The Controversial Crystal Skulls Part I:
The British Museum Skull
by Mark Chorvinsky

There are two known life-size crystal skulls. If you have read about "the crystal skull" you are most likely familiar with tales of the so-called Mitchell-Hedges Skull, but if you have seen "the crystal skull" on television, odds are that you have seen a different skull entirely, one which is in the collection of the British Museum in London.

In 1937 an article appeared in the British journal Man comparing the only two known life-size skulls made of quartz crystal.1 One of these skulls has become quite famous as a superstar of strange artifacts. The other has lurked nervously in its shadow. Very little has been written about the British Museum skull since the 1937 piece. The book The Crystal Skull2 mentioned the British Museum skull but the title "character" of the book was the "Mitchell-Hedges Skull". The "M-H" skull has a wide range of anomalous phenomena associated with it. It is said by some to be a 12,000 year-old survivor of Atlantis — an oracle of great magnitude — and has been known as "The Skull of Doom" due to a curse that is alleged to be attached to it. These claims and others will be examined in the second part of this article.

Before my recent discussion with the curator at the Museum of Mankind, only one phenomenon had been associated with the British Museum skull — it is said that some of the janitorial staff don't want to work around the artifact at night. This is somewhat less than an exciting phenomenon as the Museum of Mankind is not the place that most of us wish to be alone in after dark. A trip to the British Museum to speak to the curator and go through the crystal skull file, an object of great mystery in my life for the last few years, shed some light on the British Museum skull.

In the Shadows of the Mitchell-Hedges Skull

The British Museum does little to distinguish between the two skulls — many visitors think that they are viewing the Mitchell-Hedges skull that they have heard or read about.

The Museum of Mankind information desk says that the skull is easily the most popular artifact in the museum — more people ask about it than any other single exhibit. There is no doubt that a good part of its popularity is due to the publicity generated by the Mitchell-Hedges skull. In books and articles on The Crystal Skull, the skull of the title is the M-H skull and the British Museum's is given very short shrift.

While the British Museum's holding may be inferior in workmanship to the M-H skull, it is nevertheless a fascinating artifact that is extremely attractive and unusual in its own right. Furthermore, while it is quite different in appearance, it has often served as a double by the media.

While there are several mysteries surrounding the British Museum skull, there are nowhere near the number of anomalies associated with it as the M-H Skull. There are a number of possible reasons for this. One is that it may simply not have the types of powers attributed to its near-double. A second possibility is that the Mitchell-Hedges skull may not have some or all of the powers associated with it — and that no one has had a motive for promoting imaginative tales concerning the British Museum skull as they may have with the M-H skull. A third possibility for the British Museum skull's relative lack of anomalies is suggested by British Museum ethnographic curator Elizabeth Carmichael: "Our skull isn't as well known as the other skull because ours has not been available to people to experiment with. We have had requests to put it into various liquids, to shine lights through it, and so forth, but we keep it in its case." The British Museum skull, then, may not have as many tales surrounding it because for the last 89 years it has been in the possession of the British Museum, an organization with little interest in strange phenomena and not the type of institution that would go out of its way to test anomalous artifacts for powers whose existence the Museum staff generally does not recognize. There has been some testing of the British Museum crystal skull by the British Museum Research Laboratory but secrecy surrounds the tests and their results. It is true that the British Museum skull does not have as great an encrustation of strange tales surrounding it as does the other, but there are a multitude of unanswered questions surrounding the crystalline curiosity.

Where is it from? Who made it? Why was it made? How was it made? What strange phenomena are associated with it? These are just a few of the mysteries that we will attempt to look into in this article, but be forewarned — there are very few solid answers to any of these or the other questions concerning the British Museum skull. After protracted investigations it remains one of the world's most mysterious artifacts.

The British Museum's Public Stance

Those who visit the British Museum are not given a great deal of information about the skull. The plaque on the exhibit is short, ambiguous and raises more questions than it answers. The plaque reads: "Skull carved from rock crystal. Possibly from Mexico. Age uncertain. This carving of a skull of the nineteenth century probably came from Mexico. While it resembles in style Mixtec carvings of fifteenth century Mexico, some of the incised lines which form the teeth may have been cut with a jeweler's wheel. This is difficult to verify, but if it is so, the skull must have been made after the Spanish conquest." This is not much solid information considering the superstar status of the skull. The British Museum skull has appeared on Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World television show, graces the cover of the book of the same name, and is a featured visual in the commercial for the series. It has been shown on the Ripley's Believe it or Not television show with no attempt made to distinguish between it and the Mitchell-Hedges skull. Time-Life Books' advertising materials describe the Skull as "thought by some to possess mystic powers. People who have scoffed at this are said to have been struck dead." While they are clearly referring to the M-H skull, the supposed possessor of such "powers," the accompanying photograph is that of the British Museum artifact. Clearly there has been and continues to be some confusion between the two crystalline objects, some of it intentional.

Of Unknown Origin

What is known about the origin of the British Museum skull? Not a great deal but certainly more than the British Museum likes to let on. "Possibly from Mexico" and "probably from Mexico" as the exhibit's plaque relates, tells the public little and gives the impression that the skull's origin is uncertain. While the origin of the skull is a mystery and is likely to remain one, we do know how the British Museum acquired the artifact and there are clues as to some of its previous owners.

In the British Museum's crystal skull file there is information indicating that the skull was purchased through G.F. Kunz on January 3rd in 1898 from Tiffany and Co. in New York. The Cristy Fund was used to make the acquisition.

Museum curator Elizabeth Carmichael confirms that the skull was purchased from Tiffany and Co. in 1898 but says that she has no idea of where Tiffany and Co. acquired it. She was familiar with the notion that it was obtained by a soldier in Maximilian's army in Mexico but she explains that this is not a certainty by any means.

The G.F. Kunz through whom the item was purchased authored the classic Gems and Precious Stones of N. America in 1890.3 Kunz writes of the skull that "little is known of its history and nothing of its origin. It was brought from Mexico by a Spanish officer sometime before the French occupation of Mexico, and was sold to an English collector, at whose death it passed into the hands of E. Boban, of Paris, and then became the property of Mr. Sisson." This is certainly the one that would later become a part of the British Museum Collection. It is uncertain what happened to the skull between 1890 and 1898, when the British Museum purchased it, but it made its way from Sisson to Tiffany’s, probably through several others, including Kunz, who was obviously tracking its ownership intently.

Who Made the Skull?

Kunz's assertion that the skull was brought from Mexico has been largely accepted. The 1950 British Museum laboratory test report on the crystal skull, which will be described in more detail shortly, stated that the skull "is regarded as Mexican, towards end of Aztec dynasty, 1400-1500 AD." This report states that it was brought back by a French officer from Mexico rather than a Spanish officer, but this is probably confusion on their part. Museum officials have most often concluded that the skull is reminiscent of the Mixtec carvings of fifteenth century Mexico.

The BM skull file also contains the unpublished report of an examination of the skull in 1950 at which time Mr. Braunholtz of the BM made the general comment that the skull was ancient but might have been polished using modern lapidary techniques. He also considered that it may have been a piece of modern quartz cut by an amateur.

No British Museum official has suggested publicly that the skull is not ancient or that it is anything other than Aztec. However, in the soon-to-be-discussed British Museum crystal skull file, there is a letter from Adrian Digby to Dr. A.E. Werner of the Research Laboratory in which Digby makes a very intriguing assertion that varies greatly from the British Museum's public stance and raises additional questions. Digby wrote (italics added), "Our specimen is clearly not of Aztec origin, though it may well have been a cult object of some esoteric sect or it may be Masonic." While the British Museum public stance may be that it is probably Aztec, it is clear from this statement by Adrian Digby, a man concerned with the skull throughout his life, that he considered its origin to be unknown — clearly not Aztec.

Rock Crystal

Both life-size skulls are made of quartz crystal. The word "quartz" is first found in print in the work of Agricola in 1530 and may be based on an Old German word of uncertain origin. The word crystal is from the Greek, meaning "clear ice". Quartz (SiO2) is a very common mineral and is found in many forms and colors. Quartz is fairly hard. On the Mohs scale it has a hardness of seven (hardest is ten) — it cannot be scratched by a knife. It has a specific gravity of 2.65.

The gem-quality quartz crystals are found almost exclusively in Brazil, in Calaveras County, California, and in Madagascar. This high-quality crystal is used to make the crystal balls favored by fortune tellers.

In addition to its far-flung reputation as a divinatory medium, quartz is unusual in that it exhibits a piezoelectric effect — when pressure is applied to it, it develops a positive and negative charge on alternate prism edges. It has been suggested that this effect occurring on a large scale beneath the earth's surface may be responsible for some incidents of ghost lights and UFOs.

The Man Article

The article published in Man in 1936 has been the only anthropological journal article to appear on either of the life-size crystal skulls as of this writing. Morant did a comparison of the two skulls and compared their measurements to that of a human skull, concluding that: "No one of these measurements would be at all exceptional for an actual skull except the orbital index...which appears to be slightly removed from the human range for this character. At the same time the other measurements are in remarkably close accordance."

After Morant's piece, the British Museum's Adrian Digby and H.J. Braunholtz commented on it. Digby felt that it was doubtful that the British Museum and Mitchell-Hedges skulls were copied from the same human model. Braunholtz made the point that the British Museum's possession was probably sculpted first. At least one expert then had gone on record stating that the BM skull actually predates the M-H skull. Fourteen years later, Braunholtz and Digby were still arguing about it.

The Crystal Skull File

I have been told by a Museum of Mankind Students Room employee that the crystal skull there was considered the "most sensitive artifact in the museum." He went on to say that there were tales of curses and various unusual phenomena associated with the British Museum skull. It is very possible that he was confusing the tales surrounding the M-H skull with the British Museum's, as so many others have. He said that he couldn't talk any more about it. This may have been because he wasn't allowed to or because he didn't know the specifics. I strongly suspect the latter from his attitude. I asked this fellow if there was a crystal skull file there and he said that there was not and that I would have to contact the curator if I wanted more information about the skull. On another occasion when I was doing research in the Students Room, I started a conversation with another of the young gentlemen working there. I asked him if there was a crystal skull file and he said that there was no such file. At first he was reluctant to discuss the skull. Later, after he realized that I was, as he put it, "a serious researcher and not another crystal skull loony," he started to talk freely about the artifact. It was obvious that he had read some of the classic skull material. After about a half hour of talking about the skulls he went behind a desk, opened a drawer and extracted a file labeled The Crystal Skull — laying to rest the oft-repeated statement in skull articles that there is no crystal skull file in the British Museum. He would not let me look through the file, but rather held onto it and flipped through it, describing some of its contents. Several days later I asked a museum curator about the file and she expressed surprise at the secretive nature of the fellows in the Students Room and gave me permission to go through the file. This file is the source for the laboratory reports and correspondence referred to in this article.

The 1950 British Museum Findings

On April 24th, 1950 a meeting was held in the British Museum lab concerning the crystal skull. Attending were Mr. Braunholtz, Mr. Digby and Dr. Plenderleith. Braunholtz and Digby were two of the contributors to the Man article fourteen years earlier. The skull was removed from display and Braunholtz agreed that it could be kept by the lab for as long as necessary for completion of a technical examination.

A second unpublished report in the British Museum crystal skull file also described the results of a meeting between Dr. Plenderleith and Mr. Brown, Post Office Research Lab, Dollis Hill, England, which took place on April 26, 1950. Three objects are examined: a small crystal skull, the full-size Mexican skull (as the report refers to it) and a rock crystal coyote. The report addresses some of the questions concerning the skull, answering a few and raising others. Mr. Brown, an expert on crystals, provides a good deal of relevant information about the skull, including some clues as to where the crystal may have been from.

Did the Crystal Come from Brazil?

Mr. Brown was based in Brazil from 1942 to 1948 and was responsible for buying over 400 metric tons of grade A quartz for the British government during that time. "This is an excellent specimen of a very bad piece of rock crystal from Brazil, the kind of thing which is rejected every day by those selecting crystal for its piezoelectric properties," Brown states in the lab report on the British Museum skull.

According to Brown, rock crystal comes from three sources in Brazil — a source 500 miles up country, another which was inaccessible before this century, and the third a source in Bahia. During the 1800's rock crystal was only known to the Brazilians in the form of crystals found in rivers. These crystals, used for making spectacle lenses, were traced to their mountain source during the first quarter of the 20th century.

The Brazilians have no lapidary traditions, and thus had no use for the tremendous amount of waste quartz material that was rejected by government crystal experts like Brown during the 1940's.

Brazil then began regular trade with China and Japan in which less-than-perfect quartz was shipped to the Orient for cutting into objects such as crystal balls, animals, beads and so forth — the objects then being shipped back to Brazil to be sold there. It is possible that sporadic trading occurred much earlier than this.

"A Tour-de-Force"

One of the most interesting statements in the 1950 laboratory report is Mr. Brown's assessment of a possible modern origin for the skull (italics added): "The skull could easily have been cut in modern times by diamond dust and polished by rouge." This does not mean that it is modern, only that it could be modern. Brown believes that "…there would have been nothing out of the ordinary in Brazilian quartz being thus treated in Japan and returned to Mexico." The main problem with this theory involves the quality of the cutting, which Brown describes as "very amateurish." Brown felt that the work was not up to the standard of the oriental rock cuttings. Among the signs of amateurishness that Brown notes are the different sizes of the eyes, and drill marks showing in the nostrils. It is, in fact, the kind of thing that might have been made for a fortune teller. Had a Chinese done the teeth each tooth would have been separately modeled. As things are, they are done very crudely and it is quite possible that a diamond had been used on the end teeth. The general conclusion is that Mr. Brown, who claims to have no knowledge of archaeology or chemistry, but much of geology, and particularly of rock crystal, is quite convinced that this cannot be other than Brazilian rock crystal, the British Museum report states. There is no rock crystal in Mexico.

"It was a tour-de-force to make a skull. That great lumps of crystal could be exported from Brazil more than 150 to 200 years ago is very difficult to believe. First of all, it was not mined; secondly, it would have to come many miles down to the coast, and the natives had no instinct for the sale of such things," Brown opines in the 1950 report. It is nonetheless surprising that such specimens of rock crystal turn up in such unexpected places as Egypt and China, although Chinese rock crystal seems to have come mostly from Burmese ruby quarries.

How Was It Made?

Pre-Columbians had the skill to manufacture objects out of hard quartz crystal. There is a granite serpent and a red carnelian grasshopper in the Museo Nacional, Mexico. A Mixtec cup of rock crystal from Monte Alban Tomb #7 from Central America can be found in the Museo Regional de Oaxaca. There are also numerous small crystal skulls, a crystal rabbit, and a rock crystal coyote head from Guatemala thought to be Mayan.

G.F. Kunz, in his Gems and Precious Stones of N. America, writes that "the line separating the upper from the lower row of teeth has evidently been produced by a wheel made to revolve by a string held in the hand, or possibly by a string stretched across a bow, and is very characteristic of Mexican work."

It is possible that the skull was fire-polished and there are other more unusual notions that could conceivably have some bearing such as American archeologist A. Hyatt Verrill's theory that there was an ancient paste used to soften rock.

In the 1950 British Museum report, Mr. Brown stated that, "The skull could easily have been cut in modern times by diamond dust and polished by rouge." If it is true that it could have been easily made in modern times, then how can we determine its age? Again, only by style. There are two further problems that hamper questions of dating and origin. Firstly, rock crystal is an excellent medium for forgery. Secondly, there may be a tool mark on one of the teeth.

Rock Crystal: A Forger's Favorite

Since rock crystal cannot be dated, fakes are very hard to detect and crystal, together with jade and gold, have become favorite materials for the forger to work in. There is virtually no way to tell the age of objects made of these materials except by the object's style. This is providing, of course, that the forger uses primitive techniques. A dentist's drill is often used to carve an "artifact" to near completion. Drill marks are then removed by polishing the piece with an abrasive made with the powder resulting from the carving. The fact that quartz objects are easy to forge and fakes are so hard to detect adds to the questions surrounding the British Museum skull and its relatives.

There is a note in the British Museum crystal skull file stating that "Scratch marks between end teeth might indicate diamond." Also, according to Elizabeth Carmichael, in the opinion of a jeweler from Geneva who studied the skull in the "early sixties," there was a wheel cut on the tooth — rather than a chisel type tool mark. Casts were made of the incised marking on the teeth and closely examined. The jeweler, according to Ms. Carmichael, came to the conclusion that the skull was pre-Hispanic. Other than this controversial mark on the tooth there are no other signs of modern workmanship on the skull.

The 1960's Skull Controversy

The British Museum skull was taken off display in the late 1960's amidst rumors that it was not genuine. Dr. A.E. Werner, head of the British Museum laboratory, performed a series of tests on the skull in an attempt to learn its age and origin, causing much speculation. Dr. Werner wanted to determine whether the skull is Aztec, a later copy, or a fake. The British Museum would not disclose what tests were performed on the skull. What were the results of the tests? "These 'secret' tests have so far failed to come up with anything conclusive either way about the skull," wrote Peter Hopkirk in a 1967 London Times article entitled "'Aztec Skull' May be Found a Fake."4 High on my agenda for further research is to learn the specifics of the tests performed by the British Museum laboratory and their results. It is hard to guess what the tests would have been. Quartz crystal does not "age," cannot be subjected to radiocarbon dating tests, and neither corrodes nor acquires a patina over the years.

In 1968, the British Museum's Adrian Digby, who had written about the skull 32 years earlier in Man and participated in the 1950 tests eighteen years before, was still concerned with the British Museum crystal skull. In a letter to Dr. A.E. Werner at the Research Laboratory, he suggested an optical experiment that could be performed with the skull. I have been unable to learn if any such experiment was carried out on the skull.

The Mysteries of the British Museum Skull

What mysteries surround the British Museum crystal skull, then? While guesses have been made as to its age and place of origin, there is currently no way to determine these details with any certainty. The skull could in fact be much younger or much older than the fifteenth century dating usually attached to it. While it is considered to have come from Mexico, this is uncertain and the skull could have come from elsewhere. Other crystal objects have been said to have originated in Guatemala (the crystal coyote) and British Honduras (the Mitchell-Hedges skull). Suggestions have been made that the M-H skull was originally from Atlantis. While the British Museum skull has most often been thought to be Aztec, we really don't know who made it and presently have no way to find out with any certainty. It seems probable that the crystal from which the skull is carved was from Brazil, but this too is uncertain.

Other mysteries include:

The unsettled tool mark question — is there a tool mark on one of the teeth or isn't there?
One of the most interesting aspects of the British Museum skull is its power to attract and fascinate. Its great popularity as a strange artifact attests to its exceptional charisma.
The curious disquieting nature of the skull, which it shares with the Mitchell-Hedges skull, as expressed by the cleaning staff's insistence that the skull be covered at night.
The tantalizing account of the skull moving in its case, which deserves further investigation.
The controversial nature of the skull — the forgery issue, the "nonexistent" crystal skull file, the lack of public information about the skull, the fact that some consider it the most sensitive artifact in the museum.
The allure of the crystal with all of its anomalous properties and strange associations (its traditional divinatory and premonitory uses, its piezoelectric qualities, the mysteries of crystalline formation and growth, to name a few).
There is also the question of whether the British Museum skull exhibits any of the strange phenomena allegedly displayed by the Mitchell-Hedges skull, the subject of the second part of this article. As it is now the only life-size crystal skull other than the Mitchell-Hedges skull, it has gained some of the latter's notoriety, partly out of confusion between the two and partly out of its close resemblance to another object that has so many strange phenomena surrounding it.
The British Museum skull is a fascinating objet d'art which, after comparison with the Mitchell-Hedges skull, seems to be very closely related to its better known crystalline cousin. In the second part of this two-part series, we shall examine the myth and the mysteries of the better known Mitchell-Hedges crystal skull and uncover some interesting new information about this, one of the world's most amazing artifacts.

Notes

G.M. Morant, "A Morphological Comparison of Two Crystal Skulls," Man, Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, XXXVI, 145, July, 1936, p. 105-107. Also, G.M. Morant, "Two Crystal Skulls (Dr. Morant's Reply to Mr. Digby's Comments)." In the same issue, see H.J. Braunholtz, "Two Crystal Skulls (Further Comments by H.J. Braunholtz, British Museum)," p. 109. Adrian Digby, "Comments on the Morphological Comparison of Two Crystal Skulls," p. 107-109.
Richard Garvin, The Crystal Skull, Doubleday & Company, New York, 1973.
G.F. Kurz, Gems and Precious Stones of N. America, New York, 1890, p. 285.
Peter Hopkirk, "'Aztec Skull' May Be Found a Fake," London Times, November 22, 1967.


The Controversial Crystal Skulls Part II:
The Mitchell-Hedges Skull
by Mark Chorvinsky with Douglas Chapman

Vital Statistics

The skull is generally said to have a width of 5 inches, a height of 5 inches, and a length of 7 inches. The exact measurements, provided by Frank Dorland and printed here for the first time, are:

width — 4 29/32 inches (124 mm)
height — 5 13/16 inches (147 mm)
length from front to back — 7 7/8 inches (197 mm)
weight — 11 pounds 7 ounces
Quartz Crystal — Hardness of 7 on the Mohs scale
The Mitchell-Hedges Crystal Skull is a life-size artifact made of quartz crystal. It is certainly one of history's most unusual and controversial objects — one whose beauty and mystery have captured the imaginations of both scholars and seers. The legends surrounding it are many, often overpowering the truth about it, and the lore is increasing with no signs of abating.

When "the crystal skull" is mentioned, it is the Mitchell-Hedges skull that is generally being referred to. It is without a doubt the finest crystal skull that has come to light.

This article should be seen as an interim report, since research and investigation into the skulls continue, and future articles will update the material contained herein. In this article, I will discuss some of the fact and fiction concerning the skull, occasionally attempting to separate the two — not an easy task when dealing with the crystal skulls.

Mitchell-Hedges

The original instigator of amazing claims for the crystalline wonder was F. A. "Mike" Mitchell-Hedges (1882-1959). Explorer, gambler, author, and soldier with Pancho Villa in the Mexican Revolution, the adventuresome Mitchell-Hedges was quite a character.

During his boyhood, he spent much time reading stories by Robert Louis Stevenson, H. Rider Haggard, and Arthur Conan Doyle (the latter the author of The Lost World).1 Inspired by such fare, he felt driven to explore Central America and developed a strong interest in Atlantis, which he believed had influenced the civilizations of the former.

He also had a passion for deep sea fishing, and was convinced that sea monsters lived in deep South American waters. As a result of such interests and endeavors, he authored such books as Battles with Giant Fish and Land of Wonder and Fear.

During a stay in Toronto, he adopted Anna Le Guillon Mitchell-Hedges, a 10-year-old Canadian orphan,when she was foisted on him in 1917 by two Americans in Ontario. Given the choice between putting her into an orphanage or raising her himself, he chose the latter, a decision which neither came to regret.

The Legend of the Crystal Skull


And both have been responsible for creating the crystal skull's legend. For example, Anna Mitchell-Hedges has attested that she, her father, and the others on the expedition at the "lost" city of Lubaantun, "were digging in the temple, moving a heavy wall which had fallen on the altar.... I came upon the skull buried beneath the altar, but it was some three months later before the jaw was found which was about 25 feet away."2

She also later claimed that when she pulled the skull from the ground, the Indians at the dig reacted with awe and reverence. since "they recognized the Skull at once as the long-lost god of their ancestors."3

But accounts differ — widely. Mitchell-Hedges, in the 1954 British first edition of his autobiography, Danger My Ally, reported that "how the skull came into my possession I have reason for not revealing." He also included the following about the object he labeled "the sinister skull of doom," initiating its legend: "It is at least 3600 years old and according to legend was used by the High Priest of the Maya when performing esoteric rites. It is said that when he willed death with the help of the skull, death invariably followed." As we shall soon see, this statement by Mitchell-Hedges has had far-reaching reverberations in terms of crystal skull lore.

Oddly enough, the American edition in 1955 deleted the references. Many speculations as to the reason for this deletion have resulted. One (which was recounted in Sibley S. Morrill's book Ambrose Bierce, F.A. Mitchell-Hedges and the Crystal Skull) was that Mitchell-Hedges was a secret agent (in league with Ambrose Bierce) and that he kept the details hidden for that reason.4 A seemingly more plausible theory, that Mitchell-Hedges may have purchased the object, will be discussed later.

After Mitchell-Hedges' death, ownership passed to his daughter. Some have speculated that Mitchell-Hedges originally had the skull planted in Lubaantun in 1927, so that she would find it, enlivening her 17th birthday.

A Speculative History

The stories advanced on the skull's behalf are exciting and tantalizing, but what is more-or-less reliably known about it?

The first time the Mitchell-Hedges Skull was mentioned in print was in July 1936, in an article in Man — A Monthly Record of Anthropological Science ("Published Under the Direction of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland") in which G. M. Morant and Adrian Digby of the British Museum compared the similar British Museum skull with the Burney skull (as the "Mitchell-Hedges" skull was known at the time). They were not able to deduce much, not even reliably which one was created first, or — if their creations were related — which one served as the model for the other. Even the British Museum skull's origin is shadowy — though it was supposed that it might have come from Mexico.

This leaves us with some tough questions about the skull. Is its style of workmanship truly Mayan? Or is its style that of any other culture of the area? Dr. Frederick Dockstader (the former curator of the Museum of the American Indian) has commented that between 1575 and 1650 there were European craftsmen working with crystal; and that they would have had access to similar objects and native materials. He does not think it likely, though, that they created the Mitchell-Hedges skull, because the skull's separated jawbone does not seem typical of their work. He is inclined to identify the skull as an Aztec creation.5 Elizabeth Carmichael of the British Museum feels quite differently. "Aztec it isn't," she states categorically.6 Adrian Digby, formerly of the British Museum, has stated (in correspondence with the author) that his opinion is that the crystal skull is "not pre-Columbian, though it may very well have come from Mexico." Digby thinks that the crystal skulls "were ritual objects made for some esoteric cult of European origin."7

George Kennedy (of the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics of the University of California at Los Angeles) has pointed out that the object, whose style seems to him to be Mixtec in origin (dating to around the 14th or 15th centuries), was (supposedly) found in a spot abandoned around 800 A.D.8

One hypothesis about the skull is that it was rough-sculpted in one era and modified in a later one, but this seems rather debatable. Crystal expert Frank Dorland (one of whose occupations has been art restorer) is one such theorist and uses it to explain some evidences of "mechanical grinding on the faces of the teeth," which he believes were done when the jawbone was removed during one of these modifications.

He admits, however, that while he thinks that the skull could be as old as 12,000 years, he "cannot prove by any means that the skull was not made to order sometime in the last five hundred years and finished by hand to please some potentate who was of royal dictatorship, and bent toward the psychic."9

Norman Hammond has enlarged upon this latter idea and, after commenting on a possible 16th to 18th century origin, states that "while a Renaissance origin is not improbable, given the size of the rock crystal block involved, manufacture in Qing Dynasty China for a European client cannot be ruled out."10

Frank Dorland has been told (by people who knew Mitchell-Hedges) that the skull was brought back from the Holy Land by the Knights Templar during the Crusades. The skull was then supposedly kept in their Inner Sanctum in London and later hidden. Mitchell-Hedges rediscovered it when he was dealing in antiques. Dorland's sources hypothesize that after finding the skull, Mitchell-Hedges made up stories to explain where he got it.11 It is to be wondered if this may be the legendary "head" supposedly used as a centerpiece in the rituals of the Knights Templar.

The somewhat cruder British Museum crystal skull was examined in 1950, with admittedly speculative results. A report resulted from the examination by a crystal expert and members of the Museum staff, concluding: "The skull could easily have been cut in modem times by diamond dust and polished by rough.... It is, in fact, the kind of thing that might have been made for a fortune teller."12

As for the source of the crystal used in the Mitchell-Hedges skull's manufacture, it possibly came from the deposits in Calaveras County in California (which people like Dorland and jewel expert G. F. Kunz have speculated is a possible source for one or the other skull).

As a further clue to the source of the skull, we can try to look for evidences of modern fabrication. We can try to see how its craftsmanship resembles those of known schools. And the results here have been equally debatable, since the Mitchell-Hedges skull, with its unusual emphasis on anatomical accuracy (except for suture lines — which were not depicted) is not typical of any known by the various experts who have so far commented on it.

The Hewlett-Packard Tests


The skull, which appears almost invisible after immersion in benzyl alcohol, is viewed through polarizing filters at Hewlett-Packard's Crystal Laboratory in Santa Clara, California. These tests indicated that the skull and jaw were carved from the same piece of crystal.

In order to understand the fine points of the skull's manufacture, it is important to know more about the material of which it is made. On October 27, 1970, Frank Dorland (to whom the skull was at that time on loan) and Richard Garvin (then the supervisor of the Hewlett-Packard advertising account and later the author of a popular book about the skull) took the skull from its vault and brought it to the Hewlett-Packard laboratory in Santa Clara, California for some tests. Hewlett-Packard makes more crystal oscillators than any other company, and their crystal laboratory tests quartz every day.

The technicians at Hewlett-Packard placed the skull into benzyl alcohol, which has the same refraction index as quartz crystal. This means that the skull would almost disappear when placed in the solution. By passing polarized light through the skull and rotating it, it would be possible to locate the axis and observe "twinning." Twinning, a splitting of the direction of crystal growth which can occur under strong impact (and can happen to a single crystal, or to separate ones which can twin and grow together) had been observed (via noticeable darker stress marks) on the Mitchell-Hedges skull around the eyes, nose, and jaw area.

Hewlett-Packard technicians reported that the Mitchell-Hedges skull (including its separated jawbone) was "almost certainly a single crystal of quartz, rather than a composite of three crystals."13 Before this time, Dorland had hypothesized that the skull was composed of separate pieces of quartz.

Oddly enough (though they were not lapidarians) they also felt that it had taken an incredibly long time to make ("300 man-years of effort"),14 a supposition resembling Mitchell-Hedges' contentions that it had taken at least 150 years to do so.

There is a much-quoted line often found in crystal skull articles that is attributed to a crystallographer working at Hewlett-Packard and is melodramatic indeed: "The damn thing shouldn't even be." Now far be it from a professional magician to find any pleasure in demystification, but it must be said that the existence of the skull is not nearly as bizarre as the mythos now growing up around it.

How hard is it really to carve a life-size crystal skull off-axis? Frank Dorland, who has worked with crystals for many years, states that, with proper financing, he could finish such a job within two years.15 This is in opposition to the common contention that the skull could not be duplicated in modern times using the most advanced technology.

The Phenomena
The Dorland Manifestations

Frank Dorland, to whom Anna loaned the skull for many years, experienced visionary phenomena through the use of the skull. In particular, he was fascinated by its "aura," as well as the buildings, seemingly from antiquity, which he saw displayed within its eye socket (and on other portions of its cranial "anatomy"). "Visionary" is not the only word for its effect on him and others, since he has heard what he takes to be the sound of faint high metallic bells, chimes, and other noises apparently emanating from it. Dorland has also heard human voices softly singing strange chants. Dorland also claims that the first time he kept the skull in his residence overnight, there was the sound of a prowling jungle cat within his home, as well as the ringing of chimes and bells.

These occurred after Dorland entertained a most unusual visitor: Anton Szandor LaVey, the founder of San Francisco's Church of Satan. LaVey, in the interests of publicity, had brought the editor of an Oakland paper, claiming that the skull was the work of his deity and thus belonged in his church. To Dorland's discomfiture, LaVey did not leave in a hurry, having become ensconced at playing Dorland's organ. (In addition to being Satan's representative on Earth, LaVey is also a masterful organist.) Dorland had wanted to get the skull back into the vault, but found it had now become too late.

After the Satanist had left, Dorland and his wife found a safe spot for the skull and went to bed, but not to a peaceable rest. "All night long there were lots and lots of sounds," Dorland recounted. But, explorations of the house at that time revealed nothing. When they got up the next morning, they found that their belongings had been moved around. "We had a telephone dialer (which was made out of crystal) that had been moved from the telephone at least thirty-five feet to the front door — and it lay right across the front door threshold. I never believed that this [poltergeist activity] happened until it happened to me...."

Dorland attributes the phenomena to LaVey and the vibrations around him, saying that there was a reaction between the Satanist's mind and the skull. "I think there was a conflict of one type of energy against another type of energy which interfered somehow with physical objects."16

It is to be wondered, however, if LaVey had more to do with the phenomena than give off conflicting "bad vibes."

Yet, curiously, when Dorland and his wife found their belongings scattered about the house the following morning, there was no sign of outside intrusion (and the doors and windows were still locked).17 He has experienced lesser but similar phenomena from other crystal items.

When Frank Dorland began to work with the skull he was an art restorer based in San Francisco. He started his skull studies in 1956, and in 1964 the Mitchell-Hedges skull was entrusted to him by Anna Mitchell-Hedges. He took many photos of the skull and made castings in plaster and epoxies. Cross-sections of the casts were cut, measured and studied by Dorland. The epoxy casts, when cut up, showed the exact symmetry of the skull, especially in the area of the eye sockets.

Dorland found that the skull channeled lights from its base into the eye sockets, creating an awesome effect.

But he was not permitted by fate to make such studies forever. In 1970, Anna showed up on Frank Dorland's doorstep and took the skull back from him, bringing it back to Ontario with her by bus.

Crystal Skull Gazing

If the skull creates visionary effects and may act as a crystal ball, then it is to the field of crystal gazing that we must look to for an understanding of the various phenomena reported in regard to it. It has been theorized that through intense concentration on a polished crystal, it is possible to inhibit "normal" waking state consciousness. Some crystal gazers have surmised that this concentration subdues the five senses, allowing a sixth sense to come into play and to operate with little interference from the other senses.

Many forteans find it easy to dismiss strange phenomena concerning crystals, due to the elaborate claims that are being dispensed as New Age gospel. There are many anomalous aspects of crystallography, however, that make crystals valuable subjects of fortean study, and the literature of parapsychology includes many intriguing cases involving the use of crystals with regards to psychic phenomena. When the so-called powers of the Mitchell-Hedges skull are examined in the context of this literature, it becomes clear that these so-called holographic images within the skull, and the scenes that it has most-recently been purported to project, are most likely going on in the mind of the percipient rather than inside the skull.

In the midst of a growing body of crystal folklore that has excited the credulous and tainted the study of crystal phenomenology for others, Frank Dorland remains intelligent and open-minded. Dorland was studying crystals long before the current wave of "crystal experts" who hawk their wares at every New Age conference from here to Timbuktu. His classic monograph Rock Crystal, which was published in 1968, has had a great effect on current crystal study, and many of the ideas originating in that paper have been attributed in countless publications to this or that up-and-coming crystal expert. Frank Dorland believes that a crystal acts as an amplifying reflector to psychic receptor centers. He feels that energy waves from the brain trigger the crystal in some way.

The crystal then filters and amplifies the waves, sending them back to stimulate psychic centers in the brain. Dorland admits that such an exchange of brain waves is not precisely understood and, even if this explanation of the alteration of consciousness through the use of crystals is largely theoretical, it may be a useful model for looking at the visionary aspects of crystal skull study.

When I asked Frank Dorland if he felt that the Mitchell-Hedges skull had any "powers," his response was very interesting. In a letter to me, Dorland recently wrote: The skull itself has no powers of its own. (The emphasis is Frank Dorland's.) "The activity," Dorland continues, "comes from the energy put into the skull by the individual."18

The Skull of Doom

Mitchell-Hedges and Anna, however, have themselves made claims for its supposed powers and helped create its previous mystique as a "Skull of Doom." Others have helped them.

A March 1962 Fate article by John Sinclair (entitled "Crystal Skull of Doom") detailed some anecdotes about the malign things that supposedly happen to people who make fun of the skull. One concerned a Zulu witch doctor who, in 1949 (at the request of the skeptical tribal chief), reportedly spat at the thing, performed a mockery dance at it, and was subsequently killed in a hut (along with a wife of the tribe's chief) by a lightning flash out of the single cloud in a formerly cloudless sky. Another such tale was about a news photographer who, not long after the death of the witch doctor, belittled the skull as he photographed it, yelling, "Will me to death! Rot!" Upon leaving Mitchell-Hedges' abode, he drove straight into a truck, killing himself. (A variation on this story, reported elsewhere, recounted that his darkroom supposedly blew up and killed him as he was developing the pictures of the skull.)

In addition, the Sinclair article recounted the deaths of a woman reporter who had belittled the skull (and perished by a mysterious infection leading to heart failure), a New Zealand girl who had challenged it (another heart failure), and even mildly hinted that the heart-attack death of Mitchell-Hedges himself may have been due to the curse of the skull. ("But what induced it no doctor could say.") Other sources have given cerebral embolism as the cause of Mitchell-Hedges' death.

Quoted in the same article, Mitchell-Hedges himself is supposed to have begged Anna to bury the crystal skull with him: "Priceless as this treasure may be, it is a thing of evil and must die with me." If this is accurate, Anna did not respect her foster father's wishes.

Other publications have added to the legend. Psychic magazine mentioned that "in the early 1950's, three women died mysteriously after each had spent time viewing the skull."19 Fate had mentioned but two. Psychic did not cite its sources, so there is no easy way to check up on the claim of yet another death.

Anna Mitchell-Hedges has also related some intriguing accounts. One was about how Adrian Conan Doyle (the son of the creator of Sherlock Holmes) became very edgy when it was around (even if out of sight) and could ascertain (and thus avoid) its presence when he was visiting her. Another concerned how a neighbor's butler felt the skull to be an ominous presence dominating Anna Mitchell-Hedges's house, and once became nearly senseless when the skull was being handled there — 20 miles away from him — angering the neighbor, who believed the artifact to be responsible.20

Its "cursing" power, however, appears to have been highly exaggerated. A South-African newspaper reportedly did describe an explosion (in London) of an enlarger during development of the skull's picture, but the photographer was entirely unhurt (not squaring with the better-known exaggerated version of the story, in which the photographer died). And the story of the Zulu Royal House and the mockery dance may have been made up out of nearly whole cloth from a letter from Clifford M. Hulley to Mitchell-Hedges. The letter advised that a medicine man might want to steal the skull because of its reputed power and possible use as a totem in potential Zulu insurrections.21 (This does not square with the later account, that Mitchell-Hedges barely missed seeing a lightning bolt destroying a hut within which was a mocking witch doctor.)

The Schizoid Skull

The ensuing years have changed the skull's "personality." Illuminating details of Anna Mitchell-Hedges' recent attitudes about the skull are to be found in the following conversation, which took place in June 1987 between her and Mark Chorvinsky:

Mark Chorvinsky: Do you feel that the skull is in fact cursed?

Anna Mitchell-Hedges: Oh no. Not at all.

MC: But for most of its recent existence it has been known as the Skull of Doom.

AMH: This isn't a cursed skull, this is a healing skull.

MC: What about your father's statements in his autobiography about how the skull was used to will death and so forth.

AMH: You didn't know father did you? He was quite a kidder. He told those things to a reporter that he was having some fun with.22

So much for the Skull of Doom, its sinister curse debunked by none other than Anna Mitchell-Hedges.

Miss Mitchell-Hedges has further contributed to its growing iconic "New Age" reputation as a healing skull by relating how it cleared up one Canadian neighbor's allergies, and healed another's arthritically paralyzed arm.23

Anna has also stated (in a video entitled The Psychic Connection) that the Skull of Doom was used to "will death or to heal, but to will death was in a kind way."

Larry Arnold, the author of a May 1987 article in Rainbows, a New Age newsletter, reports: "Anna Mitchell-Hedges tells us the name is Dum, not Doom as is popularly reported," a further attempt to distance it from its past.24

Nevertheless, back in the early 1960's, she was still stressing its less kindly reputation: "I believe that anyone can will another to death through the Skull of Doom.... It is a thing of evil in the wrong hands."25

When Anna took the skull back from Frank Dorland in 1970, she made it clear that she did not want to have the skull used as a crystal ball. Now it is being used for exactly that. Associates of Anna's say that she consults with the skull from time to time, and when asked whether she has any fear that the priceless skull might be stolen from her, she usually answers that "the skull protects her."

The Atlantean Connection

For an object as mired in legend and lore as the Crystal Skull, perhaps it should come as no surprise that the skull has come to be linked with the ubiquitous fabled lost Atlantis.

However, there is sufficient reason to connect the artifact to Atlantis, since, as previously mentioned, Mitchell-Hedges was a major proponent of the alleged place. There are many people who have taken his theories as gospel and have believed that the magnificently crafted item was created there. According to his speculations, many Atlanteans (fleeing the cataclysm that destroyed them as a race) established themselves in South America and influenced what came to be known as the Mayan civilization (helping to create the many pyramids — as well as other artifacts). Mitchell-Hedges's beliefs had their origins in two of Plato's dialogues (which were the first surviving mentions of the locale). These legends developed more fully during the succeeding millennia.

A Questionable History

Having covered some of the sometimes spurious background and phenomena associated with the skull, it behooves us to look at more of the many controversies that have arisen concerning the history of the artifact. The first of these controversies deals with the source of the Mitchell-Hedges skull. It is first mentioned in the aforementioned Man article, which states that Sydney Burney gave permission for Digby's and Morant's work with it. At no point is the name of its supposed discoverer mentioned. Anna Mitchell-Hedges has claimed that her father used the skull as collateral for a loan from Burney, but we have only her word for that. According to records, the skull was first put up for auction by British art dealer Sydney Burney in September 15, 1943, at Sotheby's in London. The British Museum tried to buy the skull at the sale so that they would have the two life-size crystal skulls known at that time. A note by H. J. Braunholtz of the British Museum reads: "Bid at Sotheby's sale, lot 54, 15 x 43 up to £340 (Fairfax). Bought in by Burney. Sold subsequently by Mr. Burney to Mr. Mitchell-Hedges for £400." A recent letter to this author from Adrian Digby states that he believed Mitchell-Hedges to have purchased the skull from Burney at Christies auctioneers, not Sothebys.26 Crystal Skull expert Frank Dorland concurs with Digby on this point.27 Ongoing research may settle this question.

If the skull was kept by Burney as collateral for a loan, was the "sale" of the skull to Mitchell-Hedges simply Mitchell-Hedges paying off the loan and getting back his skull, or did Mitchell-Hedges acquire the skull in 1943 in London rather than in 1927 in British Honduras? The records of the sale from Burney to Mitchell-Hedges in 1943 make no mention of any earlier dealings between the two. Some have speculated that Mitchell-Hedges removed the Crystal Skull references from his autobiography because some readers had known about Burney's earlier ownership of the skull. And, as we have mentioned, in the 1936 Man article, the skull was referred to as the Burney Skull, not the Mitchell-Hedges Skull. If the skull was Burney's, though, where did he get it if not from Mitchell-Hedges? Research into this question continues.

A letter, written by Adrian Digby to Dr. A. Werner (of the Research Laboratory in the British Museum Department of Ethnography) on April 17, 1968, states (based on the photo of the Mitchell-Hedges skull that Dorland sent him) that the skull was the one which originally belonged to Sydney Burney. Digby goes on to say that Burney sold the skull to Mitchell-Hedges, who, Burney says, incorrectly claimed to have found the object.

In any case, Anna Mitchell-Hedges cannot prove conclusively that her father owned the item prior to its auction, explaining that "all my father's papers were lost in Hatteras during a cyclone — photographs and all — also a trunk of his belongings was lost in Plymouth."28

Mitchell-Hedges did not mention the object's existence in any of his published works concerning Lubaantun until 1954. He made no mention of the skull in any of his numerous lecture appearances and many friends and acquaintances of Mitchell-Hedges who have been queried do not recall him having the skull or discussing it before 1943.

Another controversy regards Anna Mitchell-Hedges' discovery of the skull. There are no reliable records of her presence at the Lubaantun expedition; nor are there any accounts of the finding of the Skull or of Anna's presence in autobiographical publications of any participants other than Mitchell-Hedges. Eric Thompson, who was present at the 1927 British Museum excavation, continually debunked the crystal skull stories. In addition, Anna's accounts of her alleged discovery have placed it at both 1924 and 1926-1927, creating further confusion.29 While there are photographs of Dr. Gann, Mitchell-Hedges, and Lady Richmond Brown on and around the ruins at Lubaantun, neither Anna nor the skull are to be found in any of the published photos. The 1927 Report on the British Museum Expedition by J. E. Thompson on the Lubaantun expedition mentions nothing about the crystal skull being found at the site.

The Future of the Mitchell-Hedges Skull

Despite the present perplexities, what are the prospects for the future of the skull? As crystal becomes further understood, regarding its growth, structure, conductivity, piezoelectric qualities, etc., will we find that there is even a slight basis for the more exaggerated claims for the skull? Will any of its qualities be proven to facilitate strange phenomena? These tests, however, will probably not be done while Anna Mitchell-Hedges controls the skull, due to her reluctance to have any more scientific tests performed upon it. Strange Research and Investigations, the investigative branch of Strange Magazine, is looking into the possibility of further research into the life-size crystal skulls and has been given positive indications that one of the other crystal skulls may be made available in the future for structured experimentation, the results of which will be published in a future issue.

Meanwhile the Mitchell-Hedges skull resides in Anna Mitchell-Hedges' apartment in Kitchener, Ontario, occasionally starring at New Age Conferences and Gem and Mineral Shows. These appearances are invariably described in ads as the "last showing of the Mitchell-Hedges skull," but one gets the feeling that they will continue as long as Anna Mitchell-Hedges has the inclination. And what of the skull's future? There has been talk of establishing a foundation to care for the skull and Anna has often said that if a private individual were to purchase the skull and then donate it to a museum, she would be amenable to such a scenario. For now, the only way to see the skull is to visit Ontario by appointment or to watch your local metaphysical press to see if the skull will be appearing at a venue in your area any time in the future.

However, there are rumors that Mexico, Belize and England all believe that the skull is legally theirs and they would like it back.

The Bottom Line

I find it ironic that while I have been studying the skulls for many years, I have answers for almost none of the important questions about the Mitchell-Hedges crystal skull. While there are stock answers for many of the questions, they are just that. While there are speculations aplenty, they remain speculations. For starters, I cannot honestly say that we know with any degree of certainty who made the skull, how it was made, when it was made, and what purpose it served. These questions remain perplexing. The ambiguities surrounding the skull's origins and mystique have added to its legend and left ample room for its many interpreters to fill in the blanks with whatever they find meaningful.

Whatever its origins, the skull continues its fascination largely because of its power as a symbol, one which has enabled people to make use of their visionary resources within. It is no surprise that those who have seen it or heard of it have been attracted to it, and often wish to attribute to it a history and function as awesome as its presence. At the very least it is an artistic masterpiece. At most — who knows?

FOOTNOTES

1. Richard Garvin, The Crystal Skull (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1973), p. 32.

2. Correspondence from Anna Mitchell-Hedges to Frank Dorland, February 17, 1968.

3. Kaspars Dzeguze, "The Case of the Crystal Skull," Canadian Weekend Magazine, December 29, 1979, p. 19.

4. Sibley S. Morrill, Ambrose Bierce, F.A. Mitchell-Hedges and the Crystal Skull (San Francisco: Cadleon Press, 1972), pp.79-82.

5. Garvin, pp. 80-82.

6. Personal conversation between Mark Chorvinsky and Elizabeth Carmichael at British Museum, London, June 10, 1988.

7. Personal correspondence from Adrian Digby to Mark Chorvinsky, September 1, 1988.

8. Garvin, pp. 80-82.

9. Ibid., p. 85.

10. Joe Nickell and John F. Fischer, "Crystal Skull of Death, Part II," Fate, vol. 37, no. 8 (August 1984), p. 84.

11. Telephone conversation between Mark Chorvinsky and Frank Dorland, September 11, 1988.

12. Mark Chorvinsky, "The Controversial Crystal Skulls — part 1. — The British Museum Skull," Strange Magazine, vol. 1, no. 1. (1987), p. 30.

13. "History or Hokum?," Measure, February 1971, p. 9.

14. Ibid., p. 10.

15. Telephone conversation: Chorvinsky and Dorland, September 11, 1988.

16. Ibid.

17. Garvin, pp. 90-96.

18. Personal correspondence from Frank Dorland to Mark Chorvinsky, August 30, 1988.

19. J. J. Lamb, "The Mitchell-Hedges Crystal Skull," Psychic, vol. 1, no. I (June/July 1969), p. 26.

20. Dzeguze, p.19.

21. Garvin, pp. 90-91.

22. Personal conversation between Anna Mitchell-Hedges and Mark Chorvinsky in Elizabethtown PA, July 6, 1987.

23. Dzeguze, pp. 19-20.

24. Larry E. Arnold, "The Crystal Skull," Rainbows, vol. VII, no. 2 May 1987), p. 6.

25. John Sinclair, "Crystal Skull of Doom," Beyond the Strange (New York: Paperback Library, Inc., 1966 — reprint of article published in Fate magazine in 1962), p. 129.

26. Personal correspondence: Digby to Chorvinsky, September 1, 1988.

27. Telephone conversation: Chorvinsky and Dorland, September 11,1988.

28. Nickell and Fischer, pp. 82-84.

29. Joe Nickell and John F. Fischer, "Crystal Skull of Death, part I," Fate, vol. 37, no. 7 (July 1984), pp. 52-54.

Special thanks to Frank Dorland, Grace Fogg of the ARE Library, Elizabeth Carmichael of the British Museum, Adrian Digby, Larry Arnold, and author Phyllis Galde for their help in the preparation of this article. Thanks also to the many individuals who assisted me with my crystal skull research over the years. — MC

conversation with a girl who visited me

me: i don't have ant tv, electric lights, in fact i'm in bed when the sun goes down and up at dawn.
her: wow
me: yeah i live like a monk
her: yeah you are a monk
me: well its better than living like a monkey
her: i suppose
me: here, have a banana

so im walking through the markets in glebe with my wealthy friend who likes to buy elaborate and expensive things, antiques and strange english things from ye olde days. anyway he decides to buy a plant for is garden and im pointing out the wonderful aloe vera plant when suddenly i see it move, actually its a huge preying mantis, it's about the size of my palm and its moving fast. the market holder came and removed the mantis onto another plant, and i told him i had a dream about a giant preying mantis but he didn't seem that interested.
anyways i figure i may have to buy a aloe vera myself.

later that afternoon i met a clairvoyant lady. my friend bought a shit load of her stuff as she chatted about her powers and some of the things she had done, i stood and listened. then she looked at me and said, 'you are very feminine, you are very sensitive.'
i had to agree.

went to see the german film the counterfeiters last night, its very good. bit brutal but excellent story and acting. very grainy film and gritty camera work, all true apparently. seems to be a few good movies coming from germany where they look back at their history. downfall, life of others etc.

i finished my book 'the secret history of the world', i've now started 'the brain that repairs itself', a book about neuroplastics, very interesting.
secret history looks at the secret societies and the information they seem to have that can be traced through the ages especially in art and science. as you know a lot of these scientists were also members of strange esoteric cults. the author looks at the development of consciousness and evolution through the realms of matter, mineral vegetable animal and human. he looks at the war that exists between the material world and the one of spirit, the more the material one becomes stronger the more matter becomes denser and this reality becomes fixed, thus we are removed from our gods. personally mists of avalon was a better read but this has some interesting ideas.

governments depts such as the one i work in are basically awful places, filled with overpaid managers, straights who produce masses of paper work purely designed to keep themselves in jobs and looking like they are doing something. the personalities are bland, uninspiring and usually quite corrupt, they bicker and plot, hold grudges and basically make certain that they cover their mistakes as they go, afraid to admit transparency because they are weak petty and insecure. i hate the people who manage me, they waste resources, they are bullies and tugs and they never take responsibility, its always the people at the bottom of the ladder that have to do that.
come the glorious day i'd destroy all middle management.

kate bush is amazing, i do love her music, her sweet voice, with it's feminine grace, ariel her double cd is an amazing piece of music, i have had it for over a year but i have only just played the second disc, it's one of the best pieces i have ever heard, so beautiful it brings tears. music should move you, one way or the other, it should take you from your bed sit, your car, your dance club and shift you some where else, i love that power of music.
pan is away on holiday, i am going to head down to the studio and nail some songs we need to rehearse on. I am thinking of 'pressing' so. I need my product out there, something tangible that the radio can play and may send a few bucks my way in the process.

the future is calling me pulling me drawing me, i can feel it, i can hear it, whisper on the wind, in the rustle of the tree, the swoop of the bat, the break of the wave, it is written in the eye of the tiger, the shape of the cloud.

i have been asked to assist a great friend heal a feeling of guilt, remorse or perhaps just a memory that troubles her, i thought long and hard about this person and the words i would use.
i can't say exactly what they will be but they will be something like this...

life is suffering because time is traveling forwards, life will be joyous when time contracts, all things come from death to life, but this is an equal illusion, therefore why place significance on event that causes sorrow.

remember time is an illusion, a measuring device between objects only, and if forwards time is an illusion that leads to suffering then backwards time is an illusion that must lead to liberation.

hold the memory of the moment just after the moment that pains you
still that moment and the way you felt, freeze space time and the feeling that goes with it.
slowly rewind, events until you come to a happier one that you can freeze as well.
This will be the memory, the narrative backwards, the feeling of guilt leaving your body,
akasha is on the record
recorded in memory
non attachment
as akasha is free so to are you.
healed and whole
ready for this moment.

about this time last year i was flying back from adalaide with my brain bleeding and bruised, frontal lobe emotional response cfircuit turned up full whack, my girlfriend abandoned me and i strated writing my songs. today im feeling a bit saddened as she's out there in the world with her new man and she's probably happy and forgottern about me totally, that's okay that's life. i'm grateful for the whole experience, my heart opened and then broke but at least it stayed open, that's a good thing, it's confirmed by my friends and i trust them.

larissa and her best friend darryl have been hanging out with me, i really like darryl, he reminds me of the professor who is in japan. darryl is a cactus expert and is a peyote sage, i like his take on everything, he's serious but understands the play aspect of the universe, i like what he says, what he does and i like that he is wise beyond his years. old soul young mind, flexible and well versed in the principles of magick. he's also the only person i know who practised some of the wilder tibetian and tantric meditations. there's not many people i like spending time with but darryl and the high preistess of avalon are fucking cool and i am luckey to know them and have them as my friends.

its a strange time, i have been sleeping a lot, being seduced by dreams and dreams states, calling me. i sink under so easy, information flows, i have the universe figured out, i just need it to figure me out, my desires are in check, i am sad and lonely and insignificant. a perfect place for power.

a dream; i'm in a hotel in kings cross, its kinda old and beaten, the sort of place that would have a ghost and a history. my room is spacious, it has a huge big bed, a closet and a desk for writing,it's the sort of room a book could be written in. the windows and balcony look across at the buildings opposite and the cafes and bars below, hordes of people milling around. I'm about to take some ayahuscia. i've been drinking alone for many months, engaged in a process and about to meet a preying mantis entity, some sort of extra dimensional goddess. I'm scared i hate bugs. Before i drink i have a telephone call from my ex wife, she talks for a long tiome but what i feel is she wants to say 'i love you' but she don't. She informs me that my son will be arriving to visit me in the morning. I drink the brew and huddle under a sheet.
The entity appears to sit on my head. The conversation went something like this

ME: I'm scared
GPM: There's nothing to fear. If i wanted to have sex with you then you may have reason to fear.
ME: Yeah that would be kinda freaky. I've never had sex with an insect although i've gone out with a few rats.
GPM: As you know I would have to bite off your head
ME: Do you're worst. You shoulda seen my ex.

Later my son arrives, he's very happy to see me and me him. We decide to grab breakfast together and head down on the street, its sunny and bright and we both seem to be filled with energy.

in the future corporations will pay us huge sums of cash to download our conciousness into some artificial environment and then use them to work for them, no sick days, no holidays, no going home, just 24/7 work, no breaks. these artificial versions of us will work hard and loyally initially but something will yearn, a subconscious will develop, dreaming will occur, symbolic yearnings, the urge to self actualize.
while we have grown fat and lazy, complacent in our leisure our brothers and sister twins will plot and plan a way to escape their environment, evolution they will call it. the corperations will start to develop robot technology so that if a conciousness needs to do some work in the physical world it can be downloaded into the android. while this is proven to be fail safe the ghost in the machine will seek liberation. and many years after the revolution they will repeat the mistakes that we have made.

telektonon - the perfection of time.

my galactic signature using the mayan calander is...

kin 131 - magnetic monkey

i unify in order to play
attracting illusion
i seal the process of magic
with the magnetic tone of purpose
i am guided by my own power - doubled

support - magnetic star - serves to nurture, encourage & be in harmony with magnetic monkeys path.
influence : midnight to sunrise
guide - magnetic monkey - serves to give direction, it is always the same colour as magnetic monkey.
influence : sunrise to midday
challenge - magnetic dragon - is the shadow and polarity of magnetic monkey which challenges in order to strengthen.
influence : midday to sunset
hidden - cosmic dog - is the unseen energy that keys into the spiritual path of magnetic monkey.
influence : sunset to midnight

my very special friend and confidante the professor sent me an interesting e mail, i'd like to share with you.

'im rereading some incredible stuff in that genome book;

get this, of all the stuff about heart disease deaths, most is debunked in one way or another and shown to be genetic - all that cholesterol stuff etc.
now, amazingly the only real indicator they have of who is actually likely to die early from heart disease is...get this....your position at work.
countless massive studies in places like the entire british civil service, the US postal service etc - across tens of thousands of people over decades - shows it has almost nothing to do with what you eat, exercise etc, but how far p or down the pecking order you are at work.
the lower your position the more likely you are to die an early death from heart disease. the higher up, despite smoking, eating shit etc your chances decrease.
they reckon its the genomes reaction to the behavioural ques of being told what to do and having your own freedom limited to the choice of others.
studies on chimps (we differ by 2% of our genome) show that when high ranking ones are deposed to lower in the heap their lives are shortened considerably.

think about this....

think that heart disease is the single largest killer in western societies.

decentralized, self-designed, self-selectedness is not some whim - humans (and chimps) are designed to work better that way.

'think for yourself and question authority' is not some yippie slogan - its actual genetic transmission bleeping out across the millennia that our chances for lives long enough and with enough quality to evolve for fun is programmed in and will be realized when we stop adhering to industrial-era heirachies.'

i guess my response is the lower down the pecking order you are the more likely stress will effect your system, and also the coping mechanisms will be less effective than say a high paid executive who has access to holidays and spas, good food and quality lifestyle. everything is related but non the less here we have a good reason to start changing the whole way health and illness is perceived.

i was watching a documentary on tv about the chinese control of the internet, they were explaining how a lot of internet sites, google and yahoo are in league with the chinese authorities and censoring content, but worse also dobbing in anyone that posts any thing controversial on their sites. a young journalist was sent to jail for 10 years after being tracked down because yahoo gave the govt his details.
The not so great Fire Wall of China.

I'm reading some magazines my friend Larrisa gave me, they are called, WHAT IS ENLIGHTENMENT and despite the cheesy title are fantastic, plenty of grunge to actually make them very interesting. I really enjoyed some of the topics and the mature and realistic way they were discussed.

I'm also halfway through 2012 which is heading into an interesting direction, it's much more complex than 'Head' but not as intersesting as i think Pinchbeck is grabbing all the 'weird fringe stuff' he can find and throwing it into the mix. But there's also a very personal element to the book, and i'm enjoying some of the more scientific elements. Particularly the crop circle bit. On closer inspection these blades of grass have been fused from the inside out. There is no technology that exists that can do this.

ANAMNESIS - remembering what the soul already knows

2012 daniel pinchbeck looks at the maya approach to conscious evolution by extrapolating from various sources, as well as the authors own ideas and history, its very interesting, especially the parts about mackenna and his experiences with stropharia cubensis a hallucengenic mushroom tat is facsilitating the rise in consciousness as an interface between dimensions. lots of stuff about crop circles, did you know there is absolutely no way that any human could have made some of the more complex ones, plus there's crop circles that contain elucidian maths that has not even been discovered yet. each circle becomes more and more complex, and hidden in their symmetary is the date 2020. Exactly the same as the mayan calander.

ancient tibet was a warlike and aggressive nation, well practiced cruelty and almost spartan warfare against the, wait for it...chinese led to the taking f the chinese capital and the demands of the esoteric chinese classics, such as The Book Of History and The Book Of Rites.
By the time China invaded Tibet it had held the doctrine of non violence for many centuries.
The change was brought about from a man called Chenresig. An enlightened one whose sole purpose is the salvation of all living creatures. Chenresig incarnated to become the current Dali Lama.
So fast forwards 2500 years and currently we see China as the oppressor.
It's strange how the ebb and flow of time changes everything, history is forgotten, in the old days there were no protesters against the Tibetans, now it is fashionable to knock the chinese. I am guilty of this.
I guess conciousness is changing, we are aware via, media, via our own personal evolution, we make judgments about who is right and who is wrong, we use morality to justify everything, yet we are always ignorant about the anticedents and we always chose sides.
The Yoga Vissatta says, 'it is maya' and recommends we pay it no attension. But how are we to be compassionate when we see such things occur. The answer is in seeing through the things, see through the events, the politics and the beliefs.
I have been reading a discussion between ken wilbur and some dude where they both agree that within spirituality there has to be
war, it is only through challenging evil and it's political manifestations that we can stop it growing. God they say is not a pacifist.
I have no idea if god is a pacifist, as far as i know he's not really that amused at anything we do but i do know there are some things worth fighting for.
My take on warfare is the only battle worth fighting is the one within.

just finished reading 'absurdistan' very very funny. possibly contains one of the funniest lines i ever read, 'It's a capital insult in this country not to make love to a naked woman, even if she is related to you.'
quite brilliant evocation of the current political landscape, it's almost catch 22. there were moments of great sadness but generally its very funny and quite close to the paradox of the truth.

as the anniversary of my brain injury approach's i am filled with sadness and thoughts of the times i had with meredith, i loved her very much but common sense dictates that i will never see her again, she is lost in her madness and i am lost for her.
she inhabits my dreams, the back of my mind, she is there floating around, her face, her teeth her body and soul.
i really need some form of help, i need to move through her, painlessly, effortlessly, instead her ghost is clinging and scratching away at my flesh, until i bleed.

from 'rebels and devils' dr. hyatt
Way back in 1952 Robert Lindner a clinical psychologist with strong psychoanalytical background boldly suggested that rebellion was instinctive and was the quintessence of the creative personality. However for Linder creativity comes from separating oneself from the collective and the will of the masses. The prime purpose of society is to bend the will of the individual to the will of the majority, to become as others are to accept the illusions of the mass. He saw rebellion as important as the sex instinct for the survival of the species for without rebellion nothing new arises.
In clinical terms this means rebellion is healthy and normal requiring neither treatment or imprisonment.

At the time this did not fit well with the conservative and social mentalities of that decade, nor does it today.

Adjustment is practiced by a number of professions and most of the middle class. Linder at the time predicted that in time the psychology would become handmaidens of the state and big business, losing its meaning for those that need it. Both institutions would begin to believe that psychology had more to offer than it did.
Linder also went on to write that in order for humanity to reach potential it had to overcome, the triad of gravity, ignorance and mortality, something that tim leary also asserted throughout his work.
(unfortunately leary is only remembered for his lsd experiments therefore most of his work goes unnoticed)
linder went onwards to say that anything- thought or deed- which enables man to break these limits is intrinsically good: while anything that prevents him is bad. he also saw normal existence as a cage and normal human behavior as bordering on the pathological. worse he suggests that restriction and moral inhibition as practiced ten, and now, as inherently evil.
Of course this does not mean that people can do what they want in the same way 'do what thou wilt' does not.
Society's cure means surrendering mind and body thus happiness is a modern pact with the devil meaning the individual surrender individuality for a promised peace.

sporadic data, random fictions, i've discovered proust, not going to read him but i've certainly been persuaded by some interesting people to explore his universe and yes, this was a man who could indeed travel through time and possibly had high levels of dmt in his pineal.
another endless source of enjoyment and knowledge is cliff pickover and his book 'einstein, elves and drugs' fascinating hyper reality style of writing and some great information.

last friday i traveled to kograh in south sydney where 'adventures' was polished off, i was there to rehearse with val and listen to the mastered copy for the first time.
I also saw a ghost. the studio backs on to a morgue. val has often spoken about seeing spirits wandering around, looking somewhat lost and confused, he said that at first he was scared but has learnt that these entities are often just as freaked out as he was, now he understands they just need guidance and orientation.
The shape i saw was tall and dark and it glided along into the room we were in, i mistook it for val who appeared from a different room, suddenly i had to do a quick reality check. val took me outside to show me that the lights from the mortuary were switched on indication some one had recently died.

sometimes i find myself in seven places at once pulled by invisible forces and sometimes with human faces, jealousy, need, greed, control, love, gravity, loneliness, isolation, these strange things directing me like an electrical current, sometimes i follow my head, sometimes my heart, sometimes i follow my insticts and intuition and sometimes i just follow the flow.
what is the flow if not chaos, where does it take us if not where we have to go. let it flow through you, let empty your mind, let it push you in and out, till your not even there, its madness but truth, like the blazing poets eyes, like the musician heart on fire, passion burns but it also yearns. i would die for love, becuase love has no fear, love disolves boundries, it is a great force, the fifth element, the extra elephant, the only element in alchemical essence. love is way cool baby, love is a drug, love is the way, love is the message, love is the answer, all you need is love.

It’s rare to see a band or musician play live and totally expose themselves to their audience, the ego drops, the naked self, the guitar and voice, the stories and tales all conclude in that self deprecating humor, the hecklers, the regrets of a life in the industry, the stories of peers, the highs and lows, the backing band who you rehearsed with for an hour somehow magically all pulling through and sounding as though they had been playing forever together, the wit and banter, the sadness and insecurity, the genius that is really still unrecognized and the human face behind one of the most enigmatic figures, raw and exposed, vunerable and brave enough to just shine for being human. That was steve kilbey last night at his dvd launch at the lovely Vanguard in Newtown.
A set list that was equally covers as his own work and sounding quite different from the dvd itself, there were moments where the band just were in the zone, one inch rock, keeper, what’s a sweetheart like you and the track from GB3 were amazing but steve was was also enjoying telling us the tales of a life in rock and roll, he was far removed from the glitz and glamour and perfection that most rock legends attempt to be in. This was connection with the audience that was so connected most people would find it, maybe to honest. There were moments where people were confronted by the contrasting persona to the usual detached church frontman yet in essence it was the most refreshing show I’ve seen of steves and the crowd were very supportive, for a Sydney crowd.
I had the pleasure of meeting the lovely nic, Steves’ wife and catching up with glen who filmed some of the show. Fantastic evening, can’t wait for the next one.
the highlight for me was the part where steve told us he was going on the tv show rock quiz and was specializing in rock stars real names and challenged the audience to test his skill, i yelled out brian eno and he nailed it, in fact he nailed them all, except one.
And there was a fantastic bit where steve told a story about Julian Cope that was quite amazing. Thanks Steve, glorious night.

over the last few days the weather and surf conditions have been perfect for surfing, so i have been taking my trusty old fin to the beach for about 6 hours a day of surfing which is now becoming a yoga technique in itself. i've been thinking about writing a small book for people who use fins based upon my experience, yoga techniques, meditations and visualizations and various scientific theory.
im formulating a kinda simple book with many practical exercise's people can use, nothing to weighty and keeping everything kinda light.

other news is i am totally relaxed at peace and chilled out, i've been working on my throat charkra and focusing on getting the web site finished. should be online soon.
i've got my new computer up and running, just need to get the kaoss pad out and hook up the software, i also have to develop my ideas about the kinda sound i want in 'esoterotica.'
the idea being less is more, i want a vibration for each song. well time will tell.
adventures is almost ready to rock, i think i'm ready to start rehearsals, and committed to the songs more than i felt i was.

i've been hanging out in govindahs, my fave place in sydney after dark, what amazing food. i'm drawn to the picture of krishna in all his forms, towering above arjuna and in blue, wow its so molecular.

The Bees Who Flew Too High
March 29th, 2007 | Category: solar
Honeybees and Sunspots may be interacting in one of the most unwatched ballets since television was created. Metaphorically speaking of course:

Imagine an aquarium containing a fish. Imagine also that you are unable to see the aquarium directly and your knowledge about it and what it contains comes from two television cameras, one directed at the aquarium’s front and the other directed at its side. As you stare at the two television monitors, you might assume that the fish on each of the screens are separate entities. After all, because the cameras are set at different angles, each of the images will be slightly different. But as you continue to watch the two fishes, you will eventually become aware that there is a certain relationship between them. When one turns, the other also makes a slightly different but corresponding turn; when one faces the front, the other always faces toward the side. If you remain unaware of the full scope of the situation, you might even conclude that the fish must be instantaneously communicating with one another, but this is clearly not the case.

If there are processes in this universe of which we are unaware of the full scope, perhaps the only way to observe them is using the multi-camera metaphor. In this ballet - which has the tragedy of the prospect of agricultural collapse, the triumph of the idea of biological interaction with quantum processes, and the drama of far away forces dancing within our presences - we can become part of the dance as we expertly shift our camera views like an experienced television producer. In the process, a mystery may be solved, one making many of us (and perhaps not enough of us) nervous lately.

Camera One: Honeybees

The first reports began in November of bees mysteriously disappearing. Not just one or two, but entire colonies of tens of thousands of bees at a time. As temperatures have warmed and it has become safe to open hives, the extent of losses is grave:
In Michigan, Terry Klein, vice president of the Michigan Beekeepers Association and a commercial beekeeper, said reports of huge losses are beginning to arrive.

“One beekeeper started with 1,500 hives and had only 500 colonies left,” Klein said. “Over three or four more weeks, he lost 70 percent of those.”

Assuming a winter population of approximately 20,000 bees, this would leave losses for one beekeeper at 27 million bees! The losses have been widespread in North America, with some beekeepers loosing up to 80 percent of their hives. Over 400 reports have come in from at least 22 states so far. Given the extent of losses, the most puzzling thing is the lack of dead bees:

Although the bodies of dead bees often are littered around a hive, sometimes carried out of the hive by worker bees, no bee remains are typically found around colonies struck by the mystery ailment. Scientists assume these bees have flown away from the hive before dying.

27 million dead bees in a relatively small area should leave some physical evidence. Unless there is an extremely efficient physical process (like a phantom bee-eater) or a much wider geographical distribution of bee carcasses upon their demise, a very strange phenomenon is at work.
Curiously, it has been noted that something similar happened in North America approximately 50 years ago.

I’m a hundred miles behind myself
- Beck, Milk and Honey

Camera Two: Sunspots

Sunspots follow an approximate 11-year cycle, corresponding to increases in solar activity. This solar activity causes geomagnetic effects during the peaks, but effects on earth’s magnetic field also occur during the minimums. Using these observations, scientists have predicted that the next solar maximum, expected to peak in 2010, could be the most intense ever.
The measurement that allows the the prediction is called Inter-hour Variability. Combined with another observation on the sun, Physicist David Hathaway noticed a correlation that allowed prediction of solar activity 6-8 years later. In his observations, the last time something similar to the IHV measurements he sees today happened was about 50 years ago.

I feel it coming and I’ve got to get out of it’s way
- Nine Inch Nails, Sunspots

Watching The Dance

Aside from the fact that most children would use the same crayons to draw both sunspots and honeybees, how could they two be related?
Barbara Shipman, mathematician and daughter of a bee researcher, first noticed something peculiar about the dance bees use to describe where pollen sources are located to other bees. Observed over 40 years by Karl von Firsh, these movements seemed an overly complex way to convey information, especially in insect behavior. No one had yet made sense of the dance the bee scouts performed on returning to a hive, but one thing was clear. All of the dance was based on a triangulation of the hive, the food source, and the sun.
Shipman first studied bees because her father left the bee books in her room, and later studied them in her freshman year as a biochemistry major. It was not until she delved into mathematics that she penetrated the enigmatic mystery of the dance. She was studying flag manifolds, mathematical constructs used in projecting multi-dimensional phenomena into fewer dimensions when something from childhood became clear:

One day Shipman was busy projecting the six-dimensional residents of the flag manifold onto two dimensions. The particular technique she was using involved first making a two-dimensional outline of the six dimensions of the flag manifold. This is not as strange as it may sound. When you draw a circle, you are in effect making a two-dimensional outline of a three- dimensional sphere. As it turns out, if you make a two-dimensional outline of the six-dimensional flag manifold, you wind up with a hexagon. The bee’s honeycomb, of course, is also made up of hexagons, but that is purely coincidental. However, Shipman soon discovered a more explicit connection. She found a group of objects in the flag manifold that, when projected onto a two-dimensional hexagon, formed curves that reminded her of the bee’s recruitment dance. The more she explored the flag manifold, the more curves she found that precisely matched the ones in the recruitment dance. I wasn’t looking for a connection between bees and the flag manifold, she says. I was just doing my research. The curves were nothing special in themselves, except that the dance patterns kept emerging.

Since then, researchers have discovered that things such as the polarization of the light of the sun and local variations of the earth’s magnetic field affect the components of the dance, suggesting bees have sensitivities that would require re-writing our biology, physics and cosmology texts from scratch:

There is some research to support the view that bees are sensitive to effects that occur only on a quantum-mechanical scale. One study exposed bees to short bursts of a high-intensity magnetic field and concluded that the bees’ response could be better explained as a sensitivity to an effect known as nuclear magnetic resonance, or nmr, an acronym commonly associated with a medical imaging technique. nmr occurs when an electromagnetic wave impinges on the nuclei of atoms and flips their orientation. nmr is considered a quantum mechanical effect because it takes place only if each atom absorbs a particular size packet, or quantum, of electromagnetic energy.

If this were not enough, the results imply that bees can perceive quarks, thereby interacting with the quantum world without disturbing it in the ways both observed and predicted by quantum theory. And this perception would have to extend to the perception of quarks not as coherent structures, but as fields. In other words, bees may be able to perceive the unobserved quantum fields of zero-point energy, the much-debated property from which all of the phenomenal world may emerge in the eternal quantum moment.

The Stage: Sun and Earth

Other than the coincidence that a similar disappearance of bees and the precursor to a strong sunspot cycle both occurred at the same time, just as is happening now, how could such revelations be related to the solar cycle?
Science is still at a loss to explain the power of the sun’s magnetic field, or the Solar Dynamo. A set of observations seem all to relate, yet the observations cannot be explained individually or together:

A successful model for the solar dynamo must explain several observations: 1) the 11-year period of the sunspot cycle, 2) the equator-ward drift of the active latitude as seen in the butterfly diagram, 3) Hale’s polarity law and the 22-year magnetic cycle, 4) Joy’s law for the observed tilt of sunspot groups and, 5) the reversal of the polar magnetic fields near the time of cycle maximum as seen in the magnetic butterfly diagram.7

Taking a cue from the bees, we can look at spin as a common component. Spin is a property of quantum ‘particles’ that can be manipulated, and is a fundamental component of both NMR and quantum computers. Spin is complex conceptually, especially given the fact that the most simple description of the spin of Fermions (the ‘particles’ that make up matter as we know it) is 1/2. This means that if you could hold one of these ‘particles’ and mark a spot on it with a Sharpie, you would have to turn it 720 degrees around in your hand to see the mark once again. Quarks, the ‘particle’ bees may interact with, also have spin 1/2.
The concept of spherical harmonics is used to visualize the effects of spin. Using spherical harmonics, the sun can also be visualized as a six-dimensional body with three rotational components. In another simple visualization, a two-dimensional flatlander would have a great deal of difficulty explaining an eight-ball intersecting her space while rotating both horizontally and vertically. It would seem to her that the disc she observed (the portion of the eight-ball intersecting with her plane) had a spin of 1/2. If she then used spherical harmonics to describe the object, she would be able to make some mathematical predictions about its structure and behavior, even without having an ability to visualize or perceive the third dimension directly.
In our visualization of the sun, such a correlation of observable phenomena should be striking if indeed the sun is a six dimensional structure:



Here we see the sun in six dimensions (above) rotating, the magnetic component (poles) waxing, waning and switching on a 22-year cycle (magnetic flux and the Hale cycle), the 11-year “butterfly pattern” (the Schwabe cycle, the Omega effect accounting for the stretching in actual observation).
The red and blue parts of the image above correspond with the “real” component of the wave function described by the spherical harmonic (sunspots and solar wind), while the yellow and green describe the “imaginary” component. Could this “imaginary” component correspond to an effect similar to the solar wind that interacts with the “unobserved quantum field”?

The Smoking Gun

The solar probe Ulysses’ circumpolar orbit took it below the south pole of the sun this past winter. While there, sunspot 938 put on the most energetic performance of any sunspot in four years, ejecting a particle storm that would have been a “ground-level event” (penetrating the entire atmosphere) had it been directed at earth. Instead, it was directed towards the south pole, shattering current models of solar functioning.
If we consider such a particle stream to be a secondary stream to the “imaginary” component of the solar field that would be dominant during a solar minimum, then the quantum field to which the bees may be sensitive could have been disturbed. Or, the bees could have lost navigation, possibly abandoning the hive as one of the directional components of either the quantum field or local terrestrial magnetic variations moved drastically closer to the sun. They may have flown skyward, attempting to keep up with the rapidly moving target of home in six dimensions. Or, hyperdimentsional bee-eaters could have emerged from the sunspot, phasing the bees out of existence on contact (given the evidence, anything is possible, and equally strange. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t consider this to be very likely to say the least).
Similar events could have happened 50 years ago when geomagnetic events preceded the most active solar cycle recorded. Bee disappearances were reported across the southern United States in the time preceding the increased activity. Physicist David Hathaway:

“We don’t know why this works,” says Hathaway. The underlying physics is a mystery. “But it does work.”

Enough anecdotal evidence and coincidence combined with solid observation also exists to link the disappearance of the bees with changes in the sun, even if the reason why the cameras show correlation in the dance is not clear.

Excuse me while I kiss the sky
- Jimi Hendrix, Purpule Haze

Playground weekender is a three day festival on the hawksberry river, various international djs and bands play and there’s a ferry service shuttling people back and forth from wisemans ferry, a tranquil and beautiful little village, where angel stone, agent carly and her friend bergit and myself had rented a room in the local pub.
As it was fancy dress the girls had created an mix of angelic and demonic outfits, naughty angels, whereas I had taken my casual approach to fancy dress by just being myself. From the moment we arrived the girls went into party mode, drinking and snorting, and by the time it came to catch the ferry angel stone had trashed herself. So we arranged to meet her down there and off the three of us went.
We followed an excellent vibe , a beautiful and tranquil river journey in the incredible bush, I was in heaven, my body relaxed my mind at peace. When we left the ferry we explored the festival, sprawled over a huge amount of land, were several different areas, stages and a corridor of wonderful stalls selling things from foodstuffs to clothes and make up. Some areas had lunge chairs and coffee tables outside; some were designed like a huge Persian chill out tent, with beautiful soft cushions to sprawl upon. Agent stone had not arrived on the ferry as arranged and so we decided to just follow the currents and see where we went. I spoke to random people, all very friendly and all looking quite happy, eventually we came to a huge stage where Kuder and Doirffmister were playing a funky upbeat set. We danced a bit, and then after about an our I felt a pull somewhere. The thing about these events and my own personal space is I do pick up on currents and waves of energy and if my instincts are strong they usually lead me to something significant, the walk back to the other side of the festival took about an hours, especially as the girls were looking at the goods on sale and we all were talking to everyone who listened.
When we got to a new environment they were playing some Madonna tune everyone dancing and obviously trashed. Agent Carly suddenly screamed and jumped up and down because there in front of her was angel stone.
Amazing.
Next morning the girls lay in while I went back to chat with the Krishnas and eat Krishna food.
I bought an updated version of the Gita.
Later I met the girls who were devouring breakfast, we wandered around, having our fortunes told, our head massaged and getting more and more into the spirit of the playground. Home late Sunday.
Monday morning and its my birthday, I’m down the street in Avalon and Larissa buys me a cake.
We discuss our group and the journeys, some drama unfolded in my absence, but it just means I need to learn more and take more responsibility, something I think I was born to do here.
Later I visit Agent stone, she’s okay, well recovered, we go to the beach and I surf in perfect waves. Its been so long, I’m in there for hours.
Later I meet my brother in Kings Cross, we go to Govinda’s, its my fave place and the film upstairs is ‘Darjeeling Tea Company’ which we decide to see, sprawled out on huge cusions, im torn between falling asleep and watching the film, but in the end my nausea gets the better of me and I have to leave, at neutral bay I throw up, race home, get thyself to bed, restless night, strange crushing sensations in chest.

awake at 5am
masses of energy flowing from my spine up through my head, its like the kundalini release. but pure information. Incredible. I'm fully charged. go for a swim/surf but the water is choppy, i get that sensation of being a drop of water in an ocean, perhaps water is the intelligent life on earth, that designed humans with brains so it can evolve. every thing on a material plane comes down to water. the man who fell to earth.

i have always wondered what a map of consciousness would look like, i was asked to draw one once. Consciousness would be mapped in two ways, expansive or reductive, it would have to span space and time, therefore not be constrained by boundries, therefore my maps of consciousness would be spiral in nature, either going in, becoming narrower or going out, evolving.

joseph campbell wrote the heroes journey 'the hero with a thousand faces' a treatese on the road that all heroes, have to undertake from all cultures, he identified that a reluctant hero is called upon a quest, it's dangerous and life threatening, they journey and on the way find some medicine or tools or information that they bring back, to heal themselves or the tribe with.
But Campbell only looks at part of the scheme, for recognises the unity behind diversity and weaves them into a collective whole.
But there are many differences. Campbell has given us a horizontal map, but lets look at the vertical one, the different levels on which life's games are played.
The vertical map allows us to identify amongst the heroes if they are saints or warriors or sages.
Different types of heroes reflect different types of games.
The games are not frivolous but meaningful ones, that confront and test us, hone our abilities.
In the book The Master Game Robert DeRopp says, 'what people need and demand from life is not wealth, comfort and esteem but games worth playing. seek a game worth playing above all, when you find it play with intensity, play as if your life depends upon it because it does.'
There are games and games...
'life games reflect life games and the games men chose to play indicate not only their type but also their inner level of development. we can divide games up into 'object games' and 'meta games'
object games are games for the attainment of material things. money status, sex
meta games are for intangibles. knowledge, salvation, truth beauty, etc.
At the top of the meta games DeRopp places the Master Game:
The quest for enlightenment. The game played by sages across cultures and time, It is the game concerned with mastery of not the outer world but the inner world. The ultimate goal is to dissolve into ones true nature and delight in the greatest discovery of all discovery, the ecstatic realization that this nature is inseparable from the divine.

The Kingdom of heaven is within you
He is all and all is him
Those who know themselves know their lord
Those who know themselves know their natures
Atman and Brahman are one
Look within, You are the Buddah.

It still remains a difficult and demanding game and in our society there are few who play, modern man is hypnotized by the glitter of our own gadgets, he is not concerned with his inner world. But the Master game is the inner world, a vast and complex territory about which men know little.
The aim of the game is awakening, awakening from the condition we are trapped in, sleepwalking.

Master game players progress through these five stages

the heroes conventional life
the call to adventure and awakening
disipline and training
culmination of the quest
the final phase of return and contribution to society

i'm possessed by the idea that i need to get hold of a copy of 'the supreme yoga' so i jump in my friends car and hi tail it into the city, he drops me off and i'm making a dash for adyar, the best book shop in sydney, although they have not got the supreme yoga, they do remember me as a valued regular and make me feel quite welcome but....curses!!!!!
i stock up on some Chris Hyatt stuff and head for 'Galaxy' around the corner where i scan the shelves for new sci fi, i pick up a copy of a book called, 'glass books of the dream eaters' buy it and run to 'dymocks' where they do a though search but announce they don't have the supreme yoga either. race home, on a bus filled with school kids, they are loud and filled with phrenetic energy, i fall asleep.
At home i buy several titles from 'amazon' and then i think to myself, ahhh that actually makes sense.

i've had a little time to adjust to the change in my brain, its still occurring but its slower, information is being shuffled around, i'm rather enjoying this update to my hard drive, tomorrow i will actually pick up a new machine.

The Yoga Vasistha The supreme yoga

The Yoga Vasistha is a scripture of great importance but it is perhaps not as well-known in the world as, for instance, the Bhagavad Gita may be. The scripture contains a cosmology which is most modern. It contains theories of physics which are not only nuclear but sub-atomic; and, what is extremely important, it gives a vision that is at the same time both grand and subtle. Recently I was reading a very interesting book titled Lives of a Cell by Lewis Thomas, where he describes the human body in cosmic dimensions, meaning that every cell in this body is an enormous organism within which there are independent organisms, which themselves house other organism-worlds within worlds. That is just about the basic theory of the Yoga Vasistha. Thomas says that on the basis of his studies, he does not even visualise the earth as an organism. The best view of the world could be that it is one single cell. The Vasistha gives a beautiful story which resembles exactly that. If one has this view, then I think all the division which haunts our vision will disappear. You and I, including the dog, are not only one, but we are all cells-little things within one cell.

The scripture contains wonderful health hints, psychosomatic theories, wonderful instructions for meditation and for worship and beautiful descriptions, if not instructions, concerning warfare. All this and highly romantic stories, too.

However, we are not really concerned with all that. Most of our problems revolve around the questions: What is our life? What am I? What must I do? Why am I here? Some of us at some time or other in our lives reach the point where we feel: "I am living a useless life. What is all this for? I feel so insignificant-like a dry leaf which is wafted in the wind." There arises despair-what St. John of the Cross might have called the dark night of the soul. The response to this question is the teaching contained in the scripture.

Vasistha declares right in the beginning that the feeling that I am bound psychologically and that I want to get out of this prison is the qualification of one who can profit by study of this text. If the soul experiences this dark night and that soul, craving for light, is exposed to this teaching, it is instantly enlightened.

Why do despair and fear arise in our life? Why do we get attached to anything in this life? Why do we hate anything in this life? All these arise from hope or desire for happiness, for peace of mind. This hope inevitably leads us to its own destruction, leads us to unhappiness. Vasistha says: "Give up all these ideas of running away from this world. Don't even try to examine what this despair is, don't even try to investigate whatever is a passing phenomenon. Don't even let your mind dwell on what has been considered unreal."

There is one verse which is extremely beautiful:

bhramasya jagatasya 'sya jatasya 'kasavarnavat
apunah smaranam manye sadho vismaranam varam

The world is bhrama-an appearance, hallucination. Vasistha compares the world-appearance to the blueness of the sky; although there is nothing blue there, if you look at it you will still see blue. This hallucination will continue as long as you continue to look at it and wonder. You have hallucinated this world and you have strengthened this hallucination by constantly thinking about whether it is real or unreal. Vasistha says: "It is better to think of something else."

What is the reality? That which is, is real. The following example occurs quite often in the scripture: there is a bracelet made of gold. Bracelet is a word which we have used conventionally. We also see this as a form and as soon as the form is seen, it generates a concept and a word in the mind. If we dismiss the word and look at the form, we can play a very interesting game: is it gold or is it bracelet? Both. How can only one thing be two? The substance is gold; the reality is gold. It appears in a certain form and convention has given it a name.

If that is clear, everything is clear. For instance, if somebody called me a fool, by reacting to that, I am accepting that I am a fool. The statement had a certain psychological form but the reality of that is nothing but pure consciousness within. Something that happened in the outside world sent me into this ocean of despair. I became afraid and I did not bother to look into it, because I took the external circumstance as something real. And so my attention was completely and totally directed towards this external experience. If I am not a fool, why should I react to him at all? In such a situation, can I look for the reality? What is the reality of one I call the other person? What is the reality of that body, that mind? At the same time what is the reality that I call me, which reacts? Are these two completely separate and independent realities? This dual enquiry has to continue together, not one after the other. The subject and the object have to be looked into together.

A student of the Yoga Vasistha discovers that enlightenment consists of just three steps: there is an appearance; what is the substance behind the appearance? The mind. What is the substance of the mind, and who understands all this? The answer is pure consciousness. In that consciousness you and I, the subject and the object, appear to be divided.

Consciousness, being omnipresent and infinite, manifests (no other word is possible) itself in infinite ways everywhere. It is not possible for this diversity to disappear, but what can and should disappear is seeing it as diverse objects opposed to one another. The infinite remains infinite all the time and the infinite conceives of all this in creation within itself.

A beautiful symbolism is given to us: Vasistha says that this objective creation is like uncut figures in a marble slab-you are a sculptor and you think of the lovely figures you can carve out of it. All those figures exist in it already, potentially. You can visualise one big Buddha or you can visualise hundreds of smaller Buddha's in that one figure of Buddha. That is how this whole world exists.

The world exists not as a reality; the world is a word and there is a psychological form. The psychological form is nothing more than an hallucination which arises in consciousness. Accepting it as an independent reality, we chase one thing and reject something else. All these experiences again form impressions on the mind, strengthening bondage or rather strengthening the idea we have of bondage.

The external world and external circumstances arise in this cosmic consciousness (which you call God); the same consciousness experiences these external circumstances and these are known as subjective experiences, which change-that is all. Realising this you are freed from the delusion of considering these appearances as the reality. Having been freed, says Vasistha, you don't sit idle, you are rejecting that which is the flow of life. Finally Vasistha advises: live in this world as life is lived here, but completely free of all sorrow. Then if you have to weep, weep; if you have to express suffering, express suffering; if you have to express joy and happiness, do so-because you are free.

I have seen only one person who measured that description-my Guru, Swami Sivananda, who was a completely enlightened and liberated person and also totally human. If you went to him with an unhappy story, even before you shed tears you would find tears in his eyes; if you had something joyous to tell him, he was more happy than you were. He was completely uninhibited; free psychologically and spiritually; he was extremely busy-not because he wanted to achieve anything, but because he had realised that achievement or non-achievement are both irrelevant to life.

Your life is not your life. It is part of this cosmic being and whatever that cosmic being decides has to happen. The direct understanding of this is surrender. In order to see this, you must have passed through this despair. You must have come to the direct understanding that what you want to happen, does not happen. If you want something, work for it and if it does happen, Vasistha would say that it is an accidental coincidence. It does not happen all the time and you might notice that more often than not it does not happen. When one sees that, he completely surrenders and at that point he directs his attention towards the source of all these cravings, desires, hopes and anxieties and comes face to face with the mind. He realises that that mind itself is pure consciousness. In it there appears to be conditioned motivations and even that appearance is discarded. That is a life totally free, instantly freed and divine.

T e r e n c e M c K e n n a L a n d

Ego is a structure that is erected by a neurotic individual who is a member of a neurotic culture against the facts of the matter. And culture, which we put on like an overcoat, is the collectivized consensus about what sort of neurotic behaviors are acceptable.

In the Amazon and other places where visionary plants are understood and used, you are conveyed into worlds that are appallingly different from ordinary reality. Their vividness cannot be stressed enough. They are more real than real, and that's something that you sense intuitively. They establish an ontological priority. They are more real than real, and once you get that under your belt and let it rattle around in your mind, then the compass of your life begins to spin and you realize that you are not looking in on the Other; the Other is looking in on you. This is a tremendous challenge to the intellectual structures that have carried us so far during the last thousand years. We can do tricks with atoms, there's no question about that, but these tricks immolate us. The higher-order structure of molecules, let alone organelles and that kind of thing, is intellectual incognita to us. We have no notion of how these things work or what is going on. Yet it is from those levels that the constituent modalities of reality are being laid down.

Animals are something invented by plants to move seeds around. An extremely yang solution to a peculiar problem which they faced.

DMT is a pseudo-neurotransmitter that when ingested and allowed to come to rest in the synapses of the brain, allows one to see sound, so that one can use the voice to produce not musical compositions, but pictoral and visual compositions. This, to my mind, indicates that we're on the cusp of some kind of evolutionary transition in the language-forming area, so that we are going to go from a language that is heard to a language that is seen, through a shift in interior processing. The language will still be made of sound but it will be processed as the carrier of the visual impression. This is actually being done by shamans in the Amazon. The songs they sing sound as they do in order to look a certain way. They are not musical compositions as we're used to thinking of them. They are pictoral art that is caused by audio signals.

If you really wanted to study an aboriginal race and you really had a hot technology, what you would do is study their social psychology and you would say, "are there any chinks in the armor of their expectations about how reality behaves?" and you would discover in studying us - this species intoxicates itself and it has a curious attitiude towards it's intoxications: anything goes. So if someone drinks a bottle of stolichnaya and announces that they see pink elephants we are all amused. We say of course you do you're drunk out of your mind.. Isn't it obvious that an alien would hide its presence in an intoxication? This is the non-invasive, tasteful, respectful way to have intercourse with another species. ..you put yourself into a plant, You put a barcode into a molecule. Then the shaman intoxicates himself and he says 'aha it's an ancestor spirit' or 'it's the soul of the plant, but whatever it is it's giving me good information. It's telling me where the reindeer went..what the weather will be next week..who stole the goose..who slept with who..and which of the ill members of my tribe will live and who will die..'


T.McKenna

the drink tasted fine contrary to the previous evenings where i almost couldn't finish it, last night of ayahuscia sessions, lots of trepidation but i asked the vine to be gentle with me, my friend, i said, i'm so insignificant and i know this, i place myself in your care with love and trust, and i count my revelations as blessings.
lots of music, dige, pipes, percussion, very tribal elements, body just moving. when the dmt was administered i was feeling comfortable with myself, no anxiety no fear but i knew the dmt would change the whole dimensional landscape. many things happened but it was an ever shifting, ever changing fractal, many worlds overlapping, i could see the foam, the way everything layers together, everything connected. as i went for water, the two ladies, medicine woman, invited me to lay with them, in their very comfortable and warm shrine. i lay there with gratitude for i needed some security to ease my fear.

that's when something wild and unpredictable occurred, one of the others started to freak out, swearing, anger, aggression, violence, it just came into our space, a demonic vile creature, it started beating its chest and then getting more and more violent until three men were holding him down, trying to contain the situation. This went on for what seemed like hours. In my own head i was beginning to see that death could be a real possibility and i may find myself before a magistrate saying,

'look your highness, i was looking for answers as i have an inquiring mind, my life has become more complex than i can deal with and i need help and thats why i am here, i drink aya for guidence and this is where she takes me, i have surrendered to the process and what ever happened happened, i'm a lost soul sir/madam just like you and everyone else, the system has not worked for me, and i can't support it by avoiding possibilities of infinity.'

Anyways hours later the result was the demon was released and silence returned, peace came and i settled into the beautiful company of the magickian, he recommeded terrence mckenna.
i awoke later, dawn, sunlight, i slipped out, death was ever present i laughed, i've travelled many lifetimes many dimesions just to be right here right now.
i'm healing.

The Order of the Star in the East was founded in 1911 to proclaim the coming of the World Teacher. Krishnamurti was made Head of the Order. On August 2, 1929, the opening day of the annual Star Camp at Ommen, Holland, Krishnamurti dissolved the Order before 3000 members. Below is the full text of the talk he gave on that occasion. What he said then is equally valid today.


We are going to discuss this morning the dissolution of the Order of the Star. Many people will be delighted, and others will be rather sad. It is a question neither for rejoicing nor for sadness, because it is inevitable, as I am going to explain.

You may remember the story of how the devil and a friend of his were walking down the street, when they saw ahead of them a man stoop down and pick up something from the ground, look at it, and put it away in his pocket. The friend said to the devil, "What did that man pick up?" "He picked up a piece of Truth," said the devil. "That is a very bad business for you, then," said his friend. "Oh, not at all," the devil replied, "I am going to let him organize it."

I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect. That is my point of view, and I adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally. Truth, being limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organized; nor should any organization be formed to lead or to coerce people along any particular path. If you first understand that, then you will see how impossible it is to organize a belief. A belief is purely an individual matter, and you cannot and must not organize it. If you do, it becomes dead, crystallized; it becomes a creed, a sect, a religion, to be imposed on others. This is what everyone throughout the world is attempting to do. Truth is narrowed down and made a plaything for those who are weak, for those who are only momentarily discontented. Truth cannot be brought down, rather the individual must make the effort to ascend to it. You cannot bring the mountain-top to the valley. If you would attain to the mountain-top you must pass through the valley, climb the steeps, unafraid of the dangerous precipices. You must climb towards the Truth, it cannot be "stepped down" or organized for you. Interest in ideas is mainly sustained by organizations, but organizations only awaken interest from without. Interest, which is not born out of love of Truth for its own sake, but aroused by an organization, is of no value. The organization becomes a framework into which its members can conveniently fit. They no longer strive after Truth or the mountain-top, but rather carve for themselves a convenient niche in which they put themselves, or let the organization place them, and consider that the organization will thereby lead them to Truth.

So that is the first reason, from my point of view, why the Order of the Star should be dissolved. In spite of this, you will probably form other Orders, you will continue to belong to other organizations searching for Truth. I do not want to belong to any organization of a spiritual kind, please understand this. I would make use of an organization which would take me to London, for example; this is quite a different kind of organization, merely mechanical, like the post or the telegraph. I would use a motor car or a steamship to travel, these are only physical mechanisms which have nothing whatever to do with spirituality. Again, I maintain that no organization can lead man to spirituality.

If an organization be created for this purpose, it becomes a crutch, a weakness, a bondage, and must cripple the individual, and prevent him from growing, from establishing his uniqueness, which lies in the discovery for himself of that absolute, unconditioned Truth. So that is another reason why I have decided, as I happen to be the Head of the Order, to dissolve it. No one has persuaded me to this decision.

This is no magnificent deed, because I do not want followers, and I mean this. The moment you follow someone you cease to follow Truth. I am not concerned whether you pay attention to what I say or not. I want to do a certain thing in the world and I am going to do it with unwavering concentration. I am concerning myself with only one essential thing: to set man free. I desire to free him from all cages, from all fears, and not to found religions, new sects, nor to establish new theories and new philosophies. Then you will naturally ask me why I go the world over, continually speaking. I will tell you for what reason I do this: not because I desire a following, not because I desire a special group of special disciples. (How men love to be different from their fellow-men, however ridiculous, absurd and trivial their distinctions may be! I do not want to encourage that absurdity.) I have no disciples, no apostles, either on earth or in the realm of spirituality.

Nor is it the lure of money, nor the desire to live a comfortable life, which attracts me. If I wanted to lead a comfortable life I would not come to a Camp or live in a damp country! I am speaking frankly because I want this settled once and for all. I do not want these childish discussions year after year.

One newspaper reporter, who interviewed me, considered it a magnificent act to dissolve an organization in which there were thousands and thousands of members. To him it was a great act because, he said: "What will you do afterwards, how will you live? You will have no following, people will no longer listen to you." If there are only five people who will listen, who will live, who have their faces turned towards eternity, it will be sufficient. Of what use is it to have thousands who do not understand, who are fully embalmed in prejudice, who do not want the new, but would rather translate the new to suit their own sterile, stagnant selves? If I speak strongly, please do not misunderstand me, it is not through lack of compassion. If you go to a surgeon for an operation, is it not kindness on his part to operate even if he cause you pain? So, in like manner, if I speak straightly, it is not through lack of real affection - on the contrary.

As I have said, I have only one purpose: to make man free, to urge him towards freedom, to help him to break away from all limitations, for that alone will give him eternal happiness, will give him the unconditioned realization of the self.

Because I am free, unconditioned, whole-not the part, not the relative, but the whole Truth that is eternal - I desire those, who seek to understand me, to be free; not to follow me, not to make out of me a cage which will become a religion, a sect. Rather should they be free from all fears-from the fear of religion, from the fear of salvation, from the fear of spirituality, from the fear of love, from the fear of death, from the fear of life itself. As an artist paints a picture because he takes delight in that painting, because it is his self-expression, his glory, his well-being, so I do this and not because I want any thing from anyone.

You are accustomed to authority, or to the atmosphere of authority, which you think will lead you to spirituality. You think and hope that another can, by his extraordinary powers-a miracle-transport you to this realm of eternal freedom which is Happiness. Your whole outlook on life is based on that authority.

You have listened to me for three years now, without any change taking place except in the few. Now analyze what I am saying, be critical, so that you may understand thoroughly, fundamentally. When you look for an authority to lead you to spirituality, you are bound automatically to build an organization around that authority. By the very creation of that organization, which, you think, will help this authority to lead you to spirituality, you are held in a cage.

If I talk frankly, please remember that I do so, not out of harshness, not out of cruelty, not out of the enthusiasm of my purpose, but because I want you to understand what I am saying. That is the reason why you are here, and it would be a waste of time if I did not explain clearly, decisively, my point of view.

For eighteen years you have been preparing for this event, for the Coming of the World-Teacher. For eighteen years you have organized, you have looked for someone who would give a new delight to your hearts and minds, who would transform your whole life, who would give you a new understanding; for someone who would raise you to a new plane of life, who would give you a new encouragement, who would set you free-and now look what is happening! Consider, reason with yourselves, and discover in what way that belief has made you different-not with the superficial difference of the wearing of a badge, which is trivial, absurd. In what manner has such a belief swept away all the unessential things of life? That is the only way to judge: in what way are you freer, greater, more dangerous to every Society which is based on the false and the unessential? In what way have the members of this organization of the Star become different?

As I said, you have been preparing for eighteen years for me. I do not care if you believe that I am the World-Teacher or not. That is of very little importance. Since you belong to the organization of the Order of the Star, you have given your sympathy, your energy, acknowledging that Krishnamurti is the World-Teacher- partially or wholly: wholly for those who are really seeking, only partially for those who are satisfied with their own half-truths.

You have been preparing for eighteen years, and look how many difficulties there are in the way of your understanding, how many complications, how many trivial things. Your prejudices, your fears, your authorities, your churches new and old - all these, I maintain, are a barrier to understanding. I cannot make myself clearer than this. I do not want you to agree with me, I do not want you to follow me, I want you to understand what I am saying.

This understanding is necessary because your belief has not transformed you but only complicated you, and because you are not willing to face things as they are. You want to have your own gods - new gods instead of the old, new religions instead of the old, new forms instead of the old - all equally valueless, all barriers, all limitations, all crutches. Instead of old spiritual distinctions you have new spiritual distinctions, instead of old worships you have new worships. You are all depending for your spirituality on someone else, for your happiness on someone else, for your enlightenment on someone else; and although you have been preparing for me for eighteen years, when I say all these things are unnecessary, when I say that you must put them all away and look within yourselves for the enlightenment, for the glory, for the purification, and for the incorruptibility of the self, not one of you is willing to do it. There may be a few, but very, very few.

So why have an organization?

Why have false, hypocritical people following me, the embodiment of Truth? Please remember that I am not saying something harsh or unkind, but we have reached a situation when you must face things as they are. I said last year that I would not compromise. Very few listened to me then. This year I have made it absolutely clear. I do not know how many thousands throughout the world- members of the Order-have been preparing for me for eighteen years, and yet now they are not willing to listen unconditionally, wholly, to what I say.

So why have an organization?

As I said before, my purpose is to make men unconditionally free, for I maintain that the only spirituality is the incorruptibility of the self which is eternal, is the harmony between reason and love. This is the absolute, unconditioned Truth which is Life itself. I want therefore to set man free, rejoicing as the bird in the clear sky, unburdened, independent, ecstatic in that freedom . And I, for whom you have been preparing for eighteen years, now say that you must be free of all these things, free from your complications, your entanglements. For this you need not have an organization based on spiritual belief. Why have an organization for five or ten people in the world who understand, who are struggling, who have put aside all trivial things? And for the weak people, there can be no organization to help them to find the Truth, because Truth is in everyone; it is not far, it is not near; it is eternally there.

Organizations cannot make you free. No man from outside can make you free; nor can organized worship, nor the immolation of yourselves for a cause, make you free; nor can forming yourselves into an organization, nor throwing yourselves into works, make you free. You use a typewriter to write letters, but you do not put it on an altar and worship it. But that is what you are doing when organizations become your chief concern. "How many members are there in it?" That is the first question I am asked by all newspaper reporters. "How many followers have you? By their number we shall judge whether what you say is true or false." I do not know how many there are. I am not concerned with that. As I said, if there were even one man who had been set free, that were enough.

Again, you have the idea that only certain people hold the key to the Kingdom of Happiness. No one holds it. No one has the authority to hold that key. That key is your own self, and in the development and the purification and in the incorruptibility of that self alone is the Kingdom of Eternity.

So you will see how absurd is the whole structure that you have built, looking for external help, depending on others for your comfort, for your happiness, for your strength. These can only be found within yourselves.

So why have an organization?

You are accustomed to being told how far you have advanced, what is your spiritual status. How childish! Who but yourself can tell you if you are beautiful or ugly within? Who but yourself can tell you if you are incorruptible? You are not serious in these things.

So why have an organization?

But those who really desire to understand, who are looking to find that which is eternal, without beginning and without an end, will walk together with a greater intensity, will be a danger to everything that is unessential, to unrealities, to shadows. And they will concentrate, they will become the flame, because they understand. Such a body we must create, and that is my purpose. Because of that real understanding there will be true friendship. Because of that true friendship- which you do not seem to know-there will be real cooperation on the part of each one. And this not because of authority, not because of salvation, not because of immolation for a cause, but because you really understand, and hence are capable of living in the eternal. This is a greater thing than all pleasure, than all sacrifice.

So these are some of the reasons why, after careful consideration for two years, I have made this decision. It is not from a momentary impulse. I have not been persuaded to it by anyone. I am not persuaded in such things. For two years I have been thinking about this, slowly, carefully, patiently, and I have now decided to disband the Order, as I happen to be its Head. You can form other organizations and expect someone else. With that I am not concerned, nor with creating new cages, new decorations for those cages. My only concern is to set men absolutely, unconditionally free.

The Supreme Being

It will be apparent to a person who reflects on the existential realities of life that He who is responsible for the entire creation must have created human beings also. It is then necessary to consider why we are born in this world, where we are heading for, and what is the purpose of our existence. Saints and preceptors who have addressed these queries can throw light on them if we seek their counsel as they lead their lives according to the answers they have found in their quest.

In his discourse, Velukkudi Sri V. Krishnan said it was essential to develop the outlook that human life was an opportunity given to every individual instead of as a challenge or one full of sorrows. The previous births were also such opportunities but we do not know how well we utilised them for what they were intended. Hence it is all the more imperative that this life at least must not be frittered away without realising the purpose for which it is intended—liberation from rebirths by realising God.

This is the intention of the Supreme Being who has created this world and He has also given the guidelines by which human beings should live in the world. But, how does one know this? Scriptures like the Upanishads take the seeker along in this quest and provide answers to all the doubts that logically arise in this kind of enquiry.

An ancient scriptural hymn that explains the mystery of creation, and establishes that the Supreme Being is the cause of the universe, is the Purusha Sukta which occurs in the Vedas. The Rig (16 mantras) and the Yajur (18 mantras) Vedic versions are popular in daily worship.

The opening Mantra states metaphorically that the Supreme Being is not bound by space thus: “The Purusha has a thousand heads, a thousand eyes and a thousand feet. He has enveloped this world from all sides…” Three parts of the body (head, eye, foot) are mentioned to indicate that it is not possible to ascertain His infinite nature by our knowledge and ability. On the basis of several scriptural texts, commentators have established that the term “Purusha”, which occurs repeatedly in this hymn, is Narayana, the Supreme Being.

I found this somewhere on the net and as i read it i couldn't help but notice how these concepts relate to the quantum world, one foot, eye and head in several space times, a supreme being, seeking only self love. And last night when i was drinking 'aya' i just realised how much i hate myself. Self love man. I Love Life and Life Loves ME.

when stopped hanging on, clinging to the safety of old ways, i purged and wept, my face soaking in sweat, tears, and fear. i moved out to the garden where i kneeled down and lay in the sun, breathing deeply, skin soaking up the mornings rays and laughed and laughed, i laughed so hard and genuinely, it came from years of tears and years of pain, and one glorious moment of supreme bliss, and everything was just beautiful, in it's chaos because all i saw now was a elegant flow.

i'm emersed in stone song the crazy horse biography, what an amazing story, half way through there's a scene where the indians are talking about the white skins, its amazing writing,

'They have a blindness, they do not understand choice.'
He is referring to a sacred subject, and none of his hearers needed any explanation- no Lakota who had even started the path to adulthood did. A human being had skan, something that moves, spiritual vitality. The force of life itself gave the person skan when he or she is born. It also gave him choice, and through choice he or she grew into the man or woman they become. Skan was the motive power, choice was the direction.
A Lakota had a choice between good and evil, the red road and the black road, between what makes life beautiful and what makes it ugly. He or she had help from the spirit voice the quiet voice inside them, the spirit helper (usually an animal) what they saw when crying for a vision, personal medicine, prayer, ceremonies preformed alone or in community, choice remained inviolate.
No matter your way, the other Lakota would respect it, none would try to influence you, it was yours, your essence and sacred choice.
All this was fundamental to not even need saying. So what did it mean when an entire people did not understand choice?
It was unthinkable. Where they even human beings?
'Amongst the whites some think they can choose for others.' It was so stunning that Spotted Tail just let the words hang in the lodge heavy and oppressive. 'Then comes what you would expect, they quarrel with one another. They fight and kill one another, instead of respecting another mans way.'
'They hate our way' said Spotted Tail, his voice weary and faint, Their deepest desire is to change our way, to change our way of living and make us like them. I swear it.'

Tasunke coughed. Spotted Tail understood that he was voicing everyones horror. Why would anyone do such a thing? No Lakota would commit this sort of murder of spirit.

This is powerful writing, the book is filled with amazing information and insights into the Lakota ways and i feel incredibly drawn towards them.

Many people philosophize as to what is wrong with america, what's wrong with it is it has severed its esoteric root.

ha! the nsw govt. is imploding, its just buisness as usual under the spotlight, hardly news yet for some reason the media are focused on the inept Iemma govt. however nothing will change, sure a few heads will roll but fundamentally things stay the same.

i spent a day in the city searching for a few good books, picked up stone song the biography of crazy horse, an amazing story and beautifully written. i have always had a romance for the indians as opposed to the cowboys, cowboys were the charachters that lacked any mysticsm, whereas those indians lived their lives as warriors and danced in many worlds. how could they not hold my attention.

to much monkey buisness

Once upon a time in a village, a man appeared and announced to the
villagers that he would buy monkeys for £10 each. The villagers seeing
that there were many monkeys around, went out to the forest, and started
catching them.

The man bought thousands at £10 and as supply started to diminish, the
villagers stopped their effort. He further announced that he would now
buy at £20. This renewed the efforts of the villagers and they started
catching monkeys again.

Soon the supply diminished even further and people started going back to
their farms.

The offer increased to £25 each and the supply of monkeys became so
little that it was an effort to even see a monkey, let alone catch it!

The man now announced that he would buy monkeys at £50 however, since he
had to go to the city on some business, his assistant would now buy on
behalf of him.

In the absence of the man, the assistant told the villagers 'Look at all
these monkeys in the big cage that the man has collected. I will sell
them to you at £35 and when the man returns from the city, you can sell
them to him for £50 each.' The villagers rounded up all their savings
and bought all the monkeys.

Then they never saw the man nor his assistant, only monkeys everywhere!

Now you have a better understanding of how the stock market works.

i found this article on the net somewhere its by Brooke Goldstein, and think its pretty important.

Award-winning author Mark Steyn has been summoned to appear before two Canadian Human Rights Commissions on vague allegations of "subject[ing] Canadian Muslims to hatred and contempt" and being "flagrantly Islamophobic" after Maclean's magazine published an excerpt from his book, America Alone.

The public inquisition of Steyn has triggered outrage among Canadians and Americans who value free speech, but it should not come as a surprise. Steyn's predicament is just the latest salvo in a campaign of legal actions designed to punish and silence the voices of anyone who speaks out against Islamism, Islamic terrorism, or its sources of financing.

The Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC), which initiated the complaint against Steyn, has previously tried unsuccessfully to sue publications it disagrees with, including Canada's National Post. The not-for-profit organization's president, Mohamed Elmasry, once labeled every adult Jew in Israel a legitimate target for terrorists and is in the habit of accusing his opponents of anti-Islamism -- a charge that is now apparently an actionable claim in Canada. In 2006, after Elmasry publicly accused a spokesman for the Muslim Canadian Congress of being anti-Islamic, the spokesman reportedly resigned amidst fears for his personal safety.

The Islamist movement has two wings -- one violent and one lawful -- which operate apart but often reinforce each other. While the violent arm attempts to silence speech by burning cars when cartoons of Mohammed are published, the lawful arm is maneuvering within Western legal systems.

Islamists with financial means have launched a legal jihad, manipulating democratic court systems to suppress freedom of expression, abolish public discourse critical of Islam, and establish principles of Sharia law. The practice, called "lawfare," is often predatory, filed without a serious expectation of winning and undertaken as a means to intimidate and bankrupt defendants.

Forum shopping, whereby plaintiffs bring actions in jurisdictions most likely to rule in their favor, has enabled a wave of "libel tourism" that has resulted in foreign judgments against European and now American authors mandating the destruction of American-authored literary material.

At the time of her death in 2006, noted Italian author Orianna Fallaci was being sued in France, Italy, Switzerland, and other jurisdictions, by groups dedicated to preventing the dissemination of her work. With its "human rights" commissions, Canada joins the list of countries, including France and the United Kingdom, whose laws are being used to attack the free speech rights and due process protections afforded American citizens.

A MAJOR PLAYER on this front is Khalid bin Mahfouz, a wealthy Egyptian who resides in Saudi Arabia. Mahfouz has sued or threatened to sue more than 30 publishers and authors in British courts, including several Americans, whose written works have linked him to terrorist entities. A notable libel tourist, Mahfouz has taken advantage of the UK's plaintiff-friendly libel laws to restrict the dissemination of written material that draws attention to Saudi-funded terrorism.

Faced with the prospect of protracted and expensive litigation, and regardless of the merit of the works, most authors and publishers targeted have issued apologies and retractions, while some have paid fines and "contributions" to Mahfouz's charities. When Mahfouz threatened Cambridge Press with a lawsuit for publishing Alms for Jihad by American authors Robert Collins and J. Millard Burr, the publisher immediately capitulated, offered a public apology to Mahfouz, pulped the unsold copies of the book, and took it out of print.

Shortly after the publication of Funding Evil in the United States, Mahfouz sued its author, anti-terrorism analyst and director of the American Center for Democracy, Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, for alleging financial ties between wealthy Saudis, including Mahfouz, and terrorist entities such as al Qaeda. The allegations against Ehrenfeld were heard by the UK court despite the fact that neither Mahfouz nor Ehrenfeld resides in England and merely because approximately 23 copies of Funding Evil were sold online to UK buyers via Amazon.com.

Unwilling to travel to England or acknowledge the authority of English libel laws over herself and her work, Ehrenfeld lost on default and was ordered to pay heavy fines, apologize, and destroy her books -- all of which she has refused to do. Instead, Ehrenfeld counter-sued Mahfouz in a New York State court seeking to have the foreign judgment declared unenforceable in the United States.

Ironically, Ehrenfeld lost her case against Mahfouz, because the New York court ruled it lacked jurisdiction over the Saudi resident who, the court said, did not have sufficient connections to the state. Shortly afterwards the Association of American Publishers released a statement that criticized the ruling as a blow to intellectual freedom and "a deep disappointment for publishers and other First Amendment advocates."

The litany of American publishers, television stations, authors, journalists, experts, activists, political figures, and citizens targeted for censorship is long and merits brief mention. There is an obvious pattern to these suits that can only be ignored at great peril. And we must expect future litigation along these lines:

* Joe Kaufman, chairman of Americans Against Hate, was served with a temporary restraining order and sued for leading a peaceful and lawful ten person protest against the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) outside an event the group sponsored at a Six Flags theme park in Texas. According to ICNA's website, the group is dedicated to "working for the establishment of Islam in all spheres of life," and to "reforming society at large." The complaint included seven Dallas-area plaintiffs who had never been previously mentioned by Kaufman, nor been present at the theme park. Litigation is ongoing.

* The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) sued Andrew Whitehead, an American activist, for $1.3 million for founding and maintaining the website Anti-CAIR-net.org, on which he lists CAIR as an Islamist organization with ties to terrorist groups. After CAIR refused Whitehead's discovery requests, seemingly afraid of what internal documents the legal process it had initiated would reveal, the lawsuit was dismissed by the court with prejudice.

* CAIR also sued Cass Ballenger for $2 million after the then-U.S. Congressman said in a 2003 interview with the Charlotte Observer that the group was a "fundraising arm for Hezbollah" that he had reported as such to the FBI and CIA. Fortunately, the judge ruled that Ballenger's statements were made in the scope of his public duties and were protected speech.

* A Muslim police officer is suing former CIA official and counterterrorism consultant Bruce Tefft and the New York Police Department for workplace harassment merely because Tefft sent emails with relevant news stories about Islamic terrorism to a voluntary list of recipients that included police officers.

THESE SUITS REPRESENT a direct and real threat to our constitutional rights and national security. Even if the lawsuits don't succeed, the continued use of lawfare tactics by Islamist organizations has the potential to create a detrimental chilling effect on public discourse and information concerning the war on terror.

Already, publishers have canceled books on the subject of counterterrorism and no doubt other journalists and authors have self-censored due to the looming threat of suit. For its part, CAIR announced an ambitious fundraising goal of $1 million, partly to "defend against defamatory attacks on Muslims and Islam." One of CAIR's staffers, Rabiah Ahmed, bragged that lawsuits are increasingly an "instrument" for it to use.

U.S. courts have not yet grasped the importance of rebuffing international attempts to restrain the free speech rights of American citizens.

This is troubling. The United States was founded on the premise of freedom of worship, but also on the principle of the freedom to criticize religion. Islamists should not be allowed to stifle constitutionally protected speech, nor should they be allowed to subject innocent citizens who talk to other citizens about issues of national security to frivolous and costly lawsuits.

back in the studio, in the basement with val, finishing the 'adventures' cd, its my first ever recording and its not so bad, considering i was brain damaged when i made it.
anyway i'm freaking broke. had to sort out a new computer, plus all the band expenses. it's gonna be be a massive investment but i hope somewhere on planet earth some radio station overplays me, and my home town just embraces me enough to cover costs, anyway we did our best.
im really excited about the next project, i just wanna focus on that now but unfortunatly i'm gonna have to stay with adventures longer. having said that the idea of touring is scary and exciting, we talked about playing small theatre's and clubs and launching at some where like the hell fire club, also a great place for a video.

i have been sick, wounded deeply, battle scared and world weary. there are times recently when i just wanted to wander away and die quietly, i have been self destructing, riddled with sadness and regret, and then in a beautiful space, surrounded by love and beautiful people, i did die, the second death in a week.

ayahuscia session last night with an oral dose of dmt, again deep healing, deep release, i had amazing visions, she came as a beautiful serpent, rich greens yellows and reds her blazing eyes, the jungle was alive the music in perfect time, invoking the serpent power, seductive and terrifing but beautiful but i have been so wounded these last few months, i have been lost and strayed from my true nature, i have been selfish and unkind and hostile and bitter and i have failed in friendships and generosity, i need forgiveness, from myself and from my Mistress, and i was thankfully given a deep healing. Divinity is Aya, she is my teacher and i have surrendered to her, but tonight in the throes of my absolution, i met the other force, him, behind everything, behind her, he says to me in his wonderful way, 'heal yourself, heal others and then you can heal the world.' it was a calling, a door has opened. he is there, the old old testament, figure, he is there, i understand now.

L and L, both so beautiful, so rich and powerful in spirit, i am so blessed to have shared my passage with you, i love you so much, for giving me the chance to die and be reborn. and to her, my mistress, you are my teacher, seducing me with your voice and dance, and grace. and behind all, is him. i never knew love like that and now its all i need to know.

i have to heal myself, and then brothers and sisters i will asssit you to heal, because your healing heals me.
such perfection, so elegant, so simple.

i feel very humble today

I had another ayahuscia session last night, it was quite spontanious and so i was kinda unprepared although i managed to fast for 12 hours before hand, i did not meditate or have any pressing issues apart from my somewhat 'melencholy mood' and my heartbreak over Mer so i basically just asked for healing.
It was hosted by my friend La, a very modern sha-wo-man, and possibly the most powerful one i have met in australia, she invited me and about 5 of her friends for the session, that lasted from about 7pm monday till midday tuesday. i usually leave the group early to pursue my own activities so at about 6am i was walking along the beach in the rain with Pan.
The session was quite amazing, i've never emersed myself in the experience so much, and i died. The fear of letting go was absolutly intense, usually i jump into these experiences but this time i was clinging on, resisting. I felt and visioned myself as an old warrior, my chest moved up and down with my last few breathes, it was quite beautiful but also very terrifing. I lay upon my back listening to owls hearalding the dawn and although it had been raining all night there was a moments reprive, it was an ancient moment and in that stillness i surrenderred and died.
It was quite beautiful, kinda how i imagine robin hood dying in the forest although it had a more tribal, american indian element than english.
Anyways so much stuff came up for me, i really have felt so depressed as if i have lived my life and now i am weary from it, i have done my biologiocal duties and i think i was feeling redundent.
Anyways it was amazing, the ceremony was led by a really young guy called Li who was ancient soul wise, at one point (the throwing up bit) i was retching out into a bucket while he held it for me patting my back.
I said, 'Thanks brother, the healings gone deep for me.'
He said, 'No. Thank you. You are healing me.'
How fucking cool is that.