The Ghosts of Clear Mountain

An old college friend of mine tagged me into a comment thread on Facebook the other day. Had I ever encountered any of these supposed ghosts when we were at Montclair State?

Montclair State is said to be one of the most haunted colleges in America.

For years there have been reports of doors and windows slamming, lights flickering on and off, constant cold, and even a ghost who hovers over the beds of the tenants.

It is believed that Montclair is built on top of Indian burial grounds and alumni say it’s a very scary school. So scary, that many refuse to go in the woods after sundown. There have been many reports of figures believed to be Native Americans spotted in the forests.

According to Classes and Careers, the worst stories come from the Clove Road Apartments. Tenants have reported electrical appliances turning on and off on their own, lights on the second floor flashing on and off by themselves, disembodied knocks on bedroom and bathroom doors, “unearthly” noises emanating from the woods behind the apartments.

The Remarkable Vision of Jimmy Nelson

I don't like the title of this book. It sounds fatalistic to me, as if the attrition of these indigenous cultures is inevitable. But it is also a warning, a reminder of what a treasure they are, a call to protect what's left of humanity's origins.

These are truly remarkable photographs. Jimmy Nelson devoted 25 years of his life gaining the trust of these tribal peoples, so much so that they were willing be documented by a Westerner.

Looking at Nelson’s photographs, it’s difficult to imagine how a British man could gain this kind of access. “I never, ever take out the camera right away,” Nelson says firmly. “I didn’t know their language, but we connected as people.”

Because each tribe has its own particular dialect, there was only so far a local translator could go. The rest was up to Nelson. He says he used body language to convey ideas. By way of demonstration, he stretches his eyes wide, puts his hands on his face, makes an expression of awe and ‘ooos’ and ‘aahs.’

“It’s all about vanity and empathy,” Nelson says. “You literally go onto your knees and you beg them… You put them on a pedestal and you say until you can’t hear yourself anymore, ‘You’re beautiful, you’re beautiful, you’re beautiful, you’re beautiful. You’re important.' And eventually people feel that.”

And they are beautiful -- so, so beautiful.

Nelson's story reads a little like a shamanic initiation. At age 16 all his hair fell out. This trauma set him on a course of spiritual discovery that sent him to Tibet where he explored the lives of Buddhist monks through the lens of his camera.

He went on to travel the globe and gain access to the hidden world of largely forgotten peoples. The result is a breathtaking compendium of images of very diverse cultures connected only by a set of principles.

The cultures Nelson visited spanned continents, worshipped different gods and had histories and mythologies all their own. But Nelson says all of the communities had two things in common: a sense of balance between the physical and spiritual, and they placed a heavy importance on family.

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The Holy War Against Pop Culture Pagans

A trio of pretty, karate trained teens are battling demons around the world. Charmed? No. Worse. Brynne Larson, Tess Scherkenback, and Savannah Scherkenback are evangelical Christian exorcists who have been touring impoverished mining towns in Ukraine armed with nothing but crosses, holy water... and Larson's preacher father. Their efforts at saving these lost souls from the tortures of hell have received mixed reviews... from the director of their documentary.

[Charlet] Duboc said: ‘The way they come across on camera is just the way they were when we turned off the camera, they never stopped the vacant smiling,’ the British film-maker said.

They weren’t horrid, they weren’t unpleasant, they were just a bit creepy. It was a bit like talking to the Stepford Wives, I was like “where are the humans behind this?”’

The girls will be taking their glazed expressions and vapid smiles to the heart of the dragon, which is to say Potterworld, which is to say London. Someone has to protect unwitting entertainment seekers from demonic possession!

The threesome, from Arizona, believe the spells in J.K. Rowling's best-selling fantasy series are real, and dangerous.

In fact, they see Britain as a hotbed of occult activity whose origins go back to pagan times.

Savannah explains: 'It has been centuries in the making, but I believe it came to a pinnacle with the Harry Potter books.'

'The spells you are reading about are not made up,' adds Tess. 'They are real and come from witchcraft.'

Well, no. The Potter series is actually based on Western Alchemy, but why quibble.

Meanwhile, Methodist minister Keith Cressman is keeping his battle against idolatry closer to home -- Oklahoma, to be precise. It would appear that the state has graced its official license plate with the image of a the "Sacred Rain Arrow." The sculpture on which it is based depicts an Chiricahua warrior shooting an arrow into the sky to make it rain.

Said Cressman, through an attorney, putting such a plate on his car makes him a "mobile billboard" for a pagan religion. Despite his insistence to the contrary, it seems pretty clear that he holds Native American "religion, culture, or belief" in a fair bit of contempt. That, however, is his right, so I'm not really sure which side of this debate bothers me more -- Cressman's fear of the unholy savages who lived in Oklahoma first or the State's trivialization and cooptation of Native practices by reducing them to a logo.

Oklahoma no doubt meant this to be a way of honoring its large -- and largely discriminated against -- Native American population. But by putting an image of an Apache ritual on a state issued plate, they're effectively saying that those beliefs are not a religion. Would they put a an image of the Eucharist on a license plate? I'm betting not -- not even those Oklahomans who don't believe in separation of church and state.

“(T)he case presents legal issues of freedom of speech and religion that I feel are important for all Americans of all religious, non-religious and ethnic backgrounds,” Cressman wrote.

“The case may help define personal liberties and freedoms protected by the Constitution of the United States.”

. . .

Hemant Mehta, author and board member for the humanist-based Foundation Beyond Belief, wrote of the ruling:

“If this image goes too far, then surely a cross or other religious symbol can’t be allowed on a license plate, either. A devout Christian may have done a huge favor to all of us who support church/state separation.”

Okay, I've picked a side.

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The Solstice and the Serpent

Well here's something I did not know.

This morning, while scanning the news for fun Summer Solstice events, I noticed this item on the Mother Nature Network. Apparently, the famed serpent mound in Ohio is aligned to the sun on this day. How marvelous. That puts this ancient curiosity amongst sacred sites all over the world as aligned to key astronomical events. I don't know that this will ever make Ohio Bush Creek a destination on par with Stonehenge (see above) but I actually find this slightly more fascinating.

Sunrise with a snake: Twenty miles south of Bainbridge, Ohio, a mysterious mound rises from the Earth. A bird's-eye view would reveal that this mound is in fact man-made, and that it is in the shape of a giant serpent.

On the summer solstice, the sun rises directly over the head of this serpent, which was likely created by the so-called Fort Ancient culture that thrived nearby between A.D. 1000 and 1550. The Serpent Mound park is open during daylight hours, so solstice-seekers can stroll around the ancient snake and imagine the early astronomers that must have overseen its construction.

I've never seen the serpent mound. Ohio is big state and I grew up on the other end of it. But it's always tickled me pink that this vestige of ancient wisdom appears in such an unlikely place.

Buy From Art.com

To Wikipedia!

In 1987 Clark and Marjorie Hardman published their finding that the oval-to-head area of the serpent is aligned to the summer solstice sunset.^[9][10] William F. Romain has suggested an array of lunar alignments based on the curves in the effigy's body. Fletcher and Cameron argued convincingly for the Serpent Mound's coils being aligned to the two solstice and two equinox events each year. If the Serpent Mound were designed to sight both solar and lunar arrays, it would be significant as the consolidation of astronomical knowledge into a single symbol. The head of the serpent is aligned to the summer solstice sunset and the coils also may point to the winter solstice sunrise and the equinox sunrise.^[11]

. . .

The Serpent Mound may have been designed in accord with the pattern of stars composing the constellation Draco. The star pattern of the constellation Draco fits with fair precision to the Serpent Mound, with the ancient Pole Star, Thuban (α Draconis), at its geographical center within the first of seven coils from the head. The fact that the body of Serpent Mound follows the pattern of Draco may support various theses. Putnam's 1865 refurbishment of the earthwork could have been correctly accomplished in that a comparison of Romain's or Fletcher and Cameron's maps from the 1980s show how the margins of the Serpent align with great accuracy to a large portion of Draco. Some researchers date the earthwork to around 5,000 years ago, based on the position of Draco, through the backward motion of precessionary circle of the ecliptic when Thuban was the Pole Star. Alignment of the effigy to the Pole Star at that position also shows how true north may have been found. This was not known until 1987 because lodestone and modern compasses give incorrect readings at the site.^[13]

If it is, in fact, patterned on Draco, that could make it one of heaven's all-important mirrors. Such a theory is apparently advanced in Ross Hamilton's Mystery of the Serpent Mound. Huh. Whadda you know? Where have I been?

And now it is the time Summer Solstice when we dance.

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To Suffer a Witch

Put this in the broad category of things I really don't want to write about. But I'm afraid I have to. In a curious synchronicity I noticed the latest drivel from Rob Kerby on my start page. One of these days I will remove the Beliefnet feed, but a combination of morbid curiosity and laziness has prevented it thus far. (For the back story on the Beliefnet news feed's devolution into a reactionary, bigoted, wingnut megaphone for the Christianist Kerby, see here and here.) Kerby's latest bit of wrongheadedness is a diatribe on the dangers of witchcraft. Why is this synchronous? This may be a little hard to follow but bear with me.

Let me start by saying that Kerby's biggest mistake is in conflating certain third world, tribal fears of witchcraft with Pagan faiths. He expresses dismay at Harry Potter for trivializing the dangers of witchery and at the Cornwall schools' inclusion of Paganism in its religion curriculum. This is the first synchronicity. But even more curious is that I was watching this fascinating video last night which had me thinking about a very particular usage of the term "witchcraft." It's a documentary on shaman and "vegetalista" Don Emilio Andrade Gomez who more than once uses the term witchcraft to describe the dark practice of sorcery. A lot of this could be written off to semantic differences but the distinction is too important to leave to the Rob Kerbys of the world... because that kind of thinking gets people killed.

There are several admonitions in the Bible against various supernatural practices. It all gets very confusing because the Bible also extols those same practices in other contexts -- the Book of Daniel, chapter 5 comes to mind but there are other references. The specific use of the word witch which has caused innumerable deaths through the centuries comes from Exodus 22:18 and reads, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," in the King James version.

The word witch is a poor translation from the Hebrew word m'khashepah which is more fairly translated as "poisoner." It stems from ancient beliefs in the ability of some people to harm or even kill people through various forms of spell-casting.

When a shaman like the one in the video uses the term witchcraft, he is, somewhat ironically, closer to the actual meaning of the original term. It's clear from his comments that he is referring to malicious sorcery.

The hybridization of Christianity and indigenous shamanism is one of the most fascinating aspects of this documentary, which was made as part of Luis Eduardo Luna's field work in the Peruvian Amazon. It is also somewhat jarring, as is apparent in some of the comments posted on YouTube. It is an apparently benign religious drift. The merging of Christianity and tribal beliefs, though, isn't always harmless and has led to numerous witch persecutions in third world countries. I touched on this here in a discussion of Sarah Palin's mentor, Kenyan witch-hunter Thomas Muthee. I also posted recently about the disappearances of a number of Peruvian shamans which have been tied to fundamentalist Christian officials in the region.

What I find singularly horrifying about Kerby's post is that he seems to believe that these murderous witch hunters have something to teach us about the dangers of everything from Harry Potter (which is actually based in Western alchemy) to modern-day Wiccans, Druids, and other Pagans. He also touches on Arab persecutions of sorcerers and those who consort with the djinn. Here's a lovely example from Saudi Arabia. Yet, somehow, what Kerby seems to find disturbing is all the witchery that goes on, not the fact that innocent people are being killed for it.

The problem with some of this Christian outreach and missionary zeal is that it simultaneously feeds the fear of sorcery and disavows shamanism as a healing practice, viewing it all as "witchcraft." Don Emilio repeatedly refers to his own work as aligned with Christ and as a tool to use against sorcery. It is the distinction between the shaman as healer, or curandero, and the sorcerer. Sorcery, again, is a term that is subject to semantic variation and isn't negative in every context but to a Latin American shaman it's a very negative term. Shaman Christina Pratt draws the distinction thusly: A sorcerer is someone who uses the same tools as a shaman but for the highest bidder. (I'm paraphrasing from memory.) It's the difference between having a moral compass and not.

In a recent show, Christina waded into the sorcery issue again and dealt specifically with the subject of curses. I'll be very honest and say that this subject is way over my head. Psychic attacks and the like are just so far outside my paradigm, I don't feel able to speak to them. From my perspective, as a mystical thinker, I consider it impossible to attack someone else without tearing yourself apart in the process. Because my beliefs and practices are mystical, I don't actually think it's possible to "put a spell" on anyone but myself because I am the source of my reality. To put it another way, I can't bend the spoon without bending myself, so I couldn't damage the spoon without damaging myself. In any event, to any Pagan or shaman, dark sorcery is frowned upon. It also subjects the practitioner to painful blow-back -- the three-fold law and all that.

So, in sum, I highly recommend the video above as a small window into the world of ayahuasca using shamans. I also recommend Christina's show on curses as well as interviews she did with Steven Beyer on working with plant teachers. Both, I think, lend some context to the documentary. Beyer explains the "diet" of the initiate into plant medicine, for example.

And, I think Rob Kerby is a menace and an embarrassment to a site that still at least gives lip service to ecumenicism and support for the Pagan community.

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Paul Levy on the Collective Shadow

I've referenced Tibetan Buddhist and healer Paul Levy before -- notably in my review of The Secret. Levy's essays are available on his site Awaken in the Dream and in his book The Madness of George W. Bush: A Reflection of our Collective Psychosis. In his newest book Wetiko, Levy continues to explore the projected shadow as a collective phenomenon and the Native American mythical embodiment of it known as wetiko to the Cree. Years ago, I watched a movie called Wendigo, another Algonquian name for the same phenomenon. It's a haunting film that brilliantly captures the sense of doom we experience at those times when life is turned upside down leaving us at the mercy of an unfolding fate that seems to have its own agenda. As Levy explains, we actually animate this darkness run amok from our suppressed shadow. The more in denial of our shadow we are, the more inevitably we will confront it as a seemingly alien entity in our reflective world.

One of the things that struck me in this Red Ice Radio interview is Levy's anecdote about a New Age bookstore that wanted him to appear but not talk about all that shadow stuff. They wanted it to be "positive." It put me in mind of another author who dared to write about the painful side of spiritual growth; Rabbi Yonassan Gershom who wrote about Holocaust reincarnates.  Said Gershom:

Then in 1984 I was invited to speak on Jewish mysticism at the annual Spiritual Frontiers Fellowship (SFF) retreat at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. SFF is an eclectic group of spiritually oriented people who are interested in psychic phenomena, and most believe in reincarnation. Here, I thought, would be a receptive audience for these case histories that I had been gathering. So I suggested "Cases of Holocaust Reincarnation" as my topic.

I was turned down flat. The SFF representative explained that the theme of the retreat would be "I Am the Light," and they wanted to focus on uplifting, positive material because that's what people expected. The Holocaust was just too heavy and depressing, and might upset people, even if I were talking about reincarnation. Couldn't I do something more inspiring, like a Sabbath liturgy?

This relentless focus on the upbeat and cheerful is not just naive. It's dangerous -- something I've written about ad nauseam, ad infinitum. And as Levy has been explaining brilliantly for years, it can unleash terrors beyond our conscious imagining.

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James Arthur Ray Sweat Lodge Trial: Day 10

James Arthur Ray "Just Standing There" in Court

Monday is not an actual trial day. It is a good day, however, to recap and catch up on testimony that wasn't aired last week... or was preempted on the live feed by the unfolding horror in Japan. Today In Session ran the rest of Beverley Bunn's direct questioning by prosecutor Bill Hughes and the very beginning of her cross examination by Tom Kelly.

Beverley Bunn appears to me to be traumatized. She struggles to maintain an icy control as she recounts events that still reduce her to trembling voice and tears. What I keep ruminating on as I watch her is that this was the woman who James Ray wanted to work with one on one. Something that she disclosed to the group the evening the seminar began was serious enough to demand the leader's personal attention. My hunch is that what Ray saw was a beautiful, intelligent, powerful woman with an Achilles heel; a gaping vulnerability that he could exploit. He proceeded to insult her, to hurl profanity at her, and to keep her on the kind of emotional roller-coaster any survivor of a cult or abusive marriage can relate to.

In the testimony aired today, Bunn continued to break down the course of events during the sweat lodge. In round six, all hell broke loose. Or, to use Beverley Bunn's words, everything "kinda went pretty crazy." Everyone was yelling. Someone was screaming "She's passed out. She's passed out." People started calling out each other's names. In other words, there was panic and mayhem. At the end of the round a woman was dragged, unconscious to the door and past Ray who completely ignored it. Even after she was dragged out, there was still panic and people yelling for one another. That got a reaction from Ray:

"Quiet down. Quiet down. I'm in charge here. Everyone needs to be quiet right now." And that's when we were told to not say anymore.

And that's when [unintelligible] said, again, "I can't get her to move. She's not moving. She's not breathing."

And he closed the door and he said, "The door is now closed. This round has now begun. And we'll deal with that at the end of this next round."

So a woman, who Bunn learned was Sidney Spencer, was out cold and not breathing... but it could wait.

After Ray's outburst, everyone was pretty quiet through the seventh round. And after the seventh round was over, despite Ray having said that he would "deal with that" at the end of the round, he never did inquire after Spencer's condition. He just took some extra time between the seventh and eighth round to "invite" everyone who had left to come back in.

After the end of the ceremony, Bunn helped move another unconscious, unresponsive woman out of the tent. In doing so, she passed a woman whom she recognized as roommate Kirby Brown. She described a gurgling noise coming from Brown.

Outside, orthodontist Bunn teamed up with Jean Armstrong, who she learned was also a doctor, and they began to react to what they were realizing were multiple medical emergencies. They tried to revive Sidney Spencer, who was hot to the touch but shivering, and completely unconscious. They pinched her skin, applied compresses and blankets, but she did not regain consciousness. Bunn then moved onto Stephen Ray, who was responsive but whose eyes were a mass of burst blood vessels. Both had mucus coming from the nose and mouth, as did others.

Bunn broke down as she recalled seeing, amidst the chaos, that her friend Kirby Brown was still inside the tent, unconscious but breathing, and lying next to James Shore.

There were no medical personnel, nothing but a tupperware container of basic first aid materials, and James Arthur Ray was still doing nothing to assist. She also knew of no medically trained personnel among the JRI staff. So, apparently, she also had no idea who the nurse was.

As Bunn took in more of the scene and realized how many people were in distress, she saw a Dream Team member named Aaron and asked him, "Is this normal? Is this normal? What goes on... I mean this is crazy. Do you understand that people are really in trouble here?" And he stood there "like a deer in headlights."

When she looked to the other side of the tent, people were performing CPR on James Shore and Kirby Brown. She offered multiple times to assist with CPR but was turned away by a Dream Team member.

Six to ten feet away from where Brown and Shore were receiving CPR was James Arthur Ray; "just standing there." Bunn describes staring at his face waiting for some reaction, but there was none.

Bunn also saw the woman who was having a fit, flailing, yelling out profanities, and calling out, "James Ray. James Ray."

So while people who paid to participate in a seminar jumped into service, drawing on their skills as doctors, nurses, and hair stylists, to try to save people's lives, James Arthur Ray just stood there.

As a medically trained orthodontist, and one-time Grand Canyon hiker, Bunn knew that there were concerns about people with medical conditions like high blood pressure, obesity, and other conditions in high heat environments. She also knew there were precautions about long-term exposure to heat in saunas, steam baths, and the like. (I had a similar thought last week and hit the google, but more on that later.) But Bunn swallowed her concern because she was there as a participant, not as a "rule maker." Like both Nell Wagoner and Jean Armstrong, Bunn had not been public about her medical credentials. She was not there in that capacity. She was there to get help, not to to work. She trusted in Ray's experience and purported study with "Native Indians." When asked why she had enough trust in Mr. Ray to ignore her own health and safety concerns, she explained:

I didn't question Mr. Ray at this time....You learn through the course of the week that you don't question Mr. Ray on anything. You do, you know what the rules are. He tells you what the rules are. Things are not optional. As you go through the week, you learn that [long pause] there's consequences or reprimand or something for you to be called out in front of all the people that you're there with if you question Mr. Ray or you don't do as he says or you don't play full on.

This is the kind of admission that evokes the findings of Stanley Milgram's research. Like so many of Ray's students, the subjects in the Milgram experiments were normal folks, some of them very accomplished and educated, and they ALL deferred to authority. And the more authority the clinician directing the research conveyed -- wearing a lab coat, holding a clip board, standing over the shoulder of the subject -- the more submissive they were and the more they were willing to do things that went against their own ethical make-up.

On cross, Tom Kelly tries to make the point that her testimony now is more comprehensive than in her previous interviews, including one with Shauna Williams. The implication is that her current testimony has been embellished by other press accounts. She responds that the finished article was edited down from a nearly two hour interview.

Kelly also whips out the waivers, once again, and presses her on having signed with knowledge of the "high risk" activities. When she points out that it lists the activities but does not include the phrasing "high risk" he blows right past her point and insists that as an orthodontist with a doctorate she knew what she was signing, she agrees. But the fact is, I have a pdf of the documents and the phrase "high risk" does not appear.

When asked if they were told throughout to "hydrate, hydrate, hydrate," she disagreed, pointing out that they could not hydrate when they had no food or water on the vision quest.

I think the defense's whole grown-ups who can make their own decisions tack is starting to backfire. When Kelly presses Bunn about how other people begged off of certain activities, she says she only learned about that later. He presses on. 

Kelly: I mean you're a educated, professional woman, who has a doctoral degree, and has been to a university, and runs a private business. You're capable of making your own decisions correct?

Bunn: I am

Kelly: And you made the decision to participate in the yoga activities in the morning.

Bunn: It wasn't optional.

When he tries to remind her that Liz Neuman opted out of the Holotropic Breathing (which James Ray isn't certified to teach) and the yoga, Bunn responds that she wasn't aware of Neuman's actions and points out that Neuman was a Dream Team assistant; not a participant.

But, yes, she made a choice to participate when some others did not.

Beverley Bunn is a highly educated, intelligent woman, who was very obviously intimidated by Ray's anger, his authority, and his role as a one on one facilitator in her process. She was a grown-up who wanted to "play full on."

Unlike Beverley Bunn, James Shore does not appear to have been terribly invested in James Ray... at least not emotionally. Cody Jones, friend of the late James Shore, spoke to In Session's Ryan Smith. He described James Shore as someone who had a passive interest in James Arthur Ray, but was not "a follower." He was interested in self-improvement and trying to quit smoking. (The irony.)

Shore called Jones a couple of days into the retreat and seemed disenchanted and "skeptical" of James Ray and of the kinds of exercises and teachings he was experiencing.

It is Jones's understanding that Shore had tried to cancel beforehand. He had paid for half up front but had reconsidered and tried to cancel and get a refund. He found that he could not do so. Rather than forfeit his down-payment, he went ahead with the seminar.

But like so many paying participants, James Shore jumped in and tried to help when events in the sweat lodge started to go awry. He rescued one unconscious woman, then returned to the sweat lodge to try to assist others. It is Jones's assessment, after speaking to Shore and learning his views on the proceedings, that he would not have returned to the sweat lodge for any reason other than his awareness that it was a "death trap." Said Jones:

I can't believe James Ray just stood there and watched everybody die and didn't do one thing to help anybody. Didn't participate in CPR, didn't assist with any participant to console them or help in any sort of way. He just stood there and watched.

In another segment today, Matthew James was interviewed, by In Session's Vinnie Politan, in his capacity as one of James Arthur Ray's former teachers. This was a training he did in Hawaiian Huna shamanism. His comments were very illuminating and echo concerns and observations that I and others have found disturbing; a focus on endurance rather than a deeper, more internal learning process.

Well, James Ray as a student would absorb the information, would be able to recall it with some pretty well, some good accuracy. But he also did begin to really push the boundaries, even as far back as before he was on The Secret... At one point, after having done a few trainings with us, we got word from the hotel where we conduct our trainings and we were told, again I probably wouldn't be able to confirm this, but it was enough for us to approach James Ray. We were told that he was beginning to add things and beginning to teach what we had shared with him from our Hawaiian Huna lineage. And he was adding things to it and almost creating a hybrid. And when we approached him and he said was gonna continue to do that, we cut all ties with him....

Well, there's a bunch of sacred ceremony, there are meditations, and all of these things are meant to be very calm, very safe. You know, ancient traditions, there's this safety. And it seems that people including James try to make it into endurance, try to make it into this pushing the boundaries. And according to some of the Hawaiians that worked at the hotel, he was adding alcohol into one of the meditations that we do. And when she approached us and said your student is doing this, we immediately contacted James.

So he was terminated as a student and the university even pressed the hotel to think about whether he should be staying there. He was not surprised by any of what he became aware of in terms of what James Ray was doing and was dismayed that he was using some of what they had taught him about Huna.

James goes on to describe how in their workshops they offer alternative activities for people who can't do some of the more rigorous events like hiking across the volcano. Says James:

It's not about pushing yourself past your limits. It's about finding that centeredness inside you. And I think as a trainer, when you don't have that, you try to push to the extreme and that's not what these teachings are about, whether it's native teachings or even modern teachings in psychology.

When he heard about the sweat lodge deaths, his heart went out to the victims and he thought "this was completely avoidable." He really saw Ray's "pattern of not finding the absolute beauty in the simplicity of some of these ceremonies" and how he really pushed the limits it even as a student.

Long story short, we can add Huna teachings to Holotropic Breathwork, on the growing list of things James Arthur Ray was not certified or authorized to teach.

So, as promised, back to the eternal waiver question:

The sweat lodge is described as having "sauna like" conditions. I've used a sauna or two. They're nowhere near has hot as what has been described in a James Arthur Ray not "weenie-ass" sweat lodge. But it occurred to me that I remember seeing warnings outside of saunas I've used for people with heart conditions and the like, so I did a little googling. I found a number of very similar warnings on sites that sell saunas. Here's an example from Wowshopper:

Caution: Sauna Tips And Warnings

The main risk of a sauna is staying in too long and fainting from overheating. People who are most susceptible to this are those with heart disease or who have been drinking alcohol. It really isn't a good idea to combine drinking with a sauna.

• Don't drink alcohol, as it works as a depressant, where the blood is moving slowly and the nerve endings are literally shutting down, and counteracts the benefits of the sauna.
• Older people need to avoid or limit their time in the sauna.
• People with heart ailments or respiratory diseases need to avoid the sauna, and anyone with chronic ailments needs to check first with his or her doctor.
• Don't eat prior to the sauna.
• Avoid drug use and the sauna - tranquilizers, stimulants, and other prescribed drugs alter the body's metabolism and could produce dour effects in the heat.
• If you experience dizziness, problems with breathing, or a general feeling of ill health, leave the sauna immediately.
• If you do decide to use the sauna, start gradually. Stay in only as long as you are comfortable, increasing the time with each visit.

DISCLAIMER: If you are pregnant, have high blood pressure or heart disease, you'll want to be cautious and consult a doctor first before starting a steam therapy program. [All emphases added]

So a home goods retailer called Wowshopper offers more thorough health guidance than James Ray. And they offer it on the website before you buy it. That way you're not buying an unreturnable sauna and then finding out that there are some health risks.

And finally, Mel Gibson has reached a plea and will not do jail time... I'm watching way too much In Session courtroom broadcasting.

All information on the trial comes from news articles with provided links or live courtroom footage on TruTV's "In Session" or CNN's live feed. All quotes and paraphrased statements that are not linked to a source document are my best attempt to transcribe material from live broadcasts.

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James Arthur Ray Sweat Lodge Trial: Day 9

Beverley Bunn

When prosecutor Bill Hughes interviewed Beverley Bunn today, he touched on the issue that has been bothering me regarding the waivers. That is to say, he asked her when she had paid for the event and when she received the packet containing the waivers. Indeed, she had paid months before obtaining the information packet; half up front at another event and the second half about a month later. My point: If she had looked at that waiver and had a sudden concern for her health, that money would have been forfeit. Asked if she knew when she registered what the events were going to be she said, "No." The brochure had pictures of people hiking and the details were left deliberately vague, "'Cause they told you that they didn't want to disclose any of it because they didn't want ruin any of it for you."She did not know at the time she paid that there would be a sweat lodge. She only learned that there would be a sweat lodge a few hours before the sweat lodge.

It occurs to me that telling participants that they didn't want to disclose too much about the activities beforehand could have had the effect of discouraging them from looking too closely at the waiver and ruining those surprises for themselves.

She signed the waiver when she arrived. She was late and she was rushed through the signing process and told get into the dining hall so as not to miss dinner.

Some of the most painful moments in Bunn's testimony came when she was asked about shaving her head. As Jennifer Haley, hair styling expert, said in her testimony, shaving off all your hair, especially for a woman, is emotionally challenging. And, not for nothin,' but I think that was the reason Ray wanted them to do it. That becomes clear in some of the statements Bunn ascribes to Ray regarding shaving, who she said always encouraged them to shave. Said Ray, "Are you hiding behind your hair?... Does that have to prove your identity 'cause you really need to know who you are on the inside; not just the outside."

"I struggled with the decision all week," said Bunn. She had long talks with Kirby Brown who had done it on Monday. Ultimately, she made the decision to shave off all her hair an hour before going into the sweat lodge. In this part of her testimony, Bunn became visibly uncomfortable and looked several times like she was struggling to keep from crying.

Hughes: Do you recall why you finally made the decision to shave your head?

Bunn: [Long emotional pause and looking as if she might cry] Because it was part of playing full on. And I didn't want to be perceived as a person that wasn't fully participating in the event.

Hughes: Was playing full on a component of spiritual warrior?

Bunn: Yes.

Hughes: Can you tell us to what extent it was a component of spiritual warrior?

Bunn: It was every component. It was, you had to meet or exceed all the rules and regulations that James was telling us to do every day.

Hughes: Doctor, after you shaved your head did you have a conversation with Mr. Ray about that.

Bunn: No. I had a conversation prior to. I had a conversation on Tuesday with Mr. Ray about shaving my head. Mr. Ray had asked me during the course of the week to work directly with him.

. . .

Hughes: Did you have a conversation with Mr. Ray about shaving your head.

Bunn: I did.

Hughes: Can you tell us what day if your remember that conversation took place.

Bunn: Tuesday.

Hughes: And what did Mr. Ray say to you? [Bunn again looks as if she might cry and doesn't answer.] What was the covnersation.

Bunn: I don't give a fuck what you do. [fighting back tears] Shave your head. Don't shave your head. Doesn't really matter. [emphasis added]

Hughes: Was that something Mr. Ray told you?

Bunn: Specifically to me.

Bunn was told by Ray, on the first night, that she needed to work with him directly instead of one of the Dream Team volunteers. At first she thought it would be helpful but then found herself on something of an emotional roller-coaster because there was a lot of what she called a "tough love situation,"

She also described the "recapitulation" journaling in which people were supposed to, basically, take an inventory of their issues, "black bags," and limiting beliefs. There was also an intense focus on sexual history. Said Bunn:

We were told to write about how we learned about sex, every sexual experience that we'd had, um, every person that we'd had sex with and how that made us feel and...

The defense objected at that point, as to "relevance."

Ray told them to do the writing "all night long... every night." When asked about sleep, Bunn recalled, "He told us right at the, from the beginning that we could sleep next week." She says she got 3-4 hours of sleep per night.

On the Samurai Game, Bunn testified that Ray reviewed the game, after vision quest, three or four hours before going into the sweat lodge:

He was so appalled and had never seen a group of people play the game worse than us.... We were so worried about dying that we forgot to live. All of us had died.... No matter how you played you died.... And then our assignment was after that is to write I'm not sure if it's your obituary or your eulogy as to what would be said about you, um, as the kind of person that you were pertaining to how you played the game.

That seems like kind of a demoralizing thing to hear after 36 hours without food and water and right before going into a fiery inferno.

Ray told participants that the sweat lodge was the "pinnacle event." He also introduced them to the fire keeper who was heating the rocks. He said this man had informed him that this was the hottest fire ever and that the rocks were hotter than any other year. So it was hot. Bunn says that as the sweat lodge progressed the heat level increased to the point that "there was no relief." There was no fresh air, even when the flap was opened.

Bunn heard Ray say many times during the sweat lodge, "You're better than this. You're stronger than this." But after round four, Bunn started to doubt her strength and betterness and began to crawl on hands and knees towards the door. She had reached the point at which she was concerned about even having the strength to crawl out.

Hughes: Do you recall if the defendant said anything to you as you crawled towards the door?

Bunn: I do.

Hughes:What did Mr. Ray say to as you did that?

Bunn: He said, "Beverley, especially you are stronger than this and you know you can get through this and you can endure this. It's mind over matter." [emphasis added]

. . .

Hughes: Could you see the light outside at that point?

Bunn: Yes.

Hughes: And what did you do when Mr. Ray told you that?

Bunn: I made a decision to stay and I crawled to the west side of the tent.

Hughes: Would you tell us why you made the decision to stay?

Bunn: [long painful pause] I felt that I had a lot of stuff that I was dealing with and trying to get over and maybe it would a bit to get through it and Mr. Ray obviously knows better than I do... Having been through these sweat lodges before. And I specifically was working with Mr. Ray throughout the whole entire week so maybe he knew I needed a little more help or I needed to stay there a little bit longer and I also didn't want to let him down.

Bunn also gave a somewhat different version of events regarding the person who crawled out from under the tent wall when the light came in, which has previously been discussed as having been misinterpreted as a flashlight. She describes the man who rolled out as yelling, "I can't take it. I can't take it. I have to get out of here. I can't take it anymore," before lifting the flap and got out.

Bunn: Mr. Ray seemed confused about it because he said, "Where's the light coming from? Where's the light coming from?" And at that point in time someone said that you know that the flap is up at the back and I don't know if someone thought there was a flashlight or something in there, I'm not quite sure, but he said what was going on and then someone said somebody just went out the back of the tent. And then Mr. Ray poked his head out the door and said, "Close the back of the tent. Close the back of the tent." And then he also started reprimanding everybody, "Understand that that was a sacrilegious act that has just taken place. That you know you are supposed to come and go from this door when this door is open and only when this door is open. [emphasis added] And you must exit and enter through, in this tent, only through this door and go only in a clockwise direction." And those were specific directions that were yelled out to us at that time.

Hughes: How did that make you feel?

Bunn: That I pretty much knew what the rules were at that time.

There were many attempts from the prosecutor to ask Bunn what Ray's views on following his rules were but there were many objections from the defense.

Ray apparently told a man who needed to "relieve himself" to do what he could do right there, which seems to mean that he gave a man permission to urinate inside the sweat lodge. So rolling out from under a the tent wall was a sacrilege but pissing on the floor, not so much.

I hope they run the rest of her testimony on Monday because the CNN feeds were taken up for almost the entire day with this Japan quake and resulting tsunamis... as well they should have been.

A traditional sweat lodge is not an endurance challenge. This very important point was finally made by the In Session talking heads, a number of whom participated in a sweat lodge themselves, on camera, to gain insight into this case. I was not optimistic when they first started showing footage of the event, because for me these ceremonies are so sacred and so meaningful that when they are turned into pop phenomena it turns my stomach. Here, I'm not talking about sweats, specifically, with which I've had limited experience, but with Native American and other non-traditional rituals and ceremonies across the board. Television venues tend to cheapen these experiences to a degree that is painful for me to watch. And some of the discussion of their experience, I've found cloying.

Today, however, I really listened to their discussion and I have to say that a number of them seem to have been very affected by the experience. Ryan Smith, in particular really lights up whenever the subject comes up. But today, I was glad to hear that they've actually started to talk about, not only the difference in heat and duration between their experience and what is being testified to by witnesses, but the difference in tone and intention. They seem to be grokking the difference between the idea of opening up to spirit and powering through a challenge. They heard the difference between what they were told and what James Ray said in his 45 minute introduction to the event, which was played the other day in court. (The Salty Droid has that posted in its entirety: Death Ray Lodge 101-103) Christi Paul recognized the difference between a test of "endurance" and having an "experience." Good for you, Christi Paul. Yes, there is a big difference. And I have never heard of a sweat lodge being presented as an endurance challenge, ever. But my husband pointed out to me today that he has... exactly once. And it was in a very bad movie called Best of the Best 2.

Landham says that he’s one of three people in the world that can teach our boys to defeat Brakus. The fact that this is mentioned without explanation of why there are three people with this knowledge or who the other two are is an example of how god damn spectacular this movie is. I love it. Anyway, the point is there are training montages, stick fighting, and a sweat lodge scene where Landham guilts Roberts into not giving up by saying “Brakus would stay.” I’d like that to become a common saying to try to pressure somebody to stay out late or whatever. Or those guys on the street who are always trying to get me to stop and talk to them about saving the children or the environment, if they said “Brakus would stay” I’d have no choice but to listen to their shpiel.

How much you wanna bet James Arthur Ray -- warrior/martial artist wannabe -- saw that movie?

All information on the trial comes from news articles with provided links or live courtroom footage on TruTV's "In Session" or CNN's live feed. All quotes and paraphrased statements that are not linked to a source document are my best attempt to transcribe material from live broadcasts.

Comments on this entry are closed, on this blog. If you wish to comment, please find this and all newer blog entries crossposted on Celestial Reflections.

James Arthur Ray Sweat Lodge Trial: Day 5

Jennifer Haley

I've checked the CNN live feed at intervals today and as near as I can tell there's been no courtroom broadcast today. So, it's a good time to back up and look at some elements of last week's proceedings.

In Session finally ran more of the opening statements. Prosecutor Sheila Polk laid out the prosecution's case by underscoring the key elements of case as they are to be revealed in upcoming testimony:

• Participants were being dragged from the tent as early as the fourth round in right front of Ray in obvious distress, displaying nausea, vomiting, and unconsciousness
• Lou Caci will testify to delirium that resulted in his passing out and falling into the heated rocks where he was badly burned even as he was trying to make a run for the exit
• Ray did not stop the ceremony despite the chaos and did not check on people when concerns were raised
• Liz Neuman: Polk points out something on Laura Tucker's testimony that definitely needs to be emphasized -- that it was after Ray had responded to Tucker that Liz knew what she was doing that she said she was fine (implication: she may have been intimidated into refusing help)
• Medical testimony will explain that heat induces confusion and an inability to discern when one is at risk
• There were only a few basic medical supplies on hand, no emergency medical plan, only one person trained in CPR on scene, no portable portable defibrillator
• James Ray endorsed those who had left, including the injured Caci to come back and complete the sweat lodge
• Sidney Spencer will testify that the back area of the tent where she sat near Kirby Brown and James Shore was hotter, was pitch black, and that she remembers little before losing consciousness and being carried to the opening by James Shore
• Several people called out for help for Kirby Brown; that she was passed out and not breathing and that James Ray's response was, "We're closing the door. We'll deal with it when we're done."
• The fire tender's wife looked in the tent at the end and saw three people unconscious, lying on the ground, and she initiated the rescue attempt by tearing open the tent and dragging purple and blue mottled people out -- she also called 911
• James Ray came out of the sweat lodge first and had his own needs attended to but did nothing to assist others; other participants and volunteers took care of those who were unconscious or otherwise in distress

Polk's oft repeated term for this event is "heat endurance challenge." That sums it up well. As I've said more than once, this was not a sweat lodge in any conventional or traditional sense. Normal sweat lodges are, by Ray's admission (otherwise known as bragging), nowhere near as hot as his. He turned a ceremonial cleanse, normally about as hot as a sauna, into a competitive test of metal.

For the most part I'm ignoring of the In Session commentary because it's just so insipid. But this repeated statement jumped out at me today. Apparently one woman told police that the sweat lodge was so hot that she burned herself on the floor. Think about that for a moment. Heat rises. If the floor -- which people were directed to move towards when they needed relief -- was so hot it could burn someone, how hot was the air above it?

Luis Li opened for the defense. For whatever reason, I find him to be like a human sleeping pill. The segments of the opening statement they ran today, though, are as animated and interesting as I've seen him.

The defense will refute the idea that it was cultish or that Ray conditioned them into participating or staying. They were adults making choices and they signed a waiver. Interestingly, he repeatedly says "it's not quite true" that they were uninformed about various things beforehand. He doesn't say it's untrue... because he can't. As discussed, there was a real paucity of information that could have guided people to seek medical advice or prepare them for how rigorous this thing was actually going to be.

Li also makes clear that participants were free to leave and that some people opted out of various events and some even left entirely.

It's clear that the defense is going to rely heavily on the possibility that the victims were poisoned. They will present witnesses including medical personnel who suspected poisoning. They will contest that the collected samples were not enough to determine whether or not there was contamination. Li explains that Angel Valley owners and employees destroyed the evidence by chopping up and burning the sweat lodge. He says that the owners of the ranch told their employees, "Don't worry. You're not suspects." After suggesting the culpability and cover-up by Angel Valley, and deflecting blame from Ray, he backs up and explains that, no, no one should be a suspect, because this was an accident.

Li also questions much of the procedure from the state examiners who he says did not research thoroughly the possibility of poisoning, having detected some "volatiles" in the samples but not pursuing it further. He also asserts that the state is going to have to prove that it wasn't a poison. This is another clever bit of jujutsu; calling on the state, not to prove their own case and evidence, but disprove evidence that no one actually has. That's a ballsy move. I'm actually kind of impressed.

The defense will also provide its own medical examiner who has examined all the medical records  and come to a different conclusion than the state's examiners; claiming there weren't elevated temps or dehydration.

Today's highlights also included further testimony from Jennifer Haley that I'm assuming transpired after I went out to dinner with my family on Friday. She was very sparkly. (See above.)

Mostly Haley talked about the training and requirements for Dream Team members. There doesn't seem to have been much in that regard. More than anything, Haley doesn't come off as taking a lot it too seriously. She burst into laughter when asked about signing the waiver, saying she just signed it so she could dream team the event. And, let's face it. We've all signed barely comprehensible legal forms so that we could do what we wanted to do. One of her dream team assignments, though, was getting the paying participants to sign the release forms. Here 's Haley on the release forms:

They're very vague if you read them, really! Some of them... they're... So I'd just get 'em to sign whatever papers they put in front of me. I'm just like "here, sign 'em." Or they'll sign, "is it all filled out? Here, you didn't sign this side. Fill that out." I didn't really...

She did not give participants any further information on the events. She did not ask any health questions or obtain any physical exam information. Having read the very perfunctory forms, myself, that comes as no surprise to me.

Haley was also tasked with shaving heads; something her 28 years as a hair stylist did not prepare her for. (You actually have to go to barbering school for that.) She said "a good two thirds" of participants had their heads shaved on the first day. She became uncomfortable when Ray told her to remove the guard from the clippers. At this point, her testimony was cut off for the day, on In Session, but the Salty Droid explains a bit more as to why she was uncomfortable.

Jennifer Haley is a hair stylist by trade {one imagines you’ll have better luck booking appointments in the afternoon}. Jennifer was one of the official head shavers in Death Ray’s totally not cult like head shaving ritual. But James Ray can’t do weenie head shavings like someone else might do :: so he demanded that Ms. Haley remove the plastic guard and go bare clippers. She told him that was a bad idea :: people could get burned or gouged :: “JUST DO IT!!” :: she reenacted him shouting :: “so I did” :: she said … then she kinda giggled.

Haley was, of course, correct. My husband has been shaving his head for years into a Marine Corps high and tight, and there is something of a learning curve. Without the guard you can get nicks, scrapes, and chafing on your scalp. If there are any bumps or abrasions on your scalp you can open up wounds. So, Haley's concern was justified and as someone used to trying to please customers and make them comfortable, she, no doubt, would have found it counter-intuitive to start brutalizing people with electric clippers.

Another aspect of her testimony, which they only showed a glimpse of, had to do with the lack of sleep at the event. Polk asked what they were working on that would keep them up all night. Haley responded that they had "paid a lot of money," at which point, the defense objected, calling it speculation. The combative Haley responded directly to the defense, "It's not speculation because..." at which point Judge Darrow cut her off. So, courtroom procedure is not Jennifer Haley's long suit... making her a FRIGGING RIOT. I hope someone posts video of her testimony because there's just no doing it justice. I'll just say that she should have her own sitcom. I'd watch it.

In another highlight from last week's testimony In Session played today, Melissa Phillips also addressed the money issue. Polk asked about her "investment" of nearly $10,000 in the week-long seminar. Describing that investments' impact on her participation in the event she said, "Yes, I wanted my money's worth."

There was a lot of talk immediately after the tragic occurrences of October 2009 about how improper it is to charge for ceremony. There was also a lot of insistence that Native peoples don't charge. It's not nearly that simple, as I discussed here. But the question of ceremony is specific and it is not common to charge, except sometimes a small donation. In this case, the ceremony was part of a larger training event which makes it a little murkier, though not murky enough to justify the sum in question. (Remember that that ten grand didn't even cover lodging, which was another couple thousand.) But I was contemplating this earlier today, after stumbling on this quote from a Lakota Elder.

When you do ceremony - you can not have money on your mind... The heart and mind must be connected. When you involve money, it changes the energy of healing. The person wants to get what they paid for; the Spirit Grandfathers will not be there, our way of life is now being exploited! You do more damage then good.

I think this especially true when we're talking about people laying out sums that in many cases they can't even afford. And Ray calls these expenditures, "investments." Yes, that terminology comes from him, even though Melissa Phillips owns it in her testimony like she'd made it up -- "I chose to believe in and think of it in such a term, yes." No, that's what James Arthur called it. That's what it's called in the paperwork. It's what he calls all of his fees, including those for the seminars he never gave and won't return the money for. An investment is something that people expect to see some return on. They tend to get annoyed when they don't. It's called a loss. So "investing" a huge, non-refundable sum of money in a seminar does create an incentive to see things through and could certainly motivate a person to see a thing through to its anticipated pay-off.


I mentioned in my previous entry that I thought Ray had taken his whole "spiritual warrior" idea from Carlos Castaneda whose work I described as "crap." That probably deserves a little explanation. I touched on the Castaneda question a while ago here. I would, again, recommend reading the Salon article on Castaneda. It's the best online source I've found on the subject. I read Sorcerer's Apprentice by Amy Wallace some years ago and found it stomach-turning. Wallace was one of Castaneda's followers/mistresses and she describes the cultish elements of Castaneda's inner circle in chilling detail. Little things like how Castaneda required his mistresses bring him "gifts" -- those gifts being more mistresses.

A commenter on The Salty Droid helpfully pointed out that Ray recommends his students read all of Castaneda's work. This can be found on his reading list here. Notice that he recommends reading the books "in order." When someone specifies something like that, it tells you a little something about how much importance they place on a source. So it's Castaneda as holy writ. [sigh] And, especially, notice that his book Practical Spirituality was previously entitled Stop the World. The concept is straight out of Castaneda's books. So, yes, James Ray is basing a lot of his work on Castaneda which means that a lot of his work is based on a thoroughly debunked fraud who manipulated his followers in a myriad of disturbing ways. Why am I not surprised?

 

My husband and I have several times discussed the new age fascination with the word warrior. To my husband's way of thinking, the word has been reduced to an absurdity. People love to coopt the aura of power and caché associated with warriorship -- the many phony veterans, for example. My husband has read all the Dan Millman Peaceful Warrior books and says, his mythic gas station attendant can be fairly described as an actual warrior. He does a martial art; from the description, most likely aikido. He turns out to be a military veteran. My husband, who as I mentioned, is a Marine, has no bone to pick with Millman. But the way the peaceful warrior idea has been disseminated throughout the ouvre, through no real fault of Millman's, leaves actual warriorship behind. It's become all about self-improvement, facing inner and outer challenges with courage, and so on. Likewise, Castaneda, is all about warriorship as an inner journey towards self perfection. Becoming "impeccable" is certainly a part of warriorship but it's not what defines a warrior. A warrior is someone who is ready to put his or her life on the line for other people.

All information on the trial comes from news articles with provided links or live courtroom footage on TruTV's "In Session" or CNN's live feed. All quotes and paraphrased statements that are not linked to a source document are my best attempt to transcribe material from live broadcasts.

Comments on this entry are closed, on this blog. If you wish to comment, please find this and all newer blog entries crossposted on Celestial Reflections.

James Arthur Ray Sweat Lodge Trial: Day 1

According the New York Times, opening arguments did go forward today in the James Arthur Ray trial. But whatever happened in that regard did so after In Session's trial coverage wrapped for the day. Instead, I watched a lot of the pregame show but an as yet unspecified problem with the jury delayed pretrial hearings and the beginning of the public trial. Here is a brief encapsulation from the Times.

A prosecutor, Sheila Polk, argued that Mr. Ray’s negligence caused the deaths of Kirby Brown, James Shore and Liz Neuman in October 2009. She said Mr. Ray conditioned the victims to put aside their inhibitions and trust him as a way of reaching enlightenment.

Luis Li, Mr. Ray’s lawyer, called the deaths accidental and said the victims had voluntarily entered the sweat lodge.

Mr. Li said that the victims were adults and had made their own decisions and that Mr. Ray held no power over them.

So, maybe they'll play recorded footage of these remarks tomorrow. I'd like to hear them. Today it was all commentary and an attempt to put the trial in context. Much of it was completely nauseating. I indulged in a little running commentary here. But there was very little in terms of in depth analysis; at best a little food for thought. Sunny Hostin comes off as a breathless star-fucker. She just sounds incredulous that someone associated with that "incredible" book The Secret and as famous as Ray could be facing these charges.

Beth Karas, in discussing the sweat lodge structure, claims the construction was overseen by a Native American named David Singing Bear. This is to explain that though it looks makeshift, it was actually a traditional structure. Throughout this discussion, she never refers to any tribal history but uses the generic term Native American repeatedly. Well, I had never heard of David Singing Bear so I used the google. There are some questions regarding his authenticity. I don't want to jump to any conclusions but there is not a lot of information to be found... Really, that's the problem. There is very little information on his background... on his own website.

In looking at his bio, it all seems a little vague. He lists a number of degrees, without naming a single school. He claims a Doctorate of Divinity but doesn't list the school. He also claims to be a Doctor of Metaphysics but I can't even think of an accredited institution that would offer such a thing. He says he's a Licensed Minister but doesn't say in what faith or by whom he was ordained. He claims to be a Licensed Mental Therapist. What does that even mean? I've never known of any mental health professional of any kind who called themselves a Mental Therapist. He claims to be a Vietnam Vet but never says what branch of the military or what unit. Anyone -- at least of a certain age -- can claim to be a Vietnam Vet. It's hard to prove otherwise, especially without a birth name.

If we look here, at least part of the mystery is solved. His ordination and at least some of his degrees come from the Universal Life Church, where I could fill up a shopping cart right now with a range of doctorates. For $29.00 I can be a Doctor of the Universe. No really.

So, Singing Bear's credentials seem a little dodgy. But you know what else I notice? If we look here at his services listing, there's something else missing in terms of credentials and it seems particularly germane to this case. Nowhere does it say anything about him offering or having any experience with sweat lodges. Just being generically Native American is not enough. Being of some Native American lineage does not automatically confer on a person the necessary knowledge and wisdom to know how to assemble and run a sweat lodge.

There was also a lot, and I mean a lot, of footage of James Arthur Ray doin' his thing. Another thing that struck me while I was being tortured with footage of Ray's various lectures is that he just seems so angry. It was really apparent to me when they ran this snippet of him talking about merging and falling in love with your work. There's something very jarring about listening to someone talk about love and divine union but whose voice and body language evoke nothing so much as Charlie Sheen in a public meltdown. (It gets really weird around the 8 minute mark.)

I've added Tragedy in Sedona to the bookstore. I found the interview with former Ray student Connie Joy very compelling. More information on her extreme learning experience can be found here. The Joys, whose long history with Ray includes the 2007 sweat lodge, make some very damning claims that will apparently not make it before a jury due to Darrow's exclusion of Ray's prior bad acts.

Ray, she said, was a charismatic man who seemed genuinely interested in the people around him, but he developed a Messiah complex.

. . .

She and her husband endured a sweat lodge ceremony in 2007. No one died then, but many became ill, including Connie.

"The sweat lodge was ridiculously hot for way too long," she said.

Richard Joy added, "All it was was an endurance test. We had no altered conscious state; it was an endurance test and it was a miserable time."

He explained why he was able to stay inside the tent for several hours, "I was able to tolerate a little more. I made sure I was on the edge of the tent and close to the ground, using my head to survive."

All information on the trial comes from news articles with provided links or live courtroom footage on TruTV's "In Session" or CNN's live feed. All quotes and paraphrased statements that are not linked to a source document are my best attempt to transcribe material from live broadcasts.

Comments on this entry are closed, on this blog. If you wish to comment, please find this and all newer blog entries crossposted on Celestial Reflections.

DMT - The Spirit Molecule

Several interviews from DMT - The Spirit Molecule have been released on YouTube. This new film from Rick Strassman et al. explores the research and potential of DMT, an entheogen that has long been used by indigenous shamans. As I recently posted here, the naturally occurring DMT in our brains may be a key to ascension.

Particularly insightful, Daniel Pinchbeck describes the sixties experimentation with hallucinogens as a "failed attempt at a mass, cultural voyage of initiation" because there were no "wisdom traditions" to form a context for the experience. Now that there is more information available from shamanic systems, he speculates that it may be possible to complete that initiation.

My husband and I just watched the documentary Hofmann's Potion on the discovery of and early experimentation with LSD. One of the things that becomes clear from those interviews is how little many of the early researchers knew about just what they were dealing with. Foisted on the public, largely by the egocentric Timothy Leary, with no safety parameters and no cultural enforcement of respect for this gateway into another dimension, it was misused and abused. The consequences were fairly disastrous. Many years ago I had a conversation with shamanic healer Christina Pratt about such  use of hallucinogens. She described it as "free-wheeling through non-ordinary reality." The danger, she told me, was that because that world is so closely linked to this one, the damage an unguided person, with no clear intention, can do there can also adversely affect this reality.

Speaking of Christina, and of cultural initiations, her most recent broadcast, mentioned here, is probably her most fascinating and poignant show ever... and that is saying something. I listened to the podcast last night. Everyone should listen to it. She describes our core problem, individually and collectively, as having no formal initiation into adulthood. Most of us are children in adult bodies reacting to adult situations like children. Hear. Hear. Speaking as an "Adult Child" (of an Alcoholic) I can absolutely attest to this being the central drama of my entire life.

Comments on this entry are closed, on this blog. If you wish to comment, please find this and all newer blog entries crossposted on Celestial Reflections.

Money Myth Exposed

U.S. Economy Grinds To Halt As Nation Realizes Money Just A Symbolic, Mutually Shared Illusion

WASHINGTON—The U.S. economy ceased to function this week after unexpected existential remarks by Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke shocked Americans into realizing that money is, in fact, just a meaningless and intangible social construct.

What began as a routine report before the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday ended with Bernanke passionately disavowing the entire concept of currency, and negating in an instant the very foundation of the world's largest economy.

"Though raising interest rates is unlikely at the moment, the Fed will of course act appropriately if we…if we…" said Bernanke, who then paused for a moment, looked down at his prepared statement, and shook his head in utter disbelief. "You know what? It doesn't matter. None of this—this so-called 'money'—really matters at all."

"It's just an illusion," a wide-eyed Bernanke added as he removed bills from his wallet and slowly spread them out before him. "Just look at it: Meaningless pieces of paper with numbers printed on them. Worthless."

. . .

For some Americans, the fog of disbelief surrounding the nation's epiphany has begun to lift, with many building new lives free from the illusion of money.

Okay... It's from The Onion, but a girl can dream.

Actually, I posted this because it's one of those really poignant, "funny 'cause it's true" things. Not the part about Bernanke suddenly losing his religion. That won't happen. But the simple truth is that our current monetary system is a giant, soul sucking illusion. Also true, people are waking up to that fact.

If you haven't seen the Zeitgeist movies, I recommend doing so. Not that I necessarily support all of their conclusions or proposed solutions. The movies have been very fairly, I think, described as slickly produced agitprop. But they do lend some insight into why our economic model... well... doesn't make any sense. Notably, they explain in graphic detail the fact that money, from the moment of its creation, represents debt; not work, not material goods, not gold (not anymore), not anything of actual value. Debt. It represents debt. This sets up an underlying paradigm that is truly alarming. I know that most economists reject that characterization of fractional reserve banking, but symbolism matters. It is how we create our reality.

I have pointed many times to Marianne Williamson's lectures on money, in which she explains that money is barter. "You give this. You get that." I have also described money as "an abstraction of goods and services." In an ideal sense, that is true. Unfortunately, under our current economic model, divorced from the gold standard or any other material backing, it is more accurately described as "an abstraction of debt." This is a serious, serious problem. We are dealing with a financial system that is entirely faith based.

One of the most outspoken thinkers on our unsustainable economic model is Daniel Pinchbeck. In recent articles and projects, he calls for a total re-envisioning of our financial paradigm.

Opportunities such as this one don't come along very often and should be seized once they appear. When the edifice of mainstream society suddenly collapses, as is happening now, it is a fantastic time for artists, visionaries, mad scientists and seers to step forward and present a well-defined alternative. What is required, in my opinion, is not some moderate proposal or incremental change, but a complete shift in values and goals, making a polar reversal of our society's basic paradigm. If our consumer-based, materialism-driven model of society is dissolving, what can we offer in its place? Why not begin with the most elevated intentions? Why not offer the most imaginatively fabulous systemic redesign?

The fall of capitalism and the crisis of the biosphere could induce mass despair and misery, or they could impel the creative adaptation and conscious evolution of the human species. We could attain a new level of wisdom and build a compassionate global society in which resources are shared equitably while we devote ourselves to protecting threatened species and repairing damaged ecosystems. Considering the lightning-like pace of global communication and new social technologies, this change could happen with extraordinary speed.

In this Coast to Coast interview, Pinchbeck discusses his views in some detail. The interview is more broad ranging than that, focusing primarily on 2012 and his experiences with the archetype Quetzalcoatl.  But, the crumbling of our financial edifices appears to be an integral part of the great shift. (As I've previously noted, both Karen Bishop and Time Monk Clif High see us moving away from our current money based system; although their perspectives on this are quite different.)

One particularly compelling item actually forecasts the financial collapse of 2008. I missed this when I first listened to this interview -- probably because the event had not yet occurred. Pinchbeck points to the prediction of Carl Johan Calleman. The discussion starts near the end of video six. I also located the germane passage in Pinchbeck's 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl. (p.391)

ALTHOUGH WE DO NOT KNOW how the Classic Maya interpreted the prophetic culmination of their Long Count, Carl Johan Calleman has elaborated a meticulously exact fractal model of time from the Mayan calendar, in which human consciousness evolves through nine "Underworlds," each twenty times faster in linear time than the previous one. Each underworld passes through a thirteen-stage process of alternating light and dark energy currents -- or seven "days" and six "nights" of creation -- culminating in a new level of realization. According to Calleman's model, sometime around the year 2008 -- the "fifth night" of the current underworld, ruled by the energies of Tezcatlipoca, the jaguar god of night and black magic -- our current socioeconomic system will suffer a drastic and irrevocable collapse.

One rather noteworthy synchronicity I'd like to point out: At the very end of the interview with Daniel Pinchbeck, a clearly knowledgeable caller gives an interpretation of the return of Quetzalcoatl. He associates it with the Venus transit and offers some analysis about how its reflective nature points us to oneness consciousness. In glancing over the latest info posted on the Zeitgeist website, I noticed that they call their action plan the Venus Project. Second on the list of its goals: "Transcending all of the artificial boundaries that separate people." Not reading a whole lot into that. Just thought it was a curious synchronicity.

And now, more on creating a new mythology of money from Daniel Pinchbeck:

Addendum: Yes. I know the above is extremely disjointed, tangential, and may even make absolutely no sense at all. I apologize. I am currently experiencing what I will henceforth term Ascension Related Fatigue or ARF. It involves, among other things, entire nights spent in endless, action-adventure dreams that leave me needing a nap after I wake up. Said naps include more exhausting, technicolor dreaming. You get the picture.

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