What does it mean to be Awake?

That word is thrown around a whole lot, especially in the circles I tend to be paying attention to. What I have noticed is that it’s either not really defined, or it’s being defined in a narrow band. As a result of that observation, I wanted to explore this topic a bit. Maybe, it will open your heart and allow for entire new perspectives to come into focus.

Probably the biggest meaning that I think of when I hear someone is Awake or has been Awakened, is within a spiritual context. The number of spiritual wisdom paths which describe humanity or this realm of existence as a dream is impressive. I wish I knew all their names, and it would be a research project for a future endeavor if I felt like taking it up. To awaken from the dream essentially means that the individual is now aware that they are more than their body in what is usually a very visceral way. Those who’ve a undergone mystical near death or any sort of out of body experiences know, not believe, KNOW that their consciousness exists beyond the body. I had several experiences along the astral travel lines as well as was granted the brief gift of seeing what we look like beyond the flesh. Even so, I think knowing we are more than our bodies was something I’ve aware of since I was kid. For an example, my first plane flight at 16 was a bit scary, and I started reciting “death is just an altered state of being”. Just popped out – no intention of saying that, just trying to comfort myself.

There are as many types of spiritual awakenings as there are beings on this planet – so I’m using a mighty broad brush and still missing a lot of the canvas. Just consider anything which affects how we view ourselves in relation to the non-physical world as being encompassed within a spiritual interpretation of Awake.

But being Awakened can affect a lot more than just this realm of human experience. How many things do we do which is done without our awareness? We want food, we go to the grocery store – with the choice of which store being the most conscious the average person gets about this. So we can wake up to almost anything – provided we have been unconscious to it previously.

How about waking up to the fear-based manipulation we are being subjected to? Or perhaps waking up to the poisons which make up our “food”? Or perhaps waking up to health realities due to a diagnosis? Or maybe waking up to just how energy blind we really are? Or waking up to false narratives about the causes of climate change and what needs to be done about it? Or waking up to the extent of child pornography and sexual slavery? Or maybe waking up to how many of our “leaders” are working to protect those most vile child abusers? Or maybe waking up to the awareness of foreign police operating under the radar to harass people critical of their regime? Or waking up to the curriculum of some schools? Or waking up to the great new potentials of systems like regenerative farming? Or waking up to the idea that working for money and collecting stuff doesn’t actually make us happy or provide us with meaning?

How many ways are there to wake up? Thousands – both painful and uplifting. But that is the entire point of living a conscious life – stop to consider what ways you might be awake, and in what ways you might still be asleep. Very rare is the person who can say “oh, clearly I’m still asleep over in this area” because in truth we are blind to those areas. I have no idea how many more awakenings I have to go through. Probably tons…

What I do know is that no one can person incarnated in a human body can be awake to EVERYTHING. I can’t carry it all, by any stretch, and it’s not my job. What is my job is to address everything that I’m aware of to the best of my ability with the aim of personal and spiritual expansion for myself and all around me. This will include having to hear things which might be painful.

I was watching a reaction panel to amazing movie “Sound of Freedom” and an irate South American talking about interviewing people who’ve been used as sex slaves in heart shattering ways and how the open borders are facilitating a mad growth in this area. He was irate because he was saying this is happening NOW, not 400 years ago, NOW, and nothing is being done. I was a sobbing mess! I did not WANT to hear that, but I had to. It’s another think to be awake to, and a very important one.

I was listening to a class from Sara Landon. All love and light and great and how marvelous the new Earth will be. Let’s just gloss over all the slogging which will be needed to get there. Do I think we have a “Great Awakening” going on? Yes. Do I think we are moving into an potential for a better world? Yes. Do I think it will be in my lifetime. No. Do I think I can just imagine my way there? Hell no.

There’s a lot of shit which has be moved between here and there, and a lot of unconscious choices have to become conscious ones. Ex: I’m in the process of shutting down my aquarium. I love my 75 gallon planted freshwater tank, but it takes a lot of energy. I was definitely aware of some fish being stolen from native habitat and the devastating effects of this, so I steer clear of those. What I had been blind to was just how much electricity it was using. If I imagine a time where I have to decide “fridge or fishtank?”, guess what’s going to win? I’ll make those choices now, when the transition isn’t catastrophic. There are many such choices I’m making now, and many I’m also aware that I’m putting off.

Being Awakened shouldn’t be a horrific thing, or a glorious wonderful thing. It is, and it means those who are awakened simply have an awareness of things they did not have before. It also means that spirit is saying “there’s work that needs doing here, and to get started on it – first you gotta be able to perceive it.”

How many things have YOU woken up to, especially since 2020? I always laugh when I think of this year. “Hindsight is 2020.” The year in which the entire globe was forced to shut down, and a great many started to look around and rethink things. Hindsight, indeed, is 2020.

Not a medium, a portal.

Listening the latest Suzanne Giesemann podcast by the title of “Evidence of the Afterlife: Evidential Mediumship and What That Means with Medium Lisa Wilcoxson“. In part of it, they were talking about working with a lady named Mavis while training.

Now I will absolutely admit my ego-self-I would adore having something like that happen to me – see spirits, hear messages, witness colors, feel energy, heal, etc. Alas. Nope, largely I’m just a boring plain jane with an extremely active imagination but otherwise nothing particularly extraordinary or interesting going on. Of course, the ego-self is a bit put out by this and desperately wants to be ‘special’ – which is practically a guarantee otherwise. But I digress.

So I was imagining taking a mediumship class and how that might go. In the episode, they spoke about how Mavis likes to put her students on the spot. My imagining morphed and she’s just asked me a question. The words which I speak in response are “You’re not a medium.” Of course, this was MY fantasy, so I had to answer the imaginary question in the first person, so I did it again. “I’m not a medium.” Imagination-Mavis asked me “then what are you?” and the words which came out of my mouth were “I’m a doorway. [not liking the feeling of that] No … a portal. I’m a portal.”

Now. WTF does THAT mean??

Woke is a perversion

This should be a fun one. I’m taking a class with RJ Spina and have the pleasure of working with 40+ other people similar to me in terms of our interest in self-mastery and the pursuit of spiritual growth. What makes this class so interesting to me is noticing the comments of those in the chat. It makes me realize just how different my mindset is. For example, today we had a brief aside about good and bad. RJ was talking about “good” and “bad” as being meaningless words, particularly when you are looking from the higher perspective. Absolutely true. This went on for a while and I finally posted that I tended to see things as either expansive (promoting evolution) or contractive (inhibiting evolution) while noting that both are necessary and have their place. He said this was a great answer. *blush* But to me, this type of thinking is now native. Judgements like good/bad are snapshots of a moment in time from a single perspective. Change the perspective and/or move the timeline, and the judgement is moot. Caroline Myss was the first to state this to me – judgement freezes something into position. The more I’ve sat with this, the more I agree – it’s removing it from the growth process and making it a static thing. It has Been Judged.

It was this discussion that had a thought pop into my head: Woke is a perversion. Now most folks will hear a judgement in that, but it’s not. It’s a description. The moment that description came into my head, the entire thing unraveled and I knew I had to write it down.

Ready for this?

Woke is a perversion. It’s so appealing and pulls people in because it’s wearing the robes of ‘enlightened’ or ‘awake’ thought, but it’s failing utterly to walk the talk. The very name, woke, is itself a perversion of Awakened.

This is the exact phrase that popped into my head. Let’s go through some elements and compare/contrast. Notice, this is not about bad/good – it’s about be aware, and make a conscious choice. After all, the brighter the light the deeper the shadow and without the contrast in this realm the ability to see the difference does not exist. The Woke movement is doing a fantastic job of being the darkness to call attention to light because it’s using the language of awareness. Considering that most people I am aware of who consider themselves Woke are inspired by a genuine desire to serve the highest potential of humanity, this is important. Letting people see the false to embrace the true for themselves is what I’m attempting putting my energy toward.

First up, let’s talk Diversity. DEI is the mantra, after all. For those who are paying attention to not only what is being learned about ecological health but also our own physical health, this state of health literally depends on many working together. IE, diversity. Listen to any permaculture lecture, and biodiversity is a foundational aspect. Listen to any modern farmer who is using genuine organic methods to grow food and it’s all about diversity – not only of plant and insect life but also of animal life. The single greatest contributor to restoring a depleted pasture is the COW – and it’s being horribly maligned with calls to exterminate them … for the good of the planet. *brain explodes* I’ll tell you what makes the cow ‘bad for the planet’ is modern chemical farming: We feed them corn to fatten them up, which they were not meant to digest, so their pissed off digestive system farts excessively. We cram them together in a tiny space so they are standing in mountains of excrement and require antibiotics to keep from getting sick in the short time they are in this hellscape. The resulting manure is so contaminated that it’s just more poison to be disposed of. There is nothing healthy, wholesome, or beneficial in this practice – it certainly isn’t honoring the spirit of one of our longest animal allies!! But in a holistic organic farming practice, where cows are rotation grazed on pastures – not only is their digestive system happy and so doesn’t fart any where NEAR as much methane, but their moving through the fields builds soil health in every metric used. Herds of millions of buffalo built a topsoil richness up to to 6ft deep in the midwest! (Most topsoil was measured in inches, not feet – for reference.) And don’t get me started on the BS of lab grown meat – grown from cancer cells, no less. What an insult to the natural world, to the planet! Diversity is about bringing in as much uniqueness as possible so allow for a whole and healthy system – this includes both predator and prey, expansive and contractive elements. Humanity is learning that the absence of specific gut microbes means that type of cancer, or that disease, etc. Like the world we live in, our bodies themselves require a diversity of microbes. We are even learning that some things we call ‘parasites’ are not – they only become parasites when the system is off balance. So I see Woke spouting off about Diversity, while demanding we kill all the cows and eat lab grown meat – spouting off about Diversity while telling anyone who doesn’t 100% agree with them to shut up – spouting off about Diversity while erecting rigid barriers and demanding that either these barriers be adhered to or you need to psychically torture yourself to adhere to the side they think you should be on – spouting off about Diversity while maligning and erasing anyone they don’t want to look at. And heaven forfend if anyone within the boundaries starts to disagree – immediate expulsion from the ranks. What about any of this is genuinely diverse? It’s a lie. A pretty buzzword with no follow through. When someone is genuinely Awake, at the very least, there is an understanding that different (diverse) modes of thinking are valuable. The genuinely Awake aren’t likely to consider themselves one side or the other, but recognize all sides have value and they themselves are willing to at least listen without denigrating or maligning others.

I’ve already talked about the E – Equity – and why that’s a lie as espoused in it’s current form. The genuinely Awake will recognize that it’s not our material stuff which gives us value, but rather what we do with what we have. Do you share? Do you help others attain what they need to thrive? What is the definition of ‘thrive’?

Let’s take a look at Inclusion. This is an interesting one, because – like Equity – it’s built on an old idea – Exclusion. In the case of Woke, Exclusion is the order of the day. The very focus on “the community” (take your pick as to which one that refers to) is in itself an exclusionary statement. It’s an us/them paradigm. The Awakened recognize there is only Us, that the divisions which seem apparent are actually illusions. Nationality, race, religion, sex, etc are all useful tools, and each afford unique perspectives and experiences…. heeeey, almost like genuine diversity is built right into Humanity itself. Fancy that. As above, so below. lol. And, as mentioned above in the Diversity section, there is a very strong need for the Woke to ensure that only those who are part of the cult are recognized – inherently excluding all others. How many people report that the moment they raise a critical thought, the backlash is immediate? Only the approved ideas are allowed to be included. That’s not genuine Inclusion, just as it wasn’t genuine Diversity.

Alright. So I covered those 3 tenets and why I think the Woke manifestation is a perversion of each. The biggest element of Woke is this desire to make humanity better, which I can totally be onboard with the desire to help humanity rise to their potential. But as has been stated by much better Thinkers than I, positive change is never created through negative means. In other words, you don’t get peace by hating war. I see the Woke movement hating everything, LOOKING for injustice and finding it everywhere. That seems to me to be the wrong approach from the foundation.

Judgement is the single biggest word I can think of to describe the Woke mentality in general. Intolerant is a part of that judgement approach, as is the smug self-righteousness that knows it has all the answers and doesn’t need to listen to anything else but itself. There is nothing Awakened in this. Indeed, it’s a complete perversion of what it means to be Awakened. Fortunately, Awakening can hit anyone – even the Woke. It’s not about being “wrong” – because I like the spirit that has so many thinking Woke is great (the desire to help). But Woke isn’t about helping, not really. It’s about control, and judgement is a key part of that.

My stepdaughter was considering what major she wanted to take in college. She said she was considering Social Justice, and we were like “what’s that?” This was like 2011 or so. She explained it and my jaw dropped. Nothing about what she described felt ‘good’ – felt expansive to the human condition. It felt contractive, dark, and hateful. She went on to say she received her first assignment, and said “the only thing I can find to protest…” We refused to pay for that degree. Her statement of “the only thing I CAN FIND to protest” told me that everything my emotional/energetic body was conveying to me was accurate. When there is genuine injustice, it jumps up and hits you in the face. You don’t have the go FIND it – although I 100% concede that sometimes injustice is to embedded that one must be willing to see it – usually by being willing to listen to others or by paying attention to how our energy responds to a situation (expands? contracts?). That perspective/knowledge has absolute value. But looking for it everywhere? In everything? All the time? Ofttimes, we see what we want to see – see what we expect to see. I always marveled at police, because they dealt with the worst element of humanity on a daily basis – they often get jaded and depressed, thinking all of humanity is like that. The same thing in my step-daughter’s case – here she was volunteering to train herself to look for and exaggerate the worst stuff she could find, and live there. Every day, all day. That’s not helping humanity. That’s lowering the vibration to live in separation, outrage, and anger. That shit will kill you. Being Poly Anna is likewise not helpful. The truly Awake can take in both the Dark and the Light, and this is important. They bring Light into the Darkness – how? By loving the Dark. Not reveling in the Dark, not excusing the Dark, not being permissive with the Dark. By recognizing “Darkness, you have served our journey by calling attention to this thing. It is no longer needed, and I will work to release you.” As I talked about in a recent post where I mentioned the child trafficking stuff. I will not end anything by hating it – I will love the other end of the spectrum.

Where your energy goes, that thing grows.

Hate (insert item of choice)? When you see it EVERYWHERE, and only ever see it, guess what’s getting your attention? Guess what’s growing? Where will that perspective go, where will it take me? If all I ever look at is the thing I hate, there is no positive vision for the future. There’s nothing better that I’m looking at – all I see is hate. It will consume me and as such I will not add positive energy to the trajectory of humanity. I hear some people in their righteousness and all I can think is “aren’t you tired??”

I will instead lend my energy to the positive vision for the end result – a world in which individual character matters more than our surface appearance, our contribution to the well-being and growth of those around us matters more than collecting stuff, where children can grow to adulthood in safety so they connect with who they were meant to be, and a world where humanity recognizes how we fit in with the natural world in which we live so we can compliment it best. A world in which humanity becomes the best steward possible – for itself, the planet, and all things we touch.

Control through Religion then Materialism

I was listening to a podcast episode from Rupert Sheldrake with Graham Hancock, called “Consciousness and the Limits of the Materialist Paradigm.” Throughout the course of this very interesting discussion, Rupert mentions what I would dub ‘the materialist police’ – the ones who edit Wikipedia posts and things like that to ensure that the dogma of ‘there is only this material world and what can be measured, all else is delusion and fantasy.’ Of course, that’s my wording and interpretation.

With this description, I had an interesting image or ‘knowing’ unfold in my mind’s eye. During the Age of Pisces – the age of spirituality – the true potential of the age was high jacked by the various organized religions to ensure that the common person was removed from direct contact with the divine. Indeed, the entire premise is that while the Creator force loves the Children he made, he’s more than ready to condemn to eternal suffering unless they do what the religious leaders say. While in the West, the most well-known offender is Catholicism, it’s hardly alone. Any one who dared to attempt to have direct knowing was pretty much exterminated, marginalized, or otherwise controlled into oblivion. After all, how better to control a powerful entity than to separate them from their true essence (God is ‘out there’, all conversations must be done through a mediary, any direct contact is obviously demonic and evil and must be stopped) and then convince them they are powerless and weak (here are the strict rules which we have written and must be followed, give us all your money and sovereignty). Considering the theme of the entire Age of Pisces, what a marvelous and masterfully played stroke of evil genius to subvert the potential which that age could have created.

But now, we are entering the Age of Aquarius. While Aquarius may be the rule breaker and the revolutionary, it’s not on average overburdened with a sense of otherworldliness. In fact, ruled by Saturn, it’s actually extremely grounded and practical. Enter Materialist and Reductionist dogma. Wow! Ok, so let’s flip the script on the last 1.5-2k years. Materialism says there IS no divine at all, in fact it’s only what can be measured that is valid and ‘real’. Any attempt to consider consciousness as anything other than a byproduct of the functioning of the brain is treated with derision. NDEs are just a dying brain sparking off hallucinations, etc. Anyone who considers anything beyond a purely mechanical view is black listed as a wacko, debunked as invalid, etc.

Reductionism says the parts are more valid than the whole – take a look at any drug, which has extracted out a single compound from the symphony of compounds within the plant world. While this might render that single compound exponentially more potent, it also means it’s deeply unbalanced and often causes as much or more harm than it helps. I watch my own mother continually adding new drugs to her cornucopia regimen due to attempts to manage side effects from the other drugs. This idea of reductionism is also highly prevalent in modern medical practices – isolating one system or organ from the whole and thinking you can actually just treat one piece of an interconnected and interdependent system without affecting other things.

These 2 combine to keep the same powerful beings talked about above small and weak. I mean before, the powers that be had to separate the beings from their innate Self by doing a head fake and a run around. Now? Convince them that they there IS NO innate Self. The powerful being is just a body running around – essentially convince the astronaut that they ARE the suit, there is nothing inside the suit. Now let’s convince them to start messing with the body and turn to technology to “improve” the physical. If this is done, and there are plenty who will jump at the chance to become a cyborg, then the ability to reach the innate Self will be cut off even more. All those weirdos who claim that there is an afterlife are all druggies, unreliable, and clearly disturbed. Don’t listen to or even associate with … them unless you want to be tainted by association.

Fascinating! The writer in me is salivating at this one.