February 14, 2021
I’m really horny right now and would prefer to jack off to porn but I’m going to write this instead. There’s not a lot of news to report. I meditated this morning and met up with my new guide, the silver elf, and we meditated. That was it. No trips to the Imaginal or any other fantastical voyages. Still, it felt good to have him there because his presence is so grounded and steady, he doesn’t appear to get distracted like I do. I have been feeling like my meditations are pretty consistently grounded but, after this morning’s experience, I see I have a ways to go to develop my concentration. It helps having a guide there in your field of awareness; his presence prompts me to return to meditation when I begin to wander.
I’m just guessing here but my sense is that our soul needs to develop a lot of capacity to remain grounded after the body dies. Being embodied is both a blessing and a curse; a blessing because it allows us the perfect opportunity to learn how to ground our experience - the body is the perfect vessel for grounding precisely because it is physical. On the other hand, life in the physical world is full of distraction, largely because of our physicality. We get cathected to our bodies so strongly and so captivated by the vicissitudes of the physical world that we lose touch with our soul. Most people don’t even realize they have one, much less spend the time getting acquainted with its capabilities. We fall asleep and waste our precious time here in the physical world. By the time we wake up to the fact of our sleeping, for most of us it’s too late. I don’t know what happens to a soul that hasn’t developed but my guess is that reincarnation is one possibility. Also, as I’ve seen, it’s possible that another entity will intervene and assist, guiding the soul on the path to enlightenment.
In any case, this all conjecture on my part. I’m just guessing here. I don’t even claim to know with certainty that there is life for the soul after the death of the physical body. I *think* there is but won’t know for sure until I die.
So, my new guide is helping me to develop will. I can feel it in my solar plexus, the traditional location of Essential Will. I can’t help but look for a pattern here but have to be clear that I don’t know anything at this point for sure. It seems like when I entered the Bardo with Griffin as my first guide, he helped me to ground my experience in the Imaginal/Bardo without getting carried away. He wasn’t perfect, of course, because he still has his own baggage and work to do. Still, he was good enough and, as I’m fond of pointing out, one of the lessons of the Imaginal is that True Nature doesn’t require perfection, just commitment and dedication and love of the truth.
This new guide’s focus is on developing my will and I can’t help but think this is a continuation of the process begun in the Bardo. Clearly, I need to develop will in order to develop concentration. I won’t always be able to rely on my body to ground my experience and need to learn how to do it now rather than waiting until I don’t have a body any longer.
Like I said, this is all just conjecture but developing my will and concentration certainly don’t seem like a waste of time!
***
I didn’t realize until I inquired with my friend, Alison, that one way to view my experiences is through the lens of Christianity without the superego. As we all know, Christianity has become so distorted and warped that it is more of a moral trope than an actual spiritual path. I understand that there are Christian mystics but have always thought of them squeezing blood out of a turnip. The religion seems dead to me or worse. More of a force for ill in the world than good. While I didn’t attend religious school and my church was pretty tepid, I still grew up swimming in the soup of Christianity because it pervades nearly every aspect of life in the U.S. And being gay hasn’t made me feel warm fuzzies toward the church, either. In short, I find pretty much everything about the religion repellant.
Nonetheless, as I look back over my experiences using the Christian lens, my travels through the Imaginal could be seen as entering the realm of purgatory where I encountered the souls of the dead who were stuck. Isn’t that basically what purgatory is supposed to be? Of course, there was no moralizing about this; the souls were stuck by their own delusions not out of punishment. Helping them to free themselves was an act of grace.
And then there was that business with meeting the fearsome gatekeeper who tested me. Again, there was no moralizing. Quite the opposite! She told me that True Nature (i.e., God) doesn’t demand perfection, only a commitment to and love of the Truth. She was fearsome, true, but she wasn’t threatening and I felt no fear of her. In fact, the whole experience was deeply touching and a celebration.
And what about now?
I told you already that I found myself in a dark place filled with demons and souls so twisted that they have pretty much forgotten who they are. These are the so-called evil doers, although again I didn’t perceive any moralizing and did not feel threatened or in danger. It was pretty gloomy place, sure, and it was full of despair. The malignancy of emanating from those poor, twisted souls was palpable. I would be naive if I didn’t acknowledge that people (and probably other beings, too) do horrible and cruel things to themselves and others. If they die without having come to terms with these crimes, they can’t possibly find themselves immediately in ‘heaven’. I don’t get the sense that there is punishment per se but I do get the sense that they can become so trapped and twisted in their darkness that they cannot see the way out. Clearly, these souls are more than just lost. It’s more than simply expressing love and helping them perceive the light of True Nature. No, these souls and other entities require a lot more. I would be very naive to think otherwise.
Which brings me to the being that I perceived as an elf. This being embodied the virtue of will and shone with bright silver. He wielded a sword that could pierce through anything and carried himself with the utmost precision. He was steadfast commitment to the Truth, wielding the sharpest sword possible, one that could cut through any falsehood. Furthermore, he was filled with love for the poor, twisted souls in that place. He was there out of service to the Truth but he also loved them dearly.
Alison suggested he might be a being from the angelic realm. I discarded this out of hand but then came back to it, realizing how much I have a bias against Christianity. What if, I asked myself, there was truth to that religion after all? What if its teachings were based originally on Truth but that Truth had been distorted and twisted over the centuries until it became almost unrecognizable? What if it were possible to perceive its original Truth without the baggage of the religion? How would it appear if it were clean and fresh and pure, free of any taint?
Would the angels appear as elves, perhaps? I’m not stupid - I know that when Tolkein wrote his books, he was masking a Christian allegory in the guise of fantasy and the elves were the counterparts of angels.
If this elf were really an angel, which one would he be?
The answer is pretty obvious: Lucifer. Lucifer, whose name means ‘Light Bringer’.
What if Lucifer weren’t evil but instead was devoted to redeemed the hopelessly twisted (i.e., evil) souls, helping them to escape their prisons rather than condemning them to perpetual torment? What if he loved them so much he couldn’t possibly turn his back on them? If it is true that True Nature (i.e., God) gives up on anyone, then isn’t it feasible that Lucifer was an emissary of True Nature, doing God’s work by helping these tormented souls?
It certainly puts the whole concept of Hell in a new light, doesn’t it? It also comports with my experience there. Sure, it was a place of torment but the torment wasn’t inflicted as punishment. Rather, the people were trapped there in prisons of their own devising. And Lucifer wasn’t trying to punish them; he was trying to free them.
When he appeared to me, he seemed bemused to find me there and immediately whisked me away, telling me that I needed to develop the capacities to be in that place. He has since been steadfast in his presence during my meditations, embodying the virtues of concentration and steadfastness and impeccability. He does not get distracted. He does not waver. He is so precise that it gives a whole new meaning to the word. He is sharper than the sharpest blade, unwavering in his commitment. In short, he is the perfect teacher for me right now.
Of course, I have no idea where all of this is going. It doesn’t feel delusional because there is a sharpness of focus here that I didn’t have in the Bardo. Everything is matter of fact, straightforward, clear and precise. There is no shame, judgment or guilt. No damnation or hellfire. Just the appearance of what is. It’s quite a different experience of hell and satan than exists in any of the religious texts I’ve heard of. And that’s good! Instead of moralizing, it offers true hope of redemption.
Huzzah.
***
