Hey there... it has been a while... I want to share my experience with an ally I have been learning about recently - the dragonfly.

I have experienced this magical being at various times in my life. But now I want to share a recent dream that got me to focus a bit on this being and try to learn something about its qualities. 

Feel free to share your experiences with dragonflies, as well as what you learned about them and the insights you gained through interacting with it .

Are form and perception the same? Is there perception without form? Does perception not require an observer and an object? What if we were to replace the word "form" with the word "perception"? Does that afford us a different understanding? "Losing the human form" becomes "Losing the human perception" ....

Simon & Garfunkel: The Sound Of Silence (1964)


Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
‘Neath the halo of a streetlamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dare
Disturb the sound of silence

“Fools” said I, “You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you”
But my words like silent raindrops fell
And echoed in the wells of silence

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said “The words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sounds of silence”

I think one of the biggest problems with the modern world is that everything you look up on YouTube looks blindingly stupid when other people do it.  I would feel RIDICULOUS just imitating some random slob in a YouTube video trying to tell me why HE has the authentic secrets of the universe attached to HIS brand identity and this is definitely NOT just your garden variety $15 drop in yoga or tai chi class, and so on.

Seriously though, I'm being cynical, but if you google tensegrity what you actually find is "Magical Passes®".  I cut and pasted that, I could not make this up.  I don't even know how to make the circle R on a regular keyboard.  That is taken directly from the internet, that's the economic reality.  Magical Passes®.

So...  I would appreciate it very much if someone who knows what they're talking about could tell me how this REALLY works and recommend some proven GOOD books or videos, please.

The following is a chapter from a book called "Path of the Mystic" by Ai Gvhdi Waya.

Chapter 11: Thunderbeings
When I was seven years old and my two younger siblings were six and three, respectively, a horrendous thunderstorm came up early one morning around 4 a.m. It was still dark out, and the wind was howling like a woman screaming. Frightened, I ran to my parents' room, wanting to get into bed with them to be sage from the giant storm outside our house.

Of course, they sent me back to my bed, but by this time my sister and brother, Nancy and Gary, had been awakened too by the crash of thunder and the slashing of rain against the house. It sounded like a major hail storm. We all crowded into Gary's bed, an Army cot, like a bunch of baby rabbits huddled together under the quilt and blanket, grabbing onto one another, when a bolt of lightning struck the metal clothesline just outside the bedroom window.

The entire room blew up with light so blinding that it was incredible. The horrendous sound of thunder crashed down upon us, making us all shriek in unadulterated terror. Worse, just moments before the lightning hit, the hair on our bodies had stood on end. We knew we were in for it, but had no concept of just how we were in for it.

The lighting hit a pie tin that my mother had set b the clothesline for feeding the cats in each morning. We heard the pie tin being struck, heard the metallic sound as it soared upward and then banged back down on the ground several times after the strike. We were crying and so scared. We didn't even want to get out of the bed for fear another bolt would get us before we got to our parents' bedroom!

As the storm continued to howl around the house, and I huddled in the warmth and darkness with my two shaking siblings, I vividly recalled the terror I had felt because of thunder when I was five years old. I recalled being so terrified that I'd run screaming hysterically to wherever my mother was. One time, she laughed, picked me up and told me not to be afraid of the sound in the sky. All it was, she said, pointing to the roiling, dark, pregnant clouds above us, were giants kicking a tin can around between them. Each time a giant kicked the tin can, we'd hear it down on Earth as a rumble of thunder.

I have never felt so relieved, and I remember that the fear went away after I had grasped the concept that there was an invisible giant or two up in those storm clouds. My mother returned me to the ground and I remember feeling relieved and that these giants weren't going to hurt me after all; they were merely playing "kick the can" just like us kids played it with one another!

The memory surfaced as I quaked and shook beneath the covers with Gary and Nancy, but this storm was too close for comfort, too frightening and overpowering. The sound was brutal on my sensitive "dog ears."

After that particular storm I began to try to understand these giants better, probably realizing that if I understood then I would stop being afraid. Between the ages of seven and nice, I would spend hours on my way back in a field, studying the fluffy cumulus clouds that drifted lazily across the sky. My mother had told me that I could use my mind's energy to move the clouds, and I practiced this until it became an art form.

As I began to work with the Cloud People, as we called them. I was made to understand that they were smaller, less powerful spirits who worked for Father Sky, who was the big boss. However, my father told me about Thunderbeings, huge giants who were invisible but very powerful spirits who job it was to gather the clouds and create the violence so that a thunderstorm would arise. Father Sky was the chief, but the Thunderbeings were his lieutenants and the rest of the clouds were privates.

My father would tell me about these fantastically powerful beings who are invisible to the naked eye, whose sole job it was to create the storms that raged around Mother Earth. He told me that I could see them with my third eye, but as hard as I tried, I couldn't see a thing. However, my fear of thunderstorms had transformed into one of absolute awe and excitement each time one swept across the dry, desertlike region of Ontario, Oregon, where we lived at the time.

I recall one thunderstorm in particular that occurred when I was nine years old. I saw the fluffy white cumulus clouds building into thick, high towers in the distance and heard a far-off thunder, knowing that it was coming our way. Out back, near our cow barn, was a huge pile of dried manure. This manure pile stretched about 40 feet and was about 15 feet high. Because it was dry, we kids would play on and around it constantly. It was the only "mountain" on the flat Ontario terrain.

This thunderstorm brewing west of us was enormous. It was far larger than any storm I'd ever seen roll across the dry Oregon desert. An excitement filled me, one of eager anticipation. I didn't know why. I was happy to have a thunderstorm roll over now, realizing that those invisible giants, the Thunderbeings, were amassing, moving and creating storms that would give Mother Earth a drink of necessary water for her and all her relations.

The wind spirits began to whip around me, dancing, tugging at my clothes and at my long brown hair, A thrill shot through me as I intuitively raced up to the top of our manure mountain. The storm was immense, brooding dark gray on the bottom with cauliflower, bubbling cumulus formations shooting skyward to at least 50,000 feet in altitude. The wind grew stronger, no longer playful, but sharp gusts warning me of the approaching storm.

Out of some instinct, as the lightning danced closer and closer to me, the storm now moving directly over our home, I threw my small, skinny arms skyward, my hands outstretched, open. And I laughed for the sheer joy of feeling the actual invisible power of this approaching Thunderbeing.

Then a strange thing happened. I felt wild tingling begin in the tips of my fingers, and quickly, like a bolt of lightning, it raced up my arms, into my head and down through my body. I felt electrical as if I had stuck my finger into an electric outlet. It was a heady, thrilling moment. The wind roared and gusted around me. I inhaled the sweet, fresh scent of approaching rain deep into my lungs. My hair whipped around me like live snakes. My body was buffeted by invisible hands so powerful that it almost made me lose my balance. The sensations going through me were incredible, and I stood there as the electrical activity raced among me, that storm and the Earth.

As I stood there, an old memory, a déjà vu, stirred deep in my unconscious. It was a past-life memory of being a young priestess in another country, stretching her arms skyward, the lightning dancing around her, yet never touching her or harming her. The memory itself was like a lightning bolt - gone as quickly as it had come.

I don't know how long I stood there, probably until the rains came. And then I was down off the pile of manure to the safety of the house because I hated getting wet!

Sadness and Longing... these two emotions accompany a sorcerer like two friends and steer him towards Spirit, knowledge, and learning. They go hand in hand often because one feels sadness due to not having what one is longing for - to simplify A LOT heh. As we grow on the path or gain more understanding of our experience, I think we will all find that sadness is not just about us and does not only occur in link to our lives and problems we or those around us face.
Both emotions (sadness and longing) share a base of similarities that I want to focus on and therefore I will talk about them together in general.

There were times in my life where the longing/sadness actually hurt. A lot. Now I am of the opinion that the clearer the conduit I am for Spirit (this is a different topic but in short one needs to de-bs oneself as much as possible ), the less hurt I get from strong emotions (for example beauty was another one that mixed with pain). DJ said that warriors cry tears of blood out of sadness. I can understand that .

This reminds me of our chat where serloco mentioned that crying releases pain and curses from the body. It releases other emotions too - like sadness. NM noted the term pressure in this context. Crying releases pressure. In some sense many things that utilize our energy release pressure. But if one indulges too much in anything that uses our energy, like crying can if it is overdone, it can make one tired. So, yea, the body may react by tiredness to crying, especially if it takes a long time (but not all bodies react the same). Another way how to release sadness is laughter. That one is not as tiring (though it can result in us feeling the stomach area muscles for some days if we laugh really hard and long heh). And it has the side effect of cheering everyone, including ourselves, up - that can be nice too sometimes. Knowing sadness somehow also enables us to have more laughter in our lives because we can cherish good things and be thankful. Both crying and laughter link to our souls (and bodies). Both can be soothing. There is nothing wrong with crying or laughing. Both are good and valuable expressions (and both can be used to express bent things too of course). Indulging is where I would see the crux of the problem. I have come to a stage where if I indulge in say self-pity and cry for a minute or two (I kid you not a minute is all it takes), I feel the effects (which are not nice) of it sometimes for days on my body. I have always used my body as a compass, it tells me what is healthy and what is not. A different type of crying, one out of beauty or pure emotions (not mixed with self-pity and other plagues) does not have the same effect.
DJ suggests a release method of rolling one's eyes. The eyes are indeed a great tool for a sorcerer that can be utilized on many occasions. I would add to that also that energetic movement of the body can also break the spell of sadness.

Do we need to stop or change when we feel sadness and longing? I do not have an answer for you, as in it is situation and person specific. Plus sadness is a pure/raw emotion and there are forms that it can mix with that are forms of sadness - sadness with other layers mixed in and these then have different co-causes and also different co-effects on us. Consider melancholy, loneliness, depression, grief, regret, self-pity, etc. All are compounds and one element of them is sadness.
I would say then that sometimes when we might want to utilize these methods to break sadness is if it takes these less pure forms (in the sense of alchemical purity) and do that in order not to indulge, or if we have not de-bs-ed ourselves enough and can't take the sadness anymore. The way I experienced sadness 20 years ago was so fundamentally different than how I experience it now that it is nothing short of a miracle what this emotion can be like.
To take the example of regret, I find that a warrior does not indulge regret but instead uses his or her energy and will to learn from it and change so that the behavior he would otherwise just regret does not happen. Although these feelings already add a layer to sadness, they still can be transmuted and do the things sadness does for us… if our intent is such. (Am I saying regret is bad? Of course not! All emotions have a purpose, they signal and speak to us. They give us guidance. What I am saying is not to indulge. Take the message and gift of the emotion and move on. If I start to feel regret, I look at it, 'commune' with it /'talk' to it, and learn and change and move forward. It is like a helpful person that one meets on the road. One talks with it, listens to the message they have for us, thanks them, and then moves on taking the message with them but not the messenger. Sometimes we need to stay a bit longer to really hear and understand the purpose of the meeting, that is all good and does not mean one is indulging. Indulging is if one overstays one's welcome and usually has consequences on our well-being and energy levels.
Similarly, we can mention aspects linking to sadness like sorrow and depression. these feelings have a purpose too. Not to be wallowed in but to help us change and grow. To realize things we need to leave behind. Sadness is also natural before changing things. A sorcerer sometimes leaves things behind (objects, beings, hopes, dreams, wishes, opinions, world views, etc. and these can link to the past, present or future) and it is natural if after the decision to do so one feels a bit of sadness. It is a period of transition of preparation for the next stage. It is a saying goodbye and natural. If we have been attached to something in the past and going to sever this attachment then we can mourn for it for a minute before letting it go. And then one moves on. In this sense, sadness helps us activate the change we are striving for. It is the last step of moving forward to a new setting.

Sadness can disarm some people, sometimes in good ways, sometimes not so good - again links to specific people and situations. Although sadness can paralyze some people into wallowing in bs (which is why the process of de-bs-ing is so important), it actually is an emotion that has a very practical function for sorcerers. On more levels.
For one, longing/sadness can drive us to seek out Spirit. But not just that... while we might feel that we become heavy with sadness we can transmute it and actually have it help us rise up. I remember a radio interview in which a shaman spoke on this topic... I will put part of the radio interview below (listen to the song and then the talk links to it, it was a radio talk).
How does one transmute it? Remember that a sorcerer does not really need to know how . It is great and helpful if one knows how, but one can get there without understanding it all too. (How is a question of the mind not intent). But the prerequisites are of course self-work and being able to expand, open up, allow oneself to be carried on the wings of sadness. Sadness and Longing have an inherent link to our soul and spirit. And they lead us into the unknown. They can of course also create pressure and push us forward that way heh. They can foster a love of/for learning and knowledge. They can strengthen it and they can guide it.
DJ told CC that it is natural for sorcerers to feel sadness. That there is sadness floating about in the world (unrelated to specific things in our lives) and we as warriors are more sensitive (having lost many of the typical defenses that ordinary men have) and feel it. DJ links sadness to eternity. To face sadness is to face eternity. Out there, the vast out there. It also links to facing being alone, one surely needs to come to terms with that even if one does not have to be alone. But this is another subject altogether. One can also say that our bodies /minds make sense of eternity by feeling sadness. Transmuting the unknown into something known that can link to it. Eternity and the unknown exert pressure on us, sadness is calmer and more bearable in that sense but still retains qualities of where it comes from / what it links to.

It is not surprising then that sadness links also to silence. Because our mind cannot attach things to it (if we have de-bs-ed ourselves enough), it goes silent. When the sadness comes from eternity not from us to fill it with our personal problems ID… but somehow even then I found I enter silence.
So, yea, it helps me be in the present moment, in silence. It also brings creativity, expressions of song, poetry, etc. It touches the soul and the spirit and sparks creativity.
One more effect that sadness has is something like a softening. Some emotions come along with sharpness/harshness or explosiveness, or other settings, sadness softens. It aids the development of empathy and understanding of other beings around us. It aids in connecting to our surroundings and the many peoples that live on this earth (shamanically speaking: animal people, little people, sky people, etc.). DJ talked of kindness. I totally second that. Sadness fosters kindness.

Moving on, sadness makes me aware of my own greatness. Because I can feel it and it is expansive and I expand with it. If one is strong to withstand it and not look away, it expands… one becomes greatful - grateful .
I link this also to vast bodies of water, ones where the water spans everywhere and to the horizon. Similar with grasslands. Tuvan landscapes omg . Prairies. It has also an expansive feeling and feeling of freedom. Eternity is hidden in many corners of the Earth. Being in these spaces I feel a greatness of Spirit and I feel myself expanding and tasting freedom and greatfulness (gratefulness) in this way too. But of course, I also realize how small I am. How beautifully small and how wonderful that my spirit is not limited to the size of my body . That I can commune with the prairies and the oceans of this world and taste eternity in my sadness as well.

~.~
To better get into the topic of Sadness and Longing: Huun Huur Tu & Angelite - Fly, Fly My Sadness.

Don Juan on Stopping the internal dialogue.

Sorcerers call it stopping the internal dialogue, and they are convinced that it is the single most important technique that an apprentice can learn. Stopping the internal dialogue is, however, the key to the sorcerers' world..the rest of the activities are only props; all they do is accelerate the effect of stopping the internal dialogue. 
As you know..the crux of sorcery is the internal dialogue; that is the key to everything. 
the passageway into the world of sorcerers opens up after the warrior has learned to shut off his internal dialogue.

to change our idea of the world is the crux of sorcery.. and stopping the internal dialogue is the only way to accomplish it. the rest is just padding. ...nothing of what you've seen or done, with the exception of stopping the internal dialogue, could by itself have changed anything in you, or in your idea of the world. the provision is, of course that the change should not be deranged.... that is why a teacher doesn't clamp down on his apprentice. That would only breed obsession and morbidity. 
The difficulty for the average man is the internal dialogue. Only when a state of total silence is attained can one use the (earth) boost.





***
For me Zen meditation has been the way to achieve this silence in the head. It has not been easy at all, still this monkey mind is full of good ideas, yet its easier to shift AP into one position where I just am and there is no radio station with a comment running in the head. 
Is Don Juan right that this is crux of sorcery? Im not sure, yet I must say that being open and letting 'things' manifest without putting them in boxes often times leaves me with magic experiences. Coincidences that are unreal. The second attention can much more easy be 'seen'/felt as well as that of silent knowledge. Like not knowing where my mobil phone is, because my daughter hide it for me and then it accidentally falls down behind a chest. Intuitively I just go there are take my hand down and pick it up. 
To keep quite is difficult when the un-expected, power or spirit manifest, so having a firm practice of keeping the mind still is good.

Hi guys I have been on the forum for a while reading through all the great knowledge everybody shares and I've been loving it. I  got dropped in the sorcery world surprisingly yet knowingly and have grown some since then. I feel ready now to speak up and stop keeping that voice of mine for myself I love this whole world you all have created and continue to expand it's my intention to contribute to this growing amazing community and learn and expand myself whilst striving to do my best. I am glad that I have found such people and a place like this at last I feel at peace and where I really belong thanks to lots of the knowledge on this forum and not only. I am willing to put lots of hard work to change myself and go for perfection I believe I am always expanding my world and self and it is great sharing those moments with people who appreciate that.
I'm here and I'm here for good.

When the seed was first set it did not sprout for me. The Bible had read that Adam had been able to name all the animals in the world. Adam gave them name, just as he also had been given choice. Then i took it in from my average awareness position of what animals were and thought that the Bible was telling me that Adam and God made them as they were to me then, as i had learned them to be from my teachings of the world and within it. I did not understand that man had been given the ability to name and command what an animal is thus actually naming them. A powerful position to enter into. You can almost see everything as Infinite here. Don Juan opened my eyes to seek for magical animals but said they were rare and only one with power could find one if they were lucky basically. I took that to mean that i could and most likely would. hehe. Indeed right away I began expanding this awareness of animals in any way I could and began seeking power in it, manifestation in it. Formed then was a new developing awareness of communication with animal lives. Sharing knowledge with them directly, and conscious formation of communication. Quite lovely. Just the beginning though. Did not know then that I could form them, shape them, rewrite them, conjure them in different ways, and form allies from them of great power.  Create new life forms totally even. Oh yes I have the scientists chasing hobbits! Oh yes God loves Adam indeed and gave him open space to plant anything and watch it become. To create life. I was a natural the first couple of weeks practicing sorcery and went to the zoo. Just basically a normal person then, did not see much, but little, yet had dicovered that my attention could set motion into play. So i focused into the next sequence of every animal and had them pose for me to take a great picture. The Lion would run it's course jumping from 'raised platform' to a higher one in action sequence, then reaching the top of it like it was a trimphant victory. "Snap" thanks Lion. Every animal fell into it's perfect role it had then for me. It didn't even faze me then, felt normal because that was the awareness i was in. I did it to a baboon female in a glass dorm and she stopped, vibrating in energy, hooked into my attention, turned to me and came directly to the glass i was watching her from. Walked to me and started to play pictures on the glass with me, moving her hands to my hands to match. Snap! It was beautiful. Now that sorcery feat is a powerful one now, made into what we call "next" or "looking forward", controlled prophecy positions as well. Event sequence directing with the focus of attention. It developed into many forms of attention over the years and can beckon many things from it. That day it was simple and controlled. Yet the animals were still within their habitual forms then, acting the roles, or the names, that others had given it, and that I had accepted and so the name I had given it. The bear ferociously attacked the fish thrown into it's pond thrashing the water around violently to catch it's kill. Very dramatic and powerful presentation.  Exactly what I would expect then and intend for a great shot of the bear catching it's kill. In my view then that is. All i had to do was connect my attention to the moment, and watch then as it developed into the action I intended. They found a way to make it a great picture. Only once did I have to wait about a minute for it to come then the Bald Eagle stood up and posed it's beautiful wings out from  itself, spanning outward and holding them in a pose. That was when the law of attraction was just coming out, I was practicing the instant law of attraction and event syncronization of different alignments. Quantum reality, or in other words sorcery.  The ability to control, guide, and intend your own awareness and knowledge into alignment so as to form reality. Controlled folly. I learned to fuse my attention to time as it unfolds into motion. All the awareness of reality in my attention is the essence of that moment. All knowledge I have active is the reality I see manifest.  It is all the names that i give to things, to life, and to reality.  the choices I make.

As a stalker I watch closely the names that are given to things. The name that I give things. Even the name and definition I give to myself. The name you give yourself is the pattern you set for yourself. The names you give to your animals and your reality is the manifestation you will also receive. The energy forms you cast. As a stalker we enhance awareness of all things, expand our awareness of reality and everything within it until we can see it's essence directly. We can see that everything is awareness, and that we gain knowledge or names of it's forms, and what we give life to. The form of something is made from the life we give it, thus the manifestation of it's energy form. It's name.  Under that name, that definition of it's essence, it is naked and unformed awareness, a darkness before light is set into cast or mold. Yet this mold cast comes from a source of any mold and any pattern or design, a garden of creation if you will, of any knowledge and any life.  

Do you name your animals yourself? 

I will come back and post some of my animal stalking journies from this perspective a lil later.

Things are changing here. Its nothing personal coming from me i might point out. I am merely the messenger on this occasion. I am simply tasked to bring to peoples attention  a mood. The mood is of impeccability.Putting it bluntly, if you dont know what it is, and are not striving to interact here with this mood, you should leave. No messing, no fuss, no questions, just go.

I first encountered Castaneda's books aged 15, some 28 years ago. A book fell off a shelf in front of me, so i picked it up. That small event hijacked the rest of my life. I find after 3 decades of turmoil on this path on a forum dedicated to the same thing that made that book fall. Here i am again, trying my best to serve it that abstract force. So  if you don't know what 'power' is you should leave. This is not the place for you. Go.

I find myself here on a forum with other beings who are worthy of their own sorcery novels.  Slowly it is dawning on me what this place actually is and it is chilling feeling  to realize i am  mixing with people who hunt 'power'. With impeccability one starts to see things here that are vast, layers of interaction behind these simple words on a screen that are astonishing. When you yourself accumulate power then this small forum may even be a launch pad into the infinite. It is a collecting house, a front if you will to something almost indescribable. The proper reaction to what i am writing here should be a small shiver. If its not then you are not really engaged with the full impact of this small  innocuous post. Maybe you should go, dont waste my colleagues time. Just go.

It takes another type of eyes to start to see what is really here. The real invite across the threshold is entirely impersonal. Im just drawing your attention towards the line. Dont waste our time here with useless ****. Just go, or get spat out.