Wednesday, November 18, 2015

Isis: The Divine Feminine

ISIS: the Divine Feminine.
Re-edited 1/12/2016


A Spiritual Women's bookstore in America, named after a Goddess, ISIS, has been repeatedly targeted with violence recently.

We need to remember the past, in order to become aware, so that history will not keep repeating itself.


Onc upon a time, those in power, took a life-affirming symbol and co-opped it to represent their political agenda, and the original meaning of the symbol was forgotten (if it was ever known to begin with by the masses) with the passing of time. Most people in the world came to see the swastika as a symbol of evil, but nothing could be further from the truth. Hitler bastardized a life-affirming symbol and used it to represent his very misguided personal quest/ambitions.

This is what the current "powers that be" are doing now with the goddess name: Isis.
We need to stop the suppression of the Feminine that has gone on for the past two thousand years, by educating the masses to the fact that this name, Isis, which is synonymous with the Divine Feminine and all that is life-affirming, was chosen by those in power to become synonymous with evil in the minds of the masses.

It's part of the Modus Operandi of those in power to re-write history by taking the folk/indigenous/spiritual symbols of a culture and change their meaning; by taking a symbol of light and goodness and turning it into something bad, something to be feared. This way, over time, people stay away from, forget about, and lose the magic: the power and strength that the symbol represents. And when people cease to understand the inner path of connection to the source of that power, when people cease to KNOW that they themselves ARE the Source of that power - this is called giving away personal power and allowing ourselves to be led around by the nose like sheep, and when this happens on a mass level, people are easy to control and reality is created FOR The People, instead of BY The People. Masses of people are literally "buying" into this reality that is "being sold" to them.

 Historically, The Church, Royalty, Empires, and Governments have demonized and annihilated anything or anyone that has the power to threaten the status-quo, that threatens to take control out of the hands of those who will stop at nothing to maintain control.

The Church did exactly this when attempting to convert Pagans to Christianity. The Church "Fathers," those who took control of the church long after Jesus had left the planet, co-opted the Pagan's Horned God and called it the Devil, so that in time, all the things that were good and natural, that were associated with the old religion's Horned God became evil, bad and wrong in the new religion.This is one of the more subtle, pernicious ways to take power away from the people.

Fortunately, we are entering an era in history when Women and feminine ways of knowing are making a resurgence. We must be doing something right if they fear the Feminine enough to, once again, systematically try to demonize what is good, beautiful, natural, and empowered. The attack on the bookstore and the demonizing of The Feminine is just a more subtle, insidious version of burning women at the stake.

Everyone please share the knowledge that Isis is not a terrorist group, but a symbol of
Divine Beauty and Truth.

And please note, carefully, what was actually attacked in this instance. The true terrorists did not attack a "terrorist cell," but a Women's spiritual bookstore. Women, and feminine ways of knowing, have been under attack for the past 2000 years. The old Regime, the corrupt old boys club, the old-school ways of being, doing, and thinking: those who are experiencing their last gasps of power before total annihilation, are the ones who are perpetrating these attacks because they know the status quo is breaking down and dying.

Just like an animal that is in the final throes of Death, terrified and raging because it is experiencing the hyper-real awareness of its own death,
these attacks are the desperate signs of Dying Power.

And where there is decay and death, there will be a Re-Birth.

Friday, November 6, 2015



KG singing Janis Ian's: From Me to You, 
A capella

Click on the word Youtube below:

                                 Youtube




Sunday, September 27, 2015

"Inner peace begins the moment you take a deep breath and choose not to allow another person or event to control your emotions."

I just realized the truth of this on a deeper level today. Not just as an intellectual concept, but from a place of heartfelt connection, applying this to my most challenging relationships. I am beginning to see how the universe is using other people in my life as characters in a cosmic play in order to teach me certain life/soul lessons. I'm able to distance myself from the emotions and see the situation from a higher vantage point.
Hence, the symbolism or personification of the wise guru sitting on a mountaintop. Modern Christianity co-opted that Eastern spiritual symbol, and over time, it evolved into the masculine God with a white beard in the sky, which is a very simplistic, unsophisticated characterization or interpretation. The wise old guru on the mountaintop is really a pictorial image, a symbol, a visual metaphor, of each of our higher selves.




Tuesday, September 8, 2015

Down to the Wire: (The Stringband Tribute to the Music of John Mayer)

Getting into the groove with John Mayer, I tend to experience shades of Stevie Ray Vaughan's guitar, sultry R&B phrasings, and his signature relaxed, even languid, vibe.

In buoyant contrast, the "Grassing-Up" of John Mayer via Adam Galblum's "Down to the Wire: (The Stringband Tribute to the Music of John Mayer)" is full of ecstatic energy; a rich Roots recording.

Galblum, a classically trained multi-instrumentalist with forays into Folk, Jazz, Bluegrass, and Americana, came up with the idea to reinterpret Mayer's repertoire after listening to a summer '13 Mayer bootleg, and subsequently having a series of dreams where his subconscious immediately began to work out arrangements for songs that inspired him.

His first solo album, Galblum played all the guitar, mandolin, and violin parts, then hired some seasoned touring musicians to round out the Stringband: Andy Hall of Infamous Stringdusters (dobro), Chris Pandolfi, founding member of Infamous Stringdusters (banjo), and Greg Garrison of Leftover Salmon and Punchbrothers (upright bass).

A few standout tunes:

1. Gravity: The mandolin solo is stellar, wistfully evocative of "Mandolin Wind" and "Maggie May" on Rod Stewart's roots-rock album: Every Picture Tells a Story. Galblum's soulful phrasing plays off Mayer's melody fluidly.

2. Who You Love: stands out immediately due to the "Touch of Grey"/Grateful Dead undertones, like subliminal whispers from the ghosts of Grisman and Garcia.

3. Slow Dancing in a Burning Room:
the Americana arrangement stayed true to Mayer's original vibe as Curtis Mayfield's soulful "People Get Ready" comes to mind.

4. Stitched Up: has layers of ornate bluegrass stylings, a fuller sound, and a departure from the vast space held within Mayer's rendition.

Buoyant, Imaginative, Masterful musicianship.

Well done, Adam!
This was fun.

Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Dr. Wayne Dyer, In Memoriam
September 1, 2015

For me, Dr. Dyer was about as close to the 'second coming of Christ' as we are going to get. (Godspeed, Good heart).

The thing I like most about Dr. Dyer is that he and his brother were orphans who grew up in a series of foster homes ... and look what he BECAME.

How many times have I watched main- stream TV only to hear that the "perp" in the detective story was someone who had grown up in a foster home. Growing up an orphan, or having once lived in a foster home, does not automatically mean that a child will become a villain or a menace to society.

People who see the world only in black and white are likely to buy into this type of info if they hear it repeated often enough.
However, please consider this alternative point of view: The world might actually be a better place because of its orphans: Wayne Dyer, Steve Jobs, Andrew Jackson, Herbert Hoover, Nelson Mandela, Eleanor Roosevelt, Harry Potter!, etc.
There's a reason that the archetype of the orphan with magical powers exists, as orphans very often have inner lives that are equally as important to them as anything in the external world. And this place, deep inside, where angels fear to tread, is the wellspring from which orphans Create.

Thanks for the inspiration, Dr. Dyer.

www.drwaynedyer.com

Wednesday, August 26, 2015

A critique of an original essay from adventure-journal.com
Essays Opinion:
"It's Time to End Cairn Building"
By Robin Martin, High Country News
Via American Hiking Society's FB page.



Kathryn Preston's response:

"Let's check our egos at the door?" and "a reminder of humanity?"

Last time I checked, I'm pretty sure that humanity is part of nature, too. The writer is suggesting that when he (one of those nasty human beings) is out in nature, there should be no trace of OTHER human beings. I think the real problem is that the author doesn't like people. And that's understandable. There's a lot not to like sometimes.

Forgive me for my directness, but the suggestion that a few stacks of rocks are harming the environment seems petty and small at worst, and ludicrous at best. Mother Nature herself whips up cyclones, earthquakes, volcanoes, and any other number of highly destructive forces. There has to be a certain amount of destruction, or death and decay, in order for something new to grow. However, if you want to go on the offensive towards humans that are causing mass destruction, go ahead and point your fingers at Big Oil, Logging, and the Pharmaceutical industries, just to name a few. I highly encourage this. Put your money where your mouth is and go after the "greed heads."

These are just a few of the folks causing damage to the planet at extreme levels. But there is no doubt in my mind that if this planet wants to shake-off us nasty parasitic humans, she WILL, and often DOES. Nature has already created a virus to attack our reproductive systems and kill us off. She knows exactly how to "balance the scales" ... which I'm willing to bet is all these Cairn folks are doing is engaging in an external meditative practice, a symbolic act to achieve balance. Their behavior in the external world is a reflection of their attempts to temper themselves on the inside. The author might try to follow their lead and consciously focus on learning to temper him or herself rather than try to control others by writing what sounds like the whiny, pedantic tirade of a two year old.

Link to original article:
http://adventure-journal.com/2015/07/opinion-its-time-to-end-cairn-building/
Adirondack: Life and Wildlife in the Wild, Wild East by Edward Kanze.

Published by SUNY Press 2014.

"It may explain why people who grow up in the mountains or at the seashore tend to spend their lives in mountains or beside the sea,
even if the home environment of maturity lies an ocean away from the geography of youth.
'Home is where the heart is,' goes an old proverb. We seek what we love."



The most valuable insight I acquired from this book, is that for Edward Kanze, there is a distinction between two primary Naturalist camps: the John Muir and the John Burroughs camps.

John Muir, according to Kanze, loved Nature but believed Nature should be preserved seperately from Man, that Man was distinct from Nature.

The Adirondack Park, where Kanze and his family now reside, is unique as far as National Parks go, and according to Kanze, is managed more in line with Burroughs' thinking. In Burrough's mind, he was more of a literary naturalist rather than a scientific naturalist, and he felt it was his duty to record his own unique perceptions of Nature.

The Adirondack Park is 6 million acres, covering more territory than Yellowstone, Glacier, Grand Canyon, and Yosemite National Parks combined. It's the only National Park with private in-holdings.

(On a personal note, the whole time I was growing up in the Adirondacks, I was never made aware of the uniqueness of living within a National Park, nor was I aware of the national, historical, or environmental significance of our humble neck-of-the woods.)

I'd like to leave you with a quote from the book that may resonate with some readers:

"William Chapman White, a journalist who wrote the 1954 classic: Adirondack Country, spoke with renowned Saranac Lake guide Les Hathaway (1862-1952) on this score. 'The trouble with people today,' Hathaway told White, 'is they're so busy coverin' ground they aint got time to notice what's on the ground they're coverin.'

Amen, brother.