equal vividness, what is left is a feeling of oneness, a background of peacefulness, which is what magicians call higher self, or death. Death is in the background all the time. Death is the canvas upon which our lives are painted.

When we feel that we are watching ourselves - that there is some part of us that is watching our every move - that part is our death. It is constantly looking over our shoulder; it's the sense we have that something out there is watching us (the Spirit is watching us too, not to mention lots of other beings, both angelic and demonic; but our root self-consciousness, the sense that we feel within ourselves that something is watching us, is our death).

Observe that this is not the false watcher thought form, which we use to watch ourselves with glory, and exalt in how marvelous we are. That watcher is a phony copy of the true watcher - death - which is utterly cold and dispassionate. The false watcher - our self-consciousness, or need to keep referring everything back to ourselves - is a thought form which takes anything that is going on and glamorizes it, and imagines other people applauding us for it. We learn the false watcher thought form from our society: the false watcher thought form is in fact society's way of papering over death. We do have a true watcher watching us, and that watcher is our death. The false watcher is society's way of eradicating death from people's awareness, to make people act as if they weren't going to die, to make people forget about death as much as possible. Only by making people forget about death can they be led into believing that there could be anything more important than the fact that they could die in the next instant. And part of banishing awareness of death is substituting a glory thought form of watching ("watching oneself in glory; watching oneself with approval / approbation") for the true watcher thought form, which is death.

Another way of saying this is: the sense we have that we are perceiving; that there is some detached perceiver there perceiving; that there is some "us" there to which things are happening; is our death. Without that sense of a detached perceiver there, we wouldn't be able to focus on anything. Everything that we see, hear, touch, etc. at every moment - not to mention bleed-throughs from other lifetimes and probable realities - would bombard our senses with equal impact. We would be overwhelmed with information; indeed, we would have no sense that "we" exist at all (just as an infant doesn't) - we would be pure perception. This is a common experience when one is tripping on psychedelic drugs; for example, when we take a shower while tripping, we can feel (are aware of) every individual drop of water as it hits our skin as a discrete event. On the other hand we can't balance a checkbook while tripping because we can't focus that much attention - there's too much going on to be able to focus. To use mind - to be able to focus on one thing at a time by separating it out from its background - is to create a perceiver which is perceiving; and that's what we call death.

When we say that death is watching, what we're saying is that the act of watching is what we mean by death. Anything that watches will die. This is because watching - separatedness - is a lie which eventually must run out. Separatedness is a lie which all sentient beings tell themselves. That lie is what embeds them in linear time. If a vortex in a river were to suddenly start saying to itself something like "I'm a vortex! I'm a vortex! I'm a unique, individual, separated vortex!" then that vortex would be lying to itself - it's not a unique, individual, separated anything. But by telling itself that lie, it embeds itself in a linear temporality in which it watches this, and then it watches that, and then it watches the other thing; until the vortex runs out of energy and dissolves back into the river and stops lying to itself about having been separated in the first place - i.e., it dies. But it was "dead" all along. Watching = separatedeness = death; they are just different ways of talking about the same phenomenon.

Our sense of personal continuity in the dream state is not based upon a linear, sequential, unfolding of events, as it is in the waking state, but rather is based upon an awareness of self as experiencer (i.e., one's death). That vibrant, alive quality that dreams have is actually awareness of death. In dreams we are aware of death every second, willy-nilly, because there's nothing solid in dreams to cling to: there's no way of toning down the intensity of what we are experiencing by focusing our attention elsewhere (on our thoughts). We're face-to-face with death every second in dreams. That's why we feel more alive in dreams than we do in wakefulness - because we are seeing with the eyes of death; we are one with death when we are dreaming, which is why we can't die in dreams - we're already dead. In wakefulness we make a separation between ourselves and our deaths - an absurd pretense, but a useful one for certain purposes (such as being able to focus attention enough to e.g. balance a checkbook) - and that's why wakefulness is duller, less vivid, less joyous than dreaming.

Here's the answer to the mystery: what we consider to be "ourselves" is just a given thought form at a given moment. Our lifetimes are like a collection of scenes or tableaux strung together by mind into a lattice of threaded beads. All of the beads (or life events) which directly connect to a given bead are probable realities. From that bead, mind can take any number of directions to another bead. The black threads connecting the beads are death - we literally die from moment-to-moment. We always have to pass through death to move to the next bead (the next scene; the next moment); and if we take a turn which leads to a long run of black thread till the next bead, that's "real" death and the next bead is birth in another lifetime.

Another way of saying this is, we have ourselves separated into a bunch of little pieces, each of which feels isolated and disconnected from (more important than) the rest. However, within each little piece we have tremendous focus and stick-to-itiveness ("fear of death") - a willingness to keep up the struggle to stay awake and separated no matter how much of a bummer it is.

The "you" who is reading this sentence is actually a very different being than the "you" who read the previous sentence, and this is not meant in a trivial sense (that a few cells have split in the interim) - it is meant in the deepest sense possible. The belief that you are the same person from moment to moment is an illusion, a lie. To maintain this illusion you must snatch yourself back from death every instant, be on the qui vive every second. It is precisely this clenching up against death which creates and sustains waking consciousness (gives us the focus and control we lack in dreaming, e.g. the ability to balance a checkbook). This is why we are so uptight when awake compared to how open and vulnerable we are in dreaming. To maintain waking consciousness requires incredible fortitude and self-discipline (not to mention completely lying to ourselves every second that we are awake).

In actual fact, we are nothing more than our death. Our death is the complete written record of our life. It is all contained in our death. Our death can be likened to a microdot which contains our entire life in one little point. We are like the little point which moves on an Etch-a-Sketch board or computer drawing program, blazing out a path through life (making a squiggle on a previously blank screen) and leaving a trail behind it. The entirety of our being is like that blank screen, and the squiggly path is this particular lifetime. It has a beginning and an end, and is delimited. That delimitation is death.

In other words, just as our sense of space is our sense of having feelings (familiarity); and our sense of time is our sense of having thoughts (importance - our ability to focus our attention); so too is our death our sense that there is some contained entity which is having those feelings and thoughts. Death is our sense of containment, of boundedness, of singularity, of discreteness. It is a species of glue which binds random feelings and thought forms together into an integrated, cohesive whole.

Death projects a body thought form to symbolize this sense of discreteness, solidity, stability, boundedness - just as we project a body thought form when we are dreaming, to symbolize "us". What we consider our unity - our individuality, our continuity, our "us-ness" - is actually our death. When we cling to our sanity, our sense of being centered in a stable environment where things are more or less predictable, what we are clinging to is our death. Wakefulness could not exist without it.

Observe that in reality there is no such distinction as importance - but if we were to say that one is more important than the other, certainly our death is more important than (primary to) our life. Our life is just a symbolic reflection of our death; it's not the main issue at all. To think that our life is more important than our death is not only gross stupidity, but plays right into death's hands.

Death is neither malevolent or benevolent - it just is, like the force of gravity. Gravity can both hurt us and help us, depending upon how we use it (or let ourselves be used by it). So too with death. Death actually calls all the shots and we have to dance to its tune, really; but we can do that either elegantly or spasmodically. Master magicians waltz with their death; caress it fondly; and then seduce it.

Importance - that is to say, focus: our ability to focus attention - is the means by which we consolidate death, or grab onto it (though what we believe we're doing is pushing it away). Importance is the illusion that we are controlling our death, when actually the reverse is the case. It's like hanging on for dear life to a runaway stallion and all the while trying to pretend that everything's just fine and dandy. The runaway stallion we cling to is death, and the pretense that we are in any way, shape, or form in charge of the situation is importance. It's what keeps us from enjoying the scenery as we gallop along.

Without our fear of death thought form we would be more aware of our past and probable lives (at least the feeling of them, if not the actual thought forms) as well as of the feelings of other people. We'd be able to feel them as our own feelings, as infants do. And thus we'd lose much of our sense of separatedness. That's how lunatics and magicians live: they still have individual lives, things happen to them, but there's less of a difference between something happening to them or to someone else. Something which happens to them is no more important than something which happens to someone else. Their feelings are no more important to them than someone else's feelings.

Death is the blank screen upon which all of our lifetimes are painted. Those lives don't exist; they're just momentary plays of light and shadow. However, to us they seem utterly fascinating and absorbing. To get to who we really are we would have to pull all of that obsession (energy pinned down by importance) out of all of those lives. As we do this, we find less and less of what we now consider to be "ourselves". We find the barriers which separate us from other people and the world around us becoming less and less distinct. It becomes harder for us to feel where we end and the next guy begins.

Death is just a way we keep score, keep count, keep track of things: it's how we separate this moment from that one, and this lifetime from that lifetime, and me from you. Without death the whole thing would just be one big stew. Death is what props "us" up - if it were not for death we would not have any sense of there being an "us" there at all. After all, what are "we" anyway? The sum total of all our experiences (memories) and expectations (desires). Right? What else is there? Nothing, right?

We, of ourselves, are absolutely nothing. Zero. All we are is something that is going to die. That's the only reason we have life at all, is to die. We are something that death conjured up, as an afterthought, to give itself a raison d'etre. And then, once it created us, we took off like a lumbering Frankenstein monster, and death tagged along to watch what we did.

All death is doing is watching us. It doesn't approve or disapprove of what it sees; it isn't conscience or shame; it just watches dispassionately. And what we are is death watching itself. It has nothing to do with us whatsoever. We are just a reflection in death's mirror - a symbol for death. We have no primary awareness: just as the moon only reflects light, we only reflect (are a symbol of) death's awareness of itself. We only exist as death is watching itself through the metaphor of our lives.

And that's why we say that death is mind: because that sense that we have that we are being watched is our death watching us. Without our death there watching us, we are nothing - nothing but a little point on a random walk through an infinite jungle in which nothing makes any sense whatsoever - there is no rhyme nor reason to anything (no mind). Mind (order) can only exist when there is something there watching the path that this random blip on the screen is taking. And that's what we call death. (adapted from Magical Almanac Copyright © 2007 by Bob Makransky. All rights reserved).

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Ignorance Isn't Bliss
by Sara M. Ray

You look at me and think you know,
Everything I am;
I swear I'm much more than I seem,
But you don't understand.

You lock yourself in your own world,
Where everything makes sense;
You label this and label that,
Since this world is immense.

But making your world seem so small,
Will never make you wise;
It will only make you angry,
When you're taken by surprise.

So stop and look at all you see,
And all that you've missed;
Let go of the troubled fact,
That "ignorance is bliss."

All is unique, enjoy it,
There's only here and now;
Now that I've answered when and where,
Could I please ask you how?

How you saw me as another,
When I am only me;
Now look at me just one more time,
And tell me what you see.

The Road To Elmira: Chapter Four
by Richard Kendall

The road to Elmira was not going to be an easy one today. A major snowstorm had started to engulf most of the Northeast, and facing two hundred forty miles of treacherous roads was not an appealing thought. I reminded myself that in the pursuit of truth others had faced obstacles far worse than snowstorms, and that thought helped keep things in perspective. As road conditions quickly deteriorated, the car would frequently slip and slide as it struggled to make solid contact with the ground beneath it. The outside picture was a faithful replica of my inner state. I too felt that my consciousness was resting on slippery ground and it wouldn’t take all that much for it to spin completely out of control. Although arriving late and feeling a bit shaken, body, mind, and car were still intact. As we entered Jane’s living room the looks of amazement that greeted us spoke volumes, and Jane never questioned our coming to class again.

As we settled in Jane began to speak about an altered state of consciousness she had experienced the night before. While looking out her window and glancing down at the street she noticed a crumpled up piece of newspaper being battered about by the wind. As gusts of wind tossed the paper to and fro, Jane started experiencing feelings of ecstasy with each takeoff and landing. Playing back a tape recording that had been made on her old reel to reel tape recorder while this scene was taking place you could hear a continuing series of oohs and ahs emanating from her; repeated sounds of rapture in response to the movements of this piece of paper.

The experience lasted for over an hour and although it sounded interesting I began to feel restless. I hadn’t traveled two hundred forty miles in the middle of a snowstorm to listen to someone moaning in response to a crumpled up piece of old newspaper. In short, where was Seth?

As the evening progressed we moved on from the paper experience to other topics, but the later it got the more evident it became that Seth wasn’t going to be part of the mix tonight. All that distance traveled and what would there be to show for it. What did a piece of paper have to do with helping me find a way out of the inner turmoil that colored my days and haunted my nights?

A snapshot of my interior landscape would find me standing in the midst of mental chaos, strange objects speeding toward me with total disregard for the synaptic pauses that normally cushion the linearly attuned consciousness. Being attacked from the outside can be scary enough; but how does one mount an effective counteroffensive when the attack originates from within. Lengthy treatises have been written about the strategies of war, exploring in great detail the comparative effectiveness of frontal attacks, flank attacks, surprise attacks, and the list goes on. But where is the definitive treatise on what stratagems to adopt when caught in a crossfire taking place within one’s own mind.

I felt that my position in the overall hierarchy of my consciousness was vulnerable to attack on all sides, and that foreign invaders were trying to dislodge me from the native soil of my psyche. Whenever I attempted to direct or control the flow of these inner forces, their disruptive nature seemed to intensify, doing violence to the natural workings of my consciousness. I often felt like a soldier with battle fatigue though the wars I fought were without weapons and the faces of the enemy were invisible. The desire to run for cover came up frequently, but how or where does one hide from the contents and workings of their own consciousness.

As class was winding down I started thinking about that piece of paper and the experience Jane related. Rather than trying to fight the wind or control its speed or direction, the paper surrendered to the natural forces acting upon it. Secure in its knowledge that the universe would catch it wherever it landed, the takeoffs and touchdowns became exhilarating; accelerating into feelings of ecstasy which Jane then tuned into. With a different mindset those same forces could have been viewed by the piece of paper as hostile, dangerous, and bent on its destruction.

Taking my cue from that piece of paper I thought maybe it was time I too surrendered to the forces swirling about me. But in my case those forces didn’t feel like natural gusts of wind blowing on a March day. The forces I was contending with carried thoughts and feelings that felt alien to my normal thinking processes, like orphans of the mind with no one coming forward to claim responsibility for their birth. With no parent to familiarize them with the channels by which thoughts usually traverse, they remained transfixed to the spot where they were born, jamming up interior passageways.

Other thoughts that otherwise would have spontaneously proceeded through the psyche in easy fashion suddenly had to deal with major mental gridlock, with no estimate of how long the delays might last. I felt like my consciousness was stuck on a one lane highway behind a painfully slow-moving vehicle, or worse, one that was not moving at all. But a quick look into the car ahead of me revealed that I was the driver holding up what would have been a normal flow of traffic. An even closer look showed my consciousness stuck in the wrong gear; with my fears stopping me from shifting back into drive. Thoughts are energy and the nature of energy is to move forward. When that forward motion is impeded the entire mental mechanism suffers. This dilemma of consciousness was not some theoretical or abstract metaphysical paradox one might meditate upon, but a painful part of my daily existence.

As class ended I headed toward the car for the trek back to the city. Patches of ice appeared on the sidewalk outside of Jane’s house and layers of snow still covered the highway. The fear of careening off the road became an unwelcome but constant companion during the ride back. At this point in my journey I could not share the paper’s unwavering belief in a cosmic safety net that catches us each time we fall. Yet as I fell asleep in the backseat of the car I dreamed of becoming a cosmic trapeze artist, flying through the inner atmosphere of my being with the greatest of ease, as confident as that piece of paper that wherever I fell the universe would catch me. It was a sweet dream, but one I could not sustain during waking reality. Not yet.

Dreams
by Barbara Ziegler

As the culminating day becomes the dark of night
I return to slumber closing my outer eyes not tight.
Entering the daylight of dreams I find myself in flight
Soaring high above lakes and treetops, oh what a sight!

Suddenly I find myself entering another time and place
Nor do I find it odd that I am someone else in this space
All is well my being in this future century of the human race
Yet still the same sleeping figure on my bed with another face.

Oops now I am back to the person who I know myself to be
Creating a dream I will wake up from and live to really see
As the adventurous night becomes the dawn of a brand new day
I live my life and watch my dream with wonder come to play.

For who I am is far more than just me during any given day
As I open my inner eyes to see beyond the world of every day
Exploring existences on the rays of time before me on display
Raptly discovering my essence... there is so many of me I pray.

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COMING SOON!

What is reincarnation? To begin with, reincarnation does not take place within a matrix of linear time. It’s not as if e.g. you had a life in ancient Greece and then you died; then you had a life in ancient Rome and then you died; then you had a life in the Middle Ages and then you died; etc. Rather, all of your past and future lives are going on at once, in an eternal NOW moment.

Think of it like this: survivors of near-death experiences often report seeing all the events that ever happened to them flash by them in no time at all. Thus it would seem that we experience the thought forms of our lives twice – once in linear fashion over a lifetime, and the second time around in timeless fashion at the moment of death.

In an analogous manner, while there is indeed an evolution going on in the universe, this evolution is not taking place in linear time: it’s all happening at once. Space and time have no objective existence. They are merely cognitive tools which evolved as sentient beings evolved, to enable them to focus upon one thing at a time instead of everything at once. The linearity of time is an illusion, a falsehood, which Eastern philosophers have termed maya or samsara. It is this false appearance that there is such a thing as an objective reality out there unfolding in linear time, which animates the striving of all sentient beings and keeps the wheel of reincarnation – of life and death and rebirth – turning.

Babies (and even young children, who sometimes talk about memories from other lifetimes) are not as centered in a one-track existence as adults are. Babies and young children are consciously impinged upon by influences from other lives and probable realities which most adults have learned to ignore. The same socialization process which props up a baby’s sense of being a unitary, abiding, separated individual also imprisons that individual in a furrow of inexorable linear temporality.

For most people, 99.9% of decisions are made on the basis of socially-conditioned actions and reactions – what they were taught by their parents and society. But every now and then everyone has poignant moments – moments of consciousness or conscientiousness or conscience – when they sense that probable realities are branching off this way or that; or they feel echoes from other lifetimes and realities; or they hear voices from deep inside them. When this happens people feel connected to something more profound than their customary hustle and bustle; and that something is their true purpose in this lifetime – the reason they were born.

Nobel laureate William Butler Yeats’ masterpiece A Vision (channeled by his wife) explains the true nature of reincarnation – what it really is and how it really works. Starting this coming month Magical Almanac, Bob Makransky’s free monthly ezine of astrology and magic, will be presenting a six-article series which explains the theory of reincarnation as described in A Vision. This series includes complete instructions for safe and easy techniques you can use on your own to run past life regressions and probable reality progressions; and to recapitulate memories from your present lifetime (thereby releasing the pent-up emotions which you have invested in your memories).

To subscribe, send an e-mail to: MagicalAlmanac-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

You can also subscribe (and view past issues) at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MagicalAlmanac/

Privacy Statement: We will not give or sell your name or e-mail address to anyone, ever.

“We all to some extent meet again and again the same people and certainly in some cases form a kind of family of two or three or more persons who come together life after life until all passionate relations are exhausted, the child of one life the husband, wife, brother, sister of the next. Sometimes, however, a single relationship will repeat itself, turning its revolving wheel again and again.” – William Butler Yeats, A Vision

Explore the works of Visionary Artist Shirley Hadley!

The photographs you see below were created by Shirley in her studio, and not through electronic manipulation. Each photo is available in 5x7 or 8x10 and includes a poem that goes with the photo.

Entrance to Awareness
The journey of the self is
to see without using your eyes
to hear but not with your ears.
Listen to your inner voice, it will lead you
to an awareness of new ways to view your
selves and the world you live in.

New from Sharon Hackleman, author of Marion the Magnet



MIND TIME CARDS

"Mind Time Cards are a deck of 31 inspiring positive daily affirmations created by Sharon Hackleman and illustrated by Jessica Glickman. The SOUL purpose of creating the Mind Time Cards is to teach teens about the magical powers of positive thought and the importance of feeling good about themselves-
Spirit, Mind, and Body!

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when ordered on mindtimecards.com

"We are all connected...intertwined...by a universal energy so divine." - Sharon Hackleman

Sethworld - A board game based on the Seth Material

Explore your beliefs! Stretch your imagination! Delve into your dreams! Challenge your creativity!

Seven years in the making, I am so pleased to be able to offer you SethWorld - The Game of All That Is! SethWorld is a totally unique game, the first metaphysical board game based on the Seth material - maybe the first metaphysical board game, ever! It is designed to explore and uncover beliefs while having fun. There are no winners, no losers, and NO RULES! A 24-page pamphlet included with the game gives a probable framework for play, 6 sample "moves," and a glossary of 61 concepts.

SethWorld -- You've never played anything like it!

WHAT A COINCIDENCE Understanding Synchronicity In Everyday Life
by Susan M Watkins

Overview:

What if all those seemingly insignificant little What a coincidence! moments you've experienced were actually connected, were part of a larger, more complex coincidence story?

What if they were hinting at something very personal and important about yourself—and about the workings of human consciousness?

Would you listen?

Susan Watkins does. For more than 35 years she's been documenting and studying the coincidences that have happened in her life. What she's discovered is that seemingly simple coincidences—thinking of an old friend and their calling seconds later, for example—are often pieces of larger, more complex and meaningful "coincidence clusters."

A former newspaper reporter and the author of five books, Watkins has always been intrigued by coincidences—what they mean in our everyday lives, and in the grander scheme of things. What, she asks, do these coincidence clusters say about human consciousness and human connection? In What a Coincidence! she presents coincidence clusters that are utterly astounding. What they reveal is life- altering.

What a Coincidence! is an exciting, groundbreaking journey. Along the way Watkins offers profound insights as well as practical pointers on how to become aware of the coincidence clusters in our own lives. She also shows us how to document coincidences so that we, too, can reap their valuable rewards. We'll never brush off those What a Coincidence! moments again.

Conscious Creation Links – Conscious Creation Publishers, Book Stores, Websites, Journals, Newsletters, Mailing Lists, Message Boards, and more.

The Elias forum - website by Paul & Joanne Helfrich contains an expansion of many of the conscious creation concepts introduced by Seth/Jane Roberts, channeled by Mary Ennis.

What if the Seth material was a foundation to be expanded later by other channeled sources? Can any perennial source ever be considered complete AND infallible?

Seth readers will want to check out:
Introduction & Overview
A Seth, Elias Comparative Overview (Updated!)
Digest: Seth, Jane Roberts

In The Rose Garden - a blog by Joanne Helfrich who channels the essence of Rose as mentioned in the Elias forum.

The Kris Chronicles - an expansion of many of the conscious creation concepts introduced by Seth/Jane Roberts, channeled by Serge Grandbois.

A Kris, Seth, Elias Comparative Overview (Updated!) - a preliminary comparison of core concepts in the Seth material, information offered by Elias, and Kris Chronicles

Otherfocus.com the personal website of Donald R. Johnson

Explore the creative worlds of John McNally and Kristen Fox Cofounders of the Conscious Creation Website and Email group John and Kristen share interests in writing, art, photography and cooking which they explore on a variety of websites:

John and Kristen's new Green blog: It Should Be Easy Being Green
Intuitive Astrology site: Psychic Weather
Writing: Mind Altering Fiction
Photography: Telepathicfrog
Cooking: Food Follies
Shop: Telepathic Frog Designs
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Kristen's weblog: FoxVox
Art & Photo Gallery: Art of FoxVox
Art & Photo Prints: Deviant Art
T Shirt Reviews Tshirt Casserole