Pearls of Wisdom - Rainbows

Hi all,

Sorry I have not been posting for some time. To tell the truth I have been going through something of a spiritual crisis. However, it has resolved itself now. I am very well karmed in that something within me makes me face up to my crises. It is not effort or will on my part. It is almost as if I have no choice. Somehow I am driven to come through. And the right answer eventually and always comes. And I am very grateful for that. The only thing I would add is that I have done a lot a praying lately. Mmmm.... I wondered if that helped. No, it's OK that is just a rhetorical questions!

Anyway here is another Pearl of Wisdom for you:-

"Instead of chasing rainbows seek to become the rainbow"

KK 19/10/07

Until next time.

As always.

Blessed be,

KK

Putting Anxiety and Fear in Context

Hi all,

I was discussing with a friend about the subject of anxiety recently and it would seem to me that it is quite pervasive at various times in our world. We live in uncertain times. But in actuality we have always lived in uncertain times. I wonder sometimes if some of our anxiety, on an existential level, comes from the materialistic and atheistic mind set of current Western civilization.

Within this mindset we seem to have become convinced that we can control everything. Or at least if we cannot control everything we can predict it and plan for the future. For example, we check weather forecasts and then something like the Boxing Day tsunami happens. We couldn't predict it and yet it seems that the animals that left the area before it hit could intuit it.

So how does Western materialistic society respond to this? They believe that if more money was invested into meteorology, (read Science), then tsunami's in future could be prevented, (read controlled). Now of course this would be a good thing and Science has made many wonderful contributions to the relief of suffering in the world, but the point I am making is that it is also part of a mindset that has led us to believe we, (human beings), can control everything. And here is a thought: maybe we can't.

Maybe even there is a force beyond that material world that cannot be controlled. Maybe even the "natural laws" that scientists discover are a part of that force. (And if they are they can be changed by that force). Now I believe there is such a force which for want of a better world I will call the Universe. (You may say God/Goddess/Great Spirit etc but the Essence is what I am concerned with here).

Now if you contend that human beings are not, and never can be, in full control of their lives because of the Universe then for some that may be a terrifying thought. But there has to be an assumption underlying that attitude and that is that the Universe is ultimately hostile. I don't believe that. I believe that the Universe is ultimately Benevolent. Note that doesn't mean that the Universe doesn't have hostility in it just that it is not it's Ultimate Nature.

Believing in a Benevolent Universe sometimes in hostile circumstances requires something that Science cannot give us and that is Faith. Science can never answer the ultimate questions and neither for that matter, in my opinion, can external religious authorities. Ultimately the answers are inside You. Others may guide you but the answers are Within.

Why? Because you also are part of the Universe.

So since you can't control everything you may as well do the best you can and then relax and Trust to the Universe.

For practical help in dealing with fear and anxiety I would recommend Dr Susan Jeffers book "Feel the Fear and do it Anyway". Get it here

Until next time,

As always,

Blessed be,

KK

Crone Power

Hi all,

As you know I am a Crone, (that is a woman over 50). Now the old idea of the Crone is of an wizened old lady who doesn't have much to contribute. Well what I have found since reaching 50 is that I have a lots more personal power and I am more self-assured than ever. The problem I have found is that many men my age find me incredibly threatening. I would add that this is especially so for men with very "traditional" values who didn't embrace the lessons of the Sixties, (you know, Peace and Love).

I was puzzled as to how these men had managed to live in the past so long while the rest of the world moved on. A male friend answered this by telling me that these men had led lives in traditional enclaves, (such as mainly masculine jobs) whilst living within very traditional family structures. I have spent most of my life with creative and bohemian types of people so to encounter these types of men was new to me. Especially at post 50 years.

However, what really threw me was the amount of aggression I encountered from them when they met me. I might add here that I am a comparatively wealthy self-made business woman who is financially independent and successful. I also look a lot younger than my age. And what also occurs to me at this point is that a lot of people my age, especially traditional men, have not reached the goals they set out to reach that they would use to define themselves as "successful". This being the case I think they find me very threatening and that the level of aggression they display towards me is directly proportionate to the degree that they feel threatened by me. That being the case, although I find encountering such men unpleasant I can see their aggression for what is really is: a display of weakness.

This being the case I feel a certain degree of compassion, but that is also tempered by my feeling that these men have really no-one but themselves to blame for their dilemma. If they rely on antiquated models of masculinity to define their success as men then they are responsible for holding that belief system And if by their own standard they have failed to live up to that "success" then that is also their responsibility because they are responsible for their own lives. And when they come in contact with a concrete mirror like me that reflects both those "defects", (by their definition), back to themselves then they react with fierce aggression.

Now I understand that while I find such encounters unpleasant I am serving never the less as a servant for the Goddess since it is Her Values that I am presenting to such men. It is also Her Values that the bohemian and non-patriarchal men that populate my life also embrace. Hence I am not in conflict with them.

I am probably most threatening to these "traditional" men since the power I represent itself runs counter to their concept of power. What I have is power over me and I do not seek power over others. And they know in the deepest recesses of their souls that for all their aggression they cannot touch me. And truly they can't.

I wish all non-patriarchal men out there Love and Peace. I also wish this to all patriarchal men with an addition; move on - the world has and if you don't you will get left behind.

Until next time,

As always,

Blessed be

KK

Pearls of Wisdom - Collective Responsibility

Hi all,

"We live in a world not of our own making but we are all collectively responsible for it."

KK 21/9/07

Until next time,

As always,

Blessed be,

KK

The Pathologising of the Human Condition

Hi all,

I was just pondering today on the seeming proliferation of so-called “mental illnesses” and “personality disorders”. For those who doubt the veracity of this statement please read this article: http://www.newstatesman.com/200507110021.

But I wonder what is to be the end result of what I see as the pathologisation of aspects of the human condition? And what constitutes a person without a “personality disorder”? Is there going to be a standardised way of being that means a person is “normal” and if so, how restrictive will that be?

In the past, it is true, the really mentally ill were really treated very badly, but this was mainly due to ignorance. People in the past did not have access to the drugs and knowledge we now have. However, there was also a place for “eccentricity” without the worry of being considered mentally imbalanced.

We live in a society so afraid now that some people, especially men, are scared to hug their own children in case it is thought “inappropriate”. Isn’t much more mental illness going to be caused by children being deprived of natural parental affection because of this hugely understandable over reaction?

What is considered socially acceptable behaviour varies greatly from culture to culture and conditions considered mental illness in the past, (in the West), now are not. For example, homosexuality.

I think the over pathologising of aspects of the human condition have come about in the West because we think we have a right a happiness. And not only a right to it, but to it now and without effort on our part.

Well, I don’t believe there is any right to human happiness. Yes, there may be a right to pursue it, but like all spiritual conditions, (which I believe happiness is), it has to be earnt. It doesn’t just drop into your lap, and you won’t find by buying material things. It is something you earn though spiritual effort.

And it wont be found be dropping the right pill.

As someone who has been mentally I know this. Drugs and therapy can alleviate mental illness but that cannot bring about happiness in themselves. There is only one person who can bring that about and that is you.

With assistance from, if you believe in Him or Her, God/dess.

So do not seek to change your personality to suit some socially prescribed “norm”. As long as you know that you are being spiritually true and authentic to yourself, be yourself. (And no this is not a prescription to do wrong for if you do you will surely, by the laws of Karma, be punished for it.)

No, be yourself. In fact be Yourself with Grace.

Until next time,

Blessed by,

KK

16/9/07.

Pearls of Wisdom - Worship

Hi all,

"All my poetry and prose can be essentially expressed in one word: worship."

KK 1/9/07

As always,

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

Ask What You Can Give

Hi all,

I am glad to let you know, (for those of you who were in the know), that tests now confirm that I have not got cancer of the womb and that another condition is present that is treatable. Maybe not comfortable but treatable.

However, I did spend a few days wondering, (until the tests came back), if I was about to die or not. Now this is not a new condition for me since I have had about three near death experiences, (and by that I mean I nearly physically died not that I had the light at the end of the tunnel experience etc), and I also live with a life threatening condition. The symptoms of my condition, which is a neurological malfunction, are kept in check by the wonders of modern medicine and thus I am allowed to live.

However, as I thought about death for a few hours several thoughts came to me and one particular one is that in facing death I think we really come know our core being and temperament. My two initial thoughts if I were to be diagnosed with terminal cancer were these:-

(a) What will I have left the world that is of value and the best of me?

(b) I will fight to stay alive with every last breath because although I am not afraid of death I love and embrace life.

The second thought reflects my temperament but the first one was the most important. And after thinking for a while I knew the answer. The best I will leave the world of myself will be my writings and my poetry.

Not even my children, because as you know I believe like Kahlil Gibran that children come through you, but not of you. Children come from the God/Goddess.

In a sense so does everything but in the case of my writings and poetry they come from the God/Goddess essence that is also manifest in me. I think this is also true of all artists.

So my question to you is: what upon death could you say you had given to the world that was the best of yourself? It's a good question to ponder now, while you are still alive as I found out yesterday.

Until next time,

As always,

KK

The Answers and Aid is all Around Us

Hi all,

I have been going through a crisis recently with a relative whom I love very much but from whom I am very estranged. Now being very much a "doing" person rather than a "being" person I look to see what action I can take as my natural response but sometimes in life there is nothing one can do without making the situation worse. The answer came to me in this beautiful song. One of the lessons I must learn in this lifetime to.......

Let it Be

Until next time,

Blessed be

KK

Gifts are "God-Experienced" not "God-Given"

Hi all,

I was just pondering today on that often used phrase that gifts people possess are considered "God given". Since my concept of the God/Goddess is that the entity is both immanent and transcendent and that we are all part of the God/Goddess how could it be considered that something outside of ourselves had "given " us the gifts we possess? Or had we given them to ourselves? If so, they were already part of us and could not in any real sense be "given".

The phrase about gifts being "God-given" seems to be used mostly when people appear to want to suggest that we have done nothing to deserve the gifts we possess and that possession of them is a random act of Grace from the God/Goddess. Since I believe that we are all part of the God/Goddess I do not believe this to be the case. I believe that we come to possess certain gifts because we have reached a level of soul development which allows us to attract and manifest them, and they are, in essence, aspects of the God/Goddess . And in this sense the gifts are not "God-given" but indeed are "God-experienced".

However, I do not believe that possession of these gifts is unconditional. Although at some level they were "earned" by our karma in previous incarnations, (lifetimes), so that we came to have them in this lifetime I believe we must go on "earning" them in this lifetime. If they are not exercised or are misused, at best they will atrophy or at worst, we will reap the bad karma of misusing them in this or future lifetimes. Therefore never take your gifts for granted.

Although it is permissible to making a reasonable living from them, they should never be used to profit at other people's expense. The purpose for all "God-experienced" gifts is that they should be put to the service of All, (including yourself), and Manifest the Spirit of Love.

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

Pearls of Wisdom - Gratitude

Hi all,

A little Pearl of Wisdom for you today in the form of a poem.

"For all the gifts I have received of You Goddess,
The best of these is Thy Presence,
And for all of Spirit's gifts received,
The best of these Goddess is Love, Your Essence"

(KK 12/7/07)

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

Trusting to the Universe

Hi all,

I have had a recent lesson in learning to trust to the Universe (more) and it made me wonder. What is the opposite of not trusting to the Universe? Well I think the opposite is anxiety and worrying.

I am talking about anxiety as a general response to life not to a particular event. Taken in this context it is a nebulous form of fear that focuses upon nothing in general. It just is.

However underlying this fear is a belief: that things will go bad. That things will not work out for the best. The opposite of trust in fact.

And with regard to worrying. There is an old saying that worrying is like praying for what you don't want! Understood like that worrying can be seen for the truly negative habit it is.

Do not confuse worrying and anxiety with concern and planning for the unexpected. Concern and planning for the unexpected are positive traits but in order for them to be implemented most effectively a person needs to be calm and collected. That is why it is best to contemplate the worst and plan for it when you are at a great distance from it. Therefore you take out insurance against sickness when you are well not when you have just received a terrible diagnosis from the doctor.

Unfortunately the first thing I did when the incident happened to me that made me need to trust the Universe was panic. But I came to see that the panic was about the fact that I could not immediately control the event.

However I calmed down when I came to see that although I may not be able to control the event, I am, (to a degree), able to control my attitude and behaviour towards it. To this extent I had to have trust in myself and my own strength to handle things.

Once I had this attitude I armed myself with knowledge as to what to do if the worst happened. (Forewarned is forearmed).

And I relaxed and trusted to the Universe and to myself: which is to a degree the same thing since I am part of the Universe also.

I hope you are all able to trust to the Universe when the need arises as this is also an aspect of Self-Love. And we all deserve Self-Love.

Until next time.

Blessed be,

KK

Pearls of Wisdom - Love

"I have come to understand that when you Love some-one it does not matter whether you understand their pain or not. What matters is that you care about their pain and follow their lead as to what they need from you."

KK - 9/8/07

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

Poetry Books and Pearls of Wisdom

Hi all,

Sorry I have not been blogging for some time but I have been busy with my poetry books which I now realise is my true mission in life.

My first poetry book "Songs from the Jangled Heart" came out in the Solstice 2007. I am now working on my second poetry book "The Scribe" which should be ready soon.

You can order a copy of either by sending an email to KrystalKlere@hotmail.com

In the meantime I will be posting some of my own sayings - my Pearls of Wisdom to keep you going. (This has been requested by several people so I am not blowing my own trumpet in doing this - well I hope not!).

"An i for an I and soon the whole world would See"

As ever,

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

Sluthood and Enlightenment

* Hi all,



Yawn!. No I'm not tired just tired of the old debate that seems to have resurfaced on the web recently. The "Can a woman be a feminist and a slut at the same time?" debate. Yawn! zzzz.... In my opinion this is a non - debate.

Could you imagine the corollary question for men? "Can a man be in favour of men's rights and a stud at the same time?" Most people would find the question laughable. And I find the same debate about women laughable.

After all what is a slut to begin with? Some-one, (usually a woman), who's sexual practises are not approved of by the person using the word. What on earth is how much sex a woman has had got to do with feminism as long as she is doing it willingly?

It's a no brainer. Patriarchy's basic division in regard to women is the madonna/whore split. Once they, (some men), have managed to divide woman against each other then they can rule. You know like the British did in the past - divide and rule. (I'm British by the way so I can say that).

I am concerned as a woman/feminist with equal pay and being safe from rape etc. I am not concerned with how some-one may, or may not, label me according to my sexual behaviour. It's in none of their business. And neither is their opinion any of my business.

I don't want to change their opinion or debate with them because merely by using a word such as slut they have, in my opinion, labelled themselves as a brain dead moron. Their opinion to me causes me the disturbance of a knat landing on a rhinoceros's skin.

So you may ask if the label slut does not disturb me why I am talking about it on this blog. Well what disturbs me is how so many other women seem to give credence to this labelling by being defensive if it is applied to them.

Get this: if a man calls a woman a slut and is applying it in a sexist way only to woman - it doesn't matter. He a moron. Why would you care about the opinion of a moron?

A real man, who can actually think, will apply his sexual morality equally to both sexes. So if he thinks promiscuous sex is wrong he will think it is wrong for men as well as women. I have no problem with that - everyone is entitled to have their own opinions on morality concerning sex. But at least let's make it equal. Not along the double standard that Patriarchy has dished out for so long!

I'm with Rebecca West on this: She said people called her a feminist whenever she engaged in behaviour that differentiated her from a doormat.

If someone calls you a slut because you engage in sexual behaviour that they do not approve of, don't defend yourself. Consider it a compliment. It means you have a brain and can determine your own sexuality.

Congratulations! You are a grown-up!

Until next time,

Blessed be,


KK

* Picture of Ishtar.Goddess of Love

"The Secret"

Hi all,

Well the first thing I would like to say is that "The Secret" is no secret. It has been around, in various forms, for millenia.

Though this is the first time probably that is has been mass marketed for profit.

I believe that "The Secret" takes a complex metaphysical law and waters it down to suit the tastes of consumerism orientated Westerners. It also takes other philosophies that were meant to describe spiritual processes and transmigrates them to the physical plane where they clearly cannot be applied.

For example: The Law of Abundance. Correctly understood this means that on a spiritual level whatever we give out to the world, or develope in ourselves, will increase. So if you send out Love you will increase the amount of Love you receive in your own soul. In this sense the well never runs dry.

However, on the physical plane it is obvious that we cannot all have a yacht without depleting some-one else in the world of material resources. And the Western world already consumes too much of the world's resources. If anything, we, the West, should be limiting our demands on the physical world and learning to recycle out resources.

And of course our life in also limited within the parameters of the Karmic contract we made with our own Soul at the time of our birth.

For more on this with regard to "The Secret" see this video:-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZlHZZlH_9c

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

Responsibility

Hi all,

Today I am writing about responsibility. The one thing I have noticed about people who would fall into the category of what some people would call moaners/whingers/losers is their complete inability to take any responsibility for themselves. This is also the mindset of criminals and abusers.

It doesn't really matter who they blame for their predicament: it always falls into the category of some-one else. It's almost like delete as appropriate fate/God/society/the state/bad childhood/nature etc. etc. Now note, I am not saying that people are responsible for what happens to them, (although some philosophical systems teach this). To me that is patent nonsense because it would imply that individuals have full control of the world external to them. Quite clearly with six billion people on the planet not everyone can be in total charge of their external circumstances!

No, what I am suggesting is that people are responsible for how they respond, (response - ability), to events that happen to them. Two people can go through the same experience and have entirely different reactions which suggests that it is not events themselves that determine our responses. It is rather a matter of how we view them and also whether we apply any system of morality to inform our response to events.

That is how we are responsible for ourselves. In our response to life.

Life is not always apparently fair. People act unjustly towards us. Life mistreats us. Nature can be cruel and we can be caught up in collective situations, like war etc., that are not of our own making and that we oppose even. But the one thing we can control is our response.

If you say you cannot control your response you are lying to yourself. You are absolving yourself of very thing that separates us from other animals: moral agency.

Quite frankly if you really cannot control yourself your place is in a prison or a sanatorium for the insane. And as I have worked in both places I can testify that there really are people so damaged or insane that they literally cannot stop their compulsions to kill and rape etc. Now these people really cannot control their behaviour. For every- one else it is a cop out to say that.

Now while you are responsible for your behaviour that doesn't mean that you shouldn't be able to ask for help or feel bad about doing so. Or that you should feel eternally guilty for what you did in the past. Though there is a place for guilt I believe.

I do not subscribe to the view of NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) that people were "doing the best they could at the time with the resources they had". I think this is a simplistic and sentimentalised view of the human condition. Plenty of times people were not doing their best. People can be lazy, greedy and manipulative and know that they are being these things. These are moral choices.

On the other hand people can be genuinely unaware that what they are doing is wrong and/or not have access to the real reasons they are behaving in a particular manner e.g. such as unconscious motivations. However as I believe that we all made a choice to come to Earth to learn our lessons, on a soul and a karmic level we are still responsible for our behaviour.

And on a more prosaic level, even if we do not know why we do what we do, society has to treat us as responsible for our behaviour in the sense that we are the agents that carry out the actions.

So where does guilt come in? Well guilt is an indicator that we have transgressed some moral code that we have internalised. That is, it is within us. It doesn't matter if no-one else knows about the offending behaviour: the point is, we know.

It is important that we try to get to know ourselves enough to examine whether the guilt we feel is really earned or not. What I mean by that is that some guilt people feel is unearned in the sense that it is a conditioned response to a belief system that may have been imposed upon them as children. As an adult they don't really believe in the belief system anymore but they feel guilt as a conditioned response.

An example of this might be the way some people feel about sex. They know logically that sex isn't really dirty but they still feel guilty about it. If you suffer from this type of guilt you may be in need of some therapy to recover because you do not deserve it.

But what about the guilt that you have earned. For example if I came home feeling stressed and hit my dog, (I wouldn't by the way), I would feel guilty because I had transgressed my own moral code. This type of guilt acts as a moral barometer and alerts me to change my behaviour. If it doesn't then feeling guilty is a merely indulgence.

The point is the guilt should lead me to changing my behaviour or to rectify the situation. If I have done that, or if it is not possible, feeling guilty any longer is redundant. And not only that but if continued it is dangerous to both mental and physical health. At this point you need to learn to forgive yourself.

You made a mistake. You have done what you could to put it right. You forgive yourself and move on. If other people continue to harbour grudges against you then that is their problem and none of your business.

Also I would say that you cannot take responsibility for outcomes. By that I mean you cannot be responsible for the effect your behaviour has on other people. Other people's response to your behaviour is influenced by many factors, most of which will be beyond your control.

What you are responsible for is your intentions. If you always act with good intention even if the effect of your behaviour turns out to be negative you have behaved morally and responsibly.

An example of this might be if you finished a love relationship because you no longer loved then person. The other person may be a good person but you just don't love them any more for some reason. So as gently and kindly as you can break up with them. And then in grief they commit suicide. Are you responsible for their death? No, you are not.

There is only on person responsible for their death and that is them

On the other hand if you hounded some-one you thought had wronged you and made their life a living hell and in depression they killed themselves are you responsible. Well in this case yes and no. The decision to take their own life was still their choice but you made a contribution to the situation by your evil intentions. So you are responsible your intentions and the part that played in the persons death.

So morality always comes down to intention and not necessarily outcomes.

I hope you have enjoyed reading this as some people did email me to clarify my position on responsibility.

Ultimately I believe you cannot run away from your own soul and it is that soul, as the representative of God, that will ultimately judge you.

Until next time,

Blessed be,

KK

PS Also taking responsibility gives you power over your life. You cease to be a victim. And another good thing to remember is that blame looks backwards but responsbility looks forward!

What are We?

*
Hi all,

How very prosaic life is at times. At the moment I am stuck at home with a second degree burn on my leg. This was due to a bowl of soup being spilt down my leg accidentally.

Wow did I scream with pain! Apparently second degree burns are the most painful type of burns and one of the most painful injuries possible. Anyhow I did first aid, got to a hospital and now it is healing up nicely. The nurse has also said there should be no scaring which is good.

But how prosaic life can be. Because I cannot go anywhere because of the leg people have been coming to see me and with all the extra time of my hands I have been having some amazing conversations. And they have caused me to see that some of my friends are not as developed as I supposed them to be.

In one conversation I had a friend who told me that we are "the sum of all our experiences". Now he did actually mean all the experiences in all of our lifetimes. But to me the idea that we are just "the sum of all our experiences" falls little short of those materialistic sociologists and psychologists etc. who taught in the the sixties that people became thugs etc because they had a bad childhood etc etc. This just renders humans being into robots that merely react to outside influences. It is behaviorism at its worst.

To say that on a karmic or spiritual level we are just "the sum of all our experiences" makes us seem like spiritual robots. It is a form a spiritual behaviorism. God is ringing the karmic bell and in a spiritual Pavlovian way we react.

To say that someone is just "the sum of all their experiences" is to render a human being as something that is merely enacted upon by outside influences. Now a dog may repond Pavlovian like to the ringing of a bell but you and I are not dogs.

Two people can experience the same event and respond to it differently. Therefore it is not true to say that we are shaped merely by our experiences. It would possibly be truer to say that we are shaped by how we respond to our experiences. But what is the 'I' or 'we' that is responding?

Well to me the 'I' or the 'we' that responds is our soul. I could say that the soul is that eternal part of ourselves that chooses to come into the world to learn lessons. But I will not say that I believe that is the truth. The truth is that our souls are not part of ourselves. They are ourselves. We do not have a soul: we are a soul. Everything else that we consider to be ourselves such as our minds, our personalities, our bodies even are not really us. Not is the sense of them lasting forever. They are just temporary vehicles created to facilitate our learning in one particular lifetime.

I would like to say here that I have used the word "repond" with regard to the soul. However there are many people who although they are a soul in Reality are identified with their ego. That is their little Earth self. They think that is who they really are. At that level of consciousness they do not respond they "react". These are the people whose behaviour the materialist psychologists and sociologists can predict. Because in truth their level of consciousness is more or less a little higher that that of Pavlov's dogs. And with the right Government programs those who at this level have been conditioned to become thugs can be reconditioned "trained" to become better behaved. But it is training and not education. Education is of the soul. What materialistc Government programs teach and what an educated (enlightened) soul learns is the difference between information and Knowledge.

Now I believe that enlightenment for most souls is a ongoing process. It is like drip drip drip. The soul is enlightened for most people over many lifetimes. Their are some like Buddha for whom it was instantaneous. But for most people it is a ongoing challenge.

One thing I am asked over an over again is how is the crossover made from being identified as a conditioned ego to starting to become an enlightened soul and I can only answer truthfully: I do not know. Perhaps this is one of the Mysteries that certain occult schools claim to teach. I don't know. All my my spiritual insights have come as a result of direct contact with the Divine mainly through my dreams and my poetry.

All I can say with certainty is that it is true "When the student is ready the teacher will appear" - occult saying.

So what are we? We are souls that have chosen to come to Earth to learn more lessons. Whether or not we do learn them is entirely out responsibility.

Until next time,

Blessed be

KK

* Acknowledgement: this image is by William Blake and was designed by him for his grave.

Spiritual Ancestry

Hi all,

Well first you may wonder why I have inserted a picture of a string of beads under the heading spiritual ancestry. I am using the picture to extend an analogy used by Annie Besant in her explanation of reincarnation.

From the translation by Annie Besant, Discourse ii, 18-25.

WHAT IT IS THAT REINCARNATED ?

"...... Thus successive bodily lives are linked together like pearls strung upon a thread, the thread being the living Principle, the pearls upon it the separate human lives."

Well in most peoples understanding pearls are white. (I know black pearls exist but we will leave that out for now!)

I understand that Annie Besant used the pearl analogy because pearl necklaces were common at the time she was writing. Now a days many people, especially those you might call New Age wear strings of differently coloured beads.

And this is not for nothing. Rainbow colours are used to emphasis inclusion and the umbrella nature of New Age spirituality. That it covers many different paths and traditions.

I am using the string of coloured beads in that way also but for a different reason.

Recently there has been a great surge of interest in the British media in people seeking out their ancestry. That is their physical ancestry.

Now this makes complete sense if you are a materialist, (that is you are an atheist), or if you do not believe in reincarnation. After all what else could you trace your "roots" too other than along your physical blood line. These must be your ancestors.

But if you believe in re-carnation, thinking that your ancestors can only be those linked by blood to the physical body you choose to incarnate in during this lifetime does not seem to make any sense at all. You are saying that somehow the identity of your soul and that of your body are linked in some ongoing way. That, for example, if you are born white then your true lineage of ancestry is within the white race, (which would be the case in my physical ancestry which I am using for this expamle). However, I reject this completely because, in my understanding of reincarnation, I may have reincarnated as a black person previously, (I am white in this incarnation), so how can my true lineage be in the physical ancestry of the body I have presentedly incarnated in? My answer is that is cannot be.

My true lineage, my true ancestoral line must be in my spiritual ancestry. That is my true ancestors must be those soulsI have been karmically and spititually involved with in previous lifetimes. But short of past life regression therapy, (of which I am suspect - but that is a different story!) , I cannot truly know who all my spiritual ancestors, (which I shall call true from now on), were.

It is true that I feel a karmic connection to many people I meet in my present life, and it may be true that I have karmic connections with some of my previous blood relatives but it may not neccesarily be true.

The one exception I would make to this statement is that we obviously have karmic connections to our birth parents since we chose them to be the vehicles to bring about our present incarnation. However it may not be a strong karmic connection or even an ongoing one. For example. if a person was adopted their strongest karmic connection, their true connection, may be with their adoptive parents.

So why did I used coloured beads in my anology? It was to emphasise that the chances are, that since many of us have lived possibly hundreds of lifetimes, our true spiritual ancestry can be traced through incarnations covering both genders, many cultures, many races, many sexual orientations, and any other variation you would care to mention. This being that case our connection with the whole of humanity would be self evident.

However there are still Pagan traditions that insist that spiritual ancestry and phyiscal ancestry are the one and the same thing. That one only re-incarnates within ones race for example.

This is true of some people who have misused the norse tradition of Asatru to perpetuate racist beliefs as in this paper https://kb.osu.edu/dspace/bitstream/1811/6559/1/White%20Blood.pdf. However, as the author notes most Asatru followers are not racist and the racist beliefs expressed by some "followers" do not necessarily repesent mainstream Asatru. Much as most Christians would not consider the Klu Klux Klan as a Christian church but the Klu klux Klan regard themselves as so!

My main worry would be that in making physical and spiritual ancestry one and the same thing one lays the ground open to racisim and Fascism as indeed this was one of the beliefs that Hitler used in a distorted form to justify his Nazi philosopy. And it was the Nazi philosophy that gave moral impetus the regimes horrific and inhuman consequent actions.

Of course my strongest objection to seeing physical and spiritual ancestry as one and the same thing is the logisical absurdity of it as previously explained. Also with regard to race - could some-one explain to me when I become "white" or "black"? I mean what if I am of mixed race? What percentage of blood is needed to classify my predominant race type? Believe me some people have wasted their lives trying to answer this question!

I have an easier answer. There is no pure "black" or "white" race. It doesn't exist. We are all realted to each other, even on a purely physical level. Every one is our brother and sister.

We belong to one race. The human race. And it is a rainbow!

Until next time,

Bessed be!

Krystal Klere

The Coming Spiritual Struggle

Hi all,

As most of my dedicated readers will know I believe that there is an ongoing clash between the worst aspects of patriachy and equalism/liberalism. That is to say there is a clash between fundemental patriachal values, (authoriatarianism/rule of law/conflict/the use of force/violence etc.) and the values of equalists/liberals, (liberty, non-discrimination, democracy, gentleness, concensus, the spirit of the law etc) that is happening right now and it is my belief that this will eventually polarise whole societies. Well when I observe society this becomes very apparent.

There are whole belief systems whose believers think that women are inferior, that gay people are "dirty dogs", that people of other belief systems are inferior and that it is OK to treat them so, that democracy is for weak people and violence used to enforce their view of what is right is acceptable, commendable even.

Sound familiar? I should say so. These are the values that spurred the Nazi's on and fuelled the Second World War and the mass murder of innocent civilians. It doesn't matter how you dress it up: these are fascistic values. They stand diametrically opposed to the values that the West holds dear. These values threaten to destroy our liberal Western democracies if they ever come to fruition in the West.

This is the biggest battle of all ideologies and I believe will be one of the foremost spiritual struggles of our times. And there won't be any sitting on the fence.

You either stand against the fascistic values or, even if you don't hold them, you will become part of the problem.

"All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing. " - Edmund Burke.

Of course in this day and age that also includes good women. Especially good women.

As always,

Blessed be,

KK

Happy New Year! New Beginnings!

Hi all,

Another New Year is here so Happy New Year to you all! And what a year it's been and is going to be.

It was with regret that I noted the execution of Saddam Hussein. While I understand that many people affected by this man may have wanted his death and may feel safer now he is dead I still am against the death sentence. And what really upset me was the gratuitous glory people took in spreading the mobile phone footage around the Internet. Are we still the lynch mob? I guess many are but I pray for a world when we progress collectively beyond that low level of consciousness. That is all I will say on the subject.

Now on to a happier message. Remember you cannot change the past but the future is unwritten and can be determined by you. This is so despite to the amount of fortune tellers around. Any real psychic/sensitive will tell you that they can only predict possibilities and trends and give warnings. Any-one who tells you the future is written in stone and only they can see it should be avoided for the charlatans they are.

So I will wish you all a Very Happy New Year. And as always,

Blessed be!

KK