Announcing New List Group: Spiritual Enlightenment

Much as I have mentioned in a few posts over the last day or two that I've sent to my Spiritual Surrender, Release Technique and Spiritual Healers list groups, I have decided to start a new list group devoted to the discussion -- from a practical and pragmatic point of view (versus intellectual, academic or analytic) -- of spiritual enlightenment. While the list group is primarily devoted to persons who have had significant enlightenment experiences, it is open to anyone who wishes to join.

I have reproduced below the Description of the list group from the group home page at Yahoo Groups:

~~~~~~~~~~~
This list group is a pragmatic list group devoted to the topic of spiritual enlightenment from a practical and useful point of view, and thus it is NOT for idle intellectual, analytic or academic discussion of enlightenment, which I personally feel to be nothing more than mental masturbation.

This group is operated by Vinny Pinto; I am a mystic, spiritual healer and R&D scientist with a graduate degree in the sciences. I operate a number of informational websites & email list groups on topics in the realms of spirituality, science, alternative health, strange science & mysticism. Perhaps my two most closely-related list groups to this one are my Spiritual Surrender list and my Release Technique list (devoted to the work of American spiritual teacher Lester Levenson.)

The focus of this list group is practical and pragmatic discussion of the state and experience of enlightenment, and it is primarily intended to serve persons who have had significant enlightenment experiences that have changed their lives.

Please note that fanaticism, zealotry and fundamentalism have no place on this list; I embody none of those things, and rather, I am a very happy and relaxed person who has had a number of enlightenment experiences since the age of 7 and simply finds this whole topic to be much fun!

Remember: one rule on all of my list groups is that all posts must be signed with the poster's first and last name, and all posts must display a good degree of literacy. More info on rules may be found in the Welcome file in the Files section of this group.

Enjoy!
~~~~~~~~~~~

If you wish to join the list group, you may join by visiting the list group home page at Yahoo Groups, at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sp-enlightenment
or by sending an email to
sp-enlightenment-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

And, once you have joined and wish to send an email, well, the group email address is:
sp-enlightenment@yahoogroups.com

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

Heads-up: My Recent Post on My List Group of Portal Opening in SE Arizona

This is just a very quick note to advise you -- at least those of you who may be interested -- that about two weeks ago I sent a rather lengthy post to my Time Space Doorway list group (at Yahoo Groups) about an upcoming three to four day opening of a natural interdimensional and space portal located in the mountains in SE Arizona.

For a bit more info, here is the brief announcement that I made about the matter at that time on my Facebook page and on my pages at Twitter, Kwippy, Brightkite and all those other silly "Web 2.0" sites:
~~~~~~~~~~
If you're interested in things such as interdimensional portals, it seems that one of the two powerful natural interdimensional portals (IDPs) in the mountains of SE AZ will be "opening" for about 3 days in about 3-4 weeks from now. While I can provide the approximate dates to interested parties, I can't, for obvious reasons, reveal the exact location -- you either know it or you don't; you know the drill!
Enjoy!
~~~~~~~~~~~

If you wish to read my entire announcement, which includes details and relevant background, please feel free to read my full post on this topic at my Time Space Doorway list group at Yahoo Groups; home page may be found at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TimeSpaceDoor/ or, if you are not yet a member, you may join by sending an email to:
TimeSpaceDoor-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

My Reply to Folks Who Ask "Vinny, What Do You Think About Chemtrials and HAARP, etc?"

I have recently received several private emails asking me what I think about so-called chemtrails and some other, supposedly related things which also seem to be the obsessive focus of conspiracy theorists everywhere. Here is one recent set of questions from a correspondent, along with my reply, which I originally sent earlier this evening by email:

~~~~~~~~~~~
At 11:34 AM 4/21/2009, Clarke wrote:

Dear Vinny,

I read with much hilarity your [humorous] posts about chemtrails.....

And then I got curious and tried to find past chemtrail postings in the group archives, but the search does not appear to be working.... oh well....

Which prompts me to ask: What's your take on chemtrails?

A couple of years ago we decided to suspend disbelief and thoroughly investigated the web-hype about them, watched the video, etc. And then proceeded to be thoroughly freaked out anytime we went outside and looked up.... Of course, further investigation about these matters will soon lead one to Don & Carol (Croft) and Towerbusting & HAARP and all of that, which will freak one out further anytime a cellphone tower is encountered, "hey wait, where's my tinfoil hat".... Which seems to trod rampantly over the good work done by Reich....... At which point we had to step back and get some fresh air and say 'what's the deal with the chemtrails'?....

Whaddya think, any grains of truth in this venue of thought, or is it all runaway hype? Interested in your thoughts... And if the topic has already been beaten to death in one of your forums somewhere, well the Search doesn't appear to be working so I don't mean to burden you with an already-answered question.....

And here was/is my reply to him:

Hi Clarke:

I have covered my opinion on these silly "the sky is falling" topics briefly in the past on some of my list groups, but, briefly, I am sure that you can tell my attitude from all the kinda "fear" things simply from a close reading of my most recent emails on chemtrails, that is, the ones which you have just referenced.

Life is not for worrying, but rather for loving and enjoying and appreciation, and..... the idiots who obsess about these things and worse, those who rant and rave about these things, are intensely unhappy -- and often very angry as well -- people who are compulsively searching mindlessly for ever more reasons to worry and feel bad, and they are also, in a vampiristic way, trying to recruit ever more people for their "fear bandwagon", for that is simply one of the many "fear and try to control everything" programs inherent in human nature which is operative when one is not conscious and not in the Heart, and rather, when one is on autopilot, a slave of the random programs and recordings inherited by the ever-frantic and ever-restless local mind (aka "the ego".) And so it is.

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

A Note re the Passing of Famed Spiritual Healer Dr. Willard Fuller, D. Th.

I wish to report that my friend and colleague Dr. Willard Fuller, the hellfire-and-brimstone Baptist minister turned internationally-famed beyond-religion non-denominational spiritual healer, died on April 8, 2009 at the age of 94, at a hospital near his home in Lloyd, Florida, after a short illness. Dr. Fuller had been active until the last weeks of his life in teaching seminars in divinity and healing from his home in Lloyd. He had become widely known as a spiritual healer starting in the 1960s and over the next 40 years, as he traveled the USA, and particularly the east coast, holding revival-style non-denominational meetings in tents and conference centers where many hundreds of persons each year experienced spontaneous healing of dental problems and broken bones. Dr. Fuller had been a traditional hellfire-and-brimstone Baptist minister throughout the 1950s, and then, in the late 50s, he became very ill with a serious chronic illness. When Western medical doctors informed him that they could not help him, he went into the forest alone for a 3-day fast without food or water, and, during that fasting meditation, his illness disappeared, never to return. However, in the aftermath of that healing experience, he found that he was a changed man. He quickly became totally disenchanted with the limitations and proscriptions of the Baptist religion, and he was guided by Divinity to go out and start preaching a much broader non-denominational theology, and to start performing spiritual healings in public, at revival-type tent meetings, as a way of demonstrating the power of Holy Spirit and Divinity.

He was further guided by Holy Spirit that while there were a number of spiritual healers who demonstrated their abilities in public, none of them ever tackled challenges such as missing or broken or infected teeth, nor broken bones, as these were widely viewed as "too difficult" to respond quickly to spritual healing. And so, he was asked to start offering public demonstrations of spiritual healing, but focusing primarily upon repairing or replacing broken, damaged, missing or infected teeth, and also on fixing broken bones.

I communicated with Dr. Fuller by phone, email and postal mail occasionally from about mid-2001 onward, and we met in August of 2004, when I flew to Florida to visit with him and his wife and to take a seminar with him across a long four-day weekend, during which time I stayed at a tiny, tired and care-worn but delightful motel located at a highway truck stop named Big Bend Auto Truck Stop just off Rte. I-10/SR-8/SR-59 near Dr. Fuller's home. The truck stop also sported a very unique restaurant (its name changed, and continues to change, every few years, so I will not bother to give it a name here, as it would be meaningless), located just yards from my hotel, which had been in business for over 60 years, and I quickly fell in love with the people at the diner and with the food at the diner.

During my visit, I met some folks who were what I tend to call "health nuts", that is, they were primarily fundamentalist and militant followers of Donna Gate's Body Ecology Diet and/or Sally Fallon's Traditional Diet version of the Weston A. Price diet (now, there is nothing at all wrong with either of these diets, but I do tend to have an allergy to anyone who is a fundamentalist purist follower of anything. Once I mentioned how much I loved the diner, they were uniformly "grossed out"; they each quickly and loudly announced that they despised the diner and its worn shabby interior and also the food, which they labeled as "deadly, greasy, artery-clogging American junk food", and they loudly complained that the food would likely kill them in short order were they to eat there. Much to their dismay and obvious disapproval, I simply smiled, and quietly and steadfastly maintained that there was nothing wrong with eating such foods at times, so long as it was eaten with Love, Grace, gratitude and appreciation, and I reminded them with great glee that I made a point to eat a hearty breakfast of eggs, sausage, bacon and homefries each morning at the restaurant during my stay!

Interestingly, on the last day of my visit with Dr. Fuller, I happened to mention to him my appreciation and enjoyment of the motel and the tiny diner and its food, and his face immediately lit up with glee as he informed me that this diner (located near his home) had been his favorite eatery for over 30 years, and that each visit to the diner was, for him, a visit to a Paradise on Earth. It seemed to mean a lot to him that I had enjoyed the little motel and the diner whereas, he told me, many of his other visitors over the years had apparently treated both establishments with scorn and derision.

Interestingly, Dr. Fuller also mentioned to me at least twice that it is well-known in the spiritual healing world that it is always much more difficult for a spiritual healer to perform spiritual healing work for themselves than for others, and, as one reminder of that, he pointed to my many missing teeth and broken teeth (they are due to the fact that at one time I had 48 amalgam fillings, which were removed back in the early 1990s, and I have never bothered to wear cosmetic dental appliances such as partial bridgework to cover up the gaps in my smile) and told me that he too had a great many missing and broken teeth and that he had finally resorted to having his mouth fitted by a dentist with upper and lower bridgework.

Dr. Fuller's website, at www.willardfuller.com is still "on the air", and his wife, the Rev. Althea Fuller, will continue carrying out part of their non-denominational spiritual ministry over the upcoming months.

with care,
--Vinny

Red Mercury Folklegend Sweeping Middle East: Red Mercury Found in Old Singer Sewing Machines

Much as I have mentioned in the past on some of my list groups, there has, since at least the 1970s, been a long-standing and persistent myth which is particularly entrenched in Europe, the Middle East and the countries which comprised the old Soviet Union that there exists a mysterious, exotic, very rare, extremely expensive (reportedly priced at about a million dollars per gram) and near-mystical chemical compound called "red mercury" which is reportedly produced by an exotic alchemical process and which is claimed to be the secret ingredient needed to make nuclear bombs (either by acting as a secret ingredient in the final explosive device or by acting as a catalyst to provide a shortcut in creating and refining fissionable radioisotopes), and also a critical key ingredient in various non-nuclear explosives, and it is also widely claimed that the exotic substance can be used an essential key to assist in fortune-telling, divination and as a key aid in dowsing for buried treasure. And, some have claimed, the material -- usually claimed to be highly radioactive -- is a key ingredient of the Philosopher's Stone, which can reputedly be used to convert common metals into gold, or to create an elixir of immortality.

This near-magical alchemical compound has been the focus of many myths, legends and fragments of folklore for many years since the advent of the Cold War, and it is also well-documented in the public record that there have been brief periods during which the spy agencies of various governments around the world have fallen for the hoax, and at times some of thse agencies have issued alerts warning that renegade scientists from the ex-Soviet Union (or, alternatively, shadowy scientist/holy men from Turkey or Kazakhstan, or elderly German scientists who had once been in the employ of the Nazi regime) were trying to sell red mercury (for use in fabricating nuclear weapons) to the highest bidder. And, true to form, a number of shadowy vendors have appeared in the international black marketplace over the years, offering "red mercury" for sale to the highest bidder, and, in each of these cases, the material proffered by the vendors turned out to be various types of common powders admixed with red dye. Indeed, belief in the material is so ubiquitous that it has even been mentioned as a key plot component in various spy novels and crime novels, and red mercury has appeared as a fictional item of black market trade in a number of spy movies and TV shows over the past 30 years.

It is almost certain that the modern folklore surrounding red mercury derives from the mentions over many hundreds of years in the world of alchemy of "red mercury", a mysterious red powder reportedly derived from mercury that would, according to some authors, enable the alchemist to create the Philosopher's Stone and could also be used by the alchemist to summon and command djinn (aka jinn or genies) or to talk with (ro gain power over) "spirits" on the "Other Side". Of course, the modern legends about red mercury, which seem to have started during the peak of the Cold War era, have evolved the older legends of red mercury from the world of alchemy considerably, and have spun it into the form that we see today, a mysterious and exotic red powder offered at times on the international black market to terrorists and governments of small countries at prices approaching a million dollars per gram.

There are also other components of the legend of the modern red mercury: many red mercury "true believers" in Europe and the Middle East and the ex-Soviet Union belive that cell phones may somehow be used to detect, locate and identify red mercury; most of the legends claim that a cell phone will "act weird" or emit beeping noises if it is in the vicinity of red mercury, and that the beeping or other sounds will increase in volume as the cell phone is brought nearer to the red mercury.

Since tiny amounts of red mercury are believed to be a key ingredient in many types of military explosives, peope around the world have taken to exercising great effort and ingenuity to locate and procure unexploded ordnance from testing sites and then to try to open the undetonated weapons in an effort to find and extract the tiny amount of putative red mercury contained inside. A great number of these people have, of course, been killed when the weapons detonated during their "extraction" effort.

The reality is, of course, that there is no real substance known as "red mercury" which serves as a secret key ingredient in nuclear weapons and can also be used for divination, treasure-hunting and for creating the Philosopher's Stone. However, due to human nature, perception and belief have historically had little to do with facts and reality, and so the tales about the modern version of red mercury continue to grow by leaps and bounds.

One of the funniest recent pieces of modern red mercury folklore to emerge over the past few years is the belief that smal amounts of red mercury may be found in old sewing machines, particularly old Singer sewing machines, and that it may be identified, isolated and removed from the sewing machines with the aid of a cell phone used as a "detector". Some of the tales claim that hte red mercury is contained in the needles, and others claim that it is contained inside the metal body of the machine, near the motor and gearbox. This myth has surfaced/re-surfaced recently in Saudi Arabia with an amazing intensity, and tens of thousands of people, believing the myth, are offering vast sums for old Singer sewing machines; some are selling for as much as $50,000 USD. A great number of articles about this odd folk phenomenon have hit the international media over the past week, and one of the better ones is the following news story at the UK's BBC website:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7999168.stm
Another good news story on the phenomenon may be found at:
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=31490

To me, what is really funny about this whole obsession about Singer sewing machines is that the legend has totally missed the mark; the reality is that about the only two consumer appliances in which red mercury has ever been used in any significant quantity are old Kelvinator refrigerators and old Sears Kenmore top-loading washing machines (no, I cannot reveal the exact years and models, for obvious reasons....)!

Well, I must confess that it has been brought to my attention that there exists at least one more rather commonplace device which reportedly contained small amounts of red mercury, although the device in question is, strictly speaking, not seen as solely a consumer product, but rather a product which was sold to consumers, hobbyists and small conmmercial ventures alike. Without further ado, I will name the device: it is widely claimed that certain old models of Lincoln arc welding machines, made between 1949 and 1984, contained small quantities of red mercury.

Okay... and well... you see, the reality is that there is also the matter of claims about the tiny amount of red mercury reportedly found in the carburetors of certain early Studebaker automobiles, but that is a rather moot issue, due to the limited availability of old Studebakers.

And, here are some late-breaking followup notes to append my original note immediately above:

First, I realize that I failed to mention, in my original mention about the ongoing frenzy in Saudi Arabia to find and purchase old Singer sewing machines, the fact that the Saudi Arabian government has, in response to the folktale and its economic effects, been conducting a vigorous public education advertising campaign to advise its citizens that the existence of red mercury is a myth and that the belief that old Singer sewing machines contain red mercury is mere folklore, with no basis in reality. They are also arresting and imposting stiff fines upon people caught profiteering from the fad.

Next, while performing a Google search for yet more information on red mercury, I stumbled upon the odd fact that, according to the automated topic summary engine at Yahoo Groups, the matter of "how to make red mercury" is a frequently-discussed topic on a quixotic, campy and flaky pop culture list group called "Quicksandgirl". Amazing!

I have learned, from a member of one of my list groups to which my red mercury not was originally posted, the odd fact that it was not only Saudi Arabia which was swept recently by a red mercury myth, but that a similar phenomeon has unfolded in Turkey over the past few
months, where a rumor to the effect that the picture tube in certain brands of old black-and-white TV sets contains red mercury has spread like wildfire, causing people to seek out and pay enormous sums for old B/W TV sets. And, much as in the case with Saudi Arabia, the
Turkish government has apparently been engaged in a massive public education advertising campaign toadvise its citizens that the existence of red mercury is a myth and that the belief that old B/W TV sets contain red mercury is mere folklore, with no basis at all in reality.

It appears that one of the features of the fabled exotic and rare "Russian red mercury" is that it is not only claimed to be radioactive, but that it is also reported to be super-conductive at room temperature; and this "fact" was reported by no less an authority than the Russian newspaper Pravda.

You may recall that in my original post on the red mercury myth, I reported that there exist many rumors that a cell phone can be used to detect the presence of red mercury. For a bit more detail, it seems that the most common form of this myth asserts that a cell phone will lose all signals and will "go quiet" when placed near even a tiny quantity of red mercury. This is really useful to know, particularly when browsing weekend flea markets looking for old appliances and commodity items that may contain red mercury.

I have also learned that some conspiracy theorists and free energy researchers believe that red mercury is a vital secret ingredient in many esoteric and suppressed designs for anti-gravity devices, and that some of these folks also believe that some old Nazi inventions from the late 1930s and early 1940s were anti-gravity devices that employed red mercury as a secret and critical key ingredient.

Lastly, just as we all know that red mercury CANNOT be found in any of the following:

• old Singer sewing machines
• certain old Kelvinator refrigerators
• certain old Sears Kenmore top-loading washing machines
• certain old models of Lincoln arc welding machines, made between 1949 and 1984
• carburetors of certain early Studebaker automobiles
• certain brands of old B/W TV sets
• pint containers of Ben and Jerry's Rocky Road ice cream that have been wrapped in ten layers of wax paper and then buried at least eight feet deep, along with a wooden crucifix, in a mountainous region in soil/clay that is rich in volcanic matter and then dug up after at least 12 years of burial and the contents exposed to the light of a full moon overnight before microwaving the remaining mass, alongside a ripe organic Red Delicious apple, for 11 minutes at full power in a microwave oven atop which a wooden or carved or stone image of the Black Madonna of Czestochowa has been placed.

Okay? Got it? Good! Well, in closing, I just want to be sure that you also know that red mercury cannot be found in the original (i.e., original manufacturer-produced) flyback transformers found in certain old console-type black-and-white Zenith TV sets nor can it be found in certain types of radioactive automotive spark plugs made by Firestone in the 1950s (and incidentally, these spark plugs also contain polonium to help to ionize the gases in order to ensure quicker ignition.)

Good! Glad we got that straight!

Have fun!

with care,
--Vinny

In the Tarot Deck, I Am "The Fool"

This brief note is triggered by a recent discussion on my friend Marueen's Facebook Wall about the concept of "The Fool", and by the fact that I am sometimes asked by friends on social networking sites such as this one which card or character in the Tarot deck I most identify with. I tend to hate such inane questions, but in this case, I have a ready answer. And so, here is my answer:

For myself, whenever I look at a deck of tarot cards, I never identify with cards such as kings, knights or pages, and rather, I always identify primarily with the card called The Fool. Why? Because The Fool signifies a person who is a fool, a madman, totally carefree, one who ignores the conventions of mass culture, one who wanders guided only by his/her own inner guidance; it denotes mystical cleverness bereft of reason, the childlike ability to tune into the inner workings or currents of the world, and the wisdom of "not knowing" and "not trying", and finally, it represents surrender to the wisdom and all-knowing of Divinity, to Holy Spirit and Supreme Heart.

with care,
--Vinny

Questions About "Garbage Enzymes" and "Farmer's EM" vs. EM Probiotic Microbial Products

In the past few months, I have been receiving an increasing number of inquiries from farmers, householders and consumers, particularly in Asia, about a homebrewed fermented product known as "garbage enzymes", and a very similar rlaated product which goes by the name of "Farmer's EM", and, in particularly asking how they compare to commercially-available probiotic microbial products with strong antioxidative and syntropic properties such as EM (aka effective microorganisms or efficient microbes.) Due to the increasing number of inquiries that I am receiving about these grass-roots homebrewed fermented products, I have decided that it would be useful to answer the questions here to help to clear the air a bit about these products.

First, most of the folks who have contacted me with questions about the homebrewed garbage enzyme product have asked me questions very much along the lines of the correspondent who had sent the note reproduced below:

~~~~~~~~

Hi Vinny:

I was experimenting with organic composting for my garden and stumbled upon your work with beneficial microbes via the Internet. I am also making what is generally termed as "garbage enzymes" in Asia. It is simply made with 1:3:10, of raw brown sugar, kitchen vegetable waste and water. This is left for 3 months. It can be used as fertilizers for plants, for washing and also to reduce odours of waste or sewage. Is this somewhat the same as EM but is a more primitive form?

~~~~~~~~~~~

My reply appears below:

Some History and Background
Well, first, a bit of history.... For a couple of years now, an alternative health practitioner in Thailand named Dr. Rosukon Poompanvong, who is also a vocal proponent of organic farming and sustainable living, has been promoting very strongly the concept of using a homebrewed fermented concoction rich in enzymes and (hopefully) largely-beneficial microbes for treating kitchen waste and sewage to reduce odor and disease and for treating farm soil and garden
soil as a fertilizer. She calls the fermented concoction by the name "garbage enzymes", and she has been promoting the idea heavily in Thailand, and, at times, in neighboring Asian countries as well. Due to her promotion activities, the concept has gained a limited grass-roots following in
Thailand, and also in some parts of China, where householders are encouraged by the promoters to prepare and brew their own supply of garbage enzymes from vegetable (i.e. fruit and vegetable) waste from their kitchens.

The idea has also gained a limited grass-roots following in Malaysia, where it is largely promoted by a homeopathic doctor named Joean Oon, but in Malaysia, there is much less emphasis placed by Dr. Oon and her staffers on the idea of encouraging householders to brew their own supply of garbage enzymes, and rather, consumers are encouraged to purchase a commercial bottled liquid
product bearing the same name (i.e., "Garbage Enzyme"), and, in fact, when I was in Kuala Lumpur and neighboring cities in Malaysia a few months ago, nearly every health food store
and natural foods store had an entire shelf devoted to marketing large bottles of Garbage Enzyme product, and it was also heavily advertised in the mass media; the vendor seems to primarily market their product for treating kitchen vegetable waste and also septic tanks and sewage fields for odor control, and to use for washing and cleaning floors, toilets, etc.

According to Dr. Poompanvong's instructions, the garbage enzyme product is brewed by mixing one part of black sugar (a very dark sugar which has a high molasses content) or brown sugar (a dark sugar which has a moderate molasses content) with three parts of chopped kitchen vegetable waste (i.e., teabags, tea leaves, vegetable and fruit waste; no meat or animal products allowed) and with ten parts of water, and the mixture is briefly stirred and then allowed to
ferment anaerobically in a large covered plastic bottle or bucket for about three months in a warm setting (please remember that much of Thailand and Malaysia enjoy rather warm year-round outdoor temperatures, due to the tropical near-equatorial climate.) Incidentally, Dr. Poompanvong and other proponents of brewing home-brewed garbage enzyme always stress that is important to use only vegetable garbage in brewing the fermented mixture, and that it is important not to use any amimal products such as meat, fish, or dairy, as, they say,
inclusion of any of these products will create undesirable odors and may also encourage growth of undesirable microbes.

There exist, in many publications across Malaysia, similar instructions for creating a homebrewed microbial product for agricultural use called "Farmer's EM". This is, in essence, the same product as garbage enzymes , and thus my comments in this post apply to this product as well as to the product known as "garbage enzymes".

Once the three-month anaerobic fermentation period at warm temperatures has ended, the promoters of garbage enzyme claim that the liquid portion of the resultant product is filled with beneficial enzymes and beneficial microbes, and that it will reduce odors of kitchen waste or sewage and that it will also serve as a "fertilizer" for soil in farming and gardening. They also
claim that the liquid may be used as a deodorizing cleaning liquid for floors and for surfaces in kitchens and bathrooms.

What is It?

The garbage enzyme brewing process is simply a primitive process for encouraging fermentation, largely by naturally-occurring by lactic acid-forming bacteria such as Lactobacillus species, and also to some extent by naturally-occurring wild yeasts of vegetable kitchen waste and black sugar (or, in some cases, brown sugar). As such, it is somewhat analagous to the
"aerobic compost tea" (ACT) products which have become a fad among European and American organic farmers over the past ten years, which use a much shorter fermentation period, with intensive aeration, of much the same starting materials; the finished ACT product is then used as a fertilizer and ad hoc microbial inoculant for farm and garden soil.

The finished garden enzyme product, if properly brewed, will usually end up with a fairly large concentration of lactic acid-forming microbes such as Lactobacillus species, and with a somewhat smaller population of some wild yeasts and some other wild microbes as well. It will also contain some enzymes which may help to promote digestion of wast products in solid waste streams and
in sewage waste streams. Much of the claimed deodorizing activity, when present (and it should be noted that not all batches of garbage enzyme work as promised, because fermentation is subject to many variables, and some batches will come out "wrong") simply comes from the lactic acid produced by the lactic acid-producing bacteria during fermentation, and to a much lesser
extent, to some of the enzymes and other compounds produced during fermentation.

I am sure that properly-produced batches of garbage enzymes and "Farmer's EM" which are homebrewed using the proper techniques have some useful applications around the farm or around the household, but, as we will see below, the benefits are not comparable to the antioxidative, syntropic and powerful deodorizing effects -- nor the suppression of pathogenic microbes -- obtainable with EM products.

Comparison to EM

Is this garbge enzyme product at all similar to EM? Yes, to a very limited extent, it is vaguely similar to EM, because, like EM, it contains lots of lactic acid-producing bacteria such as Lactobacillus species, and also some beneficial yeasts. However, the real power of EM for use in treating waste and soil and for deodorizing and detoxifying purposes does not come from the lactic acid bacteria and yeast which are found in EM, but rather from the PNSB microbes and the Bacillus subtilis bacteria (natto bacteria) and a few other species which are found in EM. These microbes will rarely, if ever, be found in batches of garbage enzyme product. So, even the cheapest varieties of EM or its secondary liquid products such as AEM or SAEM will usually exhibit far more powerful properties in the following realms than will garbage enzymes:

• deodorizing (one Malaysian correspondent reported that even cheap versions of AEM (an EM secondaryliquid product) exhibited about 50 to 100 times as much deodorizing power
  in tests as did batches of homebrewed garbage enzymes.)
• detoxifying
• antioxidant properties (almost totally lacking in garbage enzyme liquid and "Farmer's EM" liquid)
• anti-entropic (aka negentropic or syntropic) properties (entirely or almost entirely lacking
  in garbage enzyme liquid and "Farmer's EM")
• activity as a probiotic microbial inoculant culture to help with breakdown of solid waste and
  liquid waste

Another important point is that garbage enzyme liquid products are, for some very good reasons, considered to be entirely unsafe forconsumption by humans or animals, while most varieties of EM culture and mostvarieties of EM secondary liquid products (such as AEM or SAEM) are totally safe for human and animal consumption, and, in fact, are regularly used around the world as a nutritional supplement for humans, livestock and pets.

So, the bottom line is that while I am sure that Garbage Enzymeand "Farmer's EM" may at times (unless they end up containing pathogenic microbes, which is not always under the brewer's control) be useful homebrewed fermented microbial products, their performance in most or all realms does not come close to that of EM

I hope that this has helped!

with care,

--Vinny

Heads-up re My Posts Over Past 18 Months to My Time-Space Doorway List Group

This is a quick heads-up for any interested persons that, over the past 19 or so months, I have sent posts to my Time Space Doorway list group on the following topics:

• interdimensional portals and electromagnetic pulse (EMP)
• the theory of interdimensional portals formed by colliding 3-dimensional worlds
• naturally-occurring time-space portals and interdimensional portals
• transient and temporary natural interdimensional portals
• some observations on the Dyatlov Pass incident in Russia
• the futility of engaging theories and hypotheses via mental activity versus surrender to Divinity and Knowing
• updates on the interdimensional portal and space portal projects of friends and colleagues around the world
• updates on my own interdimensional portal/space portal project
• tales from the creators of such projects
• notes on naturally-occurring interdimensional portals, space portals and time-space portals
  

Lastly, since at least a dozen people always write to ask after I send such a post, here is information on how to join the Time Space Doorway list group:

To visit the list group home page at Yahoo Groups, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TimeSpaceDoor/

To subscribe to the group via email, send an email to:
TimeSpaceDoor-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

Heads-up: My Post to My List Groups on Blessed Mother Apparitions in Arizona (USA)

Heads-up: My Recent Post to My List Groups on Blessed Mother Apparitions in Arizona (USA)

I originally sent this note to my spiritual surrender list group and my occult-mystical list group (links for list groups below, if needed). Here is a brief preview of that post:

My recent lengthy posting to the above-mentioned list groups addressed one or two somewhat interesting aspects of the topic of Marian apparitions, that is, visitations from, receiving messages from, or sightings of, the Blessed Mother, aka the Blessed Virgin Mary (BVM), which includes appearances of images of the BVM in objects such as walls, ceilings, sidewalks, cinder blocks, rocks, etc. My post dealt primarily with the odd fact that the Phoenix, Arizona area in the southwestern part of the USA seems, for at least the past 30 years, to be the site for an amazing cluster of Marian apparitions and contacts, with far more reported cases than anywhere else in the USA.

I am personally rather interested in apparitions of the Blessed Mother and, as you can likely guess if you know me at all, it is not for any religious or denominational reasons, for I am not at all religious, but rather, my interest in this realm arises from my rather intense spiritual focus and the fact that I tend to see the Blessed Mother, as conceived by Christians, as one aspect of Divine Mother, just as I see Kali, Saraswati and other deities to be aspects of Divine Mother within Hinduism.

And, there is also yet another quite closely related reason for my interest in tales of the Blessed Mother (including apparitions of the Blessed Mother): my friend and colleague Filomena Dingle, the Italian-born Roman Catholic spiritual healer who passed on in May of 2006, always reported that much of her inner spiritual guidance came from the Blessed Mother and that she felt the Blessed Mother was the mediator for her spiritual healing abilities.

There are even more reasons for my interest in Marian apparitions, and these are disclosed in my afore-mentioned post, along with a number of tales which illustrate the fact that Phoenix seems to be an epicenter for major and ongoing Marian phenomena. If you wish to read the entire story, please see my recent post on any of the above-mentioned list groups.

Information on How to Join the List Groups
Since any announcement such as the one above always seems to generate about two dozen emails asking "How can I join those list groups?", here are links which will allow you to join either of the above-mentioned list groups at Yahoo Groups:

Occult-Mystical List Group
To join by visiting the list group home page at Yahoo Groups, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/occult-mystical/

To subscribe to the list group by email, send an email to:
occult-mystical-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Spiritual Surrender List Group
To join by visiting the list group home page at Yahoo Groups, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/spiritual-surrender/

To subscribe to the list group by email, send an email to:
spiritual-surrender-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Incidentally, I have also posted the article to my Spiritual Healers list group, but membership in that group is limited to persons who are spiritual healers. Here is the information on how to join that list group, if you are a healer:

Spiritual Healers List Group
To join by visiting the list group home page at Yahoo Groups, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/spiritual-healers/

To subscribe to the list group by email, send an email to:
spiritual-healers-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

Announcing: New Ultra-Private and Uber-Exclusive Facebook Group for Katrinka Devotees

It is my pleasure to announce the formation of the most uber-exclusive, ultra-private, limited-membership Facebook Group in the world; a group for a tiny minority of Katrinka devotees who have, well, who have... ahem... you will see below...! The announcement follows:

The official list group name, which is somewhat truncated due to the length limit of about 60 characters, is "Men Who Have Kissed or Engaged in Heavy Petting with Katrinka, She Who Is"

The full name for this uber-exclusive private membership group is as follows:

"The Sacred Order of Men (and Women) Who Have Kissed, Cuddled or Engaged in Heavy Petting with Katrinka, She Who Is, for at Least 5 Consecutive Minutes, Without Having Been Slashed to Death By Her Deadly Claws"

Katrinka, of course, is the hottie exotic semi-retired uber-spy and ultra-assassin (who reportedly has a PhD in nuclear physics, a second PhD in cryptography, and a third PhD in the realm of diabolical assassination) and goddess incarnate who is reputed to currently reside in Los Angeles, CA; she is also widely known as She Who Is, and She Who Must Not Be Named. She is widely acknowledged to be the most exotic and beautiful female in the universe, and in all universes, and she drives men and women mad with desire when they see her. And yet she is cranky, irritable and curmudgeonly, and thus she remains aloof and cold-hearted, and remains largely emotionally unavailable to all, even those devotees closest to her.

However, it is said that once in a great while, Katrinka awards some extremely lucky and extremly rare devotee with a kissing, cuddling and petting session; it has reportedly happened at least four times in all of recorded history. Many, however, driven by deep and uncontrollable desire, do try to touch her, and they are instantly punished, slashed and shredded by Katrinka's powerful claws.

This group is a private group, with an invitation-only membership open only to those extremely rare men and women who have kissed, cuddled or engaged in heavy petting with the exotic hottie goddess incarnate Katrinka (aka She Who Is) for at least five consecutive minutes without having been slashed to death by her deadly claws. The group owner is Vinny Pinto, who has also been appointed the Chief Psychopomp and Imprimatur of the group by God.

You may find the home page for this Facebook group at:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php/group.php?gid=50018745711&ref=mf

If you believe that you qualify for membership in this ultra-exclusive and uber-private group, please contact Vinny Pinto, the group owner and the Chief Psychopomp and Imprimatur of the group; you will need to provide written confirmation of your claim either from Katrinka herself, or from her doltish but dedicated handmaiden Debra.

For the rest of you lumpen proletariat who have never kissed, cuddled or engaged in heavy petting with the goddess and ex-uber spy Katrinka, well, eat your hearts out!

By the way, the longest nonstop kissing, cuddling and petting session that the Chief Psychopomp of the Group has enjoyed with Katrinka was a bit over 12 minutes, in late February 2007 in Los Angeles. Better yet, Katrinka herself initiated the kissing and petting session.

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny
Group Owner and Chief Psychopomp and Imprimatur of the Group

Announcing: Most Important Group That I’ve Ever Created: "Men Who Love Tibetan Ragdolls and..."

I wish to announce here the most important, profound and earth-shaking list group that I have ever created. The official description of, and announcement for, the list group, follows immediately below, followed by links which will allow you to join if you qualify. Here goes:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This list group is devoted to hottie exotic female Tibetan Ragdoll cats and the men (and women) who adore them and worship them.

And the official name of this list group is:

Hottie Female Tibetan Ragdoll Cats and the Men and Women Who Adore Them

This list group is moderated by Vinny Pinto, a scientist and mystic. I already operate over 40 other list groups, but I realized in late November 2008, during a major mystical enlightenment experience, that the greatest service that I could render to the world, and to God, would be to create a list group devoted to this topic, namely, hottie exotic Tibetan Ragdoll temple cats and the men (and women) who adore them.

I had actually been contemplating the idea of starting such a list group for several years, but I was finally moved into action in late November 2008 by two separate events, as follows:

• The first was, as I've already noted above, a major enlightenment experience in which a Divine voice commanded me to create this list group.
  
• The second event happened minutes later, when, while browsing a certain (and not-to-be-named) social networking website, I discovered that a friend of mine had just joined an invitation-only uber-private and uber-exclusive group on the site entitled something along the lines of "Wealthy Generous Men and the Young Women Who Adore Them". Well, as soon as I saw my friend's announcement that he had joined this uber-exclusive list group, I realized that this was Divine Confirmation from God that I was intended to immediately create this list group devoted to hottie ragdolls and the men who adore them.

Due to the somewhat sensitive and romantic nature of this list group, this will be the only list group which I operate, other than my uber-private and uber-exclusive list group entitled "Exotic Persian Female Genies and the Men Who Adore Them" (inspired by my adorable exotic Persian genie Jenni), where posters are not required to sign posts with their first and last name.

This list group is devoted to Katrinka, the Tibetan Ragdoll love of my life.

Enjoy!

--Vinny

~~~~~~end of official announcement ~~~~~~~~~~

How To Join
Group full name at Yahoo Groups: Hottie Tibetan Ragdolls and the Men Who Adore Them
Group short name: hottie_ragdolls
Group home page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/hottie_ragdolls
To Join Group via email: hottie_ragdolls-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

A Note on Spiritual Surrender and the Releasing Systems

I sending this note back in September 2008 to my Spiritual Surrender list group and to my Release Technique list group (both at Yahoo Groups), and I feel that it would also be a good idea to share this note here as well.

Due to some recent interesting conversations with friends and associates, I have had a number of reminders over the past few days that is likely time to repeat one of my favorite caveats about any and all of the so-called releasing systems or spiritual surrender systems, regardless of whether one is using one of the Lester Levenson-derived releasing systems such as the Sedona Method or the Release Technique, or any of the half-dozen other releasing systems (most of which trace back to Lester Levinson's work or to the teachings of Ramana Maharshi), or any of the three or four "heart releasing" systems which are currently in vogue, or the Byron Katie system. Here goes:

The actual secret of any and all of the so-called releasing systems is NOT about trying to let go of something (such as a problem, or a feeling), nor about trying to get rid of something, but rather it is about being willing to sink down into the heart and solar plexus, into Heart and Being, and being willing to be Present (capitalized on purpose) with whatever it is that is going on inside us at that time, or whatever is trying to emerge, often as subtle (or not-so-subtle) feelings/sensations in the heart and solar plexus region. It does often take a very brief and momenty act of concentration and will to shift attention from the chattering and chirping of the head to the heart and solar plexus area, and to announce to yourself that you are willing to be present with what is going on in your inner landscape in that region.

So the two important steps of the process are being willing to sink into the heart and belly, into Heart and Being, and being willing to be present with the stuff that is there, including long-buried emotional stuff such as fear, worries, loneliness, apathy, sadness, despair, etc. And then, a final step is being willing to surrender all such things, and also any concerns or worries or fears about survival, safety, being loved or receiving approval, or wanting to control, wanting to figure things out, to what I call Supreme Heart (aka Sacred Heart), to Holy Spirit. Some systems call this letting go and letting God, and some call this "spiritual surrender".

More and more lately I seem to be encountering people who are trying to release such things from the head, using words, and in the process they are not only NOT being Present with the feelings and other sensations in the heart/solar plexus area, but they are impatient -- that is, they are trying to get rid of the feeling or the whole thing, wanting to force it out, wanting it to go away, hating the discomfort it seems to cause. Such efforts are not releasing at all, and rather are really suppression, repression and avoidance; they are not the way to lightness and freedom, and they are not the way to greater Love and Grace and Ease.

Now, I am not trying to tell you that you SHOULD be doing the process of sinking to the Heart and Being and being Present and being willing to Surrender, nor am I trying to tell you that you SHOULD NOT be engaging in supression or repression and avoiding things. Rather, I am reminding you, for the sake of clarity, that those latter things are not releasing, and they are not a path to greater Grace and Love and Ease. It is rather foolish and delusional to engage in suppression while telling ourselves that it is some type of "releasing. Ultimately, I do not care at all what you do with this reminder; I am not a preacher nor a missionary nor a zealot, and I am not concerned whether you choose to incorporate/heed the caveat which I have shared here or not, as all possible outcomes are fine with me and I am at peace with all of them, and rather, I simply offer this caveat lightly for those for whom it may be of benefit.

Lastly, a reminder that I feel that the modern-day "releasing" systems based upon Lester Levenson's work focus way too much attention on releasing, and nowhere near enough attention upon the importance of the following acts:

• surrender to divinity, to God, Holy Spirit, Supreme Heart, whatever term and concept for Divinity works for you
• being willing to accept and love oneself just as you are, and the entire world, just as it is.
  

Have fun!

with care,
--Vinny

An Interesting Online Article Which Mentioned and Cited Me

A Recent Article on an Entertainment Website which Included Some Quotes from Me and a Mention of My Work

The November 3, 2008 issue of FromTheBalcony, an online entertainment news website, featured a few paragraphs about me (including some quotes attributed to me), along with links to a couple of my sites, in a weekly column called "Devil's Hammer" by author Victoria Alexander (more fun info on Victoria and Devil's Hammer below...). The mention of me and of some of my research work was occasioned by the fact that the author of the column had written briefly of Art Kunkin and his "immortality" theory ( that is, his claim that one may become immortal by eating one or two fruits (he maintains that apples and pears are optimal) per week that have been exposed to radiation from natural radioactive ores such as uranium ore for a few days in a cookie jar.) The November 3, 2008 "Devil's Hammer" column/article may be found on the FromTheBalcony website at http://www.fromthebalcony.com/devilshammer.php?id=141 The several mentions of me, includng quotes and notes about some of my work may be found about one-third of the way down the page.

Apparently, Victoria, who lives in the Las Vegas (LV) area, had attended parts of the International Alchemy Conference, which was held in LV in early October of this year, and while there, she heard a presentation called "Live as an Immortal After Making the Philosopher's Stone" by Art Kunkin on his theory. The November 3, 2008 edition of Victoria Alexander's Devil's Hammer column which mentioned Art Kunkin and his Immortality theory also briefly mentioned me, as Victoria had contacted me after having met Art in order to learn a bit more about Art's claims and also about related topics, such as the whole matter of the wacky people (including myself) who, for health-related reasons, deliberately expose themselves, on a daily basis to levels of radiation from natural sources that are well above normal background level. Much as noted in the section above, the November 3, 2008 "Devil's Hammer" column/article may be found on the FromTheBalcony website at:
http://www.fromthebalcony.com/devilshammer.php?id=141

Victoria, in her column, mentioned me and some of my work in this area, and also provided links to my main consulting website and to my Radiation Hormesis/Nutrition website.

Incidentally, in her article, Victoria introduced me as "...consultant-mystic Vinny Pinto, who has written many articles on Kunkin's theories." In reality, as many of you already know, I have been involved in the realms of radiation nutrition, aka radiation hormesis, for several years, albeit in ways that involve more direct exposure to radiation and radiation effects than proposed in Art's book, and I have written one or two critical reviews of Art's book on my Radiation Hormesis list group. That is NOT the same as "...having written many articles on Kunkin's theories", but, alas, the world is not a perfect place!

Incidentally, the link that I have given above for the Devil's Hammer column is for the FromTheBalcony entertainment website, which seems to be a web-only enterprise. I have also heard from a few persons who have contacted me that the same Devil's Hammer column written by Victoria Alexander also appears in a weekly print newspaper somewhere in the LV area, but I have not bothered to track down the details of these reports, and thus I cannot tell you the name of the weekly print newspaper in which her column appears/appeared.

When columnist Victoria Alexander first wrote to me, I naturally became a bit curious about her, and I spent some time checking out past editions of her Devil's Hammer column articles, which have appeared on at least three different entertainment industry-related websites over the past eight years. Her Devil's Hammer column is often quite interesting, because, while its primary raison d'etre seems to be to offer film reviews, in reality, a vast amount of space in each column is devoted to all sorts of interesting phenomena and events well outside the nexus of the entertainment industry, as we have already briefly seen with her excursion into radiation hormesis and radiation nutrition in her November 3 Devil's Hammer column. A number of the side forays in her column involve topics in the realms of spirituality, alternative health, alchemy and various New Age-related realms. Perhaps more fascinating is the fact that Victoria authors some of her columns and articles on other websites under the nom de plume "Victoria Black Lovage".

One of Victoria's more interesting columns, at least to me, involved one where she described her meeting with the modern Italian stigmatic Giorgio Bongiovanni, about whom I have writtten in the past on my Spiritual Surrender list group and one or two related list groups; that column, along with a photo of Victoria with Giorgio; that edition of Devil's Hammer may be found at http://www.fromthebalcony.com/devilshammer.php?id=131.

And now, having mentioned Victoria, and having mentioned her column which discussed Giorgio Bongiovanni briefly, I must now issue a warning to my archnemesis Rick, the mad chemist from St. Louis, MO who belongs to all my list groups and who is the Charles Bukowski-wannabe who has been my nerdy sworn arch-enemy ever since he kidnapped my beloved hottie Barred Plymouth Rock hen Samantha in late 2003. The following impassioned letter is intended for Rick's eyes only, and I am sure that those of you who are not Rick will respect my wishes and will NOT read the short private personal letter which appears below:

~~~~~~~~~ FOR RICK'S EYES ONLY ~~~~~~~~~~

Dear Rick:

I beg you, PLEASE DO NOT look at any of Victoria's Devil's Hammer columns which contain photos of her, and particularly, please DO NOT look at the photo of Victoria in the edition of Devil's Hammer cited above, which shows her sitting on stigmatic Girogio Bongiovanni's bed. You see, you are a self-professsed lech and an admitted hen-napper, and... well... you see... well... that is...

well...

you see...

...Victoria is quite cute, and obviously quite witty, and I do not want you to become obsessed with her, nor with her exotic nom de plumes such as "Victoria Black Lovage", nor with the fact that she makes custom-crafted bras and corsets for customers around the world (down, boy!) nor with the idea of pursuing her to ask her for a date, for I am certain that she will reject you. Yes, it seems to be true that one of her MySpace pages is a bit titillating (rather than provide the link to her MySpace page(s) here, I will allow you to do a bit of web detective work on MySpace, using her various email addresses, to find her page(s)...), but I am sure that she has plenty of taste and discrimination, and that, dear boy, eliminates you from the start, for you are a buffoon, a boor, a lech, and a filthy hen-napper! Oh, and I can assure you that your standard pick up line -- which involves bragging about the fact that you are a top industrial chemist, that you are listed in Who's Who in Chemistry and Plastics, and that you have more inner angst and pathos than Charles Bukowski ever did -- will get you nowhere with her! So, Rick PLEASE back off (down, boy!) and give Victoria some space!

sincerely, and with a bit of malice,

--Vinny

~~~~ END OF PRIVATE LETTER TO RICK ~~~~~

A Postscript
I have, for a number of years, been a quiet proponent of radiation nutrition, that is, the concept that exposure to radiation from natural sources at a level ranging from 10 to 400 times higher than normal background radiation levels found in most parts of the world can be beneficial to humans, animals and all other life forms, and I have for years operated an email list group at Yahoo Groups devoted to the topic of radiation nutrition and radiation hormesis. The name of the list group is Radiation Hormesis, and you may visit the list group home page at Yahoo Groups at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Radiation-Hormesis/
Please be advised that this is a select membership group, which means that anyone applying to join the list group must first have their requst to join approved by the list owner or moderators. To that end, if you wish to apply to join the list group, you will need to tell us why you wish to join, so that we may discern that you are a serious and sincere applicant and not a spammer, flamer or web troll.

I also operate a website devoted to the topics of radiation hormesis and radiation nutrition; you may find the website at http://radiationhormesis.vpinf.com/

I hope you all had fun with this post, and....

Enjoy!

with care,
--Vinny

For Mystics: A Reminder About My Spiritual Surrender List Group

For those who are mystics, this seems like a good time to remind you that I operate a list group on the topic of spiritual surrender. More details follow below, largely from my original announcement made back in late 2007.

Introduction
Lately, on several of my list groups, particularly on my ormus-related and exotic energy-related list groups, list members have asked me -- sometimes via the list group and sometimes privately -- for more information about surrendering one's life to Holy Spirit and Supreme Heart rather than to the demands and whims of what I call the "local self" (and what many spiritual traditions call the "ego".) In fact, I received two more such communications over the past two days, including one from a friend/colleague who lamented that she was tired of releasing and letting go (i.e., as espoused in the releasing methods which arose from Lester Levenson's work) and that she wanted to "...let go of letting go." It just so happened that this concept of letting go of letting go had been a constant theme in my inner work and in my work with clients over the past two weeks, and so her comments struck a chord. And so, over the past couple of days, Holy Spirit (and, of course Daffy Duck) suggested to me that it would be fun to create a list group devoted to this broader concept of surrender, rather than the idea of using releasing as a tool of the local mind/ego.

And so, I have this morning started a new list group entitled "Spiritual Surrender" at Yahoo Groups; the shorthand group name is "spiritual-surrender". A bit more information follows about the new list group, followed by information on how to join the list group.

Description
This list group is devoted to discussion of the radical act of spiritual surrender, that is, complete surrender of your life, breath, thoughts, feelings and actions to Holy Spirit, to God, to Supreme Heart, but without the stigma of ties to the dogma or baggage of any religious denomination, religious tradition, or religious agenda.

This group was founded by and is operated by Vinny Pinto, a degreed scientist and a mystic. The concept of letting go of the desires and aspirations of the local self and surrendering instead to the guidance and Grace of Holy Spirit and Supreme Heart is one which has emerged in numerous religious and spiritual traditions -- both Eastern and Western -- since time immemorial. The same concept has also been espoused by numerous spiritual masters, including Jesus Christ, Buddha, Ramana Maharshi, Ramakrishna, Jean Klein and Lester Levenson (although his message has often been somewhat re-framed by those trying to market some of his work since his death.)

One of my primary reasons for forming this list group was due to a recognition of some inherent limitations in the various email list groups (one of which I operate) and forums devoted to the "releasing" or "letting go" work promulgated by the various commercial enterprises which package and market some of the "letting go" concepts of Lester Levenson, the American spiritual master. I believe that these limitations arise because most of these traditions tend to focus on releasing as a tool to achieve the goals of the local mind, whether those goals be wealth, fancy cars, travel, great health, or to be in a great relationship, and also embody the inherent idea that we must "work" at a technique called "releasing".

In contrast to the above, the surrender which is the focus of this list group is far broader and deeper and more comprehensive than that which seems to be inherent in the systems described above.

How to Join
To learn more about the list group or to join, you may either visit the list group home page at Yahoo Groups, at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/spiritual-surrender
or you may subscribe by email by sending an email to:
spiritual-surrender-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Lastly, the link associated with this entry will take you to my small website devoted to the topic of spiritual surrender.

In closing, I am reminded of the words of Father Theophane Boyd, the famed Christian mystic, who once wrote "Every breath you take is the breath of God."

Have fun!

with care,
--Vinny