Dan's Tenacious Asylum Blog: The Blog for Controlled Insanity

Jaded at The Man

2011-11-29T20:19:00.000-08:00

This posting is dedicated to the status quo within each of us.

Dear Establishment,

I love you. You've done a lot of great work up to this point, made a lot of advancements. Great job! And...

(slap!)

What the fuck will it take? Seriously? What?

Are you that dumb that you can't see why so many people are pissed off?

Are you that dumb that you choose to employ the same strategy -- and even more of it -- to pacify the pissed off-edness that your strategy caused in the first place?

Are you that dumb that you still think you can invent something, come up with a new "tactic" to get what you want?

What will it take for you to change your ways? Do you really need a shit-kicking that will bring you to your knees? Really? Can't you become willing without it?

Stop lying to yourself.

Come on now, sit and be still for a while. Listen. Tune in and turn on. Take a workshop. Forgive yourself. Recognize the mistake(s) and move on.

Oh, you're too busy and comfortable and set in your ways? It's easier and safer to just keep doing what you're doing?

Ok then, fine. I love you anyways, but really, damn, save yourself now. Look at the way nature works and honour it; stop bullshitting yourself into thinking you have a better way that works.

You won't win. Seriously, this is a game you're gonna lose. How many more clues do you need? Another pandemic? More nuclear fallouts and oil spills? More extreme weather? More financial meltdowns? More riots, more tent cities, more rebellion?

Come on buddy, get real. I only want the best for you. You've got the resources at hand that will help with the change, and boy if you chilled out for a second, you would see the will you need is right here too.

I'm here -- as are my brothers and sisters -- for you when you are ready.

Blessings,
Dan

PS Answer key to a few the questions posed: 1. No, you're not that dumb. 2. No, it doesn't have to take a shit-kicking to become willing. 3. No, you're actually not that comfortable, nor is it actually easier nor safer to keep doing what you're doing than to change. 4. a. WTF will it take, and b. how many more clues do you need: I don't have the answer to that.
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Why I made my bed

2011-08-19T23:36:00.000-07:00

It may seem like a small thing. You make your bed, or you don't. Who cares, right?

That's how I saw it for years. Not to mention it's easier at night when you don't have to un-make the damn bed to get in it. I mean, gosh, my mom even has these fancy decoration pillows and every morning she makes her bed, the pillows go on for nobody but her to see, and at night all those fancy pillows come off till the next morning.

Crazy. And, I've got a friend who takes several naps throughout the day --> and still makes his bed every time!!

So with this obvious craziness exhibited by bed-makers in my life, why have I done the unthinkable?

Well, it's about respect, mastery and discipline. A ritual with depth and purpose. A conscious reminder that I am no longer "sleeping Dan". He is dead, gone, nonexistent. Making the bed kills all hope of him existing. The bed returns to official standby position, thanked and revered for its service as it is made.

Then, at night, the unmaking of the bed. Opening the world of comfort, relaxation, and the eventual slumber of deep sleep. Yum.

Taking control, making choices other than ease, for a greater purpose.

So, go ahead and keep not making your bed. For myself, I now join the ranks of crazy morning bedmakers.

The Truth is in Toronto: Waking Up to Waking Up

2011-07-25T00:08:00.000-07:00

Dedicated to fellow truth seekers and the Devil's advocate.

DISCLAIMER #1
You will probably feel quite disappointed with the information provided in this blog posting. It is a good sign, in terms of understanding what I am trying to get across, if you feel uninspired and/or uninterested after reading it. On the other hand, if you feel upset/agitated or otherwise emotionally aroused, you may want to read it over again until it becomes uninteresting.

DISCLAIMER #2
With what I have written below, I am not attempting to say in any way whatsoever to change anything you are doing or how you are thinking. Or maybe I am; I often have hidden motives, it seems. If so, sorry about that. I have no idea what you should do. With that said, I've made so many mistakes that I surely share some mistakes with others, and so some learning transfer may be possible. My intention is to get you to re-consider certain things you take for granted. Something I enjoy doing with my own mind.
**

FOREWORD
Goddess Maya. She's good. She knows what she is doing. Nobody better at it. I don't see how the person writing this can get out of it, not that he wants to. I was under her spell unknowingly for decades, knowingly for a few years, and only very recently has the spell occasionally broken, long enough to become lucid while in the dream. Unfortunately, even getting wiser to her ways more and more often, I'm still incredibly undisciplined, not getting laid, have my fair share of depression and anxiety, and the world still seems like it's pretty fucked up in way too many scary places.

Have you Woken Up?
In conspiracy circles, it's all the rage these days to "wake up" to what is really going on. You've spent countless hours researching pieces of history that never made it to the main-stream. You've got David Icke and Alex Jones as Facebook Friends -- assuming you haven't yet uncovered Facebook as a CIA tool and Jones as a disinfo agent. You don't go a day without sharing the movie Zeitgeist with someone, or talking about how Zeitgeist is itself an NWO conspiracy.

So, with all this dedication to the truth, with all this time and energy exhaustively spent to develop a world-view that's got the pieces to the "what the fuck?" puzzle in a more correct order than the masses, you must have woken up, right? To boot, look around and watch as people are spoon fed mind-garbage from an early age, taught to trust people in white coats, to watch the mainstream media for the "news," and otherwise accept their lot in life, including all the bullshit notions about why the world is the way it is.

You are wiser than everyone else. You *know* these masses are deluding themselves, asleep, just so incredibly ignorant and seem to be determined -- to the point of self-destruction -- to remain so.

That's nuts! The masses are clearly insane. And you see it. So *you* must now be awake to the truth right, since you see the sleep-walk they call "reality"? They dream, you see they're dreaming, and so you sensibly conclude you are awake.

You Have NOT Woken Up, Dammit!
Follow me here: you have now constructed an alternative storyline to what's going on, to what's "true," and so now see the world based on that storyline. Your actions, words, and thoughts are based on that new narrative.

You're not awake.

You're dreaming again. Except, this time you think you're awake in the dream. Goddess Maya has you by the balls. You think you have awoken and are now seeing the people around you asleep. You probably feel a strong desire to wake them up too; to have them look around and notice the craziness they've been living all these years.

Good luck with that. Even if you succeed and don't have a nervous breakdown including indescribable frustration in the process of "waking" them up, you're just having them climb out of their dream-boat and into yours.

Not to say that's not progress -- at least you and they have picked up some tools for the process of waking. After all, it connects (or ought to) with thinking for yourself; taking responsibility; having a desire for truth, for uncovering lies, for something better; and challenging assumptions. All of that, hopefully, in the name of truth, love, and beauty.

The tools are fantastically useful. You've got to keep going, though. You're haven't emerged on the other side of the rabbit hole yet!

Finding Wonderland
So how do you know you have arrived? When can you officially announce to the world that you have awoken (or at least that you are awakening)?

Boy, this is hard to put in words. It's like I'm trying to tell you what the truth of the matter is. When you've gone as far as I have, you'll realize just how awful, futile attempt that is. Just awful to put the truth in words. It ends up on your bed-pile of "why I'm awake" thoughts, right at the top where you can throw it around whenever someone asks if you're awake.

With that said, it can still be fun to try!

You are awakening when you have a concept in your brain-programming that nothing you say or believe in is true (even what I just wrote, to infinity.) It's an algorithm to ensure no more bullshit is added. From now on, only the "delete" key is in effect.

You will have awoken when you realize everything you believe in is not true. That everything you think you know is not true. If it's a concept in your head, it means it's not really true. If you no longer believe any of your thoughts as true, including the thought that says that "no thought is true", you're home free. Got it? Great, now repeat that forever, and you'll remain in eternity. If you can laugh a lot, even within your own insanity, that's a good sign too.

No Offence to Winnipeg
There is a not-so-famous saying that I like a lot: if you want to fly to Toronto, why stop in Winnipeg? You can get off in Winnipeg and call it Toronto, but you will probably feel very frustrated. Or maybe the plane stopped in Winnipeg, but now you have to wait to take off again before getting to your destination. Meaning, if you want to really awaken, to get to Toronto and finally answer"what is the truth?", go ahead and get out of your head. No more looking for the truth in a right concept or right philosophy. At best, they will point you in the right direction. At worst, they are your new dream-state, even more secure than before to keep you in the ranks of Maya's all-star team.

That's right, you can take off the 9/11 Truth t-shirt and cancel documentary night, if the truth is really what you're after. If it's lies though you're interested in (which is waaaaay more interesting than the truth anyways), go for it. (If not, that's fine -- just don't kid yourself that you're going to find the truth in those places. After all, how many more damn documentaries do you need to watch before having "enough" truth?)

Instruction to Awaken Right Now
1. Notice what is noticing this moment.
2. Repeat #1.

I know, that's kind of lame. "Waking up" should involve a massive forensics investigation, exposing lies upon lies, and then more lies. Years of work, interviews, accusations and so forth.

On one hand, I'd agree with you if you believed that. By uncovering bullshit, it's one less piece of shit that stinks your belief-pile. It takes time to wake up this way, and what your left with tends to be less bullshit than before, till there is none left. That could take a while. And don't bother putting undue effort into finding the "true story" to believe in, because the term is an oxymoron and will keep you perennially asleep in dreamland.

On the other hand, you can be awake right now no matter what. Just follow the instructions above. It probably won't seem that fantastic, though, since your story, your "monkey mind" and all the problems that were there before will still be there when you fall back asleep. And you will fall back asleep, trust me on that.

AFTERWORD
Finally, a note to help prevent this blog entry from having deceived you: Nothing I have said is true, even this sentence, which you would think would have to be true in order to fulfill its intention of pointing to the other ones as untrue. (In '60s Sci-Fi shows, this would be the moment where the robot's ears begin to smoke as the infinity loop blows its AI mind.)

Cheers.

IT's PAT! The Birth -- and Near-Death -- of a Superstar

2011-06-26T03:37:00.000-07:00

I don't remember all the details. My mind was pretty foggy at the time. Lots of booze and probably some dope mixed in too. I'd been a fan ever since Matt & I had a run-in with a machine at Fry's Electronics down in Silicon Valley, USA. Man, I loved Fry's...all those themes: Egypt, Maya, Amazon. Big-box stores, take note!!

Anyways, where was I? Oh yeah, Pat. Ok, this is in Before Pat (B.P.) times, we're talking. Just me, Dan, Matt, and a karaoke machine at the end of an aisle. Not long after we got back -- this was back circa the year 2000 (or, "3 B.P.") -- karaoke outings became a regular gig for myself and my buddies.

No big deal. Drinking, some weed, and heading out for good times. I much preferred the karaoke lounge than the nightclubs. Could never get anywhere with "the game" that everyone but me seemed to know how to play. Even a dozen gin-and-tonics later, I would make out no better than playing grab-ass on the dance floor. That got tiring and depressing pretty fast (though I still kept trying for years).

Luckily, there were a few local gems that turned on the tunes and let people screech and scratch sounds at the mike while their friends cheered and wooed. A little Paul Simon here, some Elton John there. Like I said at the start of this piece, I don't remember many specifics of when and how Pat was born. A few scraps of memory, some stories from those who were around. There are probably more facts known about the birth of Jesus than of Pat, to be honest. (No three wise men in this story, that's for sure.)

I'll do my best, though. A major karaoke hangout in Victoria was -- and still is -- Sopranos. Guaranteed action 7 nights a week, baby! Nice. I'm guessing it was 2003; probably springtime, appropriately enough. I was a lot of drinks in. I remember being on fire. A maniac on stage, couldn't wait to belt out the next tune and go wild.

Unfortunately, I couldn't write very well as the evening melted away and pitchers of beer came and went. No matter how drunk one is, though, you've GOT TO have it legible for the DJ, or else you aren't going on stage!

I wrote the next slip to give the DJ -- I believe a song to be sung by"Dan and Matt". It might have been the tune, "Bad to the Bone". Matt says I "threatened to kill people" in the audience while performing. Lucky he was there cooling things down to make sure people got the joke. (Yah, I was pretty intense and sometimes perhaps the "absurdity" part may not have been understood by some. It would have been pretty disturbing in that case. Oops.)

As the DJ read the slip aloud, he sounded confused, "What, huh, is that...'Pat and Matt'?"

And there you have it. Pat was born, in the drunken written ramblings of a madman begging for an audience that would pay attention to him. Not exactly a Christ-like birth with frankincense and myrrh, though on the other hand about as messy as childbirth.

Still, though, birth is only the beginning. It's what a person makes of their life that matters, no matter how pathological the outset might be. In the next couple of years Pat would go on to much karaoke infamy at Sopranos (including being kicked out one time for being too drunk -- I remember feeling pretty ashamed; and getting a stern warning for moving the mike stand around during the performance of "Eye of the Tiger") and a few other places that had karaoke nights.

Contests
Pat had his eye on the prize right from the early infancy. He had a few winners already like "She Bangs" and "Bad Touch". A local karaoke contest was announced, and you better believe he would be there!

As most karaoke contests go, I gather, it wasn't really about talent but about having enough friends to sway the judges. In this contest, it was all about ordering drinks, where you'd get a paper to vote on -- and Pat had a lot of friends to support him! He destroyed Queen's "Bicycle" (perhaps literally) and finished up with a strong performance of Ricky Martin's "She Bangs". Things were looking awesome. By this time he was several months old and had learned to chill down his booze just enough to not get thrown out of places...but still enough to fuel his performances.

Unfortunately, others had lots of friends to support them; apparently ordering water would get you a vote slip. So, alas, he lost. A terrible feeling of defeat.

Near-death Experience
Though Pat did not die that day, he was wounded. Only the desperate times of late-2003 would see him on stage in "full form", but the outings became fewer after that. Life changes meant alcohol would no longer be his fuel of choice. Karaoke outings with his buddies would no longer be the happening thing. Life moved on.

And yet, the superstar had been born. The rest will be history.

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AFTERWARD: There are no known photos of Pat. The closest -- pretty damn close, actually -- is Dan wearing Pat's outfit at his 2003 eviction party (photo shown at start of article). Video footage is rumoured to have been taken of at least one of his performances circa 2003/04, however its location and integrity are unknown.
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MANY THANKS: To all the friends who supported the birth of Pat. And Matt for making sure Pat only minorly disturbed the audience during his virgin song. If anyone who witnessed Pat version 1.0, and especially his birth, read this, I would love to read your eyewitness account...only then will the foggy picture I have created with this story become more clear. The accuracy of history is at stake!

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Facing the Mystery: A Story of Madness and Enlightenment

2011-05-26T00:10:00.000-07:00

Preamble: The following is based on actual events that took place in 2010. Enjoy.

He had no idea the hot water he'd be getting in to. At the time it seemed like just more "good stuff" in the intellectual spiritual realm. He'd done a stint with Eckhart Tolle's materials almost a year prior, and that had gone fairly well, helping to give him the freedom to choose to end the life situation he'd built up to that point. His quest for finding himself, a "new, better self" hopefully, had gone quite miserable that summer. Instead of finding a new, better self, he met the shit from his old self, the one he'd hoped had stayed in Victoria, again and again. He slogged his way back to the safety of his mother's second bedroom at her condo and decided he'd had enough. He quit. He quit putting absolutely any effort into anything, allowing only for what would keep him technically alive and his mom not too resentful that at 31 years old he was living with her once again. The habits wanting him to do nothing and avoid everything got free reign. Weeks spent watching TV, eating whatever was in the cupboards, and doing about as little as possible that a human being can do. It was one for the recordbooks.

He was still hopeful, though. He found his way to a couple of hundred hours of Adyashanti's lessons. Enlightenment, and all the answers that came with it, couldn't be far away after that. During one of Adya's talks, a lady mentioned books by Jed McKenna called The Enlightment Trilogy. More "good stuff" it sounded like, so he was game. After all, as much as he wanted to do nothing, a part of him wanted more than nothing. To keep that part of himself occupied, it didn't get any better than reading about the noblest quest of human existence, enlightenment.

A week went by and he'd read the books. Boy, he thought, they were a challenge. It was an assault on his sacred spiritual belief system through and through. Ouch. Anyways, it was time to move on to the next thing. Bah, but what was the next thing? He'd climbed to the top of the spiritual mountain. Little did he know, but he was standing on a precipice and about to take a tumble.

-Ch2-

Some time ago, he'd decided to write the story of his life. He started it, got to the early years, got bored and put it on the back-burner. He decided to start it up again. At first, it went pretty well. Filling in the years from his memory. Some good and plenty of not-so-good. Nothing catastrophic, but general shittiness and increasing shittiness as he hit his teenage years. The sexual memories came up. Reminders of the bestial nature and the longing of his desires, sometimes in forms totally unacceptable in the world. So alluring and so forbidden. Repression and suppression had been the name of the game for decades. He'd accidentally run in to a part of his shadow. The energy and thoughts it unleashed were intense. Some days without sleep. The sexual feelings kept him coming back for more, they were dark and they felt good at the same time. Along the way, his inner worrier had concerns that he might never sleep again, that his sexual thoughts would become overpowering obsessions, that he was transforming into who-knows-what. To top things off he had body twitches as if his cells were re-aligning (or something). Once, he thought he saw a "light-entity" move across his bedroom, and generally felt really spooked for many days. He had no context for this, no person or textbook or teaching that could tell him what the hell was going on. It wasn't a pretty time.

He had started journalling again too, after having taken a break for a few years. There was plenty of ammunition to write about. He would write his life story for a few hours and then run to his journal to help make sense of what he was going through, to give a little space and some distance to the process that was unfolding. One night, a part of himself, a very irrational one that "wants what it wants and that's that" (you can perhaps call it the inner child, but don't get too caught up on the label), started talking. Not only expressing verbally, but using his hands too. He was becoming a witness in the truest sense, not even sure who was controlling his body. Who responded was his inner therapist. After an all-night dialogue, he'd discovered things about himself and the way things work that could probably rival an LSD trip. On one hand it was illuminating and on the other hand he didn't feel in control of the process. He didn't know where it was going to go or whether he would ever get back to some sort of "normal".

A couple of weeks after the initial explosion into the unknown, he decided to write a letter to a friend to share what he'd uncovered. In the process, he poured out everything he could. It was amazing. In fact, to him it might have been the most amazing thing that was ever written, the most important discovery ever expressed. That letter might just lead to the transformation of humanity. Once it circulated and people saw it, the letter would serve to shatter their self-delusion and they would instantly become enlightened. Like a tidal wave hitting shore, it would overpower everything in its wake. It was too much to imagine. A thought came through his mind that this was what his entire life up to that point had been about. Every sorrow, every challenge, every terrible time had helped him to put all the pieces together and discover the nature of existence and to free existence from suffering. The next thought was that, since he'd fulfilled his life's purpose, he was no longer needed. He'd figured it out, shared it for the benefit of others, and at any moment the universal vacuum cleaner would come along and suck him away...just when he was getting the hang of being human!

He had worked himself up quite nicely. That night, he had no idea what was possible. Infinite possibilities became very possible, and that scared the shit out of him. What if with one thought he could end existence? He heard from the voice that was ready and willing for him to jump off the cliff into oblivion, or at least into total madness. It tempted him. Told him that God/Truth/enlightenment was in fact there. Then a thought came that he'd die the next day in a car accident; what's worse, he got the shivers that he believed told him the thought was true. He had the "opportunity" then and there to be ok with it, to "surrender" to the "fact" that he would die tomorrow. But it didn't sit right with him. Fuck no, in terror he decided that whether or not the voice was right in saying that surrendering to it would mean his liberation, it was too much to bear. This was not a mind battle he would win. His mind was convinced that he might die the next day and no amount of consoling otherwise helped.

It had never been so important for him to breathe. One breath. One breath. Not being sure of anything. Maybe he should have jumped off the cliff, though that would have meant putting his total faith in the voice of oblivion and accepting he would die the next day. He chose not to. The moment was certain, not the next, and that was as far as he was willing to be certain of. He went through that next day with his mind in massive concern, not knowing if the next moment would lead to his demise. As one concern faded, another replaced it. A thought came that what if he was wrong about a car accident, but that today would be the day and come in some other form? Or, maybe, since it had been after midnight when the initial thought had come, the voice had meant one day later?

He was on a trip. A bad trip. Anything was possible. Death was about to pounce on him at any moment. The story that had once assured him he'd be safe was now bringing terror with every step. Every small sound or word or sight could be the "signal" that he was about to be destroyed. His mind was looking for it, for the sign of its demise, and it was finding it all over.

No, he did not die, at least not his body. Nor did he break completely into madness. Close enough, though. A part of him seemed to have died, or at least diminished, that December. The part that wants to know the future—for, if the future is bad, would he really want to know? The part that relies on the illusion of safety for its sense of safety—for, if that illusion, the story that is, is taken away, what's left but the terror of its falseness? The part that wants some ultimate, final purpose—for, when that purpose is completed, what's left but to be recycled?

These were ugly ways of discovering truths, of discovering parts of himself, of discovering that personal exploration does not need to involve cliff diving. It's a big landscape of bullshit, the human psyche. Discoveries can be made slowly or quickly, by choice or by accident. What he decided in the end (so to speak) was that exploration of the mystery was a requirement of life and he could be the victim or be the master. He decided to become a master, and in so doing became a master (so he likes to think!)

In hindsight, the Jed McKenna books warned of all this: that enlightenment, the "quest for truth," isn't so much about finding the truth but running into the million-and-one lies one is attached to. That it can get pretty damn ugly. Thanks, Jed.

The most important question, ever

2011-04-15T00:52:00.000-07:00

What is the most important question ever? Some would say, "Why am I here?", others might ponder, "What is the meaning of life," or maybe, "What is my life purpose?" Spiritual people looking to reach Godhead-enlightenment Self-realization might spend decades in contemplation of, "Who am I?" or, "What am I?" in an attempt to shed the egoic veils from their consciousnesses.

I say, bullocks to those questions. They are mere child's play compared to the most important question ever:

What the fuck?

Some examples I thought of recently (being it election time in Canada):

Every day, more and more evidence is coming out at the Harper regime's atrocities to Canadian democracy and how its policies lead to social and environmental harm, yet polls show a Conservative majority is possible come May 2.
I ask, what the fuck?

Alternative media has never been more accessible and is far less biased towards big-business interests, yet most people still choose mainstream propaganda as their "information" source.
I ask, what the fuck?

We have a desperate attempt in Canada to use "strategic voting" as a crutch among progressives to make up for an electoral system that is flawed, yet last provincial election in BC, voting reform was soundly defeated.
I ask, what the fuck?

The Japan earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown is largely pictured in the mainstream as a "debate about nuclear" rather than a "debate about whether it's time to wake up and smell the roses about mankind's relationship to itself and the rest of nature". This, a year after the BP oil spill was just a "debate about oil rig safety and allowing more drilling".
I ask, what the fuck?

The war on drugs -- largely a war on the cannabis plant -- has been shown to create immeasurable suffering on society, yet Health Canada recently decided another plant, salvia divinorum, would best serve Canadians by being made illegal too.
I ask, what the fuck?

The worldwide economy is sinking in large part due to banking interests' activities, and yet these are the institutions and executives the US government saved and are relying on to save its economy, and possibly the entire world economy, from bankruptcy and destruction.
I ask, what the fuck?

There is ample scientific evidence GMO foods are not healthy for anyone or anything, yet government and industry continue to say they are scientifically shown to be safe. And, they seem to get away with it.
I ask, what the fuck?

CFL bulbs are a cause of electropollution and contain mercury, yet are supported by many environmentalists as a solution.
I ask, what the fuck?

There are plenty of reasons to suspect that vaccines, wireless devices, fluoride, teflon, artificial sweeteners, plastic food/drink packaging, and other conventionally accepted products have negative health consequences, yet they are taken for granted by many people and government authorities do not care to look at the hazards, at least not too closely.
I ask, what the fuck?

I could go on; there are just so many things that I ask, "What the fuck?" about. Though one could write an eloquent essay to answer each of my above ponderings, the only real answer I can see is that we are insane. Some more insane than others, but all, insane. Both conscious and unconscious harm done at the personal and planetary scale. In spite of evidence, often pointed out and plain-as-day, denial and rationalization are the orders of our times.

I don't know what's worse, when we harm deliberately or when we do it but don't even realize we're doing harm? I tend to think the latter is more dangerous, as it's much more subtle.

By the way, I ask the question of myself and journal my personal "what the fuck" topics very often. (Read: I'm not saying I don't have my own shit that I ask wtf about!) I suggest you do the same, you'd be surprised what turns up.

Salvia Divinorum Petition: Why it's more than just about a plant

2011-02-27T23:26:00.001-08:00

Recently I asked my mom why she had not yet signed the petition I recently started to keep salvia divinorum, a plant herb with consciousness-altering properties when consumed that's been used for thousands of years, from being made illegal.

[to paraphrase]
"Why the heck should I sign this petition, I don't give a damn about this plant I never heard of. Who cares?"

Indeed. To me the reasons were fairly obvious however after hearing what she shared, I realized it might not be to everybody. Here is Big Brother representative, Health Canada in this case, deciding that this plant is now too evil to keep legal and further deciding that the best way to prevent abuse was to put it alongside other "dangerous drugs" like LSD, DMT, GHB, and magic mushrooms.

I'll summarize my "why care about this issue":

It is an attack on your sovereignty, in this case your own capacity to choose what you ingest and affecting your own consciousness.
It's a plant and we are banning nature. Something about this is messed up.
It is downright frightening that the powers-that-be feel the need to use an ineffective strategy called the war on drugs, yet again.
The call for banning the plant is likely a political knee-jerk reaction based on a YouTube video of a pop star using salvia in a "party" context. That's not exactly how the best policies are formed.
If people (you) don't stand up, ask for -- and initiate -- change, there won't be any and things will get even more insane.
The issue underscores the amount of power and authority we as citizens have given to government bureaucracies to make decisions for us in our lives, as well as the (limited) mechanisms for citizen participation in crucial issues.

For me personally, the most insane thing is that the call from Health Canada to ban salvia divinorum and place it into the schedule of "controlled substances" (ironically titled since many of these substances are easier to acquire by teenagers than regulated substances like alcohol and tobacco) is that it's just about the most uncreative, unproducive, and ineffective possible option they could have chosen. Really, there is no more insane way to handle salvia potential for misuse than by making it illegal.

I won't go into to many details on the "why" of the insanity because I've already mentioned it in the petition preamble you can read here: http://www.gopetition.co.uk/petition/43191.html

I am hoping that, by having as many signatures added to the petition as possible, to show to Health Canada that there are a lot of sane, rational people who see that what they have recommended is insane and irrational. I am wary of calling it a purely political motivation (even though the announcement was made by an ex-police Conservative MP from Manitoba). However, it's most certainly misguided. Thank goodness there is at least a 30-day window for comments; otherwise we'd be *completely* at the mercy of the "higher ups" and their sometimes unwise decisions.

So, even if you have never heard of this plant and have no intention of even to smoke it, and even if you oppose the consumption of consciousness-altering substances, there is still a heck of a lot of reason for you to sign the petition.

On the other hand, you should not sign the petition if:

You don't want to be involved in social or political change.
You believe the war on drugs is a winner and a great strategy to prevent abuse.
You enjoy having Health Canada and other government authorities make decisions for you when it comes to natural health products and substances that alter consciousness.

Other than that, though, I hope you can take a minute and sign on to support the legal right of adults to make their own decisions, to oppose policies that don't work and in fact harm, and just basically, to support sanity.

Please, take a minute to sign the petition at http://www.gopetition.co.uk/petition/43191.html. If you're so inspired, read the Health Canada advisory at http://gazette.gc.ca/rp-pr/p1/2011/2011-02-19/html/notice-avis-eng.html, search for "salvia" to find the article; at the end of the article you'll find an email address where you can submit your own comment.

What to feed your cat -- go ahead and BARF.

2010-12-31T00:21:00.000-08:00

You might not have thought much about what to feed your cat. But luckily for you, I have. You see, I had two cats until one died in Sept 2008, and then a year-and-a-half later I gave up Doobie to a great home. My older cat, Tom, was almost 18 when he died of combo hyperthyroidism-kidney failure. In fact and kind of eerily, a friend's cat died at nearly the same time, at the same age, and of the same condition.

So what's this got to do with what to feed your cat? Because when I brought Tom to my vet a few years ago and had a blood test done that confirmed his weight loss was from the hyperthyroidism (which in turn helped minimize the kidney problem), the first thing the vet told me was to get him on a prescription low protein diet.

Now, I'll bet that 95% of people would go along with the vet's recommendation. After all, they have the piece of paper on the wall. And they deal with these problems all the time! But, not being a trusting individual of our "mainstream" medical system, I did some homework.

After many hours of online research including the blogs of several "holistic" vets, together with a holistic pet care book I owned, I decided to forge my own path when it came to Tom's, and Doobie's, diet and discovered things worth sharing.

First of all, 95% of all cat food is complete garbage, shit, crap. I can't emphasize that enough. It's the worst of the worst of our horrible factory-farm food system where chickens and cows are given feed they were never designed to eat and antibiotics to help them survive till slaughter. Secondly, the filler in most cat food (and dog food, which I could easily be talking about in this article too) is grain. The "meat" is typically "by-products" and "meal" (ie, chicken meal).

It gets worse. We give our animals dry kibble, mostly, and when it comes to cats they often keep themselves chronically dehydrated, meaning they won't keep hydrated enough for optimal health with the drinking water alone. They're better off getting wet food (at least alongside the dry kibble, if not replacing it altogether), or else their kidneys get strained over time.

And even if we're giving them "wet" food from a can, it's cooked. Now, how many cats have evolved to eat cooked food, I wonder? I doubt it's been more than 100 years since we've been feeding our pets cooked foods, and their bodies have not had time to evolutionarily adapt. In a nutshell, they're designed to eat RAW, WET, and GRAIN-FREE.

With that preamble, let me make the following recommendations. There are two tiers, "minimal sanity" and "high sanity". I suggest starting wherever you're at, and don't worry if you're in the "insane" category, because that's where you've gotta start.

0. INSANE CAT DIET:
- filled with grain
- the by-product dregs of our insane factory-farm food system
- meet the "minimum guidelines" for pet food, on paper at least. Usually they toss in lots of synthetic supplements to meet the minimums. Who knows and who cares how well the bodies assimilate the nutrients, as long as they're alive for today, right? Oh, and if the company puts pretty pictures of kitties on the bag and sponsors major pet shows, all the better.

1. MINIMAL SANITY CAT DIET:
- grain-free
- human-grade ingredients
- kibble, preferably supplemented with wet food. I steer away from recommending wet food only unless your cat doesn't bother the heck out of you to get it a meal..."always available" kibble was the only way I could keep sane with Tom.
- example of optimalness (available at all higher-end pet stores):

dry kibble: Innova Evo or Orijen. In Canada Orijen is the winner owing to its Canadian roots
wet: Natural Balance Chicken & Liver; Wellness Grain-free varieties; Evanger's Organic

2. HIGH SANITY CAT DIET:
- the above, except RAW. Note, each of the following recommendations comes pre-balanced with greens & supplements.
- my three favorite kinds (all available in frozen serving-size portions), which use hormone- and antibiotic-free meats, some of them free-range and organic:

Red Dog Blue Kat (avail. in Victoria at Bosley's on Shelbourne)
Nature's Variety (at A Pet's Life)
Amore Pet Foods (at Chez Terry's)

You can also make your own raw meals for your kittie, but it takes more work and knowledge and I won't go into that for now. The upside to BARF diet (Biologically Appropriate Raw Food) is that it's what they are meant to eat, and if you supplement with raw chicken bones their teeth will be squeaky clean too. The downside is that you need to make sure it's hygienic as you would with raw meat; you can't just leave out the food and go away for a few days on vacation; and it costs more. But if you can handle that you'll probably have an insanely healthy cat for a long time and hopefully minimize future vet bills. (Not to mention a debatable abatement of vaccines, owing to their now diet-optimized immune systems.)

My own experience? Well, I went with the "minimal sanity" diet from when I first started research, until the time when Tom died. He'd been eating a cooked diet for many years and he was old and decrepit and I didn't want to mess around with BARFing in his case. Along with a natural supplement to help his kidneys, he lasted another two years after being diagnosed. Then one day, he decided to stop eating. You can read about my experience with his final days in an earlier blog post.

After Tom died I went totally sane with Doobie and BARFed. She took to it right away and I never looked back!

DISCLAIMER AND THANKS: I'm not a pet professional, but instead an obsessive- and independent-minded animal lover. I suggest you take some time to do your own homework, or at least consider the "minimal sanity" diet, which doesn't require much change of habit. Thanks to my current cat-sitting and my friend Alix and her cat Django for the inspiration to write this.

FOR FOLLOW-UP: For the pet stores and foods I've recommended, simply look up their names in a search engine. I also recommend:
- Dr. Karen Becker at Mercola Healthy Pets ( http://healthypets.mercola.com/ )
- search engine terms: "BARF diet" and "holistic pet care"

2012, Times of Change, and Preparation

2010-12-20T17:02:00.000-08:00

About 2012, do you think it's “just” a coincidence that:

the Maya & Hopi and maybe other ancient cultures pointed to this point in time as an “apocalypse” (lifting of the veil);
there is an economic crisis stemming from the current paradigm of “what's really important” (money) to humanity at large;
the potential for Iran or terrorists or North Korea or whoever to blow us all up seems to be growing by the minute;
WikiLeaks is embarrassing the shit out of and manifesting incredible fierce backlash at it, most of which is by the embodiment-country of the current paradigm, the USA. And why, at the exact same time, support for WikiLeaks' mission grows like wildfire;
We have GMOs and nanobots and other techie things in development that, unlike nuclear bombs that can destroy everyone, can be used to make money and at the same time can destroy everyone (but since they can make money and slower acting than a nuclear explosion, they're like a “subtler” form of suicidal tendency);
Polarity in general is growing in the world psyche, and even those who say they now know the “real truth” after realizing the lie sold by government/corporate/media/bank etc interests (ie, certain activists, anarchists, progressives etc), only actually believe in a different lie, and that the polarity/resistance will only serve to annihilate each other (or reduce each other to mere scraps of their former existence);
Scientists say something to the effect of both a massive solar storm forecast potential and a seriously reduced magnetic field of the earth that could set up a “perfect storm” to wipe out the world electrical grid for a decade;
Alien sightings and crop circles have increased vastly over the past couple of decades (even taking into account greater reporting capacity and greater population);
things, from my perspective on the world-at-large, seem to be getting nutty nutty nuts at a nutty rate.

11 Ways to Prepare for Changing Times We're in and Times Ahead (aka Apocalypse aka “lifting of the veil”)

Societies come and go. Every single society ever has eventually ended and a new one begun. Not that it will happen to us, but you can't count on it not happening either. A transition between new and old societies might take some time, so it's good to start getting prepared for change. “Worst” case from these examples, if nothing much happens and things just buzz along swimmingly: you'll probably make a ton on silver, help the community, eat great food, be involved with great people, learn some great skills, elect better politicians, be prepared food- water-wise in case of an emergency, and de-stress your current life situation. Not bad whether all this preparation is “needed” or not, I'd say.

Stress management: Don't deal too well with change? Take up a spiritual practice (typically, involving meditation) and/or start counselling/therapy.
Survival storage: if you have the space, store a healthy amount of food/medicines/supplies. Assume: No food for six months, no water till it rains or in the local creek, and no power for one year. If you don't have the space personally, be open to share storage with others.
Neighbours & community: Be open to befriending your neighbours. You'll want to see them as friends. Put down the TV remote and check out your local community. You've probably never really seen it before.
Food: Support your local farmers, learn to grow food, and save seed.
Got time? Become part of a Transition Town movement or Evolver Social Movement or We Are Change. Each of these movements have existing chapters in many cities.
Got money? Buy hard silver, both coins and bullion (and not ETFs).
Got more money? Invest in micro-lending and community lending initiatives.
Learning & Skills: learn to sew, fix machines, build a shelter, make a fire. Communication/leadership, herbs, martial arts.
Politics: Support candidates who have sound character and integrity, and not just ones who belong to a particular political affiliation. Place your time and energy on picking the best local versus national politicians. Change happens on small scale much faster than on a large scale.
Information: Look beyond mainstream news sources as your source of points of view on where society is at. Don't believe any of it, and at the same time if you're already in the “alternative,” question that too. The world is not as it appears.
Move: If you feel the itch, head for an area out of major urban centres and communities who completely depend on the major urban centres. Lots of land to grow food and a friendly community is a bonus. Ecovillages, intentional communities, and co-operative farms are good candidates too.

Composting toilets deserve consideration

2010-04-04T12:24:00.001-07:00

As published in the Victoria News and the Peninsula News Review on Friday, April 2, 2010

With all the discussion around the nearly billion-dollar sewage treatment project, I have yet to hear of the suitable alternative that is much less expensive, much more environmentally conscious, and promotes personal responsibility for what gets flushed.

Composting toilets.

For much less than the cost of treatment, each home could be installed with one of the units.

Do your homework into composting toilets: you’ll find they’re proven effective at creating excellent compost.

If a community was to embrace the total use of composting toilets and appropriate grey water systems, it would have no sewage charges, sewage pipe installations and maintenance costs.

We’re in the 21st century. It’s time to think differently. And composting toilets deserve a fair look.

Daniel Tourigny

Victoria

Dead Cat in a Freezer: how a mortal cat achieved immortality

2008-09-16T21:18:00.000-07:00

Spirit. Life. Attachment. Impermanence. It is one thing to read about these concepts and another to experience a life situation that demands that I apply a new perspective on life. On Friday, September 12, 2008 I experienced firsthand and for the first time the so-called “death” of a loved one. It was a gift I am most grateful for.

I am speaking here of a cat named Tom, who spent the past seventeen-and-a-half years by my side. An awesome cat with just the right amount of arrogance. Over the past few years he had developed hyperthyroidism and his kidneys started to weaken – an irreversible, terminal condition according to the vet. I wanted to prove her wrong and set about to give Tom the best chance of recovery I could.

Final Countdown
Monday (t-minus 4 days): Alas, even with a better diet, supplements, and lots of love, the notion of ‘impermanence’ began to flood into my brain. My attempts to postpone the inevitable were no longer working. Tom stopped eating and began to sleep in far-off spots in the apartment, doing what he could do to follow his natural instincts when an animal approaches death.

Tuesday (t-minus 3 days): Life kept me busy and I had little time to contemplate what was happening. I was powerless to stop what was happening and that wasn’t something I wanted to dwell on.

Wednesday (t-minus 2 days): After Tom had not eaten for two days, I started to accept that our life situations would soon change; my heart began to open to the experience. I felt no desire to try to stop a situation that was asking me to let it be. His body was giving the signals it had served its purpose. Looking into Tom’s eyes and sensing his energy, I felt sure he was asking to move on.

Only Tom knows what exactly Tom was going through, but from his regular meowing at the bath tub, I began to associate it with pain and a desperate desire to let go of his body. His kidneys had failed and toxins were building in his system. Having not eaten and already being so thin from his hyperthyroid condition, I found myself having to dig deep to stay calm and present while seeing him in this state. His hind legs had begun to fail and he would stumble around and stare at the water bowl and bathtub in a plea to satiate an insatiable thirst.

Wednesday night came and I went to bed, knowing that what Tom was going through was his journey. It was no benefit to him for me to feel sorry for him. Still, as I heard his regular heart-turning meowing throughout the night, it was tough. To contemplate life after Tom, or to think about “the good old days”, brought tears to my eyes.

Thursday (t-minus 1 day): After a night of Tom’s frequent requests for release, I made an a.m. call to the mobile vet unit. At home and in familiar surroundings was how I wanted it to be for me and him. I asked them to come later that day, but Friday, 9:30am was the time they had available.

Part of me was grateful to have another day to say my goodbyes, but it would mean another day of needing the great spiritual and life teachings I had followed for the past few years. Being present, accepting and not resisting, offering compassion but not pity, contemplating that Tom was not the body a part of me believed him to be – these were among the pillars of my strength that would carry me beyond valley of the shadow of death.

Friday morning 9:30am (t-minus 0): By this time Tom’s physical decent was challenging my ability to stay sane. His back legs were spaghetti, his meowing was almost constant and he didn’t even bother trying to drink anymore – he had lost faith that anything of this world was his salvation.

Not a moment too soon, the vet and his assistant arrived at my door. It was surreal. In my fantasies the day before I had imagined breaking down, but instead I was calm. I escorted them to Tom, who was peacefully laying by the bathroom door awaiting what was coming. He had surrendered and so had I. I watched as the vet injected first a mild painkiller, and then a needle filled with an overdose of anesthetic. The motion of Tom’s ribcage ceased. The vet checked his heart, and confirmed that it was finished.

But he did not die…

Post-mortem, I looked into the eyes of the body I had thought of as “Tom”. Tom was not there. What I saw instead was a biological machine that had ceased functioning. I felt little sadness and if fact relief that Tom’s life force/essence/soul/spirit had left the trap of a body which now sits in my freezer and awaits composting.

I am grateful for Tom entering my life. But it was a love for the experience of Tom that I had, and not a love of his body. To feel him purr when I pet him; to hear him meow when I came home. That was Tom. Everything that matters about our relationship is within me – I cannot mourn for his death because he was not his body and so he did not die.

There is a part of me that wants Tom back. To hold on to a fantasy. It’s not easy to let go. But the nature of our physical universe is one of change and impermanence. The nature of spirit is one of permanence. I am moving on. And Tom has not died.

It's after midnight and I'm writing this and in the past that would not have been surprising but at this time in my life it is (fortunately) uncommon.

2008-02-16T00:07:00.000-08:00

To my loyal reader(s) of Dan's TAB...I am alive, and I intend to write some amazing, profound, life-altering things on this blog. They will no doubt blow your mind and hopefully provide some ways to put it back together again.

But not tonight.

toodles :P

I am BACK...and on Facebook (!)

2007-10-29T01:14:00.001-07:00

Greetings my Friends!

Yes I may go down in history as the person who updates his blog the least frequently, but I will do my best to change that.

I just got on Facebook, as a result of too-many friends nudging me to join them in the Web 2.0 revolution.

Why was I hesitating? Well, a part of me is like, "Leave me alone." Another part of me is like, "It's just too much to handle!!!!!!!!!!!!!" And another part of me is like, "It's a government conspiracy to control the world."

But then another part of me was like, "Okay, enough trusted sources have shared their love of Facebook, so I will give it a go."

Aaaaaahhhhh!!!!!

I got going and I was calm and everything, with entering details about what I like etc and linking with a few friends whom I knew were on Facebook.

And then I had the site do a search of my Yahoo! Mail address book.

Oh no.

I was instantly bombarded with a myriad of Contacts who are on Facebook. Most of these people I know longer communicate with (not for any bad reason...you know, time marches on...)

My impulse was to get the 'add-a-friend' train running full-steam and get busy with every biz-bang feature, but I have learned enough about myself the past couple of years to take a step back and breathe.

It helped. While I'm looking forward to getting back in touch with many of these people, I doubt it will be possible to meaningfully 're-connect' with most. I truly hope that my relationships will deepen as a result of Facebook, but *overindulgence insanity* is very much a possibility. You know, having a million "friends" and not knowing where you stand with any of them. Or, spending so much time on Facebook (or 'Crackbook, as I've heard it called) that my 'profile' becomes an obsession in itself and the number of 'friends' becomes the source of my self-esteem.
No thanks. I don't need anymore delusion, thank you.

It will be a real challenge to moderate my Facebook life. I have to say, though, that after dabbling at it for a little while, I like it.

Blessings,
Dan

Oh, and until next time, remember to choose sanity (or at least control the insanity)!!

Welcome to my TAB!!!

2007-01-01T00:01:00.000-08:00

Hello visitors and patients of the Tenacious Asylum. If you have been a longtime admirer of The Tenacious Asylum, then welcome back...yes, I am still alive!! To all the soon-to-be patients of the TA...it's about time!! The doors of the TA have been closed since last year's Christmas-time spectacular (New patients: go to the web site www.tenaciousasylum.com to catch up!!)

I've decided to change course a little bit so that the TA has more 'control' in the 'controlled insanity'. I'm happy to introduce to you Dan's Tenacious Asylum Blog, or, Dan's TAB. Of course, most of the time being on someone's tab is not so desirable--it means you owe them money. Now, though, you have a great reason to be on my tab and stay there!

What's this TAB all about? Anything I want it to be, basically. Interesting stuff, no doubt about it! My goal is to contribute to the raising of your consciousness, and help you lead a happier life in an authentic way. Keep in mind that I have not yet figured it all out myself (or else I probably wouldn't be living with my mom :-P ), so bare with me while I continue this journey.

What's cool about this blog versus the old way?

Well, more than 1 issue of The Tenacious Asylum per year for starters! Rather than a huge giant issue that will take you forever to read and even longer for me to compose, the TAB will be more digestible for all of us than its previous incarnation.
Also, you can leave comments about my postings right on the blog, so I expect interaction and feedback to go up. Yay!
Live Bookmarks :-) (AKA RSS, Atom) I didn't know much about them until a few weeks ago, but are they ever cool...basically, you save the link as a "live bookmark" instead of the regular way, and right from your "bookmarks" folder you can check to see if there are updated postings. So, until I get a mailing list going, you won't need to actually go to the site to find out what medicine I am serving up for the Asylum's Patients (our term for subscriber).
Inspiration. If I can have a blog--it's free and easy--why can't you?...do it!!

You will no doubt learn a lot about me as I write my postings. Expect that sometimes we will disagree, and sometimes you will not be interested in what I have to say. That's ok. I forgive you.

Ha!

And speaking of learning, I am still learning this Blog thingy, not to mention web site design, mailing lists, and all the other tools to direct my vast empire of goodness (oh, and I have to plan what that will be too). Hold onto your seats, baby!!

Welcome to Dan's TAB.

Until next time, remember to control the insanity!!!!