10-Q Baba Yaga

The smallest one wanders into the book witch's dungeon. Pike is four years old. "What are you eating," he inquires smiling broadly. "Candy pumpkins," the witch cackles through her slightly orange teeth.

He wanders far not only for himself but for others through a realm, where cats sometimes outsmart people and the large people are always keeping an eye out for tender little morsels in order to stop goings on that seem perfectly fun. He arrives to this place where books randomly fall in piles stacked to the sky and hot cappuccino bubbles in the largest cup anyone has ever seen. He comes for himself and for others and because there is something he remembers... pumpkins... and something he forgets... the witch is working.

"Jay and PB like those," he said. The witch remembers another time when this little being relishes the candy pumpkins so fully that the drool is orange in an amazingly large display all over the front of his shirt. The little Pike continues to give her the biggest, loving smile, the smallest and boldest person in this particular corner of the realm. She hands him the bag rather than cook him back into a nice cup of original coffee.

There is another journey to make and little Pike says "10-Q" to the witch and takes his bag. He looks at the long way back to where he came. It is never so easy! At that very moment of viewing the path the witch's mother swoops down and takes the bag from him, also apparently remembering the orange t-shirt. "No! No! THE PUMPKINS! What about Jay and PB!" he cries out to the Great Mother. She tells him the rules of the taller beings as little Pike hops up and down very high and fast with his pleas. "You can each have two and you have to wear a bib!" the Great Mother announces from above. Little Pike quickly agrees and receives his great treasure of a candy pumpkin bag back, and continuing on his great journey.

Pike arrives to his destination, a small hero no worse for wear but wearing a bib. (Wearing a bib is apparently a great sacrifice when you are four.) The smallest little candy man in this area of the realm really does joyfully hand out two pumpkins to each child, all of whom are significantly larger than himself. They all thank him for his journey not quite comprehending what he has gone through to deliver these gifts but rewarding him with their pleasure. Pike is the big man today and even looks taller for the difficult journey and smiles as brightly as the sun at everyone eating pumpkins. I even see an old man in his place for a second.

And the witch with the slightly orange teeth and the cat we suspect may really be very smart says to you.... 10-Q for Everything.

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For a more accurate retelling and great edition of the Baba Yaga tale click here!
BABA YAGA AND OUR SACRED LONGING taken from "After the Ecstasy, the Laundry" by Jack Kornfield

Endings and Beginnings of the Self

The end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And to know the place for the first time.
---T.S. Eliot


There was a question about manifesting and premonition. When we have a feeling how do we know that this is actually a premonition? How do we also know that the energy from the feeling did not actually manifest the situation? This may seem to be the long way around the question. This is the only way I could think of to answer this puzzle. I have been pondering this since the question was posed.

One person responded with a dialogue that to me is saying, "What am I?" I am often asking, "Who am I and what is not me?" I may not be the best person to answer this question since this is something I am still working on. For some reason I have come to a place where I realize the answer to that question is not so black and white. Do I end just at that place right past my fingertip edge? I include the nail, although that is not such a living part of me. My hair comes in this category too. It is definitely me. Where the heck is it that I actually end? My shoes, those are not me, although, I am wearing my favorite loafers as I compose this.

Before this question came about, a dream experience occurs. I am with my spirit guide:

The Vision of Gold

I watch the great ball of golden fire turn and swirl. I can only see into a small part of the giant orb because it is so very vast. A piece of this golden fire swirls and breaks away. Then another small part swirls from the mass and is similar somehow to the first. These golden flames split away from the larger mass forming into beings. New as they are they look at themselves. These new beings then turn and gesture in happiness toward each other.

My guide has this same golden glow. Wherever he goes he casts a golden energy that permeates everything. I invite him into my alabaster house in astral. As I watch him step inside, my home glows with a flame of his being lighting up like a holiday ornament. Suddenly, I realize this is the philosopher’s stone. We all have the opportunity to find the gold inside of us. All the materials are there awaiting transformation.

---EvonneTheStorytellerAn experience in astral.

What strikes me about this dream is that the energy does not just penetrate past the edges that I perceive as my guide, but also penetrates other living and non-living things. Plants, stones, houses, trees, people and the very air light up, all sweetly touched by this golden energy. I believe we all radiate to an extent that we are able to and in ways we may or may not perceive.

Every now and then something happens that makes me ask that seemingly ridiculous question… "DID I DO THAT?" The other week I am about to pull out of a small side street onto a rural route. I am turning right to be in a right lane. No cross over of traffic was involved in this circumstance. Suddenly, my head jerks twice hard to the left and I slam on the brakes. It happened so quickly, I wonder what the heck my head is doing. Is that a teeny little seizure? Why do I do that? I am still looking to the left. There is a truck hauling fast down the little route doing about 70 m.p.h. A SUV has just passed it on the left right in the lane I was going to turn down. That would obviously be a no passing area and not a good thing to do across our little wooded side streets. We have to peek our car noses out a little in order to see if it is safe to go or not. One turn of my head is for the truck, and the other must be for the smaller passing vehicle. I realize that could be a tough break if I had stuck my car nose out at all! I must have somehow watched both vehicles at 70 going by, which is very fast when it happens not far from your face. I sit at the corner of the street wondering at my head having done that. It happened faster than I could assimilate the information, but it did happen. It must have been me somehow? (1)

We spend our lives, probably after we turn five or so, believing we end where our physical bodies end. This is obviously incorrect according to how I perceive the world at this time. In martial arts, I have some rare experiences of merger with my opponent. (Rare for me that is...) Again, I have no idea of how and why this occurs. I wonder if this is why the archers in "Zen and the Art of Archer" do not aim but hold themselves empty and simply shoot. They are archers doing what archers do.

In the ring, after my accident, I continue to learn. I try to return to the dojo where I always train and find myself sparring with Joe. I get two calls that seem "bad" to me, but I know not to argue. The first one, Joe kicks out all the way. I sidestep this and whack his leg, half spinning him and knocking him off balance. It was called as though Joe successfully kicked me. The fight continues on. Again I make a motion that is not seen by any judges and Joe is given another point for whacking me. That one has at least been very close in timing according to my perception of the event. The last round, I actually catch Joe’s leg, which is not something I do often. I se his leg and it just seems to be hanging there in space for a long second to me. I step to the left and securely tuck the leg under my arm. Normally I would have thrown Joe from the leg, but I clearly see a dark flash of fear in Joe’s eyes. Somehow I just know that he was about to "rip" something in his groin area. I can clearly see this in him somehow from that split second "flash." I release Joe’s leg and with both hands, push the limb down just hard enough so that he catches his footing and avoids injury. We are both smiling at each other and stop the fighting together. No call is made yet. (Normally, we keep going until we hear something.) Then the judges MAKE THE CALL AGAINST ME AGAIN! Usually, I just trot right off but I am so dumbfounded I just stand there. Not only did I catch the leg and took the time to give it back, BUT NO ONE BUT JOE AND I EXPERIENCE IT SOMEHOW!!! I know Joe experienced what I did too, from his smile back at me. He drops his hands and stands in the ring with his mouth open together with me after the call. Well, it is not too often you get to see two fighters looking so stupid just standing there in the middle of the ring catching flies, so my teacher asks... sort of... "WHAT!!???" he exclaims, actually... He knows something is up. "I caught his leg…" I respond eventually and quietly. My instructor looks over at Joe. Joe shakes his head slowly in a yes gesture. It seems so obvious and took a significant amount of time in my perception. Only later do I ponder how I know Joe is about to sustain an injury. I realize somehow our energy works together on this one.

Very broadly speaking, there are only a couple of ways to grow into perceiving your psychic ability. Simply living and being what you are seems to do the trick. I do not find it so simple to find out exactly what I am though. The farmer may be a friend of the land. The vet is loved by his animal patients. Lots of people just come to this point of "knowing" in being exactly what they are and feel their deepest bonds that way . Another way is by directly working on developing abilities, practicing a variety of techniques such as dowsing, reading, dreaming, etc. For many, that is considered the "long way." This point is often argued though. There are the big fans of meditation who would discourage such specific practices. This is because they are learning how to empty the self and be more open to "everything." The huge obstacle, in any of the cases given, would be the ego. In meditation, the student grows and over time will become more open. What appears to develop seem to be what we call the special gifts. These skills are never worked on but are simply there when the time is correct. The individual has developed to the point that is past ego to a certain extent where they are not so prone to the usual obstacles in perception. We say that they are observer from a place that is a little further away from the physical realms. Some people seem to be able to reach quite far past this physical realm.

To explain ego more clearly, I think almost every psychic person has had the experience of not accepting information. You throw your tarot deck layout and don’t like the information. "Not a good reading. I was not concentrating…" and you reshuffle. Things look worse. "I am obviously not in the mood…" then the supposedly non-compliant cards are tucked away for another day. You are the one in your own way. Ego… expectations, dreams, and a host of other information is in the way from you. You are not watching from a place outside of desires and hopes that are more based in physical than it the great game plan for all. That is probably only one out of potentially hundreds of examples of "us" getting in the way.

I include a few experiments here to perform. Perhaps you will attempt them and share your impressions. If you complete each step as it is presented, that is ideal Otherwise, this may not be a good example for you. I enjoy Helen Palmer’s lectures on the "Three Gates to Intuition." I think they are probably from back in the days of Esalan. She had a routine similar to this one. Do NOT read the whole exercise first. Be sure to do each step before reading the next one:

Your Color Spot

1. Imagine a color spot of any color that you choose.

2. Hold the color spot outside and in front of you with your mind.

3. Note and observe what that feels like. Take time for a few notes.

4. NOW FORCE THAT COLOR SPOT INTO YOUR HEAD! Take it and cram it right into your head so that you are holding it inside of yourself! Is it there yet??? Can you do it? Is it there yet now????

5. Observe what it feels like trying to get that color spot into your head. Is it working? Did you get it yet? Take some time to write down your observations of what trying to get the spot into your head feels like.

6. Let go of the spot. Forget about the spot. The purpose is just to feel what it is like to try.

7. Write down what vibrations you felt and what happens when you let go.

8. Did the spot pop into your head when you let it go? Did it pop there when you read this sentence just now???

9. Write down your responses and experiences of what happened in the 8th step above.

10. Feel what it is like holding the spot outside of your self and inside of yourself now that you can do this easily. Note the differences that you feel.

If you are like me, and apparently a lot of other people, the spot will easily pop into your head when you let go of the idea and vibration of forcing. Just the nice easy suggestion will help you move it simply and without any tension created into your head. And yes, I did manipulate the language to show you the vibration. There just seems to be a nice restful place in vibration where we can accomplish something without using a whole lot energy. Forcing, which we have experienced in many other ways besides this example does not work. Perhaps you will ask yourself if it was me or if it was you that popped that little spot around. I think it was you. After all, It is your spot. You created it!

I was thinking of this exercise the other day and wondering if I had actually done something in my "real life." If I do these things, I do not notice the effort. Maybe that is the casualness of the vibration we are putting out that works. Merger may be so effortless, it brings us to questioning if we are involved at all. Perhaps we have a way of merging and going with the flow that works. All we need is to simply relax and enjoy the trip in an accepting fashion. I did a lot of work with feeling the vibrations in days gone by and getting used to the idea of what different vibrations feel like. Here is another good exercise that should be performed slowly to get the best effect:

Sensing Presence

1. Bring to your mind a threatening person you have had problems with in the past.

2. Place this person behind you in your imagination.

3. Note what that feels like to your body.

4. Place this person on different sides of yourself in your imagination and in front of you too.

5. Note where you feel energy and changes as you move this person around.

6. Clear yourself and the area to feel balanced again.

My experience with this exercise is that I feel tension at the base of my neck when my problem person is behind me. When I move the person around, I feel the static at different points on what I am going to call my "energy collar." You know the person is not actually there, however, if they are, that is probably just what it would feel like. You are doing this alone in this case, since you are making the vibration come from a certain point. However, if you work with a partner to just direct energy at you from different points, that might be a helpful exercise too. We had to do this in martial arts as well. This exercise teaches us how to sense and join the energy of our "foes" in order to intuit them and better respond. People will feel this presence in different areas of their body. Perhaps you get a "gut" feeling form instance. It can be valuable performed assigning the person different characteristics. What does someone you love feel like behind you? Where do you feel this?

We are also told to use our spots for practice and literally point at it and call it "Object." We point at ourselves and say "Observer." Sometimes the observer (via ego) gets into the object and muddies the view. We turn the object into all sorts of things we would like it to be... money, beautiful people, winning that nose job in bowling for dollars... The more we can learn to let go of what we are and simply accept the information as a whole, the closer we can get to answering this question of what we actually participate in. (Of course, I am not sure yet. :-) I think that is the closest I can come to an answer with my experience in this subject. As I mentioned, I am working on this question myself.

Some say we participate in every event that occurs, even when we are standing still, doing nothing, and not getting involved. We participate in events that seem quite far away from any horizons we remember visiting in this sense. Everything is always in motion. Just think, the earth spins and we could swear that all of us are standing quite still. That is simply amazing.

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1. Note: In the book "Emotional Intelligence" by Daniel Goleman, the occurrence where part of the brain is bypassed and the person responds is mentioned. In one scenario towards the beginning, a man only remembers seeing a woman's horrified face looking into the water. He instinctively jumps in without really knowing why. He rescues the baby and then realizes the event.