WOW… “Will I be pretty?”…Please watch…Only 3.29min March 8, 2011
When I was just a little girl, I asked my mother “What will I be? Will I be pretty? ” Will I be pretty? Will I be pretty? What comes next? Oh right, will I be rich which is almost pretty depending on where you shop. And the pretty question infects from conception passing blood and breath into cells. The word hangs from our mothers’ hearts in a shrill of fluorescent floodlight of worry.
“Will I be wanted? Worthy? Pretty? But puberty left me this funhouse mirror dry add: teeth set at science fiction angles, crooked nose, face donkey-long, and pox-marked where the hormones went finger-painting my poor mother.
“How could this happen? You’ll have porcelain skin as soon as we can see a dermatologist.” “You sucked your thumb. That’s why your teeth look like that! ” “You were hit in the face with a Frisbee when you were six, otherwise your nose would have been fine! ”
Don’t worry; we will get it all fixed she would say, grasping my face, twisting it this way and that as if it were a cabbage she might buy. But, this is not about her. Not her fault she, too, was raised to believe the greatest asset she could bestow upon her awkward little girl was a marketable appearance.
By sixteen I was pickled by ointments, medications, peroxides. Teeth corralled into steel prongs, laying in a hospital bed. Face packed with gauze, cushioning the brand new nose the surgeon had carved.
Belly gorged on two pints of my own blood I had swallowed under anesthesia, and every convulsive twist, like my body screaming at me from the inside out “What did you let them do to you? ” All the while, this never ending chorus groaning on and on like the IV needle dripping liquid beauty into my blood.
“Will I be pretty? ” Will I be pretty like my mother, unwrapping the gift wrap to reveal the bouquet of daughter her $10,000 bought her? Pretty? Pretty.
And now I have not seen my own face in ten years. I have not seen my own face in ten years, but this is not about me! This is about the self-mutilating circus we have painted ourselves clowns in. About women who will prowl thirty stores in six malls to find the right cocktail dress, but haven’t a clue where to find fulfillment or how to wear joy, wandering through life shackled to a shopping bag, beneath those two pretty syllables.
This, this is about my own some-day daughter. When you approach me, already stung-stayed with insecurity, begging, “Mom, will I be pretty? Will I be pretty? , ” I will wipe that question from your mouth like cheap lipstick and answer no.
The word pretty is unworthy of everything you will be, and no child of mine will be contained in five letters. You will be pretty intelligent, pretty creative, pretty amazing, but you will never be merely “pretty.”
Dr. Mercola: White Rice Cereal Is NOT a Healthy Baby Food March 1, 2011
by Dr. Mercola
The choice of solid food for your baby is very important. Contrary to what childcare books say, feeding white rice cereal to your baby is ill-advised. USA Today says that white rice cereal is a heavily-processed “nutritional disaster” since it’s devoid of vitamins, fiber, and other nutrients.
If your baby’s diet is high in grains, he or she will grow up craving processed carbs like white bread, cookies, and cakes. This contributes to childhood obesity, Dr. Joseph Mercola warns.
Dr. Mercola strongly believes that grain-based infant cereals should NOT be a part of your baby’s diet. When flour is refined to make cereal, the grain’s most nutritious part is removed. The flour essentially becomes sugar.
As white rice or flour turns into sugar in the body, it raises blood sugar and insulin levels. Worse, babies who consume highly-processed white rice or flour may become accustomed to this unhealthy diet in their older years.
The Dangers of White Rice Cereal
Stanford University pediatrician Dr. Alan Greene warns that rice is the number one source of calories during the first year of life. Babies who ate white rice cereal diets developed an increased risk of type 1 diabetes. White rice increases your baby’s insulin levels, promoting weight gain while weakening the body’s ability to lose fat.
Excess weight and obesity causes heart problems and a wide variety of other diseases later in life. High insulin levels also suppress growth hormones that promote muscle development and glucagons that burn fat and sugar.
Dr. Mercola recommends breastfeeding your baby exclusively — meaning no solid food or water — during his or her first six months. At six to nine months, supplement with solid foods while continuing to breastfeed.
Healthy Solid Foods for Your Baby
According to the Weston A. Price Foundation, egg yolk is a good first solid food for babies. You can start when your baby turns four months old. Egg yolk from free-range hens contains special long-chain fatty acids that are critical for your child’s optimal brain and nervous system development. Egg whites can cause allergies, so avoid giving them to babies less than a year old.
Dr. Mercola recommends freshly pureed organic vegetables as baby food. Sweet potato, cooked peas or carrots, and mashed avocado are nutrient-rich and soft enough for babies. As your child’s teeth begin to come out and the GI tract epithelium begins to mature, you can add:
• Cooked and finely chopped or pureed greens, like kale, collards, chard, and spinach
• Mashed asparagus
• Squashes like acorn, butternut, and other winter squashes
• Raw nut butter
• Seaweeds that become soft when wet, like nori or wakame
• Eggs
• Raw milk cheese or yogurt
• Organic and pasture-raised or grass-fed meat
Aside from white rice cereal, Dr. Mercola also warns against store-bought baby foods because they contain unhealthy ingredients like excessive sugar, trans fats, and processed salt. Toxic contaminants like bisphenol A (BPA) can also pollute baby foods in plastic containers.
For Dr. Mercola, homemade baby food is still the best. It’s a little time-consuming, but you’re sure that you’re giving your baby a healthy diet.
Boab Essence- It could bring about a profound change in this planet. March 1, 2011
I used Boab essence for most of my pregnancy. I had a very powerful experience with this amazing tree. I read aborigen women give birth inside these trees and if not on a blanket made of its flowers, I felt a call from it and every night would have some drops before going to bed… It has been a life changing experience, very positive … I am still working with it.
By Ian White
The Boab tree, Addisonia gregorii, is found only in Australia and then only in the North West. It has been indicated through channeling that this tree is not originally of the Earth but from the star system Pleiades and the essence derived from it is one of the most powerful healing forces I have ever worked with.
The Boab clears the patterns of the ancestors – the negative patterns that are invariable learnt and passed on from generation to generation. There exists within the Boab tree an energy spiral representative of the family with the many patterns and negative beliefs coursing through each individual inherited from their forebears. In fact it is quite common with the Boab tree to have younger trees growing around it in a circular pattern. The Doctrine of Signatures once more pointing to the family pattern. Also a number of smaller Boabs can merge and from into one tree, again indicative of the learning and passing on of those ancestral patterns. If there is one key scenario you keep repeating lifetime after lifetime you will most likely attract a family structure that will cause this pattern to be repeated.
The Boab Essence will access and clear those core patterns and all the ensuing beliefs.
Interestingly the Boab tree is also known as the bottle tree because it has a reservoir of fresh water stored in the trunk. Another Doctrine of Signatures is that water is closely associated with the emotions and this tree stores deep emotional patterns.
Boab has to do with clearing karma of past actions. It works on the spiritual level initially and then on the mental and emotional. If, in the past, an individual has acted in a detrimental way towards another then, when that injured person returns to earth they will carry with them a dark line of energy which will attract the person who originally created the harm as so commence readdressing the karma. The Boab will clear that negative/dark line attraction. Often if there are negative patterns operating between two people there is confusion at a conscious level as to why they are acting in a strange way towards each other. When that spiritual dark line is cleared to too is the confusion of understanding the other person’s behavior. This may come through dream or meditation. Also the negative patterns which stem from the past are released. Remember though, when Boab releases past actions it is usually from people we are close to. Dagger Hakea on the other hand is working on clearing the resentments to things that have happened directly between people during this life.
When used as a spray in a misting bottle, the Boab Essence is very good for clearing negativity, if that negativity is coming from people who are out of balance in your environment or earth bound spirits. Its effects will not be so beneficial if that energy is coming from the dark side. Also the spraying will help clear the negativity and help to heal the collective consciousness of the planet which is made up from everyone’s actions, thoughts and beliefs. This is a very important essence for it can bring about a profound change in this planet.
We spent quite some time clearing residual negativity both around and inside the tree due to the way it had been used in the past. They synchronicity of the quality it brings about and how it had been used in the past being very strong. The energy above the hollowed, prison section of the tree was incredibly strong and was working to balance the energies of the area below that were due to past trauma of its previous prison usage. The Boab Essence is also very powerful in helping people who are experiencing, or have had experiences of, abuse or prejudice, though, inmost cases this too is a pattern that they have repeated many times in the past and are drawing to them again in this life. Once we stop being imprisoned by negative patterns, we have a greater spiritual development, awareness and sensitivity. This Essence is very good for an understanding of our true spiritual origin and can give great strength when undertaking new goals and activities that are very challenging. It certainly makes a successful outcome to this new challenge more likely once we release the negative thought patterns.
The flower is pollinated at night by moths and again this seems to be another aspect to its Doctrine of Signature of how it accesses and heals the sub-conscious mind. It has a very creamy white color, and its scent is similar to, although not quite as strong as, tuberose.
Pisces New Moon March 1, 2011
NEW MOON IN PISCES – Saturday 5th March @ 12:46 PST/ 3:46 EST
by Rebekah Shaman
The Leo full Moon illuminated our blocks and showed us our limitations so we can make the changes we need in order to shine and become empowered.
With our new found Leo courage, strength and inner knowing the Pisces new Moon asks us:
“Am I living my dreams and being true to myself…?”
It is the last new Moon of the lunar cycle before we spring forward into a new cycle and the coming of Summer, It represents the end of the winter hibernation and is our final opportunity to go deep within, to enter the dreamtime and clarify our visions.
The Pisces Moon brings the energy of reflection and inner meditation. It is the right time to go into silence and hear the small whisper of our hearts. The Piscean Moon can help you to access the inner messages, if you have been feeling that a change is necessary.
As we head deeper into the year we will find that our inner voices – our intuitions, will get louder and more dominant, as we look at our lives and recognize how our actions are impacting on our immediate surroundings, our community and the planet.
Pisces reminds us to use our unique skills, talents and energy to help serve each other to make this world a better place. There is no better time than NOW! It is exciting to be alive because there is so much room for change. Use this Moon to go within and find your true vocation. Use the power of the Leo full Moon to inspire and give you the strength to do what is best for YOU.
We are at our most sensitive and in tune with the Planet over this new Moon so don’t worry if things get on top of you or you feel emotional, teary and anxious about the future. These emotions must come up in order for us to recognize what we must change.
Rather than get caught up in an emotional storm – become the observer and see what you can learn from it, rather than become its victim. My feeling is that this Moon is going to be especially strong so that we can really blast through some of our resistances.
To follow our dreams takes courage, commitment, and strength. This Pisces Moon will guide you through your fears and send you messages through the dreamtime and meditation to show you the way.
There are never any reassurances, only trust and faith in all that you do. Trust yourself fully and you can never fail. Allow yourself the space to really listen to your true desires, wishes and inner messages.
The next full Moon in Virgo will help us organize our dreams into actions but for now – allow the dream to come through in all its glory without judgment or comparison…it will empower you and illuminate hidden parts of yourself that are now needing a voice.
I will end this Lunascope with the wise words of Oscar Wilde:
“A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.”
Scientification of Love by Michel Odent March 1, 2011
Only someone who has been both a medical doctor/researcher and a homebirth midwife could write a book like this one, which explores love from a scientific angle yet with great respect for the beautiful orchestration of normal physiology as it works to its best capacity when it is undisturbed. Love, we learn, is a strategy for human survival.
The author begins with the primal period which includes fetal life, the perinatal period and early infancy. He explores the behavioral effects of various hormones on birth, postpartum, and the interaction of mother and baby. Using this lens, he then examines the offspring in adulthood: has an undisturbed birth resulted in an expansive capacity to love, or have interventions of many kinds resulted in violent criminality, suicide, impaired sociability, schizophrenia?
The book goes on to explore human sexuality, mysticism, death and prayer as changed levels of consciousness. Odent discusses peak experiences and their impact on human health and well being. The human attraction to water and the physical adaptations of the human body to life in water are given a chapter, as is love at a molecular level, a fascinating look into the physiology of emotional states.
Odent’s book gives the reader just enough to think about in regard to each subtopic he raises, while the reader is then compelled to find out more-both by doing further research of a formal nature and obeying the urgent need to tap one’s deepest, purest intuition. This in itself sounds like an amazing incitement for an author to accomplish, but for anyone who has been in Odent’s presence, it is not at all surprising. This fine book is quintessential Odent-passionate, inquiring and brilliant, with the kind of emerging logic that animates, excites and inspires
Support a UN 5th World Conference on Women! February 20, 2011
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/support-a-un-5th-world-conference-on-women.html
A UN 5th World Conference on Women (5WCW) would be the first in the 21st Century and the most influential women’s conference ever held. It will happen only if grassroots activism mobilizes political will within the United Nations and its member states.
The 4th conference was held in Beijing in 1995, drew over 40,000 participants, and led to the Beijing Platform for Action, which if implemented would create a world where women’s rights and human rights are one in the same.
On July 2, 2010, UN Women–the new women’s superagency was established by the UN General Assembly. Michelle Bachelet, former president of Chile was appointed its president and an Under Secretary-General. UN Women could organize a 5th World Conference on Women in 2015 (instead of a Beijing +20 review). The effect could be synergistic in advancing the women’s equality and empowerment.
5WCW would encourage the formation of women’s circles and mobilize a new wave of women’s movement activism. It would be the first since widespread use of the internet and satellite technology which can link the conference with the world. It would bring together and inspire the next generation of women leaders to implement documents and goals already in place such as the Beijing Platform for Action, and UN Security Council Resolution #1325 on Women, Peace, & Security, which are steps toward reaching gender equality and peaceful solutions to conflicts.
Information on website: www.5wcw.org.
and in Urgent Message From Mother: Gather the Women, Save the World. www.jeanbolen.com
Signatories: (http://www.5wcw.org/who.html)
Isabel Allende, author, activist
Jean Shinoda Bolen, MD, author Urgent Message From Mother, Jungian analyst,
Marilyn Fowler, founder US Women-Connect, Women’s Intercultural Network
Carol Hansen Grey, author, activist
Dr. Patricia Licuanan, President Miriam College, Philippines, Chair of prepatory meetings for Beijing conference
Susan Collin Marks, Search for Common Ground, Leadership Wisdom Initiative.
Patricia Smith Melton, founder PeaceXPeace
Joyce Oneko, founder Mama na Dada-Africa
Elly Pradervand, founder Women’s World Summit Foundation, Geneva
Zainab Salbi, president Women for Women International
Leticia Shahani, Secretary-General 3rd UN World Conference on Women (Nairobi)
Gloria Steinem, founder Ms. Magazine, author, activist
Alice Walker, author, activist
Rosemary Williams, founder Women’s Perspective
Lea Wyler, co-founder ROKPA International
Leo Full Moon – Friday 18th February 2011 February 17, 2011
FULL MOON in LEO – Friday 18th FEBRUARY @ 08:36am GMT
Ritual for LEO FULL MOON
______________________________________________________________
FULL MOON IN LEO – Friday 18th FEBRUARY @ 08:36am GMT
( 3:36 EST/ 12:36 PST)
The new Moon in Aquarius helped us to focus on what we want to achieve for this year. It emphasised the importance of our role in our local community and how we can best serve both the micro and macrocosm, for the greater good.
Now this illuminating Leo Full Moon asks us: “What do I need to let go of in order to step into my power and start shining?”
This Leo full Moon brings the focus back to ourselves, so we may appreciate our unique skills and talents. Leo energy urges us to acknowledge what is holding us back from fulfilling our full potential. The sooner we accept our limitations and let go of them, the easier it becomes to step into our power.
This Moon can strengthen our self-esteem, self-assurance, and self-belief. As Leo gives us the courage to stand up for who we are and what we believe in despite the fear and negativity that surrounds us.
A woman in America decided to count the amount of negative and positive ‘body image’ messages she received in a day…for every positive message there were 353 negative ones. http://danceswithfat.wordpress.com/2010/03/07/386170-unhelpful-things/
Leo Moon is here to remind us that we do have the power to change in order to reach our full potential, but it comes from within. The external world is too chaotic and impermanent to provide the support and love we need. It can only come from our own inner work, to break through our fears and limitations about who we think we are and become the powerful person we know we are.
This Moon gives us the courage to let go of what others tell us, and walk our own path. It also shines the light where we need to go through the fear, in order to speak our Truth. If you are compromising, this Moon is an opportunity to stand in your power and say what you truly feel without the fear of consequence.
FEAR is just ‘False Expectations Altering Reality.’ When we lie and deceive we become drained, exhausted and weary. It is an amazing divine paradox of life, but when we finally stand in our truth and speak from our hearts the energy is so pure, only good can come from it!
Leo helps us feel generous and good-natured but don’t get too caught up in your own perspectives, someone may have a different way of looking at things that could be helpful. Be compassionate and keep it real. Leo also shows us that not all that glitters is gold so be aware of making assumptions or jumping into something that sounds too good to be true.
If the energy does ramp up over Thursday, Friday and Saturday go with the flow and remember to enjoy it, knowing it will change soon enough. Find pockets of time to breathe and centre yourself or take a walk in the park and hug a tree – Spring is on its way and the flowers are beginning to burst through the soil….
I will end this Lunascope with the wise words of Dr Robert Holden:
” Success is about recognising the Self you came to Earth with, and whilst success can add to happiness, happiness is more likely to help you be successful. .”
by Rebakah Shaman
Ken Wilber and Larry Wachowski February 14, 2011
The following is a transcript from the now-famous interview between Ken Wilber and Larry Wachowski (writer and director of The Matrix) originally aired on Integral Naked in July of 2004. If you haven’t heard it already, i urge you to pick up The Ultimate Matrix Collection, a must-have for Matrix fans and AQAL freaks alike, which features a fascinating blow-by-blow commentary of all three Matrix movies by “Brother Ken” and Dr. Cornel West.
The Many Meanings of The Matrix
Larry Wachowski and Ken Wilber
Ken: You yourself have not talked about your interpretation of The Matrix trilogy or what you were attempting to say, because you didn’t want it to become dogma—in other words, you wanted people to be free to interpret the movies the way they wanted to, and to have the freedom to do that, and as soon as the movie-maker gets up and says “This is the meaning of The Matrix, and this is the so-and-so” this really limits people. I think it’s a very wise thing to do…
Larry: Yeah, I mean, you make a work of art, and you want it to be provocative, you want people to dialogue about it, you don’t want them to rely on somebody to tell them what it is, or… it’s like, the whole nature of the movie is exactly that—inspect it and pursue it yourself…
Ken: Right.
Larry: Yeah, it seems hypocritical for us to go out and tell everybody what it’s supposed to be about, or what you’re supposed to think about it, and even if I was to do it, or Andy was to do it, and in the gentlest of terms and try to contextualize it as what it means to us, it, because by the very nature of us being the creators of it, it becomes, you know, law—it becomes THE interpretation, and anyone else’s interpretation is just some crazy individual that really doesn’t get it. I don’t wanna devalue anybody’s opinion of it, because they’re all… I don’t know, I think that’s one of the reasons that art is a worthwhile experience…
Ken: So, you decline to do the traditional director’s commentary over the films, so Warner Brothers then suggested that…
Larry: They had a bunch of, like, typical DVD commentary ideas, and, you know, we found most commentary pretty mundane, pretty boring, pretty pleonastic, pretty shallow… And, you know, I’m not very interested in most commentary, and so I started thinking about it and talked about it with Andy and we were like, oh, what would be interesting? And so, we had this idea: try to create tracks that reflected our hope for the movie, which would be that the the movie would inspire people to think about it and inspire dialogue about everything… [they laugh] And so, we thought that basically demonstrating the range of dialogues that the movie has inspired would inspire its own dialogue about not only The Matrix, but the way that we talk about art…
Ken: Right.
Larry: And so, suddenly, the commentary wouldn’t be just about The Matrix, it would be about something bigger, something larger, it would have a larger scope to it. And so we told Warner Brothers that, and they’re like “GREAT!” [Ken laughs] But, I mean, how we would go about doing it is getting two critics to talk about the movie, who hated the movie, and two philosophers who saw the movie and were inspired by the movie, and juxtapose those two different dialogues against each other. And Warner Brothers was like “You wanna—let me get this straight—” [Ken starts laughing loudly] “You wanna put two critics who hated the movie, talking about the movie for six hours?!” “Yeah!” [Ken continues to laugh] And, you know, not only because I think it will be interesting, and, the dialogue, the internal way that they’ve come to these opinions will be interesting, it will be interesting to see how the critic talks about the movie that they don’t like, and they don’t see anything in it, and then it’ll be interesting seeing how two philosophers would talk about it, and see something in it, and see something that works in it. And listening to those two perspectives, I think will be inherently interesting.
Ken: Yeah, yeah. So that’s what were gonna do and as you know it’s sort of, erm, it puts me in a somewhat awkward position because you and I have an agreement. We spent hours discussing what I think the films mean, what you yourself, your own interpretation of the film. We have an understanding that I’m not gonna discuss your interpretation of the film with anybody, that that’s a private thing, and you and a few friends talk about it and we’re keeping that, you know, to ourselves, so to speak. At the same time, I’m being asked to give my interpretation for public, but I’ve already done that and you already came up here with a film crew and shot three hours of me giving my blow by blow interpretation of all three. As you know, I think it’s incredibly gutsy because the whole key to the Matrix trilogy—this is my interpretation—is given in really in the last fifteen, twenty minutes of the third film; that the Rosetta Stone is when Neo, for example, is saying of the machines, “If you could only see them like I see em…they’re all light. They’re made of light”, and so on… That interpretation is the key to all three of the films, and it’s incredibly gutsy, because film number one—so many people sort of relate to film number one because it makes sense. You think it makes sense if you don’t see the other two; it seems a very simple story if you look at just film one. It’s very Manichean actually, which is, everything in the matrix is bad, everything outside of the matrix is good, everybody in the matrix is trapped, everybody outside of the matrix is free—and that very simple kind of dualistic thing—the machines are bad and they’re trying to hurt freedom and so on. And so everybody goes “wow that’s great!” And then you go and you watch part two, and you get to the part where Neo’s talking to the Oracle and says “you’re not human are you?” She goes “no.” He says “You’re a program aren’t you?” “Yeah.” And everybody starts scratching their head, because now all of a sudden—and I’ve told you this, and again this is in my opinion—we’re taken out of the realm of movie and into the realm of complex literature, because this is a very sophisticated plot now, with a whole lot of pieces, and a lot of the pieces of the puzzle aren’t really given until that last part of the third film. And that’s where all of a sudden things really start to fall into place. They start to fall into place with the speech from the Architect, they start to fall into place actually with the first talk with the Oracle. Smith is a real key to all of this, and anyway, it’s that overall interpretation, which is really that body, mind, and spirit appear in the Matrix trilogy, both in their alienated forms, and then in their resurrected, or healed, or more integrated forms, which happens towards the end of the third part. And that’s why it’s very confusing to some people if they don’t get that overall big picture, that’s why sorta part one makes sense and then they get lost a little bit in part two and part three. So I sorta stuck to that interpretation, as you know, when Josh was filming here at the loft—but then I found myself every now and then, you know, having to kinda bite my lip and say “well, I happen to know that Larry agrees with me on this part,” or something like that [Laughs]
Larry: That’s what I was saying, it’s like, it just becomes a natural validation.
Ken: I know.
Larry: I’m here to say that your opinion is whacked! [both laugh]
Ken: “I don’t know that tall skinny guy, he just came in off the street and started talking to Cornel, we have no bloody idea who he is.” [Laughs] We’ve talked about the nature of interpretation as well, and the sort of more integral a context you have, the more certain similar meanings can start to emerge for somebody. And we, you and I both are, you know, we’re integrally informed. I mean, we share a passion for that sort of integral approach. So I think, without giving any of the thing away, there’s certain areas of this, you know, overall production that you and I certainly see eye to eye on.
Larry: Yeah, and you know, it’s like the third movie has its revelation moments, but they’re all based on things that have been built up through all three movies.
Ken: Certainly.
Larry: The beginnings, the little tiny introductions to each film, has kind of a reflection of what each movie is about. And, you know, in those little tiny prefaces to each film, we kind of tell the audience where we are in the journey of development.
Ken: Right.
Larry: I mean, the Matrix is an exploration of consciousness, those little tiny bits and pieces at the beginning of each of the films sort of tries to help you map it out a little bit.
Ken: Right. That to me is what makes it, like I say, such rich literature—that there’s just multiple levels of meaning, and I think that the critics have missed it on that basis. When they don’t stand back and see a bigger picture they are free to criticize it in any way they want, for the same reason that anybody is free to interpret it in any way.
Larry: Yeah, I’m hoping that the problem will be somewhat self-evident, that, you know, in a way that you describe things as having an interior and an exterior, the way that the Matrix kinda is in a lot of ways about that, and the exterior tends to remain very obvious, very surface-based, observation-based. And I’m kind of hoping that these two dialogues that’ll be juxtaposed will be kind of about an exterior and an interior, and the critics will be essentially interested in surfaces, and philosophers will be interested in interiors.
Ken: Well let’s certainly hope so, but, you know, we’ll just go down there and bash around…
Larry: Yeah.
Ken: Are you and your dad still reading SES? [Sex, Ecology, Spirituality]
Larry: Yeah!
Ken: Very cool.
Larry: We’re about half way through it.
Ken: Very cool.
Larry: I had a very good, very interesting sort of discussion about you and what I perceive to be your relationship to Hegel, which could be completely wrong… [Ken laughs], I kinda went on this riff with him about it.
Ken: Does he have an interest in that?
Larry: Yeah, of course, we talked about it, and it’s definitely, I would say, the book that has the most in it, that I got the most out of and that has kind of, I think, is developed the clearest, book…
Ken: Yeah. Yeah, I think what happened with SES, it was really the first book that, all of the books leading up to that were in a sense dealing with a particular piece of what that book pulls together, to kind of integrate them all. And something sort of changed for me at that point, because seeing that more kind of comprehensive picture brought just a really great deal of clarity… [Larry: Yeah.] …that, my god, there’s just so much of it, and sometimes people, by the time they get to chapter five or six, they’ve forgotten chapter one or two, three…
Larry: Oh you’re pretty good about going back, I mean that this solid tradition of I think good writers that write in these veins, they remind you when you have to be reminded. They create their own language, and they remind you of the definitions of the language when you need to have a reminder. I love that in this book you can struggle with very difficult concepts, and then there’ll be a sentence where you’ll use a word like SUPER-ESPECIALLY [They laugh] as a technical defining term… [More laughter]
Ken: But your interest goes back to all of these, I mean the people that are dealt with in that book like Hegel and Nietzsche and Plotinus and all that, this is a love of yours, I mean this is something you’ve been interested in, in really ages like I was, I mean, it’s all kind of coming together in a certain sense.
Larry: Yeah, well I mean, I’ve been looking for a reason… [They laugh] I was talking to my father about it, it’s like with the four quadrants—what still holds the quadrants together is still that zero, that omega point, that center of the x-y axis, right? There’s not four Big Bangs, there’s only one, and it sits there exactly in the center—but it’s interesting in some ways that’s the only, I mean, that’s why Schopenhauer is so dead on, is like that point is the only point worth talking about in some regards, ’cause it’s the beginning of it all, it unites all four quadrants, it pulls everything together. If you don’t have it, then they’re all separate again [Ken: Exactly.] and it’s all nothing. But, you can’t… if you make it entirely about that then you are making it about nothing, because you can’t know.
Ken: Right, and that sort of, that empty ground is the same as that original point, which is your original face…
Larry: Yeah. So it’s interesting that you talk like he does, like Schopenhauer does—you can talk so well about the quadrants, and yet, when you talk about the thing that holds them all together it becomes difficult to talk about.
Ken: Yeah. Well, and that’s the thing that holds them all together, you know, it’s not another quadrant in addition to those, it’s not something outside of it. I sometimes say that it’s the page on which the diagram is written, or something like that, but that’s just another…
Larry: I think it’s the origin point of them, the thing that pulls, the thing that allows you to say that these four quadrants relate to each other, and are not just separate things…
Ken: I agree.
Larry: …holding up by themselves. The thing that holds them is that zero point…
Ken: Exactly, and that zero point…
Larry: That was the… in the beginning of the third movie when there’s like… we’re like: “How do we start the third movie? Which is gonna talk about the things that are so hard to talk about?” It’s like: Ok, you go to black and then you have to have a moment of Big Bang and that’s the origin of everything, the origin of thought, the origin of consciousness, whatever it is—in that moment it’s like ‘from that nothing to everything’ is everything… [Ken laughs]
Ken: And that’s the same origin point…
Larry: Yeah.
Ken: Absolutely, I agree, yeah. There’s a great line, that, everybody knows ontogeny and phylogeny, but there’s also microgeny, which means the moment to moment movement through the sequence. And so, for example if I see an apple, the microgenetic movement is, there’s an impulse, there’s an impression, there’s a simple sensation, then I form an image, that I might think about an apple as a concept and then I can have my personal reactions to it, et cetera.
Larry: Yeah.
Ken: And microgeny recapitulates ontogeny which recapitulates phylogeny which recapitulates cosmology. So from the Big Bang up to this moment is all that same sequence of the unfolding of the four quadrants but it’s also repeated moment to moment out of that empty origin, right now, moment to moment. And that’s the interesting thing about it because when you discover your original face, the face you had before the Big Bang, then you’ve discovered that moment as well—that’s the satori moment, that’s realizing this radical self that’s all-embracing and all-encompassing – out of that moment-to-moment all that thing’s emerged, all the quadrants emerged, all the levels, all the lines, that same origin point that you’re talking about, and that is what holds the quadrants together, because the quadrants are just dimensions or aspects of that origin, moment to moment, this very moment now.
Larry: Yeah.
Ken: And you gave a pictorial representation of that at the beginning of the third…
Larry: Well, we tried to. [Ken laughs]
Ken: But you’ve been interested in this as long as I have, in terms of, you know, the span of your adult life. When you and I first talked on the phone, when we first connected, as you know, we spent three and a half hours, and it was just non-stop talking about all these things, and it’s so, um…
Larry: Couple of chatty Cathies [Laughter] Well you know, it was like one of those great moments where you meet someone, and you talk, and you have a confirmation or a validation about the world. It’s like you have connection, you have instantly a feeling of fellowship or community, and it was nice feeling, it is a nice feeling…
Ken: Ongoing…
Larry: Yeah. It’s interesting too, that, I was talking to my friend Jeff, artist on the Matrix, and talking about how human beings have this—you know, we’re social animals, it’s like so much of our reality is our construction based on communication. We have a point of view about the world and we validate it through finding another human being that has a similar point of view, and thus we say ahhh! You know, it’s like, because we can’t really know anything, so if we just get enough people together, we can believe in castles in the sky…
Ken: Right.
Larry: Until I get this tape back… [Ken laughs loudly] I realize that I sound like a dork! [Ken laughs] Reciprocity is what it is—it’s what friendships are based on—you help me with this DVD, I talk to you, I don’t talk to people, you don’t talk to people…
Ken: That’s right.
Larry: We’re showing how much we care…
Ken: [laughing] Mutual extortion!
Larry: Yeah! Mutual extortion… Mutual exploitation!
Ken: But I think this is very sweet though, is that, seriously, I don’t think either one of us would be doing this if we hadn’t really struck up an almost immediate resonance, because, as you know, I’ve turned down doing anything public at all whatsoever for over twenty-five years, and doing an interview on tape, on film for you and Josh was the first time I’ve done this, and you don’t talk about this stuff to anybody, which is well known. And so I…
Larry: Well, we have a very similar outlook on the nature of celebrity and public experience of it—that it’s not such a great thing… [Ken laughs]
Ken: But, I mean, what’s so amazing is how… well, I mean, it’s pretty easy to understand how an academic philosopher can avoid the limelight, but, how, you know, the co-director and writer of the most astonishing movie experience of the last several decades can avoid the limelight. You were talking about when you were over in Japan for one of the openings and they’re like… you know, everybody else is…
Larry: Yeah we’re actually standing next to press row.
Ken: Exactly.
Larry: Like the entire row of like cameras and video cameras and all these reporters are standing there and we’re like standing right next to ‘em.
Ken: Right… [laughs]
Larry: And everyone’s like, this woman is watching as Carrie-Anne and Keanu come down the aisle and they’re all taking pictures and very excited, and then Joel Silver comes down the aisle and she’s like…
Ken: The producer…
Larry: …you know, gets very excited who’s standing next to me this Japanese woman she’s like [Japanese accent impersonation, breathes hard] “It’s Joel Silver! Joel Silver! Joel Silver!” [Ken and Larry laugh] I’m like “Ohhh… who’s he?” She’s like…
Ken: She’s elbowing you and saying “look! look! There’s the producer!” Oh God!” And you’re sitting there… you’re appropriately excited of course? [Ken continues laughing]
Larry: Oh of course, well I had to find out who he was first… “Who is he? Ohhh… he’s responsible for the Matrix… Ohhh.” [Ken continues laughing] No, I mean, not, not to say anything bad about Joel.
Ken: No, understood.
Larry: Our leader…
Ken: Or the Japanese woman for that matter.
Larry: No, no she was sweet, she was very nice, but I felt very happy with the fact that they didn’t know who we were. [laughs]
Ken: Yeah. Well wait, but you’re not just, you know, for things that I believe are public knowledge, you’re not planning on going back and filming anymore Matrix things for the foreseeable future right now. You filmed the three of those, you know, in one long, intense five-ish year period, and you’ve sort of taken a break from that right now, yeah?
Larry: Yeah, the actual full span is probably ten years that we’ve been working on it.
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: And it’s just, you know, that’s the story. I don’t know, we’ll see…
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: Down the line I’m hoping that I recover enough to even wanna make another movie.
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. So you’ll just sorta wait and see what unfolds?
Larry: Yeah, yeah.
Ken: Yeah?
Larry: I don’t know, I used to love movies. [Ken laughs loudly] I used to go to movies all the time—I used to, you know, watch hundreds of them, hundreds a year, and now I can’t stand them. [laughter] Somebody asked me what did the Matrix do to us in terms of watching other movies, and probably the most distorting aspect of having made these films is looking at movies and just feeling such a lack of ambition on the part of people who are making them.
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: I kind of think like—why bother?
Ken: Yeah. Yeah.
Larry: It’s like, if they can’t generate ambition and energy, why should I be interested?
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. Well you know look, I think that’s an occupational hazard of anytime you try to bring some sort of quality or excellence to anything. I mean, frankly I feel the same way about writers, you know, I mean I bust my ass on these things and I pick up books and read through it, I go, “Jesus, this person you know, I could do this between stoplights. I mean, this is just horrible!”
Larry: Yeah, which is interesting, because at the same time, that is the thing that really enables you in the beginning. It’s like, Kubrick used to talk about how when he first started he would go to the movies and he’d say “Christ, that was crap. I could do that standing on my head.”
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Larry: And you know you forget that crap is there before and after you do it. But before you do it it’s like “Whoa!” It’s inspiring. [laughs] And then after you do it, it’s just…
Ken: Still there.
Larry: Yeah. It’s kinda like defeating in a way.
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. Ah, so, before I forget, what was your take on Hegel?
Larry: Oh, we were talking about how… this is very complicated, but essentially the Hegelian idea that the development of everything is leading towards the singularity of the individual, right?
Ken: Yep.
Larry: It’s the whole process, that mystical—that Eros that you talk about, that’s underneath everything, has been bringing us toward the development of self-awareness and consciousness. Well I guess consciousness, and then self-awareness.
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: And how that development, I guess in your terms it would be the holonic development…
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: …leads towards the singularity—it’s like, the base leading towards the singularity of the individual. Right?
Ken: Ah, well, but not, but… individuality is not an omega for me, it’s sort of on…
Larry: Correct, but I mean, you see that progression as a development.
Ken: I think so, from what you’ve said so far I think so, yeah.
Larry: But then whereas he arrives, you know, he basically says “Here I am, I’m Hegel, I’m self-awareness, I’m the omega point incarnate,” you then turn around and reverse out of that pyramid.
Ken: Through further development.
Larry: Yes.
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: Which is an interesting shape, I guess, that was the nature of our discussion, because generally people want to be describing things that, you know, reach a pinnacle and not then turn around and get out of the pinnacle.
Ken: Right. Yeah I know, it’s just an occupational hazard when people get into evolutionary developmental thinking, they sort of find themselves perched miraculously on top of the heap. And I find ourselves miraculously about half way up the heap and more than that, the heap is unending in a manifest domain. You get off of the evolutionary spiral, which is very important to come to terms with, but you find freedom from it by finding that origin point we were talking about, that underlies all of it. And that doesn’t exist in time, that doesn’t pop out at the top in time, that’s the timeless ground of all of it, and so, you know…
Larry: Right, but the path there, is a development of an ever re-expanding path.
Ken: In a sense, sure…
Larry: Whereas you start off, and, you know, we’re going from base matter, atoms, molecules, cells, living organisms, up to the triune brain, and you know, that is a progression, a developmental progression which kind of suggests a value statement there, leading towards this entity, this… leading towards Hegel, [Ken laughs] leads to Hegel’s family, then leads to Hegel’s tribe [Ken: Oh God!], Hegel’s nation state, and then the world, and then, you know, the non-dual awareness, which brings you back to the superbase element — the non-dual awareness.
Ken: One of the main differences between anybody writing now and somebody writing in the time of Schopenhauer is just, you know, science keeps progressing, to the extent that we make the assumption that science finds something out about some sort of relatively objective world. Then, you know, there’s… god, we’ve got so much more science we know about now, starting with the evolutionary sequence itself, astonishing things that those developmentalists up to Hegel still had no conception, of the geographical spans of time and all of the studies that have been done, you know… Darwin was taking their ideas and applying it to biology, it would be another century before…
Larry: Yeah, it’s totally intuitive work.
Ken: It’s amazing they got as far as they did, to a certain extent.
Larry: No, it is amazing, it’s just, it’s staggering… [Ken laughs]
Ken: Did your dad, was he, obviously he’s very bright about all these things, but had he studied any of the idealists or just sort of knew in general what some of them had talked about?
Larry: Ah yeah, he’s read a lot.
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: He kind of got into Schopenhauer more because I was so into him.
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: Forced it down his throat!
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: Yeah, and he’s probably more of a Marxist than I am [Ken laughs], in terms of these ideas effecting and informing history.
Ken: Right. Well ok, we’ll give him the lower-right quadrant then… [laughs]
Larry: [mumbling]…social systems…
Ken: So is Karen coming down, are we going to see her?
Larry: Yeah, she’s going to be there.
Ken: Oh cool…
Larry: She’s going to be there, that should be fun, she’s looking forward to seeing you again.
Ken: Where are you guys staying?
Larry: We’ll probably either stay at the Viceroy or we’ll stay at—we may bring our dog…
Ken: Oh, sure you’ve got a dog…
Larry: Yeah the dog died and we got one, this is the balance of the universe…
Ken: [laughs] And the Viceroy doesn’t allow dogs, so you might stay someplace else?
Larry: Yeah, it does not, we might stay somewhere else. Where are you guys staying?
Ken: I might stay at the Standard. I’m just going down by myself, I going to stay at the Standard…
Larry: The Standard?
Ken: Yeah.
Larry: The one in West Hollywood?
Ken: I think so.
Larry: That’s a hipster place!
Ken: You bet.
Larry: For a hipster dude!
Ken: Absolutely! Me and West Hollywood, made for each other…
Larry: Metrosexual that you are!
Ken: I’m metrosexual, exactly…
Larry: I was going to try to arrange a dinner with Joel, I think it could be fun
Ken: That’d be great…
Larry: If you actually are flying over the Getty center you can see Joel’s House, it’s pretty cool…
Ken: Wow.
Larry: The red box!
Ken: So ok, I’m free that Friday evening and then all Saturday and Saturday evening and Sunday and Sunday evening, so…
Larry: Doing some socializing?
Ken: Well I thought since I’m down there, you know, might as well… I don’t get out much….
