the art of hans ruedi giger

"...swallow everything out of the preacher's mouth..."

~the amorphous fury of the biological organism that seeps from the matrix of this piece reminds me of faith in the divine~

It is a frightening thought that man also has a shadow side to him, consisting not just of little weaknesses and foibles, but of a positively demonic dynamism. The individual seldom knows anything of this; to him, as an individual, it is incredible that he should ever in any circumstances go beyond himself. But let these harmless creatures form a mass, and there emerges a raging monster; and each individual is only one tiny cell in the monster's body, so that for better or worse he must accompany it on its bloody rampages and even assist it to the utmost. Having a dark suspicion of these grim possibilities, man turns a blind eye to the shadow-side of human nature.
~Jung~ Two Essays on the Collective Unconscious




To make light visible God had only to postulate shadow. To manifest the truth He permitted the possibility of doubt. The shadow bodies forth the light, and the possibility of error is essential for the temporal manifestation of truth. If the buckler of Satan did not intercept the spear of Michael, the might of the angel would be lost in the void or manifested by infinite destruction launched below from above. Did not the heel of Michael restrain Satan in his ascent, Satan would dethrone God, or rather he would lose himself in the abysses of the altitude. Hence Satan is needful to Michael as the pedestal to the statue, and Michael is necessary to Satan as the brake to the locomotive.
~Levi~ Transcendental Magic



What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
~T. S. Eliot~ The Waste Land



In the Swiss soul, as all human souls, there are regions we do not know about...
~C. G. Jung~



"Human history in all ages is red with blood, and bitter with hate, and stained with cruelties ..."

"... death was sweet, death was gentle, death was kind; death healed the bruised spirit and the broken heart, and gave them rest and forgetfulness; death was man's best friend; when man could endure life no longer, death came and set him free."
~Mark Twain, Letters From the Earth~

my dog has been dead exactly a year. i miss him ... terribly.

enigmatic? the human psyche

[~inspired by an email i wrote recently to a dear friend, currently suffering @ the hands of that dark shadows that crosses spirits - depression~]

... about the beast within ...

each of us resides in special, certain part of ourselves ... some of us live in our heads ... some, live in our guts ... and so, those of us that have this beast .... share that space with said beast. as for 'subtle genetic make-up that adversely affects behaviour/personality ...' i do think that we - i.e. our current human society/species - have little or no understanding of the human psyche ... society speaks of psychiatric imbalance as purely a physiologic phenomenon. i, however, (having had lifelong exposure to said psychiatric imbalance) choose to see it less definitively. i see it also as a spiritual phenomenon ... those of us frail of psyche, prone to channelling the despairs that surround us, etc ... i think we have special sensing capabilities that other humans do not yet recognize ... call me crazy if you like ... but i cannot view any psychiatric illness entirely devoid of considering one's spirit ... one's soul.

i believe environmental manipulation - i.e. engaging in some spiritual ritual (in the case of johnny cash, this would mean appealing to his god in prayer, etc etc) - has proven helpful for some. and perhaps this reinforces my view of psychiatric imbalance as having partially spiritual origins. ... can the spirit/soul and the channels that it finds itself 'surfing' - can such activity manifest itself in brain chemistry activity? no doubt - i believe that's how our primitive medical community attempts to understand the psyche.

i see illicit drug use as intimately intertwined with this phenomenon - as in so many, many humans see and feel the need to self medicate. everyone does, somehow - through pursuit of power ... trifling, shiny and completely unnecessary material goods ... speed ... or just plain old trying to get as 'high' (i.e. 'stoned') as possible - comfortably numb, as the band Pink Floyd called it. we all have heard of that movie The Matrix. i believe its a wonderful, gothic-ly surreal (in a modern way) metaphoric interpretation of humanity and perception. in particular the choice Neo must make to take the blue pill or the red pill. does this not constitute the choice one's spirit makes regarding perception of one's world? one's truth?

... about the concept we call masochism ....
and ... that nebulous concept called 'balance,' or sanity ...

i wonder about myself sometimes. in a subtle way, though. like ... in the times when the shadow of darkness falls upon my spirit ... the feeling of despair reminds me i feel anything at all. and sometimes the purging sensation that courses through my very wise blood feels oh-so-much sweeter than does that often numbing sensation of 'happiness.' does that constitute masochism? or ... could one man's sorrow become another man's joy? and who decides ....? how can anyone determine whether any of us have psychiatric balance ...? considering our Selves all reside @ different calibration points (and in different parts of our own biologic microcosm) - what makes one one individual, with several years of university, qualified to judge something so raw ... so mystical ... so enigmatic? just thinking out loud, here.

martin has old, old scars along his arms from his youth/early adulthood - when he used to press the glowing tip of the cigarette against his skin ... just to feel something. masochistic, perhaps? to appeal to physical pain in order to dull that gnawing, aching, searing wound that makes one's spirit throb? i have had analogous experiences ... albeit with food/appetite ... in times of deepest depression ... it strangely, sickly lifts my spirit ... to feel the physical sensation of hunger. it gives my Self a physical focus ... draws it away from that which lies inside. does this constitute masochism? who's to judge?

i have felt like this for days ...

pssst - if you're one of those carebears
that only wants to live in the 'feel good' moments -
then your post is two posts back - sea otters holding hands.

enter this post @ your own risk.

alone. alone. alone.
melting into the darkness.
GONE. GONE. GONE.
we have all GONE.
well ... no matter.
i have GONE. but, still -
i'm here. besides,
stuffed animals make
far better companions anyhow.
and so do street people -
even though they're only nice
because they want something.
... at least they're honest!
that's more than i can say for others.
human beings -
they're highly overrated anyhow.
they simply lie and patronize
far too much for my liking.
morality and rationality -
they're just costumes we wear.
ultimately everyone acts
in their own self interest.
g-d is a tool of our trade -
self-service.
only the very weakest seem so very strong.
no one will close his eyes for you.
no one will close his heart for you.
no one will open his heart for you.
no one will save his heart for you.
no one will protect and defend you.
no one will pick you up when you fall,
but many will trample you, without a second thought
no one will ever open a door for you
but many will want to slam it -
and catch your heart in the doorjamb
there are no lovers, or friends, or partners
community exists only in one's dreams
promises mean little more than
the dust from which we emerged.
happiness - the exception, not the rule.
pain - the currency of life.
go lightly from this ledge
leave @ your own chosen speed.
nothing in here moves -
everything - just made of stone.
festering madness will eat me alive,
reduce me to a few meaningless shards of glass
sharp - jagged - shattered.
melting into nothingness
a beam of light --
swallowed into a cell of darkness.

i give up today. i feel sorrow-filled.
disconnected. i want to disengage.
from everything.
i cannot. i will not.
but -- i dearly, dearly WANT to.
that makes me weak, i suppose.
or --
perhaps too honest for the living?

if you want feel good, see previous post

otherwise ... take a look. take a good look. its real. its not a political statement -- just ... the best thing i could find to express what i feel like inside.

despair

why, oh why, does it seem so hard to tell the difference between the despair that's placed before us to tell us to change course and the despair that's an inevitable part of transition?
there's a saying that tells us 'things seem darkest before the dawn.' in fact, its cliche to say so. so ... ? why don't we ever get it?

why do we find it such a challenge to know? to know, the difference.
time and time again, when i face my old friend despair,
i fear i do not know him. after all these years, i still don't know.

other questions i have ...

why do people say such horrid things to each other over the phone?
do we get an emotional hard-on when we hang up in someone's ear?
why do humans inflict suffering upon each other? what's so fucking entertaining about it?

why is each one of us our own worse enemy? why?
what's wrong with having an addiction? really, i'm asking.
i mean, do you still villify a junky, even if s/he is a functioning junky?
why should i give up my addiction just to make society feel better?
society does not give up its addiction to greed and power and stuff to make me feel better.
so ... ? what gives?
it seems to me like some fucking control thing.
what are we, living in a fucking borg cube, or somethin?

breathe. can we?

[also posted in wakeupcall] deny. demonize. deny some more. then kick sand in everyone's face if they express opinions that differ from yours. have we, here in this north american society, grown this small? really? i despair. it feels like we have. where, oh where, have our hearts and minds gone? where has constructive outrage gone? where has compassion gone? oh ... sometimes i feel like its all too much. far too much.

did we think the threat of mcarthy-ism dead? think again. maybe not. did we think solving the middle east difficulties would really be that easy? did we bother to inform ourselves of the history of the conflict? did we already forget about lawrence of arabia? did we already forget that 54,000 canadian, 400,000 american, and 25 million in total, soliders died in WW2 - a war that spanned 6 years? the world effectively lost an entire generation of men. do we have a fucking clue? about history? about things that happen on the other sides of the oceans?

do we really think its ok to send adolescents, who have questionably yet to reach the age of consent, into a environment filled with manipulative, power-addicted narcisstists (read:politicians)? OMG. what the fuck makes us soooooo blind and naive? really, its all too much. i wonder if its occuring to anyone out there that sexual deviance and sexual repression goes hand-in-hand. or if we are all just going to put another pair of blinders on and get on the 'indignant outrage' soapbox.

it saddens me a great deal that people out there still think the collective WE bears no responsibility for all the world's suffering. absolutely saddens me. that they honestly believe, because they did not pull the trigger, wield the torture device, or hold down that 15 year old girl so 14 others could rape her, this grants absolution and frees them from accountability. why? why, if another human, somewhere - anywhere - out there, suffers would ANY one think they have no responsibility to contribute toward efforts to relieve said suffering?

and why have we attached some sort of twisted ideological entitlement to the relief of suffering?

and what the fuck is up with this culture of retribution and revenge?

breathe. can we?

image originally uploaded by wimdejonge.