We all generally want to feel "happy". But when you reflect on your life, when did your big spiritual growth spurts happen? Usually deep growth comes from hardship and strife, from those dark nights of the soul. I think many humans rob themselves of a rich life experience by succumbing to the assembly line of quick distractions and comforts- TV, gossip, scrolling social media, overeating, partying, alcohol, drugs, pornography... the multitude of balms we rub on ourselves, and they are plentiful. Left unaware, we become slaves to sense gratification.
I think it's crucial that we make ourselves present for life, all of it, rather than distract. We must understand why we're here in this human form, which is for spiritual realization, not just a happenstance universe explosion as Materialists would have you believe (and had me believe for a good portion of my life). In this way, you can reinterpret suffering and not be a captive to the finite material world, the body you're in, and what it's currently enduring.
Hone your mind. Connect to the Divine through daily devotion. Build up a sanctuary in yourself. Fortify what is eternal in you.
Sitting in my camper in the mountains, drinking coffee all day, listening to bigfoot stories as I work... really beginning to feel like one of those Northwesterners. A good [season 1-2] Twin Peaks cast member. Which I'm fine with. Just need to replace my wardrobe with corduroy, flannel, and hats only. And invest in a HAM radio setup. But seriously, have you listened to the Sierra Camp footage at the end of Missing 411: The Hunted?! * opens eyes really big * Have you!?
I could watch the interplay of sun and cloud dancing across the Okanogan Highlands for hours.
A yellow-headed blackbird sounding his distinct song.
A yellow-headed blackbird at Molson Lake.
Pflug Mansion - John Pflug had a dream of building a lovely German style home for his growing family. He began building in the summer of 1908. Money was scarce for all early homesteaders, so he hired no help and did all the work himself. He hauled all the materials from a sawmill about ten miles away with only a team and wagon. He never finished his dream house, but the family lived for several years in a part of the house that was finished. The house has been vacant since 1921.
An old homesteader's cabin from long ago.
A serene road through the Okanogan Highlands.
Another old homestead, from a whole 'nother time, still standing.
These three should we mind ourselves closely over if we wish to draw closer to God:
attachment
fear
anger.
I guess it all boils down to attachment, really. At the foundation, it is attachment that provokes fear and anger.
Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 4, verse 10: Being freed from attachment, fear, and anger, becoming fully absorbed in Me, and taking refuge in Me, many persons in the past became purified by knowledge of Me, and thus they attained My divine love.
On average, about 4 people per day go missing in America's national parks. But did you know that if a person goes missing on federal land, it's not counted? There's no complete federal database of people who have disappeared within these national parks, which makes it hard to spot any trends or commonalities from case to case. Some are reported, because some families push harder, but nowhere near all. [further reading]
This is where David Paulides' work comes in. I came across him last year and was immediately enthralled. But my fascination took me a little too deep and ended up messing with my wilderness adventures that I've cherished my whole life. Instead of enjoying being outdoors in wild nature, I was feeling a little hesitant and frankly scared. So- I backed off for a while.
"But how many of those disappear in the wild is unclear. Neither the Department of the Interior, which oversees the National Park Service, or the Department of Agriculture’s US Forest Service keeps track."National parks like Yosemite operate almost as sovereign states. When somebody goes missing in their territory, they’re not inclined to seek help from outside government agencies." [source]
In this strange case, Kara Moore wandered home weeks after her disappearance, but remembered very little of the experience. "A search-and-rescue effort doesn’t always make a difference. In 2017, a middle-aged woman named Kara Moore disappeared in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan’s Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. Almost immediately, dozens of searchers with canines covered 73,000 acres and found nothing, only to have Moore wander home a week later on her own."
Then recently, David's work came back into my field of awareness and I watched the documentary Missing 411: The Hunted one night with my husband. You can watch it free on YouTube, by the way. And I recommend you do.
This film didn't focus as much on the national park relationship, instead it highlighted hunters who had gone missing, many of them in very strange ways, and often not a trace was ever found of them despite hundreds of search and rescue teams scouring the area for days, even weeks, and canine teams being employed. Nothing- not even their rifles or bows- were ever found in some cases.
This really intrigued me because hunters know the woods. They know the wildlife. They're equipped, armed, and attentive.
But it was toward the end of the documentary when I really got fascinated. The Sierra Camp story. In a nutshell, a large group of men sojourn high up in the Sierra Nevada Mountains once every year. They've been doing this since the 70's. Because they stay for a couple of weeks, in order to get all of their supplies up and out to this very remote location, they take a mule train. These men are professionals. Successful men. They aren't looking to get famous. In fact, they've kept their experiences quiet for a very long time, and David Paulides is the first to bring what they heard to public awareness. The recordings they made were analyzed by linguistic and electrical professionals and found to be non-human vocalizations.
For more in-depth details on this, you'll have to watch the documentary for yourself.
Throughout the Vedic literature, the oldest written history that humanity has, there is mention not only of the history of Earth and other planets and realms, but also of other beings, some of which coexist here with us. Some are benevolent, and others malevolent. Let's also not forget that late last year, the former Israeli space security chief publicly stated that we have been in contact with "aliens" for some time now, and have asked the government agencies not to publish that they are here, as humanity is not ready yet. You can read more on that in this article. So I have my theories as to what could be going on.
And, sigh, of course I begin revisiting this a couple of weeks before we move back out to the rugged and remote mountains of the Inland Northwest, an area David coincidentally mentioned in a video I watched this morning.
A strong wind blew through late in the night while we were sleeping, leaving a fresh--early Spring--dusting of snow on the high foothills, which I stood and admired out the window early this morning as I sipped coffee.
But I couldn't stand and sip coffee and coo over beauty for too long as this weekend is my Ayurvedic intensive. We have one each month. It's 20 hours of school in one weekend. Arduous as it is, because the school is done via Zoom these days, I usually manage to get some craft projects completed on intensive weekends.
There was a purple hat that needed finishing, so I tended to that.
Then I began knitting a scarf, but turned it into a cowl, deciding it would make a boring and stiff scarf. I think for this kind of wool, a scarf would look better if I held two strands together to create a looser knit. Or something to this effect. So, a cowl it was! And since chunky cowls are pretty quick going, I finished it in one sitting, working in a basket weave stitch.
Now, as the shadows stretch out and the end of the day grows nigh, I'm just going to finish my latest embroidery, which means stitching a piece of fabric on the back to hide all of the thread chaos.
My brain is weary with so much new information, as it always is with these intensives, and to think I still have a full 10-hour day tomorrow... phew...wish me luck.
Despite having lived here for two years and walking this same patch of nearby woods and trails each week, today, somehow, we stumbled right into a new area. There was a feeling of strangeness, coming upon something new in a place you believed yourself to know well, but the peculiarity soon gave way to unexpected delight.
Memory's Vault is, as one of the first pillars told us, "a place for contemplation-- of nature, of man and his intentions." The trails we walk here each week are within what was once an active military artillery corps in the late 1800's and early 1900's to protect the Puget Sound from invasion by sea, so this made some lines of the poems inscribed in bronze onto pillars all the more poignant.
It was a nice space to spend some quiet moments in, as the afternoon sun slowly sank down into the west, spilling its golden rays and imbuing the whole experience with a dreamy quality.
Twin Peaks fans will appreciate this: a little while ago, we took a little drive out to Kiana Lodge, otherwise known as the Great Northern Inn from Twin Peaks. Though the exterior of the hotel was portrayed from shots of the Salish Lodge in Snoqualmie (with the waterfall beside it in the opening credits), the interior scenes and the beach outside with the log where Laura Palmer's body was found, and where Pete would go to fish, were all filmed here at Kiana Lodge. It was perfectly strange with not a soul to be seen, except one native maintenance man in a hoodie who could've cared less about us wandering around the place.
Pete would walk down this path to go fishing
This set of doors was portrayed as the main entry to The Great Northern
The log where Laura Palmer's body was found
Inside The Great Northern. Recognize the wall paintings? This is the room where Leland exclaimed, "Somebody dance with me!"
And that concludes our little jaunt into Twin Peaks. Luckily, we didn't run into Bob. At least, I don't think so.
