April 2011 Issue

VOLUME 1 • ISSUE 4

April 2011

Mastery Journal

The International Ezine on Mastery in Qigong, Internal Arts, and Life

Body Awareness Lama Tantrapa

Dancing with new Energies

World Healing Day

Julia Griffin

Bill Douglas

Three Minds Into One

The Ins and Outs of Breathing Part II

John Weston

Gary Giamboi

The Greatest Epidemic Known to Man Part III Paul Levy

April 2011

Volume 1

Issue 4

Letter from the Editor Articles

Body Awareness Lama Tantrapa

World Healing Day Bill Douglas

The Ins and Outs of Breathing Part II Gary Giamboi

Dancing with the New Engergies Julia Griffin

Three Minds Into One John Weston

The Greatest Epidemic Known to Man Part III

Dear Reader of Mastery Journal This month we are very pleased to offer you a special issue dedicated to tai chi and qigong in honor of World Tai Chi and Qigong Day (WTCQD), which is happening on Saturday, April 30, 2011. This day will be celebrated around the globe. For those of us dedicated to bringing you meaningful content on mastery in qigong, internal arts, and life, we will be celebrating WTCQD at the World Qigong Congress in San Francisco, California on April 30 – May 2, 2011. For more information on the WQC go to www.eastwestqi.com or to find events in your area go to www.worldhealingday.org.

WTCQD was founded by Bill Douglas, who just so happens to be our Master of the Month. In addition to our special guest, this issue offers articles on increasing your health and wellbeing through breathing exercises, improving body awareness, addressing the three dan tiens or gateways of the body, and releasing the chains of our egos.

Paul Levy Click Here to Subscribe and Receive a Bonus

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As we enter springtime, which is a time for renewal and transformation, we hope this issue will help you boost your energy through the practice of greater awareness. Please join us in the celebration of hope and healing!

Namaste, Kali Samaya Tara

Publisher: Lama Tantrapa Production Designer: Thomas Pamelia The Cover Composite: Bill Douglas Copy Editor: Lucas Meyer Information is correct at press time.

Mastery Journal is published monthly by the Academy of Qi Dao in Portland, Oregon. Signed articles do not necessarily reflect the official company policy Š 2011. All rights reserved. Reproduction in part or whole without permission is prohibited.

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As the host of this enlightening talk show, Lama Tantrapa interviews prominent experts in the fields of Oriental Medicine, Energy Healing, Meditation, and Internal Arts. He also shares his unique perspectives on the principles and applications of energy awareness.

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Body Awareness Lama Tantr apa In the English language, there are many metaphors reflecting the awareness of the human body-mind. For example, one can be “nosy,” “spineless,” “gutless,” or “heartless.” One may also be “straightforward” or “upfront.” One can either “face things,” “throw one’s weight around,” “pull away,” “turn one’s back” on a problem, or even “lose one’s face.” One may have a “good head on his shoulders,” “gut feelings,” “butterflies in the stomach,” “balls of steel,” or “no leg to stand on.”

Moreover, one may appear to have a “stiff upper lip,” a “high brow,” or even a “stick up one’s ass.”

These phrases hint on some degree of body awareness people had in the olden days. One must pay at least some attention to one’s bodily sensations and expressions in order to come up with such a bodycentered phraseology. Nowadays, fewer people pay attention to their bodies than to their cars or computers.

It seems that the advancements in technology left our “civilized world” without the need to pay attention to the sacred abode of our precious lives. Being in the flow of life within the temple you inhabit – the physical body and its energy field – is the hallmark promise of Qi Dao to you.

Alignment of the Head Alignments of the head and neck are obvious areas to start with. People in modern society often complain about pain and tension in the neck and the base of the skull. Such tension blocks the circulation of blood and lymph and often leads to headaches, ringing in the ears, TMJ dysfunction, eyesight disorders and other complaints. Observation suggests that energy cannot flow freely through areas of the body holding a lot of tension. Since communication requires free flow of energy, tension in the neck and shoulders restricts and even disconnects communication between the head and the rest of the body.

The phrase “stuck in the head” generally denotes someone who thinks or intellectualizes too much. This describes a person whose muscle tension has created an energetic and emotional divide between the head and the rest of the body. Someone who is stuck in the head often

displays a peculiar culture of movement revealing his or her body awareness, or rather lack thereof. Such culture of movement is what I refer to as disharmonious, because it isolates and compartmentalizes movements of different parts of the body, which makes it look comparatively robotic.

For the energy to flow freely between the head and the rest of the body, the neck and shoulders need to be free of excessive tension. When the head and neck are misaligned, the muscles of the neck have to continuously hold tension in order to compensate for the lack of support from the spine. When the vertebrae of the neck naturally rest one on top of the other, there is no need for any more tension than a regular muscular tone.

Since the cervical spine is a part of the whole spine, you cannot be in alignment if your head and neck are not aligned. Neck alignment requires some basic awareness of its bone structure. Despite a popular belief, the bodies of the cervical vertebrae are not really close to the back of the neck like many people think (confusing the vertebrae for their spinous processes), but are connected to the center of the skull and continue down in the middle of the neck.

Head alignment also entails awareness of the top of the head so that it actually is the highest point of the head. The center of mass of the head corresponds to the location of the atlas – the first cervical vertebra.

The head can balance effortlessly on the bone structure of the neck when it is in a neutral position. It happens totally naturally as long as the top of your head (Bai Hui acupressure point) is literally on top.

In order to experience the natural alignment of your head, you can gently pull your head straight up by the tips of the ears with your fingers. Notice the way

your head naturally finds its alignment. Bear in mind that tension is something you do to yourself. Keeping the head out of its natural alignment requires a lot of doing.

You cannot ease tension by doing more. Relaxation is a function of non-doing. By simply paying attention to the areas of tension in your body, you will begin to notice changes happening moment by moment.

Experiment with the following methods of focusing attention on tense neck muscles: 1) Physical touch – match tension with pressure and gradually ease pressure when the tension begins to subside; 2) Increasing and decreasing tension – prevent the head from moving with the help of one or both hands while contracting and relaxing the tense muscles; 3) Animation of the head – move your head with the help of the hands in the direction it wants to go without tensing up the neck muscles; and 4) Breathing and visualization – imagine that you can breathe through your neck muscles while observing the flow of energy being restored.

No need to force Qi to flow where you think it should flow or to do anything to the muscles in attempt to make them relax, unless you actually wish to experience more stress and frustration. Letting go of tension parallels letting go of expectations.

Lama Somananda Tantrapa is the 27th lineage holder of Qi Dao, also known as Tibetan Shamanic Qigong. He has been practicing Qigong, Dream Yoga, Meditation, and Internal Martial Arts for over thirty five years, primarily trained by his Grandfather who was the paragon of the Russian Martial Arts and Qi Dao Grand Master. His background is complex enough to include serving in the Soviet Army’s Special Forces, being kidnapped in the Ukraine and surviving several near-death experiences.

Lama Tantrapa was ordained as a Buddhist monk in three different orders and initiated into Subud spiritual brotherhood. In addition to being a Tibetan Bon Lama, he studied with a number of Qigong and kung-fu masters, great teachers of Yoga and meditation, as well as Native American, Hawaiian and Siberian Shamans. He is also trained in Cultural Anthropology, Meta-coaching, Hypnosis and NLP. When living for two years on a small tropical island in the Pacific, 7000 miles away from the majority of his students and clients, he pioneered a novel method of conducting Qi Dao sessions over the Internet called Qigong Coaching. In the last decade, he has provided wellness, peak performance and life coaching to thousands of people of all ages and from various walks of life. He is also a bestselling author of several Qi Dao books, executive producer of the film Qi Dao – Tibetan Shamanic Qigong, creator of CD albums Qi Dao Initiation and The Art of Being in the Flow, publisher of the Basic Qi Dao Home Study Course and other multimedia learning materials available at www.qidao.org.

In addition to being the publisher of Mastery Journal, Lama Tantrapa is also the host of the Internet Radio talk show The Secrets of Qigong Masters that you can enjoy at www.blogtalkradio.com/qigongmasters.

World Healing Day Bill Douglas

World Healing Day - Needed Now More than Ever

Our lives are accelerating. Technological transformation is part of it, population growth is part of it, and the strains of both of these accelerations are adding to it. Humanity is slapping the water of life in all directions trying desperately to stay afloat.

When the world is spinning faster and faster, finding our center becomes more and more important. Just like on a merry-go-round, when you stand in the center of life, you don’t get as disoriented and dizzy. All decisions in this world come from the field of human consciousness. If it is in a state of fear and panic, then nothing good can come out of it. If it is in a state of compassion and calm, then a world of possibilities becomes evident.

Years ago, the vision of a World Healing Day came into being as yoga and meditation and even healing prayer groups contacted World Tai Chi & Qigong Day, asking how they could be part of the global wave of Qi and healing intention that WTCQD is.

On Saturday, April 30th, 2011, at 10 AM local time, worldwide, tens of thousands of people will come together to wrap our world in a wave of healing Qi, consciousness, and intention. This event is called World Healing Day, and is listed in the Chase Calendar’s Calendar of Global Events. World Healing Day is comprised of a host of healing events. How did this begin?

Over a decade ago World Tai Chi Day gave birth to World Tai Chi & Qigong Day when Roger Jahnke of the National Qigong Association contacted us and suggested that Qigong be added to the day, and this global event has since evolved into the birth of World Healing Day.

On World Healing Day people from many walks of life all around the world will cross racial, ethnic, religious and geopolitical boundaries to come together . . . to breathe together . . . and to wrap our world in a wave of healing intention.

The World Healing Day family of events includes many events, all designed to focus human consciousness on the vision of global healing. These events include:

World Yoga Day, www.WorldYogaDay.org World Tai Chi Day, www.WorldTaiChiDay.org World Qigong Day, www.WorldQigongDay.org World Reiki Day, www.WorldReikiDay.org World Healing Meditation Day, www.

WorldHealingMeditationDay.org World Prayer Day, www.WorldPrayerDay.org World Art Day, www.WorldArtDay.org World Music Healing Day, www.WorldMusicHealingDay.org

and many other World Healing Day events such as World Sufi Dance Day and World Native & Aboriginal Sacred Dance Day.

The goal -- to affect our world by sending a vibration through the field of human consciousness and our physical world -- a vibration of world healing.

This is not just a symbolic act. There is scientific research that shows that cohesive human consciousness, such as is produced with mind-body meditative tools, can affect the larger society positively, far beyond the number of people actually meditating. See this fascinating video by physicist John Hagelin: http://www. youtube. com/watch?v=yVFa6Wtu xu8&feature=player_embedded

The Global Consciousness Project (GCP) caught our attention at World Healing Day and became part of our reason for creating this global event. Born out of research at Princeton, GCP discovered that when human consciousness was focused en masse, such as during the tragedies of 9/11 and Princess Diana’s death, that it actually physically affected their computers worldwide. This realization that thought can not only affect others around us, but physically affect our planet, spurred World Healing Day to push on with the effort of

bringing as many humans as possible into our global circle of healing intent.

By planting seeds of vision now, we may reap the benefits in future months and years. Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, wrote, “The world you see is the one created by your own thoughts.”

On the last Saturday of April each year, people around the planet from Israel to Iran, from the United States to China, from Brazil to Russia, and in over 70 nations -- will come together -- breathe together -- a vision of global healing.

In 2010, global media embraced World Healing Day: “What if human consciousness were focused en masse for a 24-hour period not on fear and desperation, but on an intention for personal and global healing,” [World Healing Day’s] founders asked. Further details may be found at www. worldhealingday.org. - Al-Ahram Weekly, Cairo, Egypt Working together, World Healing Day seeks to accomplish collectively the true power of a global human consciousness. - Pakistan-Asia News.com World Healing Day . . . addressing world healing - Agence France Presse Today is World Healing Day . . . [it] seeks to unite healing intentions from a multitude of spiritual and medical practices. - The Huffington Post.com [The last Saturday of April] is World Healing Day, plus Adam Yauch (Beastie Boys) and Yoko Ono are meditating twice daily for world health . . . - UK Independent

World Healing Day events are open to all. Attend an event or organize one yourself. Visit www.WorldHealingDay.org to learn more.

Master of the Month Bill Douglas

Bill Douglas is the co-founder (together with Angela Wong) of World Tai Chi & Qigong Day. Over a decade ago they invested their life savings in a vision of bringing together the global Tai Chi and Qigong family, so that we might together spread Tai Chi and Qigong to the entire planet at time when it was most needed by a stressed out modern world.

Bill is the Tai Chi Expert for Dr. Andrew Weil’s DrWeil.com, and was one of a handful of national Tai Chi experts to help formulate a National Council on the Aging national efficacy guide for aging professionals to begin Tai Chi programs for local aging populations.

Bill has presented for the National Parkinson’s Foundation, the American Heart Association, and for some of the world’s largest corporations and health institutions. He is the 2009 Inductee to the Internal Arts Hall of Fame and the recipient of the Extraordinary Service in the Field of Qigong Award from the National Qigong Association, the Media

Excellence on Qigong Award from the World Congress on Qigong and the Leadership Award from the National Tai Chi Association. Please visit the official website of the World Tai Chi & Qigong Day www.worldtaichiday.org for more information about this worldwide celebration of the Energy Arts.

He is the author of the best selling tai chi book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to T’ai Chi & Qigong (Penguin/Alpha Books, New York), which is published worldwide in several languages. Bill is the presenter/producer of the DVD titled, Anthology of T’ai Chi & Qigong: The Prescription for the Future, which was called “an excellent introduction to this ancient art” by Booklist Magazine.

He is also the author of a highly acclaimed mind-body spiritual thriller, 2012 The Awakening, which was chosen Best Fiction of 2010 by Spiritual Enlightenment Magazine.

Enlightenment Dudes Review gave it ten out of ten stars, calling it mind-blowing. Midwest Book Review called 2012 The Awakening “riveting metaphysical fiction . . .” Bill’s next novel, A Conspiracy of Spirits, an environmentalspiritual thriller, is slated to be released in 2011.

Bill has been a media source on mind-body tools for the modern world and a host of other issues regarding humanity’s challenges for The New York Times, China’s Xinhua News Agency, BBC World Radio, The Wall Street Journal, The South China Morning Post, The Vancouver Sun, and media worldwide.

World T’ai Chi & Qigong Day

An Unprecedented global health and healing event which will unfold across the planet on

Saturday, April 30th, 2011, 10am worldwide

The Ins and Outs of Breathing Part II Gary Giamboi

easier with practice.

Because of all of the sequential actions involved in this form of breathing, it is the slowest method of breathing.

The slowness of this breath does not short change our breathing. Because of the great amount of air it actually gets into the lungs, it is actually the most efficient method of breathing.

The Complete or Yogic Breath In Part I of this article we discussed in detail three of the four forms of chest breathing. We will now take a look at the fourth kind: The Complete Breath or the Yogic breath.

Perhaps because of the slow, even and rhythmic nature of the Complete Breath, it does not cause any extraneous stress factors even though we are using our mid and upper chest to breathe.

The complete Breath is called Complete because it entails utilizing all 3 of the previous methods of chest breathing in two particular sequences:

Speaking of slow, even breathing, the ancients believed that when we were born, we were allotted a certain fixed number of breaths to take during our lifetime.

When we use this number of breaths up, we die. By breathing slower, deeper and longer, we can decrease the number of breaths we need each minute, each day and thus prolong our life. If this seems a little farfetched to you, just consider that a good rule of thumb in the animal kingdom is that generally speaking, the quicker the respiration of an animal, the shorter its lifespan is.

An elephant lives longer than a mouse. A tortoise lives even longer than that.

1. The Inhalation consists of beginning with lower chest breathing initiated by lowering the diaphragm. When this part of the breath is complete (as full as it can comfortably get), the next phase begins with middle chest breathing. This is initiated by expanding the rib cage as far as comfortably on all four sides. When this is complete, then upper chest breathing begins which is initiated by moving the upper chest and collarbones upwards and slightly forward.

2. The exhalation proceeds in the exact opposite order. First, the collarbones drop, pushing the air out of the upper part of the lungs. Then the rib cage relaxes, pushing the air out of the middle section of the lungs.

Finally, the diaphragm relaxes, rising up and expelling the air out of the lower lungs.

This is the most complete, fullest method of exchanging gases between the lungs and our surroundings. Unless it has been practiced regularly, this method requires a lot of concentration to perform correctly. It does become

Another ancient yogic text says that the further outwards your exhalation can be felt, the shorter your lifespan will be. Or conversely, the shorter the distance your exhalation can be felt on your skin, the longer you will live. This is actually the same concept because in order for you to expel the same volume of air in each exhalation while using a shorter column of exhaled air, one’s exhalation must be propelled by less air pressure and thus it must take a longer amount of time to finish.

If one is to breathe rhythmically, one’s inhalation must proportionally match one’s exhalation; and so, it must also be longer. Thus, this is just another way of saying that the slower we breathe, the longer we will live.

The very act of breathing more slowly calms us down.

If we are breathing slowly, the part of our brain that monitors such things comes to the conclusion that all is well and keeps the body working in calm, slow, relaxed manner without a stress hormone in sight.

The ancients would attribute this calmness to the slowness of the breath. This is because as we inhale, our Prana or Qi rises up our body toward the top of our head. The more we inhale with greater pressure, the faster and higher it will rise up.

As our energy rises, it energizes our heart center and causes havoc with our emotions. It then proceeds to our throat center making it easier for us to speak things we wouldn’t have if we had taken the time to think about them some more. Lastly, our energy makes its way up to our brain and feeds whatever thoughts up there that the feelings from our heart center inspired. It short-circuits our intellect, bypasses our reason and lets our emotions dictate our actions.

This is not to say that breathing more quickly makes you lose control of yourself. It just means that it makes it more difficult for your intellect and reason to remain in control of your actions, and that you will have to be more vigilant in watching over what you feel, think, say and do.

In other words, breathing more slowly, evenly, deeply will help keep our energy from rising unnecessarily. This will also keep our emotions and intellect from rising unnecessarily.

Gary Giamboi founded The Institute of Asian Arts in 1994 in order to continue the tradition of discovering, nurturing and passing on the wisdom of the ancients.

He began his Eastern journey in 1969 and has had the unbelievable good fortune to have become a disciple and personal student of four World Class Masters He has achieved the Rank of Master Level Instructor in Qigong, Taijiquan, Ninpo, Jujutsu, Asayama Ichiden Ryu, Kenjutsu and Yoga in world recognized organizations. He is also certified as a Personal Trainer, as a Pilates instructor, in Ohashiatsu, in Thai Yoga and has several other lower rank Black Belts in various martial arts. He specializes in finding the common thread of Truth in All of these Arts, because at the end of the day “Things Can Only Work One Way.” Even though they use different systems of Internal Energy, Yoga works in China and Acupuncture works in India. Each contains a piece of The Truth or The Way Things Are. It is up to each of us to find as much of That Truth, That Way and live by it as closely as possible.

Gary has taught and demonstrated Martial Arts, Qigong, Yoga and Fitness Training in the USA, Japan, China, Canada, UK, Belgium, Germany, and Ireland. He has several articles published a total of over 64 times on various web sites and blogs, produced 2 DVDs on Qigong, 1 on Taijiquan, 2 on Yoga, 1 on Balance and a Point by Point Relaxation CD. He also has two books nearing publication and several new DVDs coming soon. His web sites are www.Genbukan.biz and the new www.Secrets-of-Yoga-Qigong.com

Dancing with the New Energies

discovers an odd conundrum – now the mind argues with the form with the strange talk to self that is called the monkey mind or inner dialogue. Strange situations and upsets follow which cause disturbing emotions and often shut-down with a desire to do nothing but experience this state.

The time of the turning ages, the ending of the Mayan calendar and the positions of the stars hint that it is time to leave behind the undesirable parts of “our reality” to create a new life or reality that is a more fulfilling expression of our higher nature. (Think of it as an opportunity to use the skills that you have gained through the summer and past year, like graduating from skiing on two skis and now learning to slalom.)

It is the nature of the Universe to allow opportunity for expression of mastery. What is mastery? It is the understanding that our conflicts allow for insight, greater compassion and inner love for self while moving into the auspices of greater co-creation.

Through meditation, it is possible to discover that our reactions and upsets are caused by deep childhood or past life beliefs. Ultimately, life responds to our inner being. What we refuse to see, the Universe must mirror. Many of us are passing through this fire of inner discovery. As Frankl said, “That which is to give light must endure burning.” As we move into enlightenment as a group, we surrender and sacrifice the old patterns that cause discomfort and pain – the odd part is that our patterns form the experience of opposition and squares as reflected by the heavens.

Julia Griffin

Grasping our ability for co-creation is only possible by witnessing the dance between the shadow and soul.

The soul longs for greater opportunity and dreams of frontiers for experience. The un-integrated ego finds the sofa and television appealing with a sigh of “Oh, I’ll do that later.” The dreams of the soul are elusive until we learn how to put the two voices together. The soul speaks through intuition, a repetitive voice that sings in the heart, while the ego speaks of past pain, hurt and protection with patterns of victim, perpetrator and hero.

While the dreams of the past ages are being surrendered, new dreams of love, compassion and enlightenment are being born, but alchemical birth only comes through the marriage of opposites. Opposites are light and darkness, soft and hard, yin and yang. The opposite sides of our nature are the shadow and soul.

Every desire is born of both, the hidden vulnerability of gifts that lie beneath the shadow and the brave courageous inspiration of the forward-moving soul.

The Alchemical Process A dream or desire is born from the heart and is illuminated by the fire of the soul. It forms an intention, a blazing star that our heart follows with sharp visual images and is shaped by emotion. The body follows, for it must follow it with action for it to take form in matter.

In the moment that the image is formed, the aspirant

In an opposition, two planets or forces face one another at 180 degree angles, and the two forces are not in agreement. For the sake of expression, they could be said to be in disagreement. In squares with 90 degree angles, there is an element of force. Two energies must come together in an expression of matter. We could say that the soul’s desire for expression in the material and the ego with its karmic patterns of self-protection and neediness are in opposition. By learning to combine two opposing forces, we step into the operation of the marriage of opposites – the only known formula of creating consciously in matter. As the two opposites (imagine 2 circles overlying one another as in the Flower of Life) merge, a third thing or child is formed. Right angles of a square are formed as the offspring of the two opposing forces takes shape in matter.

The “Hastened Path” is the name given by Robert Wilkinson (Aquarius Papers) to the path of the enlightenment or light seekers. The Hastened Path means that the commitment to awakening begins a journey of experiencing karma, gifts and wisdom more quickly. It is said that astrological aspects that we find so challenging are but the heavens beckoning this group into the awakening of mastery. The planets and stars are amplifying the alchemical process that must take place within those who are awakening so that the co-creation of reality is better understood throughout this process of attaining higher frequency.

Patterns Patterns begin usually in childhood, adolescence or early adulthood. They are based on a belief that involves acceptance, approval and love from others. We measure our value by the gift of these qualities as children as they are necessities for survival. Imagine a child who only knows how to give love and encounters a parent who is angry or upset. The parent may tell the child that they are too social or solitary or that reading or playing with friends is inappropriate. The parent may say that the child is too loud or quiet, too different or a conformist.

At this point, damage is incurred. The child begins to change his or her behavior for approval, acceptance and love – it seems responsible to reflect that these episodes likely occur because of accumulated karma brought into this existence.

Regardless, a pattern is formed. Whenever the child experiences the same situation, a false behavior is exhibited so that the pain from the initial situation is not again caused. This behavior is known as the protective part of the ego – the false behavior hides the true self. The odd part of the pattern is that the protection eventually causes pain because it hides the gift of true expression and causes our being to move out of balance.

This protection from the ego is the device that causes so trauma in life itself. It is the software in the computer of the self that brings about harsh words, unkindness and repetitive situations in life. The truth is that if a situation is repetitive then it is “us” who is causing it, not an outer force or difficult universe. In fact, the universe is presently delivering perfect aspects to see our internal mirrors and the beliefs that lie behind them.

resonance with illusion or lower vibration. Also, we accumulate karma or a particular vibratory rate through the energy of the repetitive experience. We can begin with the admission that it is our pattern – not someone else – that causes the frequency. By accepting the frequency, pattern and situation, we immediately begin to observe it. And everything changes when an observer is added to an equation. When we move into acceptance of a pattern, then compassion is gained for the characters in our play of life that are mirroring our deepest pain. It is helpful to entertain the idea that our experience eventually frees us from our pain body.

Listed below are a few of the steps that I use in counseling. They can be applied by anyone who is willing to practice. The application of the alchemical elements is also useful.

Exercise: Begin with the feeling and stay with the negative feeling or state for a few minutes. Initially it will deepen, but in a few minutes or hours it will lessen. Notice that you have always felt this way (or at least for years) and remind yourself that observation changes it. Only the “inner you” or “real you” can observe. When the feeling lessens, visualize the opposite state, meditate, or exercise. Any of these three acts builds the frequency for the desired change, and the three acts differ from the usual response, thus changing the pattern. When your energy changes, notice that everyone involved is simply acting as a mirror. Try to feel compassion for their involvement and extend forgiveness. Now ask, “What would I do if I were free of reaction?” Simply imagining it or asking the question changes the pattern.

When I work with students, I find that our darkest feelings and thoughts travel back almost as long as we can remember. For example, the topic may be love, money or health but our feelings and thoughts tend to stay the same whenever faced with difficult situations.

One person may feel overwhelming anxiety about career or money; another person feels tragically abandoned or abused in relationships. Through intuitive probing and gentle conversation, I usually find that the same circumstances have followed the person throughout his or her life. Their dream is often the exact or polar opposite of the situation.

1) Meditation – Devotion to spiritual life is always helpful when moving through difficulty. We find new insights and learn to apply them.

The connection with spirituality is comforting and provides love and nurturing. (Akasha – connection to the Field)

The experience of patterns occurs because of our

3) Images – Create new images of life that move in

2) Spirituality – Inspiration is the expression of spirituality in physical form. Ask what the Universe wants from you and act on it. Notice the actions that cause fear and visualize that you begin them. (Fire – inspiration)

the opposite direction. Whatever you are not receiving, imagine it in abundance. Whatever you needed as a child, imagine that life now imparts it. Observe any negative images or projections. Remember how often you have been successful with similar situations even when they seemed overwhelming. (Air – mental image) 4) Feelings – Notice that feelings change sometimes hourly. Stay with negative feelings until they lessen. When the change comes, breathe through the heart and feel love flow through the heart chakra. Express gratitude for all that is good. (Water – emotions) 5) Body – Notice that tension or contraction occurs in the body when working with a pattern. The same energy is in the body as well as outside of it. Breathe through tight points, practice yoga or walk. Whenever possible, eat well and drink plenty of water. Remember too that your home, body and life are expressions of your being in the physical realm. Love every molecule whenever possible. (Earth – physical surroundings, sensations and body) The Light The real reason for hesitancy is that movement forward in the light brings change and chaos. Sometimes, we lose the sense of our identity. People react differently to us, and their reactions may cause feelings of instability or negative emotions. But like two people in a dance, if one steps away, then the other will step forward or find another dancer. The people in our lives will either step up to match our frequency or fall away, as will the events in our lives.

The illumination of the light is known to bring change, initially chaos. But we survive it and create again. The garden is plowed before it is brought to life; the house is most disorderly as it is cleaned. We also learn balance by bringing the forces of the self together. We learn to rephrase words, to alter reactions or to exercise and meditate first instead of last. We understand that everyone acts in a certain way because of our underlying beliefs – not the people themselves. As we understand our involvement, we eventually surrender and let go.

We end our movement between the low and high point

of a desire by staying fixed on its course like the North Star. We do this not because of the end result, but because Spirit leads us.

Our desire becomes more profound as we move into the path prepared by Spirit or the creative forces of the Universe. Now our desire is more than “us”; it is the path of sharing our light with many in whatever way that the Universe offers. No longer do we suffer through the creations of our patterns – we shed them to follow the light. Our lives begin to follow a new pattern, one that is based on the new person that we are becoming. We find new ways of action, new forms of expression, and as we do this, the light comes to meet us.

The presence of the light comes with its illuminating power – its love and majesty for every fiber of our being.

Now we feel only that – and not the darkness through which we traveled. We express our gifts and talents.

This is part of the path of the journey of the soul, and it is one of the paths of awakening.

There are many paths on the journey, as well as many different roads for travel. It may be that soon a transcendental leap will be made as we choose to learn from simple expansion and growth, as opposed to patterns. In the meanwhile, each time that one of us surrenders a pattern and transmutes the energy to create a higher vibration, all of us experience a greater opportunity for change and to see the light within ourselves. At this moment, humanity is moving away from patterns of hiding the self into self-love, awareness and discovery. By bringing together the opposing parts of our nature, we move away from judgment and loss toward compassion, love and expansion – the gift of illumination.

For more information, sign up for Julia’s newsletter or visit her website at onetrueself.com

Julia Griffin is an intuitive healer who has successfully transformed the lives of thousands of people through her manifestation and meditative techniques. She teaches these techniques in her group classes, one-on-one sessions, and now e-courses.

Julia has a deep understanding of energetics based on extensive studies and her own successful practice.

She is an alchemist, astrologer, herbalist and Reiki master, and is able to communicate with plants and animals. She lived with wolves for nine years, while developing her intuitive abilities. Julia has been a contributing writer for Spirit of Ma’at and Aquarius, and she publishes a bi-weekly newsletter called One True Self.

Three Minds into One

of the actual picture on the screen. Literally on your forehead is a picture screen where you can visualize and observe what needs to be observed, like a movie picture on your forehead.

The conscious or middle mind is where we are actually doing the thinking, which is in the heart center. The Taoists say you have three minds, but we use the three minds at the same time. In other words, three minds into one mind. They call this one mind the “Yi” (one).

Now Taoists have an interesting concept and we have already mentioned the first two minds, the upper mind or monkey mind that you can transform to the observatory tower or the feeling mind. The second mind that we talked about was the second brain, which is called the heart center or heart mind and the conscious mind. The first mind is the observing mind, the second mind is your consciousness or your conscious mind and we have a third mind the Taoists talk about, which is the lower mind. It is in the abdominal area and it is the awareness mind.

So, the abdominal, Lower Dan Tien or the lower mind is the awareness and that is really as the West calls it “our gut feeling.” When we are aware of whatever it is through this awareness we start to feel a sensation in the gut or abdominal area, which is the third mind.

And the interesting thing about this is, again through Western science, that if we utilize our upper mind to think we utilize eighty percent of the energy in the body just in this thinking process. When the monkey mind is activated, the rest of the body uses twenty percent of the energy.

We put far too much of our energy in the upper mind, when in reality it does not really think for us anyway.

It is really crippling us because we do not have the awareness if we do not activate the lower mind and we do not have a consciousness if we do not activate the middle mind.

So, as the Taoists explained, what we need to do is to activate all three minds at the same time, and when we activate all three minds we form one big mind which the Taoists call the “Yi” – Three Minds into One (it is just an expression or word for three minds into one, the “Yi”).

Jon Weston

So, I think we have a clear idea of what we mean by the first mind, the upper mind, and a clear idea of what the middle mind is, the conscious mind. Now, what is the third mind? Again, going back to Western science, it has been proven that the abdominal area has the same nerve endings or nerve connections as the upper mind. It has the same reaction and thinking process with the neural transmitters and connections in the lower abdominal area that the brain (upper mind) has. Now what do we mean by “awareness”? Awareness is expansion, like radar. It expands way out to the universe and you can pick up different aspects of the universe. So it is like radar. We can use an illustration from the time people were in the desert war several years ago.

They lived buried in the ground because of the bombing and had TV screens with radar.

They sent out a signal and they picked up a picture of an aircraft from way out in space and transmitted that picture, the awareness from the radar, onto that TV screen.

The TV screen buried in the desert cave where they lived buried inside the earth was the actual observer.

Then the conscious mind was the person determining what the actual picture was explaining. So you have the awareness, which is like sending out radar, way out to the universe. You have your observation

Now, you are probably asking yourself, “OK, I understand what to observe is, I mean just witnessing and feeling and sensing like a TV picture, but what is the difference between the awareness of the lower mind and the consciousness of middle mind?” Well, again as I explained before, the awareness is like radar. You just send out your energy field way out and your energy center is in your Lower Dan Tien. You send that energy, expanding it way out and it just becomes aware. You start to pick up radar or sensitivity way out to certain points so the upper mind or observatory mind can pick it up. It is like radar sending out and picking up what it can pick up and then you utilize the upper mind to observe what you actually picked up. That is the awareness.

So it is a conscious effort on your part just to send that focal point out into space, make that connection and then start to pick up the information or whatever is out there. Now, once you pick up the information, you have to make a conscious understanding and this is the conscious mind, the middle mind or heart center. That conscious understanding is when you recognize what it is and you can make comparisons and then make a conscious decision, have a conscious thought or take a

Jon Weston is the true “international man of mystery,” who contributed to the massive success of master Mantak Chia and his organization. In addition to W. U. Wei, Jon Weston wrote under the pen name Wei Tzu and co-authored Living in the Tao, the twelve Taoist poetry books of over 1,200 poems Emerald River expressing the feeling, essence and stillness of the Tao. He also co-created with Mantak Chia the Universal Tao formula cards, “Chi Cards” (6 sets of over 240 formulas) under the pen name The Professor – Master of Nothingness. www.the-professor-mon.com conscious direction. This is where the direction and the consciousness are manifested in the heart center. This is the complete knowing. In other words it is deductive; you compare it with various aspects and come out with a conclusion from the source of all knowledge of the Wu Chi, the Nothingness.

This is the actual thinking process because the middle mind picks up everything, using all the information and utilizing the awareness within itself to make a conscious decision. This is where you make the thought process, so one’s awareness is like radar, which is the lower mind, and the other is consciousness, making a conscious, deductive reasoning based on all the information of the universe to complete the thinking process itself.

One is thinking and the other is radar: Awareness and Consciousness. And the third, upper mind, you utilize it not as awareness or consciousness, but just to observe, just to witness .

CALENDAR OF EVENTS WORLD CONGRESS ON QIGONG IN SAN FRANCISCO You are invited to participate in this rare opportunity to experience Qigong and learn from the world-class masters at the Thirteenth World Congress on Qigong/TCM in San Francisco at the historic Hotel Whitcomb, April 29 - May 2, 2011.

Featuring a distinguished faculty of over 55 Qigong/TCM practitioners, scholars, scientists, VIPs, and presenters, the Congress sessions are lead by Dr. Steven Aung, Dr. Stanley Ngui, Dr. Effie Chow, Dr. Alex Feng, Dr. Kevin Chen, Lama Somananda Tantrapa, Master Chunyi Lin, Sifu May Chen, Dr. Sandra Rose Michael, Master Ting-Jue Zhou, and many other experts. In addition to experiential, hands-on sessions and exhibits, there is the dedicated Scientific Symposium chaired

by Dr. Shin Lin. The registration fee is $175, but a couple of scholarships are still available.

For information, please go to www.eastwestqi.com or call 415-285-9400.

HOLISTIC FITNESS AND WELLNESS PROGRAM Academy of Qi Dao is pleased to announce a new program starting this May. The Holistic Fitness and Wellness Program is an extension and expansion of the Qi Dao Basic Home Study Course with the inclusion of a very important and useful aspect of the Qi Dao previously reserved for the Intermediate Program – Strengthening Exercises. Similar to what is known as Dao Yin in China, this Holistic Fitness and Wellness Program is designed to take you step by step through a basic fitness program integrates the best aspects of Chinese Qi Gong and Indian Yoga without having to memorize any forms or hold any poses. If practiced on a daily basis, it will naturally expand your range of motion, flexibility, strength, and agility. This program will also include a series of 12 short exercise videos for you to follow that progressively add new movements and strengthening exercises week by week.

We recently surveyed over a thousand Qigong enthusiasts regarding their greatest challenges in learning Qigong or Tai Chi. Our new program serves to address those challenges by providing a more clear structure to your exploration of the Harmonious Culture of Movement found in Qi Dao. It also offers clear, simple and easy-to-do series of exercises that will empower you to achieve more tangible results faster. To further encourage your development of self-discipline, we will assist you in identifying your fitness and wellness goals at the beginning of the course, and help you consistently track and assess your progress throughout the three-month program.

Basic Qi Dao Home Study Course

WORKSHOP ON PEAK PERFORMANCE IN PUSH HANDS

Including the Basic Qi Dao Book, Workbook, Instructional DVD, Audiobook, and Meditation CD. Complementary Coaching Session (30min)

The main reason to attend this workshop is for developing formidable skills in and for exploration of the most misunderstood practice in Internal Martial Arts. Although many arts tend to offer some techniques of Push Hands, but Qi Dao provides the most in-depth principles empowering you to stand, move and breathe naturally, free of selfimposed limitations and energy blockages. Once you have learned to apply these simple principles, you will be more than ready to delve into more challenging and exciting aspects of our art of being in the flow.

Where: Whitcomb Hotel at 1231 Market Street, San Francisco, California When: Monday, May 2 from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm with a potluck lunch afterwards How much: $99.

Offered at the beginning of the course so you can assess where you are currently and what areas of your life you’d like to see improvements in Six Bi-weekly Group Coaching Sessions (via phone) - Go deeper into the nuances of Holistic Fitness and Wellness - Ask questions regarding the material and how to apply the principles in life - Track and assess your progress with your level of fitness and wellness - Have the support of a Master, and the Qi Dao community in achieving your goals Six Bi-weekly Pre-recoded Teleseminars - Review the finer points of each chapter of the Basic Qi Dao

Home Study Course - Learn how to apply the principles of Harmonious Culture of Movement in your daily life 12 Weekly Holistic Fitness Videos In just 15 minutes a day you’ll be able to: - Increase your range of motion - Decrease pain - Improve flexibility - Gain more strength (without any soreness) - Lose weight - Have more energy Regular tuition is $497. Register by May 10 to receive a $100 early bird discount and reduce your tuition to $397. If you have already purchased the Basic Qi Dao Home Study Course, its price - $150 - will be deducted from your tuition as well. Please contact academy@qidao.org for more information.

WIN A TICKET TO THE QI DAO WORKSHOP AND INITIATION By enrolling in the Holistic Fitness & Wellness program, you will be eligible to enter into the exciting contest to win a ticket to the workshop concluding the Basic Qi Dao Certification Program and receive an initiation into the Practice of Empowerment. All you need to do is set a clear goal that you would like to achieve in three months and share it during your orientation session with Lama Tantrapa. You will need to take two photos or videos of yourself: before and after the contest in order to provide the proof of your transformation.

Three months later, you achievements will be compared to those of other participants, and the winner will be invited to attend the workshop concluding the Basic Qi Dao Practitioner Certification Program that our students pay $1497 for. The second prize is the ticket to the Qi Dao Wilderness Retreat this summer - $397 value.

CONTRIBUTIONS Our publication accepts unsolicited contributions from professional and amateur writers. We are looking for articles and interviews that fall under the broad concept of mastery in Qigong, Kung fu and related disciplines. Please send us your stories on the best practices, masters’ profiles, as well as product and service reviews.

Additionally, you are welcome to submit anecdotal stories about personal breakthroughs, discoveries, inventions, new approaches and applications. We will be glad to publish well written stories about Qigong, Kung fu and other masters from any place in the world capable of boosting health, well-being, and prosperity with specific approaches or methods that can be explained in writing.

If you who would like to contribute to our future issues, you may submit articles, columns, profiles, stories and reviews electronically by emailing us at masteryjournal@gmail.com. Please provide your brief bio (a couple of paragraphs) and color head shot along with your piece of writing. Once you have been accepted as a contributor, you will be able to submit further contributions online by using our content management system.

ADVERSTISING Mastery Journal reaches out to thousands of Qigong, Energy, and Martial Arts enthusiasts from around the globe. Our market research indicates that the prospect subscribers to Mastery Journal are 55% male and 45% female. The average age of our readers is between 35 and 55; the majority having a college degree or higher.

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The Greatest Epidemic Known to Man Part III Lets Spread the Word: Wetiko

By Paul Levy In the first part of this series, we contemplated the idea of a psycho-spiritual disease of the soul that has been wreaking havoc throughout human history that Native Americans call wetiko. In part two, we inquired into how the wetiko bug disrupts and deranges a living system, using the world financial system as our case study. The wetiko virus is like a parasite that literally feeds off, takes over and aberrates the “curren(t)cy” of the infected system. The wetiko pathogen originally manifests as a disturbance in the field of the collective unconscious of humanity itself, creating the psychic ley lines upon which world events are erected and energized. The origin of this virulent disease is to be discovered within the psyche. Because of the psychic nature of wetiko, it serves us to understand the psychological underpinnings of the virus, which is to say, how it affects our day-to-day relationships and lives. We begin to ‘see’ the bug when we are able to get in focus and recognize its psychological signature in both ourselves and others. The fact that the source of the wetiko germ is within the psyche means that the cure for this disease lies hidden within the psyche as well.

Wetiko psychosis is at the very root of humanity’s inhumanity to itself in all its various forms. As a species, we need to step into and participate with our own spiritual and psychological evolution, which means that we must focus our attention on and contemplate this topic of topics before this virulent madness destroys us. Up until this point in our history we have been too easily distracted by the ruses of the wetiko bug itself. The disease itself is now demanding that

we pay attention to it, or it will kill us. Its cure is the most pressing and fundamental issue facing us today.

Author and environmental activist Derrick Jensen writes in his foreword to Jack D. Forbes book about wetiko psychosis, “Columbus and other Cannibals is, I think, the most important book ever written on one of the most important topics ever faced by human beings: why is the dominant culture so excruciatingly, relentlessly, insanely, genocidally, ecocidally, suicidally destructive?” Historian Arnold Toynbee points out that a civilization doesn’t die from being invaded from the outside, but unless it creates culture that nourishes the evolution of the creative spirit, a civilization invariably commits suicide. As if possessed, our civilization is, trance-like, sleepwalking in a death-march towards our own demise. The most pressing and inevitable question of our time is not just “why?” but more urgently, how can we stop this seemingly out-of-control, selfdestructive, hell-bent part of ourselves?

“PSYCHO-ANALYSIS” The origin of wetiko is the human psyche.

Psychologically speaking, shadow projection is at the very root of wetiko disease. Shadow projection is a process in which we split-off from and project out our own darkness onto others. It is our misguided attempt at a final solution to the problem of the evil within ourselves, which actually deprives us of the capacity to deal with evil. Projecting the shadow opens up the door and invites in the vampiric entity of wetiko to make itself at home in the most intimate spaces of our own psyche. It is through the dynamic of shadow projection that the wetiko bug digs in and entrenches itself within our psyches, where it is then able to commandeer the executive function of the psyche to its own ends. When we project the shadow, we unwittingly become a conduit for evil to possess us from behind, beneath our conscious awareness, and to act itself out through us. When there is mutual shadow projection between individuals, groups or nations,

each side has an unconscious investment in the other playing out the projected evil so as to prove their own self-righteous innocence, a dynamic which becomes self-reinforcing and continually feeds the polarization in the field. Shadow projection, as it collectively plays out en masse on the world stage is an outer reflection of the initial process within ourselves of our “be-night-ed” effort to exterminate our own darkness. When shadow projection happens en masse, it is as if the archetype of evil emits its toxic radioactivity underground, through the shared unconscious of the collective, and manifests collectively as destructive psychic epidemics.

In shadow projection, we attempt to master and experience power over the internal condition that originally proclaimed our powerlessness to ourselves not by becoming conscious, but by unconsciously identifying with, becoming, and then acting out the power to externally destroy. Unconsciously acting out unbound power without restraint is our perverse way of defending against the internal breakthrough of feelings of helplessness. Evacuating and relocating our inner darkness outside of ourselves by demonizing the ‘other’ seemingly protects us from feeling our vulnerability and pain. Our inner anxiety about our existential ‘power to be’ attempts to resolve itself in the power to act free from restraint. In an unmediated expression of our disempowered inner condition, our unconscious acting out does not surmount the need for compulsive repetition, however, but rather, assures it.

Wetikos’ modus operandi, their MO, becomes to root out and kill everything that feels tender, vulnerable and alive within themselves, thus systematically murdering anything and everything within them that could possibly melt or produce a crack in the ice that encases their heart.

Because full-blown wetikos are soul murderers who continually recreate the on-going process of killing their own soul, they are reflexively compelled to do this to others; for what the soul does to itself, it can’t help but to do to others. In a perverse inversion of the golden rule, instead of treating others how they would like to be treated, wetikos do unto others what was done unto them. The wetiko is simply a living link in a timeless, vampiric lineage of abuse. Full-blown wetikos induce

and dream up others to experience what it is like to be the part of themselves which they have split off from and denied, and are thus not able to consciously experience – the part of themselves that has been abused and vampirized. In playing this out, wetikos are transmitting and transferring their own depraved state of inner deadness to others in a perverse form of trying to deal with their own suffering. Paradoxically, wetikos both try to destroy others’ light, as it reminds them of what they’ve killed in themselves, while simultaneously trying to appropriate the light for themselves.

Wetiko disease is an expression of the convincing illusion of the separate self gone wild. Bewitched by the intrinsic projective tendencies of their own mind, full-blown wetikos are unconsciously doing the very thing they are reacting to and accusing other people of doing. Projecting the shadow onto others, they will accuse others of projecting the shadow onto them.

To use an extreme, but prototypical example, it is like someone screaming that you’re killing them as they kill you. If their insanity is reflected back to them, they think it is the mirror that is insane. Suffering from a form of psychic blindness that believes itself to be sightedness, full-blown wetikos project out their own unconscious blindness and imagine that others, instead of themselves, are the ones who are not seeing.

Governed by the insane, self-perpetuating logic of fear and paranoia, those taken over by the disease fear that if they don’t attack and rule over others, they are in danger of being attacked and ruled over themselves.

In their convoluted, upside-down, flawless illogic, wetikos re-act to their own projections in the world as if they objectively exist and are other than themselves, thinking that they themselves have nothing to do with creating that to which they are reacting. Someone fully taken over by the wetiko bug is like a kitten endlessly reacting to her reflection in a mirror as if it is another kitten separate from and other than herself. The evil we see in the full-blown wetikos is a reflection of our own

evil; if we don’t recognize this, we will just be projecting our shadow onto them. We are then guilty of the very same thing (shadow projecting) we are essentially reacting to and of which we are accusing them.

The term wetiko is a Cree term (windigo in Ojibway, wintiko in Powhatan) which, to quote Forbes, refers to “an evil person or spirit who terrorizes other creatures by means of terrible evil acts.” Wetikos are the human instruments for the transpersonal spirit of evil to terrorize the world. In wetiko disease, we unwittingly become drafted into being foot soldiers in the war not on, but of and for terror. The wetiko parasite feeds on and harvests the emotions of fear and terror. Terror is the essence of its insidious “ill-logical ill-usion.”

In wetiko disease, the psyche takes the terror that haunts it from within, and in its attempt to master it, unwittingly becomes taken over by it, thus becoming an instrument of terror in the world. We have then become the thing we most feared, creatures of the

European nightmare world, as we psychologically terrorize ourselves, as well as terrorizing the world at large. Wetiko is the bug that feeds the experience of terror within our minds and out in the world, fueling one of its more prominent manifestations in our world today: the Global War on Terror.

A FRANKENSTEIN MONSTER COME TO LIFE Wetikos suffer from what is called “pseudologia phantastica,” a form of hysteria characterized by a talent for believing their own lies. “Lying,” Forbes writes, “in fact may represent a key strand in the entire epidemiology of wetokoism.” Ultimately deceiving themselves as they believe in the propaganda of their own lies, full-blown wetikos become strangers to themselves. Wetikos continually have to invest their life force in lying to themselves, while at the same time fooling themselves into believing that they are not doing so, a version of what George Orwell referred to as doublethink. Suffering from amnesia, they have forgotten what it is to remember, and to seal the deal, they have forgotten that they have forgotten. The result is that they split their mind in two. Falling into denial, and yet denying they are in the state of denial, becomes a process that they are invested in at all costs, or it would blow their denial. Anything that threatens their perverse state of affairs has to be destroyed.

Hiding from their lie, they are in essence hiding from themselves, which is pure madness.

Instead of living from and out of an awareness of the psyche, full-blown wetikos continually avoid awareness of the psyche, a habitual pattern which becomes their internal compass and continual default, their M.O. Taking refuge not in, but from, themselves, wetikos are continually fleeing from themselves, endlessly circling around in the hamster wheel of samsara. All of their energy gets invested in fueling their own, and others, deception. Their will becomes dedicated to hiding from the truth of what they are doing, a truth, which endlessly pursues them, as they continually avoid relationship with themselves. Wetikos become wedded to the full-time occupation of keeping one step ahead of themselves, a process that, once it gains a certain momentum, attains a seeming autonomy that is selfgenerating. As this inner process progresses, it gains a sovereignty over their psyche, as if a self-created Frankenstein monster has come to life in the flesh. The wetikos have then created their own sci-fi nightmare, with themselves in the starring role. Once created, a mind-virus like wetiko, just like the Frankenstein monster, gains a seeming life of its own, independent

of its creator. It then holds its creator in thralls, unable to escape from the out-of-control hell of their own making.

Speaking of someone possessed by the wetiko virus, Forbes writes, “such a person cannot be authentic.

Such a person is not merely a pimp, he is also a ghost, as it were, a mere imitation of a person. His life is an imitation of life…their life is less than that of a wild (free) animal who is, after all always authentic.”

Wetikos become unreal to themselves, a simulation of themselves. Split in two, they become schizoid, dissociated from themselves, duality having seemingly established itself as the reigning logic at the core of their being. Different parts of the person taken over by wetiko become compartmentalized, neither connected to each other nor to the whole. This process of inner fragmentation serves to hide from the wetikos what they are doing to themselves, as they become their own never-ending cover-up. This psychological dynamic is kept in place by how painful it is to behold and contemplate the modes of avoidance they construct to protect themselves from what they do not want to know. And yet, as painful as it is, it is only in the seeing of what they are doing (to themselves) that there is any possibility of becoming free from this malignant malady.

Wetikos can psychopathically (and thus toxically) mimic the human personality perfectly. If it serves their agenda, they can be convincing beyond belief, making themselves out to be normal, caring, politically correct human beings. They are unable, however, to grasp emotionally the meaning implicit in the thoughts and feelings they are exhibiting. They lack insight into how they differ from others, for they do not differ from others as they see others. They are skillful at pretending love and devotion, as if they are imitating a person. Impersonating themselves, their existence is a true parody of life. They can’t distinguish between their mimicked (pseudo) responses of love, remorse, etc., and the genuinely felt responses of a healthy person.

Full-blown wetikos are emotionally stunted, as their feelings are confined to the primitive, archaic emotions

of anger, frustration, numbness and rage. Suffering from a deep disorder of feeling in which they cannot allow themselves to consciously feel, they typically swing between numbness and rage. Fixed in their own limited and myopic point of view, they have no capacity to see themselves as others see them. Proclamations to the contrary, they have neither empathy nor compassion. They can’t see the world through others point of view, only through their own, which in Hannah Arendt’s opinion is a primary characteristic of what she calls the “banality of evil.” Wetikos don’t relate to others as autonomous, independent beings, but rather, as pawns to be used as means to their own selfish ends, objects to be manipulated for their own narcissistic benefit, rather than as ends in themselves, subjects with their own intrinsic value and valid viewpoints. Because they have lost connection to their soul, they cannot hear the pleas of nor see the soul in others. They refuse to see the harm their actions are doing to others, as this would injure their overly positive, inflated narcissistic self-image, which protects them from consciously feeling their shame and guilt.

Seemingly unable to consciously experience their guilt animates more shadow projection, which fuels the wetiko pathogen in a continually self-regenerating feedback loop. Unwilling to experience their guilt, wetikos are afraid of being exposed, of being found out, which is an outer reflection of the terror that the wetiko parasite within us feels at potentially being illumined.

We secretly feel a sense of guilt when we shadow project, because we inwardly know we are not in our integrity. This sense of guilt itself is the very feeling from which we split-off. Our guilt does not allow us to feel our guilt, which is what we secretly feel guilty over.

To the extent that we don’t consciously experience our guilt, we become caught in an infinitely perpetuating double bind, in which we project out our guilt and darkness perpetuating the very thing we feel guilty about, ad infinitum.

Big wetikos may neither know nor be forced to come to terms with the harm they have caused, as oftentimes they find themselves in the privileged position of the victors who rewrite history on their own terms. Many of our society’s historians, themselves infected by the wetiko virus, exalt aggressive and exploitative behavior, categorizing as primitive and backwards those, who don’t forcibly conquer others, thereby subtly and subliminally brainwashing the young into the ways of the world of wetiko.

THE SELF-DESTRUCTIVE EMPIRE Being a field phenomenon, wetiko psychosis doesn’t just express itself individually, but its nonlocal tentacles are continually manifesting collectively throughout the underlying field of consciousness. The multiheaded hydra that is the wetiko collective psychosis materializes itself in families, groups, nations, and in whole species such as ours. Wetiko’s body politic has an intrinsic and insistent need for centralizing power and control, fueled by the bottom line of corporate-driven profits. Speaking about the monster of ever-expanding empire, Forbes writes, “imperialism and exploitation are forms of cannibalism and, in fact, are precisely those forms of cannibalism which are most diabolical or evil” A front for the underlying wetiko virus, the military-industrial-criminal-complex, with its ultimately self-destructive, built-in need for endless expansion is like a systematic runaway in cybernetic theory. The Frankenstein monster of ever-enlarging empire is like a runaway locomotive gaining speed, approaching the event horizon of its inevitable crash, all under the deceptive banner of progress. Meanwhile, this progress destroys people, families, communities, and potentially, the biosphere itself upon which human life depends.

“Wetikos,” Forbes writes, “have taken their Satan to the four-corners of the world, and they have made him their God.”

Evil is like a pathogen that enters a system, be it an individual, nation-state, or world-system, and exploits the system, knocking it off balance. Such disturbances can transform something wholesome, such as the drive to reproduce, into something evil – the drive to

rape. Etymologically, the meaning of the word evil has to do with excess as well as to transgress boundaries.

Full-fledged wetikos are rapists of the human soul.

The word ‘rape,’ etymologically speaking, is derived from words that mean to overwhelm, to enrapture, to invade, to usurp, to pillage, and to steal, which are all characteristics of someone who is taken over by the wetiko virus.

Wetiko disease is a self-devouring operating system that leaves nothing unmolested. It is a living death sentence that, if left unchecked, destroys everything within its dominion, including itself. Wetiko psychosis ensures that everything is sacrificed on its altar of death and destruction. From a galactic perspective, our planetary so-called “civilization” is a living, spreading outbreak of wetiko psychosis that is threatening to destroy not only its human host, but the entire planetary biosphere which makes life on earth possible as well. Speaking of wetikos’ ravenous hunger, Forbes points out, “It’s voracious, rapacious, appetite will cause it to literally eat itself.” Forbes continues, “The rape of a woman, the rape of a land, and the rape of a people, they are all the same…Brutality knows no boundaries. Greed knows no limits. Perversion knows no borders. Arrogance knows no frontiers. Desire knows no edges. These characteristics all tend to push towards an extreme, always moving forward once the initial infection sets in.” Untreated, this psychic infection gradually takes hold of the wetikos’ being, corrupting their heart, poisoning their psychic body politic from within. Like the virus of evil insinuating itself into the soul in incremental, un-noticed steps, at a certain point this leukemia of the soul becomes irreversible, inevitably leading to its host’s destruction.

The wetiko virus’s pathogenic effects within an individual are a microcosmic fractal iteration of the collective, macrocosmic dynamics of the disease; how wetiko works within each of us is synchronistically mirrored with stunning perfection in how it is playing out throughout the greater body politic.

Unchecked by a psychic vaccine, the disease, like an addiction running rampant, is progressive and is thus getting worse over time. Forbes writes, “The wetikos destroyed Egypt and Babylon and Athens and Rome

and Tenochtitlan and perhaps now they will destroy the entire earth. But neither the junkie looking for money for a shot of heroin nor the capitalists destroying Amazonian forests for big profits are able to stop their own destructive behavior.” Wetikos can’t help themselves. Suffering from a compulsion to destroy, if left to themselves they are unable to stop their suicidal behavior. Having lost their internal freedom, they are singularly lacking in options.

Having mesmerized themselves, wetikos have, ultimately speaking, become their own victim. Running like a tape that loops back into itself in endless iterations, their self-hypnosis is dedicated to forever forestalling the prospect of the gnawing anxiety of confronting and dealing with the insanity of what they are doing, both to themselves and others. Like the subject of a master hypnotist, their attention becomes attenuated, narrowed and constricted to their limited and particularized viewpoint. After a certain point, wetiko disease becomes so completely internalized that the person so afflicted, as if compulsively repeating their initial moment of trauma, moment by moment recreates their own psychosis without any external stimulus at all. Having unconsciously identified with the aggressor, they become their own perpetrator, police state and control system. Their

pathological inner state in-forms their actions in the outer world, which becomes the channel through which their ravaged inner landscape plays itself out and takes on embodied form.

An inner sickness of the soul, wetiko is unique in that it is a boundary-dissolving disease, collapsing the distinction between the inner and the outer, between dreaming and waking. Wetiko nonlocally materializes itself in, as and through the medium of the outside world, which becomes the canvas for its full-bodied revelation of itself. Wetiko nonlocally in-forms, gives shape to and configures events in the world so as to synchronistically express itself, which is to say that just like in a dream, events in the outer world are symbolically expressing an inner, psychological situation. Wetiko can only be seen, when we snap out of our literal way of interpreting our experiences and start seeing with symbolically informed awareness. At the same time, wetiko itself can become the impetus for expanding our consciousness and recognizing that the world itself is a continually unfolding, living revelation of itself that is speaking symbolically, which is the language of dreams.

“THE CULT(URE) OF MADNESS” People have to be cured of their spiritual sickness before they can build a just society. Forbes says, “to adjust to a wetiko society is to become insane.” It is no great accomplishment to adapt to and be considered sane in and by an insane society. The culture of wetiko promotes the systematic destruction of the human heart, which when fully internalized, alienates us from everything in ourselves, save what reproduces the conditions of the system. Adopting the values of our oppressors, however, insures the continuation of our own dehumanization. The system is set up to be a set up such that, to quote Forbes, “a person oppressed by wetikos adopts the values of wetikos as he rises in position. The wetikos taught him well, but they taught him falsely.” Big Wetikos learn to exploit every situation to their advantage and sacrifice in themselves everything that doesn’t advance this motive. To become a “Big Wetiko,” Forbes comments, “requires

a lot of back-scratching, back-stabbing, drinking, and maneuvering. It also requires the corruption of other young men (and women), who in turn, will become hooked into the system.” Speaking about how “very, very easy” it is to become a wetiko in our society because of all of the perks and incentives, Forbes writes, “they do get promoted, they do get better salaries, and they do get testimonials (and a gold watch) when they ‘retire.’” Because of all of the benefits of the role, there is not merely a passive disinterest, but rather, an active resistance and counter-incentive for wetikos to self-reflect, a contraction that simply feeds their compulsion and further reinforces their addiction to power.

Forbes writes, “the wetiko disease has so corrupted European thinking (at least of the ruling groups) that wetiko behavior and wetiko goals are regarded as the very fabric of European evolution… if we continue to allow the wetikos to define reality in their insane way, we will never be able to resist or curtail the disease.” It should be noted that indigenous people are not free from the wetiko virus as well. There are indigenous cultures that are governed by wisdom, but there are also indigenous cultures that are ruled by wetiko. We should be careful to not romanticize and idealize indigenous, aboriginal cultures as opposed to European cultures, which would be too simplistic, and dualistic of a view. When wetikos possess power in any culture, or more accurately, when power possesses them, they are in a position to influence, define and create a certain level of reality that, though based on falsehood, operates as if it is real. In words that would be just as relevant with regards to the current Obama administration, author Ron Suskind quotes a neocon in the previous Bush administration as saying, “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality ─ judiciously, as you will ─ we’ll act again, creating other new realities.” If left in positions of power, wetikos will ultimately become and dream up into full-bodied materialization their own, as well as our, worst nightmare into reality.

Evil can take many forms – political, social, economic,

militaristic, and psychological. Forbes says, “predation can lurk under many guises, such as ‘patriotism,’ profit-seeking, ‘protecting our way of life,’ and ‘investment returns.’” Many “isms” themselves are simply thought-forms used by wetikos themselves to justify their rape, criminality, murder and evil.

Wrapping their cause in the mantle of goodness allows Big Wetikos, who are in fact full-fledged predators, to sleep at night, seemingly guilt-free. In a form of self-entrancement, they have so thoroughly convinced themselves of the rightness of their actions that they rarely, if ever, have any ethical qualms about what they are doing. Where the evil of wetiko is endemic, there tends to be an ethical, developmental arrest in both individuals and throughout the society.

Full-blown, big Wetikos are morally insane, and abuse power simply because they can. This is why, to quote Forbes, “the development of rigid patriarchy follows the wetiko disease.” In other words, cultures dominated by wetikos tend to organize themselves

around the calcified, archetypal mythic pattern of the negative patriarchy, which, simply put, is based on domination over others. To quote Forbes, “’Might makes right’ is the wetiko belief, but it is often accompanied by self-serving doctrines of ‘divine will,’ ‘manifest destiny,’ ‘providence,’ ‘the march of civilization,’ ‘doing God’s work,’ ‘stopping communism,’ or comparable slogans.” These slogans are the mantras, or words of power, by which the collective spell of group-think is disseminated throughout the collective psyche. Any rationalization will do, as long as it serves as cover for the wetikos to continue to exploit others, centralize power and feed their sickness.

INTERCONNECTED ROLES IN A NONLOCAL FIELD

Speaking about how our species has never been able to get a handle on what is at the root of our self-destructive behavior, Forbes comments, “Unfortunately, most of these efforts have failed because they have never diagnosed the wetiko as an insane person whose disease is extremely contagious.

Nor have they, generally, understood that the [seemingly] non-wetikos, whether flunkies, pimps, or the most oppressed, are often ‘secret carriers’ of the disease.” The wetiko virus can only thrive in the global human family if, just like in any family system, each member enables and is complicit in the abuse.

Being a field phenomenon, wetiko incarnates by em-bodying itself through various interconnected, form-fitted roles arising in the field, all at different stages of the disease. Each of these figures is a representation of the multiple faces of the underlying pathogen. Wetikos can be hard to recognize because the people who are its instruments seem like normal, well-intentioned, innocent looking people, and yet, it is these seemingly regular people, just like you and me, who often become the “secret carriers” of the disease. To the extent that we are not aware of this insidious, nonlocal, psychological disease, both in others and potentially within ourselves, we can very easily become its “secret carriers,” its unwitting accomplices.

Forbes writes, “But this we must emphasize over and over, that the whole wetiko disease is not limited to the brutes and goons who handle the gun, the lash or the instruments of torture. The nice people in the offices, the typists, the lab technicians, the clerks and, of course, the owners, directors, stockholders, senators, generals and presidents who use, profit from, and feed on human exploitation are also cannibals to one degree or another.” The Big wetikos could never get away with the murder that they do without “the nice people in the offices” enabling them. These typists, lab technicians and clerks are just “following orders,” and yet, are complicit in the insidious evil that is being spread throughout the world with their co-operation. Modern, corporate, technological systems are set up to distance us, both physically and psychologically, between what we do for a living and the ultimate, potentially destructive consequences of our actions. Even the nice people in

the offices, people just like you and me, to the extent that we are not aware of how we are feeding, and being fed by, the wetiko virus, are tiny cogs in the great predatory machine, complicit in the impersonal evil of the faceless system and in the destruction it wreaks upon all life.

Wetiko is an entity that becomes co-dependently entangled and inextricably coupled with others in its environment in order to survive. It serves us to differentiate the interdependent roles in the field that conspire (which literally means to “breathe together”) to create and sustain the wetiko disease.

All of these figures collaboratively enable the bug of wetiko to play out its reign of “(t)error.” Forbes writes, “The most guilty of the wetikos are, I would think, those who mastermind, justify and profit most from such systems. Such persons are the ‘master predators.” The full-blown, Big Wetikos, the “master predators” in positions of power, can be suave and sophisticated, with refined tastes, highly intelligent, educated people, with offices in places like New York and London, and can be highly respected by society, all of which makes their malady hard to recognize.

Others are cast in the role of protecting the abuser, the master predator’s handlers, minions, sycophants, enablers, supporters and followers, while others are complicit by simply remaining silent and looking away.

Some pick up the role of feeling powerless, thinking, “what’s the use?” Some politically active sorts can pick up the role of attempting to fight the disease in a way that simply strengthens the diabolical polarization in the field, which just feeds and is the signature of the disease itself. Whatever the role, it’s all just one of multiple guises wearing the same underlying uniform.

All wetikos, including the Big Wetikos, are themselves just pawns in the hand of the underlying archetype itself, however. It is like when Toto, in The Wizard of Oz pulls away the curtain, but instead of their being a man behind the curtain, there is no one there but the formless archetype itself. If the master predators are removed from their positions of power, but if the underlying system which spawned them remains in place and not dealt with, over time others will simply

pick up their vacant, and vacuous roles. These powermad roles exist as potentials in the field waiting to be filled, fleshed-out and incarnated, as these roles are an expression of the full spectrum of possibilities implicit in the underlying field, reflecting, as it always does, this same range of potentials within ourselves.

The nonlocal field is seamless, and the roles do not, and cannot, exist in isolation, but rather, in co-relation to each other, as well to the whole field itself, in an interconnected web of infinite relatedness.

In the culture of wetiko, people at various stages of the disease pick up seemingly different and separate roles from each other, but when the deeper, underlying pattern comes into focus and is seen, it can be recognized that all of these inter-locking roles fit together like a higher-order mosaic. This process couldn’t play itself out without all of its parts reciprocally co-arising relative to each other. The whole field, with all its myriad, fluid and unfixed roles ─ each of us at various moments in time picking up the different roles ─ are mutually conditioning each other in a seamless, interpenetrating net of relations, as if appendages of a higher-dimensional organism that is revealing itself through our nonlinearly orchestrated and coordinated interplay.

It is important to see the whole system, rather than only fixating on, and demonizing, one of its parts as separate from the whole. Focusing on an individual person is analogous to contemplating one finger on a glove without recognizing the underlying hand informing and animating all of the interconnected, and fundamentally inseparable fingers in the glove. To concretize a localized manifestation of the pathology in an individual would be analogous to only seeing the circle that a three-dimensional sphere makes as it passes through a two-dimensional plane. The circle is a lower-level reflection of a higher-dimensional entity (the sphere of wetiko’s influence), just as the person taken over by the wetiko bug is a surface expression of a deeper, more fundamental pathogen that pervades the underlying field. To use another example, the person momentarily afflicted with wetiko is like a shadow on a wall ─ cast from a globe hanging from the ceiling ─ relative to the globe. The shadow on

the wall is a re-presentation and projection of the higher, three-dimensional entity of the globe into a lower dimension of space. Studying the shadow within its proper context relative to the globe is the way of understanding the object casting the shadow (the higher-dimensional entity of the global wetiko psychosis). In these examples, the point is not to focus on the personal manifestation of the disease, but rather, to see the deeper, nonlocal field that is giving shape to, in-forming and pervading the particular, localized outbreaks of the disease in the greater body politic. Seeing, in Jung’s words, “the numinous character of the reality in the background,” is the very expansion of consciousness that becomes the doorway connecting us to a deeper part of ourselves, as well as to each other. Recognizing the underlying field paves the road to healing.

A long-time practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism, Paul Levy has intimately studied with some of the greatest masters from Tibet and Burma and serves as the coordinator of a Buddhist center in Portland, Oregon.

Deeply steeped in and inspired by the work of C. G. Jung, he is an innovator in the field of dreaming (both night dreams as well as waking dreams). He has had innumerable articles published on consciousness, dreaming and spirituality, and has lectured about his work at various universities.

Paul is also the founder of the “Awakening in the Dream Community,” a group of people who mutually help each other to wake up to the dreamlike nature of the universe. His work is the inspiration for the “Awakening in the Dream Center,” a psycho-spiritual healing center in Mexico. As visionary artist, he helps create an “Art-Happening Called Global Awakening,” a work of living art in which we, as a species, collaboratively help each other to become lucid in the dream of life.

Paul has developed a unique and creative vehicle to introduce people to the dream-like nature of reality that he calls “The Dreaming Up Process,” which is based on the realization that the same dreaming mind that dreams our dreams at night is dreaming our life.

He teaches this dreaming up process in “Awakening in the Dream Groups” where people who are awakening to the dream-like nature of reality come together and collaboratively help each other to wake up in the dream together.

Paul is also a visionary artist and a spiritually-informed political activist. He is the author of The Madness of George Bush: A Reflection of Our Collective Psychosis.

Feel free to pass this article along to a friend if you feel so inspired. Please visit Paul’s website www.awakeninthedream.com.

You can contact him at paul@awakeninthedream.com

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