Which came first, Spirit or Matter?

I am in awe of how precious each of us are and the unique contributions each of us brings to the banquet table. How delicious. My cousin Mark, so full of integrity and responsibility as he struggles to make his business thrive in the midst of many a shark who would eat him alive. Kelly, an old lover, in spite of the fact I withdrew six years ago like a typical male offers to clean my teeth for free. In some ways I feel so unworthy of these miraculous blessings and people. We all carry such amazing grace and such stark disjunctions. I am very curious about these We spaces, the places where we touch and exchange energies. Sex and Space. Sex with a capital S. Union, touch, exchange, penetrating, receiving............ at every level of our beings.......Genital sex being only a metaphor for deeper levels of interaction at every chakra . Saniel calls this "Whole-Being Currency Exchange". It's interesting that today I've been receiving pulses of energy right at my root chakra up my spine. I have been out of balance here for nearly my whole life and I finally feel as if there is a deep healing occurring. The kundalini opened at the heart and crown for me before it moved down. As I write these words there are study waves of energy pulsing at the base and my soles and palms are very hot. Saniel spoke about how each chakra or plexus in the body has a domain or field of exchange and each can also have both a positive and negative expression. Wow, I suddenly became aware of my physical heart beating. I've never felt it quite like that before on the left of my chest. I've experienced the infinitesimal point on the right which is the seat of consciousness but never the actual physical heart as the seat of matter. I am humbled.

I dreamt last night of traveling in underground caverns of running water and the also of Ken Wilber, where we were good friends and drove around in a volkswagon beetle and were up to some sort of mischief.

I listened to the new Integral Naked talk between Andrew Cohen and Ken Wilber on Immortality and found it very interesting. What's interesting is how my crown just became more intensified as I wrote that....... Andrew spoke of the God-Impulse and its ceaseless drive to move forward and how he would get people in his seminars to get how God feels. I wondered, how does Matter feel???? 3000 or more years of dissociation and attempt to get away from Her or penetrate Her. Which came first Saniel asked "Spirit or Matter?" Check your gut response. Explore the perennial philosophy and you get a certain story. I am more in line with the theory that matter is not the lowest rung in the spectrum of consciousness but the outward manifestation of spirit at every level. See A Comprehensive Theory of Subtle Energies by Ken Wilber. I loved how Ken talked about Christ as deep Tantric Archetype ( Is it any wonder there is so much emerging about Mary Magdalene in the world collective consciousness today?) as a symbol for the suffering, awakened one. Oh how I love Jesus. I weep.

It's time for us to become embodied Bodhisattvas. To take the vow to be BOTH nirvana and samsara, to not withdraw from either of those. What is the real Non-Dual? Fucking disaccociated pricks, Wake Down! Love Her. Our beautiful Lilith of the Zohar.



Here's a plug for Healing the Spirit/Matter Split

G'Night......mmmmmmwwwwwahhhhhhhh

The Force of Destiny part. 2

I am dumbstruck by the shear immensity of what it means to be a divinely human being living in the 21st Century. I am humbled by what I see and aspire to live up to these deep intimations. I feel as if I carry within me the entire history of human kind and I marvel at the complexity and immensity of what that means. It's really time to show up. We are not here to get out of here. We are here to fully be here. As Carl Jung states in An Answer to Job, "It is not us who are seeking to become God, but it is God who is seeking to become Us." As Uncle Ben said to Peter, "With great power comes great responsibility." We must claim our birthright and then act in accordance with what that means. From Cosmos and Psyche "These ongoing archetypal developments affect all of us....some obviously more dramatic than others, but everyone is in some way carrying the whole within them."

In Vajrayana or Tibetan Buddhism it is often talked about that the five emotional poisons of anger, pride, jealousy, ignorance, & lust when transmuted by conscious awareness at their deepest essence are the five wisdoms of clarity, equanimity, unobstructed action, non-conceptual mind, and discernment. Read Kuntungzango's Prayer for an empowerment of this realization.

Saniel talked today about smokescreens and how our deepest wounds and disaccociated patterns when we awaken and they are brought into conscious awareness are transformed and become the very key to our greatest gifts. Self-Sabotage is transmuted into Other-Empowerment. This I see as my gift to humanity. May we become truly Selfish as we deeply understand what really is the Self.

The Force of Destiny

I just returned from the first day of the Force of Destiny Retreat with Saniel and Linda. It was quite a large group, about 25 I think. I definetly feel "activated", perhaps in ways that I wouldn't have predicted. There is a deeper sinking into my body, especially the Hara . There is so much I want to convey and yet my energy is a little low and I want to curl up and sleep. My entire Brain is buzzing although buzzing may not be the proper word for it. I can actually feel waves of energy and pressure moving about inside of the Brain as I relax and let the Shakti move about of its own accord. This is nothing new to me as these experiences have been occuring for about two and a half years now. I am thinking of Sri Aurobindo's autobiography and the things he went through. It makes me want to revist cognitive science especially brain anatomy and look at all the scientific data and external mapping we have and compare that to my own subjective experiences of the energies that move around in my brain. If you read my short autbio ( by the way I apologise for not making it clearer with links and such, I will go back and work on that at some point), you would know I spent a few years deeply studying accelerated learning technologies and in particular cognitive science. I want to look into it again and compare that to these kundalini experiences. As I write this I'm having these intimations of artificial intelligences combing the collective data of the web, learning, and so as much as this may bore a lot of you somehow I hope it can serve our unfolding (It's Unfolding). See The Age of Spiritual Machines. Check out and explore The Secret Life of the Brain
Enough for tonight...

Upcoming Astrology Transits

Last summer I read a book called The Passion of the Western Mind by Richard Tarnas which I really loved and had been anxiously awaiting the release of Cosmos and Psyche : Intimations of a New World View . I picked up the book a couple of weeks ago. I thought the book would pick up where the Passion left off. I expected him to continue and give us his insight into emerging worldviews. This is one of my deep interests from studying the work of Ken Wilber and also Spiral Dynamics. I had no idea it would be about astrology! I am about halfway though and find the book absolutely fascinating. I wonder why he never mentions Wilber in any of his writings? I think it has something to do with the ongoing tension between CIIS/Spiral Dynamics with Chris Cowen and Ken and I-I. This is the very juxtaposition I speak of in relation to Saniel and Andrew, seemingly at odds. I know Ken and Andrew have their differences ( I should hope so!) and it all seems to me good and healthy but I do know there are those on both sides of the issue that have philosophical differences and approaches. I am fascinated by these dynamics and am excited to explore the deeper dimensions of our collective emerging consciousness. Anyhow, I've taken up a study of Astrology ( I know Ken feels there doesn't seem to be any evidence supporting a predictive astrological theory) and have found it to be deeply mind opening. Being involved intensely with Vajrayana, I feel particularly interested in Archtypal energies and such. I work shamanicly with animal and land energies and can only imagine that the stars and planets are related energetically as well. I mean, I can feel it in my body(Body). I am a scientist and a skeptic as well and as yet can't explain these phenomena from a rational perspective but I intuit the deepness and richness of the Kosmos. "There are more things on Heaven and Earth then dreamt in your philosophy, Horatio." I believe we are beginning to re-integrate the Deep Feminine and coming into an understanding of patterns, cycles, and our embededness. At the same time we are also that divine Impersonal Witness who Andrew Cohen seems to be a human incarnate of. Integration! How Blessed! I've just given voice to these Kosmic polarities, Masculine and Feminine. From my studies of Wilber, Gebser, Aurobindo & the like and my immersion in the practices of the traditions and the Waking Down in Mutuality Work I feel something is emerging in my consciousness attempting the bring a full Tantric embrace of the seeming contradicting streams.

So....I'm going to write some of my personal astrology explorations here. I am examining transits in particular which are where the various planets are in relation to my personal birth chart. What I find fascinating is how we relate to our external world. Let me explain what Gebser would call

The Magic structure of consciousness (taken from An Overview of the Work of Jean Gebser )


Around some unspecified time far back in our past, a change took place. Man entered into a second phase of development and gained a new structure of consciousness, the Magical structure. This structure is characterized by five primary characteristics: (1) its egolessness, (2) its spacelessness and timelessness, (3) its pointlike-unitary world, (4) its interweaving with nature, and (5) its magical reaction to the world.[9] A rudimentary self- sense was emerging and language is the real product of this change. Words as vehicles of power are typical of this time and structure; incantations as precursors to prayer emerged. Consciousness, in this phase, is characterized by man's intimate association with nature.

This is perhaps the most notable characteristic regarding this structure. Man, at this time, does not really distinguish himself apart from nature. He is a part of all that surrounds him; in the earliest stages it is hard to conceive that he views himself apart from his environment. The plants, animals and other elements of his surroundings share the same fate as he does; they experience in a similar manner. Latency is still dominant; little is transparent. Magic we can define in agreement with Gustav Meyrink as doing without knowing,[10] and it is magic man who is engaged in this activity in all aspects of his existence. The hunting and gathering, the quest for survival are all activities that consume most of his waking hours. But in the quiet of the evening around the fire; there is time for reflection of sorts. The activities of the day were codified (in speech) and recounted. Memory was collective, tribal, and all things were shared and experienced by all. The "I" is not a factor; the "we" is dominant.

This is a one-dimensional, pre-perspectival, point-like existence that occurs in a dream- like state. Unlike the dreamlessness of the previous structure, a recognition is developing in man that he is something different from that around him. Not fully awake to who he is or what his role in the world is, man is recognizing his self as an entity. The forms of expression for this structure can be found in the art and other artifacts that have been recovered from this time. Graven images and idols are what first come to mind. However, ritual should also be considered here, for it is in the specific and directed execution of certain actions and gestures that conveys much about this consciousness structure. Feuerstein feels that this structure persisted till around 40,000 BC and the advent of the Cro-Magnons.

Tarnas talks about transits ( Taken from URL An Introduction to Astrological Analysis )

The study of transits is especially valuable because it allows us to get a sense for the timing of the planetary archetypes in our lives. Perhaps of all areas of astrology, it is the study of transits that produces the most compelling evidence for the power of the astrological perspective, and its immense pragmatic value. The principle of transits rests on the fact that as the planets continue moving after a person’s birth, they move into and out of aspect in relation to the natal planetary positions. Thus when any planet's present position in the sky forms an aspect to a point that was occupied by any planet at the time of one’s birth (for example Uranus now in the sky forming a conjunction to Venus in the natal chart), then during the period in which that particular aspect is in range one would tend to have experiences that correlate with the planets and aspect involved (in this example, a two-or-three year period in which one would tend to experience the awakening of new love, the stimulation of one's artistic creativity or aesthetic responsiveness to life, a certain restlessness and unpredictability in one's relationships, and so forth).

While the birth chart in itself is a portrait of one’s life and character as a whole, transits to the birth chart reflect the dynamic unfolding of one’s life and character in terms of specific events and experiences. Transits activate the potential that is inherent in the birth chart.

So anyway I'm reading that Mercury is beginning to be in a square relationship to my Moon. Again from Tarnas.....

Mercury represents the principle of mind, thinking, and the movement or exchange of ideas through speaking, writing, and other forms of communication. It governs the capacity to conceptualize and communicate, to articulate, to use words and language, to analyze and comprehend, to learn, to perceive, to mediate, transport, and connect. The Mercury archetype is associated with the Greek mythic figure of Hermes, the Roman Mercury, the messenger of the gods. A major aspect between Mercury and another planet tends to correlate with how one’s mental and neural processes tend to work, how one gives and receives information, and the nature of one’s education and intellectual vision.

The Moon corresponds to how one feels about oneself even before one thinks about oneself--as well as how one tends to relate spontaneously to others and to life's various situations. Like the ever-shifting cycles and phases of the Moon, the lunar part of the psyche, associated with one's moods and feelings, tends to be changeable and fluctuating in character, though on another level its deeply imprinted patterns are very enduring. The Moon concerns one’s immediate psychosomatic mode of response to life that begins in one's earliest years, that is partly a matter of inheritance, and partly forged in one’s early interactions with the world--especially with one’s mother and other mother-figures, one’s family (siblings, father) and one’s early home environment in general. It governs one's sense of belonging (or not), how one tends to nurture and be nurtured, and is associated with both the maternal instinct and the needs and instincts of infancy and childhood. In later life, the Moon reflects the nature of all one's intimate relationships, familial and otherwise, as well as one's home life. In mythic terms, the Moon is associated with certain aspects of the Great Mother goddess, and is yin in nature.

Again, as with the Sun, if any major aspect is formed between the Moon and another planet in one’s birth chart, this second planetary archetype will tend to be especially significant in one’s life. But in this case that second archetype will tend to channel itself through those parts of one’s life governed by the Moon: one’s emotions and moods, one’s infancy and childhood, one’s mother and early familial environment, one’s intimate relationships and domestic life, and so forth. Also, in both women's and men's charts, the Moon tends to reflect significant female figures in a person’s life.

So I can interpret this to mean that the archetypal energy of Mercury is influencing in the part of me associated to the Moon, i.e. the feminine, emotional, psychosomatic aspects of my persona. Perhaps this will indicate an interface between mind and emotions and an deeper ability to understand and communicate my emotions. It's to last through the middle of April. I'll have to let you know.

Personal History

I've decided to post my very rough autobio.... It's very honest and a little scarry to put it out there like this but somehow I feel it is part of why I am here to let myself be known. Tomarrow I am attending an event with Saniel Bonder and Linda Groves-Bonder called the Force of Destiny.
I am currently working on their marketing team. The following weekend I hope to attend the retreat with Andrew Cohen at Ions.

What's interesting is their respective juxtopositions within me. As I write this I am having extremly intense energies running throughout my brain, maybe haveing to do with the fact I just got off a conference call with Saniel, Linda and other destiny attenders of tomarrow. See Andrew's recent blog More on this later......

A Short History of V. John Baker


I was born on March 21st, 1972 at 7:03am in Redwood City, California during the end of the Uranus-Pluto conjunction. For the astrologically inclined that makes me an Aries with Aries rising. I am born on the cusp, three minutes into the very beginning of the Zodiac. I am also born in the year of the Rat, which is the sign that begins the Chinese Zodiac. I think that’s kind of cool to be born on the very edge of the beginning and end. My mom told me that I was a rambunctious little kid who crawled around in everything. When I was six months old, I crawled out of my crib and fell into my diaper bucket. I nearly suffocated in my own shit.
My parents were both brilliant socialites. According to my half-sister Lisa, ten years my senior, they were the life of every party and consumed copious amounts of substances. My parents were divorced when I was a year old. My sister tells me she took care of me most of the time and I was constantly getting into everything. My mom wanted to give me up for adoption, but my aunt and uncle on my dad’s side took me in and raised me until the age of three. I finally crawled out of my crib at age two.
My aunt and uncle are good people and I am blessed to have had that time with them and have a few memories of happy times. I broke my collar bone at age two & remember splitting my head on the fire place as well. The circular movement from dark to light and back became a major theme for my life. I was told that I was to be adopted by them, but, my dad got married to what would turn out to be the wicked step-mother and he decided to take me away from my Aunt & Uncle.
Kathy, the wicked step-mom, abused me both physically and psychologically while my dad was mostly not around. I remember spending most of my time alone outside with my toys and my beautiful self-created fantasy world.
I loved going to Grandma and Grandpa Baker’s house. My grandmother was a school-teacher from Nebraska who taught grades K-8 in a rural town and played piano in the silent movies. She taught me all kinds of things and I fell in love with learning at an early age. Her first child, a boy, died three days after he was born. I believe this had a profound affect on the way she raised my father. She had three other children, two girls and a boy, my father, the youngest. My Aunt Barbara died the year I was born. My cousin Johnny was her son and four years my senior. He used to teach me to draw and is now an amazing guitarist. My grandfather was a great salesman with a big heart and used to play cars and Star Wars with me all the time. I have fond memories of my grandparents.
Dad, Kathy and I moved to Missouri before my half-brother Jason was born in 1976. I remember a lot of dreams I had from ages four on. They were filled with vampires and ghosts. I remember seeing glowing green skeletons in my closet and had dreams of female vampires that I was afraid of but I also wanted desperately for them to bite me. I would always go explore everywhere on my own and loved to crawl down in sewers, on top of roofs, and out in the wide wilderness. We moved back to California in 1977. I got stuck inside of a chimney I tried to go down at age five. The fire department had to cut a hole in the damper and I made the front page of the Napa Register.
Kathy loved Jason and hated me it seemed. The abuse from Kathy continued and I remember hitting my brother once when I was five and he was one. I felt so horrible when he cried that I never hit him again. I absolutely loved Kindergarten and couldn’t wait to go everyday. We moved a lot and I went to three different Kindergartens and two different first grades. I contemplated suicide and told my Dad I was going to run into the street to get run over. I started going to therapy at age five.
In 1978 Kathy and Dad split up, Kathy taking Jason back to Missouri. I lived with my Dad, but he was mostly not around so I would take care of myself most all the time, going to Catholic School in the first grade.
He got together with another lady, Reba. They had Reba’s daughter who was eleven watch me but she would try to get me in trouble by planting pictures that said “I hate Reba” in my room and then I would get spanked for lying that I didn’t do it. After a number of these incidents I burned her Barbie dolls and started stealing since I was a bad kid anyway.
They split because of me my Dad said and then I moved in with my grandparents while my Dad partied and worked and I saw him at times. My grandparents went to church and so did I. That’s when I fell in love with Jesus. I wanted to be Jesus. I felt so guilty though. I was stealing from stores around that time and getting into mischief. I remember Grandma telling me that Jesus would only forgive me so many times and I tried hard to be good but then I would mess up again. I prayed every night for forgiveness and was afraid I would go to Hell. I remember blessing everybody every night even Kathy who I wanted to love me.
I was given a kitten named Sandy that I loved. One day I swung Sandy around by her tail and beat her on the ground. Nobody ever found out but she was hurt really bad and I cried and cried. Since that day I only hurt one more creature, besides the occasional bug (I shot a bird with a BB gun when I was thirteen and held it in my hands as it died and I cried for hours). Today, I can’t even swat a mosquito.
Around this time I have the first memory of my real mom, Bonnie. I would go to visit her for a few weeks in Santa Rosa throughout the year. She lived on a big ranch and had several houses. I met my half sister Lisa, who was 19, and my cousins Mark and Kim who were my age and I loved to play with them. Mark and I are still close.
In 1980 my Dad bought a house in Napa and I went to live with him. He worked a lot and I was alone most of the time with a key to the house. I had some new friends that would play games and stuff. I had a baby sitter sometimes when my Dad was gone overnight. That same year Kathy and Jason moved back from Missouri and they were remarried.
I did pretty well in school, especially in math, due to my grandmother doing flash cards with me all the time. I fell in love with reading and writing in the 2nd grade. I started reading incessantly around this time. Dracula, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the Littles, The Hobbit, Choose your Own Adventure, and then all kinds of Fantasy and Science Fiction. I also started playing Dungeons and Dragons and reading comic books. I would spend all of my free time in the library and book stores. I stole a lot of books and toys at the time as well. I also got an Atari 2600 and played a lot of video games. I especially remember the writings of Roger Zelazny. I also wrote a lot of fantasy stories.
I remember when the library got a computer and my friend had an Apple 2C. I started going to Christian school in the 4th grade and played computer games at the library. Socially I was cool with the boys and was average in sports but, I was really intimidated by the girls. I always had crushes on these girls but I was so shy and really needy when I would be around them.
I did well in school but got into trouble after school. I would steal money from my parents and stole a lot of things from stores. My brother and I got along well and I loved him very much but, I was really jealous of all of the attention Kathy gave him. I would of course receive the occasional beating. After I got my brother in trouble for stealing toys with me, the beatings got a lot worse.
In sixth grade I went to Catholic school since Kathy was Catholic and Jason went there as well. I really loved going to Mass and also the Baptist church with my Grandparents. It was at this time that I asked Jesus into my heart as my personal Savior. I tried really hard to be good and do the right things. I was so incredibly lonely and would pray a lot. It was this year that my Aunt & Uncle got me an IBM PCjr and I started to learn Basic and go onto BBS’s with my 300 baud modem.
One day, after a particularly intense beating I ran away to my mom’s house. It was during this time that my Dad and Kathy finalized a second divorce. While staying with my Mom I was enrolled in another Christian school. My mom was rarely around but when she was she was mean and demanding. She was a heavy drinker and it was during this time that I experimented with alcohol and cigarettes. It wasn’t long, six months, before my Mom said she couldn’t take care of me any more.
I went to live with my grandparents at this time. I switched schools again, but after a few months my Dad took me out of the Christian school when I got in trouble. Amazing enough through all of this I still did well in school and really loved to learn. In public school I did well and spent a lot of time on the computer. I had a few friends who were trouble makers and we used to skate board, steal stuff, and smoke marijuana.
I moved around so much that I never had much chance to get to know girls. It was during this time that my sex drive became very powerful. My dad used to hide magazines under his bed that I would look at and my Mom also had a collection as well. Neither of my parents said anything about sex so I learned from the magazines and in school a little.
My Grandfather died of colon cancer after about 6 months in and out of the hospital. That was 1985 and I moved once again to stay with my Mom when Grandpa fell ill. Again, my Mom was rarely around and when she would come back from her trips she was always upset about something I did or didn’t do. After a few months my Mom had had enough of me and so I went to live with my Dad and Grandma.
This was also my first year in High School. I did pretty well in school and then after school would go play computers, read or steal. That summer I got to go to a Seventh Day Adventist camp with my cousins. After camp I vowed that I would be good and try really hard. I prayed that God would take care of me.
That prayer would be answered in a way that I could not have predicted. My Dad had a party one night and I was really sad and lonely. I snuck into the kitchen and stole some of the pina coladas they were making. Then I went to wander around in the woods behind the house at night. I came to a neighbor’s house and decided it might be exciting to break into their house. I had a flashlight and I tried to open a window. Someone saw me and called the police. As it turned out going to Juvenile Hall was the best thing that could have happened to me.
My Dad came to get me but I refused to go home. They had me take some psychological tests and I made up answers. After 45 days in Juvie, I became a ward of the court and they sent me to a “residential treatment center”. It was 1987 and I was 15. This event would dramatically alter my life.
The place was called Family Life Center and it was in Petaluma, California. For the first time in my life, I was surrounded by people who actually seemed to care for my welfare. There was structure and the rules were very strict. I remember thinking it would be really easy. In some ways it was, but in other ways it was the hardest thing I have ever done.
There were a total of 21 boys there, twelve of which lived on campus and another 9 that lived in satellite homes and came to school from 9-4pm M-F. Everyday we had what they called “circle” where we would all sit together and we would work on issues. Sharing, anger work, confronting underground issues, cradling, & bringing yourself up for a phase change were some of the things we did during circle.
Daily we had our rooms to keep clean and indoor and outdoor cleaning periods. I had to rake the gravel driveway everyday for about 10 months. That’s also how long it took me to go from phase two to three. Each phase carried it’s privileges and it’s responsibilities. We had to do so many guided visualizations and a certain number of additional work hours during your free time in addition to working on your issues and behaving in order to move up phases.
We had no contact with parents except once a month and we got to go home for Thanksgiving and Christmas but we couldn’t stay overnight. We were expected to introspect and examine ourselves. Each phase had three key concepts that we were to meditate upon. Each phase also had certain requirements such as certain numbers of guided meditations, work projects, circular breathings, art therapy, and wilderness trips. We also had regular school each day from 10-3pm.
When you first enter the program we wrap a string around an arrow and we are supposed to meditate upon the words communication, listening, and resolution. We also are to take responsibility for why we are there and make the major commitments of no drugs or alcohol, no sex, no violence, threats of violence, or destruction of property, and no running away.
Phase three was about self-image, personal history, and exploration. It took me ten months to get it and I lost it a few months later for watching a rated R movie, looking at pornography and keeping it secret for a few weeks. I was assigned a lot of work hours and then I ran away for an evening.
When I came back I was in huge trouble and it took four months of disciplined work and effort before becoming phase three again. This is when I got to move off campus into a satellite home with five other boys.
Our parents were really amazing people that to this day I credit for opening both my mind and heart. They were both working on MFCC’s; Scott was 30 and Rachel, 26. They were both vegetarian and followed the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda. I read Autobiography of a Yogi, a bunch of Richard Bach, & The Way of the Peaceful Warrior around this time.
One of the other staff members was a Buddhist and I fell in love with Cat Stevens who I found out had converted to Islam. I developed a profound appreciation for the spiritual quest and felt drawn to Scott’s stories of satoris and began to contemplate enlightenment at age sixteen. I took up meditation and subscribed to the Self-Realization lessons while attending events and meditations with Scott and Rachel. I also became a vegetarian.
I still had plenty of issues to work on, and with phase three I began to have monthly therapy with my parents and got to go home for a day per month. As far as school went I got straight A’s and I was proud of the fact I taught myself Algebra 1 and 2 since our teacher didn't know math very well.
Phase Four was about responsibility, integrity, and connectedness. I began to take on a leadership/mentor role for the newer students. Art therapy exploration was amazing, and we got to go on hiking trips off trail with outward-bound staff members.
The program used a lot of Native American symbolism and on our wilderness trips I did a vision quest, and a twenty-four hour solo. Back on campus we had a medicine wheel, got to visit on reservations, and had a shaman come. I was chosen to have him give me a healing. I also explored and discovered my personal totems and made lasting connections with Horse and Tiger.
In Phase Five, we began to transition towards leaving FLC. We went through a work-training program and I got a job a Mervyn’s Department Store. During this time I developed a crush on a girl that I was in work-study with. She was a student at the other coed FLC campus. The key words for Phase Five were Interdependence, Humility, and Appreciation.
I graduated in January 1990 from both the program and high school. I was the twenty-first person to ever graduate the program since 1977. Many years later, I found out that the school was developed by Tibetan Buddhist students. FLC helped me transition into work and attending Santa Rosa Junior College. I was 17 when I started college. I had decided to become a Physics major. I was fascinated by science and wanted to figure out how and why everything was. I figured Physics could answer most anything and I was determined to figure out a Grand Unified Field Theory.
I began Shotokan Karate, took piano, and got straight A’s in college. I was also very lonely at times and would go through periods of intense depression. I had my first sexual experience at age 18. She was a co-worker, had a boyfriend and a child, and generally speaking, was not a good situation. When I told her I was done with the relationship, she informed me she was pregnant. It turned out to be a lie, but that scarred me tremendously.
It was with Kashya that I had my second sexual encounter. She was the one I had a crush on in work-study. We became good friends and she became my roommate, but we were only sexual that one time.
For the next two years I studied and did well in school, but was terrible with my finances, was very impulsive, and racked up quite a lot of credit debt. I bought my first car, a 1965 Volvo 122S for $650, took an auto class at the JC, and taught myself how to drive a stick shift. I went to US Karate Nationals in Miami as a brown belt and maintained a 3.75 GPA. I managed to have quite a few girl “friends”, but I could never seem to get past the friend stage and was pretty shy about making any moves even when the girl was sleeping in my bed!
I had a couple of other jobs, one working with developmentally disabled kids and the other was as a line cook in a vegetarian restaurant. The summer of 1992 began another shift in my life. I was about to teach Karate for the summer, but I tore my ACL.
So, instead I got a sales job. In Junior High I used to buy candy and sell it at school for a profit and whenever there was a sales contest in school or cub scouts I would do very well. I turned out to be very good at selling Cutco knives.
I was number five in the region in personal sales for the summer and number ten for the year. I began to develop social skills and became an assistant manager in the fall of 92. I loved learning about sales and started listening to Anthony Robbins and reading a lot of “success” books. I also had an affair with my manager, Anita and then another girl, Agnes both of which were short.
I began to go through the management-training program and in the summer of ’93 I became a branch manager for Vector Marketing. I had just turned 21 and I moved to San Francisco to open an office in the financial district. That was a challenging summer. It was very lonely and although I was a great recruiter my reps did not do very well. I lost a lot of money and would go out dancing and drinking at night. I found that I was naturally a good dancer. I also had sex with a couple of prostitutes that summer.
After closing my office early I went up to help my friend run his office and I helped him do very well. That fall I put off school after I decided that I really wanted to succeed with management and wanted to train with the best district manager in the company, Brad Britton.
I thrived in Brad’s office and he was promoted in the spring. I became Brad’s sales manager for the next year and we kicked ass. The following year I became a district manager in Fresno where we broke recruiting records and I bought myself a BMW 735i.
I was young and reckless though with my finances. I would go out a lot and developed bad habits of pornography, gambling, and drinking. Periodically, I would go though intense depressions and would stop showing up for work until things would get bad, I would be broke and then I would start to work again. When I worked we did incredible as a team.
For the next six years I would oscillate between periods of intense work and success (3-6 months) and periods of depression and sabotage (3-6 months). I would also avoid relationships and run away or sabotage those, the longest lasting four months. I listened to and read just about every self-help and success book I could find, and went to Life and Wealth Mastery with Tony Robbins. When I was on, I would do everything right, eat well, exercise, and work. Then suddenly I would do a 180. Fortunately we did so much business when I was on that I managed to keep my job, but after six years I hadn’t saved a dime and had the worst credit of all time.
In 2000 I began to re-contemplate the spiritual. During those six years I read a lot of Deepak Chopra, Course in Miracles, and pop spirituality. In 2000 I tried Ecstasy, LSD, and mushrooms for the first time and went to a lot of raves. I read Conversations with God, How to Know God and similar books. During my times of deep depression, what would often bring me out would be a recognition that if others felt anything like the pain I felt then I needed to be here and help in some way.
In April of 2001 after reading the Tao de Ching, Siddhartha, and the Kabbalah, I got in my car, left all of my possessions, left my phone, left no message for anyone and started driving. I was pretty depressed and thought I might drive off a cliff. The other thought I had was driving to Alaska and then catching a boat to Russia and hiking to China to get enlightened. I drove to Alaska.
I traveled all over Alaska for five months. I bought a tent and sleeping bag along the way and camped and hiked everywhere you could drive to. I started to read everything related to the spiritual quest, The History of God, a lot of Alan Watts, and lots more. I began to really want to know everything and began studying philosophy as well and intensely craving a “World Philosophy” that could make sense of all of these seeming contradictions. I haven’t mentioned this before but I have been journaling forever and so this process intensified.
Then I had an epiphany. I thought if I wanted to study and know everything then what better way then to study learning itself. I began to make a systematic study of learning and knowledge acquisition. Then I had another epiphany. What if I created a seminar on learning, that way I would really learn how to learn? I decided to learn and study everything as if someday I would teach and share it. This was my raison d’etre. This was my Daemon.
I moved to Hawaii after it started snowing in Alaska in the fall of 2001. It was in 2002 after breaking up from a very intense short relationship that I discovered Ken Wilber. I stayed in Border’s for months. I read everything he wrote and then just about every book he recommended.
I formalized an integral life practice at this time and began to visit every single spiritual master on the Island I could find from every tradition. I was on fire. I began psychotherapy, did my first 7-day sesshin, and actively sought out every authentic spiritual discipline I could find. I meditated every day, got intensely involved with the Jerrahi Order of Sufi’s and read countless books on everything, falling in love with Lex Hixon's writings.
Then I crashed into Vajrayana. It was rich, beautiful and intricate. And Padmasambahva was just the coolest person i'd ever heard of and I fell in love with the deep Tantric Archetype. I moved over to the Big Island to stay at a Buddhist temple and meet Sakya Trinzen. I went deeper and deeper, meeting and studying with one of Lex’s good friends Babaji Bob Kindler who was an Advaita master and moved close to Robert Aitkin, a Zen master, so I could I have dokusan everyday. In the course of two years I did 4-5 week long Zen sesshins, attended zikr weekly, met and had empowerments, teachings or retreats with 20 or more Vajrayana masters, did a 10 day vipassna retreat, a 5 day Advaita retreat, and 2 week long Dzogchen retreats with Lama Surya Das and Roger Walsh.
In addition, I did yoga, ITP, swimming, Tai Chi and read and listened to every integral thing I could get my hands on finding out that one of my former Vector managers from 1992, Barrett Brown was working with Integral Institute and began to really want to work with I-I. I did some volunteer work with I-I in the business & leadership domain helping Brett Thomas on some brief projects.
I began having kundalini experiences in 2003 that continue to intensify and I began having flashes of kensho culminating at the end of a Dzogchen retreat where during mantra practice, all pressures equalized and my self-sense expanded to fill everything. The experience lasted for a couple weeks where I knew I was in The Great Perfection.
Throughout this time I would occasionally slip into self-sabotage patterns. I feared I would always oscillate. I really wanted to have one spiritual master and friend that I could tell everything to but most of my teachers said I would have to just focus on one path and were at odds with Ken. I did want to follow Lama Surya Das, but he was too far away and never responded to the email I sent him.
It was in the fall of 2004 that I met Saniel Bonder. I saw an ad in What is Enlightenment? magazine and noticed Ken’s quote and ordered the free tape. I called the number and as it happened they were having a sitting the next day so I went. I bought all his books and few months later went to a Tantra of Trust retreat. Something went off. There was something very unique here and amazing.
When I got back to Hawaii, everything began to fall apart and all I can really say is that after and during a tumultuous 2005 I deeply arrived here……..
More to come

Evolutionary Odyssey

This is the begining of a journey into the Mysterious Unknown. May we relax our need for certainty while certainly moving one foot in front of the other. May we realize we are the Altruistic Intention. May Eros be our driving force toward new and deeper horizons and may Agape reach down to love the landscape and dimensions we have already transversed. May all beings come to know the secret transfigured integration of Spirit & Matter.

This blog is to be an interactive Matrix connecting one to an individual's search for growth, meaning, & deep love. Enjoy the ride.