Friday, June 29, 2012

Thinking outside the box

When most of us were children, or even not yet born, a man named Hubble found that distant stars had what is called red shift in the light that we on earth received from them. The red shift is caused by something called the doppler effect: The motion of bodies moving away from us stretches the light waves that reach us, just as a passing train's whistle seems to change pitch as it rushes away from us. This great discovery of Hubble's led to the whole notion of an expanding universe and then to the origins of the universe at the Big Bang.
But what if Hubble was wrong? Of course this very idea is like ranting against apple pie and motherhood: no one in the scientific community is likely to support the idea that there is another way of thinking about red shift.
Mainly through meditation, we Frosts have received an alternate possibility. It is what we call tired light.
Today there is consensus that a large part of the energy in the multiverse is made up of dark matter. We have no idea what dark matter is; but we do know that it acts like a fog, obscuring distant stars. So now let's imagine that the light coming toward us across the vast distances in the galaxy travels through dark matter--as it does--and that the dark matter absorbs some of the energy from the light. So far so good? Just as in the case of the doppler effect, absorbing energy from the light causes a red shift. The further the light from a distant star has to travel, the more dark matter it has to push through. Thus distant stars would appear to be moving away from us faster than stars closer to us would appear to be doing.
This simple explanation of the red shift phenomenon obviates the necessity for the much-admired Big Bang theory. It is simple; it is elementary. Having lived in foggye olde England, I (Gavin) know that a car's headlights shift into the more-yellow range when viewed through fog. Why then wouldn't light shift more into the red range when some of its energy is absorbed by the elusive dark matter?

Tired light? Remember that phrase. You heard it first from (shudder) those people, the Frosts.

Monday, June 25, 2012

Spiritual versus Mundane Energy

I am only one--but still, I am one.
I cannot do everything--but still I can do something.
And because I cannot do everything,
I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.
-- Edward Everett Hale

Mountain-top removal is the practice of Big Coal in West Virginia of dynamiting whole mountains, destroying them, and throwing the loosened soil and rock (the "overburden") into the nearest stream, killing the stream itself and all flora and all fauna supported by it.
So the other day some friends of ours went to a rally protesting the practice of mountain-top removal. They told us that the festivities started off with a sincere prayer to Jesus. At a pagan meet a week earlier, we ourselves had joined hands, chanted, and raised energy to protect the earth from the devastation caused by the coal companies ("operators"). Whether or not either procedure did anything, in both cases they helped the participants by letting them feel that they were actually doing something to save the mountains.
The question is: Were they? A secondary question might be: Which procedure would produce more results?
Through countless experiments we know that people have power. Probably the most famous work is the Russian research (see Psychic Discoveries behind the Iron Curtain) in which the (female) lab workers actually moved 2-kg blocks across the surface of the test table, using only mind power. So if you gather together a bunch of people and get them all concentrating on the same idea, surely their combined force must have some effect. We think this is especially workable if the force is used in an effort to change the minds of politicians and mine owners.
Now let's think about the possibilities of Jesus-power. We Frosts share a belief of classic Hinduism; namely, that transcendent deities (no matter what their names) have no power to operate on the earth-plane. However, if people continually put their own energy into a visualization of a god (no matter what its name), then that energy must be going somewhere.
Thus we might say that people who for centuries have prayed to Jesus have caused a pool of energy to exist called "Jesus". Of course this assumes that the energy of those worshipping exceeds the amount of energy extracted by those praying for help. The energy that is stored in this pool is mundane energy. It is put in by people using their own mundane energy in their worship. Because it is the same energy as the energy developed in the Wiccan circle, when that local group prays to Jesus to stop mountain-top removal, some of the stored energy (both ancient and modern) might serve to get the result they're aiming for.
Many years ago Isaac Bonewits came up with the idea of the bank account in Mount Olympus Savings and Loan. Each deity that has been worshipped has power stored in its specific savings account; and if you can locate that account (make out a withdrawal slip/prayer request), the power in the account can be used to make things happen on the earth-plane.
Therefore it matters not which system you use: Similar results should obtain.

Thursday, June 21, 2012

Meditation is Easy

Too many people make too big a production of meditation. The key thing is to find somewhere quiet and peaceful, and become quiet and peaceful yourself. If some question or thought is bugging you, you will find it extremely difficult to get a meditative answer because the fact that something is bugging you takes you out of the flatlined, serene state that allows the mind to drift free.

Q: What do you mean, flatlined state?

A: If you were to go to the doctor's office and get hooked into one of the machines that monitors your body functions, then in the state we're striving for, the readout would be essentially a flat line.

Any repetitive task that doesn't involve sudden, abrupt surprises will do. Washing dishes at a sinkful of nice warm sudsy water is ideal, provided the dishes aren't too fragile and you don't have to take too much care or worry about breaking something. Somehow having water present and involved helps meditation along. It may be that the fact of our origin in the sea ourselves so long ago in what is surely the most natural of environments, the contact with warm liquids, gets us back to a time when our problems were of an entirely different sort.
Today there are so many things that cause us stress that simply getting into the meditative state is a challenge. We have probably mentioned before our favorite mnemonic, HARP: These letters represent four words that will help you proactively limit stress.
The H stands for Humor. If you can laugh at yourself or at a situation, the stress will be removed from it.
The A stands for Avoidance. Why do you have to continually put yourself back into stressful situations when they could be avoided? Why do you always drive to work at the same time over the same route? Why not try a time when there won't be a traffic jam? Why get into a fight with a loved one or a child over things that in a few weeks' time will seem so unimportant? Just refuse to get into the fight. Just refuse to drive when you know traffic will be jammed.
The R stands for Renaming. Right now summer is starting. It's @#$* hot downtown--but it sure is pleasant at the beach. So instead of thinking what a lousy hot day it is, think of how pleasant it would be on the beach.
Finally the P stands for Place. This is a tricky one. What you need to do is try to remove yourself from the place you're in and put yourself into a pleasant environment: a safe environment. We often go through a little meditative exercise with our students. We ask them to invent a safe place: safe and pleasant and secret, one that they can keep in their mind and revisit when a situation seems to be getting out of hand.

To enhance further your ability to meditate, a glass of red wine and a chunk of dark chocolate just before starting adjust the body's endorphines so that meditation comes more easily. Of course, being "those people" (oh gasp), we also recomment an orgasm or maybe two before starting. Yes, we've said it all before and you'll hear us say it again; but meditating isn't difficult. It just takes a little time and patience.

Monday, June 18, 2012

To Pray or Meditate


It seems to us that people pray too much. All they're doing is asking some unknown deity / juju to help them with a mundane problem--not a spiritual problem but a mundane one. It reminds us of the sticky-faced kid sitting on Santa's lap in the mall concourse asking for expensive Christmas presents. Meditation, on the other hand, is listening, both to your inner self and for spiritual guidance in your problems.

In days gone by when Grandpa followed the plow and Mother did the laundry by hand on a scrubboard, they spent time with their hands busy and their minds open to receive information. This is the ideal of meditation. You have probably heard that you must sit in a certain fashion with a white robe of unbleached fabric and say certain mantras or yantras to release the mind from daily cares. Most of this is pure blah-blah (for want of a ruder term) window dressing. Yes, we teach meditation; but it is extremely elementary and certainly free from esoteric hoodoo. The only thing that sometimes worries us is that people do not do any protective measures, just to be sure that no naughty occult practitioner is playing games and sending bad vibes or entities against you ... and knows enough about such things to be effective. ("Psychic attack! Psychic attack! Squawk! I'm under psychic attack! Oh gasp.")

But once you have established a connection with the Beyond, connecting to the entity we call a Guide, such protective measures become less essential. All you need to do is sit down quietly and wait for answers to come to the questions you may have. We recommend doing it always at the same time every day, when the sun is below the horizon. We also recommend that you take a drink of red wine and perhaps eat a piece of dark chocolate to adjust your endorphines so that your body will be more relaxed. Another way of relaxing the body, of course, is to have a good strong orgasm a few moments before going into meditation. Perhaps you might want to think of meditation and prayer as the two sides of a coin. The prayer is the asking; meditation is the receiving. What is the good of asking if you never bother to wait and listen for a reply?

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Everyone Get Up and Come


It's time to get Gavin out of the house and back onto the road ... after fourteen months of dealing with old back injuries and the health insults resulting therefrom. Sitting around in pain is no fun, and traveling probably won't be any day at the beach either. However, we're going to try.

The first trip we foresee is to a dual festival: one site, two events back to back. The festivals? Sirius Rising and SummerFest at Brushwood Folklore Center near Sherman, New York, just east of Erie PA. This is a wonderful site of over 400 acres that will hold up to 1,000 happy campers and Witches and pagans, not to mention others of diverse spiritualities. Large parts of the grounds are clothing-optional. There will be excellent lectures, of which Gavin and Yvonne (probably attired) will give eight (8).

And you are invited to come and meet with them, because seriously: this may be the last time they'll be traveling. On the other hand, we hope it is the first time of a new series of travels, though this, candidly, we doubt. All that is in the hands of the Elder Ones.

What can we say? Sirius Rising kicks off on July 16; SummerFest begins on July 23. If you stay through SummerFest it will end on July 29. Find details of the whole thing at

Brushwood.com

We recommend that you book early--and arrive early too so you can claim a good campsite, either in the woods or on the field. Of course there will be hundreds of vendors there as well, selling everything from clothing to mead, from sculpture to violins and books. We expect everyone to have a wonderful time.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Accepting all Pantheons or None

When we first put together our course on Witchcraft in 1968, we recommended that students of the course select a pantheon of deities relevant to their individual background. Many modern Witches choose to revere the various Celtic gods and goddesses; other Witches choose other pantheons. We have also recommended that people who are into Christianity can use Father/Son/Holy Ghost or Mary as their pantheon. A surprising number of circles use Mary. It is simply amazing to realize that over 90 percent of the churches and cathedrals of old Europe are dedicated to her. Open-minded theologians surmise that Mary is just the most recent name for the Mother who has been worshiped for untold centuries--She of many, many names.

In the cultural matrix where we westerners find ourselves, Christianity is the default religion. Still today many people don't dream that another system exists with a whole other nomenclature.
Within the modern Witch/pagan subculture there is a high resistance to use of the Christian pantheon in rituals. Can we not accept these people as true seekers, even though they use the default nomenclature--and can we perhaps also accept Witches who have a view of the world slightly different from our own? In general they are just as eco-friendly as any modern Witch. It is only when they are attacked on the truthfulness of their holy book that they distinguish themselves from the Witches, who in general are willing to discuss and perhaps compare their pantheons and ways of worship.
It is this very closed-mindedness that separates many Witches from the mainstream. Guys and gals, we wish you'd give it up. The problem, you see, is that when anyone defends a specific pantheon and excludes all other possibilities, they become divisive. We find many modern Witches are equally divisive in the defense of their own specific pantheon. Can we not take what is good from everybody's practice and if we like it use it, disregarding the parts that we don't like? Your pantheon is necessarily as personal as your toothbrush. That fact can (and should) go a long way toward smoothing out jealous differences.
Remember that, after all, some of us have little or no use for named pantheons of deities. Such pantheons are merely the names of tribal heroes and heroines that have been passed down to us. Yes, you can call on the great goddess Gaea to help with your growing crops; but equally you can get out into the yard and put up a hex sign that might encourage the plants themselves to grow. Or you can do a chant with the same intent in mind. Such an act need involve no third party at all.
In India for centuries this acceptance of the good and rejection of things which are not liked by a specific group has worked successfully. You can go to festivals that honor many different gods and goddesses--yes, including even the Christian pantheon--and everybody gets along happily. We, Gavin and Yvonne, know full well that many people totally reject our own magical practice and the precepts that we espouse--yet thousands of others find within them truth and strength.

Tell us, dear Reader, either how we can improve our ways or how we can convince others that we are not dogmatic divisive dictators.



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