i was an atheist, who turned agnostic only after carefully considering that 'something' had to have created the universe. and i was a very scientifically-minded person, filled with skepticism that often caused me to be less than tolerable to all things mystical or theological.

sometime around early 2009 i was searching the net for an acronym of some company or software name and accidentally stumbled upon a wikipedia article about DMT -a highly potent psychedelic drug. i was so amazed by the effects outlined in the article that i immediately read Rick Strassman's DMT: The Spirit Molecule. oddly enough, it was quantum physics with it's multiple dimensions and startling discoveries, such as the double-slit experiment, that created just enough objectivity (open-minded skepticism) to allow me to read The Spirit Molecule with an open mind. as it turned out, that book was a fork in the road for me. it chronicled the first government approved studies with psychotropics since the twenty-year moratorium imposed after Timothy Leary's reckless antics with LSD in the 60s. it explained how DMT trips were nearly identical to meditative states and mystical experiences, as well as profound out-of-body experiences witnessed during momentary death or while in extreme pain and/or stress -many times happening to mothers during child birth. next i read a hefty book on buddhism, followed by books on out-of-body experiences, near-death-experiences, lucid dreaming, and a litany of scientific material regarding quantum theory.

during all my research it became clear to me that all these events were either the same thing, or just different flavors of the same thing. all these accounts also declared that during the events, time and space were dilated, or, time and space did not exist! as if that isn't hard enough to grasp, they also conclude that reality itself is just an illusion, or a hologram, by which we all share the experience of physical reality. this is the same thing Einstein discovered while trying to prove his 'unified field theory' -that all physical matter, specifically, and reality, in general, stem from a non-physical field. this is also what the budda was trying to say 2500 years ago.

during all this research i had experienced a few lucid dreams, and with the aid of some OBE manuals and some of the TMI recordings, i had almost gotten fully Out-Of-Body a few times. it is pretty amazing when you find out for yourself that these types of things are actually real. they change the way you perceive existence, well, at least they did for me. those
early days were really neat for me.

while reading about buddhism i realized something that i feel christianity failed to truly teach me: the importance of thinking, speaking and acting in a way that is kind and compassionate; not because it is the right thing to do, but because those actions originated from sincere intent within me. that last sentence creates a conundrum for those of us who are
human, and flawed -how can you think, say and do nice things all the time, when they might not jibe with your true feelings and intent? as you can see, i had my work cut out for me. i had a lot of things to consider.

so that is where my mind was at in late 2009 when i took a few hits off of a joint with my niece's boyfriend, Avi. smoking pot is something i did very infrequently back then, and even less now. i might have a hit once in a while now, but i use it selectively. so the buzz was kicking-in and i decided to put Dark Side Of The Moon on. Avi left the room for a bit and the song On The Run started playing; it is the song with the weird synthesizer loop that phases and morphs throughout the tune. at that moment it sounded a lot like the TMI tracks or the binural-beat recordings i had been listening
to, however, it worked extremely quick and although i felt the 'tug' that meditation often creates when it starts ramping up, i totally blacked out.

a few moment/minutes (?) later, when i regained consciousness, i heard my niece and her boyfriend in the other room arguing about why i was saying such whacky things. they seemed pretty concerned -i wasn't. i looked around my room and it looked somehow different and peculiar, not uncommon for a stoned person, but this was different. i saw through it all at once, i understood everything to be a type of simulation, someone's, or some thing's conception of what a physical reality might be like. normally, we all think we know what we know, but this was the first time i have ever been certain of anything in my life.

i started shouting 'it's all fake!', referring to reality. i also thought that i might just be stoned out of my gourd and i might feel differently tomorrow, but that thought was very brief. i shouted 'and i'm not going to feel any different about it tomorrow!' my mom came into my room and said 'what is going on here???' her concern was understandable as it is pretty outlandish to hear someone say 'the universe is fake' with such conviction. i live in one end of the house, and my mom and my brother -my caregivers, since i broke my neck in 1995- live in the other end, and they were familiar with my theories that the universe might be an illusion, so i'm sure that served as a cushion while dealing with me in that state.

she asked again 'what is going on? why are you saying these things? did you take something?' i told her about the pot and said something like 'but that is not the reason. i can see through this whole illusion right now'. i was in bed and she pulled up a chair and sat next to me, waiting for me to come down. that is when i sensed 6 or 7 'beings' above my house. one by
one, my mind instantly held the full understanding of some of the world's big problems. imagine spontaneously knowing literally everything there is to know about world hunger. knowing all those affected by it, all the effort and motivations behind those seeking to solve it, all the efforts, motivations, fear and greed behind those who seek to perpetuate it, and
understanding the relationship between all the players involved, as well as the details of those relationships hidden within them. everything! that happened 6 or 7 times in a row, each time containing all the details of certain world problems. it was like a big data transfer in one quick burst. i knew that the data came from the beings above my house, not from my own mind.

each time i received these data transfers i instantly understood the solution to that particular issue. the answer was Love! if someone would have told me 'Love can fix any problem that we have' an hour earlier, i would have just considered it cliche hippie-talk, but i now knew it as fact and understood exactly why it was fact. i don't recall if i said the word Love out loud or not, but when that word came to me i was hit in my heart/chest by so much love that it physically hurt, while also being the most euphoric sensation i have ever felt. the love came from the beings, it was like i was getting rewarded for getting the answer correct. the best metaphor i can give is a four inch fire hose of pure genuine love blasting me in the heart, and i wasn't sure how much more i could handle. tears poured out of my eyes, i couldn't help it.

like i said, this happened 6 or 7 times in a row, each time i understood a different painful problem faced by mankind, realized the answer is 'Love', and was blasted by the fire hose to the point of tears. by this time my mom was holding my hand, i looked over at her and knew she was my guardian angel. i was confused because i always thought guardian angels existed in some sort of spirit form, not as physical people. apparently this is not always the case.

with that roller coaster of sensations and emotions behind me it was even more clear that this life is just an illusion or a sub-reality of the larger 'real' one. with that, i considered the game exposed, the jig was up and i thought 'ok, i've solved the puzzle, now i can leave here!' and i was excited to leave! i expected my room and all of physical reality to dissolve away, delivering me to my real domain, but obviously nothing like that happened.

there were a few other components to this event that were pretty peculiar, but i think i'll keep them to myself.

then, as now, i had zero religious beliefs, yet i had this very spiritual experience. because it was such an eye-opener for me i began to ask certain people that i knew to be very religious if there was some event or stark turning-point in their lives that made them 'believe' -i was fishing around to see if any of them had a similar experience, but either they had not, or they chose not to talk of it. i now believe that religion, although flawed by its dogmas, has most-likely provided many more of these types of mystical experiences to its followers (due to its large number of followers) than has agnosticism, OBEs, NDEs and drug related states that act as conduits to the larger reality (when used by the right people with a conducive mindset). in my opinion, religion does not have a monopoly over mystical experiences, they just have a lot more members who are willing to open themselves up to the possibility of something beyond this life/reality -something bigger than themselves. i believe this is the key, in conjunction with the desire to improve one's self, that facilitates
transcendental events. i used to despise religion until my experience, now i see it as a productive mechanism -although limited- in spiritual evolution.


a few notes:
i have no recollection of what happened during the time i blacked-out, but Avi finally told me (after prying it out of him a month later) that he came into the room and i was staring up at the ceiling, i told him i was looking down at my body from up above. i also have no recollection of what the 'world problems' were that i fully understood at the time.

lastly, my mom is pretty religious, and later when i asked her about her thoughts on what happened she told me she thought i was going to be 'raptured up' lol:)

Nice writeup pondini and thanks for your thoughts.

Thank you pondini for sharing this.

Lena

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'Real knowledge is to know the extent of ones ignorance.' Confucius.

My theory is that religion is largely a thing of the baked in R complex, like sex, but it is a neutral benign medium rather than a message....messages of higher and lower entropy attach themselves to the religious communications medium, and over time, productive messages fill productive voids, and unproductive messages fall to the wayside

So, one of my observations is, the older the religion, the greater the likelihood that it is productive

mentally or spiritually centered people will gag on primally centered religions

There is a religion or denomination for every type of person if you look

Having a first authentic religious experience in a church, synagogue, or temple that knows what it is doing, is on par with getting laid the first time, and Christmas is a good time to try it if you lean that way - I believe it is an animal hunger, a void that is part of the stress infrastructure of intellectual life

whether you are a buddhist, christian or TOE-head, you cannot escape the paradox of intentional compassion being in the realm of pretending to have quality greater than what just comes naturally

Tom is not explicit on this, but I believe what comes naturally is not part of intent, but is rather a function of your legacy quality...free will must override your baseline response to establish a delta of QoC

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Does this PMR make my butt look big?

it was tough to explain this stuff in words so thanks for the kind replies:) i just wish there was a better way to describe the sheer intensity of the love i felt.
if i seemed to imply it was somehow religious in nature that was not my intention, i was only suggesting how i can easily understand how religious people might have these sorts of experiences. had i not been free of religious dogmas i definitely would have thought there were angels above my house rather than non-descript beings.

Pondini,

For curiosity, have you recovered from your broken neck? That you are sitting up without a neck brace in the photograph is not a certain sign that you have. Could you possibly gain from being on the healing list?

Ted

ted, no, my situation has not changed, but your post made me smile:) thank you for your concern:) the truth is, i think my paralysis is required. i think it was necessary in steering me towards self improvement. i can't see my old self discovering my higher purpose any other way.

i live in a suburb of Seattle, but i moved to Boise, Idaho to get away from heroin. although i was successful in quitting, i replaced the addiction with heavy drinking. the path i was on held no opportunities to discover my life's real purpose.

Thanks pondini. What a story!

_________________
-"You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find... you get what you need"

Pondini,
We do have a similar path, and thank you for sharing that.
My experience was very similar to yours, not being satisfied with the modern views on the nature of reality, and not accepting the churches (or anyone elses) description of the nature of reality, I set out to do my own search for the truth. My plan was to review all current data available, conduct my own research, and draw my own conclusions. Beginning with Copernicus, Galileo, Darwin and Newton. Most of this was just revisiting my old high school science lessons (except with much more enthusiasm) and then I found Einstein.

Einstein was a little more (to say the least) difficult to fully understand. The Photo electric effect, and the Special, and General Theories of Relativity were mind bending (or stretching, lol) enough, and then he led me to Quantum Mechanics. The double slit experiment, and entangled pairs of particles. My reaction was much the same as most scientists (then and now). What can I do with this information, and what does it REALLY mean?
And I have been trying to figure this out ever since.



Having been raised in a Christian tradition, I can relate to your feelings on this subject. After searching for the truth through science, I needed to search through religion and mythology. And THAT is when really strange things began to happen. Yet it was quantum mechanics that led me to the ancient religion of hinduism as well as the writings and teachings that arose from Hindusm (including Buddhism)


My problem with christianity was, that it denied me access to higher spiritual knowledge. In the Catholic tradition, the masses need not trouble themselves with higher knowledge. They only need to come to the church for their forgiveness and absolution. The church is (according to their doctrine) the keeper of the "Keys to the Gate". But I needed direct access.

It was through my exposure to Buddhist and Hindu writings that I discovered that we do in fact have direct access. And it was Quantum mechanics that led me to the understanding of the NON-physical nature of all matter, that all of realiity is based on probabilities, and that all matter and energy behave much like the subatomic particles, All the "larger' objects in the universe are, ultimately, made up of the smaller "Quanta"

And it was Toms Big "TOE" that brought it all together. Thanks again for sharing.

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LOVE is the answer

peace
patrick

for me, it all fell into place nicely with science providing the plausibility of 'metaphysical stuff' being possibly true. it allowed me to take the blinders off.

p.s. as you might guess, i highly relate to your signature, patrick:)

Niels Bohr, the father of the orthodox 'Copenhagen Interpretation' of quantum physics once said, "Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it".

It took me a long time to understand the implications of Quantum mechanics, and the more I looked at it, the more it resembled something Mystical. And the more I read the scientists struggle with thier interpretations of Quantum Mechanics, the more it sounded like the ancient mystics describing "the spiritual", where Nothing is really as it seems.

Yes. in the end it was Quantum mechanics that forced me to reconsider the spiritual.

_________________
LOVE is the answer

peace
patrick

Thanks Pondini

Have you considered putting your story to a book? You could start writing it on this forum with us cheering you on. Personally, I already want to hear your story.

one idea I have about addiction is that it is the pervasive availability which brings certain people down in spite of having the will power to stay clean 99% of the time

this idea initially came out of observing problems we are having on Canadian native reservations and western towns.

anyways, the idea is what I call "happy town", and happy town is a normal town in every way, but it is isolated and gated, and no drugs or alcohol or whatever temptation you choose, is physically permitted to enter the town, and individuals commit themselves to happy town voluntarily.

I believe the concept could be applied to corrections problems as well, with communities designed for each type of felony, as a voluntary alternative to a prison sentence.

You applied this principle to leaving Seattle, but got caught with the other thing

are you working on OBE, the ultimate drug?

_________________
Does this PMR make my butt look big?

20/20 or one of those investigative shows presented a program where they thew a dart at a map, went to that town, found a phone booth and randomly picked a single person out of the phone book. they called the guy and asked him if they could interview him and show his life's story on their program. he agreed and the show was pretty interesting. the point was made that everyone leads an interesting life. some more than others, but all still basically interesting.

based on the forum posts by the members here there are probably ten life stories i would watch in film format. and while my story might seem interesting, there are two reasons why i wouldn't write it: 1) i don't have the writing skills. 2) there is not a complete 3rd act... yet.



not as vigorously as i could. i have not had a lot of them but i sure do dig it when i succeed:)

bullpucky

the thing is...its not the technical writing, its the quality of conciousness behind the communicator that is the thing. I think how this fits into the model is that while environment (including sensor platform constraints) has no impact on quality of consciousness, environnment does impact the process of drawing out our legacy quality, and any material or ego setback in the PMR journey, anything that takes you out of the ego game of the perfect upwardly mobile yuppie trajectory, is useful for this purpose.

the technical aspect just takes effort and practise. I remember being struck by something Seinfeld said in an interview, referring to how bad he was as a comedian when he started...but he kept at it and got better....what struck me was the importance of desire to do something rather than inherent talent...and your belief otherwise may be part of a self limiting thingy that needs to be purged.

The neighbourhood I grew up in, was the poorest of my province (Like an American state), and was right beside one of the richest of my province, and I went to the (public) school where the rich kids went. One thing I noticed was that the rich kids where not in any way brighter than the kids from my neighbourhood and background, but what struck me was the belief of the rich kids in their abilities (whether those abilities existed or not), and the belief of the poor kids in their lack of ability (even if they were very talented).

it may be difficult for you to write...but, like...is there somewhere else you need to be?

you could also do youtube videos interpreting your events with MBTOE language - the visual image of communicating from the chair would be a real attention getter...I guess where I am really going with this is prodding you to work to promote MBTOE through these various means, and at the same time build an meaningful purpose for your life



the writing/communicating could be the 3rd act



not as vigorously as i could. i have not had a lot of them but i sure do dig it when i succeed:)[/quote]

I think it was in North Carolina where Tom said most people should stay focussed on PMR and keep NPMR time down to a couple hours a day at most...with the caveat that for persons with constrained sensor platforms, which is of course an ideal configuration for bridging dimensions, that restriction would not apply.

For addiction, I would read/listen to Antony Robbins if you have not done so. His core thought is that addiction should not be faced directly, but rather should be replaced by something else - that reaching for the bottle or any other vice (fun stuff you know damages you) is a natural reaction to being out of emotional gas...so you need to rebuild from the ground up, with a diet for the body and mind, and a goal that makes your heart skip a beat...and it is not reaching the goal that matters, its aspiring to an impossible goal and being happy about waking up each day in that effort

I hope this information is useful to you and not just irritating.

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Does this PMR make my butt look big?