The Ostrich and the Elephant

A blog on spirituality, science, philosophy, ETs, and mental health

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  • Evidence for the Existence of Extraterrestrial Life

    Image credit to Shutterstock

    Preface

    This article is the result of more than three years of personal research into this subject, where I went from being someone who was vaguely interested in the possibility of life outside of our planet to someone who is now convinced that: yes, extraterrestrials do exist, and, yes, they also know that we exist. I hope you find the information contained in here as compelling as I did, and if you do, please share it so we can get the message out on what I think is the most important topic in our world today. Thanks!

    The Story

    I was never very interested in UFOs or the possibility of extraterrestrial life growing up. I mean, I knew how unfathomably big the universe was, and how it was very possible there were other lifeforms living within it, but as for them visiting us or communicating with us? I was very unconvinced. I used to think what a lot of people do, that it’s either people with fanciful imaginations, mistaken sightings, or Star Trek nerds who want to make their life more interesting. (no offence to Star Trek nerds, I have never seen the show 😛 )

    However, as I spoke about in my last blog “My disastrous spiritual awakening”, along my spiritual path I came across a person who claimed to channel an extraterrestrial entity called “Bashar”. Despite being very skeptical about this in the beginning, I soon became blown away by the clarity and wisdom he shared, and this opened me up to the possibility that maybe, just maybe, I could have been wrong about this.

    I wasn’t content to have my belief in extraterrestrials based on a channeller though – I would need a lot more convincing than that, and a lot more “down to earth” evidence that pointed in that direction.

    This initially came through a researcher called Richard Dolan, someone Bashar had actually recommended in one of his channeling sessions, along with his book, “A.D. After Disclosure: When the Government Finally Reveals the Truth About Alien Contact”. I’ve since come to buy any book that Bashar recommends, because his insight is so great; the other book he recommended being a series called “Conversations with God” by Neale Donald Walsch, which is fantastic, and I highly recommend reading or listening to the audiobooks. The more recent fourth volume of this series, called “Awaken the Species” actually specifically deals with the topic of extraterrestrials, or as he calls them “highly evolved beings” (HEBs), and it is just as good as the previous three volumes.

    Nevertheless, my first introduction to “earthly” research on this topic came through Richard Dolan, when I watched his After Disclosure lecture, which can be found here:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYYcWcENEEM&t=5526s

    In this lecture he takes a hypothetical look at what will happen on Earth once this truth finally comes out.

    One of the notable inclusions in this lecture is when he mentions the famous “Twining Memo”, otherwise known as “The estimate of the situation”, where U.S. General Nathan Twining responded to an inquiry by another general about the phenomenon of “flying discs” that were being witnessed. His estimate is revealing:

    He states: “It is the opinion that:
    a. The phenomenon is something real and not visionary or fictitious.
    b. There are objects probably approximating the shape of a disc, of such appreciable size as to appear to be as large as man-made aircraft.
    c. There is a possibility that some of the incidents may be caused by natural phenomena, such as meteors.
    d. The reported operating characteristics such as extreme rates of climb, maneuverability (particularly in roll), and motion which must be considered evasive when sighted or contacted by friendly aircraft and radar, lend belief to the possibility that some of the objects are controlled either manually, automatically or remotely.
    e. The apparent common description is as follows:-

    1. Metallic or light reflecting surface.
    2. Absence of trail, except in a few instances where the object apparently was operating under high performance conditions.
    3. Circular or elliptical in shape, flat on bottom and domed on top.
    4. Several reports of well kept formation flights varying from three to nine objects.
    5. Normally no associated sound, except in three instances a substantial rumbling roar was noted.
    6. Level flight speeds normally above 300 knots are estimated.

    He ends the memo stating that the observed phenomena represent something “not known to this command”.

    The full version of the report can be found here:
    http://www.roswellfiles.com/FOIA/twining.htm

    The real issue with talking about the ET subject is not “what evidence is there to prove this” it’s “what evidence out of the abundance of information out there should I start with?”

    I’ve never really been very interested in UFO sightings, and I’m still not really. I think they are the least reliable sources of evidence. What I am interested in is government and military documents which prove that government and military personnel have been VERY interested in this topic for a very long time.

    As UFO researcher Grant Cameron said, “The problem is not that we don’t have the evidence; the problem is we have a hard time getting it out to the public.” Or, as ex-nuclear physicist Stanton Friedman said, “There is no doubt in my mind, after 37 years of study and investigation, that the evidence is overwhelming that planet Earth is being visited by intelligently controlled vehicles whose origin is extraterrestrial. There are no acceptable arguments against the flying saucer reality, only people who either haven’t studied the relevant data or have a strong will not to believe that Earth is at the bottom of the heap sociologically and technologically in our local galactic neighborhood.”

    Dr J Allen Hynek, the scientist appointed to head the seemingly “official” Air Force inquiry into this matter (project “Blue Book”) said to Dr Steven Greer that despite the efforts of the project to dismiss anything unusual, that there were an “embarrassment of riches” in terms of the evidence. And, despite the official report that there was “nothing to be seen here”, Dr Hynek later became a UFO believer himself.

    I just finished rewatching the 2017 Netflix documentary “Unacknowledged: An Expose of the World’s Greatest Secret” by Dr Steven Greer, which, I don’t think is an exaggeration to say that it is one of if not the most important documentaries ever made – not only because it shows there has been a cover up, but because it delves into how and why this cover up has gone on for so long. On the second time of viewing it, I went to the trouble of listing all the significant quotes mentioned in it by very high ranking people, including former presidents, military generals, and a director of the CIA.
    They are as follows:

    “The phenomenon of UFOs does exist, and it must be treated seriously.” – Mikhail Gorbachev, former President of Russia

    “I can assure you that flying saucers, given that they exist, are not constructed by any power on Earth.” – President Harry S Truman

    “I feel that the Air Force has not been giving out all the available information on these Unidentified Flying Objects. You cannot disregard so many unimpeachable sources.” – Honorable John McCormack, Speaker of the House

    “I believe that these ET vehicles and their crews are visiting this planet from other planets, which obviously are a little more technically advanced than we are here on Earth.” – Astronaut Gordon Cooper

    “I knew that we didn’t have any vehicles of that kind, the Russians didn’t have any of that type either. At that point in time there was no doubt in my mind that this vehicle was made at some other place than here on Earth.” – Gordon Cooper again

    “Yes, there have been ET visitation. There have been crashed craft. There have been material and bodies recovered. And there is some group of people somewhere that may or may not be associated with government at this point, but certainly were at one time, that have this knowledge, and have been attempting to conceal this knowledge.” – Dr Edgar Mitchell, 6th man on the moon

    “I believe the American people are entitled to a more thorough explanation than has been given them by the Air Force. I think we owe it to the people to establish credibility regarding UFOs, and to produce the greatest possible enlightenment of the subject.” – Former President Gerald Ford

    “Of course flying saucers are real, and they are interplanetary” – Air Chief Marshall Lord Dowding

    “We have indeed been contacted – perhaps even visited – by extraterrestrial beings, and the US government, in collusion with the other national powers of the Earth, is determined to keep this information from the general public.” – Victor Marchetti, former Special Assistant to the Executive Director of the CIA

    Document from the Canadian government:

    “a. The matter is the most highly classified subject in the United States government, rating higher even than the H-bomb.
    b. Flying saucers exist.
    c. Their modus operandi is unknown, but concentrated effort is being made by a small group headed by Doctor Vannevar Bush.
    d. The entire matter is considered by the United States authorities to be of tremendous significance.”

    “I am convinced that UFOs exist because I’ve seen one.” – Former President Jimmy Carter

    “It is time for the truth to be brought out. Behind the scenes, high-ranking Air Force officers are soberly concerned about the UFOs. But through official secrecy and ridicule, many citizens are led to believe the unknown flying objects are nonsense. I urge immediate Congressional action to reduce the dangers from secrecy about unidentified flying objects.” – Former CIA Director Vice Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter

    As part of the Freedom of Information Act, the FBI released a memo sent from special agent Guy Hottel addressed to J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI, three years after the Roswell crash. This is now public record and has become the number 1 document viewed on the FBI website since its release. The memo states:

    “Subject: Information concerning Flying Saucers

    An investigator for the Air Forces stated that three so-called flying saucers had been recovered in New Mexico. They were described as being circular in shape with raised centres, approximately 50 feet in diameter. Each one was occupied by three bodies of human shape but only 3 feet tall, dressed in metallic cloth of a very fine texture. Each body was bandaged in a manner similar to the blackout suits used by speed flyers and test pilots.

    According to Mr [blacked out] informant, the saucers were found in New Mexico due to the fact that the Government has a very high-powered radar set-up in that area, and it is believed the radar interferes with the controlling mechanism of the saucers.”

    Link here:
    https://vault.fbi.gov/hottel_guy/Guy%20Hottel%20Part%201%20of%201/view

    There is a great youtube video done by the screenwriter for the films “21” and “The Social Network”, Ben Mezrich, called “Why I believe in UFOs and You Should Too” where he discusses, among other things, the famous “Roswell” incident of 1947 –
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urKhVssiygA&t=4s

    The Roswell incident was actually a very interesting event, and not many people know the story, because it has been so clouded in secrecy and ridicule for so many years. Basically, there was some type of crashed craft retrieved, and the Air Force (amazingly) released a statement saying, “We now have in our possession a flying saucer”. Two hours later they retracted that statement and brought out the now-famous “weather balloon” photograph. The interesting thing about that weather balloon photograph is that every person involved in taking that photograph: the cameraman, the person in the photograph, and the person who ordered the photograph be taken, all later came out and said that it was a fake and what was found was not a weather balloon. Not to mention that this doesn’t even mention the three bodies that were recovered and detailed in the Guy Hottel report. To this day the Air Force has not released the files related to this event.

    A Newspaper from 1947 headlining the Roswell crash


    For those who say, “if this were true then where are all the whisteblowers? How could they keep this secret if people knew?”

    Well, Steven Greer released another great documentary a few years ago called “Sirius”, which is interview after interview with air traffic controllers, pilots, military personnel, etc all testifying of their personal experiences of this phenomenon. Here is the link for that documentary:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYIk2kfiL0Q

    One of the most interesting cases of a mass UFO sighting occurred in Phoenix, Arizona in 1997. About 10% of the state of Arizona was outside one night looking up at the sky to witness the Hale-Bopp comet that was meant to be passing by that night. Instead, a formation of lights appeared above Phoenix belonging to a ship about a mile wide, flying low and slowly on a trajectory crossing all major cities in Arizona. At the time, Arizona governor Fife Symington denied witnessing the event, and went along with the official Air Force explanation that these were “military flares” (he now admits this was not true, he did witness the event, and acknowledges that they were not military flares). Given that about 10% of the state witnessed this, there are obviously countless testimonies, including from quite prominent people, some of whom are included in this documentary:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAsEBtICIWU&t=2404s&fbclid=IwAR3CG-lZCNF6JPyiQIFKOwWYXSsIRdFR8fBgrHABUBuS1W788dJ2oiRRT3o

    Fife Symington now believes he, along with all the others, witnessed a UFO.

    Another former government official, Canadian Defence Minister Paul Hellyer has now come out as a whistleblower for the reality of the extraterrestrial phenomenon. He’s pretty old now so his approach is rather… straight to the point! See him here at the Citizen’s Hearing for Disclosure:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgUYEQ_2QpU

    And here is Richard Dolan giving a speech at the same hearing:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iROkeC3lmVA

    Now I will discuss more recent events circulating around the 2016 election, including some very interesting remarks from Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and former Bill Clinton Chief of Staff John Podesta.

    Part 2

    “The implications of this are so vast and so profound that no aspect of life will be unchanged when it comes out.” – Laurance S. Rockefeller to Dr Steven Greer

    2016 was a big year in the field of UFO research. With the U.S. election and Wikileaks revelations, a lot of things began to come out of the woodwork. Notable among these was Hillary Clinton’s expressed interest in the topic through her campaign manager and former Bill Clinton Chief of Staff John Podesta.

    John Podesta has been a long-time advocate for the disclosure of the UFO files. In 2014, upon leaving his position as Counselor to the President in the Obama administration, he tweeted: “Finally, my biggest failure of 2014: Once again not securing the #disclosure of the UFO files. #thetruthisstilloutthere”

    Some people may have passed this off as a light-hearted comment from someone having a little joke at the end of his role in office, but Podesta was serious, and has been serious about this topic for a long time.

    Here he is at the National Press Club where he says: “I think it’s time to open the books on questions that have remained in the dark, on the question of government investigation of UFOs. It’s time to find out what the truth really is that’s out there. We ought to do it really because it’s right. We ought to do it because, quite frankly, the American people can handle the truth. And we ought to do it because it’s the law.”
    Video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9ttSXYwZsg

    This is not the only time he has spoken so candidly about this either. When Hillary Clinton was interviewed by Lena Dunham, he tweeted, “Great interview, @lenadunham. But Lena, ask her about aliens next time!! #TheTruthIsOutThere”

    And here he is speaking to Jake Tapper on the issue:
    Podesta: I think that the U.S. government could do a much better job in answering the questions, the legitimate questions, that people have about what’s going on with Unidentified Aeriel Phenomena, and they should – you know, the American people can handle the truth, so they should just do a thorough search and open it up.
    Tapper: What is the truth, is there evidence of alien life?
    Podesta: You know, that’s for the public to judge once they’ve seen all the evidence that the U.S. government has.
    Tapper: What do you think? What do you think personally?”
    Podesta: What do I think?
. I think there’s a lot of planets out there.” 
    Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLeH7Ujj9vw 

    Here are The Young Turks responding to this interview, where Cenk Uygur says: “When I read this story I thought it was tongue-in-cheek and, you know, largely kidding, but kind of serious at the same time
 Wow that was not tongue-in-cheek! Wow that was totally serious!
    Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5rBPgzLZCo

    One of the most damning and revealing pieces of evidence for this came through a Wikileaks revealed email between John Podesta and Eric Brys thanking Podesta for his work on uncovering the truth about UFOs for future generations, with Podesta then thanking Brys for the email, saying “Thanks for your support. We will keep at it.”
    Podesta’s leaked emails were littered with references to UFOs and disclosure, and this to me seems like a smoking gun admission that John Podesta is working very hard on this issue. The email can be found here: 
    https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/33010 
    And remember, Wikileaks has a 100% record for producing legitimate documents.

    Now we come to a more light-hearted but very interesting part of what happened during the 2016 campaign. Those who know Hillary Clinton know she has had a long-standing interest in the topic of UFOs, and was pictured at the Rockefeller Ranch with Laurance S. Rockefeller holding a book by Paul Davis entitled, “Are We Alone: Philosophical Implications of the Discovery of Extraterrestrial Life”.

    Clinton (left), with Laurance S. Rockefeller holding Paul Davis’ book, “Are We Alone? Philosophical Implications of the Discovery of Extraterrestrial Life”

    The reason this became more light-hearted was because both Clinton and Obama were asked directly about this issue on Jimmy Kimmel’s late night TV show, Jimmy Kimmel Live!.

    Anyone who understands politics will understand that politicians on these talk shows are given what questions they will be asked prior to appearing, so they can prepare their answers. This means that what both Clinton and Obama said were very carefully worded replies, which makes them all the more interesting.

    Here is Obama’s appearance: 
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYzRY2XpLBk

    Here is Hillary Clinton’s appearance: 
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R95X8rwYD9o

    Given the context of all the available evidence, their replies are quite interesting. If there was no evidence there, why would Obama respond to Kimmel’s question of whether he looked into the UFO files by saying, “I can’t reveal anything”? It seems to me that is suggesting there is something there and he is answering honestly: that he can’t reveal it. Because how could he? How could he come on national TV and come out straight with, “Oh yes Jimmy, I looked and there is literally mountains of evidence supporting the fact that we are not alone in the universe.” He could never say that. It would panic the public. What he said seems to come as close to indicating there is something there without coming straight out and saying it. And think about it from the opposing perspective: If he looked and there really was nothing there, would he ever say on national TV “I can’t reveal anything”, and risk worrying the public that there is something there? What reason would he have to do that?

    In Hillary Clinton’s case, it is just as interesting. Kimmel says: “I asked your husband this and he said there was nothing there.” To which Clinton replies: “Well
” and Jimmy, shocked, says “Oh!” Clinton then continues: “I’m going to do it again, right?” Something else interesting happens here: she tries to move away from the acronym UFO (an acronym with a lot of psychological baggage attached to it) and uses a new, fresh term: “UAP” – Unidentified Aeriel Phenomenon. Again, here it appears she is saying yes this phenomenon is real, and yes we take it seriously enough to have come up with a new term for it to move away from all the spookiness of the term “UFO” and all the little green men that term conjures up in the mind.

    And finally, here is a news report from the 2016 campaign detailing Podesta and Clinton’s interest in UFOs. In it, it quotes Clinton as saying: “I think we may have been (visited already). We don’t know for sure.” And, “Maybe we could have, like, a task force to go to Area 51.” Why the president would need a task force to go to Area 51 is beyond me – unless of course presidents have asked for information previously and been denied (which has been claimed many times).
    Video here: 
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3qZbXbTxfI

    So the question remains WHY then? Why after all this evidence is the public still largely in the dark on this issue? Well, I think there are a couple of reasons. Firstly, there has been a lot of disinformation and ridicule of this topic, which has ingrained it in our psyche that this is not something to be taken seriously. But more importantly, I think it’s a deeper psychological issue: People will only open up to and accept what they are psychologically ready to open up to and accept. There’s a phenomenon in psychological research called cognitive dissonance, where, if people are shown evidence that is contrary to their particular belief or behaviour, they will disregard the evidence, even if it is credible, just to avoid the discomfort that goes along with having their beliefs or behaviours brought into question. We really like to think we know how the world works, it makes us feel comfortable in a world that’s often difficult to make sense of. So we hold onto our beliefs, even in the face of significant opposing evidence, just in order to avoid feeling uncomfortable.

    There is really a lot more I could write on this topic, but I think that this post is enough for now. My challenge to you, the reader, is to go out there and look for yourself! Keep your mind open (although still use your own discernment obviously), and consider the possibility that maybe, just maybe, we as a collective society have been very very wrong about something very big for a very long time.

    For more stories like this, including mental health, extraterrestrials, and spirituality, please subscribe to my blog, follow my Facebook page “The Ostrich and the Elephant”, or find me on Twitter @willkenway, Medium @willkenway, or Instagram @will.kenway. Thanks!

  • My disastrous spiritual awakening

    Preface

    This is one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to share publicly, and those of you who read it might understand why once you’ve read it.

    Nine months ago I was just about to start what I thought would be a writing career about my story of spiritual awakening, extraterrestrials, and any other topic that interested me.

    Then some things happened. Some not very good things. And I wondered whether it was really what I should be doing.

    But, I still feel like this is what I am most passionate about, so I decided to still write, and be completely honest about my experience, warts and all.

    So here I am… This is my story, and these are the things I am passionate about. Despite the horrible twists and turns my life took over the last nine months, I still feel like this is what I should be doing, and I still believe honesty is always the best medicine, so I’ve included it all.

    For those of you who do read it, there is another post on my blog which may give some context to this one — it’s called, “Evidence for the Existence of Extraterrestrial Life”, which might help explain why I believed what I was experiencing to be true.

    And for those of you who think spirituality is all just mumbo-jumbo woo-woo talk, I wrote a blog called “What the hell is spirituality anyway?” which you might also find interesting.

    I have made these posts public, so feel free to share them if you find any of them interesting.

    I hope some of my posts resonate with you.

    Will.

    The Story

    My story – a bit like the story of humanity as a whole – is not always a pretty one. In fact, at times it was downright horrendous. But – also as I see it like the story of humanity as a whole – it contains within it a great hope and redemption. This is the story of my life’s struggle with mental illness, and how I recovered and eventually found awakening through my spiritual path.

    I was always a pretty quiet and reflective kid. My mum likes to tell a story about how I was staring out the window in a car one day daydreaming, and she looked back and thought, “I wonder what he’s thinking about?”

    Eventually her curiosity got the better of her: “What are you thinking about, Will?” She asked.

    “I know who Jesus was, Mummy,” I replied.

    “Oh do you?” She asked.

    “Jesus was God.”

    And I still agree with my child self back then. Now, I don’t believe in God the way a lot of people believe in God. I don’t think there’s some magical heavenly being that is orchestrating events. I use the word God as a way to describe the ultimate nature of reality itself, which I believe is beyond the capacity of the human mind to comprehend, given that our brains really only evolved to pick berries, have sex, and navigate what we perceive of as the “physical world.”

    And I believe – based on what I have read of him – that Jesus was a person who achieved this realization of his “God self”. What some people have called enlightenment, awakening, or self-realization – the realization that ultimately what we are is not separate from what reality is. As Alan Watts once said: “What you are deep deep down, far far in, is simply the fabric and structure of existence itself.” And I believe it is possible for humans to realize this directly, not as just a belief, but to see as plain as the nose on your face, that you are that reality, that everything is that reality. As the old spiritual clichĂ© goes, life is ultimately all one.

    Most of my life on the surface has been pretty boring, so I won’t go into a lot of detail on that. Given my quiet and reflective nature, I always found it difficult to fit in a lot of the time, and this led to me experiencing a lot of depression and loneliness through most of my early life and through to my 20s. As a result of this depression and loneliness, I had a great longing for a romantic partner that I thought would cure me of these feelings, and just before my 20th birthday, I met one of these things called a girl. As David Bowie wrote in his song “Boys Keep Swinging,” when you’re a boy, these are your favourite things. And it certainly was my favourite thing.

    Despite seeming to start out really well, a combination of this girl’s shyness and my intense depression and anxiety, it ended before it had even really begun, and I was d.e.v.a.s.t.a.t.e.d. I went from being someone who struggled a lot with depression and anxiety to someone who was completely crippled by it. It was what I felt was the first really good thing to happen in my life, but it ended up being the worst, and it took me years to recover from. During this time, I managed to complete a degree in biological science, but the intense depression I had never lifted, and I struggled with it on a daily basis. This led to me becoming very introspective and always reflecting on the ultimate nature of life, trying to find some sort of meaning to live for.

    I never found this meaning until I was 25 years old, when I read an article by one of my favourite science writers called Robert Wright. He had just completed a 10 day silent meditation retreat and wrote about his experience there. He said it was a profound experience, and he came home with a great appreciation for all life. Looking at the weeds in his garden, he saw their inherent beauty without the label of “weed.” A lizard crossed his back porch and he said, “I kind of loved that lizard.” When I read this article, and subsequently watched an interview he did with Gary Weber, a “nonduality” or enlightenment teacher, something switched in my head. I suddenly knew this was what I had to do. I had to meditate, and I had to get enlightened. I somehow knew it was the only way I would ever be truly free of my suffering.

    And so I started meditating. I started listening to teachers who had realized what I was trying to realize. From Eckhart Tolle to Byron Katie to Adyashanti, I devoured endless hours of youtube videos from all the teachers I could find on this subject. My entire life became focused on this single goal of attaining enlightenment. This continued for a number of years until I found a teacher in my hometown of Sydney, Australia who was teaching the same thing.

    I had heard of this woman called Isira in passing before and watched a video of hers on youtube, but I didn’t feel any great attraction to her at that stage. I thought, “she seems like a nice lady,” but that was about it. There was no deeper recognition. Then, about a year later a friend mentioned her again to me and I decided to go along to one of her satsangs (a Sanskrit term meaning “association in truth”), where there is a meditation and talk followed by questions and answers. This time, I felt her presence. This time I got where she was coming from. It was almost as if when I first watched her she was on a different plane to me and I couldn’t understand her, but this time I did. As Eckhart Tolle wrote in his book “The Power of Now,” this book will either change your life, or it will be meaningless to you. I believe this is also what Jesus meant when he said, “those who have the ears to hear, let them hear.” This time it changed my life.

    I began volunteering for the organization surrounding Isira called “Living Awareness”, and it was great to find a community of people who were interested in the same thing I was interested in. I wasn’t always the best student: I found maintaining a daily meditation practise very difficult with the intensity of emotion I was always going through, but I was completely committed to the goal of awakening, and I loved being a part of a group committed to that goal.

    I was volunteering with Isira for 2 years before a big event happened.

    In May of 2018 Isira held a weekend event called The Presence. I was one of the cameramen. I was working late nights at my job so I was always pretty tired at these things, and I knew I’d struggle with concentration and getting into the zone of meditation. At the start of each event, Isira gets us to write down an “I am” intention, to get in touch with the deeper reasons we are there. My intention was a big one: “I am here to commit to walking my highest path at all times.” Talk about asking a lot of yourself. But it felt right to me at the time.

    The event was going smoothly enough, and I enjoyed working with the camera. On the second day, however, after struggling with tiredness and an inability to get centred, I made a prayer: “I am too tired to get into this properly, so please, anything that needs to happen, let it happen.”

    In order to get prepared for meditation, Isira has an exercise she calls the “Shakti shake”. Shakti is another Sanskrit term which refers to the primordial energy that runs through the entire universe. We do this shake to let off all the excess energies in our body before we sit down to meditate. Nothing much had really happened the previous times I had done this, but this time something big shifted. I was doing the exercise, bouncing up and down on my heels, swaying my arms, and breathing in rhythm, and suddenly something else took over. It felt like the universe suddenly went, “my turn,” and picked me up and shook me really intensely. I was gone from the equation. It only lasted a few seconds, but the shock of it was enough to send me falling backwards against the wall behind me. Isira saw this and came over to ask if everything was okay. “Yeah, I’m fine,” I stammered, still not sure what had happened.

    The Shakti shake had come to an end, and Isira instructed us to put our hands on our lower abdomen, a place called “tantien,” also known as the hara – the centre moderating point of energy in our body. When I did this, a flood of tears came through me, and I sat crying in a room full of 30 people for about half an hour. I’m not usually a public crier, so this was very out of character for me. But I was still only half there, so I couldn’t have stopped it even if I wanted to. This, I would later learn from Isira, was a partial kundalini awakening. Kundalini is another Sanskrit term which refers to a usually dormant coil of energy located at the base of the spine. In humans it is often suppressed by all our thoughts and bodily conditions, but when it opens and flows, it is a very powerful force. And, I later discovered, anywhere you still have energetic blockages or repressions, it will come up against these and put tremendous pressure on them. This is why a kundalini awakening, while always a significant stage in a person’s awakening, is not always an easy thing to deal with. I experienced this, and experienced what is commonly known as “kundalini syndrome” – a result of the person, with all their mental and emotional resistance, struggling against the force of this energy. For about three days after this energy started to move inside me, the only word I was able to say was “fuck.” Over and over and over again, “fuck, fuck, fuck.” It was intense.

    The next two months were filled with magic and horror. As my body tried to cope with the energy that was moving through it, my mind went into panic mode, fearing that it was losing control. An analogy that is often used for kundalini energy is like shaking up a coke bottle: when you lift the lid off, everything spurts out. I started to experience a lot of synchronicities, feeling more love, bliss, and connection (the magic), but my mind was also throwing up very scary visions of what would happen to me if I let go of my mind (the horror). I was working as a gardener at the time but ended up having to leave my job because I started to experience psychosis as a result of my mind feeling like it was losing control. The fear was overwhelming at times, and I started to develop a lot of paranoia because of it.

    The next part of the story I will need to backtrack a bit to give it some context.

    During the period when I was listening to teachers on youtube, and about a year before I met Isira, I was following an interview program called “Buddha at the Gas Pump,” where the host Rick Archer interviews people who have had various stages of awakening. It’s a great show, and in my opinion Rick is the best interviewer out there for this type of thing. One day I decided to have a look at who the most watched interviews were, and found one with a guy called Darryl Anka, who claims to channel an extraterrestrial being called “Bashar.” At first I was pretty skeptical to say the least; I went in thinking, “I wonder how crazy this guy is.” But I was interested to see why so many people had watched it, so I sat down and listened. To my surprise, he seemed normal, sane, and had a lot of insight on spiritual matters. I couldn’t fault him on that. So I decided to go and watch some of his channeling sessions.

    It didn’t take long before I realized this person was sharing very high spiritual wisdom. I was blown away by his clarity and understanding of spiritual concepts and concepts in modern physics, which I think is something very hard to fake, though some people try. I felt so drawn to this work, but my mind was having a hard time accepting it. My mind was thinking, “What? This can’t be real
 aliens don’t exist
 or if they exist I’m quite sure they’ve never contacted us, and I’m quite sure channeling is not a real thing!!” But still I felt drawn. This created a bit of a split between my deeper intelligence and my mind. My deeper self was so drawn to this, but my mind was reeling backwards saying “this can’t be true!” Luckily I had already established a meditation practise which allowed me some witnessing of my mind’s reaction, so I wasn’t completely caught in it, but it resulted in a very scary night where my mind realized it could never know anything for certain. In that time I became convinced this was real, which also brought on its own paranoia. “Do I have reason to be worried?” “Who are these beings? What do they want?” “Are we in any danger from them?” I didn’t know the answers to these questions. For the next three months my mind went through a radical change. It felt, even on a physical level, that my brain was being wrenched open, making room for this bigger reality I felt I had plunged into.

    I started to do some groundwork research on this, and soon found out – despite what a lot of the public thinks – governments and military personnel have been VERY interested in UFOs for a very long time. I looked into the work of Richard Dolan, who I think is the best researcher around on this topic today. I looked at Dr Steven Greer’s work with the disclosure project. In a period of three years of looking into this, I came to the conclusion that it was real. Yes, aliens do exist, and yes, they also know that we exist.

    This realization played a role in what happened next with my awakening.

    As I mentioned, I started to develop a lot of fear and paranoia. I felt like I had just woken up to this bigger reality, and I didn’t know what was real or not. My fear and paranoia turned to the subject of extraterrestrials and the possibility of so-called “negative beings,” and I started to feel a lot of fear about this. I thought, “I’ve just woken up to this bigger reality, what if they know this? What if it means I’ve become a target of some kind?” Maybe not a very rational thought, but the uncertainty made me extremely anxious.

    This fear all culminated in one night when, after hallucinating that my housemate turned into one of these negative beings, I attacked her out of fear.

    At the time I was deeply psychotic. I was convinced that these beings were coming to get me, and I was trying to get my housemate’s help so she could stay with me and help keep me safe. But, in the middle of trying to convince her of this, because of my own deep fear, I suddenly saw her face change, her eyes became dark, and I suddenly didn’t know who she was anymore. At the time, it looked like she turned into a demon, and I lashed out in fear.

    This was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to come to terms with. My housemate was a beautiful person and the last person in the world I would have wanted to hurt. But I did. The police came and took me to the station, but I was still in a deep psychosis, so the next morning they took me in an ambulance to a mental hospital where I stayed for three months. I tried to explain everything that was going on for me to the doctors – the kundalini experience, the extraterrestrials, the fear associated with this – but their diagnosis was clear: “William, you have paranoid schizophrenia. This is an incurable condition, and you will likely need to be on medication for the rest of your life.” Well, that was one doctor’s opinion at least, the other doctor said he couldn’t be certain, but the one thing we all agreed on was that I had had a severe psychotic episode. (Pro tip: if you’re trying to get out of a mental hospital, don’t tell them you think aliens exist.)

    Where I am at now.

    Well I’m still not completely enlightened (damn!), but I had a significant partial awakening, and it seems to me the process now is one of calibration – aligning my body and mind more and more to the energy that is now moving through me. It hasn’t been an easy path, but then, no one said awakening was always easy. In a way, despite the horribleness of everything that transpired, it showed me clearly just how insane the human mind can be, and I now know that, whatever awakening has in store for me in the future, it can’t be worse than continuing to let the mind rule the show. So, going through something so extreme helped me see the nature of the mind more clearly, and helped me see that the mind really is only useful for practical things – the stories it comes up with can lead to a very confused and sometimes disastrous destination.

    A Zen monk was once asked, “How’s your enlightenment going?” And he replied, “Fine. My body is having a hard time keeping up with it though.” This I think gets to the point that awakening largely happens through the body. As Adyashanti would say, it really begins from the neck down. If it’s not from the neck down, it remains just another largely superficial game of the mind with no change in your actual behaviour, which at the end of the day is the only thing that really matters about awakening.

    Thank you for reading my story,

    In love and light,

    Will.

    For more stories like this, including mental health, extraterrestrials, and spirituality, please subscribe to my blog, follow my Facebook page “The Ostrich and the Elephant”, or find me on Twitter @willkenway, Medium @willkenway, or Instagram @will.kenway. Thanks!

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