text:
Internet Book of Shadows, (Various Authors), [1999], at sacred-texts.com
RITUAL THEORY AND TECHNIQUE Copyright Colin Low 1990 (firstname.lastname@example.com) 1. Introduction 2. Magical Consciousness 3. Limitation 4. Essential Steps 5. Maps & Correspondences 6. Conclusion 1. Introduction These notes attempt to say something useful about magical ritual. This is difficult, because ritual is invented, and any sequence of actions can be ritualised and used to symbolise anything; but then something similar can be said about words and language, and that doesn't prevent us from trying to communicate, so I will make the attempt to say something useful about ritual, and try to steer a path between the Scylla of anthropology and sweeping generalisations, and the Charybdis of cultish parochialism. My motivation for writing this is my belief that while any behaviour can be ritualised, and it is impossible to state "magical ritual consists of this" or "magical ritual consists of that", some magical rituals are better than others. This raises questions of what I mean by "goodness" or "badness", "effectiveness" or "ineffectiveness" in the context of magical work, and I intend to duck this with a pragmatic reply. A magical ritual is "good" if it achieves its intention without undesired side effects, and it is "bad" if the roof falls on your head. Underlying this definition is another belief: that magical ritual taps a raw and potentially dangerous (and certainly amoral) psychic force which has to be channelled and directed; traditional forms of magical ritual do that and are not so arbitrary as they appear to be. An outline of ceremonial magical ritual (in the basic form in which it has been handed down in Europe over the centuries) is that the magician works within a circle and uses consecrated tools and the magical names of various entities to evoke or invoke Powers. It seems to work. Or at least it works for some people some of the time. How *well* does it work? That's a fair question, and not an easy one to answer, as there is too much ego at stake in admitting that one's rituals don't always work out. My rituals don't always work - sometimes nothing appears to happen, sometimes I get unexpected side effects. The same is true of those magicians I know personally, and I suspect the same is true of most people. Even at the mundane level, if you've ever tried to recreate a "magical moment" in a relationship, you will know that it is hard to stand in the same river twice - there is an elusive and wandering spark which all too often just wanders. In summary, I like to know why some rituals work better than others, and why some, even when that elusive spark is present, go sour and call up all the wrong things - these notes contain some of my conclusions. As I have tried to lift the rug and look underneath the surface, the approach is abstract in places; I 2692 prefer to be practical rather than theoretical, but if magic is to be anything other than a superstitious handing-down of mumbo- jumbo, we need a model of what is happening, a causality of magic against which it is possible to make value judgements about what is good and bad in ritual. Traditional models of angels, spirits, gods and goddesses, ancestral spirits and so on are useful up to a point, but these are not the end of the story, and in penetrating beyond these "intermediaries" the magician is forced to confront the nature of consciousness itself and become something of a mystic. The idea that the physical universe is the end product of a "process of consciousness" is virtually a first principle of Eastern esoteric philosophy, it is at the root of the Kabbalistic doctrine of emanation and the sephiroth, and it has been adopted by many twentieth century magicians as a useful complement to whatever traditional model of magic they were weaned on - once one has accepted that it is possible to create "thought-forms" and "artificial elementals" and "telesmic images", it is a small step to admitting that the gods, goddesses, angels, and spirits of traditonal magic may have no reality outside of the consciousness which creates and sustains them. This is what I believe personally on alternate days of the week. On the remaining days I am happy to believe in the reality of gods, goddesses, archangels, elementals, ancestral spirits etc. - in common with many magicians I sit on the fence in an interesting way. There is a belief among some magicians that while gods, goddesses etc may be the creations of consciousness, on a par with money and the Bill of Rights, such things take on a life of their own and can be treated as if they were real, so while I take the view that magic is ultimately the manipulation of consciousness, you will find me out there calling on the Powers with as much gusto as anyone else. 2. Magical Consciousness The principle function of magical ritual is to cause well-defined changes in consciousness. There are other (non-magical) kinds of ritual and ceremony - social, superstitious, celebratory etc - carried out for a variety of reasons, but magical ritual can be distinguished by its emphasis on causing shifts in consciousness to states not normally attainable, with a consequence of causing effects which would be considered impossible or improbable by most people in this day and age. The realisation that the content of magical ritual is a means to an end, the end being the deliberate manipulation of consciousness, is an watershed in magical technique. Many people, particularly the non-practicing general public, believe there is something inherently magical about ritual, that it can be done, like cooking, from a recipe book; that prayers, names of powers, fancy candles, crystals, five-pointed stars and the like have an intrinsic power which works by itself, and it is only necessary to be initiated into all the details and hey presto! - you can do it. I believe this is (mostly) wrong. Symbols do have magical power, but not in the crude sense implied above; magical power comes from the conjunction of a symbol and a person who can bring that symbol to life, by directing and limiting their 2693 consciousness through the symbol, in the manner of icing through an icing gun. Magical power comes from the person (or people), not from the superficial trappings of ritual. The key to ritual is the manipulation and shifting of consciousness, and without that shift it is empty posturing. So let us concentrate on magical consciousness, and how it differs from the state of mind in which we normally carry out our business in the world. Firstly, there isn't a sudden quantum jump into an unusual state of mind called magical consciousness. All consciousness is equally magical, and what we call magical depends entirely on what we consider to be normal and take for granted. There is a continuum of consciousness spreading away from the spot where we normally hang our hat, and the potential for magic depends more on the appropriateness of our state for what we are trying to achieve than it does on peculiar trance states. When I want to boil an egg I don't spend three days fasting and praying to God; I just boil an egg. One of the characteristics of my "normal" state of consciousness is that I understand how to boil an egg, but from many alternative states of consciousness it is a magical act of the first order. So what I call magical consciousness differs from normal consciousness only in so far as it is a state less appropriate for boiling eggs, and more appropriate for doing other things. Secondly, there isn't one simple flavour of magical consciousness; the space of potential consciousness spreads out along several different axes, like moving in a space with several different dimensions, and that means the magician can enter a large number of distinct states, all of which can be considered different aspects of magical consciousness. Lastly, it is normal to shift our consciousness around in this space during our everyday lives, so there is nothing unusual in shifting consciousness to another place. This makes magical consciousness hard to define, because it isn't something so extraordinary after all. Nevertheless, there is a difference between walking across the road and walking around the world, and there are differences between what I call normal and magical consciousness, even though they are arbitrary markers in a continuum. There is a difference in magnitude, and there is a difference in the "magnitude of intent", that is, will. Magic takes us beyond the normal; it disrupts cosy certainties; it explores new territory. Like new technology, once it becomes part of everyday life it stops being "magical" and becomes "normal". We learn the "magic of normal living" at an early age and forget the magic of it; normal living affects us in ways which the magician recognises as magical, but so "normal" that it is difficult to realise what is going on. From the point of view of magical consciousness, "normal life" is seen to be a complex magical balancing act, like a man who keeps a hundred plates spinning on canes at the same time and is always on the point of losing one. Magical consciousness is not the extraordinary state: normal life is. The man on the stage is so busy spinning his plates he can spend no time doing anything else. ................................................................................ 2694 A characteristic of magical consciousness which distinguishes it from normal consciousness is that in most magical work the magician moves outside the "normally accessible" region of consciousness. Most "normal people" will resist an attempt to shift their consciousness outside the circle of normality, and if too much pressure is applied they panic, throw- up, become ill, have hysterics, call the police or a priest or a psychiatrist, or end up permanently traumatised. Sometimes they experience a blinding but one-sided illumination and become fanatics for a one-sided point of view. Real, detectable shifts in consciousness outside the "normal circle" are to be entered into warily, and the determined ritualist treads a thin line between success, and physical and psychical illness. A neophyte in Tibet swears that he or she is prepared to risk madness, disease and death, and in my personal experience this is not melodramatic - the risks are real enough. It depends on temperament and constitution - some people wander all over the planes of consciousness with impunity, some find it extremely stressful, and some claim it never did them any harm (when they are clearly as cracked as the Portland Vase). The grosser forms of magic are hard to do because body and mind fight any attempt to move into those regions of consciousness where it is possible to transcend the "normal" and create new kinds of normality. The switch into magical consciousness is often accompanied by a feeling of "energy" or "power". Reality becomes a fluid, and the will is like a wind blowing it this way and that. Far out. There are several traditional methods for reaching abnormal states of consciousness: dance, drumming, hallucinogenic and narcotic substances, fasting and other forms of privation, sex, meditation, dreaming, and ritual, used singly and in combination. These notes deal only with ritual. Magical ritual has evolved organically out of the desire to reach normally inaccessible regions of consciousness and still continue living sanely in the world afterwards, and once that is understood, its profundity from a psychological point of view can be appreciated. 3. Limitation The concept of limitation is so important in the way magical ritual has developed that it is worth taking a look at what it means before going on to look at the basics of ritual. We are limited beings: our lives are limited to some tens of years, our bodies are limited in their physical abilities, and compared to all the different kinds of life on this planet we are clearly very specialised compared with the potential of what we could be, if we had the choice of being anything we wanted. Even as human beings we are limited, in that we are all quite distinct from oneanother, and guard that individuality and uniqueness as an inalienable right. We limit ourselves to a few skills because of the effort and talent required to acquire them, and only in exceptional cases do we find people who are expert in a large number of different skills - most people are happy if they are acknowledged as being an expert in one thing, and it is a fact that as the sum total of knowledge increases, so people (particularly those with technical skills) are forced to become 2695 more and more specialised. This idea of limitation and specialisation has found its way into magical ritual because of the magical (or mystical) perception that, although all consciousness in the universe is One, and that Oneness can be perceived directly, it has become limited. There is a process of limitation in which the One (God, if you like) becomes progressively structured and constrained until it reaches the level of thee and me. The details of this process (sometimes called "The Fall") lies well outside a set of notes on ritual technique, and being theosophical, is the sort of thing people like to have long-winded arguments about, so I am not going to say much about it. What I *will* say is that magicians and mystics the world over are relatively unanimous in insisting that the normal everyday consciousness of most human beings is a severe *limitation* on the potential of consciousness, and it is possible, through various disciplines, to extend consciousness into new regions; this harks back to the "circle of normality" I mentioned in the previous section. From a magical point of view the personality, the ego, the continuing sense of individual "me-ness", is a magical creation with highly specialised abilities, an artificial elemental or thoughtform which consumes all our magical power in exchange for the kind of limitation necessary to survive, and in order to work magic it is necessary to divert energy away from this obsession with personal identity and self-importance. Now, consider the following problem: you have been imprisoned inside a large inflated plastic bag. You have been given a sledghammer and a scalpel. Which tool will get you out faster? The answer I am looking for is the scalpel: a way of getting out of large, inflated, plastic bags is to apply as much force as possible to as sharp a point as possible. Magicians agree on this principle - the key to successful ritual work is a "single-pointed will". A mystic may try to expand consciousness in all directions simultaneously, to encompass more and more of the One, to embrace the One, perhaps even to transcend the One, but this is hard, and most people aren't up to it in practise. Rather than expand in all directions simultaneously, it is much easier to *limit* an excursion of consciousness in one direction, and the more precise and well-defined that limitation to a specific direction, the easier it is to get out of the bag. Limitation of consciousness is the trick we use to cope with the complexity of life in modern society, and as long as we are forced to live under this yoke we can make a virtue out of a necessity, and use our carefully cultivated ability to focus attention on minutiae to burst out of the bag. What limitation means in practise is that magical ritual is designed to produce specific and highly *limited* changes in consciousness, and this is done by using a specific map of consciousness, and there are symbolic correspondences within the map which can be used in the construction of a ritual - I discuss this later. The principle of limitation is a key to understanding the structure of magical ritual, and a key to successful practice. 2696 To summarise the last two sections, I would say the characteristics of a "good" ritual are: 1. Entry into magical consciousness and the release of "magical energy". 2. A limitation of consciousness to channel that energy in the correct direction, with minimal "splatter". Without the energy there is nothing to channel. Without the limitation, energy splatters in all directions and takes the path of minimal psychic resistance to earth. A magical ritual is the calculated shifting and limitation of consciousness. 4. Essential Steps There is never going to be agreement about what is essential in a ritual and what is not, any more than there will ever be agreement about what makes a good novel. That doesn't mean there is nothing worth discussing. The steps I have enumerated below are suggestions which were handed down to me, and a lot of insight (not mine) has gone into them; they conform to a Western magical tradition which has not changed in its essentials for thousands of years, and I hand them on to you in the same spirit as I received them. These are the steps: 1. Open the Circle 2. Open the Gates 3. Invocation to the Powers 4. Statement of Intention and Sacrifice 5. Main Ritual 6. Dismissal of Powers 7. Close the Gates 8. Close the Circle 4.1 Open the Circle The Circle is the place where magical work is carried out. It might literally be circle on the ground, or it could be a church, or a stone ring, or a temple, or it might be an imagined circle inscribed in the aethyr, or it could be any spot hallowed by tradition. In some cases the Circle is created specifically for one piece of work and then closed, while in other cases (e.g. a church) the building is consecrated and all the space within the building is treated as if it is an open circle for long periods of time. I don't want to deal too much in generalities, so I will deal with the common case where a circle is created specifically for one piece of work, for a period of time typically less than one day. The Circle is the first important magical limit: it creates an area within which the magical work takes place. The magician tries to control everything which takes place within the Circle (limitation), and so a circle half-a-mile across is impractical. The Circle marks the boundary between the rest of the world (going on its way as normal), and a magical space where things 2697 are most definitely not going on as normal (otherwise there wouldn't be any point in carrying out a ritual in the first place). There is a dislocation: the region inside the circle is separated from the rest of space and is free to go its own way. There are some types of magical work where it may not be sensible to have a circle (e.g. working with the natural elements in the world at large) but unless you are working with a Power already present in the environment in its normal state, it is useful to work within a circle. The Circle may be a mark on the ground, or something more intangible still; my own preference is an imagined line of blue fire drawn in the air. It is in the nature of consciousness that anything taken as real and treated as real will eventually be accepted as Real - and if you want to start a good argument, state that money doesn't exist and isn't Real. From a ritual point of view the Circle is a real boundary, and if its usefulness is to be maintained it should be treated with the same respect as an electrified fence. Pets, children and casual onlookers should be kept out of it. Whatever procedures take place within the Circle should only take place within the Circle and in no other place, and conversely, your normal life should not intrude on the Circle unless it is part of your intention that it should. Basically, if you don't want a circle, don't have one, but if you do have one, decide what it means and stick to it. There is a school of thought which believes a circle is a "container for power", and another which believes a circle "keeps out the nasties". I subscribe to both and neither of these points of view. From a symbolic point of view, the Circle marks a new "circle of normality", a circle different from my usual "circle of normality", making it possible to keep the two "regions of consciousness" distinct and separate. The magician leaves everyday life behind when the Circle is opened, and returns to it when the Circle is closed, and for the duration adopts a discipline of thought and deed which is specific to the type of magical work being undertaken; this procedure is not so different from that in many kinds of laboratory where people work with hazardous materials. The circle is both a barrier and a container. This is a kind of psychic sanitation, and in magic "sanity" and "sanitary" have more in common than spelling. Opening a Circle usually involves drawing a circle in the air or on the ground, accompanied by an invocation to guardian spirits, or the elemental powers of the four quarters, or the four watchtowers, or the archangels, or whatever. The details aren't so important as practicing it until you can do it in your sleep, and you should carry it out with the same attitude as a soldier on formal guard duty outside a public building. You are establishing a perimeter under the watchful "eyes" of whatever guardians you have requested to keep an eye on things, and a martial attitude and sense of discipline creates the right psychological mood. ................................................................................ 2698 4.2 Opening the Gates The Gates in question are the boundary between normal and magical consciousness. Just as opening the Circle limits the ritual in space, so opening the Gates limits the ritual in time. Not everyone opens the Gates as a separate activity; opening a Circle can be considered a de-facto opening of Gates, but there are good reasons for keeping the two activities separate. Firstly, it is convenient to be able to open a Circle without going into magical consciousness; despite what I said about not bringing normal consciousness into the Circle, rules are made to be broken, and there are times when something unpleasant and unwanted intrudes on normal consciousness, and a Circle can be used to keep it out - like pulling blankets over your head at night. Secondly, opening the Gates as a separate activity means they can be tailored to the specific type of magical consciousness you are trying to enter. Thirdly, just as bank vaults and ICBMs have two keys, so it is prudent to make the entry into magical consciousness something you are not likely to do on a whim, and the more distinct steps there are, the more conscious effort is required. Lastly - and it is an important point - I open the circle with a martial attitude, and it is useful to have a breathing space to switch out of that mood and into the mood needed for the invocation. Opening the Gates provides an opportunity to make that switch. 4.3 Invocation to the Powers The invocation to the Powers is often an occasion for some of the most laboured, leaden, pompous, grandiose and turgid prose ever written or recited. Tutorial books on magic are full of this stuff. "Oh glorious moon, wreathed in aetherial light...". You know the stuff. If you are invoking Saturn during a waxing moon you might be justified in going on like Brezhnev addressing the Praesidium of the Soviet Communist Party, but as in every other aspect of magic, the trick isn't what you do, but how you do it, and interminable invocations aren't the answer. On a practical level, reading a lengthy invocation from a sheet of paper in dim candlelight requires so much conscious effort that it is hard to "let go", so I like keep things simple and to the point, and practice until I can do an invocation without having to think about it too much, and that leaves room for the more important "consciousness changing" aspect of the invocation. An invocation is like a ticket for a train, and if you can't find the train there isn't much point in having the ticket. Opening the Gates gets you to the doorstep of magical consciousness, but it is the invocation which gets you onto the train and propels you to the right place, and that isn't something which "just happens" unless you have a natural aptitude for the aspect of consciousness you are invoking. However, it does happen; people tend to begin their magical work with those areas of consciousness where they feel most at home, so they may well have some initial success. Violent, evil people do violent and evil conjurations; loving people invoke love - most people begin their magical work with "a free ticket" to some altered state of consciousness, but in general, invoking a specific aspect of consciousness takes practice and I don't expect 2699 immediate results when I invoke something new. If interminable tracts of deathless prose work for you, then fine, but I find it hard to keep a straight face when piety and pomposity combine to produce the sort of invocations to be found in print. I name no names. I can't give a prescription for entering magical consciousness. Well devised rituals, practised often, have a way of shifting consciousness which is surprising and unexpected. I don't know why this happens; it just does. I suspect the peculiar character of ritual, the way it involves the senses and occupies mind and body simultaneously, its numinous and exotic symbolism, the intensity of preparation and execution, involve dormant parts of the mind, or at least engage the normal parts in an unusual way. Using ritual to cause shifts in consciousness is not exceptionally difficult; getting the results you want, and avoiding unexpected and undesired side-effects is harder. Ritual is not a rational procedure. The symbolism of magic is intuitive and bubbles out of a very deep well; the whole process of ritual effectively bypasses the rational mind, so expecting the outcome of a ritual to obey the dictates of reason is completely irrational. The image of a horse is appropriate: anyone can get on the back of a wild mustang, but reaching the point where horse and rider go in the same direction at the same time takes practice. The process of limitation described in these notes can't influence the natural waywardness of the animal, but at least it is a method for ensuring that the horse gets a clear message. 4.4 Statement of Intention and Sacrifice If magical ritual is not to be regarded as a form of bizarre entertainment carried out for its own sake, then there has to be a reason for doing it - healing, divination, personal development, initiation, and the like. If it is healing, then it is usually healing for one specific person, and then again, it is probably not just healing in general, but healing for some specific complaint, within some period of time. The statement of intention is the culmination of a process of limitation which begins when the Circle is opened, and to return to the analogy of the plastic bag, the statement of intention is like the blade on the scalpel - the more precise the intention, the more the energy of the ritual is concentrated to a single point. The observation that rituals work better if their energy is focussed by intention is in accord with experience in everyday life: any change involving other people, no matter how small or insignificant, tends to meet with opposition. If you want to change the brand of coffee in the coffee machine, or if you want to rearrange the furniture in the office, someone will object. If you want to drive a new road through the countryside, local people object. If you want to raise taxes, everyone objects. The more people you involve in a change, the more opposition you encounter, and in magic the same principle holds, because from a magical point of view the whole fabric of the universe is held in place by an act of collective intention involving everything from God downwards. When you perform a ritual you are setting yourself up against a collective will to keep most things the way they 2700 are, and your ritual will succeed only if certain things are true: 1. you are a being of awesome will. 2. you have allies. The universe is changing, there is always a potential for change, and if your intention coincides with an existing will to bring about that change, your ritual can act as a catalyst. 3. you limit your intention to minimise opposition; the analogy is the diamond cutter who exploits natural lines of cleavage to split a diamond. Suppose you want to bring peace to the world. This is an admirable intention, but the average person would have no more effect (with or without magic) on the peacefulness of the world than they would if they attempted to smash Mount Everest with a rubber hammer. Rather than worry about the peacefulness of the whole world, why not use your ritual to create a better relationship with your spouse, or your boss, or someone who really annoys you? And why not work on the specific issues which are the main source of friction. And try to improve things within a specified period of time. And do it in a way which respects the other person's right to continue being a pain in the arse if they so wish? This is the idea behind focussing or limiting an intention. Having said all this, there are a lot of people in the world who would appreciate some peace, and perhaps your grand intention to bring peace might catch a wave and help a few, so don't let me put you off, but as a general principle it is sensible to avoid unnecessary opposition by making the intention as precise as possible. Think about sources of opposition, and about ways of circumventing that opposition - there may be a simple way which avoids making waves, and that is when magic works best. Minimising opposition also reduces the amount of backlash you can expect - quite often the simplest path to earth for any intention is through the magician, and if there is a lot of opposition that is what happens. [The very act of invoking power creates a resonance and a natural channel through the magician.] I try to analyse the possible outcomes and consequences of my intentions. There is a popular view that "if it harms none, do what you will". I can think of many worse moral principles, and it is better than most, but it is still naive. It pretends that it is theoretically possible to live without treading on another person's toes, it leaves me to make unilateral decisions about what is or is not harmful to others, and it is so wildly unrealistic, even in the context of everyday life, that it only seems to make sense if I intend to live in seclusion in a wilderness living off naturally occuring nuts and berries (having asked the squirrels for permission). If it is used as a moral principle in magic, then it draws an artificial distinction between magical work and the "push me, push you/if it moves, shoot it, if it doesn't, cut it down" style of contemporary life. It completely emasculates free-will. I prefer to believe that just about anything I do is going to have an impact on someone or something, and there are no cute moral guidelines; there are 2701 actions and there are outcomes. The aim is not to live according to guidelines, but to understand as fully as possible the consequences of the things we do, and to decide, in the light of our understanding (which has hopefully kept pace with our power), whether we are prepared to live with the outcomes. And so to sacrifice. There is a problem here. The problem arises from the perception that in magic you don't get something for nothing, and if you want to bring about change through magic you have to pay for it in some way. So far so good. The question is: what can you give in return? There is a widespread belief that you can sacrifice a living creature, and while most magicians (self included) abhor the idea, the perpetuation of this idea is still being used as a stick to beat the magical and pagan community about the head. The issue is further complicated by the fact that if one looks at surviving shamanistic practices worldwide, or looks at the origins of most religions, ritual animal sacrifice is endemic. That doesn't make it right, and I have an unshakeable prejudice that it isn't an acceptable thing to do, but I am only too aware of my hypocrisy when I order a chicken curry, so I'm not going to stand on a soapbox and rant on about it. What I prefer to do is to examine what the notion of sacrifice means. What can one legitimately sacrifice? You can't legitimately sacrifice anything which is not yours to give, and so the answer to the question "what can I sacrifice" lies in the answer to the question "what am I, and what have I got to give?". You certainly aren't any other living being, and if you don't make the mistake of identifying yourself with your possessions you will see that the only sacrifice you can make is yourself, because that is all you have to give. Every ritual intention requires that you sacrifice some part of yourself, and if you don't make the sacrifice willingly then either the ritual will fail, or the price will be exacted anyway. I don't have a rational justification for this statement, and it certainly isn't based on "karma" or a paranoid feeling that accountants are everywhere; the belief was handed on to me as part of my magical training, and having observed the way in which "magical energy" is utilised to carry out intentions, it makes sense. Each person has a certain amount of what I will call "life energy" at their disposal - some people call it "personal power", and you can sacrifice some of that energy to power the ritual. Sacrifice does not mean turning the knife on yourself (and there are plenty of people who do that). What it means in ordinary down-to-earth terms is that you promise to do something in return for your intention, and you link the sacrifice to the intention in such a way that the sacrifice focuses energy along the direction of your intention. For example, my cat was ill and hadn't eaten for three weeks, so, as a last resort, fearing she was about to die of starvation, I carried out a ritual to restore her appetite, and as a sacrifice I ate nothing for 24 hours. I used my (real) hunger to drive the intention, and she began eating the following day. Any personal sacrifice which hurts enough engages a deep impulse to make the hurt go away, and the magician can use that impulse to bring about magical change by linking the removal of 2702 the pain to the accomplishment of the intention. And I don't mean magical masochism. We are (subject to all caveats on generalisations) creatures of habit who find comfort and security by living our lives in a particular way, and a change to that habit and routine causes some discomfort and an opposing desire to return to the original state: that desire can be used. Just as a ritual intends to change the world in some way, so a sacrifice forces us to change ourselves in some way, and that liberates magical energy. If you want to heal someone, don't just do a ritual and leave it at that; become involved in caring for them in some way, and that *active* caring can act as a channel for whatever power you have invoked. If you want to use magic to help someone out of a mess, provide them with active, material help as well; conversely, if you can't be bothered to provide material help, your ritual will be infected with that same inertia and apathy - true will, will out, and in many cases our true will is to flatter the ego and do nothing substantive. I speak from experience. From a magical perspective each one of us is a magical being with a vast potential of power, but that is denied to us by an innate, fanatical, and unbelievably deep-rooted desire to keep the world in a regular orbit serving our own needs. Self- sacrifice disturbs this equilibrium and lets out some of that energy, and that is why egoless devotion and self-sacrifice has a reputation for working miracles. 4.5 The Main Ritual After invoking the Powers and having stated the intention and sacrifice, there would seem to be nothing more to do, but most people like to prolong the contact with the Powers and carry out some kind of symbolic ritual for a period of time varying from minutes to days. Ritual as I have described it so far may seem like a cut-and-dried exercise, but it isn't; it is more of an art than a science, and once the Circle and Gates are opened, and the Powers are "in attendance", whatever science there is in ritual gives way to art. Magicians operate in a world where ordinary things have complex symbolic meanings or correspondences, and they use a selection of consecrated implements or "power objects" in their work. The magician can use this palette of symbols within a ritual to paint of picture which signifies an intention in a non-verbal, non-rational way, and it is this ability to communicate an intention through every sense of the body, through every level of the mind, which gives ritual its power. I can't say any more about this because it is personal and unique to every magician, and each one develops a style which works best for them. 4.6 Dismissal of Powers Once the ritual is complete the Powers are thanked and dismissed. This begins the withdrawal of consciousness back to its pre-ritual state. 4.7 Close Gates/Close Circle The final steps are closing the Gates (thus sealing off the 2703 altered state of consciousness) and closing the Circle (thus returning to the everyday world). The Circle should not be closed if there is any suspicion that the withdrawal from the altered state has not been completed fully. I like to carry out a sanity check between closing the Gates and closing the Circle. It sometimes happens that although the magician goes through the steps of closing down, the attention is not engaged, and the magician remains in the altered state. This is not a good idea. The energy of that state will continue to manifest in every intention in everyday life, and all sorts of unplanned things will start to happen. A related problem is that every magician will find sooner or later an altered state which compensates for some of their perceived inadequacies (in the way that many people like to get drunk at parties), and they will not want to let go of it because it makes them feel good, so they come out of the ritual in an altered state without realising they have failed to close down correctly. This is called obsession, and it is one of the interesting difficulties of magical work. Closing down correctly is important if you don't want to end up like a badly cracked pot. If you don't feel happy that the Powers have been completely dismissed and the Gates closed correctly, go back and repeat the steps again. 5. Maps & Correspondences If consciousness is imagined as a space we can move around in, then it is a space of several dimensions. An indespensible tool for any magician is a method for describing this space and its dimensions, a method to specify the "the coordinates of consciousness", like giving a map reference. The magician uses such a descriptive method to say "this is where I want to get to", and you can imagine a ritual as a vehicle which transports him or her to the destination and back again. A descriptive method of this type is one of the most obvious and characteristic features of a particular magical technique, because states of consciousness are usually described using a dense mesh of symbolism and metaphor, and if a magical tradition has been around for any length of time it becomes identified by the details of this symbolism. Given the tendency for maps to be confused with territory, there is a tendency for symbolism to take on a life of its own and become completely detached from authentic magical technique. People confuse magical symbolism with magic; its use as a coordinate system is lost, vast tomes of drivel are written, and every manner of absurdity follows. I am a Kabbalist by training and use a map of consciousness called "The Tree of Life". This map has been coloured in using a thousand years of symbolism, and the result is called "the Correspondences", and it is a system which allows me to navigate around the dimensions of consciousness with some precision. There are many other maps, some well worn by history, some not, and my choice is a matter of personal preference. It works for me because of the kind of person I am, but it is only a map and I wouldn't pretend that there was anything intrinsically special about it. 2704 Many magicians operate within a religious framework. The Christian Mass is a magical ritual par excellence, and there are several other magical rituals associated with Christianity. Some magicians work within a pantheon - Graeco-Roman, Egyptian, Scandinavian, Aztec or whatever. Some (e.g. Crowley) invent their own religion. A characteristic of all these systems is that they provide a complex mesh of symbol and metaphor, a map for the magician to work within. For any pantheon it is usually straightforward (with some bending, stretching and hitting with a hammer) to identify a personification for the following aspects of consciousness: heaviness, old-age, stagnation, limitation, inertia creativity, inspiration, vision, leadership violence, force, destructiveness harmony, integrity, balance, wholeness love, hate, passion, sensual beauty, aesthetics, emotional power, nurture reason, abstraction, communication, conceptualisation, logic imagination, instinct, the unconscious practicality, pragmatism, stolidity, materialism And once we have gods and goddesses (or saints) to personify these qualities, a weave of metaphors and associations elaborates the picture; the Moon is instinct, fire is both destructive and energetic, death is a sythe, air and mercury are "the same", and so on. The meaning of a symbol is personal - white means "death" to some and "purity" to others. What matters is that the magician should have a clear map, and with it the ability to invoke different aspects of consciousness by using the symbolism of gods, goddesses, archangels, demons or whatever. It does not matter whether the magician believes in the literal reality of the territory or not, as long as he or she treats the map with respect and does not muddy the water by dabbling with too many different maps. There are two principal ways in which maps become muddled, and as the main theme of these notes is the precise use of limitation in conjuction with magical consciousness, I think it is worth mentioning what I see as potential pitfalls. The first pitfall is mixing systems; the second is working with other people. There is a tendency nowadays to muddle different systems of correspondences together, to add Egyptian gods to a Kabbalistic ritual, to say that Tanith is really the same as Artemis, or that Cybele and Astarte and Demeter are "just" different names for the Mother Goddess, to find parallels between Thor and Mars, between Kali and Hecate, between the Virgin Mary and Isis, until, like different colours of paint mixed together, everything ends up in shades of muddy brown. This unifying force is everywhere as people find universal themes and try to make links between groups and systems. 2705 It is (in my opinion) a bad idea to mix systems together in a spirit of ecumenical fervour. Correspondences are like intentions: the sharper and more clearly defined they are, the better they work. Despite a few similarities, the Virgin Mary is nothing like Isis, and Demeter has very little in common with Astarte. Syncretism usually takes place slowly over the centuries, so that for most people there is no distinction between the classical Greek and Roman pantheons and Mercury is a synonym for Hermes, but to do it in real-time in your own head is a recipe for muddle-headedness. Symbols can be diffused when people work together in a group. It is a mistake to believe that "power" is raised in direct proportion to the number of people taking part in a ritual. Unless people have been trained together and have similar "maps", then the ritual will have a different effect on each person, and although more power may be raised, it will be unfocussed and will probably earth itself through unexpected channels. When people begin working together there will be a period of time when their work together will probably be less effective than any one of them working alone, but after a time their "maps" begin to converge and things start to improve dramatically. There is nothing magical about this - it is a phenomenon of teams of people in general. I don't like "spectator rituals" for this reason; you are either in it or your are out, and if you are out, you are out the door. Does it matter what map, what system of correspendences a person uses? Is there a "best" set? This is an impossible question to answer. What can be said is that working within any magical framework incurs a cost. The more effective a magical system is at limiting, engaging and mobilising the creative power of consciousness, the more effective it is at ensnaring consciousness within its own assumptions and limitations. If a person works within a belief system where the ultimate nature of God is pure, unbounded love, joy and bliss, then that closes off other possibilities. Without sitting in judgement of any set of beliefs, I would say that the best belief system and the best system of correspondences is one which allows consciousness to roam over the greatest range of possibilities, and permits it the free-will to choose its own limitations. And that is a belief in itself. 6. Conclusion The gist of these notes is that ritual is a technique for focussing magical power through the deliberate use of limitation. Limitation comes from the belief system of the magician, and the set of correspondences used to create symbolism within the ritual. Further limitation comes from the structure of the ritual itself, and ultimately from the statement of intention. With practise these elements add up to a single-mindedness which can shift consciousness out of its normal orbit. ................................................................................ 2706


text:
Golden Pavilion springtime - Kyoto, #Japan #dna2japan #gadv
Japanese School Girls in Takayama, Japan
A group of smiling Japanese school girls in the folk village outside of Takayama, Japan.
Great Buddha (Kotokuin Temple) - Kamakura, Japan
The Great Buddha statue at Kotokuin Temple in Kamakura, Japan.
Tunnel of Torii (Gates) at Fushimi Inari Shrine - Kyoto, Japan
A tunnel of gates (torii) at Fushimi Inari Shrine near Kyoto, Japan.
View of Mount Fuji - Yamanaka-ko, Japan
View of Mount Fuji from balcony of Hotel Tagaoogi at Yamanaka-ko in Japan.
Mixed Sushi Donburi at Tsukiji Fish Market - Tokyo, Japan
A mixed sushi donburi - rice bowl covered with raw fish - at Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo, Japan.
Sadako's origami cranes in Hiroshima -- They were her symbol of a wish for life. She was an atomic bomb survivor. She died of leukemia at age 12. #Japan #dna2japan #gadv
Sanja Festival Crowds - Tokyo, Japan
Lots of people gathered for Sanja Shinto festival in Tokyo, Japan,
Monjayaki Covered with Hanakatsuo - Tokyo, Japan
A serving of monjayaki (a pancake/omelet dish) covered with hanakatsuo (dried fish flakes). Delicious! Tokyo, Japan.
Geisha Encounters in Gion, Kyoto
A couple of Geishas are on their way to the tea house in early evening in Gion area of Kyoto.
Kanazawa Castle, Japan
Kanazawa castle profile shot, Japan.
Japanese Woman in Kimono - Tokyo, Japan
A Japanese woman is all decked out in a kimono for the Sanja festival in Tokyo, Japan.
A peek into Itsukushima Shinto shrine - Miyajima, Japan #dna2japan #gadv
Tokyo Skyscrapers at Night
A view over Tokyo from the 45th floor of the Tokyo Metropolitan Building in Shinkjuku. Japan.
Tako (octopus) at the Tsukiji fish market, Tokyo
Japanese Tea Ceremony - Kyoto, Japan
A Japanese tea ceremon in Kyoto, Japan.
Buddhist Statues at Daisho-In Temple - Miyajima, Japan
Buddhist statues at Daisho-In Temple on Miyajima, Japan.
Dotonbori street, Osaka - the scene of last night's gorging on fugu (blowfish), okonomiyaki, takoyaki...and cow rectum #dna2japan #gadv
Japanese Woman in Shinto Opera - Kyoto, Japan
A shinto opera at the Aoi Matsuri shinto festival in Kyoto, Japan.
A gift from Japanese students for talking with them in English, so sweet - Kyoto, #Japan #dna2japan #gadv
Children Running at Itsukushima Shinto Shrine - Miyajima, Japan
Children Running at Itsukushima Shinto Shrine - Miyajima, Japan
Bullet Train Coming Through Kyoto - Japan
A bullet train coming through the Kyoto station in Japan.
Shinto Priest at Itsukushima Shrine - Miyajima, Japan
A shinto blessing at Itsukushima Shinto Shrine on Miyajima, Japan.
Vermillion Gate at Entrance to Fuji Sengen Shrine - Mount Fuji, Japan
The beginning of the Yoshidaguchi trail up Mount Fuji, vermillion gates (torii) at Fuji Sengen Shrine. Japan.
Mount Fuji Peak - Japan
A view of Mount Fuji's Peak from station 5. Japan.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
当前位置: Language Tips> 双语新闻
What do ex-British prime minister Gordon Brown, Jackie Onassis, Britney Spears and I all have in common? We all are (or were) nail biters.
It's not a habit I'm proud of. It's pretty disgusting for other people to watch, ruins the appearance of my hands, is probably unhygienic and sometimes hurts if I take it too far. I've tried to quit many times, but have never managed to keep it up.
Lately I've been wondering what makes someone an inveterate nail-biter like me. Are we weaker willed? More neurotic? Hungrier? Perhaps, somewhere in the annals of psychological research there could be an answer to my question, and maybe even hints about how to cure myself of this unsavoury habit.
My first dip into the literature shows up the medical name for excessive nail biting: 'onychophagia'. Psychiatrists classify it as an impulse control problem, alongside things like obsessive compulsive disorder. But this is for extreme cases, where psychiatric help is beneficial, as with other excessive grooming habits like skin picking or hair pulling. I'm not at that stage, falling instead among the majority of nail biters who carry on the habit without serious side effects. Up to 45% of teenagers bite their nails, for example; teenagers may be a handful but you wouldn't argue that nearly half of them need medical intervention. I want to understand the 'subclinical' side of the phenomenon – nail biting that isn't a major problem, but still enough of an issue for me to want to be rid of it.
It's mother's fault
Psychotherapists have had some theories about nail biting, of course. Sigmund Freud blamed it on arrested psycho-sexual development, at the oral stage (of course). Typical to Freudian theories, oral fixation is linked to myriad causes, such as under-feeding or over-feeding, breast-feeding too long, or problematic relationship with your mother. It also has a grab-bag of resulting symptoms: nail biting, of course, but also a sarcastic personality, smoking, alcoholism and love of oral sex. Other therapists have suggested nail-biting may be due to inward hostility – it is a form of self-mutilation after all – or nervous anxiety.
Like most psychodynamic theories these explanations could be true, but there's no particular reason to believe they should be true. Most importantly for me, they don't have any strong suggestions on how to cure myself of the habit. I've kind of missed the boat as far as extent of breast-feeding goes, and I bite my nails even when I'm at my most relaxed, so there doesn't seem to be an easy fix there either. Needless to say, there's no evidence that treatments based on these theories have any special success.
Unfortunately, after these speculations, the trail goes cold. A search of a scientific literature reveals only a handful of studies on treatment of nail-biting. One reports that any treatment which made people more aware of the habit seemed to help, but beyond that there is little evidence to report on the habit. Indeed, several of the few articles on nail-biting open by commenting on the surprising lack of literature on the topic.
Creature of habit
Given this lack of prior scientific treatment, I feel free to speculate for myself. So, here is my theory on why people bite their nails, and how to treat it.
Let's call it the 'anti-theory' theory. I propose that there is no special cause of nail biting – not breastfeeding, chronic anxiety or a lack of motherly love. The advantage of this move is that we don't need to find a particular connection between me, Gordon, Jackie and Britney. Rather, I suggest, nail biting is just the result of a number of factors which – due to random variation – combine in some people to create a bad habit.
First off, there is the fact that putting your fingers in your mouth is an easy thing to do. It is one of the basic functions for feeding and grooming, and so it is controlled by some pretty fundamental brain circuitry, meaning it can quickly develop into an automatic reaction. Added to this, there is a 'tidying up' element to nail biting – keeping them short – which means in the short term at least it can be pleasurable, even if the bigger picture is that you end up tearing your fingers to shreds. This reward element, combined with the ease with which the behaviour can be carried out, means that it is easy for a habit to develop; apart from touching yourself in the genitals it is hard to think of a more immediate way to give yourself a small moment of pleasure, and biting your nails has the advantage of being OK at school. Once established, the habit can become routine – there are many situations in everyone's daily life where you have both your hands and your mouth available to use.
Understanding nail-biting as a habit has a bleak message for a cure, unfortunately, since we know how hard bad habits can be to break. Most people, at least once per day, will lose concentration on not biting their nails.
Nail-biting, in my view, isn't some revealing personality characteristic, nor a maladaptive echo of some useful evolutionary behaviour. It is the product of the shape of our bodies, how hand-to-mouth behaviour is built into (and rewarded in) our brains and the psychology of habit.
And, yes, I did bite my nails while writing this column. Sometimes even a good theory doesn't help.
英国前首相戈登·布朗(Gordon Brown)、杰奎琳·肯尼迪(Jackie Onassis)、布兰妮·斯皮尔斯(Britney Spears)之间有什么共同点呢?他们都爱(或曾经都爱)咬指甲。
当然,心理学家在咬指甲方面有许多理论。西格蒙德•弗洛伊德(Sigmund Freud)把它归结于性心理发育不良,当然是在口腔期。典型的弗洛伊德理论认为,口欲滞留的原因有很多,诸如:喂食不足或喂食过盛、哺乳时间过长、或与母亲关系不睦。当然,各原因交错也导致了诸多症状的发生:当然,咬指甲是其一,还有为人尖酸刻薄、吸烟、酗酒、喜欢口交。其他理疗师建议将咬指甲归于"内在敌意"——毕竟是某种形式上的自残——或是紧张焦虑。
(译者 Canddi 编辑 丹妮)
上一篇 : 一马航客机在乌克兰东部坠落
下一篇 : 196本书带你看世界
Email: email@example.com


text:
High-ranking state police brass owned up to the trips in a report.
HARRISBURG - Three state police lieutenants - including the former head of the elite detail that guards the governor - were investigated by the FBI and the state police for their alleged involvement with prostitutes during successive personal vacations to Southeast Asia.
Records in a case pending in federal court in Pennsylvania say the lieutenants all admitted hiring the prostitutes on trips between 2002 and 2008.
An Associated Press review of the internal state police records shows the supervisors evaded significant punishment, and a Right-to-Know Law request found no evidence they were discharged or demoted, the state police said Wednesday.
The investigative records were disclosed in an employment-discrimination lawsuit filed by retired Cpl. Joe Farthing, a former member of the Executive Service Section, which protects the governor, lieutenant governor, and their spouses.
Farthing, who is African American and who lives in Lancaster, alleges state police brass concocted a racially motivated claim that he had improperly milked overtime while guarding then-Gov. Ed Rendell. He was not implicated in the Asian trips.
Farthing worked closely with one of the three, Lt. John Kruse, as the two top-ranking members of the Executive Service Section.
Although it's not clear what triggered the FBI's interest, by 2007, it was investigating alleged sex-tourism trips by Kruse and Lt. Brad Lawver, who worked in legislative affairs. Kruse and Lawver told investigators they had been joined by a third member of state police brass, Lt. Douglas Martin of the Bureau of Liquor Control Enforcement, according to state police documents.
The U.S. Attorney's Office in Harrisburg said a federal investigation regarding the Asian trips was closed without charges being filed, and prosecutors declined to comment further.
Rendell told the AP he had heard rumors of the alleged prostitution trips "through the grapevine, stuff about trips to Asia and sexual hijinks, but again, I didn't know there was anything illegal about them."
The three men told FBI agents they hired prostitutes in Thailand and Vietnam, according to a February 2009 general investigative report regarding Martin filed by Sgt. Farzad Sharif with the state police Bureau of Integrity and Professional Standards. Kruse and Lawver had just retired at the time.
Court records describe an unspecified number of private trips to Thailand, Vietnam, and Singapore that combined tourist outings with hiring prostitutes, in some cases for a week at a time. An FBI agent told a state police supervisor that during one trip, the men - it's unclear which of them - were seen by the FBI drinking heavily and entering what was believed to be a house of prostitution.
Farthing's lawsuit was filed in February 2011, but the detailed disclosures about the lieutenants' alleged sex-tourism trips, the alleged abuse of overtime by members of the Executive Service Section, and evidence the unit was poorly run emerged in court documents this year. The state Attorney General's Office sought unsuccessfully to have Farthing's case thrown out.
As state police leadership and internal affairs looked into the trips, questions about the ages of the prostitutes arose repeatedly. The three state policemen have repeatedly insisted none were underage, records show.
"There was no indication, wherever they went, that there was any children involved, which is what our concern was," retired State Police Maj. Charles J. Skurkis, who headed internal affairs at the time, said in a deposition.
Child prostitution is a particular problem in Thailand and some other Asian countries.
"The age of the prostitutes they were with was not a concern to Lt. Martin [because according to him, they all looked old enough]," state police disciplinary officer Capt. Francis Hacken wrote. Hacken recommended in January 2011 that Martin be court-martialed, but Martin avoided it by retiring two months later.
Hacken wrote that Martin "indicated that prostitution is a culture that is accepted in Thailand."
Now-retired State Police Commissioner Frank E. Pawlowski described the lieutenants' behavior as "sexual misconduct" during a September 2011 deposition.
"People suggested that they [prostitutes] were juveniles, but I was not privy to any of the evidence in the case that I could make my own conclusion," Pawlowski said.
Doubts about the illegality of prostitution in Thailand arose during the investigation, with Skurkis likening the men's conduct to someone visiting an area where medical marijuana is legal.
"California dispenses marijuana for medical use," he said in the deposition. "Pennsylvania does not allow that. If a trooper goes to California and a doctor prescribes marijuana and he smokes it there, is he in violation of the law? That case has to be looked at, and there's no immediate right or wrong answer."
Skurkis did not return a phone message seeking comment.
At some point, the department's own lawyers researched the matter and concluded the men's actions "arguably" did violate Thai law. Hacken's court-martial report for Martin said a customer soliciting a prostitute violates Thai law if the solicitation is done openly or shamelessly and causes a public nuisance.
A 1996 Thai law on prostitution prohibits hiring minors for prostitution, soliciting prostitution activities in public places, and the buying or selling of sex "where people are available for prostitution," said Janice Raymond, a board member of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women.
Those laws in theory would apply to the customers of prostitutes, but Raymond said the reality was that the women are the ones who end up arrested and charged.
As the FBI investigation was starting, the state police received a complaint from another trooper on the governor's detail alleging that Kruse and Farthing assigned themselves disproportionate amounts of overtime and accrued it under circumstances where it was not needed or when they were not performing work for the pay.
The handling of the Asian sex scandal relates to Farthing's lawsuit because he contends the department was tougher on him, a black man, than it was when disciplining white employees, including the three lieutenants in the unrelated case.
Farthing was pulled from the governor's detail and assigned to duty at the lieutenant governor's mansion while he was investigated for alleged overtime abuse. He retired about a year later.
Farthing disputes that he abused overtime, and says he was forced to retire in October 2008, believing he had been singled out for punishment because of the color of his skin.
The state police have denied racial animus was behind any actions taken against Farthing but said management of the Executive Service Section had been improved and the overtime issue had been addressed.
Farthing subsequently filed an employment-discrimination lawsuit, which is pending before District Judge Henry S. Perkin in Allentown. His case was recently scheduled to go to trial next summer, with Rendell among possible witnesses.
According to documents filed in Farthing's lawsuit, the agency moved to discipline him and Kruse for alleged overtime misuse only after both had retired, rendering any action meaningless.
Reached at his home outside Lewisberry, Kruse at first denied any knowledge of the matter, then declined to comment and referred questions to his lawyer, Jerry Russo, who did not return messages. Martin, who lives in Mechanicsburg, and Lawver, also of Lewisberry, did not respond to requests for comment.
Farthing's attorney, Harold Goodman, declined to discuss the case on the record beyond what was in the court file. The Attorney General's Office, which represents the state police in the civil case, declined to comment for this article.
The overtime allegations against Kruse and Farthing were reviewed for potential criminal violations, but the local prosecutor took a pass. Kruse and Farthing ranked No. 1 and No. 2 within the detail in total overtime from 2002 to 2007, with each collecting well over $200,000.
In September 2007, Dauphin County Assistant District Attorney Fran Chardo told a state police internal affairs investigator he believed Farthing had put in for overtime when he was not working, which "would support culpability for the offense of theft by deception." But, he said, there was a lack of oversight and Kruse allowed it.
Chardo, who recently announced his candidacy for county judge, also declined to prosecute overtime-related allegations against Kruse in March 2009, saying it was not in the public interest, partly because Kruse had agreed to retire immediately.
Kruse was denied an honorable discharge, and an internal state police report issued a few months later said "sustained overtime misconduct" practices would have justified court-martialing him and Farthing. Troopers who are not honorably discharged do not get to keep their badges or service hats, matters of great symbolic importance within the agency.
Kruse had been recommended for a two-rank demotion to trooper, a 25-day suspension, and an involuntary transfer; Farthing a one-rank demotion and 20-day suspension, according to a declaration by then-Deputy Commissioner John R. Brown.
The state police found that total overtime in the 20-person Executive Service Section fell from $612,000 in 2006 - a busy election year for Rendell, and the year before the investigation began - to $474,000 in 2007 and $346,000 in 2008, when Kruse no longer ran the detail. It skyrocketed in Rendell's final year, 2010, however, to $739,000, and was at $533,000 in 2011.
A good overtime year can yield dividends for the rest of a trooper's life, because pension amounts are based on peak pay years. Farthing retired in October 2008 with a $130,000 lump payment and now has a $72,000 annual pension. Kruse retired in January 2009, collected $84,000, and gets a $45,000 pension.
Lawver and Martin apparently were not investigated for alleged overtime abuse. Lawver retired in January 2009, received a $106,000 payment, and collects a $63,000 pension; Martin retired in March 2011 - weeks after Hacken informed him he faced court-martial - collected $131,000, and has a $69,000 pension.


text:
Recently the Pentagon released more details of last September's thwarted terrorist attack on New York: A few Muslim terrorists planned to stand in the middle of crowded subway cars and blow themselves up mid-tunnel. In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, most Americans worry about what's next, but perhaps New Yorkers are especially sensitized—things that go bump in the night, a fleet of wailing sirens, a subway car held a minute too long between stops; it all can make any heart pause.
Now, suppose the Next Thing isn't a suicidal al Qaeda henchman lurking in the subway, but a young, upper class, college-educated American woman who decides to blow up Barneys on Madison Avenue? We wouldn't have seen that one coming. A stretch? Not in American Subversive.
Goodwillie's wit serves his story well—in addition to all of the perfectly authentic character quirks, there's some wry terrorist banter, playful Post-style headline writing, and loads of well-informed satire.
David Goodwillie has set his expansive novel in the unsettlingly near future of 2011. In Lower Manhattan, Aidan Cole gossip-blogs his way into self-decay; like so many young professionals in the post-recession grimness, he has become disenchanted with his profession and pessimistic about his future. At night, Aidan parties with rich, connected, fabulous friends, including a handsome South American financier, Touché (who becomes the plot's perfect red herring), and Aidan's bland, unlikable girlfriend, Cressida. (The ostentatious character names are my lone quibble.)
American Subversive is at its best and brightest here in Aidan's world. An insider-y satire of the incestuous media world is at play—Aidan's boss, Derrick Franklin, at the gossip website Roorback.com, are Nick Denton and Gawker if fiction ever claimed them; Cressida, a newspaper reporter, is the archetypally ambitious lit-girl. And boy, she really is just so hard to like. Her disagreeable character helps only to propel the reader toward a certain empathy with the other woman in Aidan's life—the terrorist.
Touché, too, is a well-hewn caricature of that outlier every New Yorker counts as an acquaintance: the really, really rich, coincidentally sexy guy whose luck unfurls like a plush, golden carpet before his every step. Touché's family counts a sprawling Fishers Island estate and friendship with the likes of J.D. Salinger among their many assets. All this—the fun stuff that the most Gatsbyan stories are made of—is the material Goodwillie is most comfortable with, and it shows.
Which is not to say he doesn't do misguided politico-chick well. Indeed, it's remarkable that anyone would be able to ably achieve a narrative that captures what makes a female terrorist tick, but he pulls it off.
While Aidan's having ambivalent sex with his equally ambivalent girlfriend, Paige Roderick has left her job in D.C. and returned to North Carolina to mourn the death of her brother, a soldier killed in Iraq. Emotionally razed and adrift, she has fallen into league with her brother's old Appalachian pals—a band of neo-hippies dedicated to varying degrees of radicalism: Some are mere dabblers, happy to smoke joints and talk politics around the campfire; others, the ones Paige allies herself with, are violent activists, derivatives of and subsidized by aging members of the Weather Underground. The fine line between murderous fanaticism and impassioned activism is part of what Goodwillie aims to explore in the book.
When an explosion tears through Barneys, Aidan receives an anonymous email reading "She did it," and a picture of Paige. How did this normal, pretty girl become a dangerous revolutionary, and why does Aidan of all people receive such information? Aidan, under the delusion that involving the police or FBI would be a mistake, and half hoping he can break a major story and reinvigorate his career, decides to find Paige himself. Meanwhile, the radicals, whose previous attacks have been casualty-free, plan to set off another bomb, this time filled with nails, glass, and shrapnel—this time, meant to kill people—and Paige balks; American Subversive kicks into high gear.
Paige and Aidan's surprising connection to a Weatherman becomes the most interesting historical tangent. Fortunately, Goodwillie does not provoke post-Obama Bill Ayers fatigue, but effectively toys with the idea that some aggressive political movements were founded with good reason and reasonable intention, even if ultimately the wrong approach. (Lest anyone mistake the exploration of concepts here for any sort of advocacy for violence, he or she has missed the point.)
American Subversive skillfully spins the themes of morality, loyalty, and patriotism into an insightfully entertaining commentary on modern history and contemporary society. Don't mistake a buried exegesis for seriousness, though. Goodwillie's wit serves his story well—in addition to all of the perfectly authentic character quirks, there's some wry terrorist banter, playful Post-style headline writing, and loads of well-informed satire. This is a fast-paced, engaging novel of pop-culture and big ideas, authentically subversive, and thoroughly American.
Plus: Check out Book Beast for more news on hot titles and authors and excerpts from the latest books.
Claire Howorth is on staff at Vanity Fair and lives in Brooklyn.


text:
hot cross bun cookie sandwiches a couple years back and I knew I could never reach that level of perfection. But I decided to press on with my attempt, since I had a lot of egg yolks to get rid of. My interpretation is slightly different to Y's, with the cookie adding to the flavours that made this ice cream sandwich very much like a hot cross bun in taste. I decided to use my Orange Buttermilk Choc Chip Cookies as they were lovely and light so they wouldn' be too hard after freezing. I made them slightly bigger than the original recipe and added some cinnamon, using a cookie cutter right after baking to give them nice, clean edges. The orange zest in the cookies seemed like a great substitute for the candied orange peel you find in some hot cross buns. (I've never been a fan of the candied orange peel in the buns) Also the chocolate chips reminded me of the choc chip hot cross buns that I happen to love.
Lisa, my trusted advisor for all things ice cream and doughnut related, suggested that I adapt her lovely Christmas pudding ice cream, replacing the fruit and nuts with sultanas and currants. It worked perfectly, such a beautifully creamy and smooth ice cream that really tasted just like a hot cross bun, especially thanks to the sultanas and currants. I would be quite happy to eat the ice cream on its own to be honest. And before anyone starts complaining about the amount of wastage you get from the leftover scraps after using the cookie cutters to get your pretty round sandwiches, just remember you can re-freeze the leftover ice cream and crush up the cookie bits and have yourself an awesome snack with the leftovers. It's a great alternative sweet treat for Easter if you feel like doing something besides the usual hot cross buns. Just dont be like me, remember to close the freezer door or your sandwiches will go FLOP :(
Hot Cross Bun Ice Cream Sandwiches
(makes 12 ice cream sandwiches, adapted from Lisa's recipe)
3 eggs
2 egg yolks
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp allspice
1 cup caster sugar
2 cups pouring cream (min. 35% milk fat pure cream)
3/4 cup sultanas
2/3 cup currants
For the cookies:
Ingredients for Orange Choc Chip Buttermilk Cookies
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
100g melted white chocolate
Place the eggs, extra yolks, vanilla, spice and sugar in a heatproof bowl. Place over a saucepan of simmering water and whisk until thick and pale. Remove from the heat and beat for a further 5 minutes or until cool. Whisk the cream until stiff peaks form. Gently fold through the egg mixture until just combined. Refrigerate until cold, preferably overnight. Freeze in an ice cream maker, according to manufacturer's instructions. Fold through sultana and currants, pour into a baking paper lined casserole dish or large baking sheet with high sides and freeze until hard (at least 6 hours or overnight).
(Optional step:) Use a round cookie cutter to cut the edges off of each cookie so they are nice and neat. (I used a 7.5cm cutter) Place on a wire rack to cool completely.
When ready to assemble, use the same sized cookie cutter (or one size smaller) to cut rounds of ice cream out of the tray it was frozen in and sandwich between cookies. You have to this in several rounds to stop the ice cream from melting. Refreeze ice cream sandwiches until hard. Place melted white chocolate in a piping bag with a round tip and pipe white crosses on the tops of each ice cream sandwich. Freeze until set and then serve.


text:
THURSDAY, April 24, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- More than 7 percent of American schoolchildren are taking at least one medication for emotional or behavioral difficulties, a new government report shows.
Apparently, the medications are working: More than half of the parents said the drugs are helping their children, according to the report.
"We can't advise parents on what they should do, but I think it's positive that over half of parents reported that medications helped 'a lot,' " said report author LaJeana Howie, a statistical research scientist at the U.S. National Center for Health Statistics.
Howie and her colleagues weren't able to identify the specific disorders the children were being treated for, although she said 81 percent of the children with emotional or behavioral difficulties had been diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) at some point in their lives.
The researchers were also unable to identify the specific medications prescribed to the children for their emotional and behavioral difficulties, according to Howie.
An expert not involved with the report agreed that ADHD likely would be one of the most common conditions involved.
"Although the authors don't really talk about the diagnoses, ADHD is likely the most overwhelming diagnosis. Oppositional defiant disorder, anxiety and depression are other likely diagnoses," said Dr. Andrew Adesman, chief of developmental and behavioral pediatrics at Steven and Alexandra Cohen Children's Medical Center of New York, in New Hyde Park.
Data for the study came from the National Health Interview Survey, which continually collects information about health and health care in the United States. All of the information on children is obtained through parental (or other guardian) responses. None of the information comes from medical records.
Overall, the researchers found that 7.5 percent of U.S. children between the ages of 6 and 17 were taking medication for an emotional or behavioral problem. Significantly more boys than girls were given medication -- 9.7 percent of boys compared with 5.2 percent of girls.
Older females were more likely than younger females to be given medication, but the age difference among males wasn't significant, according to the report.
White children were the most likely to be on psychiatric medications (9.2 percent), followed by black children (7.4 percent) and Hispanic children (4.5 percent), according to the report.
The study found that significantly more children on Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program were on medication for emotional and behavioral problems (9.9 percent), versus 6.7 percent with private insurance and just 2.7 percent of children without insurance.
Additionally, more families living below 100 percent of the federal poverty level had children taking medications for emotional and behavioral problems than those above the federal poverty level.
Fifty-five percent of parents reported that these medications helped their children "a lot," while another 26 percent said they helped "some." Just under 19 percent said they didn't help at all or helped just a little.
Parents of younger children (between 6 and 11) were slightly more likely to feel the medications helped a lot compared to parents of older children. Parents of males were also more likely to feel the medications helped a lot -- about 58 percent of parents of males reported that they helped a lot compared to about 50 percent of the parents of females.
The report found that parents with incomes less than 100 percent of the federal poverty level were the least likely to feel the medications helped a lot. Just 43 percent of those parents said the medications helped a lot, while about 31 percent said they helped some. More than one-quarter of these parents said the medications only helped a little or not at all.
Of those findings, Howie said, "We really can't speculate what factors would account for the difference."
For his part, Adesman said there are many factors that might contribute to more use of medications in people living under the poverty line and for those on government insurance programs.
"There may be parenting challenges, such as more single-parent households, medications may be more available than access to behavioral treatments, there may be more logistical issues with nonpharmaceutical interventions, like getting time off from work," Adesman said. "Many more families have access to prescription medications than to non-pharmaceutical interventions. There's a lack of mental health treatment parity.
"It's encouraging that children who are identified as taking prescription medications are benefiting from those medications," Adesman said. However, he added, "There are nonpharmaceutical treatments for virtually all psychiatric diagnoses in children. For households where a child has significant emotional or behavioral difficulties, counseling, behavior management and some forms of psychotherapy can be helpful as well."
More information
Learn more about medications for childhood emotional and behavioral problems from the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
This article: Copyright © 2014 HealthDay. All rights reserved.


text:
Continuing a tradition of Harman Professional sound technologies being employed at the conventions of both major U.S. political parties, the company today announced that its JBL Professional VERTEC® line array loudspeakers were deployed by leading rental sound system provider, ATK Audiotek, at the Democratic National Convention at Denver's Pepsi Center. A JBL VERTEC system was also used for presidential candidate Barack Obama's acceptance speech at the city's Invesco Field football stadium, with Crown power amplifiers also in use at both facilities. The combination of JBL speakers and Crown amplifiers has also served as the sound system of choice for many of the party's recent election rallies and assemblies around the nation.
The Pepsi Center in downtown Denver opened its doors to Democrat convention-goers on August 25 and hosted key speeches by Senator Ted Kennedy, Michelle Obama, Senator Hillary Clinton, former President Bill Clinton and other party stalwarts including Vice Presidential candidate, Senator Joe Biden. The convention concluded on August 28 with an acceptance speech by Senator Obama at Denver's Invesco Field and featured live performances by Steve Wonder, Jennifer Hudson, Will.i.am accompanied by John Legend, and the Agape Choir, Sheryl Crow and Michael McDonald. The stadium swelled to an 85,000-person capacity with much of the infield used for temporary seating.
Event Sound Designer and Chief Engineer Pat Baltzell of Baltzell Audio Design specified 82 JBL VERTEC VT4889 large-format line array loudspeakers, eight VT4880A arrayable subwoofers and 68 VT4887 compact line array loudspeakers set up in distributed fill arrays for the Pepsi Center sound system. ATK Audiotek deployed 22 channels of bi-amped amplification with Crown Micro-Tech 1200 on the high frequency drivers Macro-Tech 3600 for low frequency drivers. The portable system for Invesco Field comprised 76 JBL VERTEC VT4889 full-size line array elements and 12 JBL VT4880A arrayable subwoofers in sports-venue perimeter configuration along with 32 JBL VT4888 midsize line array elements for delay-tower applications powered by three racks of Crown I-Tech IT8000 amplifiers. All monitors for the Invesco Field performances were powered by 20 channels of Crown Micro-Tech 1200 and Macro-Tech 3600. An additional battery of Crown I-Tech IT4000 amplifiers powered JBL Professional VRX928 compact line array elements for fill applications throughout the stadium. According to Mike Stahl, President of ATK Audiotek, the system performance, ease of integration and proven reliability make Harman Professional components the go-to solution in such high-profile applications.
"From the Grammys to the Emmys to the Academy Awards, ATK Audiotek's business is dedicated to providing excellent, highly reliable sound performance coupled with world-class customer service for the most prestigious events in the United States entertainment, sporting and political calendar," Stahl said today. "For these once-in-a-lifetime special events we cannot afford to miss a spoken word, a musical note or any subtle inflection, which is why we work with the sound components and the people from Harman Professional. JBL VERTEC loudspeakers and Crown amplifiers provide my team with the sound system performance to get our job done successfully along with the ease of mind to sleep comfortably before these large events!"
Echoing this sentiment, Michael MacDonald, Executive Vice President of Marketing & Sales at Harman Professional, noted, "Working with top professionals like Mike Stahl and Scott Harmala at ATK Audiotek, along leading event sound designers such as Pat Baltzell, we are honored and pleased to have our sound system technologies deployed in the most demanding and prestigious applications like the Democratic National Convention. But just as we are encouraged and gratified by the consistent use of our products in these mission-critical events, we understand the need to earn our customers' business with every product we build and with every project we support!"
ATK Audiotek Inc. can be reached at http://www.atkcorp.com/
Harman International Industries, Incorporated (www.harman.com), designs, manufactures and markets a wide range of audio and infotainment products for the automotive, consumer and professional markets. Harman International maintains a strong presence in the Americas, Europe and Asia, and employs more than 11,000 people worldwide. The Harman International family of brands includes AKG®, Audioaccess®, Becker®, BSS®, Crown®, dbx®, DigiTech®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon®, Mark Levinson®, Revel®, QNX®, Soundcraft® and Studer®. Harman International's stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "NYSE: HAR."


text:
An Awesome Book! is a little book about dreaming big, written by Dallas Clayton. This is an online version of the book, which you can read in any one of 17 awesome languages (or all 17 if you prefer). You can click on the text to hear Dallas read the book with a few awesome sound effects, too.
A couple years ago, Dallas wrote and illustrated An Awesome Book! for his son, but had trouble getting it published. Instead of giving up, he put a version of the book online for free, and self-published some copies. People started sharing the book, and he sold thousands of copies via word of mouth. He eventually got published and now the book has been read by people all over the world.
"Thanks for reading this book! Please feel free to share it with others. I love sharing. Let's all dream big together." - Love, Dallas


text:
Taxi Driver reimagineered to portray Travis Bickle as obsessed with Mickey Mouse.
(via waxy)
Taxi Driver reimagineered to portray Travis Bickle as obsessed with Mickey Mouse.
(via waxy)
From 1980, Roger Ebert interviews Jodie Foster, who is on the cusp of entering college. Here's an anecdote about Taxi Driver at Cannes:
The movie had been controversial. The president of the festival jury, Tennessee Williams, already had vowed that it would win a prize only over his dead body (it won the Grand Prix; Williams lived). The key people at the press conference were Martin Scorsese, the film's director, and Paul Schrader, who wrote it. The French critics were lobbing complex philosophical questions at them in French, and then the English-language translators were wading in, and everyone was getting nicely confused.
Someone finally condescended to ask a question of the little girl down at the end of the table - the one, you might assume, who'd been brought along to France as a treat, along with all the ice cream she could eat. The translator grabbed for the microphone, but Jodie Foster waved him off and answered the question herself, in perfect French. There was an astonished round of applause: At last, an American who spoke French! And less than 5 feet tall!


text:
New speed pocket delivers extraordinary distance, performance and forgiveness
CARLSBAD, CALIF. (Sept. 12, 2013) – TaylorMade Golf, which became the No. 1 iron brand in the game by releasing breakthrough products like Burner®, RocketBallz® and RocketBladez®, today announced SpeedBlade™ – a game-improvement iron that launches the ball exceptionally high and far.
Visually, the SpeedBlade iron is striking, combining a two-tone, satin nickel chrome plating with dark smoke satin ion plating (IP). Internally, the key performance feature that separates SpeedBlade from the pack is the Speed Pocket, a handle-bar shaped slot in the sole of the 3-7 irons that enables a large area of the face to flex and rebound at impact, resulting in faster ball speed, higher launch and better feel.
"The Speed Pocket performs where golfers need it most," said Brian Bazzel, TaylorMade's director of iron, wedge and putters development. "Our research indicates that 72% of shots by 5-25 handicap golfers are impacted below the center of the face. That typically results in low-launching shots of inconsistent distance. The Speed Pocket helps you launch those low-impact shots on a consistently higher, longer carrying and softer-landing flight."
Research also indicates that, the average replacement cycle for irons among core golfers is 4.9 years* – a significant length of time given the advances TaylorMade has made in improving iron performance. When tested, the new SpeedBlade 6-iron travelled almost ten yards farther with a 4% higher peak trajectory than TaylorMade's Tour Burner iron, which was introduced in 2009.
"Five years ago we challenged ourselves to create the best iron we could," added Bazzel. "We've taken everything we've learned since then and created our most complete iron ever in SpeedBlade."
Since Tour Burner, TaylorMade iron engineers have strategically worked with the company's metalwood team to better understand how to incorporate driver design into an iron. The result of that effort is the SpeedBlade, which combines a low center of gravity (CG) with TaylorMade's thinnest/fastest iron face to date. Along with the company's renowned Inverted Cone Technology (bigger sweet spot on off-center hits) and an improved Speed Pocket, SpeedBlade is truly in a class of its own.
Low CG and Speed Pocket = Powerful Combination
No other TaylorMade iron delivers such desirable launch conditions as SpeedBlade. The low CG promotes superior energy transfer from club-to-ball for consistently high launch and fast ball speed.
The improved Speed Pocket has been widened and lengthened, giving golfers more face area toward the toe and heel that promotes a high launch angle, strong ball flight and a steep, quick stopping descent angle. The Speed Pocket also features a cut through slot internally, which allows for more flex and rebound on the bottom part of the face, making the SpeedBlade iron set the fastest face TaylorMade has ever created, measuring right up to USGA COR limit.
Individually Engineered Heads/Distance Gapping
Critical to the overall performance of the SpeedBlade is progressive shaping throughout the set. The slender topline and sole in the short irons promote better workability, feel and control. The long irons feature a bigger topline to inspire confidence at address, and have each been optimized not only to promote phenomenal distance, but also to promote fantastic feel and sound – thanks to the vibration-dampening qualities of the Speed Pocket polymer and multi-material badge.
As metalwoods continue to evolve and deliver more and more distance, TaylorMade has engineered SpeedBlade to close the gap between the longest iron and the shortest metalwood in your bag. TaylorMade engineers have carefully managed the distance-gaps between clubs by meticulously controlling loft, face thickness, CG location, shaft, club length and most importantly through the Speed Pocket. The result is a complete iron set that delivers generous and consistent gaps between every club.
SpeedBlade Wedges
The SpeedBlade Attack Wedge (50°), Sand Wedge (55°) and Lob Wedge (60°) have a classic tour shape and blade construction and are sure to suit the eye of any player. Distinguished from the rest of the set by their dark gray finish, each wedge is optimized for feel and performance. The sand and the lob wedge feature TaylorMade's All Terrain Versatility (ATV) to promote great feel, spin and control from a wide variety of greenside lies. Each is equipped with a heavier steel shaft for improved performance and consistency.
Pricing, Options and Availability
SpeedBlade irons are available in 8-piece sets (4-AW being the most popular) and are equipped with a stock 85-gram steel shaft ($799) or a VELOX-T 75-gram (stiff), 65-gram (regular), 55-gram (senior), or 45-gram (ladies) graphite shaft ($899). SpeedBlade irons hit retail starting Friday, October 4. Wedges are available separately for $100 apiece. Learn more at taylormadegolf.com.
*2011 NGF Study


text:
|Loaves and Rolls, First Batch
|Loaves and Rolls, Second Batch
|Flat Breads, Sweet Breads, and More
I'm uber impressed with the quality of the breads in today's Yeastspotting round-up. So many fantastic breads, so many skilled bakers. Thank you for making this unique bread exposure available to us.
My goodness, this is bread heaven. I'm impressed with the variety and quality of these breads.
Thanks again for providing these round-ups. It is a great way to explore the world of bread baking. There are some people doing lovely things out there.
Your food photos are amazing! I've been lurking on your blog for awhile and finally thought I'd say something…. your photography is excellent.
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Susan Tenney, girlichef. girlichef said: RT @wildyeast: #FF YeastSpotted http://tinyurl.com/4wxjvjv @breadexperience @elra @cindystarblog @girlichef @kochtopf @kitchenpuppies […]


text:
YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK (AP) — A Montana man died in a rock climbing accident as he tried to climb to the top of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, authorities said.
Mason Robison, 38, of Columbia Falls, Mont., was killed after a rock dislodged and severed his rope as he and a partner were about 2,300 feet above the Yosemite Valley floor, Yosemite spokeswoman Kari Cobb said Monday.
The two climbers were about 600 feet from the summit around 9:15 a.m. Sunday when Robison put a piece of gear into what's called a "flake," or a deep crack in a large rock that runs along the slope, and it dislodged and severed his line.
Robison fell about 230 feet, with a second line eventually stopping his fall but leaving him dangling and hanging motionless.
A park helicopter flew rangers and search-and-rescue teams to the summit of El Capitan, where rangers, described by Cobb as "highly trained" in cliff rescues, rappelled down to reach Robison and his climbing partner.
Robison was pronounced at the scene. His partner, who has not been named, was not hurt.
El Capitan is a favorite climbing area for experienced rock climbers. Rising more than 3,000 feet above the valley below, it is the largest monolith of granite in the world, according to Yosemite's website.
Robison's death is the second accidental death at the park this year, Cobb said.
Earlier this month, a 73-year-old Minnesota man died when he apparently fell at the park's Vernal Fall after stopping to take a photo.