Tag Archives: spirituality

Spiritual Objectivism – Part 4

  By Eleni | June 1, 2013 - 10:06 | ,
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The topic of spiritual objectivism has blossomed into something that seems to keep evolving. In my previous post, I explained where I’d separated from a purely objectivist stance. However, I still resonate with the objectivist philosophy. From a surface perspective, it allows us to grow spiritually by championing ourselves as individuals.  It also frees us to be true visionaries where we can  nurture our talents without apology or guilt.

I’m now going to focus more on the spiritual angle of this series. This helps keep me grounded and humble. I’ll also demonstrate how a spiritual objectivist mindset keeps me free from forming new conditionings.

Authenticity

I strive for authenticity. For me, being truly authentic means to outwardly express my true nature, as opposed to compromising myself to appease someone else’s ideology or belief. It sounds simple, but it took me years to reach this point.

Through my own spiritual practice, I’d recognized that Ayn Rand was correct: morals come from within us when we make decisions based on reason. While religion may work for some people, it doesn’t for me. It tied me down and kept me form learning. I had to let it go to grow. We all have our own paths to follow. Mine is the rebel’s path; sometimes frightening, sometimes weird, oftentimes both, but always fulfilling.

“Each man must live as an end in himself.” Ayn Rand

Most individuals throughout history are remembered because they dared to set their own path.

“No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path.” The Buddha

Buddha was a Spiritual Objectivist!

The Buddha is a prime example of what it means to be an objectivist. He was quite the rebel! He found enlightenment only after he’d dared to break away from the religions of his time. He put himself through a lot of anguish to attain enlightenment, including depriving himself of food. In the end, he had some rice pudding, sat under the Bodhi tree and became enlightened. He had to detach from everything he was told to believe in to get there.

A Parallel Journey

I view my kundalini awakening as the beginning of my spiritual journey.  I only use the term because it’s faster than saying, “A fountain of light exploded inside my head and plugged me into something vast and seemingly borderless!” Being Greek, I’d like to mention that the Greeks call the light experience, Hesychasm. Whatever name you want to call the light experience, it has nothing to do with what happened to the Buddha under the Bodhi tree. In fact, he had transcendental experiences and never tied them to any greater knowledge.

Like Gopi Krishna, I see kundalini as part of a biological/evolutionary process, but since it’s nothing I can prove, I don’t commit to any theory. What I can say is that it did dump a lot of data into my brain. I started to have a lot of visions. Some were of geometric shapes, which were hard for me to understand. It was up to me to learn how to utilize what I was receiving and why I was receiving it. How I thought and perceived the world had become even more critical during this time in my life. It’s so easy to get swept up in visions and mystical experiences, and I kept myself grounded by not making any judgements about what I was seeing.

Kundalini forced me to ask questions and confront issues I’d refused to deal with in the past. It was as if something switched on inside me that refused to shut off. During the process, I felt that following an ideology—any ideology, kept me from growing spiritually. This happened when I realized gurus and spiritual masters merely stated opinions. They interpret their experiences subjectively. And politicians were mortals who were no better or smarter than myself. It moved beyond ideology when I realized I’d created belief systems about myself and the people in my life, all of which were mere opinions. It was an epidemic! I gave up all forms of belief. It was the act of belief, as opposed to the ideology, that kept me from traveling forward.

I should mention here that I read about the Buddha’s journey after I had gone through my ideological data dump. This had further demonstrated to me that the genuine truth is learned from within, irrespective of our location in either place or time. The truth is literally universal, and we can all be Buddhas if we so desire.

The Surreal Years

The early years after I gave up belief was surreal. The world my personal dogmatism created was so different from the reality I was waking up to. In a sense, I was deprogramming myself from many years of conditioning. With that came a lot of releasing of pain, the healing of emotional scars and a bout with cancer, which happened during the time I’d brushed aside my spiritual practice.  They were also years of learning. I read many books, even ones that would be considered blasphemous. At firs I was scared but then soon realized the topics were also ideologies. Today, I can read any topic without fear of damnation.

I was finally free from belief, or so I thought. Seeing how everything I ever believed in had been written by a subjective interpretation, stated by a subjective mindset and taught by a subjective individuals, I had become an atheist for a while…until I realized atheism was another form of belief. Belief will try to snag me every time!

And after all that, I was free from ideology. I could finally live free, as nature intended for us…as individuals that are born with an innate morality.

“It’s not about being right or wrong.  It’s all about the experience.”

I bring this phrase up again because it liberated me. It keeps me objective and allows me to take in and enjoy every experience. And for those experiences that are painful or difficult, I still immerse myself in them fully as all experiences in life teach us about ourselves. We can choose to ignore them or learn from them and evolve. The day I heard this phrase in my meditation is as important to me as my kundalini awakening and another event, which I’ll bring up in my next post. It goes to show you…the path to enlightenment is ongoing.

Part 1  Part 2  Part 3

Love and light,

Eleni

Spiritual Objectivism – Part 3

  By Eleni | May 23, 2013 - 17:44 | ,
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In my last post, I formed a connection between spirituality and objectivism linked together by morality that’s natural to humans. I want to focus this post on the aspect of reality that influences my writing.

 “Reality exists as an objective absolute. That man’s mind reason is his means of perceiving it. And that man needs a rational morality.” Ayn Rand

 This is where I splinter off with Rand. I hold a view similar to Robert Anton Wilson:

“Humans live through their myths and only endure their realities.”

I resonated with Robert Anton Wilson’s writing, but I was still tethered to my self-perceived reality…although I’d been aware of it at the time. After I’d detached from the collectively agreed upon notion of reality, I resonated to the truth behind his words. I don’t view reality as an absolute. I see it as highly subjective. What we all see and experience collectively is the reality we’ve all agreed upon. That doesn’t necessarily make it true. Therefore, I don’t view perceived reality as absolute, and I cannot make absolute judgements based on that which isn’t absolute.

“We did not fall because of a moral error; we fell because of an intellectual error: that of taking the phenomenal world as real.” Phillip K. Dick

All my stories are written from a non-absolutist stance. I’m about as non-absolutist as they come! While plots resolve, I find there’s always an unidentifiable beyond. I suppose I’m fascinated with storytelling because I see so many potentials, and writing fiction is my way of discovering them one possibility at a time. Life has certainly become more interesting…and weird, after I’d detached from ideology!

Mix Ayn Rand with Socrates and what do you get?

Ayn rand stated that the base of knowledge stems from three axioms:

1. We exist

2. We are conscious

3. Identity

I veer off at number three, which isn’t surprising as Ayn Rand was an atheist, and I’m not. Atheism is as absolute a term to me as believers of any religion.

“There is no complete theory of anything.” Robert Anton Wilson 

Total knowledge is impossible. Socrates realized the only advantage he had over most people was that he was aware of his own ignorance. That awareness hit me after the following message had come to me while meditating:

“It’s not about being right or wrong.  It’s all about the experience.”

I’d previously mentioned the above message in posts. However, this one simple phrase is what had detached from all forms of ideology. What I view as existence is going through life experiencing it through the senses. Labels and identities can limit our experiences when we attach to what the identity represents. This was demonstrated by Ayn Rand who became a victim of her own philosophy, after she’d become a cult-like figure. That was bound to happen because of her attachment to her own identity. Still, her philosophy is conducive to a free society where people are free to express themselves as individuals.

“Groups are grammatical fictions; only individuals exist, and each individual is different.” Robert Anton Wilson

Objectivism stands the test of time and should be taught in school, but society today shuns individualism in favor of the collective. We’re turning into the Borg, and I don’t say that to be funny. In order to grow, we must be able to think for ourselves and not be dictated to by bureaucracies and despots.

 There is no absolute knowing in an observable reality. I can only go by experiences as they occur. And since experiences aren’t static, it doesn’t make sense to me to attach to an ideology. Circumstances change, events happen, and opinions shift, especially when our knowledge increases. This is all very positive to me as I’ve been more creative since detaching from all forms of ideology. There’s no belief system within me that I must defend or argue over, so I find I’m more open to differing opinions that I would have either tuned out or refused to hear. I could’ve never written Unison with any residual dogma, as I held nothing sacred while writing it. I see the Spheral Series as my personal evolution. My protagonists tend to evolve to a higher level than my own current level of evolution.  I suppose that’s how I challenge myself to keep growing.

Tune in next week for my next installment on a subject that’s taking on a life of its own.

Love and light,

Eleni

Part 1  Part 2  

On Being An Author Of Visionary Fiction

  By Eleni | August 3, 2012 - 16:06 | , , ,
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I’ve recently met other visionary authors, and we’ve come together to create the Visionary Fiction Alliance as a means to promote the genre. What I value most about this group is that even though we all have diverse opinions, we get along great. The reason for this is because there is no dogmatism in Visionary Fiction. By letting go of beliefs, we humble ourselves and  recognize there are many roads that lead to the same truth…at least that’s how I see it.

What is my personal philosophy as a visionary author? 

After my kundalini awakening I detached from religion, and accepted I cannot know anything beyond what I’m experiencing, as it’s happening.  My characters tend to have difficulties because of their expectations of an outcome along with inflexible thinking.  Only by exploring and expanding their inner-awareness can they hope to find their way out of the mess they got themselves into.  I deal with this aspect mostly in subtext, but it can definitely be felt in the actions my characters take.

What do I believe in?

All the visions and insights I’ve gained since my awakening have opened my eyes to a myriad of possibilities.  I make no assumptions  or claims as to their meaning. Some people have visions and make pronouncements regarding them, but I see too many possibilities as to what mine can imply. That is why writing fiction is the better option for me.  It gives me the freedom to explore all possibilities.

My personal world view is:

Something exists that is greater than us. It presents itself to those of us who seek it out, and we can connect to it if we so desire. When we are connected to this something, we are at our happiest. If we stray too far, we’re mired in materialism, needless rituals, empty vices and are disconnected from that which makes us whole. This disconnection makes us feel like there’s something missing in our lives when, in fact, what makes us whole is already present in each of us, waiting to be rediscovered. 

The above is my personal truth. I don’t expect, nor would I want, others to accept my world view as I learned this on my own. Being a skeptic allowed me to find and connect to this realization that I’ve now internalized. When I refer to being a skeptic, I don’t mean the type that writes books denouncing God, UFOs and all things paranormal. That’s not being a skeptic; that’s another form of dogmatism. In one of my meditations, I received the following message:

“It’s not about being right or wrong. It’s all about the experience.” 

Being a true skeptic is seeing a world filled with infinite possibilities, and while I personally use the term, Divine when I connect to the inner-light, I don’t attach a definition to what the light is.   Narrowing it down to one absolute meaning is impossible, in my opinion. We can only analyze our visions through the lens of this reality, and our interpretations are based upon our understanding of this reality.

In my stories, my world view is clearly established, and I also write to expand my own consciousness and learn new truths. It’s the receptiveness to all possibilities that makes life more exciting and unpredictable to me. With this mindset, there’s no fear of damnation for questioning or choosing to opt-out of dogmatic practices. This includes politics, nationalism, religion and all other groups that adhere to one fixed opinion.  Out here, in the beautiful chaos of independent thought, I’m responsible for my own fate, and I get along with people of all backgrounds because I don’t hold an opinion that I think is superior to anyone else’s. It’s the most liberating feeling—to think freely and openly.  I liken it to having the mind of a child in that I’m not afraid to take chances. To me, this is what it means to live life to the fullest.

Love and light,

Eleni

When Writing Rewrites The Author

  By Eleni | July 16, 2012 - 01:00 | , ,
4 Comments

I’ve written about how spirituality drives my fiction, but something unusual happened to me last week. While doing research on my new visionary fiction story, On The Farm, I was so affected by what I read that I gave up eating eggs. The point of my blog isn’t about the compassion behind vegetarianism, even though that’s my personally held view, but rather about how, as writers, what we write can also influence our own behavior. I’m discovering it’s not only my spirituality that filters into my storytelling, but my storytelling filters into my spirituality and makes me alter my behavior.  Writing pulls out the weeds that cover my spirit.

We Are What We Write

If we can positively influence people by our writing, it stands to reason that all the negative things we write can influence equally as well.  It’s important to explain here that my writing changed my behavior—not out of guilt, but rather from unveiling a little more of my inner-awareness that’s hidden by layers of conditionings draped over me since childhood. All the ethical questions I’ve been forced to answer during the plotting stage led to my unveiling. To be true to the story, I had to step beyond my comfort zone. As I began outlining and digging deeper into one of the characters, I sympathized with her plight.  I didn’t know to what degree until I later went to prepare a quiche for my daughters. I  removed some eggs from the carton and something felt off. I didn’t feel right holding them. I told my daughters I would no longer eat eggs again unless I found a local farm where I could see how the hens are being treated. They asked me more questions, and I told them my research experience—minus the graphic details—and they decided to stop eating eggs as well. I told them they didn’t have to give them up because I did, but they insisted.

I don’t want my children to follow my example because they think that’s what I want. As a parent, I know I’m a role model; however, I’m teaching my children to develop value systems from within themselves. Through my own personal experience, I’ve come to learn internalization is the key to inner-growth, not copying. Inside us is our inner-guide and when the right moment comes, a new bit of self-awareness is pulled out.  For me, a blog post I had read at a  great Taoist site a few years ago led to my vegetarianism. Derek Lin never came off as preachy or condescending , and  I personally appreciated his reference to Hitchiker’s Guide To The Universe.  Even after I read the article, I didn’t internalize the content until a few months later while passing a farm on a road trip. Time will tell what motivated my daughters. They both joined me and have been lacto-ovo vegetarians for a year, and they haven’t even once asked me to go to a McDonalds.

An Allegorical Tale

The best method to tell a story without coming off as preachy is to use allegory in storytelling. George Orwell’s, Animal Farm is a prime example of allegory. I’ll also be using animals for my next project—but not in a political context. My husband pitched me the idea, and I loved it enough to begin plotting. I’d like to begin writing it in August; however, I’m finding that piecing this story together is quite challenging.  I’ve got the beginning, and the ending came to me last night. I was stuck on the mid-point, and it came to me after I began the first draft of this blog. As with many of my other breakthroughs, it happened while I was working out at the gym.

Power to influence…without the preaching.

If my story organically could change my own behavior, I wonder what kind of an effect it will have on the reader. Will the characters from this story affect people as strongly as they’re affecting me? It will be interesting to see. I don’t preach vegetarianism or any other isms in my stories, although a character may become engaged in or attached to one form or another. After all, it’s our attachment to places, things and ideals that create conflict, including vegetarianism. I’ve read about a few instances where vegetarians splashed paint on fur coats…while people were wearing them. When we attach labels to our own behavior, we must be mindful not to identify with it so strongly that we lose our ability to think critically and act rationally. By the time I type the words, the end, the ism is replaced by whatever inner-lesson the character had to learn. To me, that makes a more positive and satisfying read.

Love and light,

Eleni

Transcendent Experiences That Inspire The Sci-Fi Author

  By Eleni | July 5, 2012 - 10:42 | , , ,
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This blog was inspired by Dr. Jeff Kripal’s podcast interview on Skeptico discussing his book “Mutants and Mystics” which I’ve ordered and am looking forward to reading. The book is about how authors use their own paranormal experiences to write their stories. I was immediately intrigued as that’s what I do, although I don’t refer to my kundalini awakening as paranormal.  The very meaning of normal is a subjective interpretation of reality, and  my experiences are as natural to me as waking up in the morning.

Ever since I was a child, I was transfixed by science fiction. From Captain Kirk on Star Trek to Ripley on Alien, I was awed by the limitless possibilities of the imagination. Anything could and did happen in these stories, and since I had a sad childhood, these stories helped me forget about my own life for a while. One step into the time doorway in Land Of the Lost, and I was in their world.

The signs of being a writer were always there, but it took all my experiences to feel worthy of writing science fiction.  Since my spirituality drives my fiction, I thought it would be interesting to draw parallels in my writing to what I heard on the program.

The titles in bold were the key points of the podcast that I relate to as a writer of science fiction and speculative fiction.

 

Humility Versus Certainty

The host discussed humility versus certainty when it came to how one deals with what’s beyond our current level of understanding, and I thought it was a great way of explaining my own motivation in writing.  I was brought up Greek Orthodox, and there was a level of certainty I had towards my faith. That was all gone after my kundalini awakening and not because I was shattered or depressed. The further I tried to understand what happened to me, the more I realized I could never know anything for certain and that made me more humble.

In Unison, the protagonist, Damon1300-333-1M, is a scientist, and he begins his journey as a materialist. His position makes him shortsighted regarding his invention of a technology that ends up enslaving his people. When things start to move beyond his world view, everything he believes in is brought into question, and he has a difficult time adjusting. The movement from certainty to humility is depicted in Damon’s inner journey, mirroring my own interior struggles.

With my newly developed humility, I became less self-centered, and I had a strong desire to help people. I wanted to reveal how my spiritual evolution led to a happy life. I could’ve written self-help books, but that wasn’t my style. I didn’t want to make the message about myself.  Writing under the umbrella of visionary fiction flowed into my writing organically and without any pretense or proselytizing. As an author, my intention is to transmit positive energy through my writing, and I would find it rewarding, and more humbling if my stories  open hearts and minds in addition to being entertaining.

Humanism Versus Mysticism

During my kundalini awakening I was plugged into something larger than myself, but I never viewed it as above, outside or beyond human potentiality. Because we’ve collectively accepted the paradigm of materialism, anything outside the scope of this understanding is labelled paranormal. As I’ve mentioned in the opening, I find my experiences normal, and within the realm of human potential. What my experience showed me was that all of creation is part and parcel of the life force that created it.  I also see it as a natural process as opposed to supernatural.  So in my stories, the characters all have their chance to transcend, but what they transcend to is never referred to as magical or mystical; it’s part of a natural order.

Writing  To Understand

Dr. Jeff Kripal mentioned that Phillip K. Dick wrote to understand his experiences. I write for the same reason.  I’ve written journals and a few blogs in the past that helped me come to terms with my experience; however a complete understanding is impossible. Socrates understood absolute knowledge is elusive. I’ve reached a similar point in my journey, so I’m not a seeker anymore. This all leads back to how I can never be certain of anything. The only thing I do try to understand is how to tailor my new paradigm into a world that appears so vastly alien to me. At times, I feel like an alien in this world because I can’t talk candidly about my experiences with people. Damon goes through similar challenges along his journey as he tries to find his own place in a world he thought he understood. Writing science fiction helps me reveal my spiritual evolution that I would otherwise keep to myself.

Culture Dictates Experiences

My kundalini awakening wasn’t part of my culture, although there is a Greek mystic sect known as Hesychasm where the monks sought out the “uncreated light,” This was shocking when I had first heard about it as it sounded a lot like kundalini.  I haven’t heard about Hesychasm until a few years after my awakening.

I can’t prove my visions are divinely inspired anymore than I can prove that some undisclosed technology is producing them in my brain. Being unable to state what exactly creates my visions is why I don’t define them. It’s safer to observe them as they are, without any judgement. The more I ruminate over them, the more strange reality appears to me. It’s as undefinable as my visions. This is another aspect that’s humbled me.

“There is no such thing as truth. The only thing that is actually there is your logically ascertained premise, which you call truth.” U.G. Krishnamurti

…Which is why science fiction is the cultural vehicle in which I express my spirituality.

Freedom To Say What I Want

I found that no matter how delicate I present my position, if it counters something a person is passionate about, they get offended…even when it wasn’t my attention to offend. As I’m not a mind reader, I have no way of knowing how deeply someone feels about their position, so I’d rather not risk hurting feelings.  This goes back to my feeling like an alien because I can’t speak freely with people.  Science Fiction is the only way I can say what I want. However, it’s important to mention that even in fiction there’s a fine line between preaching and remaining true to the story. How I avoid preaching is I make sure the character speaks through his or her personality and not my own.

As I don’t live in a world of certainty, it’s easy for me not to be preachy in my stories. The only time I’ve slipped is when I wrote while being angry.  Since then, I avoid writing when I’m over emotional. To get the best story out of me, I need to be detached from myself and fully engaged in the story world. Some of my characters may be preachy, but that’s to demonstrate their particular character flaws rather than to convince the reader of some personal ideology, of which I have none.  Unless you consider not having an ideology as an ideology. It’s a vicious cycle!

Relating experiences through characters

If I try to explain my kundalini awakening to people, either I’m viewed as crazy, or I’m asked what kind of drugs I was on. However, if it’s happening to a character, people are more apt to accept it, so I nestle my visions and experiences into my fiction.

Future is creating the past

I’ve had many occasions of feeling like I’ve already lived through particular events. This was the basis of Unison in that time is not linear but happens in a constant loop.

Do we author the world or does the world author us?

My ideas never come on a conscious level, so I definitely feel authored. This has been a humbling admission for me. Since  accepting this, my work has become more authentic. It’s almost like my stories are tailor-made for me. I’m right-brain oriented, so writing a first draft is very visually intense. I capture different pictures of my story, and they come to me in no particular order. Eventually, they make sense. For instance, in Sunrise, I envisioned a green flame flickering in a cave. I had no idea what it meant when I saw it, but I wrote it into the scene knowing it would eventually make sense when I got all the pieces, and it eventually did.

I’m in the middle of outlining my next book, On the Farm. I’ve already got a few images  and designed the book cover.  Working on the cover gave me a lot more visuals for the story. It was so effective,  I’ve decided to include book cover design during the development phase of my stories.  Visuals tell the story, and words interpret what I see.

Near the closing of the show Dr. Jeff Kripal claimed the culture is writing us.  I close with asking who or what is writing the culture?  There’s definitely another loop here which further demonstrates how limiting our understanding is. I have my theories, but I’ll save them for another book.