From The Secret to Ekhart Tolle and now to past lives (I do NOT want to see the show she does on colon cleansing!).

Have you ever heard someone talk about their past lives? Or heard someone tell another what they did when they were here before?

Have you noticed that however un-cool, un-accomplished, un-impressive or just un-  we may be now, in the past we were all important, amazing and admirable.

We might be losers now, but when we were helping birth homo sapiens, we were good enough, smart enough and, gosh darn it, people liked us.

Go to a past-life workshop and you’ll meet Cleopatra! Go to another workshop the next week and you’ll meet, why could it be? another Cleopatra?! Another workshop, well, I’ll be… ANOTHER Queen of Egypt!
Why doesn’t anyone ever discover that in ancient Rome they were Vic the vomit bucket carrier, or in the Ming dynasty they were Chang, a soldier in the army who was known for being the fourteenth guy from the left… or was that fifteenth? I don’t know, but somewhere under twentieth.

Okay, sure, sometimes someone “recalls” a less-than-stellar lifetime. But even those were somehow important. “I died giving childbirth and saw the ephemeral nature of life… and that’s why I now have 37 cats in my one bedroom apartment.”

Those who had, oh, less than respectable careers always find a way to make them uber-special. Prostitute in ancient times? If this was you (and if this was you then, there are many who want to know you now), well you weren’t just giving handies underneath the steps of the Acropolis for 20 dinars… oh, no, you were doing SACRED SEXUALITY, or were the mistress to the Sultan of Somewhere-ville, or were Gaia and gave birth to the universe itself!

I can’t recall one past life story (and, living here in Boulder, people answer “What do you do?” with past-life stories) that sounded like, “Oh, I was an accountant in a small town. Nothing much happened. Died in my sleep.”

I’m just not sure why I would believe that under the unusual and often mind-bending conditions that are required for “remembering” past lives, I should assume I’m getting the facts straight. I know how crappy my memory is about things that did (or didn’t) happen to me in this life, let alone when I was a crystal cleaner in Atlantis. Hell, I rarely remember what I had for breakfast by the time I’m eating dinner. Oh, and I have a VIVID memory about having pneumonia when I was 10… which is only complicated by the fact that I DIDN’T HAVE IT!

I’ve also noticed that past-life readings tend to “reveal” causes from the past for events we are aware of now. Got a pain in your leg. Well, guess what? You were stabbed in the leg in the Peloponnesian War! Migranes? Killed with a shovel to the head by Gengis Khan.

But we don’t tend to hear stories that reveal something previously unknown to us in real-time. I haven’t seen any testimonials for past-live workshops where someone remembered where they hid all that Mayan gold, or buried the body, or etched “Michaelangelo was here” under David’s scrotum… and then found the gold, the body, and, well, where Michaelangelo had unknowingly been.

Now, look, I’m open to the possibility that we were here before and we will be here again. Could be. Granted, I’m not going to hide the Hot Wheels cars I’ve saved since I was 7 with the expectation I’ll pick them up again in 1000 years and become a millionaire on the reincarnation of eBay.

And I also won’t deny that some people find great solace in “discovering” that, say, they have “commitment issues” now because they were the daughter of the 4th concubine of the Prince of History-stan in the 12th century. I’ve seen it happen that a thought that sure FEELS like a memory triggers a great release, a stunning insight or even the eradication of some pain or illness.

But sugar pills are also very effective against pain and depression.

There’s a phenomenon I call “The Resonant Lie.” It’s something that FEELS right, that SEEMS true, that may even bring a big “AHA!” with it… but isn’t true. You can have a life-changing insight about your “Inner Child”… but there’s no such thing. It’s a concept. A sometimes-useful concept, but just a concept. (Admittedly, when my inner child wants chocolate, I spoil him rotten.)

My favorite Resonant Lie story is of a woman I knew whose father died and at the funeral said, “I’m at peace with the fact that Dad died, but I’m sad that I won’t be making new memories with him. I remember when I was a little girl and he taught me how to wash a car… I just wish we could make more sweet memories like that one.” The memory was very useful for her in many ways. Afterwards, her uncle approached her and said, “That was a very touching thing you said about your dad teaching you to wash the car… but *I* was the one who taught you how to wash the car.” SNAP!

I’m sure there’s more to be said, both about reincarnation (BTW, the title of this post refers to the definition of REINTARNATION: Being reborn as a redneck), and the Resonant Lie… but I’ll have to save that for another time because, in a past life, when I was Henry VIII’s court jester, I was punished for getting to the end of a story, and now I tend to leave things hanging and incomple…

There was more to that joke than a good laugh at uber-serious guys and gals with acoustic guitars who could use a shower.

Contrary to the idea that laughing at someone or something can diminish their/its power, I think that when we laugh at something it lessens our charge about the issue. I think the more we laugh about it the more we dismiss it as unimportant.

Which is why Mike Myers (yes, “Austin Powers” Mike Myers) is the root of all evil.

Mike’s upcoming movie is The Love Guru where he plays an American boy who was raised by gurus in India (similar to being raised by wolves in Alaska, but with better food and more dirt), and then “comes back to seek fame and fortune in the world of self-help and spirituality” as Guru Pitka.

The good news is that his motives are, at least, transparent and honest, unlike many of those whose footsteps he follows.

The better news is that if the movie is half as funny as the material they’ve put out to advertise the movie, it’ll be HYSTERICAL.

And now you might be getting the hint about why, once again, Mike Myers is the root of all evil.

By getting everyone to laugh at the techniques that “gurus” (self-help, spiritual and business) have used for decades to help us become detached from our egos wallets, in the name of some nebulous thing called “growth,” we may become even LESS critical of people who make untenable promises of “personal advancement” with the help of meaningless acronyms (e.g. they say “fear” = false evidence appearing real… but I think should be: “F*%k! ‘ere are rattlesnakes!”) and dopey aphorisms turned into playing cards, screen savers, and needlepoint wall hangings (Like: “Enjoy the journey and not the goal”… something you would only think to tell yourself if you’re having a crappy trip and aren’t near a rest stop, let alone Disney World).

So, even with Guru Pitka’s melodious voice (which is a better Deepak Chopra impression than Deepak Chopra does!), and his more useful teachings (rather than Sanskrit, his mantra is Hungarian: Mariska Hargitay, which, if you repeat it often enough will land you a part in an NBC crime drama), he may help make New Age nonsense seem even more meaningful!

In fact, I’m willing to bet, right now, that after this movie comes out, the average “spiritual” reviewer will completely miss that Myers is skewering the self-help and spiritual biz and, instead, they’ll say things like, “Not only is Mike Myers funny, but he’s teaching the TRUTH!” Non-dual fans will drool over themselves (wait, have we just discovered a new teaching — non-drool-ism?) with the idea that Guru Pitka is introducing Ramana Maharshi’s “Who am I?” teaching to a whole new generation!

There could, though, be a silver-ish lining to the (hopeful-if-hysterical) popularity of The Love Guru. Let me explain:

Back when I would host comedy shows, I would sometimes open the show by doing every “hack” old joke I could think of (e.g. Here’s one that was told in Vaudeville houses and still shows up in comedy clubs: A bear and a rabbit are taking a dump in the woods. The bear asks the rabbit, “Hey, rabbit, do you have trouble with poo sticking to your fur?” “Never,” answers the rabbit. So the bear wipes his butt with the rabbit).

I’d do this to punish the comics who would come on later and who relied on these old jokes rather than writing their own material. They’d tell the joke and instead of a laugh, they’d have the entire audience just staring at them, wondering why the guy was stealing material from the host (full disclosure: I stopped doing this technique because I didn’t want anyone who didn’t understand satire to think *I* was just another hack comic who relied on 80 year-old material).

Well, Guru Pitka seems to be a walking Best Of… Old Trite Spiritual Teaching Stories. He has more “borrowed” material than the Chicken Soup books (which, btw, are ALL borrowed material). If we’re lucky, Pitka/Myers’ telling these stories will force the gang on the self-help circuit to write some new (I’m not too naive to hope for true) stories. But, if the gang proves to be as creative as they have been for 100+ years (did you know that the “teachings” from The Secret came from a book that’s almost 100 years old?), instead we’ll have a gaggle of gurus introducing their stupid stories with, “And as Guru Pitka said in The Love Guru…”

All that said, I can’t wait to see the movie and nothing I said above will stop me from laughing — even at times where I’m the only one, no doubt — and thanks to The Love Guru, my new spiritual practice will be doing prostrations to Justin Timberlake, who is… well, go here to see for yourself.

A monk asks the master, Joshu, “Does a dog have Buddha-nature?”

Joshu answers, “Mu!”

This story has become known as the Mu koan — a koan being one of those semi-meaningless statements that, by beating your answer-seeking mind against the unanswerable statement, may, eventually, after a lot of brain beating, result in a moment where rationality snaps and you have a dramatic (and temporary) shift in perception (doesn’t that sound much less interesting than, “You experience Satori!”?).

The way you wrestle with this koan is by trying to understand Joshu’s answer. And if you go to a Zen retreat where people are putting their mind into a cage match against the Mu koan, you’ll often hear people muttering, “Mu! Mu! Mu… mu… muuuuu,” as if repeating “2+2, 2+2, 2+2″ will spontaneously make them think, “FOUR!”

First of all, why they’re saying Mu is a mystery. Why did the entire story get translated into English, but not the last word?

“Mu,” is a Japanese word for “no” or “nothing” or any form of negation. But you never hear good Zen boys and girls mumbling, “No. No. Nothing. No… nooooo….”

Instead, they sit on the floor or walk around the zendo sounding like their practicing for the upcoming 4-H cow impression competition.

Which makes me wonder if there’s another Zen story that hasn’t yet been translated:

A monk asks Joshu, “Does a cow have Buddha nature?”

Joshu answers, “WOOF!”

But the Buddha nature of livestock and companion animals is not my concern here… I really want to know this:

Do my cats have free will?

My cats clearly learn things. Things like, “don’t eat that plant,” “that weird sound means food is coming,” “if I face this door and meow long enough I get treats,” and, “no matter how much those tall animals yell, I have no personal issue that would prevent me from walking on this counter, scratching that chair, and wiping my butt on the carpet.”

My cats also seem to make decisions. Decisions like: “I will run to that empty corner of the room as if my life depended on it… NOW!” and, “NEVER MIND, I’ll make a 90-degree turn at 100 miles an hour and dash up the stairs instead.” Or, “I think I’ll nap here, and then get up and sleep there, and then rouse myself in time for some serious shut-eye over there.” And, even seeming artistic decisions like, “Yes, it is much more aesthetically pleasing if this mouse were floating in my water dish!”

But do my cats have free will? It seems like a silly question. We don’t think they sit around deliberating, “Do I find a nice sunny spot to lie down, or do I plant myself in the middle of the guests and lick my butt ?” We don’t expect them to be thinking, “I feel a certain sensation that I’ll call ‘lacking’ and if I could only spend a weekend in a hotel room with other cats and discover my ‘purpose’ for living, I should be able to eliminate this sensation.”

Cats seem to do fine, free will or not.

Now, if we’re going to suggest that cats have do have free will, let’s move further back on the evolutionary chain… fish? worms? algae? amoeba?

They all seem to survive just fine without what most of us would call free will. It doesn’t seem to be a prerequisite for survival.

So, let’s head in the other direction. What about us?

For over 40 years, cognitive scientists have noticed that you hook people up to various scanning and measuring devices and see something happen in the brain when they have made a decision. What has been puzzling to them is that this event takes place at least half a second prior to the person actually deciding. A recent study showed a neurological event SEVEN SECONDS prior to the person deciding, “NOW!”

These scientists suggest that decisions, and perhaps most of the rest of our life, is happening in some non-conscious way, and that our conscious thought is simply narrating an event that has already passed.

“I decided to buy that new Brittany Spears album,” is a thought you have merely to explain the fact that, for no rational reason, you’re standing in line with the CD in your hand, and some goth kid behind the counter giving you the evil eye.

Some scientists say, “Well, the initial decision is out of our control… but then we can decide whether to act on it or not!”

Oh? Really?

But what about that decision? Why isn’t that one as non-conscious and non-controllable than the first?

The notion that we aren’t the conscious and volitional actors that we seem to be makes most people more than a bit nervous… and many — including scientists — avoid thinking about it all together and then justify that lack of consideration with, “Well, that couldn’t be true… it sure seems like we have free will… the notion that we don’t argues with our every day experience!” Even though they know that what we “experience” and what is accurate are often as disconnected as “Paris Hilton” and “Nobel Prize for Physics.”

Or people get even more nervous and suggest that if people truly accepted that the are not the ones running the show, then all hell would break loose. Or nobody would do anything. Or some other equally horrible future would ensue, where humans would merely alternate between watching Brady Bunch reruns, killing each other, and trying to lick themselves.

But I’m not sure anything would change if we all suddenly accepted that, contrary to our seeming experience, we are DNA robots who have a glitch in the programming that makes us think we’re not robots. I’m not convinced that having an intellectual understanding of something that’s so contrary to our experience would make a bit of difference. After all, we know that we could die from any of a thousand causes in almost any moment, but that doesn’t stop us from partying like it’s 1999.

Years ago I heard someone say, “Humans think they are immortal. The proof? They always act surprised when one of them dies in a manner that has taken out millions of others.” Every day’s newspaper, TV and radio tells of some “surprising” death… just like the “shocking” one from the day before and the day before and the day before and…

Though, maybe, if we truly accepted that the thought of having free will is also just some idea that popped into our awareness after our non-conscious being “decided” to cut our hair with a lawn mower instead of a weed whacker… then, maybe, we wouldn’t be as committed to justifying and acting to support our beliefs. Maybe, for example, we would see our desire demonize some group of humans who speak, look, talk or smell differently than we do as no more “conscious” or rational than our “choice” to put on our pants left leg first.

That might be interesting.

I don’t know.

I’m just thinking… or am I?

“What!? I never had sex with my pet!”

“Stop avoiding the question. How old were you?”

“But, I…”

That argument is clearly going nowhere. And the reason is obvious: the most important part of the question is actually the assumption underneath it. The questioner creates a domain and, in order to answer the question in any way, you must acknowledge the validity of the domain. To answer in any way, you must admit that your schnauzer was kinda cute.

Absurd as the above volley may sound, try out this one, from today’s Boulder Daily Camera (our local newspaper that sometimes has the editorial weight of Tinkerbell):

“Are human beings inherently good or evil, connected or disconnected?”

This was from an article about how more people are calling themselves “spiritual” rather than “religious” (I’ll have to save my thoughts about THAT premise for another post… but the short form is: same ugly prom date, different dress).

Check out the question again: “Are human beings inherently good or evil, connected or disconnected?”

Not much different than, “When did you stop pokin’ the puppy?”

They imply a belief: a spectrum on which we can judge people, with “good” on one side and “evil” on the other, and a set of relationships where “connected” or “disconnected” are the only possibilities.

They rely on the person answering to make up what “good” and “evil” and “connected” and “disconnected” mean, and then land on one side of the fence or the other.

And, clearly, “good” is better than “evil” and “connected” is more evolved than “disconnected.”

In reality, this question is no more meaningful than: “Are human beings inherently 4.17 or yabba-dabba-do, jalapeño flavored or Dutch?”

To even entertain the question is to suggest that you agree with the unspoken premise. And, sadly, to tell the questioner that they have been unknowingly speaking in a language that sounds like English, but is really a dialect of Moron makes you “defensive.”

Anthropologist David Eller gave a great example of the statement-under-the qusetion during a talk today: If we’re at a restaurant and I ask you ‘Are you going to finish those fries?’ I’m not asking for you to predict your future eating habits… I’m telling you to push the plate towards me!

Just because a sentence ends with a question mark, that doesn’t make it a question!

(But if it ends in an exclamation point, it *is* serious! Seriously!!!!!!!)

A question mark is like the command a stage hypnotist uses to make someone start clucking like a chicken. Say it at the right time, and the person will stop what they were doing and start looking for bird seed. Use a question mark at the end of a veiled statement and it’ll make the listener hunt and peck for an answer.

“How can I attract more money into my life?”

“How do I get rid of the blocks and resistance that are keeping me from having a successful relationship?”

“How do I get over my fear of intimacy?”

I know these SOUND like questions, but they are actually statements about a ridiculous set of beliefs. And to even consider that there is even a way of answering them means you buy into these beliefs. Let’s have a word swapping party to see what I mean.

“How can I vomit more money into my life?”

“How do I get rid of the hybrid cars and jelly donuts that are keeping me from having a successful relationship?”

“How do I get 5′ to the left of my fear of breathing in and out?”

Trust me, the first batch of questions is as ludicrous as the 2nd if you don’t believe in notions like “attracting,” “blocks,” “resistance,” “getting over something” or “fear of a concept.”

And, BTW, to “not believe in those” notions doesn’t mean you believe in the opposite. It means there’s no frame of reference for which  those notions have any meaning at all.

I’ll bet that if you’re reading this, you don’t believe that the Sun is actually the burning of Thor’s hammer as it travels through the cosmos. It’s not a question of whether Thor’s hammer is or isn’t burning, it’s that the question is nonsensical.

If you want proof that not all questions are questions, just go listen to your average high school student make the simplest statement and use the rising intonation at the end of their sentence, as if there were a question mark at the end!

“Hey, young man. How old are you?”

“I’m 17?”

“I can’t tell from the way you said that. Are you asking me, or telling me?”

“Um, I’m telling you?”

“Do you WANT me to shoot myself in the face because I find the way you’re talking so annoying?”

“No?”

BANG!

Okay, now follow the math on this one:

If I play a tone in your right ear at 110 cycles per second… and one at 120 in your left ear… you “hear” a pulsing sound at 10 cycles per second, the difference between 120 and 110. This is called a “binaural beat.”

When your brain “creates” this missing tone, the binaural beat, guess what else happens? Your brain starts resonating with that tone at 10 cycles per second… which is the relaxed Alpha frequency… and you get relaxed. Automatically.

Make a binaural beat that’s at 6 cycles per second… instant Theta! At 2 cycles… sleep-like Delta without the bed hair.

Sounds great, right?

Too bad it seems to be another theory that SOUNDS good, but isn’t. (Just because something makes sense, doesn’t mean it’s true! Just because it “feels right” doesn’t mean… well, anything).

I’ve been wondering about binaurals for a long time. I’ve listened to tapes of binaural beats from a number of publishers. In fact, I’ve spent quite a bit of cash on them. Some of my best friends make products based on this theory.

I usually like listening to binaural beat tapes… but never enough to slap on some headphones for the 30-120 minutes a day that the manufacturers say I should. I often, but not always, feel more relaxed when I listen to them. I like them as white noise when I’m on a plane.
But something always troubled me about the advertisements for binaural beat products — they never showed real-time proof of the “your brain entrains to the frequency” claim. It would be easy, I thought, to show the read-out from an EEG (a device that measures these brain waves) so we could actually see someone’s brain on binaurals. Especially with the ease of doing video online, I figured people would be racing to use SCIENCE to prove the “entrainment” claim.

Alas… nobody entered the brain wave race.

And now, there may be an explanation for why:

A recent study at the Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, Oregon (near one of the largest sellers of binaural beat products), plugged people into binaural beats, measured their brainwaves, and concluded:

1. “There were no significant differences between the experimental and control conditions in any of the EEG measures.” (that is, the brains didn’t beat to the music)
2. “There was an increase of the Profile of Mood States depression subscale in the experimental condition relative to the control condition (p = 0.02)” (some of the people listening to the binaural beats got more depressed… maybe because these were people who had spent thousands on brain wave products and they just realized they had wasted their money?)
3. “There was also a significant decrease in immediate verbal memory recall (p = 0.03) in the experimental condition compared to control condition.” (I can’t find the words to describe this effect… but that’s because I was just listening to some binaural beat tape.)

Now, granted the experimenters think that more studies need to be done to examine #2 and #3, they’re pretty certain brain-made pulses do not make brain waves.

For those who have spent cash on, and love the effects of, brain wave tapes, let me just give you a quick opportunity to exercise your rational thinking muscles:

Make a list of the possible OTHER causes for the effects that you believed came from the expensive tapes you just bought, that you rearranged your schedule to listen to, and that you believed would work (or you wouldn’t have bought them).

(Hint: I just gave you 3 other causes)

I’ll suggest a concept, and you tell me what you think about it.

Here we go:

You do NOT deserve… anything

And, you do not have ANY rights

Needless to say, I think those two statements are true. Tell me what you think (and why) and, if necessary, I’ll back up my claim (and toss in some jokes) in my responses.

And…. BEGIN…

Quantum Physics has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to say about ANYTHING OTHER THAN QUANTUM PHYSICS

And even then, what it “says” is often hotly debated.

Quantum Physics provides no insight into:

• human psychology
• religious philosophy
• new age theory
• getting what you want
• Bea Arthur

Remember, that Quantum Physics was developed when the physical laws that we see every day, right in front of our non-Quantum faces, weren’t working when examining of sub-atomic “particles” (while particles is not the most accurate word, let me assure you that VIBRATIONS is completely not accurate).

SUGGESTION #1:

If you are not a physicist and you’re talking about any of those topics, or anything else that IS NOT QUANTUM PHYSICS, please remember and remind your listener that you are using your ideas about Quantum Physics AS A METAPHOR.

For example: QP does NOT say that “we are all connected.”

If you want to be a bit more accurate, try this: In Quantum Physics, there is a highly unusual experiment that shows, again under highly unusual experimental conditions, the likes of which which we’ve never seen in nature and can barely sustain using millions of dollars of precisely tuned scientific equipment, that certain particles, which we create using even more expensive and complicated scientific instruments and which we don’t see isolated in nature, exhibit peculiar and currently inexplicable (so inexplicable that when/if we *do* find an explanation, it may undermine the theories of Quantum Physics) connections over an infinite amount of time and space (though we’ve only actually tested this phenomenon over finite amounts of time and space)… poetically speaking, if those infinitesimally small particles exhibit that kind of connection, don’t you love the vague and not-inherently-logical leap to suggest that we do, too!?

Similarly, our observing something does NOT change the composition of the thing.

Most people pull this one out of their hats by saying, an electron is either a particle or a wave, depending on how you look at it.

Excuse me while I apply standard physics to map the trajectory of my projectile vomiting.

An electron is not a particle OR a wave… when examined in a particular way, we see particle-characteristics. Examined another way, we see wave characteristics. This, in an of itself, is pretty wacky. And, perhaps, we’ll find another way to examine electrons and see it exhibiting yet another type of “behavior” (or “behaviour” if it’s observed in the UK). Frankly, we have no frickin’ clue what an electron “is” or even if “is” is the right word (proving that Bill Clinton was also inappropriately bringing in Quantum Theory when discussing a sexual relationship whose pushing and shoving was, clearly, Newtonian).

Also, that, mathematically, a sub-atomic particle COULD BE SAID TO exist everywhere in the universe, that does not mean “we are all one.”

The probability that any SINGLE particle is anywhere other than exactly where it is (and don’t get me started on how we can’t really know where that is), is so close to ZERO that it may as well be ZERO. And that’s for a SINGLE PARTICLE (I was hoping that the initial capitalization would make that point, but again, as I said before, I may be redundant). Add together enough particles to make, say, a basketball, or a Lexus, or JUST TWO PARTICLES… and, trust me, whatever you’re looking at, sitting on, driving, wearing or eating will not suddenly disappear only to be found on the other side of the galaxy.

Oh, and for those who say that our observation creates the universe we experience, let me just ask two stupid questions:

1) And so, after we all die, the universe will cease as well? (let me answer: Uh, yeah, right)

2) Well who is aware of, and therefore created, the observer?

Anyway, let’s continue…

SUGGESTION #2:

If you are not a physicist and you’re talking about any of those topics, or anything else that IS NOT QUANTUM PHYSICS, please remember and remind your listener that you are using your ideas about Quantum Physics to demonstrate that your cranium might be mislocated somewhere in your anal orifice.

I’ll let the physicists argue that they don’t have a case of rectocephaly, but let’s talk about physicists for a moment…

Remember the guys in high school or college who majored in physics? (I know there were girls who did, too, but if you were a female physics major you will soon understand why I’m leaving you out of this example.)

Think back for just a moment (or go back in time because, remember Quantum Physics can’t see why time only moves forward) to those physics guys… what names did you call them then?

Nerds, geeks, dweebs… shall I continue? (And do I need to reiterate and repeat my point?)

Do you honestly think that a PhD or Nobel Prize in physics magically confers superior insight into metaphysics and the human condition upon people who couldn’t get a date for the prom and were unable to dress without the help of GrrrAnimals?

Now, clearly, I don’t believe that all physicists are unable to grasp emotions and philosophy and, instead, have to be home at 6 for Wopner. But, look, just because someone is smart, doesn’t mean they aren’t stupid!

That is, we’re ALL prone to making silly leaps in logic, believing in magic, landing on AN answer without knowing it’s the WRONG answer, and confusing something that “feels true” with something that IS.

Let’s turn this upside down for a second… when Einstein (who once said, “Even *I* am no Einstein”) came up with the theory of relativity, many physicists thought he was a bonehead and wrote him off with, “Yeah, right. Like an assistant patent clerk can solve a problem that has perplexed us real physicists for decades.”

If they were so wrong about him, then why do we think they’re so right about how we “create reality” with our thinking?

I can’t help but end this rant by paraphrasing the really cool, incredibly witty, quirky sketch artist, bongo player, safe cracker and Nobel Laureate in Physics, Richard Feynman, “Anyone who thinks they understand Quantum Physics doesn’t understand Quantum Physics.” And let me add, “And if they tell you ‘Quantum Physicists say…’ then they’ve clearly never been to a physics conference, where there are often more opinions than there are attendees.”

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get into my wormhole so I can go back in time fix the rift I made last time where I accidentally caused my grandparents to not meet in that coffee shop, resulting in the non-birth of my father and, therefore, me and… hey, if you’re reading this, I guess it worked!

No more limiting this revolutionary article of clothing to the very young and very old. We should ALL wear them!

And not because of the combination of convenience and entertainment value that we would get by being able, say, to interrupt the negotiation of a Kosovar arms treaty with, “Could you repeat that, General, I was taking a leak.” And not because it would replace the stress of trying to find a clean bathroom in 3rd world countries with a self-satisfied and self-reliant smile.

But because, as far as I can tell, no matter our age, we haven’t really grown up. And we may as well admit it and demonstrate it with the symbolic act of replacing boxers with Depend undergarments (full disclosure: as soon as I make this post, I will find the company that makes/owns Depend and buy their stock).

While I could site seemingly countless examples of how we haven’t grown up, today I’ll focus on just this one: that the arguments over most serious topics facing our world today devolve into: “You are rubber and I am glue; whatever you say bounces off me and sticks on you!”

Athiests criticize those with religious beliefs… and are then criticized by being “religious” about their atheism (they’re actually being “passionate”).

Those who attack Islam for being intolerant are re-attacked as being intolerant (actually, “critical” does not equal “intolerant”).

Christians who scream that we should allow prayer in the school and then scream louder about how their children are having science shoved down their throats (I don’t even know where to begin on this one).

Speaking of science, opponents of “intelligent” design (btw, it’s more accurate to put quotes around the I-word and not the whole phrase) as not giving a actual answer to how things began are opposed by those who say, “Well, you don’t know, actually, what happened at the moment of the big bang, do you? Nanny, nanny, boo, boo.” (sometimes they leave out the last part… but they don’t seem to understand that not have a complete counter-answer doesn’t give credibility to a meaningless answer).

The US government says it refuses to be made fearful by the threat of nuclear attack… and then threatens nuclear attack on those who made the original complaint (this might be less a “rubber/glue” issue than a debate about the blackness of pots and kettles… but it still warrants diapers).

I could go on…

So, I’m going to propose that until we learn to argue, debate, and negotiate like adults, we show our true colors with the wearing of a comfortable absorbent layer of pillowy freshness.

Oh, and on a similar note (don’t ask me HOW it’s similar; I haven’t thought it through that far. It’s just the thought that appeared next in my mind so it MUST be similar): I don’t understand why people are shocked when someone lies about an affair. When’s the last time you heard THIS conversation: “Are you sleeping with that fire-eating circus freak?” “Well, in fact, I am! I’m so glad you asked!”

I’ve tried to be removed from every mailing list that sends me emails which make me scream. I’ve even set up filters to automatically trash email that comes in with subject lines that make my blood turn into liquid nitrogen at room temperature (a.k.a. “boil”).

But, like messages that will allow me to get a mortgage that’s cheap enough so I can afford a house big enough to hold my gigantic new “manhood”, with a spare room for all the herbal V1agyra I’ll need to use it, somehow a few “You can have/manifest/attract anything you want” emails make it into my inbox every day.

Yes, every day.

There are so many people pitching this idea that, despite my best efforts, I get 3 or 4 emails assuring me that the universe is just a big Sears catalog waiting for my telepathic order, that “SCIENCE” has proven we are put on this planet to be abundant (if , instead of “so wealthy you would pick up that tab at a lunch with Bill Gates and Warren Buffet,” you’ve defined “abundant” as “obese”, then a trip to the mall actually supports this position), or that once you know the way rich people think differently than you, you too will become skinny and tanned and spend all your time posing next to your imported Italian sports car or laughing in the wind while steering your new yacht.

The problem with this message is that it’s so compelling, it plays so well into our 100,000 year-old “how do I get what I want” brain, that when we hear someone suggest that it’s true and that they can teach us how to do it, we turn off our rational thinking process faster than we’d turn off a movie that advertises “Starring Paris Hilton!”

We ignore that we’ve never met or even heard of one human being who has “gotten everything they wanted.” (And that the ones who have seemingly come closer than we have aren’t really much happier.)

We don’t notice that the teachers themselves seem to want more and more and more… and apparently include in their list of wants: divorces, bankruptcies, children they barely see, and critics who think they’re morons.

And then we reach for our wallets when the teacher tells us the price for this incredible (literally) knowledge of how to do what has never been done.

I have only one message to pass along to the “You can have everything you want” teachers:

Call me when you have cancer

That’s my provocative way of saying, “No, you can’t.”

There are times where we get what we want, and times where we get what we don’t want. There are times where we don’t get what we want, and times where we get things we never imagined.

I don’t care how much I want to be the richest man in the world, the way that occurs require the confluence of so many factors that are beyond my control, it ain’t gonna happen. Hell, I could win Powerball every week and STILL not crack the top 10 in the Forbes 100 Richest People list.

It doesn’t matter how much I want to be the greatest golfer in the universe, there’s only one Tiger Woods, and even the people who are #2 and #3 behind him, who practice all day long just to beat him… well, they aren’t Tiger Woods either.

But back to the cancer thing.

This whole effort to try to get what we want, to get what we think will make us happy, seems like it’s just a way to pretend we aren’t going to die… something that most people REALLY don’t want. And, I’m not sure if these teachers have noticed but, so far, everyone who has ever really wanted to live… has died. But only every one of them.

At some point, nature will be stronger than anything we to do bend it in our favor.

So, to the “you can have everything you want” teachers: call me when you realize that you’re on the losing side of that game… let me know how your visualizing, vibration raising, goal-focusing, universe-requesting, unproven treatment-taking — but HIGHLY PROFITABLE — magical thinking is working for you.

Personally, I now know too many people whose last days were made miserable by their continued efforts to get something they wanted — more days — when there wasn’t any one or any thing that cared about their wants.

I can only hope that in the end you can enjoy the truly magical thing about the universe, that it’s WAY beyond our ability to comprehend, let alone control.

And now, please excuse me while I Feng Shui my office in an attempt to repel these unwanted emails.

You do not have BLOCKS!

That’s right, absolutely NO BLOCKS to success, weight-loss, health, millions of dollars, your soul-mate, the perfect home, the ideal pet, winning the lottery, finding a parking space, working 4-hours per week, or becoming a finalist on American (or British) Idol.

I’m serious here. I don’t care what you THINK or what you FEEL about “blocks.” You don’t have them. 100% Guaranteed.

“Blocks” is a made-up concept, invented by naive-but-well-meaning or manipulative-scumbag (your choice) people whose goal is to:

• sell books about the “blocks” and how to “clear them”
• sell tapes about the “blocks” and how to “clear them”
• sell coaching services about the “blocks” and how to “clear them”
• sell seats in a workshop about the “blocks” and how to “clear them” (where you’ll also be able to buy books and tapes and coaching services)
• sell membership into the “advanced” course about…

Get it?

What’s interesting to me is why we’re such suckers for this idea.

Let’s play the home version of our game and find out:

PART 1

1. Think of something you want, but don’t have. Could be that fur-lined car, or the fat-free house, or the job where you get paid for playing solitaire on your computer (For many, if they’re honest, that’s what they’re getting at least 25% of their current salary for that already).
2. Now think about your current situation.
3. Okay, now pay attention to, and feel, the gap between NOW and the IMAGINED future. If you don’t know how to get from “here” to “there”, see if you can feel that something must be in the way. Something MUST be blocking the passage. Feel how that “clearing up” that something would create a direct path to what you want.

Okay, now shake that off for a sec and go on to…

Part 2

1. Think about the city you live in… I’m in Boulder, so that’s what I’ll pick.
2. Think about some other city, a few states away. I’m using Washington, DC (since I’m going there soon for my mother’s birthday).
3. Notice that, while you can “feel” the distance between the two, there is no feeling of a “gap” or a “block” or something that needs to be “cleared up” to get you from here to there.

Let me ask you a question.

Would you ever even consider taking a workshop from someone who suggested that to get from one city to another, you needed to:

• Listen to subliminal tapes that said, “You can get there! You travel with ease!”
• Spend an hour a week talking about your childhood until you understand why you haven’t hopped on a bus
• Focus on being in the other city, as if you were already there… but this time with EMOTION, or PURPOSE, or while having an orgasm
• Evolve to a new level of consciousness, where you can buy an airline ticket without your ego
• Hyperventilate to clear out astral demons who are tying you to where you currently are
• Have some sadist dig her/his elbows into your muscles until you release what’s holding you where you are
• Scream, beat pillows, rearrange the furniture in your home, wear crystals, get a colonic, get a makeover, chant, meditate or do anything else besides MOVE YOUR DAMN BODY FROM HERE TO THERE

Of course not.

Well, what’s the diff?

Simple. One is a real trip and the other is a fantasy trip.

When we engage in the fantasy, we feel a “gap” because where we are NOW is real… and the imagined future is IMAGINED. We feel a “gap” between here and there… because there’s no way to get from REAL-here to IMAGINED-there. There’s no there there!

We sense the “block” because our problem-solving mind can’t figure out how to do the impossible — build a bridge between (that we’ve told it must exist) between the REAL and the IMAGINED.

When we compare reality vs. imagination, or try to bridge the two, the EFFECT of those actions is a feeling that we could describe with words like “gap” or “block.” But that doesn’t mean there IS a gap or a block. It’s just a feeling. A feeling that follows imagining something that doesn’t exist and wondering why we’re not living in Barbie Dream House.

Just because we feel something doesn’t mean it’s true.

Next time you have the chance to go to a workshop about your blocks, remember that if feeling something meant it were real, you wouldn’t be able to drive to the event because of the traffic caused by all the unicorns and monsters that little children feel are real.