A pendulum is a weight suspended from a pivot so that it can swing freely. When a pendulum is displaced sideways from its resting equilibrium position, it is subject to a restoring force due to gravity that will accelerate it back toward the equilibrium position. When released, the restoring force combined with the pendulum’s mass causes it to oscillate about the equilibrium position, swinging back and forth. The time for one complete cycle, a left swing and a right swing, is called the period. The period depends on the length of the pendulum, and also to a slight degree on the amplitude, the width of the pendulum’s swing.
Wiccan Pendulum
Pendulums are one of the oldest of divination tools and are a form of dowsing. In Europe the scientific use of a pendulum is called Radiesthesia and is a well accepted form of gaining information. They can be used for locating just about anything including water, gold, and oil. During the Vietnam war they were used by soldiers to locate underground mines and tunnels. In France doctors have used pendulums to help with diagnoses and many people have used them to predict the gender of their unborn babies. You can even use a pendulum on a map to discover a great place for a trip or a new place to live. Simply hold the pendulum over a map and ask “Is this the place?” Some pendulums come with small chambers that can be loaded with the substance that you are seeking such as water or gold. Loading the pendulum programs it to find that substance.
A pendulum is one of the simplest and easiest forms of divination. It’s a simple matter of Yes/No questions being asked and answered. Typically, most people use a crystal or stone, but you can use any object that’s got a bit of weight to it.
Charge Your Pendulum
To charge your pendulum, place it overnight in water or salt. Remember that some crystals will degrade in salt, so be sure to check before you do this. Another option is to leave the pendulum outside overnight in the moonlight.
Calibrate Your Pendulum
To calibrate your pendulum simply means you’re checking it to see how it’s working. To do this, hold it by the free end of the chain so that the weighted end is loose. Make sure you keep it perfectly still. Ask a simple Yes/No question to which you already know the answer is Yes, such as “Am I female?” or “Do I live in California?”
Keep your eye on the pendulum, and when it starts moving, note whether it goes side to side, forwards to backwards, or some other direction. This indicates your “Yes” direction.
Now, repeat the process, asking a question to which you know the answer is No. This will give you your “No” direction. It’s a good idea to do this a few times with different questions, so you can get a feel for how your pendulum responds to you. Some will swing horizontally or vertically, others swing in small or large circles, others don’t do a whole lot unless the answer is really important. Once you’ve calibrated your pendulum and gotten to know it a bit, you can use it for some basic divination.
The Lost Bearded White Brother
Esotericism
Theosophy, Anthroposophy, and the Perennial Philosophy
Esotericism signifies the holding of esoteric opinions or beliefs, that is, ideas preserved or understood by a small group of those specially initiated, or of rare or unusual interest. The term derives from the Greek, either from the comparative (esôteros), “inner”, or from its derived adjective (esôterikos), “pertaining to the innermost”.
The term can also refer to the academic study of esoteric religious movements and philosophies, or to the study of those religious movements and philosophies whose proponents distinguish their beliefs, practices, and experiences from mainstream exoteric and more dogmatic institutionalized traditions.
Examples of esoteric religious movements and philosophies include Alchemy, Druze, the Alawites, Anthroposophy, early Christian mysticism, The Fourth Way, Freemasonry, Gnosticism, Hermetism, Kabbalah, Magic, Neoplatonism, Numerology, Perennialism, Rosicrucianism, Swedenborgianism, Spiritualism, Tantra, the Theosophy of Jacob Böhme and his followers, the Theosophist movement associated with Helena Blavatsky.
Although esotericism refers to an exploration of the hidden meanings and symbolism in various philosophical, historical, and religious texts, the texts themselves are often central to mainstream religions. For example, the Bible and the Torah are considered esoteric material.
Definition
Among the competing understandings of what unites the various currents designated by “Esotericism” in the scholarly sense, perhaps the most influential has been proposed by Antoine Faivre. His definition is based on the presence in the esoteric currents of four essential characteristics: a theory of correspondences between all parts of the invisible and the visible cosmos, the conviction that nature is a living entity owing to a divine presence or life-force, the need for mediating elements (such as symbols, rituals, angels, visions) in order to access spiritual knowledge, and, fourthly, an experience of personal and spiritual transmutation when arriving at this knowledge. To this are added two non-intrinsic characteristics. Esotericists frequently suggest that there is a concordance between different religious traditions: best example is the belief in prisca theologia (ancient theology) or in philosophia perennis (perennial philosophy). Finally, esotericism sometimes suggests the idea of a secret transmission of spiritual teachings, through initiation from master to disciple. It should, however, be emphasized that Faivre’s definition is one of several divergent understandings of the most appropriate use of the term.
The “perennialist” or “traditionalist” school is represented by authors like the French René Guénon (1886-1951), the Indian Ananda Coomaraswamy (1877-1947), the Swiss Frithjof Schuon (1907-1998), the Italian Julius Evola (1898-1974), the Iranian Seyyed Hossein Nasr (born in 1933), both scholars and esotericists. They postulate that there exists a Primordial Tradition of non-human origin.
- “We say that it [the origin of the traditions] is polar, and the pole is nomore Western than it is Eastern. It is only in a later epoch that the seat of the primordial tradition, transferred to other regions, was able to become either Western or Eastern. We consider the origin of the traditions to be Nordic, and even more to be polar, since this is expressly affirmed in the Veda as well as in other sacred books.”
In perennialist usage, esotericism is a metaphysical concept referring to a supposed “transcendent unity” of all great religious traditions. Esotericism is the metaphysical point of unity where exoteric religions are believed to converge.
- “Our starting point is the acknowledgment of the fact that there are diverse religions which exclude each other. This could mean that one religion is right and that all the others are false; it could mean also that all are false. In reality, it means that all are right, not in their dogmatic exclusivism, but in their unanimous inner signification, which coincides with pure metaphysics, or in other terms, with the philosophia perennis.” (F. Schuon, 1995).
After all, the esoteric tradition may be recovered if the seeker undergoes initiation.
- “Initiation is essentially the transmission of a spiritual influence, a transmission that can only take place through a regular, traditional organization, so that one cannot speak of initiation outside of an affiliation with an organization of this kind. We have explained that ‘regularity’ must be understood to exclude all pseudo-initiatic organizations, which, regardless of pretention and outward appearance, in no way possess any spiritual influence and thus are incapable of transmitting anything.”
Luc Paquin
What is Aphasia?
Aphasia is an acquired communication disorder that impairs a person’s ability to process language, but does not affect intelligence. Aphasia impairs the ability to speak and understand others, and most people with aphasia experience difficulty reading and writing. The diagnosis of aphasia does NOT imply a person has a mental illness or impairment in intelligence.
What Causes Aphasia?
The most common cause of aphasia is stroke (about 25-40% of stroke survivors acquire aphasia). It can also result from head injury, brain tumor or other neurological causes.
How Common is Aphasia?
Aphasia affects about one million Americans -or 1 in 250 people- and is more common than Parkinson’s Disease, cerebral palsy or muscular dystrophy. More than 200,000 Americans acquire the disorder each year. However, most people have never heard of it.
Who Acquires Aphasia?
While aphasia is most common among older people, it can occur in people of all ages, races, nationalities and gender.
Can a Person Have Aphasia Without Having a Physical Disability?
Yes, but many people with aphasia also have weakness or paralysis of their right leg and right arm. When a person acquires aphasia it is usually due to damage on the left side of the brain, which controls movements on the right side of the body.
Can People Who Have Aphasia Return to Their Jobs?
Sometimes. Since most jobs require speech and language skills, aphasia can make some types of work difficult. Individuals with mild or even moderate aphasia are sometimes able to work, but they may have to change jobs.
How Long Does it Take to Recover from Aphasia?
If the symptoms of aphasia last longer than two or three months after a stroke, a complete recovery is unlikely. However, it is important to note that some people continue to improve over a period of years and even decades. Improvement is a slow process that usually involves both helping the individual and family understand the nature of aphasia and learning compensatory strategies for communicating.
Does Aphasia Affect a Person’s Intelligence?
NO. A person with aphasia may have difficulty retrieving words and names, but the person’s intelligence is basically intact. Aphasia is not like Alzheimer’s disease; for people with aphasia it is the ability to access ideas and thoughts through language – not the ideas and thoughts themselves- that is disrupted. But because people with aphasia have difficulty communicating, others often mistakenly assume they are mentally ill or have mental retardation.
Are All Cases of Aphasia Alike?
No. There are many types of aphasia.Some people have difficulty speaking while others may struggle to follow a conversation. In some people, aphasia is fairly mild and you might not notice it right away. In other cases, it can be very severe, affecting speaking, writing, reading, and listening. While specific symptoms can vary greatly, what all people with aphasia have in common are difficulties in communicating.
Norma
Neo-Vedanta
Neo-Vedanta, also called Hindu modernism, Neo-Hinduism, Global Hinduism and Hindu Universalism, are terms to characterize interpretations of Hinduism that developed in the 19th century. These modern interpretations emphasize ideas, such as Advaita Vedanta, that are asserted as central or fundamental to Hindu culture. The development took place partly in response to western colonialism and orientalism, contributing to the Indian freedom struggle and the modern national and religious identity of Hindus in the Republic of India. This societal aspect is covered under the term of Hindu reform movements. Among the main proponents of such modern interpretations of Hinduism were Vivekananda, Aurobindo and Radhakrishnan, who to some extent also contributed to the emergence of Neo-Hindu movements in the West.
From their origin and through much of their history, and continuing in the present, the terms “Neo-Hindu” or “Neo-Vedanta” have also been used polemically, the prefix “Neo-” then intended to imply that these modern interpretations of Hinduism are “inauthentic” or in other ways problematic.
History
Unifying Hinduism
With the onset of Islamic rule, hierarchical classifications of the various orthodox schools were developed to defend Hinduism against Islamic influences. According to Nicholson, already between the twelfth and the sixteenth century,
- … certain thinkers began to treat as a single whole the diverse philosophical teachings of the Upanishads, epics, Puranas, and the schools known retrospectively as the “six systems” (saddarsana) of mainstream Hindu philosophy.
The tendency of “a blurring of philosophical distinctions” has also been noted by Burley. Lorenzen locates the origins of a distinct Hindu identity in the interaction between Muslims and Hindus, and a process of “mutual self-definition with a contrasting Muslim other”, which started well before 1800. Both the Indian and the European thinkers who developed the term “Hinduism” in the 19th century were influenced by these philosophers.
Within these socalled doxologies Advaita Vedanta was given the highest position, since it was regarded to be most inclusive system. Vijnanabhiksu, a 16th-century philosopher and writer, is still an influential representant of these doxologies. He’s been a prime influence on 19th century Hindu modernists like Vivekananda, who also tried to integrate various strands of Hindu thought, taking Advaita Vedanta as its most representative specimen.
Colonialism and Modernism
With the colonisation of India by the British, a darker era in the history of India began. Prior to this, Muslim rule over North India had had a drastic effect on Hinduism (and Buddhism) through systematic persecution. While the Indian society was greatly impacted, its economy however continued to remain one of the largest in the World. Muslim rule over Southern India was also relatively short-lived before the 17th century.
In contrast to the Muslim rulers, the British actively engaged in destroying the Indian economy as well.
The economic destruction wrought by restrictive British policies and Industrial revolution in Europe, led to the dismantling of the prevailing decentralized education systems in India in the 18th century. The British state-supported education system, after the English Education Act of 1835, emphasized western religions and thoughts at the cost of indigenous ones.
The British also nurtured and were involved, post 1813, in the aggressive propagation of Protestant Christianity. This was concomitant with the British propaganda machine’s involvement in the spreading anti-Hindu sentiments. In response to the British rule and cultural dominance, Hindu reform movements developed, propagating societal and religious reforms, exemplyfying what Spear has called
- … the ‘solution of synthesis’ – the effort to adapt to the newcomers, in the process of which innovation and assimilation gradually occur, alongside an ongoing agenda to preserve the unique values of the many traditions of Hinduism (and other religious traditions as well).
Reinterpreting Hinduism
Neo-Vedanta, also called “Neo-Hinduism” is a central theme in these reform-movements. Neo-Vedanta aims to present Hinduism as a “homogenized ideal of Hinduism” with Advaita Vedanta as its central doctrine. It presents
- … an imagined “integral unity” that was probably little more than an “imagined” view of the religious life that pertained only to a cultural elite and that empirically speaking had very little reality “on the ground,” as it were, throughout the centuries of cultural development in the South Asian region.
Neo-Vedanta was influenced by Oriental scholarship, which portrayed Hinduism as a “single world religion”, and denigrated the heterogeneousity of Hindu beliefs and practices as ‘distortions’ of the basic teachings of Vedanta.
Luc Paquin
Ink is a liquid or paste that contains pigments or dyes and is used to color a surface to produce an image, text, or design. Ink is used for drawing or writing with a pen, brush, or quill. Thicker inks, in paste form, are used extensively in letterpress and lithographic printing.
Ink can be a complex medium, composed of solvents, pigments, dyes, resins, lubricants, solubilizers, surfactants, particulate matter, fluorescents, and other materials. The components of inks serve many purposes; the ink’s carrier, colorants, and other additives affect the flow and thickness of the ink and its appearance when dry.
History
Many ancient cultures around the world have independently discovered and formulated inks for the purposes of writing and drawing. The knowledge of the inks, their recipes and the techniques for their production comes from archaeological analysis or from written text itself.
The ink was first invented in India. The Indian inks used natural plant (plant dyes), and mineral inks based on such materials as graphite that were ground with water and applied with ink brushes. The best inks for drawing or painting on paper or silk are produced from the resin of the pine tree. They must be between 50 and 100 years old. The Chinese inkstick is produced with a fish glue, whereas Japanese glue is from cow or stag.
The process of making India ink was known in China as early as the middle of the 3rd millennium BC, during Neolithic China. India ink was first invented in China, although the source of materials to make the carbon pigment in India ink was later often traded from India, thus the term India ink was coined. The traditional Chinese method of making the ink was to grind a mixture of hide glue, carbon black, lampblack, and bone black pigment with a pestle and mortar, then pouring it into a ceramic dish where it could dry. To use the dry mixture, a wet brush would be applied until it reliquified. The manufacture of India ink was well-established by the Cao Wei Dynasty (220-265 AD). Indian documents written in Kharosthi with ink have been unearthed in Chinese Turkestan. The practice of writing with ink and a sharp pointed needle was common in early South India. Several Buddhist and Jain sutras in India were compiled in ink.
Wiccan Ink
Add power to your spells by writing them with magical ink!
Because these magical inks are made from only natural ingredients, separation may occur. This is normal. Please make sure to shake well before use.
Dragon’s Blood Ink
Color: Red
Good for protection, energy, and purification. Adds power to any spell, incantation, or other charm. Increases potency of your spells. Has strong banishing powers against negative influences, and will drive away negativity.
Dove’s Blood Ink
Color: Red
Good for love, romance, friendship, and peace. Add power to love spells. Thank your spiritual guides and helpers. Ignite romance and passion.
Bat’s Blood Ink
Color: Red
Good for domination, command, curses, and hexes. Great for summoning spirits. Good for binding spells. Also use for spells of mystery, darkness, and all things hidden.
Butterfly’s Blood Ink
Color: Golden Yellow
Good for change, inspiration, and expression. Helpful for calling on the element of air. Magical aid for artists, brings creativity. Aids in communication, for both the physical and spiritual realms. Once dry on your parchment, Butterfly’s Blood Ink is nearly invisible. Which makes this ink excellent for spell working that relies on the subconscious, or sigils.
Raven’s Blood Ink
Color: Copper Red
For healing, transformation, and mystery. Good for healing spells. Excellent to use in spells bringing about transformation, or spells to ease one’s mind when faced with a life transformation. Use this ink when you want to add an air of mystery to your spell workings.
Raven’s Feather Ink
Color: Dark Red
For commanding spells and spells to contact the dead. Good for summoning spirits, banishing spirits, and exorcisms. Use this ink to create your own “talking” boards for contacting spirits, or for mediums to write out their questions for the dead.
Lampblack Ink
Color: Black
Lampblack ink adds extra power to any spell. Particularly useful for wisdom and knowledge spells, making this an excellent ink for writing in a witch’s book of shadows. You can also charge Lampblack ink with specific intent by coordinating the color of the candle used to create the Lampblack soot.
Invisible Ink
Color: Invisible
Write on a piece of paper with lemon juice. When you want to read what has been written, warm the paper by candle light. (Don’t burn it!) The words will “magically” appear.
Alchemy Ink
Color: Blue
With lavender for transformation, change, dreams, imagination and fairie magic.
Wishes Ink
Color: Green
With sage for wishes, desires and magic related to the material plane.
Sweet Talk Ink
Color: Red
With rose for love, friendship, and relationship magic.
Vision Quest Ink
Color: Purple
With hyssop for clairvoyance, intuition, divination, and magic involving the psyche.
Monk’s Ink
Color: Black
For general magical and mundane use.
The Lost Bearded White Brother
Transcendentalism was a religious and philosophical movement that developed during the late 1820s and ’30s in the Eastern region of the United States as a protest against the general state of spirituality and, in particular, the state of intellectualism at Harvard University and the doctrine of the Unitarian church as taught at Harvard Divinity School.
Among the transcendentalists’ core beliefs was the inherent goodness of both people and nature. They believe that society and its institutions – particularly organized religion and political parties – ultimately corrupt the purity of the individual. They have faith that people are at their best when truly “self-reliant” and independent. It is only from such real individuals that true community could be formed.
History
Origins
Transcendentalism is closely related to Unitarianism, the dominant religious movement in Boston at the early nineteenth century. It started to develop in the aftermath of Unitarianism taking hold at Harvard University, following the elections of Henry Ware Sr. as the Hollis Professor of Divinity in 1805, and of John Thorton Kirkland as President in 1810. Rather than as a rejection of Unitarianism, Transcendentalism evolved as an organic consequence of the Unitarian emphasis on free conscience and the value of intellectual reason. They were not, however, content with the sobriety, mildness and calm rationalism of Unitarianism. Instead, they longed for a more intense spiritual experience. Stated in alternate terms, Transcendentalism was not born as a counter-movement to Unitarianism, but, as a parallel movement to the very ideas introduced by the Unitarians.
Emerson’s Nature
The publication of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s 1836 essay Nature is usually considered the moment at which transcendentalism became a major cultural movement. Emerson wrote in his 1837 speech “The American Scholar”: “We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds… A nation of men will for the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which also inspires all men.” Emerson closed the essay by calling for a revolution in human consciousness to emerge from the brand new idealist philosophy:
- So shall we come to look at the world with new eyes. It shall answer the endless inquiry of the intellect, – What is truth? and of the affections, – What is good? by yielding itself passive to the educated Will. …Build, therefore, your own world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend the influx of the spirit.
Transcendental Club
In the same year, transcendentalism became a coherent movement and a sacred organization with the founding of the Transcendental Club in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on September 8, 1836, by prominent New England intellectuals including George Putnam (1807-78; the Unitarian minister in Roxbury), Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Frederic Henry Hedge. From 1840, the group published frequently in their journal The Dial, along with other venues.
Second Wave of Transcendentalists
By the late 1840s, Emerson believed the movement was dying out, and even more so after the death of Margaret Fuller in 1850. “All that can be said”, Emerson wrote, “is that she represents an interesting hour and group in American cultivation”. There was, however, a second wave of transcendentalists, including Moncure Conway, Octavius Brooks Frothingham, Samuel Longfellow and Franklin Benjamin Sanborn – Notably, the transgression of the spirit, most often evoked by the poet’s prosaic voice, is said to endow in the reader a sense of purposefulness. This is the underlying theme in the majority of transcendentalist essays and papers – all of which are centered on subjects which assert a love for individual expression. Though the group was mostly made up of struggling aesthetes, the wealthiest among them was Samuel Gray Ward, who, after a few contributions to The Dial, focused on his banking career.
Luc Paquin
Bacchus & Uriel…
Bacchus
Antagonism
Since the scientific revolution, the relationship of science to religion and spirituality has developed in complex ways. Historian John Hedley Brooke describes wide variations:
- “The natural sciences have been invested with religious meaning, with antireligious implications and, in many contexts, with no religious significance at all.”
It has been proposed that the currently held popular notion of antagonisms between science and religion has historically originated with “thinkers with a social or political axe to grind” rather than with the natural philosophers themselves. Though physical and biological scientists today avoid supernatural explanations to describe reality, many scientists continue to consider science and spirituality to be complementary, not contradictory, and are willing to debate.
A few religious leaders have also shown openness to modern science and its methods. The 14th Dalai Lama has proposed that if a scientific analysis conclusively showed certain claims in Buddhism to be false, then the claims must be abandoned and the findings of science accepted.
Holism
During the twentieth century the relationship between science and spirituality has been influenced both by Freudian psychology, which has accentuated the boundaries between the two areas by accentuating individualism and secularism, and by developments in particle physics, which reopened the debate about complementarity between scientific and religious discourse and rekindled for many an interest in holistic conceptions of reality. These holistic conceptions were championed by New Age spiritualists in a type of quantum mysticism that they claim justifies their spiritual beliefs, though quantum physicists themselves on the whole reject such attempts as being pseudoscientific.
Luc Paquin
There are a number of different kinds of problems that might hinder a person with aphasia from being able to say what they would like to say. The first thing to emphasize is that people with aphasia know what they would like to say, but they have difficulty finding the words they need to communicate their message.
Sometimes a person with aphasia might be able to picture an object, person, place, or other message, and just not be able to think what it is called. This is a phenomenon that happens to all of us occasionally, but for the person with aphasia it can be a constant state. Other times, a person with aphasia might know what they want to say, but a related word comes out instead. For example, the person might say “dog” when they mean to say “cat”. Other times, the sounds that make up the word that they want to say come out in the wrong order. For example, if the person wants to say “table”, it could come out “batle”. This might seem like nonsense sometimes, but it is a problem of the brain failing to select the right sounds for the intended word. Finally, some people with aphasia have great difficulty saying verbs and other small words that are important grammatical words, like articles and prepositions. These individuals sound like they are speaking in telegraphic language. For example, the person might want to say “I went to dinner with my family” but it comes out “Me and family dinner”.
Norma
Health and Well-Being
Various studies have found a positive correlation between spirituality and mental well-being in both healthy people and those encountering a range of physical illnesses or psychological disorders. Spiritual individuals tend to be optimistic, report greater social support, and experience higher intrinsic meaning in life, strength, and inner peace.
The issue of whether the correlation of spirituality with positive psychological factors represents a causal link continues to be debated. Both supporters and opponents of this claim agree that past statistical findings are difficult to interpret, in part because of the ongoing disagreement over how spirituality should be defined and measured. There is evidence that positive emotions and/or sociability (which both correlate with spirituality) might actually be prerequisite psychological features needed before spirituality can emerge (i.e. past association with psychological well-being measures might reflect a reverse causation), and that the effects of agreeableness, conscientiousness, or virtue – personality traits common in many non-spiritual people yet known to be slightly more common among the spiritual – correlate more strongly with mental health than spirituality itself.
Intercessionary Prayer
Masters and Spielmans conducted a meta-analysis of all the available and reputable prior research examining the effects of distant intercessory prayer. They found no discernible health effects from being prayed for by others.
Spiritual Experiences
Neuroscientists have examined how the brain functions during reported spiritual experiences finding that certain neurotransmitters and specific areas of the brain are involved. Moreover, experimenters have also successfully induced spiritual experiences in individuals by administering psychoactive agents known to elicit euphoria and perceptual distortions. Conversely, religiosity and spirituality can also be dampened by electromagnetic stimulation of the brain. These results have led some leading theorists to speculate that spirituality may be a benign subtype of psychosis. Benign in the sense that the same aberrant sensory perceptions that those suffering clinical psychoses evaluate as distressingly in-congruent and inexplicable are instead interpreted by spiritual individuals as positive-as personal and meaningful transcendent experiences.
Luc Paquin