Les Visible and Smoking Mirrors

[clerck de bonk]

You ....
... call me a dog

Are those Your own words or did You borrow them too?

 

[Gimpy]

You ....
... call me a dog

Are those Your own words or did You borrow them too?

It might be a poem or song of some sort...and it appears you are picking a fight, clerk. You don't need to do that.

Can you look at why you are reacting to ryan1942 this way?

 

[clerck de bonk]

You ....
... call me a dog

Are those Your own words or did You borrow them too?

It might be a poem or song of some sort...and it appears you are picking a fight, clerk. You don't need to do that.
Can you look at why you are reacting to ryan1942 this way?

You're right, not enough sleep. I'll go sulk in a corner

 

[Mr. Premise]

I think that's way too harsh, Clerk. There is no reason to call anyone a dog, especially when their posts were polite and articulate, but just articulating a different point of view.

Yes, my apologies to both. I didn't remember it can be so derogative a word in english.

Edit: I did wrong to canines comparing You to them.

Clerk, why did you feel the need to add the comment after Edit? Was your original apology insincere?

 

[ryan1942]

More new age love and light "we're all one" nonsense. When are you and all who think like you going to grasp the basic idea that thinking we are all one when there is CLEAR SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE that the masses of normal human beings share this planet with an intraspecies predator aka the psychopath. Do a little actual research for a change (rather than navel gazing) and you might actually learn something of real use, not only to you but to those you profess to love and care about. Alternatively, just continue to skip merrily on down the path of lies, personal hubris and illusion.

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'. :P

Mod's note: Edited to fix the quotation boxes

 

[Beau]

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'.

Posting song lyrics adds nothing to the discussion. It is noise. If you have something to say, best to come right out and say it.

 

[clerck de bonk]

I think that's way too harsh, Clerk. There is no reason to call anyone a dog, especially when their posts were polite and articulate, but just articulating a different point of view.

Yes, my apologies to both. I didn't remember it can be so derogative a word in english.

Edit: I did wrong to canines comparing You to them.

Clerk, why did you feel the need to add the comment after Edit? Was your original apology insincere?

No, not originally but I let myself get triggered when their trolling just continued. Needless to say I'm sorry for that slack as well

 

[ana]

I have no doubt that spending time here among you discussing topics of mutual interest would sharpen my reason and discernment. I would have the chance be corrected in my tendencies toward lazy thinking. But I find the thought of that route too tiring. I don't believe I have the spiritual and mental stamina for it. Also, I am easily enough influenced by the energies of others that the strong collective here might quickly either sweep me along (doubtful) or overwhelm me to the point of exhaustion and claustrophobia.

The hability to not become influenced or overwhelmed by any collective energies comes precissely from working to use properly reason and discernment, by always self-observing and mastering/growing the real self.

Time is short; choices have to be made. This is not the place for me in the long run, I'm too much of a mystic and a child.

The activity of the mystic is to bring reason and emotion to higher levels trough the use of the higher centers and that can't be done without proper work on the lower centers and the "fusing"/growing of a real I. You may be more a child than a mystic if you become easily influened or overwhelmed by any collective energies.

I see the validity of the points presented in these last few posts, and cannot refute it. But I can say that how LV and his way are perceived here is not the entire picture as I see it. I suppose I might as well mention here what I also posted at Visible Origami, about the dream I had before this all exploded into the public scene over there (which Les himself started, for whatever reason) and before I was ever introduced to this thread. The dream was very basic, more emotional/archetypal, so not much detail level was retained. Someone from this group (maybe a dream representative of the group as a whole, although it did feel like one individual; still, I'd hesitate to say it was any actual, real-life member) was criticizing Les, making points that I myself would probably not have thought of on my own. There was validity to most of the person's arguments, which I was able to recognize also intellectually but mostly by intuition (which is how I tend to operate, for better or for worse). I also felt that the person didn't "get" Les and never would, and that that was just how it was and perfectly OK. I don't claim to "get" him myself, but I do resonate with him a lot of the time. (It's possible the dream was simply a pre-echo of the personal thoughts/experiences that later came about through my examining this unfortunate but inevitable series of events.)

Unfortunate but inevitable series of events? I would say that whatever help us see the truth even if that makes us confront sacred cows about us and others, usually coming from identifications is not less than fortunate and welcomed if you are in real search of truth.

Pashalis, I do believe in God. I relate to her mostly in the feminine aspect these days, as Gaia-Sophia and Kali the destroyer of demons/illusions, the divine mother. I take a pluralistic approach, gathering many differing perspectives and using whatever feels most fitting in the moment, even if there are apparent contradictions between them (which, I believe, are resolved as one approaches truth holistically). It's a chaotic path on the one hand, but there's a logic to it in retrospect. It's what works for me and I'd be crazy to assume it might work for anyone else.

Contradictions are not resolved magically by ignoring them, without friction and strugle in this field as in everything else there is no way to aproach truth.

Les admits to being twelve years old, so his immaturity in some respects is not a point of contention. I'm about two years old myself. I've used cannabis on occasion and found it a very powerful catalyst not only in itself through its effects, but also through the process of self-questioning and learning responsibility that it brings with it.Haven't smoked it in a while, and agree in principle that real spiritual growth requires a sober state of mind. Still, I allow in general for the possibility of mind-altering substances as catalyst. I took LSD once and didn't regret the trip itself at all - but the month of social isolation imposed by my loved ones, who absolutely do not condone drug use, as a consequence, was of equal or greater teaching significance.

Cannabis to self-questioning?, boy do you ever question yourself?
The responsability that comes from ever having consumed cannabis comes from the realization of how it really isolates you from productive work, real understanding and self growth so as to never try again. It is not a catalyst but an inhibitor, it changes the way in which sensory information gets into and is processed in the hippocampus a component of the limbic system of the brain that is crucial for learning, memory and integration of sensory experiences with emotions and motivations,inhibits the synthesis of DNA, RNA and proteins, and produce alterations in glucose metabolism and suppresses neurons of the information processing system. Is in this state how you question yourself?

Psychedelic drug use will get no recommendation by me for anyone, but people's choices are their own. I have no great personal desire to meet Les in person, and I think the disharmony that resulted from his visit to the chateau is understandable simply based on the differences in basic philosophy between you and him.
I have no opinion on whether he behaved inappropriately; I wasn't there, and so much depends on a person's concept of what is appropriate. The difference in accounts is sharp enough that one side or the other, or both, must be distorting what happened to some degree. Les I can't fully trust because his psyche is most likely fractured, and I'm sorry to say, there appear (in my newbie eyes) to be individuals here who seemingly relish interpreting every possible detail as evidence of dangerous pathology. We're all sick; we wouldn't be here otherwise. Fault-finding is OK, but it needs to be done neutrally, without personal satisfaction, with love. It's possible that some have become attached to the notion that the whole world-out-there is somehow against SOTT, and inadvertently then create their own enemies just by operating from that overly defensive paradigm. Not saying that's how it is, just that it's possible. Also possible that such a paradigm would appear completely transparent, justified and internally consistent to one who sees the world through it.

By this time it seems you are too tired so as to be able to see more and so you oversimplify things so that they don't bother you too much, it's ok if that's how you aproach life, now try to understand that people here tries to observe deeper and conscientiously.

I am putting a lot of energy into this. It will be interesting to see where it goes. Nowhere,
yes, but in what way it goes there and what I can learn/teach along the way is what interests.

I think by now you are not in a shape of mind so as to be able to learn from what we've been discussing, you show apathy towards trying to care deeply and discern, far from being able to teach.

I urge anyone who finds this all a waste of energy not to feed it any further and just walk away and let it be. I will do the same when I am ready.

We do not "let it be" when we see gaps, we work.

Edit: spelling

 

[Ady_H101]

Clerk from what i can tell your reacting to new posters here...... of which there are many.... maybe let the dust settle first? know ur friends and ur enemys. Instant reactions are no good for anyone ;)

 

[Alada]

Posting song lyrics adds nothing to the discussion. It is noise. If you have something to say, best to come right out and say it.

But maybe there is nothing in there to say! It's silly, mechanical, nonsense, how could it mean anything? How quickly folk run out of steam when they have to think for themselves.

 

[Windmill knight]

In a recent blog posting he wrote: "Am I a Bodhisattva? Yes" Leaving aside the lack of humility, he later posted that he wanted to be friends with God. The two are mutally exclusive concepts. Les Visible would dismiss that as just words etc., but if words have no meaning then why does he bother to write at all, infact how can he? Obviously words have meaning when he wants them to, and when the meaning of the words would disgrace him, then they become meaningless.

The signs of spiritual attainment are almost commonsensical, but with common sense not being very common, have been laid down through the ages with little deviation. Evenness of mind is one such. Test Les Visible on this and he fails. Honesty is another. Again people can testify to his dishonesty, infact Les Visible testified against himself when he said he had finished commenting on the gathering and then proceeded to focus on nothing else. Compassion is another, in fact you could say it is the boat in which all the other virtues sail. He has shown himself to be mean spirited, and like any con, his benevolence always has a material or Karmic aspect.

Some will defend him and say he is justified in acting in the manner he does. That is just evidence he is just as like everyone else, so if you are looking for enlightenment just turn on the TV.

Les Visible testifies to his search for God, the truth etc with his mention of poverty, turning his back on his family etc... Poverty is not a vouchsafe for holiness, and any dead beat dad can claim moral superiority for claiming his relationship with God is more important.

His use of drugs to get messages however speaks more to his faith than his words which always have the tinge of justification. A life mis-spent can take on purpose if you assign it an invisible value apparently.

Anyone who believes there is no need for outward signs of inward holyness, but some self professed miracles, an ease at gabbling together words, being locked up in an insane asylm, and taking drugs may want to read over this and consider, some people who claim to have you best interests at heart don't.

http://www.harekrsna.org/iskgone/monkey/contents.htm

PS:

then he may be protected and guided through any and all perils that even a psychedelically-influenced path might bring with it.

There are many very bad men, both present and past who seemed to be protected and guided. That is why sometime you have to use your reason and not, as as Les Visible would demand, your lying heart.

Well said, Friday, and welcome to the forum. What you write reminds me of something Don Juan said:

There are scores of imbeciles who become seers — seers full of foibles, or rather, human beings full of foibles that were capable of becoming seers.

Les may be a wonderful writer and poet and have a great many fantastic insights and whatever - the fact remains that his massive ego and hypocrisy make him a jerk. Having said that, I'm not sure I would call him a seer in the sense that we give to the word in this forum, since he obviously cannot see himself.

 

[Laura]

A reader pointed out a blog post written by Les that is really bizarre. I'll bold a few things that stand out for me.

_http://zippittydodah.blogspot.com/2011/03/everybody-hurts-and-nobody-wins.htmlThursday, March 17, 2011
Everybody Hurts and Nobody Wins.

Dog Poet K-Transmitting.......

‘Always remember that Cheech and Chong could have done the dog thing better. Big up to Fifi!’

About a year ago... and I am assuming or presupposing most of what I say, because I don’t have the curiosity to go check and I am in the land of vitamin intensives at the moment which is why this post may take a lot longer than the usual half hour of rata tat tat ...because, I am reclining like the universe stretched out across itself and admiring the endless callipygian rondulars of its expanse, tailing away into the darkness like the passing of a comet or the taillights of a 1959 Cadillac El Dorado, with no bodies in the trunk.

I have to say that I misbehaved on purpose, regular, in former times, because it was the only way to keep the people pestering me to be a guru from turning me into one. Real event; I was sent to the Petersburg Reformatory, in Petersburg Virginia, around the time of the Robert Kennedy assassination for 60-90 days observation. It was a gladiator school and I don’t think they ever saw anyone like me come in there before. Surely, someone from that period can do the research because there have to be people still living that were there then like; John Reed, or Ian Fralich who did the Be-ins at P Street Park and owned a headshop; The Source? The MTA’s and some of the prisoners should still be alive. I was known as Leslie William Crook at that time. I’m not lying. After a few days they put the nametag ‘guru’ outside my cell where I held court.

They used to like to bring in the other guards to let them see me kick the tile walls with the ball of my foot and make them ring. I got a piece of flexible white cardboard and wrote The Supreme Grand Dragon on it and had pictures of The Beatles and The Maharishi all glued on. I had no idea what the title meant which was ironic. I was 23 years old and still in the kundalini uproar that lasted for 3 years from ’67 to ’70.

I was standing by the front cage on the day that Kennedy got killed and there was a TV playing. Off to my left was a dorm ward cell dormitory L shaped with 8 black guys and John Reed. They were all in there from catching the clap from raping some boy and they were a surly lot. While I was standing there, one of the MTA’s said to me, “guru, close the door”. There was a door open to my right. It was a couple of feet away and out of my reach. I turned and said, “It’s coming to me and the door opened into my hand. The cats in the cell dorm went bananas as I then pushed it closed, boom!

One of the MTA’s said, “You’d better settle down in there or I’m going to send guru in after you. I walked right over to the cell door and said “Yeah” and they all jumped under their beds. True story.

Couple of times some guys snuck in to where I was, intending to rape me and I put them down like children. I took a sock and stuffed it with wet toilet paper and got ten plastic bottles and made myself a bowling alley in the main hall. I could add lots of color and highlights but I don’t need to.

One time I was on acid at Rehoboth Beach, Delaware and I was bringing the waves in to shore with the reins of my hand and a writer from Newsweek came to me and wanted to write an article about me. The second time Elvis Presley found me, in Palm Springs; I was sitting on a park bench and doing that with cars pulling up to the stoplight. I know it all sounds like completely wacked out but it happened none the less. One of the readers here was with me when I was on a plane, hijacked from Albuquerque, New Mexico when some black nationalist hijacked the plane and I made friends with them. The Washington Post even printed my poem in praise of them. One of them sat with me and we chatted during the flight to Tampa. Then they went to Cuba. I asked them to take me with them but they wouldn’t. The FBI had a field day with that. It was even better than the story about when I met Charlie Manson. You might ask how come nobody ever heard about me. Well, I’m Les Visible.

I’m leaving out the really world shaking sh*t that happened but you can imagine, maybe. And I didn’t even get a t-shirt. I never got much of anything except the one thing I was looking for and he still likes to play hide and seek. So, I don’t want to play guru because I don’t know sh*t and I ‘know’ that I don’t know it. People were pretty cruel to me because of who I am routinely but there were some real bright spots and I have not forgotten one of then. They are why I am alive against all odds and when I write certain brutal poetry like Bad Leroy Bustin Caps, I know what I am talking about. I have faced down Bad Leroy more than once with no one but my invisible friends to help and people, who have gone driving with me know that almost anything can happen and that I will not let you down if you are my friend.

The thing is that no one owns Krishna or Hare and no one owns the Vedas. These traditionalists all have these pompous disputes with each other to pump up their own celebrity, when a common fool might know that god prefers a humble person. Any time some one comes around and grabs my coat about scripture and tells me I am not in line with his jumped up program of acquiring and regulating. It looks like a bank and its got something to do with money, somewhere, somehow, it has to do with money. I know what Dvaita is and I know what Advaita is. I know where Shankaracharya and Buddhism are comporting about the different, this, that, this... It’s just words....

I wrote that piece out of my sincere love for god and Hare Krishna is just a greeting too. It was only a poem in praise of what I hold in the dearest place in my heart. I didn’t think about attacking scripture and originally I had penned the poem to Ganesha. Somehow it comes back to me that you are laying in wait or something for me to do what? I don’t know. Maybe I am amiss at my studies. I don’t know the Vedas like you do. I know very little about my ineffable and all I have ever held on to was love. I might have abused love when I was young but Love was my goal all along. The search for truth drove me and I have never had anything to build with, or to make, except myself and my life is almost over now. I have not had an easy life, these few years with Susanne have been most of the ease that I have known and it does not ease. Still.

So I write a poem for my good friend Ganesh lord of the devic realm and I changed the title to suit you, which I did, because you have to have it your way. Yes! That is why it is now called Hare Krishna because it was originally called Lord Ganapati. I changed it for you personally and never told you, just to be agreeable with you. I know Lord Ganapati- Ganesha does not mind and Krishna does not mind but I wanted to be your friend and the friend of your fellowship. I was going to come and visit you at the Grand Kumbhamela. So I changed the name of the poem about the be all and end all to suit you, cause I don’t care and they don’t care; only you care.

I have no contact with you and.... Do you see? Now you come to my Facebook page and throw down on me like Krishna is your boy. What are you thinking? What is it that you should be thinking? You should not stop a person from making a prayer to God because he didn’t sign in.... or .... Or... I don’t know; buy a ticket on a ride called the Krishnasaurus?. Well, now everybody can listen to it and tell me if you think I did a bad thing. Anyway, I never actually had to mention you.

End Transmission

Lord Ganapati (with apologies to Lord Krishna for being a knucklehead)

Later

 

[thevenusian]

A reader pointed out a blog post written by Les that is really bizarre. I'll bold a few things that stand out for me.

He comes across as a very disturbed person here, at least to me. I get the sense that he has no real self-awareness at all. Much of his writing is full of bluster and dazzle (smoke and mirrors) designed to fool the reader into thinking he has a larger-than-life self, but I wouldn't be surprised if in fact that is an indication of the opposite. I get the impression he is lost to himself.

 

[Gawan]

A reader pointed out a blog post written by Les that is really bizarre. I'll bold a few things that stand out for me.

He comes across as a very disturbed person here, at least to me. I get the sense that he has no real self-awareness at all. Much of his writing is full of bluster and dazzle (smoke and mirrors) designed to fool the reader into thinking he has a larger-than-life self, but I wouldn't be surprised if in fact that is an indication of the opposite. I get the impression he is lost to himself.

Agreed, this article reads itself really strange and has a taste of pity me.

Among all other phrases in the text, this stood out the most for me:

but my invisible friends to help

 

[Aaron r]

Seems to me to be the self-indulgent ravings of a narcissist.