SOUTHERN UTAH ROCKS [and] SHIFTING THE PARADIGM

SOUTHERN UTAH ROCKS

Greetings from sunbaked San Diego, CA where only 9 cm of rain have fallen since 1 January (the average is about 2.5 times that). But an El Nino wind/sea surface temperature event is currently taking shape in the Pacific, which should help California have a more robust upcoming winter rainy season.

Your lead A.P.R. editor is visiting his brother Greg (who is an avid surfer), and sister Mischelle, and soaking in the sights/activities of the area. One thing I've long wanted to do, is tour southern Utah more in-depth, than I have in the past. This was a good opportunity. So, the morning after my arrival here on 9/22, Mischelle, her partner Lisa, and I set out in our little rented car.

First stop was Las Vegas, for two nights. Mischelle and Lisa both love it there. I find it compelling, for different reasons, as an epitome of what our current financial/economic system represents, and an excellent metaphor showing how unsustainable it is. Las Vegas receives only about 10 cm of rainfall a year, yet has a population of 1.5 million, with green lawns, golf courses, and swimming pools evaporating water into the desiccating desert air. Water comes not just from the Colorado River (the entire output of which is allocated to the states it flows through, leaving nothing but a salty trickle for Mexico!), but other smaller waterways in Nevada. Which are also fully used up. Then there is the incredible power load for all the casinos, the lights, machines, etc.. Which uses the bulk of the electricity from Hoover Dam, which will silt up and become useless in 20-30 years, because of the extreme evaporation from Lake Mead (this is not factoring in any drought effects).

So, I think of these things alot when I'm there, but still try to have some fun! And, I did win 500.00 on a keno machine my second evening there at Sam's Town, one of the older casinos, north of "the strip" (which necessitated a trip to REI the next day, to make sure I'd have something to show for it). And a couple hundred the last day on the slots in different places.

We had two objectives for this trip, to spend the bulk of our time visiting Bryce Canyon N.P., then drive back through Zion N.P. An anomalously strong high pressure ridge (imagine that?) was over the western states, and so the weather was perfectly sunny and very warm during our entire trip. The drive from Cedar City, east up through the Cedar Breaks country was very beautiful, the aspens were in full fall yellow/red colours from about 2000 metres elevation up. Unfortunately, in the ten years since I had last been through here, half the high-elevation stands of lodgepole pine and white fir were dead from bug kill and diseases, caused by the warmer winters now, which allow more pests to over-winter. Making for some bleak scenes at times.

This route, Utah state highway 14, east from Cedar City, is highly recommended, for those of you who haven't driven that way. Of course, you won't find it on this old map of the region, but we here at A.P.R. happen to like it, so included it, to serve as a reference. It pre-dates the designation of Bryce and Zion N.P.'s as well, so you'll have to poke around a bit on it.

Lisa reserved us a nice "wet" cabin in Kodachrome Basin state park for three nights, which is about 40 km east and south of Bryce. Not having heard much about this area, I was not sure what to expect.
This is a view of the Basin. Amazing orange/red rocks, with interesting "sand pipe" formations in different shapes and sizes.

There were about 25 km of trails in it in different places, and the lighting at different times of the day made for beautiful views and photo-ops. We all hiked around quite a bit, and I did a few short 10K runs, once in the evening, and again on our last morning there.

One of my favourite rock formations was just down the road from our cabin, a sand-pipe (thought to be composed of sand from an ancient stream bed), next to the orange rocks, which had a strange horizontal groove in them. This picture, taken in the evening, shows how the lighting really accentuates the colours here. I liked having the moon in close proximity as well.

Kodachrome Basin is lower than Bryce, only around 1800 m, so it was quite warm, up to 30C by day, and only dropping to about 10C at night. It is cold enough here in winter for snow and frost, but not cold enough to limit nasty insects. Our second evening there I discovered a 12cm diameter spider with a tan/black body in the shower. Argh! I slipped a paper coffee cup over it, then slid a coffee bag envelope over the cup, and ran it out the door, fast! Just as I took off the covering envelope, it raced up the cup toward my hand. I yelped and dropped that sucker fast! It fell under the floor-boards of the front porch. We are not too crazy about spiders...

Both of our of two days in Bryce NP dawned hot and sunny. What makes Bryce so noteworthy are the tan/pink/orange sandstone eroding rock formations on the east side of a high plateau, which is at an elevation of 2300-2800 metres. The dropoffs on this amazing east-side are around 200-700 metres. You can see these interesting colours from near the start of our hike on the first day, the Queen's Canyon and Navajo Loop trails.

The fall colours from the aspen (and vine maples, where there are denser coniferous stands of white fir, ponderosa pine, and douglas fir) combined with those from the rocks were fantastic.

On our 9 km hike the first day on the Queen's Canyon and Navajo Loop trails, here are some of the interesting sights. Not bad for such a short excursion!

Dropping down into a slot canyon pretty quickly on this hike, the orange rocks combined with the deep blue high-elevation sky were stunning.

I really liked these Douglas Fir (Pinaceae Tseudotsuga Menziesii) trees in the narrow slot. This one was almost 30 metres tall and and had a one metre diameter trunk at breast height.

The bright orange colours even made me look like that. The warm and dry conditions, combined with the high altitude, made me have to carry lots of water and fuel. Even on this short hike, I must have drank two litres of water.

At the tail end of the hike, at the top of the rim near Sunrise Point (at an elevation of 2700m), was this interesting bristlecone pine. I named it the Walking Tree. Erosion has been steady, but slow enough, for the tree to keep pace with it by extending its roots. Interesting. The late afternoon colours were of course amazing here. There are about 15 km of trails above the rim that are groomed for skiing in winter. What a beautiful place to get some nordic skiing in, something we'd love to do there.

I had wanted to do a full 48km fast-pack of the Under The Rim Trail from Rainbow Point north to Bryce Point, then the Rim Trail to the visitors center. But that saturday night it was so hot in our cabin, none of us slept well, and instead of getting up at 0630, so I could be on the trail by 0900, we slept in until 0930. So, I decided just to do the first half. Starting at Rainbow Point, the southern terminus of the park road and trailhead for the 38 km Under the Rim Trail. I got to the Rainbow Point trailhead at 1330, and ran the first 10 km downhill, from 2780m to 2260m. I was able to keep a good pace on the downs and levels, but any upslope, and I had to walk, with that altitude. It felt like 30C, even that high, with strong sun, so used alot of water and fuel, more than double than I would at home in the lowlands of interior Alaska. By the time I finished my 23K, 3 hours later, I had gone through 4 liters of water, 3 energy gels, and a lunch. Since there was no water available on the trail, it would have been difficult to carry twice that much for the full 48K. My pack on this outing was just about 8 kg.

The Under The Rim trail drops down from the high plateau, to the base of the rim, which all the multi-coloured rock formations jut up from. This it follows, in up and down sections through three drainages, to Bryce Point. I cut out though halfway through, to get back to the highway, where Mischelle and Lisa could pick me up. Scenes like this were common though, looking up through the fir and aspen trees to the bright orange rocks toward the top of the rim. I was warned by a ranger the previous day to be careful of the altitude, but I just felt a little more tired than usual, the heat was just as much a factor.

After our three days exploring Bryce Canyon and Kodachrome Basin, we had to drive back to Cedar City, and hop south on I-15 to Vegas, then San Diego. But were able to drive a different way, south on US-89, to Utah 9, which bisects Zion NP.

Zion was even more stunning than Bryce. The rocks are more solid sandstone here, and are almost reminiscent of Yosemite's granite, except with more colour. Which makes for incredible scenery, with sheer vertical rock walls 500-1200 metres high.

The hot, dry weather continued, under the high pressure ridge. Since the highway through Zion descends here to only 1200 metres, it got quite hot, up to 35C! And this is the last day

in September. But the deep blue sky and dry air made the colours of the rocks, that more vibrant.

Unfortunately, we didn't have time to stop and hike any of the many trails there. So, a multi-day exploration here will be necessary some time in the coming years. Preferably in a cooler month.

We got to Vegas in the evening, where we stayed at the Fitzgerald. The largest casino in the old area north of the strip, 34 stories of hotel rooms, with a casino at the bottom. None of us did very well this time. It was even hinted at by one of the workers there, that the casinos aren't paying out as well as they used to, because fewer people are coming in, due to the poor economy and higher unemployment.

SHIFTING THE PARADIGM

From Wikipedia...

"Another use of the word paradigm is in the sense of Weltanschauung (German for world view). For example, in social science, the term is used to describe the set of experiences, beliefs and values that affect the way an individual perceives reality and responds to that perception. Social scientists have adopted the Kuhnian phrase "paradigm shift" to denote a change in how a given society goes about organizing and understanding reality. A “dominant paradigm” refers to the values, or system of thought, in a society that are most standard and widely held at a given time. Dominant paradigms are shaped both by the community’s cultural background and by the context of the historical moment. The following are conditions that facilitate a system of thought to become an accepted dominant paradigm:

Professional organizations that give legitimacy to the paradigm

Dynamic leaders who introduce and purport the paradigm

Journals and editors who write about the system of thought. They both disseminate the information essential to the paradigm and give the paradigm legitimacy

Government agencies who give credence to the paradigm

Educators who propagate the paradigm’s ideas by teaching it to students

Conferences conducted that are devoted to discussing ideas central to the paradigm

Media coverage

Lay groups, or groups based around the concerns of lay persons, that embrace the beliefs central to the paradigm

Sources of funding to further research on the paradigm"

For all of modern U.S. history, and especially since the 1980s, when a concerted effort seems to have been undertaken by the "power elite" and corporate media to reinforce this, the dominant paradigm of our culture has been that the "free market", or unregulated capitalism, would see to all of our needs. That although capitalism is based on greed, market forces would weed out the "bad apples" and the general population would benefit greatly from commerce unfettered by government regulations. And, the last four U.S. administrations (and seemingly now, the fifth) have driven policy by this paradigm.

What has it gotten us? Well, just since 2001, two immoral, illegal, and un-necessary wars, leading to the deaths of at least 1.2 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan (with millions more homeless and unemployed). A semi-depression economically, with true jobless rates approaching 25 percent, brought on by the near-demise of many of the largest financial institutions in the U.S. Who through their greed and short-sightedness, and abetted by the deregulation of the financial industry over the past 25 years, bankrupted themselves through greedy and short-sighted decisions, and keep begging the government for more aid, since they are "too big to fail". Not to mention the thousands of corporate lobbyists in Washington D.C. working on behalf of the defense, fossil fuel, financial, and insurance industries, who are intent on keeping the system unchanged. As well, increasing atmospheric CO2 and methane concentrations from our fossil-fuel based way of life are continually increasing, with no real end in sight. Which will unleash global climatic catastrophe unless concerted action is taken within 10-20 years, at most.

With all these problems as a result of the "dominant paradigm", isn't it time for something new and different?

http://www.commondreams.org/further/2009/10/02

I urge you all to look at this link, and see Michael Moore's new movie, when you can. He puts everything we just discussed in great perspective, and in a very convincing, yet entertaining way.

I came across this article last week.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/09/30-14

I thought it was an excellent summary of where we are at, concerning the Obama administration, and very disheartening. We knew Mr. Obama, from his senatorial record, was not going to effect much change, on his own, and warned you in several previous posts. Yet, it still is discouraging, to see this borne out.

I'd like to present you with the best part of this article:

"And given the global financial meltdown that has hit working people so hard, can anyone really say that those who critique the entire capitalist system don't have a point?

Rather than being a mere "abstraction," as Obama claimed, capitalism is an economic system that functions on a set of rules that we created, which inevitably leads to massive inequalities between the haves and have-nots and the easily avoidable deaths of millions around the world every year who simply cannot afford basic medical care or food. It rewards greed and is based on a belief that continual, limitless economic growth is not only possible, but necessary.

The planet's atmosphere and natural resources, however, are finite and being quickly exhausted by the developed world's gluttonous consumption.

In his new book, All My Bones Shake, Robert Jensen succinctly sums up our predicament: "Capitalism is fundamentally inhuman, antidemocratic and unsustainable. Capitalism has given those of us in the First World lots of stuff (though much of it of questionable value) in exchange for our souls, for our hope for progressive politics, and for the possibility of a decent future for children. Either we change or we die -- spiritually, politically, literally."

Obama's dismissal of mass nonviolent action was disingenuous for other reasons as well. Behind his desk in his Senate office, Obama prominently displayed pictures of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

In an interview last year, he explained that the portraits were there "to remind me that real results will not just come from Washington, they will come from the people." And only weeks before the G-20, during his "controversial" address to school children, the president brought up Gandhi, calling him "a real hero of mine."

Could anyone possibly argue with a straight face that King, who was killed while planning the Poor People's Campaign, would not be on the streets with those calling for economic justice? Would Gandhi not oppose the diversion of $700 billion this year from meeting people's basic needs to fund the Pentagon and the military occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan?

The interview with Obama also revealed a growing chasm between his approach to social movements and that of Franklin D. Roosevelt, to whom he is widely compared.

After listening to the concerns of the legendary labor organizer and civil rights leader A. Philip Randolph during a meeting, as the famous and perhaps apocryphal story goes, FDR replied: "I agree with everything that you've said, including my capacity to be able to right many of these wrongs and to use my power and the bully pulpit ... But I would ask one thing of you, Mr. Randolph, and that is go out and make me do it."

During his presidential campaign, Obama even used this story. He told his supporters that he was just one person who could not make the changes they wanted to see by himself. Obama's final message was clear: "Make me do it."

Now that Obama is in the White House, however, he is singing a different tune. Rather than encouraging grassroots protest to help push the public debate and further a progressive legislative agenda as Roosevelt did, Obama is unfortunately publicly trying to quash pressure from the left.

As a counter to the recent mobilization of right-wing tea-baggers, it would seem that now is as good a time as ever for the president to embrace the protesters who are championing at least some of the causes that he once claimed to believe in.

Instead, Obama disgracefully sent in the militarized police -- with the National Guard on the ready -- to silence their dissent."

This sums things up nicely. It really is time for a "Paradigm Shift", because the future of the planet, and the human race, is at stake. Instead of a system based on greed, how about one based on empathy and concern for one's fellow man/woman?

What would such a system be like? Very much like what the Green Party espouses. A governmental system with tightly regulated capitalism, universal health care, education, gainful employment and housing as human rights, and vastly reduced military expenditures, combined with an end to all overseas military operations.

The closest analogues to this can be found in the social democracies of Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Western Europe (and Japan to a certain extent). If more people in this country could visit these countries, especially those who are blue collar and socially conservative, traditionally voting Republican, they would understand how they are being manipulated. And we would become much closer to being able to realize the dream of a more sane and just political and economic system. But since this is impossible, we have to try and educate people about what is possible here, since other countries are providing for their citizens much more effectively than ours. And work in our own lives, to promote peace, tolerance, and justice. Then change can really occur. Cheers.

ENTERING THE CIRCLE - Shamanic Thoughts [and] WE'RE SCREWED!

Your lead editor has been interested in "paranormal" issues for as long as I can remember, since childhood. I've read hundreds of books about psychics, unexplained occurrences, and "new-age" themed books for self-help and spiritual seeking.

So it was only natural, that when I came across this very interesting and thought-provoking book, Entering the Circle, in 1997, when I lived in Missoula, MT, that an interest in shamanism would develop.

http://www.amazon.com/Entering-Circle-Siberian-Discovered-Psychiatrist/dp/0062514172/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1253559225&sr=1-1

This book is a fascinating story of a psychiatrist in the Soviet Union in the 1980s, in Novosibirsk, Siberia, and her experiences, as she treated an indigenous Siberian man for psychological issues. And how she ended up learning from his culture (which is similar to indigenous cultures in the Americas), and came to incorporate some of their principles into her discipline.

Lately, it has become increasingly apparent that the prevailing "western" technological culture we are immersed in, with Capitalism as it's economic mode, is fouling our nest and will lead to catastrophic events due to global warming/rising sea levels and eco-systems collapse if left unchecked. Because, like cancer, being based on unlimited growth and expansion, it will kill the host. Clearly, a spiritual paradigm shift is needed globally if there is to be a future for humanity in any large sense, on this planet.

This is where Shamanism becomes important. Because of it's focus on holistic spiritual discipline and respect for all living things as part of a larger whole. Incorporating these views into the prevailing culture(s) of our planet will help us solve the looming problems facing us. So, I thought I would share this article with you, from a man who has been at the forefront of Shamanic teaching and cultural practice, for over 45 years.
http://www.shamanism.org/articles/article01.html

Shamanic Healing: We Are Not Alone

An Interview of Michael Harner by Bonnie Horrigan © Shamanism, Spring/Summer 1997, Vol. 10, No. 1

Michael Harner, Ph.D., is an anthropologist and founder of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies, an international nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving shamanic knowledge as it survives on the planet and to teaching the basic principles of that knowledge for practical applications in the contemporary world.

Harner, who has practiced shamanic healing since 1961, received his doctorate at the University of California-Berkeley. He is a former professor and chairperson of the department of anthropology at the Graduate Faculty of the New School for Social Research in New York, and has taught at Columbia, Yale, and UC Berkeley. He also served as co-chair of the anthropology section of the New York Academy of Sciences. His books include The Jívaro, Hallucinogens and Shamanism, and the classic The Way of The Shaman.

In the course of his academic study of shamanism, Harner lived and worked with indigenous peoples in the Upper Amazon, Mexico, Peru, the Canadian Arctic, Samiland, and western North America.

Alternative Therapies interviewed Harner at his office in Mill Valley, California, during an intense storm. The following article is from the FSS journal, Shamanism, Vol. 10, No. 1 (Spring-Summer) 1997, and was originally published in 1996 in Vol. 2, No. 3 of Alternative Therapies.

What is Shamanism?

Michael Harner: The word "shaman" in the original Tungus language [indigenous Siberian group, eds.] refers to a person who makes journeys to nonordinary reality in an altered state of consciousness. Adopting the term in the West was useful because people didn't know what it meant. Terms like "wizard," "witch," "sorcerer," and "witch doctor" have their own connotations, ambiguities, and preconceptions associated with them. Although the term is from Siberia, the practice of shamanism existed on all inhabited continents.

After years of extensive research, Mircea Eliade, in his book, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy, concluded that shamanism underlays all the other spiritual traditions on the planet, and that the most distinctive feature of shamanism—but by no means the only one—was the journey to other worlds in an altered state of consciousness.

"...in our culture many consider it avant-garde if a person talks about the mind-body connection, but the fact that the brain is connected to the rest of the body is not the most exciting news. It's been known for hundreds and thousands of years. What's really important about shamanism, in my opinion, is that the shaman knows that we are not alone. By that I mean, when one human being compassionately works to relieve the suffering of another, the helping spirits are interested and become involved."

Shamans are often called "see-ers" (seers), or "people who know" in their tribal languages, because they are involved in a system of knowledge based on firsthand experience. Shamanism is not a belief system. It's based on personal experiments conducted to heal, to get information, or do other things. In fact, if shamans don't get results, they will no longer be used by people in their tribe. People ask me, "How do you know if somebody's a shaman?" I say, "It's simple. Do they journey to other worlds? And do they perform miracles?"

Is shamanism a religion?

The practice of shamanism is a method, not a religion. It coexists with established religions in many cultures. In Siberia, you'll find shamanism coexisting with Buddhism and Lamaism, and in Japan with Buddhism. It's true that shamans are often in animistic cultures. Animism means that people believe there are spirits. So in shamanic cultures, where shamans interact with spirits to get results such as healing, it's no surprise that people believe there are spirits. But the shamans don't believe in spirits. Shamans talk with them, interact with them. They no more "believe" there are spirits than they "believe" they have a house to live in, or have a family. This is a very important issue because shamanism is not a system of faith.

Shamanism is also not exclusionary. They don't say, "We have the only healing system." In a holistic approach to healing, the shaman uses the spiritual means at his or her disposal in cooperation with people in the community who have other techniques such as plant healing, massage, and bone setting. The shaman's purpose is to help the patient get well, not to prove that his or her system is the only one that works.

In many cultures, shamans are often given gifts for their work, but they will return all the gifts if the patient dies, which I think is a commendable innovation that might help us with the costs of health services today.

How is an altered state of consciousness achieved in shamanism?

In about 90% of the world, the altered states of consciousness used in shamanism are attained through consciousness-changing techniques involving a monotonous percussion sound, most typically done with a drum, but also with sticks, rattles, and other instruments. In perhaps 10% of the cultures, shamans use psychedelic drugs to change their state of consciousness.

I was introduced to shamanic work in 1961 among the Conibo Indians in eastern Peru, with the aid of native psychedelics. When I came back to the United States and no longer had my supply of ayahuasca, I experimented with drumming. Much to my surprise, it really worked. It should not have surprised me, because drums were reportedly used by shamans almost worldwide. Virtually everything you find in shamanism is done because it works. Over tens of thousands of years, shamans developed the most time-tested system of using the spirit, mind, and heart for healing, along with plant remedies, and so on. Again, the system is time-tested. So if healers in 90% of the shamanic cultures are using the same methods, we pay attention to them. And, of course, we find they work.

To get back to the extraction technique: the technique involves an altered state of consciousness and seeing into the client's body. Much shamanic work, including journeying and extraction, is done in darkness for a very simple reason. The shaman wishes to cut out the stimuli of ordinary reality—light, sound, and so on—and move into unseen reality. The shaman learns to look in the body with "x-ray vision" and see the illness and its location, and then to extract that illness.

Is that like depossession?

Depossession is related to extraction but it's not the same thing. From a shamanic point of view, it's very important to get out of the Middle World when journeying for spiritual purposes. In the old days, shamans journeyed in the Middle World to see how relatives were doing at a distant place or to locate the herds of migratory animals. But most of our work today is in the Upper and Lower Worlds where shamans have voyaged since ancient times. Shamans often prefer not to draw on the spirits of the Middle World because many of them are confused and lacking in power. Going to the Upper or Lower Worlds, one reaches spiritual beings of compassion, power, and wisdom.

Shamans who do another type of healing help the dead as well as the living. These shamans are called "psychopomps," or conductors of souls. Remember, from a shamanic point of view, when you're comatose, you're dead. So the shaman, in the case of comatose persons, would seek them out and see if they wanted to come back. Shamanism is not a system that intends to keep people in this ordinary reality whether they like it or not, because the shaman knows that this is not necessarily the best reality. You make the journey for the person who is comatose to find out what they want. If they want to come back, then the job of the shaman is to bring them back. But if they want to go on—or, more commonly, if they're dying or already dead—then the job of the shaman is to get them to a place where they will be content and not have them stay here, adrift in the Middle World.

So now we come back to this business of depossession. Most cases of depossession of humans are by other humans who are dead, who are here in the Middle World and don't know they're dead. If people are disempowered, or have soul loss or power loss, they are like a vacuum into which these confused entities can come. This is involuntary possession.

Shamans will conduct the entity—with its permission once it realizes it's dead—to a place beyond the Middle World where it will be reunited with people who it loves. Once this is done, so that the clients are no longer possessed, shamans restore their full soul and lost power connections so they are again whole and not vulnerable to further possessions.

Depossession work has slightly different forms in different cultures, but the basic principles are the same. I hope that one day our culture will recognize the need to permit shamanic practitioners to work with the spiritual aspects of illness in cooperation with nonspiritual health professionals.

In your opinion, why don't we do that now?

Unfortunately, when science started, partially as a reaction to the church in Europe, it ordained that souls and spirits have no reality and therefore could not be considered in scientific theory. Now that's an a priori position; in other words, ironically, a statement of faith enunciated in the 18th century. In fact, science has never disproved the existence of spirits. I would submit that now, on the edge of the 21st century, it's time to stop having a science that's based on faith (the faith that there are no spirits) and make it real science, which means that it doesn't ordain a priori that certain types of causes cannot exist.

In regard to extraction healing, in the shamanic view, where does the illness to be extracted come from?

From a shamanic point of view, all people have a spiritual side, whether they recognize it or not. When people get angry, jealous, or have a hostile emotional attitude, they can vent not only verbal and physical abuse, but spiritual abuse without even knowing it. In other words, if somebody is ignorant of shamanic principles, they can do damage to other people on a spiritual level.

Among the Untsuri Shuar and Jívaro people of eastern Ecuador, with whom I lived for quite a while, they call these intrusions "magical darts." There were many feuds and wars, and sometimes healers would get angry and lose their discipline and use their powers to get even. But it is important to know that this is a big mistake, not just ethically, but in terms of self-preservation. No matter how justified a person feels emotionally at the time, those spiritual beings who are representative of the great, loving, hidden universe will disconnect. It's like we're rechargeable bat

teries. We still have some power, and we can do damage, but the power source is no longer charging us. I've seen this many times in the Amazon. The shamans, in their anger, do harm for awhile, but eventually everything they send out comes back in on them, and it often results not only in their own death or pain, but their immediate family gets affected disastrously by it.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't get angry at people. It just means that you should have discipline and know there are parameters. You can get angry with somebody and verbally let out steam and, at the same time, control your spiritual side. But for your own self-preservation, if you don't work to relieve pain and suffering—and especially if you work in a contrary way—you're soon out of business, and probably dead.

If I understand the concept, shamans restore wholeness and power to a human being, and then that wholeness and power heals whatever is wrong with

that person. So in this framework a power-filled person has the ability to heal himself.

To an outsider, it would look like they're healing themselves. But the concept of self-healing excludes the spirits. From the shamanic point of view, nobody's lived into adult life without spiritual help, whether they know it or not. The self-healing concept is a secular concept, and that's fine as far as it goes. It teaches people to take some responsibility for their illness. But it also teaches them to take responsibility for their death. With that approach, everybody's a failure at the moment of death, because they are responsible for the whole thing. From a shamanic point of view we are not that important. We are not necessarily the biggest thing in the universe. The shaman has a more humble point of view, that there is what looks like self-healing but, in fact, we are getting help. And the shaman has the role, of course, of accelerating that possibility.

So the person is not healing himself?

They might be in a specific case. I don't want to rule that out. Self-healing is a very secular view of reality, but it's a step in consciousness. It's like recognizing the brain is connected to the body.
Can you talk about the difference between ordinary reality and nonordinary reality, especially regarding the implications for medicine?

The terms "ordinary reality" and "nonordinary reality" come from Carlos Casteneda. Ordinary reality is the reality that we all perceive together. It's the reality in which we can all agree that there is a clock on the wall. Nonordinary reality is the reality that is associated with the shamanic state of consciousness; that is, when the consciousness has been altered and you're able to see what you normally don't see in an ordinary state of consciousness.

Ordinary reality is something that virtually everybody agrees on. Nonordinary reality is very person-specific. The information obtained in nonordinary reality is tailor-made to the individual—other people may not perceive it at all, as opposed to the information obtained in ordinary reality, in which everybody gets the same thing.

Nonordinary reality is also an empirical reality; that is, the person interacts with it, sees it, touches it, hears it, feels it. And the shaman sees with the heart in that reality. In nonordinary reality, for something to be the same for different persons, it has to be the same in the heart. Here (in ordinary reality) for something to be the same it doesn't matter what your emotion is; you'll see it, for example, as a door in the room. If I showed you a picture of my mother, now deceased, you and I would not have the same emotional relationship with that picture. But if I said the word "mother," and everyone saw their own mother, the emotional feeling in the heart would be closer—not identical, but closer. So to see things exactly the same in the heart, they have to be a little different for each person, because each person has a different personality and a different life history.

The term "nonordinary reality" is useful because it permits one to be reminded that access to these worlds is related to the degree to which you have entered the shamanic state of consciousness. It clarifies our thinking. For years, many people were confused by what shamans said. "I made a journey and was away for 3 years, and such and such happened." Now that person in nonordinary reality had the experience of living somewhere else for 3 years, but might have been gone only a half-hour in ordinary reality.

What about divination?

Work in shamanism also involves divination. A person can journey for themselves or have somebody who's a shamanic practitioner journey for them to get an answer to a question. What's really interesting is when somebody who's a complete stranger—about whom the shaman knows nothing—asks for an answer to a question, and the shaman then journeys or uses other techniques and gets the exact information that's valid for that person's life. This can happen because these things are known by the spirits. The shaman doesn't need to know anything except the methods, and to have his or her own spirit helpers.

How can doctors and nurses use this knowledge?

Sometimes I informally call our foundation the "University of Shamanism." I bring that up because our primary purpose is to return shamanism to the planet by training people. Many of these people are doctors and other health professionals. It is they who must discover how to integrate what they are taught into their practices. We don't have a ready template for that. Within the next few years, we hope to have a large-scale conference of health practitioners who have studied with us, to exchange information about how they have used these methods in their practice.

I know the Foundation is conducting research regarding drumming and health. Can you talk about that?

Our research, thanks to a Canadian foundation, is investigating certain matters regarding shamanic journeying and drumming and health. My wife, Dr. Sandra Harner, is the director of the Shamanism and Health Project. Her research involves two major aspects, one of which is the effect of shamanic journeying and drumming on one measure of immune response and on emotions.

In connection with this work, she has gotten some hints that people with certain profiles of psychological descriptors respond much more effectively in terms of the immune response than others. This is a subject, obviously, of considerable interest. She has also found that there is a tremendous increase in the sense of well being as well as decreased mood disturbance and stress in people working with shamanic drumming and journeying. But to say more would be premature.

It's ironic that a system of healing that—other than using plants—is the oldest known system of healing in the world, should have no research going on in it at all, other than what we are able to do with our meager resources. I look forward to the day when the possibility of spiritual causality is not ruled out of research, so that science, in fact, can be completely scientific.
We also have what the medical profession would call "anecdotal" accounts. People often come to the shamans when everybody else has failed. We have cases in which, once people start getting shamanic treatments and laboratory tests are continued, the tests turn out negative, whereas they previously were positive. The assumption from the medical profession is usually that the previous diagnoses were incorrect, because there's been a reversal. That's fine with us. After all, it's virtually impossible, on a case-by-case basis, to prove causality. People wonder, How do you know this works? Well, you just practice it for your life and it develops a track record for you.

What are you working on now?

My primary interest right now is in miracles. I've devoted some years now to finding out what principles are involved to have miracles happen. I think we're making significant progress. Almost everything that anybody's ever read about in the shamanic literature or the miracle literature is something that we have some knowledge of how to do now. And this includes miracles of healing.

Starting next year, we will be moving forward on this project with some of our most advanced students. I'm not in a position to comfortably start sharing this information publicly—it's too early—but it does involve a real awareness of the spirits.

I might say something about spirits, because it's a strange word to people. What is a spirit? In 1961, when I was with the Conibo Indians in eastern Peru in the Amazon, I was training using ayahuasca with a shaman, and we were working with the various nature spirits every night. I worked with the anaconda spirit, the black panther spirit, the fresh-water dolphin spirit, various tree spirits, and so on. They would come, we would see them, and so on. Then one night I got introduced to the outboard-motor spirit. And then the radio spirit and the airplane spirit. I came to realize that anything that you see in complete darkness or with your eyes closed is technically a spirit. That makes it sound like it's just an image in the air, but shamans find out which spirits have power and which don't. They discover what spirits can help in what ways. It's very important to recognize that whatever you contact in nonordinary reality is technically a spirit. It's a spiritual reality.

Once a shaman contacts the spirits, what happens?

There's a crossover of the power from nonordinary reality to ordinary reality. The two realities are conceptually discrete, but the shaman is able to move the power of one over to the other. When this is done successfully, that's how healings occur and how we have what is called miracles.

Your interest in miracles was obviously spurred by your experiencing or witnessing miracles. Would you be willing to tell us a miracle story?

This is a very simple one that can be seen to this day, empirically, in ordinary reality. One of our students, Carol Herkimer, was in what we call a "spirit boat," along with other members of a basic class. The spirit boat is a technique used in aboriginal Australia, on the northwest coast of North America, and in the upper Amazon. A group of shamans journey together to the Lower or Upper world to go outside of time. They may be going for healing or knowledge. When a whole group of people, trained properly and in contact with spirits, journey together to help one person, it's very powerful.

We were using a dance studio in lower Manhattan on Canal Street called "The Kiva." Like any other dance studio, it had highly polished floors, so

we always had to be careful not to scuff them. Carol was recovering from a terrible traffic accident and she couldn't sit on the cushions on the floor with the other people. She had to sit in a chair with bent tubular metal legs. So we went off on the journey, and when we came back (to ordinary reality), people shared what they had encountered. When Carol went on the journey, she went through a sea of fire in nonordinary reality. When she came back, the floor was smoking under her chair, and the bent aluminum tubular leg on one side had burned a channel into the floor, but she hadn't gotten burned. The people who owned the studio were quite upset, and to this day the burned channel is still there.
This example alone doesn't prove anything, but it's these kinds of coincidences that build up in your own practice. In no single case can you be sure what actually happened, but if you find a high correlation between treatments by people who are well known as healing shamans and recoveries—when other things have failed—then you begin to pay attention.

When you start shamanic journeying, if you're the kind of person the spirits feel compassion for and want to help, you're going to get lots of teachings you never asked for and never expected. Because once you go through those doors—whatever those doors are—the spirits will teach you according to your preparation, and your life will change. Even one journey may start changing your life.

In my daily life, I have incorporated some basic shamanic principles over the past few years very effectively. I have a collection of music of drumming, didgeridoo, and other "native" or "indigenous" percussion sounds. I listen to these cd's when I am working as a meteorologist on evening or night shifts, and I feel that they do alter my consciousness just slightly. To a point where I am able to access my "intuition" or "higher self" more effectively. I also do this while driving long distances, and while still alert to the conditions of the road, will shift slightly into a very peaceful, and insightful state of being. I plan on, in the coming years, taking Shamanic courses and traveling to workshops, to more fully acquire knowledge and skills which I can use for the benefit of those around me, and myself.

WE'RE SCREWED!

http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2009/09/21-0

I came across this cool article yesterday, and couldn't help but share it with you. I love it when people creatively take matters into their own hands to spread knowledge and subvert the dominant paradigm!

'We're Screwed': Media Heist Blankets City With 'Special Edition' New York Post
Tabloid Tells Truth About Climate Change and How It Will Affect City, World

NEW YORK - September 21 - Early this morning, nearly a million New Yorkers were stunned by the appearance of a "special edition" New York Post blaring headlines that their city could face deadly heat waves, extreme flooding, and other lethal effects of global warming within the next few decades. The most alarming thing about it: the news came from an official City report. Distributed by over 2000 volunteers throughout New York City, the paper has been created by The Yes Men and a coalition of activists as a wake-up call to action on climate change.

It appears one day before a UN summit where Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon will push 100 world leaders to make serious commitments to reduce carbon emissions in the lead-up to the Copenhagen climate conference in December. Ban has said that the world has "less than 10 years to halt (the) global rise in greenhouse gas emissions if we are to avoid catastrophic consequences for people and the planet," adding that Copenhagen is a "once-in-a-generation opportunity." Although the 32-page New York Post is a fake, everything in it is 100% true, with all facts carefully checked by a team of editors and climate change experts. "This could be, and should be, a real New York Post," said Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men. "Climate change is the biggest threat civilization has ever faced, and it should be in the headlines of every paper, every day until we solve the problem." The fake Post's cover story ("We're Screwed") reports the frightening conclusions of a blue-ribbon panel of scientists commissioned by the mayor's office to determine the potential effects of climate change on the City. That report was released in February of this year, but received very little press at the time.

Other lead articles describe the Pentagon's alarmed response to global warming ("Clear & Present Disaster"), the U.S. government's sadly minuscule response to the crisis ("Congress Cops Out on Climate"), China's alternative energy program ("ChinaŐs Green Leap Forward Overtakes U.S."), and how if the US doesn't quickly pass a strong climate bill, the crucial Copenhagen climate talks this December could be a "Flopenhagen."

The paper includes original investigative reporting as well. One article ("Carbon counter counts New Yorkers as fools") reveals that Deutsche Bank - which erected a seven-story "carbon counter" in central Manhattan - not only invests heavily in coal-mining companies worldwide, but has recently entered the business of coal trading itself.The paper has the world's gloomiest weather page, covering the next 70 years rather than just 7 days. The "Around the World" section describes the disproportionate effects of climate change on poorer parts of the world, including extreme droughts, floods, famines, water shortages, mass migrations and conflicts. Developing countries will bear the brunt of climate change effects even though they have done very little to cause the problem. But the paper isn't all doom and gloom. An article called "New York Fights Back" notes that the carbon emissions of Big Apple residents are only one third the national average, and that the city is building 1800 miles of bike paths, planting one million trees, and replacing its fleet of police cars with hybrids. There's also a page of black-humor cartoons (in one, Charlie Brown finds Snoopy drowned), a gossip section that takes no prisoners, and a number of truly cheerful ads - for sex ("Awesome. No carbon emissions."), tote bags, bicycles, and tap water ("Literally comes right out of your faucet!").

Another ad promotes civil disobedience, encouraging readers to visit http://BeyondTalk.net and pledge to risk arrest in a planned global action November 30, just before the conference in Copenhagen. "We need strong action on climate change," said David Solnit of Mobilization for Climate Justice West, one of the partners in BeyondTalk.net. "But history shows that leaders act only when people take to the streets to demand it. That's what needs to happen now."This paper is one of 2500 initiatives taking place in more than 130 countries as a response to the "Global Wake-up Call" on climate change. For more information, visit www.tcktcktck.org/wakeup Fake New York Post: http://www.nypost-se.com/Video News Release: http://www.nypost-se.com/videoCity report on climate change: http://www.nyc.gov/html/om/pdf/2009/NPCC_CRI.pdf

Fantastic, yes? Three cheers to the Yes Men and activists who put this together!

The A.P.R. will be on the road over the next three weeks. Visiting family and friends in San Diego, CA, and Jupiter, FL. We'll be sure to stay abreast of the latest events though, and even provide you with some undersea images from our exclusive A.P.R. Dive Cam, as I submerge to 20-30 metres in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. Mattie and Homer will be holding up the fort at the Chena Ridge Research Centre, in my absence. Cheers.

METRIC MANIFESTO! [and] MT. PRINDLE - el otro mundo?

Back when I was in Miss Mannarino's sixth grade class at Whittier Elementary in San Diego in 1975-76, we studied the metric system. Change was coming, the U.S. was going metric by 1980! So we were told. The following year in seventh grade, through all of junior and senior high, and college thereafter, nothing more was mentioned about this. What happened? Take a look at this world map. What is it showing? Those countries in red, including the U.S., are the only ones not officially requiring the use of the metric system in all aspects of living, transportation, weights/measures, weather forecasts, etc...

http://lamar.colostate.edu/~hillger/laws/usmb.html The preceding link gives the history of the aborted U.S. drive to go metric. The Reagan administration cancelled the funding for the U.S. Metric Board in 1982, citing budgetary reasons. So ended the U.S. drive toward metrication. What was the real reason? American exceptionalism, complaints from industry (especially auto-makers)? Probably a mix of both. And in spite of the findings and recommendations of the U.S. Metric Board, which were:

Findings
The present policy of maintaining a dual system of measures for trade and commerce is confusing to all segments of American society.

Voluntary metric conversion by industry occurs primarily in response to marketplace demands and usually on a company-by-company basis.

The costs of metric conversion have not been excessive.

Large segments of industry have metric capability.

Past perceptions of the difficulty of metric conversion have no basis.

There are no substantial legal barriers to metric conversion requiring Federal preemptive action.

There are no substantial technical problems with metric conversion.

Consumers accept conversion according to their own interests.

Recommendations
The Metric Conversion Act of 1975 should continue to be administered.

National policy on metric conversion should be reassessed.

Research should be conducted on economic sectors where metric capability may be critical.

The Federal Interagency Committee on Metric Policy and the National Council on State Metrication should be continued.

The functions outlined in the Board's Private Sector Planning Guidelines should be continued.

Government public awareness, consumer and education programs should be continued selectively.

The States should consider enacting uniform metric conversion legislation.

As we proudly and often state, all of the A.P.R. staff are "One-Worlders" (my favorite epithet hurled at me by a conservative person once!). That is, we view ourselves as part of the human race, who just happen to live in a certain country. And that if humanity is to survive as a race with some form of technological culture, all countries and groups must trust each other and work together to solve the looming and inter-related threats of global warming/environmental collapse and overpopulation/resource depletion. Which means working toward some form of effective World Government. As you often see in science fiction, stories/novels, and movies/television shows. I don't know about you, but I think it's inspiring to see a vision of the future like the Star Trek shows, where 300-500 years from now, humanity has evolved to the point where there is effective World Government, and the related pestilences of poverty and war have been eliminated.

M.K. Ghandi famously stated, "You must be the change you wish to see". Since we here at A.P.R. wish to see an end to the curse of American Exceptionalism, and for this country to join the global community as a force for positive change in tackling the serious threats facing us all, we offer the following METRIC MANIFESTO:

We pledge ourselves to only use the metric system henceforth in all our daily activities, writings, and relations with others. And to educate others as to why we are doing this. Of course, there are some instances where this is not possible (in your lead author's other job, for example), but every effort will be made to go metric, and hence, through this small step, become more of a global citizen.

There are signs of gradual change, as this highway sign on I-15 in the Mojave Desert shows, yet the speed limit sign is still in MPH. Let's make the transition complete, and become more a part of the global community!

MT. PRINDLE - el Otro Mundo?

El Otro Mundo (spanish for "the other world") is my favorite way of referencing the place we all go every night in our dreams and when we finally let go our physical bodies in this life.

Looking out our windows of the Chena Ridge Research Station, you can see peak fall colour is upon us. This also means that within a few weeks it will be much colder, the ground will be frozen, and the first snowflakes flying. And, moderate conditions for a short pack trip won't last much longer. This past weekend the A.P.R. staff decided a short getaway was needed, and we decided to visit Mt. Prindle, which is listed as a 30 kilometre round trip hike to the top of it's 1612 metre summit. It is about 120 km east of Fairbanks, off the Steese Highway. A guidebook showed pictures of interesting rock formations (tors - granitic outcroppings) there and that it is not a very heavily visited place, because of two stream crossings on the first part of the trail. Perfect!
We headed out last saturday afternoon and reached the trailhead at 4pm. Sure enough, not 20 metres from the parking spot, we had to cross Nome Creek, which was too deep and wide to hop across on rocks, so we just plunged through in our regular hiking boots and socks. Another smaller stream then had to be crossed another 100 metres or so up similarly. We did this because I knew this would be a swampy tundra hike, full of tussocks and underwater sections of trail. And since we were just going to hike 10 km this day and set up camp, no biggie. I brought extra socks for the next day, and my 7mm scuba dive neoprene booties to wear in camp for comfort/dry feet.

It didn't take long to realize, there really aren't many people coming in here. Because berries like this wouldn't be seen on all sides of the trail otherwise. We had to stop and gorge a few times.

The trail the first several kilometres gradually ascends up the Nome Creek drainage above treeline, and did have many swampy sections, so my feet were constantly wet and muddy.

About 9 km and two hours up, we decided to stop and set up camp just below a bowl where the valley comes to an end. A nice stream close by would give me access for cooking and drinking water and for Mattie and Homer's needs. A few weeks ago I visited our local outdoor store, Beaver Sports, and checked out the clearance area. I saw a small one-person "Big-Agnes" Seedhouse SL-1 tent for sale for 100.00, normally 250.00. I snapped it up. This was my first opportunity to use it. It only weighs .9 kg (not much more than my bivvy sack!) and takes up a third the packed space of my larger tents. Here you can see it without the fly. During high summer, when bugs are in full swing, if not expecting rain, this will make a great bug escape zone.

With the fly on, it gives full protection from the elements. It is big enough for me and all my gear, or two people could squeeze in in a pinch, leaving their packs outside. Not bad for 100.00! It sure pays to check out that clearance rack!

Looking up the valley from our camp-site that evening in the gentle fall sun, I could make out the route we'd take tomorrow to get up Prindle. Up the slope of the tallest hill in the center, then following the ridge to the right east, and then north.

After a chilly, rainy, windy night, we awoke to grey skies, sprinkles, and a stiff 30-45 kph northeast wind. I knew it would be much worse as we ascended, but them's the breaks. We waited until 1030 though, for it to warm up a little, and see if it would stop sprinkling or improve. It didn't so we set out.

After ascending the flank of the first hill and ridge-line, a few kilometres brought us to the first of the significant "tors", ones I called "the bookends". All very old, weathered granite, millenia of arctic extreme weather has been working on these. These were probably about 200-300 metres above camp, which itself was probably around 1000 m elevation (tree line here is only around 900 m).

Homer was very happy to be here, many times he had to roll around on the ground, whine, and growl to register his approval. With his strking blue eyes, wolfy body and face, he can come off as rather imposing. But he is as kind and and gentle a canine as I've ever been fortunate enough to associate with. Mattie sure loves him too.

Getting up the first slope, there was no real trail, but by the time I got to the "bookends" one re-appeared. Looking up the trail, just past this, is when I first realized, what a strange place this is. In the far distance, the 1612 metre summit of Prindle looms. The "trail" (such as it is) weaves through the tors, up that dark ridge past them, down this to another, up and over that, then to the top of Prindle. By the time we got this high, the winds were easily double what they were in camp, still sprinkling, and it was about 6-8C (42-46F), we estimated. More importantly, the lichens on the many rock fields we had to go through were quite slippery, which was potentially dangerous, in the wind, and we had to pay attention to every step.

Mattie switched to mountain-goat mode early on, once we hit the rocks.

She loves being in high places, and climbing around, just as much as she loves being in the water.

Weaving through these bizaare-looking rocks, I felt as though I was in "el Otro Mundo". They looked like a cross between Stonehenge, and the huge statues on Easter Island, at times. I think the flat grey lighting, and strong cold wind just accentuated the effect. The main area of these tors is about a kilometre long, and we took our time going through, they were so interesting. They are reknowned for rock-climbing, and I can definitely see the draw there, and will put that on the list for next year.

My favorite of the tors was the last large one before ascending the dark ridge heading toward the Prindle summit. This is the one that I think really looks like an Easter Island statue.

This is looking back, south, down the line of the tors. Such a strange place...

We were definitely put into a spiritual, almost trance-like state being here. I am a strong believer that certain areas exert different influences/energies upon us. Many hot springs have healing energy, for example. This area, to me, exemplifies a "power-center", where it would be beneficial to conduct nature-based rituals and ceremonies, as they would be very powerful. Since I am scotch/irish and swiss/german, I identify strongly with the pre-Christian, nature-based Celtic beliefs. Which I believe are healthier, and more affirming than Christianity, as every part of the Earth, person, plant, and animal, are seen as sacred, and part of the larger whole.

After our spiritual experience weaving through the tors, we ascended the next ridge. The rocks were very slippery, and I could see I would have another hour of that in the strong wind, to ascend Prindle. I decided to save it for another time. I'm running a longer, 50 km equinox marathon next weekend, and didn't want to jeopardise that with a slip. Not to mention, having to get back down, and out 15 km back to the car. It went pretty quickly descending back to camp, packing up, and then heading back to the car. We were there at 430 pm. A perfect quick two-day getaway.

I decided there should be a Summer Solstice ceremony/celebration here next June. Anyone with me? Cheers.