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Mammoth Stars: WR 25 & Tr16-244 Region ©

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Warped Spiral Galaxy ESO 510 13

Credits: C. Conselice, U. Wisconsin, STScI, et al., Hubble Heritage Team, STScI, AURA, NASA

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between stars and souls ⋆⁺₊✧ get wallpapers ★ twitter ★ art prints ★ support me

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Saturn seen by the space probe Voyager 2 (1981) , Voyager 1 (1980) , Cassini (2007) and Hubble (2021).

Credit: NASA

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Me as a child: [crying] please don’t let the aliens take me Me now: [crying] why won’t the aliens take me

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I’ve been backsliding.

Which is to say it’s been less than two weeks since the transmission of my cellular plan and I’m already back to my old tricks.

My degree of resolve has steadily collapsed over the last week and a half or so and I need to reel it back in. Initially I had planned on not drinking or smoking anything even socially, during hang-outs, but while my friends would gladly accommodate this my own grit has been lacking — so far at every hangout after I ostensibly gave up those things I’ve smoked, drank, or both. Certainly including a few nights ago, when we had a couple of blunts going around and I drank two beers and a bottle of wine. Or yesterday, when I had four mimosas and two bottles of wine while out celebrating my best friend’s birthday. My cigarette intake has also increased to the point where I bought myself a pack a couple evenings before; I finished it three days ago, it was just one pack over several days, and it was a pack of shorts. This is still a huge improvement over nearly three packs of 100s a day but is, overall, still unhelpful and a definite decline from where I’ve been. I’ve also been making freer and non-medicinal use of the weed I do have left — although, again, not nearly to the extent it’s been in the past.

I’ll admit that a part of me feels justified.

In The Maitreya II, a compilation of the Prophet’s teachings, he says to “enjoy life and don’t deprive yourself of what gives you pleasure! The Elohim gave us some rules to protect our genetic code when we plan to have children, but only for this reason! If you don’t plan to have children then there is absolutely no reason to deprive yourself of any pleasure.” I certainly don’t plan on having children so it sounds like I’m in the clear for booze and drugs. But in the very same sentence he clarifies that one shouldn’t deny themselves “except of course if you are a member of the structure of the International Raëlian movement who must have an exemplary life, at least in public.”

This tracks with what my local guide told me and, I guess, makes it much easier on the rank-and-file Raëlians. Being a guide and being a member of the structure more generally are, I think, two different things — at least according to the welcome packet I received via email the other day, which distinguishes between those rank-and-file Raëlians, all those who’ve had their cellular plan transmitted, and “active” Raëlians, who pay an annual tithe and are eligible to take on responsibilities within the Movement. I guess it’s the active Raëlians in general who need to follow the rules — the only question is, do I want to become an active member and possibly a guide?

Well I don’t know; I kind of want to be a Hare Krishna.

Monday night — very late, past the point where useful thoughts are known to occur — I was seized by the recollection of a Hare Krishna ashram in New York City that I made contact with about five years ago; the initial contact went well but I didn’t end up following through because I jived less with their ethos of sankirtan (publicly chanting the Hare Krishna mahamantra) than of puja/ritual worship, which was focused on to a much lesser extent. This time around, however, I felt I resonated deeply with their way of doing things and bitterly regretted not joining up when they seemed receptive to me. I’m a big fan of Hare Krishna teachings of bhakti yoga — total devotional submission to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. My copy of Srila Prabhupada’s The Nectar of Devotion rivals my copy of Intelligent Design in density of highlighted text. I wrestled with these urges for days and still now find them tempting: the prospect of running away to an ashram in the Big Apple, of finally doing something meaningful with my life at the age of 27. I was ready to cue up “My Sweet Lord” and get to writing a banger of an email reintroducing myself. But…

Do not go astray among the sects of the East - the truth is not on top of the Himalayas any more than in Peru or elsewhere. — Intelligent Design, pg. 208

If I’m a baptised Raëlian (and I am) it behooves me to listen to our scripture, as previously discussed even before the transmission of my cellular plan, and you can’t get more pristine and precise than “do not go astray among the sects of the East” when considering the advice of the Elohim — which I’m duty-bound to keep in mind after publicly signing a declaration of belief in them witnessed by two other signatories. This particular snippet of sacred text was especially meaningful even prior to being tempted by the Hare Krishnas: the religion which immediately preceded Raëlianism for me was a Dharmic religion (one which firmly contended that the Buddhist Maitreya was prophesied to come in the East, in stark opposition to the Raëlian belief that he was prophesied to come in the West) and I leaned on this verse coming out of my former faith. So why be suddenly so enamoured of visions of this Hare Krishna lifestyle?

I think it’s a few things, really. One reason is the idea of a secure, independent living at 27(!) outside the familial home. This aura of security has always lent itself toward a proclivity for the monastic life, although my time spent as a religious was with a congregation which doesn’t provide for the physical sheltering and assistance of its members; not through their own fault. Another reason is the idea of being able to spend most of my time engaged in religious work without (at least in this specific case) having to take up a secular occupation— the Hare Krishnas spend six hours a day chanting and distributing books and literature. Sounds tremendously attractive and much better than a 9-5 to my ears. Not to be overlooked is the yearning for life in community rather than the eremitical vocation. Finally there is the raison d’etre, that of religion itself: the joy of spreading the celestial message and being of loving and worshipful service to our creator(s). That’s the real cat’s meow. The first three unfortunately have no equivalent in Raëlianism; guides do not get paid or live in community, and provide for their own housing and their own living. But there is good news!

Spreading the Message and being of loving service to our creators the Elohim is totally a viable and suggested thing in Raëlianism: in Intelligent Design the Maitreya exhorts “you who feel such joy in reading this message, and who wish to radiate this truth and make it shine around you, you who want to live by devoting yourself totally to our creators, by scrupulously applying what they ask, by training to guide humanity on the path of blossoming and fulfillment, you should become a Guide if you want to be fully capable of this.” I do feel joy in reading the messages of our fathers from space, and I do want to live by devoting myself totally to the Elohim — this is essentially the same fundamental desire that made me consider joining the Hare Krishnas, and I don’t have to leave Raëlianism to sate this desire; quite the opposite! I only need to embrace the religion of religions, yet another occasion to do so in what I suspect will be a lifetime of re-embracing. This means ‘scrupulously applying’ what the Elohim ask of us, which after all is nothing less than demonstrating my love for them.

It, again, won’t be easy. I still intend on trying to get a medical card (although I’ve been told that’s not as easy as I thought either). But I need to make these changes. I want to make these changes, even though they’re unbearably hard and I desire to smoke cigarettes so intensely, because these things are what our creators have ordained. I just need to keep trying. Keep struggling. I hope that, observing me, they’ll understand and say “well done.”

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Alien Abduction Digital artwork by me, 2022

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Me spreading the Message

I DONT NEED SLEEP I NEED TO PROVE ALIENS ARE REAL

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In lieu of evidence to the contrary in Intelligent Design (and there isn’t any) you can’t convince me that the doctrine of the Assumption — of which today is the feast day! — isn’t totally consonant with Raëlianism.

Both Elijah and Christ were taken alive by the Elohim to the Planet of the Eternals as opposed to being scientifically recreated after their natural deaths (II Kings 2:11, Mark 16:18; ID pp. 41, 76) and there’s no reason why, presumably at Christ’s request, the Elohim could not/did not assume the Blessed Virgin bodily to their planet as well.