One of the big things Jesus did was cast out unclean spirits and demons.  It is repeated many times in the New Testament.

About a year ago I ran across this book:  People Who Don't Know They're Dead: How They Attach Themselves To Unsuspecting bystanders and what to do about it by Gary Leon Hill.

Hill may not know about the Monroe and Moen, or he may be a regular poster on this forum.  In any case, he seems to have hit on the same thing they have.  I tried to find a way to email him but a short search turned up nothing.

In a black sheep branch of my family, there seems to be an amazing compulsion to keep repeating the mistakes of the past, trying even harder, with the same disastrous outcomes.  

Several of my parents generation have passed on in the last few years, and I wonder if the reason these things are coming to my attention is to get me to try to pry a member of that generation who killed himself free so he will stop screwing up his children and grandchildren.

I tried some of Moen's techniques and seemed to make contact, but was met with incredible wrath and rage.  I was not successful in even maintaining any contact.  If I did actually contact the individual in question, he doesn't want to leave.  He also believes he has power to screw up my life if I don't leave him alone.

There is a psychological concept called projection.  It is often seen in people living in psychological denial.  There is also the concept of Shame vs Guilt, which applies to individuals as well as societies and cultures.  Shame is a disabling emotion, and people avoid it with all the power they can muster.  Guilt is something that can be ended by stopping the bad behavior, but shame seems to be out of the control of people experiencing it and can only be denied and projected on others.

Is removing these stuck malicious spirits the thing that Jesus did when he cast them out.  Did he free them to move up higher and leave those on earth alone?  Being forgiven should end any feeling of shame.

Islam is known as a Shame Culture, as opposed to the Western Guilt Culture.  Does this afterlife mechanism explain the behavior of Islamic suicide bombers, and the Islamic Religion's belief in demons and assorted evil spirits which they believe have a lot of power on earth.  Is part of the belief system they find themselves in after death a belief that they are in even better position to kill Jews and infidels than when they were on earth.  

I know I intruduced several questions in this rambling post, but any comments from those more experienced than me would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Rei said:  Being forgiven should end any feeling of shame.

____

kinda works that way, my pov Rei. I don't think it is understood well what forgiveness actually is, until one goes through a situation where you learn first hand.
what I discovered forgiveness clears the mind of any negativity, whether self generated or outside generated, any relationship which harbors hostility, greed, lust, negative emotions is a single dance where that stuff is generated.

Bruce has an article here somewhere on attempting to clear a nonphysical lady of sticky black stuff on her, only to get it stuck on his own self and couldn't get it off easily, until he trained his mind to "see it not there."

"believing it away." perhaps thats a good phrase. there is a website called Astral Pulse where the administrator there calls malicious beings "negs." because they are negative, rather than positive charged.

I don't do those kind of clearings, just a few that my guides helped me with but Robert Bruce over there has tons of examples how he does it. Dave here does some of that in his office. Robert Bruce is a virtual warrior in the astral towards the more fiercer kind of neg.

but back to my favorite about forgiving. We talk about PUL here as being something pure.

When forgiving is accomplished in a soul they can extend forgiveness to others, like JC did. when this happens, right on the tail of forgiveness PUL enters the scene, as now theres a place for it to enter. like fresh starts. this goes on all the time either here or there. I've never met a demon and if I did, I'd probably "see it not there." therefore it's not in my perception values. rather I do see occassionally a stuck person in the astral who is negatively stuck, meaning, like the dog that bites the hand that feeds it. they can be calmed down to an extent, I surmise, with practice and PUL, but have not come up against that myself. I'm surprised you tried to do a retrieval on a wrathful person. did u feel tired afterwards? be careful. we are just told to project PUL here, soon as we learn the basics of that.

I rather see this kind of healing example as building light forces in our body which clear darker forces from the path, like when light enters a room the darkness disappears, where did it go? probably over to see the ones who will do battle with it. ramble ramble..lol

I think in examples of every kind of healing some forgiveness is required, of self or other.

guilt might be oh no, I messed up again!
while shame might be #*!!??* I did it and I enjoyed it and now time to pay.

or maybe they never get to the time to pay part until help arrives. I believe there are none that are so bad they don't get a chance to be remodeled.

love, alysia

Quote:

Is removing these stuck malicious spirits the thing that Jesus did when he cast them out.  Did he free them to move up higher and leave those on earth alone?  Being forgiven should end any feeling of shame.

We who live in the 21st century tend to mix up all kinds of imagery that we have inherited from the past! It sometimes might be like comparing apples and oranges. I'm not sure what level Jesus was purportedly talking on when he cast out demons. I'm not sure it exists in the same framework as guilt and shame. Or maybe it does but people in the first century couldn't understand that because they did not have the conceptual framework to understand it. The concept of projection may have been like rocket science to them. So  I'm not sure where the ideas of demon possesion come from historicallly but I'm pretty sure they didn't mean the same thing we do.

However, it seemed to work and that was all that mattered. And you are just looking for something that works, right?

Thanks Alysia,

Your comment on the person covered in black sticky stuff that Bruce imagined away seems to have some relevance.

Part of the reason this is in my experience right now is that the black sheep branch of the family seems to be involved in another crooked scheme which IMHO has no chance of working the way they hope and may cause everyone to lose a lot of money.

When I asked a Practitioner about this she referred me to an MBE quote on handling difficult people which says to not let the Golden Rule rust from lack of use.

I keep thinking people can't really be that stupid and there must be something influencing them that can be removed, (other than their belief that it is possible to get rich quick at others expense) and that is the reason I was led to Monroe and Moen.  

I have been trying to get a better handle on the how to apply Jesus saying:  "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God".  If we could truly express the Kingdom of God, or PUL, all the time here in this experience, everything would look much clearer.

REI

Lucy,

I am simply looking for something that will work, but I hope it also teaches me something about handling situations like this.

I would like to see a healing in the situation, which in my definition would see the black sheep members making an honest living.  Part of the problem is that they are so in debt from previous get rich quick escapades that they believe only a BIG score will get them back on top.  

The shame they seem to feel causes them to spend most of their after interest income trying to keep up appearances so nobody else will know.  What they are in denial about is that everyone in the community already knows exactly what their condition is.

The grandfather went bankrupt and his family bought back his farmland.  The father killed himself apparently when faced with a hopeless situation.  The son married well but has gone through his wife's money and is in deep trouble again.

Before he passed on, my father counseled them to go bankrupt and start over.  Their wrath was so intense it almost killed him.

REI

I suppose REI that this sort of situation can be described using many sorts of language. It gets quite subtle.

By eastern thought I guess your guys are being led into unwise and unloving actions by ego or by selfishness. Which in effect means that our grasping gets us so focused the object of our desire (or aversion) that we develop tunnel vision - we can only see the positive outcome we hope for and in our delusion become unable able to see the likely negative consequences that will bring grief and suffering for ourselves and others.

Our natural wisdom, true seeing and the like are obscured by our grasping.

Put another way the problem amounts to a refusal to allow events to take their natural or optimum most loving (for the good of all) course. Perhaps out of fear (can't trust others to treat us right if we're poor), or a mistaken view that this is what 'smart' people do.

We do this all the time, it's just a matter of degree. For example when we have that extra cream bun that promptly attaches itself to our waistline and makes us miserable. Our lust for the bun over rides our knowledge of the likely consequences.

I talked recently elsewhere of the Tibetan Chod practice. http://www.afterlife-knowledge.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?num=1199459611/0 Which suggests that on the big issues we create a mind made demon (from unwanted things) or a god (from desired things) from them. We focus so much of our awareness into them (we obsess) that they suck energy and awareness as above out of us and make us miserable. Gods and demons are in this regard ultimately the same.

The mental scenarios being played out and the justifications we use  for our role in them can vary widely, but in the end the bit that matters is the 'shenpa' (Tibetan Buddhist word)  - that sticky, unavoidable conditioned urge to act in response to a particular situation that arises prior to our ever attaching a rationale to it.

This might sound like just a way of visualising a scenario, except that some Tibetan masters are known to be able to bring some of these independent entities into physical existence for short periods of time but at the cost of huge energy expenditure - it's in effect creative mind at work. Possibly in a way very analogous to how this reality is created. (presumably why God is infinitely forgiving - He ultimately wants to re-integrate us)

The healing process is as Alysia has just said to me much like the Recovery process. We in essence by showing love to them (actually to ourselves but 'forgiving them') enable their reintegration with ourselves. And so stop the energy drain and the associated blindness.

So to talk of Jesus literally casting out demons may be simultaneously a figure of speech of the time, a mind based process and even a literal act. All seeking to re-integrate the mind of the ill person through love and restore their true seeing.

There may be no easy cure for your relatives. They may have to commit whatever act and endure whatever consequences (karma) it brings so that eventually they see what they did in true perspective. Alcoholics anonymous teaches that the individual has to reach the point where they hit rock bottom and they themselves really want to heal before they can act, and ego is the same. Cures can't be forced on people in this situation.

If they are sufficiently open and the explainer (teacher) is good enough so that he/she can get through intellectually or at the heart level to them they may see the reality of what they propose and change path. But very possibly not, at least not without a lot of skill  - if the ego position is strongly entrenched this risks  being perceived as an attack. (ego never wants its games brought into the open and so finds ways to divert its humans)

Highly realised people seem in addition to function at an energetic level (the subject i think realises there is little or no ego present to threaten them) to create the opening needed to enable seeing, or re-integration as described in Chod or by Jesus above.

Even if they can open temporarily enough to 'see' for a while they will need a lot of ongoing mindfulness and loving support to avoid heading off down that path again. To catch the urge ('shenpa') as it arises and say 'no thank you, not today'.

There unfortunately seems to be no instant cure.....

interesting thread Lucy, Ian and Rei regarding healing.

I was thinking in one sense what you are doing we might call a retrieval on the black sheep, as I perceive retrievals as an integration process Ian speaks of, I perceive it as the atonement JC spoke of, or healing the separation.

I have two more relationships to heal myself in my family before I can say I'm done here. my half sister and half brother.
I have an interesting little obe to speak of these things, where we are making efforts with family members.

my kid sister is 10 years younger than me. she picks men who punch her face in. she says nice men are boring. there is nothing I can do about it. she looks at me cross eyed whenever I speak of something entirely out of her belief system patterns.
I had to realize she's not the toddler anymore I held in my arms once.

In the obe I traveled out there once to just check up on her spiritual state of being.
it's relevant to say she has a problem with money too. phones are often disconnected, and living quarters change as rent not paid, her kids do not pay room and board, now they are adults and she has a problem disaplining them to make them indendent.

so I travel out there concerned. I glide up to her, there she is buried in the Earth, only the head is just peeping up from water in the hole: I bend down to focus on her face. her own special guide, a woman appears from nowhere and gently lifts her head from the water to keep her from drowning.
I am feeling love and grief at the same time. possibly compassion. I look at her face as she slightly turns it towards me and she is sending a little smile to me, a very tired smile, but nonetheless it says to me, that and the guide lady, that she's going to be ok eventually as long as this lady stays beside her.

I do believe in helpers out there, who want to be of assistance, and as long as sis was being cared for, I could release my worries to her, the guide, knowing that sis has these things to work out on her own.

I don't have much of a relationship with her, maybe once a year I get a HELLO! I'm still alive! a little more used up but still kicking! gotta go! the man just walked in the door! lol.
she has quite a few relationships to work through.

my main point is maybe we just use visualization to see a person's perfect highest good to come, and we don't know exactly what that looks like often enough so we keep the faith while thinking love for them.

I have only to fall back on Religious Science premise: 1) treat 2) move your feet

which means affirm their good in prayer, then release it the universe, this desire to be of service to life, knowing it will happen.
love, alysia

:) 'she looks at me cross eyed whenever I speak of something entirely out of her belief system patterns'

Right on Alysia. That thousand yard stare, or some version of it. This is precisely the sign to look for when working with somebody as above. The moment where they click out of empathetic engagement. When it happens you know you've exceeded what they can as a result of your skill level, the relationship and/or their beliefs/conditioning or all handle and it's time to back off.

This applies in normal e.g. working relationships too. The hard bit is to stay mindful or present enough at all times so that we catch it - so that we don't get sucked into our own dramas (sometimes we're intent on playing out our own ego games without knowing it - even in the guise of kindness), the other's or the situation. Simple distraction or loss of awareness is also a problem.

We're very conditioned to attempt to handle this stuff via some sort of logical step by step process. e.g. by rational pointing out of consequences as mentioned above.

But often the subject can't take this - all you can do is to just keep on behaving in a loving manner towards them. If you can manage this it will probably eventually melt something - their ego is lulled into quietness, and in the gap or the opening they can maybe suddenly see. Or will at least avoid driving them (e.g. an oppositional defiant kid) into even more damaging behaviours, or maintain a relationship for the future.

Trust is very important - break it and it takes a lot of time to get it back. (if ever)

Grief and big setbacks are classic opportunities, it's much tougher when they are feeling good and on a high. Timing and method can be all, the guard will often snap down again very quickly.

Sometimes you can only show love to people in a very considered manner because a very few will take advantage and try to abuse you. (this applies to for example manipulative and difficult parents or partners too) This sort of stuff is often accompanied by a lot of emotional intensity that threatens to suck you into their drama. In that case compassion for yourself is as important as compassion for the other (they ultimately are the same), and so it's generally important not to make a martyr of yourself.

In that case the game seems to be to do what you can at your skill level while avoiding getting sucked in to their dramas. First off you have establish a helicopter view of the situation so that you can accurately judge what's right and reasonable. It takes a truly skilled and evolved person though to be able to engage in a highly loving manner from this point -  without seeming distant.

This is the famous agape at work. It usually requires quite tough and direct behaviours too to get through, and to avoid harm being done. The highly co-dependent emotional rose tinted variety most regard as 'love' is a recipe for disaster here.

You can see the importance of the mindfulness, mental stability and centering delivered by meditation too. It's as much about raising our game as that of the other...

Hi Rei-
The works of Edith Fiori on entity depossession give as good a generic introduction as I've been able to find. However, there's seems to be a bit more to it.

Samuel Sagan has written an interesting interpretation called Entity Possession in which he classifies four levels of intrusions. The lowest is mindless and grossly material, the next somewhat instinctive with a little life force, the next is deliberately adaptive, but without a sense of self, and the highest level of Sagan's hierarchy has a well-devloped ego structure and personality. The system Sagan presents is logical and clear.

In my practice I've encountered two main types of hitch hikers, the obvious everyday spirit with personality, and the other with utter undirected panic that overwhelms all personality. On one or two instances I've found a aethereal being that had stuck onto a person, claiming to have been misdirected by other spirits, plus a very rare third instance of bundles of spiritual energy more or less maladaptively stuck onto muscle and organ groups.

For the general case, such as family members etc, it's a matter of ego and pride, confusion and projected expectations, plus hatred and rejection and the fear that accompanies it. The "black hatred" that we occasionally encounter comes out of the level of anxiety and fearfulness that these guys feel. I've had hitchiking entities who were afraid to go into the Light because they were certain that their tormenters awaited them there. I've had people killed by animals who felt that they must now act like an animal. And I've had a few spooks who thought that they were demons - because it had been so long since they stopped being people, and they had adopted ways of parasitic existence.

The treatment is essentially educational. First, it is necessary that everyone be aware that these are dead people. Death is OK, because it is never fatal. (When a spirit laughs, then we're OK.) If necessary, we review life, how death happened, unresolved desires and fractured dreams, and also what is the purpose of being a "stuck-on spook" as compared to going into the Light to learn a better way to accomplish all those good things etc.

Then we have to develop the sense of clarity a little. The entity has extremely imited abilities. Attachment to the everyday world is only through those very few traits that overlap between the spirit world and the material world.  These especially include the extremely basic strong emotions. The entity has no proper memory, so the causes of events must be perpetually present in order to think about them. That means that if Uncle Louie is attached to Willie's hatred of rutabagas, then that will be an obsessive thought about which the attachment will revolve. Usually this turns into a few moments of expressing emotions, as well as realization that there it is really not possible to "help" or "cause" the host to perform in any specific manner. The entity's awareness is thus turned to the global situation and away from the specifics of attachment.

The third part is reintegration, abandonment of fear and hatred and acceptance of infinite lve and forgiveness. This can be scary, because we're all pretty imperfect. But the story of the Prodigal Son has served me the same way as a sniper's rifle, tergeting and eliminating fear of judgement. In a few cases I've had to point out that the well-meaning fire-and-brimstone preachers who threaten hell and damnation were simply wrong. There's neither hell nor is there any kind of rejection from God. The worst we get is a feeling of embarrassment that we didn;t do a better job - but we get that wth the ability to go back and do it right.

I work in a chatty friendly manner, as these are they guys that I've dedicated my life to serve. There are no souls so needy as those wh fancy themselves damned and dominic. What a pity! Often I ask the entity if there are friends in the Light from their past lives - and there always are. Then I ask their friends to tell the entity whether or not the Light is a universally better place to be. I also often point out that they can return from the Light -and get the friends to verify this. In that way, they are not losing anything, but they are gaining abilities.

Once in a while someone doesn't know how to get into the Light, or feels inadequate to go there because of past issues. Then the friends can reach down and give them a hand up. I've had some pretty rickety souls perched on a cloudy outcropping in fear of falling back into chaos, but once they get there for a moment, it is possible to point out how much easier it is to accept that in spite of all the ways we screw up, it still is OK, and God is accepting of all of it.

I have a protocol for basic past life work on my web site mbs-hypnoclinic.com as well as a written booklet at Lulu.com and if you want a complete text I have a text "Introduction to Hypnotic Regression" and another book of related readings "Developmental Psychopathology", available at BookSurge.com or Amazon.com under my name "David P. Armentrout, PhD".  Please note that these are simply complements to Bruce's books. If you've read Bruce's books then you've already gotten the same ideas, and it's simply a matter of application. And, in all honesty, Bruce is a more competent and more readable author. Oh well. ;-)

I hope this helps-
dave

I enjoy being exposed to the thoughts of a hynotherapist and I might add Dave, when you say your attitude when conversing is chatty friendly manner, as that is precisely how I act when doing a retrieval, which I consider is a healing act of integration with the light.

once I was doing a retrieval when I first started out, some guides were there and they said I had a bad attitude which made my voice raise. they said I was being judgemental. they essentially kicked me out of the room with that. lol...

very instructional that one keep it light, also makes the PUL easier to flow, not to get overly enthused...lol....

Ian, you said: and so it's generally important not to make a martyr of yourself.
_____

this made me recognize my pattern. I do this, or I used to do this, be a doormat in relationship..then in builds up the tension of letting this happen, and I came to call it overextention of myself..where one always ends up with the short end of the stick.
____
so one day just decided, hmm, been there done that, don't work, whats next? oh I know how about start with OUCH! that hurt. at least its a communication.

I discovered in relationship, especially with men/women, they have not a single clue what you're thinking, and here we women think they should be able to read our minds.
lol...I don't think so.

thanks Ian and Dave, you guys are swell.  :)

This is one area of life in which we are all doing the same thing in different ways.

I recall one spook who was being a real pain in the backside. I was geting nasty words, angry thoughts and so on. I finallly brought out the "Big Guns" - a quote from the Prajanaparamita Sutra in Sanskrit, literally "Om namo, arya prajna paramitaya hum." Which actually translates into something like, "Paise be. the highest spiritual transcendental kowledge. So mote it nbe." - And amazingly it worked, he calmed down and all was peaceful.

Ya never know.

d

Thanks Alysia,

We can be grateful for what we as individuals have and realize how blessed we are.

I hadn't paid much attention to the black sheep branch of the family until their and my  parent generation started to die off and I had to handle some estate matters.

A tragic accident happened to a son in the black sheep extended family, one of the better kids, and I recommended they contact a Practitioner to help him.   The Practitioner gave up after a few days and sent them a copy of God's Law of Adjustment:   http://www.christianscience.org/GodsLaw.htm

She encountered an attempt to co-opt her and control other things she was involved in.  The whole family seems under the control of this evil influence.

I have started using God's Law of Adjustment as a method of ending mental discussion that tries to draw me and others into their schemes.  Knowing that God in Christian Science is only capable of doing Good is all that is needed to turn it over to Him.  When projection hits me I just know that I have turned it over to God and am awaiting a good outcome.  I refuse to sweat the details until I get a clear sense of direction.

Part of what has happened is that I have read a lot about mental disorders.  I have a much better understanding of what people can do to themselves psychologically than before this experience.  

I have also become wary of the current crop of serotonin reuptake inhibitor drugs.  They seem to help a lot of people, but in some people they also seem to remove any sense of right and wrong and the ability to see obvious outcomes to their actions.  Many of the mass murders in the last few years happened soon after people went on Prozac or related drugs.

I am expecting a good outcome, and am listening for anything I should do to help the process.  

Bull whipping and caning seem to be in disfavor in our culture and probably have a very negative influence on those carrying them out, so I will just stick with silent prayer on this case.

The problems that unfettered human will can create are truly amazing.  

REI

Thanks everyone for your suggestions and insights.  I started the reply I just posted hours ago and just finished it to find several other good posts had gone up in the meantime.

Just around the corner and down the road from my office is a local state hospital for the criminally insane. One of their psych technicians came in for hypnotic work. She was so full of SSRIs that she could neither sit still nor stay on task, much less relax and focus.

SSRIs operate by reducing the attention span to prevent brooding. For that one thing they're great. Otherwise they are about as useful as several shots of booze, and leave people about as messed up. I've known people on very small dosage to function quite well, but it's the exception.

Since then I've learned. At state hospitals you can tell the difference between the Keepers and the Kept by virtue of who has the keys. ;-)

d

That was a nice piece Dave. I should have said that higher states of awareness are involved in working on yourself with Chod for example too - this enables access to mind at levels and in a context where self suggestion is effective.

Presumably too in healing a third party too as Jesus is described as having done. I'm not sure how it works there as I've no experience, but I imagine it's to do with accessing a high enough state of awareness so that the minds are effectively joined or at least in communication/influencing is possible  at a high enough level as above.

I guess hypnosis must be another way of placing a third party in a state of consciousness where suggestion reaches a sufficiently a sufficiently high/deep level of their mind for this to happen too.

On the doormat issue Alysia. It's possible I guess to work without too much C1 involvement of others as above, but it's often so much about getting this stuff into our own conscious awareness too. Once you 'see' for example that you have a doormat problem and have an idea of roughly the way to treat the situation (stop fighting, use love) it's fairly easy to start heading down the right road.

I know nothing about Christian Science REI, but that's a really interesting piece on that link. Switch some terminology around, replace the biblical language with modern English and she's basically saying what what I very briefly paraphrased a Buddhist inspired view as. That we can access guidance on how to act  to maintain the flow or natural (God/love based) state of things via higher awareness, that all is (one) mind, and that it's when the ego gets involved and starts trying to push through it's selfish agenda that the trouble starts.

I've not been following the other thread, but the fit is remarkable. How did Mary Baker Eddie come up with this stuff? Was she influenced by eastern thought?

You're so right Dave in saying that everybody is doing the same but in different ways....

PS I'm very cautious about SSRIs too. I've very little experience, but when faced with a mind given to excessive intensity (brooding) as you describe Dave I can't help thinking that as in much of medicine that's responding to the symptom rather than the underlying cause.

Meditation trains the mind so that it becomes able to stay without getting overly intense  - I should know - that's a family tendency and was my problem. I'd suspect too that many of the chronic illnesses caused by lack of mindfulness of the body that lots of these people suffer from might for this reason not be helped by SSRIs.

Jon Kabat Zinn's 'Full Catastrophe Living' is worth a look in this regard - it sets out a 'mindfulness based stress reduction' methodology that's proven to be highly effective in treating such illness in ordinary people and restoring well being. He's a Buddhist doctor that developed and ran the meditation and yoga based stress reduction programme at one of the big US teaching hospitals.

Unfortunately, Vajra, the better option to replace SSRIs is a swift kick to the posterior and strong counsel to get along with life. Or, as Rei might appreciate, "God didn't make junk, so there's nothing really wrong except that you don't like it. Stop whining and take responsibility and it will change. We are here to help, but we can't do it for you. Now move your arse."

But with only rare exceptions, people aren't ready for that.

If we didn't take ourselves so seriously, life would be a lot simpler. Maybe that's why the Egyptians weighed the heart - lighthearted people tend to have their world together.

In case anyone still feels that hypnosis has some arcane powers, it doesn't. Hypnosis is nothing but guided meditation. Viewed the other way around, meditation is nothing but self hypnosis. When the mind shuts down its internal babble and is aware of whatever is going on, then that's the basic state, whether hypnotic or meditative.

The reason that hetero-hypnosis works better than auto-hypnosis, is that it's easier to have a guide direct you, so that you aren't halfway caught up in trying to figure out what to do while you're trying to do it.

It's no big deal.

dave

Hi aylsia I remember a time years ago when i was worried about Deanna with this man,who she moved in with,one day she came back home to mom and dad and she told me that this man had hit her,well i just see red and this man's mother lived next door to my mom,so i waited for him to go round his mom's and then i saw him go in and i went round his mom's knocked on the door and he opened it and at the same time i punched him straight in the mouth and he flew backwards and hit the wall and i said to him,"Thats from me and Deanna,dont ever hit my sister again,because next time it will be both of us knocking on the door,"and that was the end of it,so i know how you must feel about your sis and i will keep her in my prayers,his mother never spoke to me again,but it did not bother me.

Love and God bless   love juditha

Re the kick ass method Dave. Just to say that it works in some cases (tough love so to speak) but that it can be problematical too. People can benefit from being forced to get moving, although a change in life circumstances together with some tacit recognition of their problem is probably better than pure advice or instruction (no matter how loud) which they may be unable to act on.

It takes a lot of wisdom, self mastery and care to make the right call on this. Sometimes it's flat the wrong tack. Given our cultural conditioning it's very easy for it to spill over into criticism or be interpreted as such - which actually worsens the situation.

My own experience was that I developed a big problem with low thyroid which had really bitten by the early 90s and the resulting fatigue left me unable to do more than minimal work without getting physically ill. (chronic sinus and other infections flared up when I got tired) I repeatedly tried to ignore it, but after numerous episodes of high temperatures and weeks in bed with bad flu symptoms it got to me. The brain fog low thyroid and mercury poisoning produces meant that my focus and thinking were dodgy anyway. I got gun shy.

Then the guilt  and inadequacy set in - I was very heavily conditioned to achieve in conventional terms, and to get into self blame and denigration when it didn't happen.

A not too physically demanding and blame-free environment where I could have worked on stuff not requiring a lot of thought might have helped me. Although maybe not  - as things were I was forced to confront the issue and find ways to stop hating myself while undoing the damage I'd already done. If the pain had been reduced I'd probably not have done this. (the benefits of karma again  :))

I've seen it happen with geriatrics of this disposition as well (it's a bit of a problem where the Anglo Saxon work ethic holds sway) when they reach the point where they physically they can't work any more and through mental intensity and brooding take themselves apart.

I was lucky enough to discover meditation and some other tools to work on myself, but lucky was the word. My every instinct was to fight when actually what I needed to do was to relax and accept the situation for what it was. I was lucky too that my wife was not inclined to push. Fighting just tightened the noose....

Juditha, you strike me as a little tiger for god. I can see your love for Deanna what made you do this, and it acts to make your bond stronger with your twin, so I can hardly see anything wrong with instant karma for the man who hit Deanna, just glad that he didn't chase you down the street. had that happen to me a couple of times, not fun.  :P
it might be better to help Deanna choose a man not so aggressive, if that is possible for you? maybe women in this predictament should make a questionaire and hand it to the man before becoming involved? unrealistic I know.

I have to let her take her hard knocks of life, as that is what I was told, I couldn't protect her, or even give her money or shelter, because it would just deter her from her pathway, but I can send loving thoughts and this will help, as no thought of love is ever wasted!

Juditha, if I were a movie director, I would want to make a movie of your life! love you, alysia

Dave said It's no big deal.

but I'm still happy at least some people do it, I know its a service nontheless.

I regressed my own kid. she wanted to know about Dan, her first boyfriend.
I relaxed her and asked her what she saw. she didn't see anything, but I started seeing things, so i told her, his name was Dirk. you were in the 60's, early on. you started a romance that didn't get off the ground. He loved you very much, vowed to track you down in the next life. I saw her get trampled by a protest crowd and die under the feet of them. she was flower child. she came to me this life, and was a flower child for awhile, we even got her a VW bus and painted "love Wagon on it." lol. the neighbors were not impressed!

shes not hippy anymore, she took up roller derby, to learn to be tough. she still likes her pot though and it don't hurt nothing to smoke that stuff. its even good for certain medical conditions, but I'm not attracted to it myself..

but I still like the way you are helping people Dave its very interesting.
love, alysia

I dont know what SSRI's are?  I think prozak is a cop out that is socially accepted. according to my bible all things in moderation can be used, because it says sometimes we go into a panic condition of fear.
it's better to "temporarily" use outside means then because it's not healthy to be in fear 24/7.

but sometimes we get addicted. thats the bad news.  then what else my bible says drugs are like delay mechanism.

you buy yourself a little time before facing off with whats really wrong. only by going within and taking a step of self mastery can the root of the problem be overcome. however, we delay our spiritual growth also in many other ways besides drugs.

my husband with his drink, is example of not facing up to whats really bothering you, that you're not adjusted to society, whatever, not happy camper. couple of sips of bourban and suddenly, nothing matters, flip on TV, eyes glaze over. oh, he said, are you still here?

yea sad. but it happens. the only serious study on our world I ever saw him do was listen to an Allan Watts philosophy tape really really hard. I was thrilled to death to see his wrinkled sober brow for once.
because he was a really good man. never found anyone else like him.
love, alysia

SSRI - Selective Seroronin Reuptake Inhibitor. Prozac, Effexor and so on...

Serotonin is your natural inhibitor and moderator. People who get all freaked out and agitated can benefit from a brief period of anything (meditation is ideal, of course, but drugs work) that slows things down and allows them t get straight again. This is what these things are designed for.  Unfortunately, they produce a nice zombyfication allowing people go off into a rosy glow with little interest in reality. - And they're all addictive, meaning that there are severe depressive episodes that accompany reduction and termination of use. Catch 22 - if you're depressed we have something that will solve that, but you can't stop taking it or you'll get even more depressed.

Vajra is totally correct that most people are not ready for rapid relief. My practice aims for ultra-brief hypno-analytic therapy, which amounts to going directly back to the event and dealing with it. This is not something that can be used with fragile temperaments, nor is it appropriate for long term supportive needs. Instead, my approach is confrontive, robust, dynamic and can overwhelm people who need a more gradual approach. I do the psychological equivalent of kick-ass, with a major dose of clearing away old issues and wreckage. I play from love, but have no time for Poor Me types. Those with actual needs for support generally get referred to people who offer that type of work. I view my job as "getting rid of people" - not as lifetime income security. (Actually, at the present time I'm building a restaurant in Morro Bay, California - I don't have time to do long term supportive work.)

dave

thank you Dave, and I foresee in my crystal ball a hugely lovely enterprise of feasting going on in your new restaurant.
I think lemon in the water is a great pull.

well, since we are on topic of healing in general I would like to share a self retrieval I did on myself, learning some of the TMI things I could do for self help.

I took this route as I'm type of person never can ask for help from nobody. therefore typical introvert, luckily, Monroe came along and left me a clue.

Dave says: My practice aims for ultra-brief hypno-analytic therapy, which amounts to going directly back to the event and dealing with it.
so heres mini example self retrieval for any newbies can't get to somebody for help.
Baby Falls Out of the Car

When I was first learning art of retrieval, I was taught to ask for a guides assistance. guides are nonphysical, we can call them helpers also. in olden times centuries past, we called them angels. but as it turns out they have been physical people at one time, in most cases and they are there to assist human evolvement.

So one day I ask Bruce, how many retrievals should I do weekly to get this business down? he suggested 2 or 3, as he implies he would do 2 or 3 himself.
Fresh retrievers ask questions like this, as I had done a retrieval before I came here, I knew it was possible.
I never knew what I was doing, but I would sit still and try. so this day I asked for a guide and waited to see if I could be taken to do one.
heres a picture of me in the beginning phases of the art of retrieval: don't laff.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v323/spiritvideo/Alysia/myspace2/myspace3/thmagnificent1.png

a few minutes of darkness foggy images come into view, I seem to have a guide, but not sure so I fixate on the image trying to see it more clearly. I see some wheat like grass and a little kids head is the same color as the wheat she sits in. all alone, I begin to get worried for her and think I must retrieve her. I seem to be told to get closer to her. it seems there are more than 2 guides, maybe 3, but I can't see them.

I feel like I'm listening to them anyway. I focus in closer and wonder what to say to this child, whom cannot be myself, as I am thinking it's a retrieval of another. I speak to her and she pretends I'm not there, as she does not trust anyone. I am persuaded to be persistent. I muster up some enthusiasm, related to pul, and ask again if she would like to go with me somewhere that's fun? in retrievals, not supposed to just make a command, have to ask them. this time she notices me and gets all happy and asks if she can take her dolly with her. I seem to hear this voice in my head when she speaks. a very cute voice which makes me fall in love with her and she comes into my arms and we fly away to the reception area of focus 27, but before we get there, I blink back to C1.

I am aware of my emotions at this point, of sad, happy, relief, different emotions, but logically, I still don't know what I have done. so I let it rest, I know I'm in training is all.

months or weeks go by, and this retrieval stays on my mind. I am thinking about it one day and a memory starts to unravel, that this self retrieval is related to the day my family moved out of our home and left me in the back yard. the memory amazes me as they eventually returned, placed me in the back seat, drove down a dirt road and the door opened and I fell out on the ground, and they all started laughing at this.

heres where my problems began in life. when they left me in the empty house, I remember thinking "I must not be important, just like mother said, so maybe I will die now."

so I went through life with this buried thought pattern that I wasn't important, and that is considered the core issue to self retrieve a thought/experience which made an impact on your youth, then you can change the pattern to "it was a lie."
but first there was the forgiveness to do of mother, and every single family member involved and that takes work also, but later you experience a feeling of freedom from that kind of sad or angry energy of the memory.  :)

That sort of experience I think Alysia probably really underlines the creative nature of mind, and the problems our inevitably uncontrolled use of it creates. We talked earlier of god and demons as separate self created entities. Your story suggests that we even do this from moments in our own life which we get 'stuck' in, or can't forgive or can't let go.

They produce a 'kink' in our mind (the mind?), and then somehow time moves on leaving it (actually perhaps the vibe attached to our initial perception of it) intact or in some way existent (as some sort of negative energy or sentiment attached to what we perceive as a deep memory, but perhaps it's actually real in some way) before we have time or are able to unravel and release it. This kink, while after some time beyond our everyday awareness still lives on as a god or a demon that sucks energy out of us  - causing effects that we feel today without necessarily being aware of the cause.

It's a kind of catch 22 problem anyway - we need time and more life experience than we have available when it happens to be able to on the spot unravel and release it, yet the very fact of time's moving on somehow leaves it with a more or less infinite existence unless much later on we can with our new found 'view' somehow get back to and release it.

If our view was wholly correct or realised from the start so that we were 100% forgiving of these events as they happened then somehow the kink would never have formed.

Not sure if this makes any sense, but it's sobering to think that (a) this may very well be analogous to the process by which this reality and self is created, and (b) that every time it happens it takes us deeper into, extends and leaves us more tightly bound to this samsaric reality - with more work to do if we are to escape. That the more problematical our life the deeper the mess gets.

Clear as mud??

Ian said:  
Not sure if this makes any sense, but it's sobering to think that (a) this may very well be analogous to the process by which this reality and self is created

____

right. what was sobering to me is how one's upbringing so conditions us/me, that we adopt whatever an authority figure has told us as the truth, shove it into the unconscious and begin to live out the lie.  because I saw other retrievers had many of my same problems from their family dynamics and also needed to stop believing what somebody told you about yourself way back when you didn't have a reason NOT to believe it, as your mind was just absorbing experience's and feelings when you are a brand new consciousness here. a child.

so what this accomplished for me was to start growing up, as essentially, the lack of love in my family I experienced told me I was also, not lovable. As we grow into adults, we may shove down into the unconscious the memories as we don't want to look at the pain we went through. self retrievals allow us to look at the pain and realize we no longer have to run from it, that now we can deal with it, and understand why we act the way we do, in this circumstance, to not be able to love the self, and if you cannot love your self it is very difficult to be loving others.  Later, like 50 years go by, I began to tell mothers to love their children as I realized what was missing in my own childhood.
that if mothers would do this, it would help all of humanity to evolve into all we can be.

my entire life was effected by the lack of love I saw everywhere and consequently was creating my environment by this deep seated belief system which built upon itself.

the idea of creating my own reality and whether I could do that by creating my own internal climate would work hand in hand with self retrievals then.

the only difference I can see with doing self retrievals and sitting and talking it out with  a therapist, is that I am using images with the participation of guides, whom I often call spirit, (also can be considered a basic trust that love prevails)
while the therapist is a physical helper who guides the process of self retrieval.

it's another way of going within and grabbing a rote which unravels in linear time and wanting to understand why bad things happen to good people, then working with what is the truth of the matter versus what is the untruth of the matter, and how can I change my software program?
update it I suppose... :)

How's about a not very good analogy to this situation:

The Sausage Factory

Think of a sausage machine bringing together all sorts of ingredients and extruding this continuous strand sausage. You are the minder of that sausage machine. Your job is to keep it fed with material, and to make a simple adjustment to keep it working right. You have other tasks elsewhere in the factory too.

As the minder you can detect when something you think is nasty (dark meat maybe) comes through in the sausage. You're very concerned about the sausage because it's an important part of your diet, and of other's too.

The problem is you are a young and very impressionable sausage machine operator. After one or two nasties have come through you start focusing really hard on the  the string where it leaves the machine to catch what you think are the bad bits. Trouble is no matter how hard you focus you can't seem to catch them - they somehow slip by because you can't quite figure what to do.

It'd make a lot of sense to consult with the factory owner, but somehow you get such tunnel vision that you can't take your eyes off the machine. Not wanting to eat what you think is bad sausage you meanwhile bust a gut trying to  remember where all the nasty bits are in the string of sausage.

Every now and then the factory owner allows a short break and you manage to go back and cut out the odd bad bit. But you can't seem to get close to them all and eventually you end up frantic with worry that you'll end up eating bad sausages, that others will too, and that you'll be in big trouble with the boss.

Eventually it all gets out of hand. You end up stressed out and in melt down, you haven't a hope of catching up with all the bad bits and meanwhile you're so focused on the one bit of the string where it exits the machine that you forget to adjust the machine or to feed it with fresh material. You're doing none of your other jobs elsewhere in the factory, and have forgotten all about the rest of the string.

The other workers have all quit and long started other things, but you don't notice.

Production gets very slow, quality is variable and occasionally it almost stops. Eventually the factory  owner comes in and looks to see what the problem is. You're scared silly and hide, but eventually he finds you.

Upon being asked what the problem is you deny its existence, try to blame others, the crappy machine, the bad ingredients, everything except yourself. Gently and persistently he shows you that this can't be the case, that the problem is the way you are seeing the job.

You're amazed that he's not blaming you for doing harm, he's more worried that you're not upset and troubled. And that you're missing out on the fun work the others are doing.

But then he blows you away by bursting into a great laugh, throwing his arms around you and saying -  but the sausage filling was fine. The dark stuff is no problem. The machine checks this automatically, I designed it so that it will remove any really bad bits itself before they get into the sausage. Your job is only to keep it fed with material, and to adjust it as needed to maintain the flow.

What's more it's late at night and everybody else is long gone and off having fun doing important things while you're stuck obsessing about what is not a real problem. Your obsession with this issue has been closing down your awareness and stopping you seeing how important all the other parts of your job are too.

The sausage is important, and it's important to learn to operate the machine but not so important as all the other things you need to do in the factory. And certainly not so important that the owner would fire you. he sees things in a much larger way - he knows much better than you do what your potential is and wants eventually to develop you into a manager in the factory.

So eventually you learn that you can trust the boss, that he your interest at heart, and that if you are going to do what's best for yourself and everybody else you need to lightly but mindfully keep and eye on the machine while not losing awareness of all the other parts of your life.

The sausage is your C1 life stretching back into eternity.

The dark bits of filling are those events in life that we grasp at, or perceive as problems or important - that get hung up about and can't release. With time we see nothing except these.

Our broader job in the factory is our total existence - not just C1 but at all levels of which we need to become aware and where we have work to do too.

The short breaks where we get to remove some of the dark bits are short periods of awareness of this, and of the reality of our C1 life, soon lost when we get sucked back into our obsession with the bad bits.

The bad quality runs of sausage caused by our not letting the machine run properly with just the right touch on adjustments is life getting out of shape as a result of our inability to go with the flow  - or to know intuitively when to intervene, and when not.

The skill, mindfulness, care and broad awareness required to do all the jobs properly are analogous to how we are required to learn to handle this life and our broader existence.

The great sausage of life and our operation of the machine being important to our development but not mattering in any absolute way is analogous to the way that it's only the learning that matters in life, not the events themselves. That we literally can do no permanent wrong.

The caring factory owner is of course God or higher mind.

And in the end when we get good at operating the sausage machine what matters to him is our ability to move on to a higher job.

:) Anyway. Hope it's not too long!! No doubt it's full of holes and inaccuracies which you'll see immediately....

Interesting, thought provoking, and stomach queasying analogy there Ian.  

I didn't know you eat sausage Ian.  :) that would be an ok analogy to my pov, if it didn't take 50 years, half a lifetime, to get the production line going again. but thats just another personal take in itself, that I do.

I see the mind as similar to a computer with belief system software up there running the show that can be changed out as necessary, even though seeing one's self as a computer, it can seem demeaning at first, but it's not really, once the observer part of the mind gets into the picture; this might be analogous to the inspector showing up and telling sausage cranker to use some disinfectant after work so nobody gets sick.

ok, I missed the later part of the analogy and then up pops Justin and I was sitting here laffing because of his use of the word queasy...

then as I'm reading I realized just how I function, with images from words.

as I read Ian's post, I kept seeing a giant never ending greasy sausage floating in the air. rolf!  it got in the way of my critical powers of logic. so it made me laff. which I'm sure is not your intention Ian. just rambling here.

you said something significant to me here: Your obsession with the issue has been closing down your awareness and stopping you seeing how important all the other parts of your life are too.
______
actually, this might be the case sometimes, that there is obsession in some of us.
with the sausage guy, that he wishes to do a good job, he is driven by his fear of perhaps becoming unemployed, yet in my particular story, I'm talking about the subconscious mind is like a computer program with one single pov, which closes down awareness of other points of view.

you sum up, more or less god is in charge here, so all the fuss is really not necessary, if we could only come to that perspective.
thats entirely true, yet while living a single life in waking reality, we will not be aware god is in charge until it's all over, in most cases, unless conscious pathways into the subconscious and the super subconsious even are taken up.

I believe that's why you're always telling us to meditate because you are aware of that benefit. I think its a good point. a lot of us however, do not know how to meditate.

therefore I'd just conclude theres tons of advice out there how to do it. retrievals is one of the pathways to the psyche and also Buddhism, Christian Science, A Course in Miracles, TMI, etc etc etc, prayer, etc etc can lead to inner reflections or meditation.
all the different paths are to say god is in charge of all this even if we don't realize it, we do a life review when we're dead, or earlier if possible and discover, it was all good because of the result of searching yields the meaning.

then we get into holy wars and try to define god. we try to find the edges of the universe, or measure infinity. we eat our own tails by chasing them.

In the end we get real quiet in good company and listen to the others tales, and say, yes, I am also that. I celebrate your uniqueness. then we all do a cooperative effort and things really start to happen!

thanks Ian for all your sausages, I hope I can throw some posies in there as well.
love, alysia

wrote on Jan 28^th, 2008 at 1:51pm:

The great sausage of life....

And here all along, I thought it was the great SALMON of life..... it all becomes clear to me now!

I am eternally grateful, Vajra.


love, blink :)

Vajra - when I was about 4 years old, the ultimate unholy terror of my life was that the neighborhood kids were going to feed me through a meat grinder into the equivalent machine. So Thanks for another pleasant memory of childhood   [smiley=undecided.gif]

I've noticed that all of us here seem to have one or another semi-major issues. It's rather like the tradition of the shaman as the wounded healer. And what can be more shamanic than to get right into the nitty gritty of spiritual confrontation?

Adam lost a rib (considering some divorces, he got off lightly) to the process - a sort of exteriorization throgh tragedy. Others have lost everything from bodily organs to internal chemistry that is hard put to maintain any kind of homeostasis.  The usual result seems to be that we decide that we have to do it all personally, rather than maintaining faith in those who are training us to be social.

I recall growing up behind barbed wire - always on a military base, and usually one that was shut down and very empty while being converted, refurbished or something. What a wonderful place to get into trouble as a pre-teen and teenager! At one time I had a small (35 lb) antipersonnel bomb in my bedroom as a souvenir - I forgot about it, and the movers came and it got packed and shipped to  our next residence where I discovered it years later. It came complete with bursting charge, but I had trouble locating a fuse - fortunately - and as the explosive used in such things has a tendency to age and decompose, increasing its sensitivity, it more or less scared the pee out of everyone - the thing now rests deep in the mud of SF Bay. -  

I suppose that this sort of fits my fear about being shredded. It definitely fits my recollection of being blown up by a bomb. Like when Wiley Coyote looks down the barrel of the Road Runner's canon and a moment later there's just a cloud of flying smudge.

My theory on this is that we sometimes get eaten by the bear, so we get a stuffed bear as a toy, to make it OK. That reconciles us, at least indirectly.

So we get abused by society and have started out to make it better by fixing things on a spiritual level. I think that's a very realistic approach.

dave

I must confess I suppose the name laffingRain was befitting, given to me in a dream message as I'm sitting here this morning having fits of laughter, out loud, at all the responses in this thread all linked together by a....sausage.

yet I wasn't one to laugh until around year of 2003. now it's something I notice happens more often and a pleasant change for me. not making fun of anyone, just saying I enjoy everyone's input, and the comraderie feeling.

Dave, I recalled you saying something about being a military kid but the bomb...I'm surprised your folks let u have a bomb, especially if they get more sensitive as u say, over the years. it almost seems like it was a reminder of another time of great truama.

we have really strayed from the topic title "casting out demons" started by Rei I think, and I wonder if he is staying away because he's as perplexed as I am? I hope Rei, you don't mind we ramble on here, it wasn't my intention and I think you started a good topic. hope you get what you want here. love, alysia

I have been out of town.  I saw the new posts when I got back.  A lot of good conversation.

Something in the thread brought out a lot of childhood memories.

There is probably something in Bruce's books about how people choose the families they come back into but I didn't see it.  If anyone can refer me to the pages I would appreciate it.

I guess it can be inferred from his descriptions of people sprung from various hells and hollow heavens, but if there is more I would like to read it.

Thanks in advance.

:) I guess guys the 'great sausage of life' started out as a serious attempt at an analogy for what's a fairly complicated situation - but I couldn't in the end resist playing it up a little....

More seriously, I have met no spiritual beings who were demons. When challenged, they all turned out to be misguided spirits whothought that they would be preserved forever if only they kept hooking onto people. Then, to exercise themselves, they interfered, and thus got into the negative definition of self and so on.  

Casting them out is as simple as getting to know them, assuaging their fears, and helping them understand that in the Light they will find total love and forgiveness. Then I sometimes ask their dead friends to explain that it's a nice place to go, and for those that really give me a bad time, I offer to let them ride along with me if they don;t like it in the Light. (Of course most of them don't like the way I base my identity on pure emptiness - it kinda makes it difficult to be demonic or anything else, and brings in the question about who we really are etc. So except for a few scientists and perhaps a bored sage or two, invited to assist in my writing and studies, I have no such issues.)

The very worst way to handle malicious spooks is through exorcism. It creates vast amount of negative energy, and they use the energy to do their thing even more effectively. Love conquers all - especially the really mean and nasty ones. ;-)

dave

Right on Dave. It's so true the way or ingrained urge to fight everything from a self based perspective (illness, other people, spooks, whatever) leads only to escalation....

Hi Alysia-
I don't think that I said anything about my parents "allowing" me to have a bomb. Unused empty casings are often laying about when a base is shut, and this was a base where they loaded these things. The also loaded a lot of other things. I discovered how to enter the buildings where they did that kind of work and steal high explosives by the pound. That wasn't "allowed" either, but as a thirteen year old I was sneaky as hell.

I suppose that you can tell by this that I had a predestination for discovering the spirit world, and that the question was more on the order of how long it would take me to arrive, and by what means. ;-)

dave

;D  oh I see Dave. glad you made it this far.

no, I never met any thing I could call a demon, it's just not the sort of thing I'm interested in finding so its not there. I have met a few people I wondered what hell they came from. one of them a next door neighbor would shoot cats in the neighborhood and beat his wife, if thats not a demon, well, it's pretty close!
he was a hunter. people would hire him to go and get them a rhino head. so I guess the cat shooting was to keep the neighbors cats from invading his territory, which is an animal instinct sort of..like cross over this line and your dead, type of thinking.

I observed instant karma for him though; he had a pug for a pet which he was greatly fond of. one day it got into a neighbors back yard and was just laying there dead. probably some dogs killed it. instant karma for the harm he had done to cats.

but in the astral, it's guys like this when they die, they might get attached to someone, but I don't think it is a permanent attachment and they are easily removed like Dave said, by informing them there's another place more suitable for them.

love, alysia