Monday, July 25, 2016

Pran (vital energy) Mudra


As the name suggests, Pran Mudra increases your vitality from the root up giving you energy up through your nervous system and chakras.

Join the tip of the thumb to the tip of the ring finger and the little finger while keeping the rest of the fingers straight.  It should be practiced with both hands.

Pran Mudra is said to generate and redirect life energy. This life energy is the energy that animates the living being. It redirect this life to the parts where it is most needed. Pran mudra is like cure for all. According to some sources pran mudra benefits include everything from eyesight to fatigue, to skin rashes to vitamin deficiency. Pran mudra gives vitality and energy to the body  and reduces fatigue and nervousness. If you have too much distraction from outside and very little inner stability, by practicing pran mudra, one can achieve inner stability and mind clarity.

1) Pran mudra change the energy in the body, it is always beneficial if you incorporate conscious breathing with your hand mudra practice.

2) Take deep & rhythmic breathe.

3) Inhale and exhale for same duration.

4) You can also chant the mantra sound ‘So-hum’. Chant 'so', when inhale and 'hum' on exhale.

5) Though at start you will find it difficult to chant and inhale-exhale simultaneous. But with practice, you can get the expertise on this.

6) Do the inhale and exhale (with sound chanting) for continuous 20-30 times.

7) Then stop and try to focus your mind.

8) You will feel a sudden vibration in your body. You will experience like your body is floating between a pool of vibration.

All of a sudden, you will feel some instant effect of pran mudra. You will be rejuvenated and overwhelmed.


Wednesday, July 20, 2016

Evidence of dream telepathy between people


Dream telepathy suggests that human beings have the ability to communicate telepathically with another person while they are dreaming. 

This isn’t a new concept, scientific interest in telepathy dates back to the fathers of the psychoanalytic movement. Freud, for example, looked at the implications of telepathy on psychoanalytic thought. He also considered dream telepathy, or the telepathic influence of thought on dreaming, on multiple occasions. Carl Jung believed in the telepathic hypothesis without question, and even developed a theoretical system to explain “paranormal” events of this nature.

It seems that all great minds encourage the study of various types of non-physical phenomena.

“The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence.” – Nikola Tesla

According to Stanley Krippner, Ph.D. and professor of psychology at Saybrook University in California:

A wealth of anecdotal and clinical material exist which supports the possibility of telepathic effects occurring in dreams (Krippner, 1974). However, an experimental approach to the topic did not become possible until psycho physiological laboratory technology became available. It was discovered that sleeping research participants awakened from periods of rapid eye movement (REM) activity were frequently able to recall dream episodes. As a result, it was possible to request a “telepathic receiver” to attempt dreaming about a target stimulus that was being focused on in a distant location from a “telepathic sender.”

Experiments and Results

In the mid 1960’s, Montague Ullman, MD, began a number of experiments at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York to test the hypothesis that people could be primed to dream about randomly selected material. In other words, they could choose what they wanted to dream about before going to sleep, and this could include anything, from artwork to movies to photographs and more. Shortly after these experiments began, Ullman was joined by Stanley Krippner (quoted above), who has a very impressive background in the scientific study of dreams, psychology, and parapsychology.

The experiments they conducted lasted a span of more than 10 years, and “yielded statistically significant results.”

During the experiments, there was usually a “telepathic sender” and a “telepathic receiver.” They met in the laboratory for a short period of time before being placed in completely separate rooms just before going to sleep. The telepathic sender had an envelope waiting for them in the room in which they’d sleep. It would contain something like a picture or a drawing. The receivers were then purposely awakened shortly after Rapid Eye Movement sleep (REM) began so the researchers could take a dream report.

A Very Significant Session

One very memorable and significant session of dream telepathy experimentation took place where the selected art print was “School of Dance” by Edgar Degas, which depicts a several young women in a dance class. According to Krippner, the receivers’ dream reports included such phrases as “I was in a class made up of maybe half a dozen people, it felt like a school,” and “There was one little girl that was trying to dance with me.” These results are fascinating, and the idea that one can influence another’s dream opens up a lot of doors. Although we might not understand the process behind the transfer of information, and we can’t see this transfer take place from mind to mind, we have proof of it occurring. This is quite common when we examine scientific studies that have evaluated parapsychological phenomena – we know what is happening, but not how.

Another significant session conducted by Krippner and Ullman took place on March 15th, 1970. In this session, a large group of people at a Holy Modal Rounders rock concert was selected to send something telepathically. A local media artist by the name of Jean Millay took responsibility to ready the telepathic senders for “target preparation.” She did this with help from the Lidd Light Company, a group of artists who were responsible for the light show at the concert. Millay gave the audience a brief verbal set of directions before the image was flashed on the large screen that the telepathic senders were looking at. Six slide projectors were used to project a colour film about eagles and their nesting habits, as well as information about various birds from around the world (including birds from mythology, like the phoenix). This all happened at the same time Holy Modal Rounders were playing their song, “If you want to be a bird.”

There were five volunteer telepathic receivers for this experiment, and they were all located within a one hundred mile radius from the telepathic senders. All of the receivers were aware of the concert location and were told to record their images at midnight, because that was when the material would be sent to them.

According to Krippner:

One “telepathic receiver,” Helen Andrews, had the impression of “something mythological, like a griffin or a phoenix.” The second, third and fourth research participants reported images of “a snake,” “grapes,” and “an embryo in flames.” The fifth participant was Richie Havens, the celebrated American singer and recording artist, who reported closing his eyes at midnight and visualizing “a number of seagulls flying over water.” Both Mr. Havens’ and Ms. Andrews’ reports represented direct correspondences with the target material.

More remarkable results were seen when the rock group “Grateful Dead” also volunteered to participate in a dream telepathy session over a span of six nights. These results were actually published by the American Psychological Association.

These are usually the instructions given to subjects who participate in these experiments:

1. You are about to participate in an ESP experiment.

2. In a few seconds you will see a picture.

3. Try using your ESP to “send” this picture to the receiver.

4. The receiver will try to dream about this picture. Try to “send” it to them.

5. Then, receivers will be made aware of the sender’s location.

Possible Explanations?

Quantum physics has shed light on the vast interconnectedness of everything in the universe. One possible explanation is quantum entanglement. For example, consider two electrons that are created together. If you send one to the other side of the universe, the other will respond instantly, regardless of their distance from each other. This is one way of interpreting how everything is really connected in some way. Einstein called it “spooky actions at a distance.”

The truth of the matter is that we have no way to explain how this works. The researchers involved were only able to observe and record what was taking place, which again, is very common for parapsychological phenomenon.

At the same time, these experiments involve dreams, a completely different and altered state of “reality” that we really don’t know much about. It’s a world separate (or at least we think is separate) from the world in which we are “awake” (although, of course, the world we perceive when we are awake could very well be just a dream). 

Parasychological Phenomena Have Been Proven and Documented All Over The World

Parapsychological (PSI) phenomena have been studied, documented, observed, and proven (over and over again) by a number of renowned scientists in laboratories all over the world. The Department of Defense has had a huge interest in this subject (and has studied it) for a number of years, yet the scientific study of it is concealed from the public and left out of universities and mainstream science, which is not fair, and not right. It isn’t as though this information is inaccessible to us, some of this documentation and these publications are available in the public domain.




Books we recommend on this topic:

  • Dream Yoga: Become Conscious in the World of Dreams by Samael Aun Weor 
  • A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming: Mastering the Art of Oneironautics
  • The Art of Dreaming by Carlos Castaneda
  • Lucid Dreaming: Gateway to the Inner Self by Robert Waggoner
  • Journeys Out of the Body: The Classic Work on Out-of-Body Experience by Robert A. Monroe

You can find some of the book on the right bar of our site.


Also read:

Friday, July 15, 2016

Silence is much more important to our brains than we think


In 2011, the Finish Tourist Board ran a campaign that used silence as a marketing ‘product’. They sought to entice people to visit Finland and experience the beauty of this silent land. They released a series of photographs of single figures in the nature and used the slogan “Silence, Please”. A tag line was added by Simon Anholt, an international country branding consultant, “No talking, but action.”

Eva Kiviranta the manager of the social media for VisitFinland.com said: “We decided, instead of saying that it’s really empty and really quiet and nobody is talking about anything here, let’s embrace it and make it a good thing”.

Finland may be on to something very big. You could be seeing the very beginnings of using silence as a selling point as silence may be becoming more and more attractive. As the world around becomes increasingly loud and cluttered you may find yourself seeking out the reprieve that silent places and silence have to offer. This may be a wise move as studies are showing that silence is much more important to your brains than you might think.

Regenerated brain cells may be just a matter of silence

A 2013 study on mice published in the journal Brain, Structure and Function used differed types of noise and silence and monitored the effect the sound and silence had on the brains of the mice. The silence was intended to be the control in the study but what they found was surprising. The scientists discovered that when the mice were exposed to two hours of silence per day they developed new cells in the hippocampus. The hippocampus is a region of the brain associated with memory, emotion and learning.

A 2013 study on mice published in the journal

The growth of new cells in the brain does not necessarily translate to tangible health benefits. However, in this instance, researcher Imke Kirste says that the cells appeared to become functioning neurons.

“We saw that silence is really helping the new generated cells to differentiate into neurons, and integrate into the system.”

In this sense silence can quite literally grow your brain.

The brain is actively internalizing and evaluating information during silence

A 2001 study defined a “default mode” of brain function that showed that even when the brain was “resting” it was perpetually active internalizing and evaluating information.

Follow-up research found that the default mode is also used during the process of self-reflection. In 2013, in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, Joseph Moran et al. wrote, the brain’s default mode network “is observed most closely during the psychological task of reflecting on one’s personalities and characteristics (self-reflection), rather than during self-recognition, thinking of the self-concept, or thinking about self-esteem, for example.”

When the brain rests it is able to integrate internal and external information into “a conscious workspace,” said Moran and colleagues.

When you are not distracted by noise or goal-orientated tasks, there appears to be a quiet time that allows your conscious workspace to process things. During these periods of silence, your brain has the freedom it needs to discover its place in your internal and external world.

The default mode helps you think about profound things in an imaginative way.

As Herman Melville once wrote, “All profound things and emotions of things are preceded and attended by silence.”

Silence relieves stress and tension.

It has been found that noise can have a pronounced physical effect on our brains resulting in elevated levels of stress hormones. The sound waves reach the brain as electrical signals via the ear. The body reacts to these signals even if it is sleeping. It is thought that the amygdalae (located in the temporal lobes of the brain) which is associated with memory formation and emotion is activated and this causes a release of stress hormones. If you live in a consistently noisy environment that you are likely to experience chronically elevated levels of stress hormones.

A study that was published in 2002 in Psychological Science (Vol. 13, No. 9) examined the effects that the relocation of Munich’s airport had on children’s health and cognition. Gary W. Evans, a professor of human ecology at Cornell University notes that children who are exposed to noise develop a stress response that causes them to ignore the noise. What is of interest is that these children not only ignored harmful stimuli they also ignored stimuli that they should be paying attention to such as speech. 

“This study is among the strongest, probably the most definitive proof that noise – even at levels that do not produce any hearing damage – causes stress and is harmful to humans,” Evans says.

Silence seems to have the opposite effect of the brain to noise. While noise may cause stress and tension silence releases tension in the brain and body. A study published in the journal Heart discovered that two minutes of silence can prove to be even more relaxing than listening to “relaxing” music. They based these findings of changes they noticed in blood pressure and blood circulation in the brain.

Silence replenishes our cognitive resources

The effect that noise pollution can have on cognitive task performance has been extensively studied. It has been found that noise harms task performance at work and school. It can also be the cause of decreased motivation and an increase in error making.  The cognitive functions most strongly affected by noise are reading attention, memory and problem solving.

Studies have also concluded that children exposed to households or classrooms near airplane flight paths, railways or highways have lower reading scores and are slower in their development of cognitive and language skills.

But it is not all bad news. It is possible for the brain to restore its finite cognitive resources. According to the attention restoration theory when you are in an environment with lower levels of sensory input the brain can ‘recover’ some of its cognitive abilities. In silence the brain is able to let down its sensory guard and restore some of what has been ‘lost’ through excess noise. 



Thursday, July 14, 2016

10 Ancient books that promise supernatural powers

Humankind has long dabbled in the supernatural, lured by the promise of obtaining power and enlightenment. Several texts have been devoted to this practice, outlining complicated and mysterious rituals that were presented as the key to achieving communion with otherworldly spirits.

10. Greek Magical Papyri


The Greek magical papyri from the second century B.C. listed spells, rituals, and divinations. These included instructions for how to summon a headless demon, open doors to the underworld, and protect yourself from wild beasts. Perhaps most tantalizing of all, they describe how to gain a supernatural assistant, an otherworldly entity who does your bidding.

The most commonly found spells in the Papyri are divination spells—ceremonies that offer you visions of the future. One of its most well-known passages provides instructions for how to forecast upcoming events using an “iron lampstead,” “an offering of frankincense,” and an “uncorrupted and pure” child. After being placed into a deep trance, the child sees images flickering in the flame.

Among the Papyri’s most famous components is the Mithras Liturgy. This ceremony describes how to ascend through seven higher planes of existence and communicate with the deity Mithras.


9. The Black Pullet



Originating in France in the 18th century, The Black Pullet focuses on the study of magical talismans, special objects engraved with mystical words that protect and empower the wearer. It was reportedly written by an anonymous officer in Napoleon’s Army, who claimed to have received the contents from a mysterious mage while on expedition in Egypt.

The Pullet includes detailed instructions for how to construct talismans out of bronzed steel, silk, and special ink. Among these invocations is a spell to call upon a djinn, a creature made of smoke and fire who will bring you true love. If your ambitions are slightly more cynical, then the Pullet also provides talismans that will force “discreet men” to tell you their secrets, allow you to see behind closed doors, and destroy anyone who is plotting against you.

The apex of the book’s mystical teachings is acquiring the Black Pullet itself—a hen that can find buried treasure.



8. Ars Almadel


The Ars Almadel is Book Four of the Lesser Key of Solomon, also known as the Lemegeton, a significant grimoire of demonology compiled in the 17th century by an unknown author. This particular book of the Legemeton provides a blueprint for constructing an Almadel—a magical wax altar, somewhat like a ouija board, that allows you to communicate with angels.

The Almadel is composed of four Altitudes, or “Choras,” each of which corresponds with a unique set of angels with different domains. The text provides the names of the angels of each Chora (Gelomiros and Aphiriza, for example), the proper way to direct your requests to them (ask only what is “just and lawful”), and the best calendar dates for invoking them. It also includes brief physical descriptions of these angelic manifestations. The Angels of the Third Chora, for example, come in the form of “little women dressed in green and silver” wearing crowns made of bay leaves.



7. Picatrix


The Picatrix is an ancient grimoire of astrological magic. Originally written in Arabic and titled the Ghayat Al-Hakim, it dates back to the 11th century and spans a mammoth 400 pages of astrological theory. Alongside are spells and incantations to channel the occult energies of planets and stars to achieve power and enlightenment.

The Picatrix is perhaps most notorious for the obscenity of its magic recipes. These gruesome and potentially deadly concoctions are designed to induce altered states of consciousness and out-of-body experiences. Not for the faint of the heart, their ingredients include blood, bodily excretions, and brain matter mixed with copious amounts of hashish, opium, and psychoactive plants. To construct a mirror that gives you power over the dead, for example, you must use noxious fumes of “blood, sperm, spit, ear wax, tears from the eyes, feces, and urine.”



6. Galdrabok


An Icelandic grimoire that originated in 16th century, the Galdrabok is a collection of 47 spells compiled by multiple magicians. Like most Icelandic magic of the period, the Galdrabok relies heavily on staves—runes that have magical properties when carried on the body, carved on objects, or written out. Among the staves drawn in the Galdrabok are ones to attract and curry the favor of powerful men, incite fear in your enemies, and put someone to sleep.

The majority of the spells found in the Galdrabok are “apotropaic spells,” benign remedies designed to protect the practitioner and heal various maladies. These include tiredness, difficulty with childbirth, headaches, and insomnia.

Other spells are pretty peculiar in nature. Spell 46, the hilariously titled “Fart Runes,” is a stave that will strike your enemy with “bad gas . . . and all of these will plague thy belly with great farting . . . may thy farting never stop.” Some are downright sinister. Spell 27, for example, when drawn on someone’s food, will make them sick and unable to eat all day, while Stave 30 is designed to kill another person’s animal. There are also staves to prevent your house from unwanted visitors, catch thieves, and “get satisfaction in a legal case.”


5. Arbatel De Magia Veterum


Composed late in the 16th century by an unknown author, the Arbatel de magia veterum is a comprehensive handbook of spiritual advice and aphorisms. The Arbatel reads much like a mystical self-help book, stressing the importance of Christian godliness, productivity, positive thinking, and using magic to help instead of harm. Its kernels of wisdom include “live for yourself and the Muses; avoid the friendship of the multitude” and “flee the mundane; seek heavenly things.”

The Arbatel reveals a series of rituals to invoke the seven heavenly governors and their legions, who rule over the provinces of the universe. The governors include Bethel, who brings miraculous medicines, Phalec, who brings honor in war, and Aratron, who “maketh hairy men.” However, the ability to perform these rituals is only for a person who is “born to magic from his mother’s womb.” All others, the Arbatel warns, are powerless imitators.

In addition to angels and archangels, the Arbatel mentions a coterie of other helpful elemental spirits that exist beyond the veil of the physical world, including pygmies, nymphs, dryads, sylphs (tiny forest people), and sagani (magical mortal spirits that inhabit the elements).



4. Ars Notoria


A Solomonic grimoire compiled in the 13th century, the Ars Notoria does not contain any spells or potions. It focuses instead on the acquisition of learning, the command of memory, and gaining insight into difficult books.

The Ars Notoria promises practitioners the mastery of liberal arts—geometry, arithmetic, and philosophy among them—through a lengthy daily process of visualization, contemplation, and orations. Through these orations, you can beseech God for intellectual gifts, including eloquence, heightened senses, wisdom, and perfect memory.

As a book concerned primarily with enlightenment, the Ars Notoria eschewed some of the more malevolent aspects of magic. However, not everyone was convinced of its benign nature. One notable 14th-century monk, John of Morigny, devoutly followed the teachings of the Ars Notoria and had haunting visions, until he claimed that the visions themselves were demonic in nature. He warned people of the diabolical nature of the Ars Notoria in his own mystical manuscript, the Liber Visonum.



3. Pseudomonarchia Daedonum


The Pseudomonarchia Daedonum was written by famed 16th-century physician and demonologist Johann Weyer, who was greatly inspired by his former teacher, celebrated German occultist Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa. It is the appendix to his seminal work against the persecution of witchcraft, the Praestigiis Daemonum, hailed by Sigmund Freud as one of the most important books of all time.

The Pseudomonarchia Daedonum is a catalog of 69 noble demons—prominent members of Hell’s monarchy—their specialties, and the methods of conjuring them. Naberius, for example, is a marquess who comes in the form of a crow and “maketh a man amiable and cunning in all arts.” Foras is a president who “recovereth lost things and discovereth treasures.” Other members of the demonic aristocracy include Haagenti, who can turn water into wine, Shax, who steals horses and robs people’s sight and hearing, and Eligos, who can see the future of wars and the fates of soldiers.

Weyer, however, was a devout Christian who approached the prospect of conjuring these Hell-bound spirits with great caution. He omitted key details of the rituals and warned those who read the Pseudomonarchia against imitating this “proof of folly.”


2. Sworn Book Of Honorius


Also known as the Liber Juratus Honorii, the Sworn Book of Honorius is a medieval grimoire and defense of ritual magic rumored to be the work of Honorius of Thebes, a mysterious, possibly mythological figure who has never been identified. The book begins with a scathing criticism of the Catholic church. The Church, a staunch enemy of the dark arts, has been corrupted by the devil, whose goal is to doom humanity by ridding the world of the benefits of magic.

The Sworn Book makes lofty demands of its practitioners. Only three copies of the book can be made, anyone in possession of the book who cannot find a worthy magician to inherit it must take it to their grave, and all adherents must “utterly forbear the company of women.”

Like many other grimoires, its rituals focus largely on summoning angels, demons, and other spirits to gain knowledge and power. By repeating long-winded orations, the practitioner is promised a wealth of scintillating abilities. These powers range from the awesome (causing floods and destroying kingdoms) to the eerie (seeing into purgatory and knowing the hour of your death). Among its most malign spells are ones to “to cast sickness into whom you will,” “to cause discord and debate,” and “to kill whom you will.”


1. The Book Of Abramelin The Mage


Written in the 15th century, the Book of Abramelin the Mage is one of the most prominent mystical texts of all time. It is the work of Abraham von Worms, a Jewish traveler who purportedly encountered the enigmatic magician Abramelin during a voyage to Egypt. In exchange for 10 florins and the promise of piety, Abramelin gifted this manuscript of magic to Abraham, who then passed it on to his son Lamech.

Abramelin’s ritual, referred to as “the operation,” is an arduous one. It consists of 18 months of prayer and purification, which is only recommended for men of sound health between the ages of 25 and 50. Women in general are discouraged from undertaking “the operation” because of their “curiosity and love of talk,” although an exception can be made for virgins. If the tenets of “the operation” are adhered to strictly and with unwavering devotion, you get in touch with your Holy Guardian Angel, who will grant you a wealth of powers. These powers include necromancy and divination, precognition, control of the weather, knowledge of secrets, visions of the future, and the ability to open locked doors.

The book relies heavily on the power of magic squares—unique words arranged into puzzles. Like the Icelandic staves in the Galdrabok, these squares contain mystic and occult properties when written out. The word “MILON,” for example, reveals the secrets of past and future when written on parchment and placed over the head, while “SINAH” brings war. The author warns that some magic squares, like “CASED” are too sinister to ever implement.

This text had a profound impact on famed occultist Aleister Crowley, who claimed to have experienced several supernatural occurrences after embarking on the ritual, and on the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, a 19th-century British magical order. Crowley later used the book as the foundation for his own system of magic.


You can find the books on the left and right bars of this blog.

Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Scientists achieve direct brain-to-brain communication between humans


Telepathy is the stuff of science fiction. But what if the dystopian futurists were on to something? What if our brains could directly interact with each other, bypassing the need for language? The idea isn’t quite so far fetched, according to a recent University of Washington study in which researchers successfully replicated a direct brain-to-brain communication between two people.

Participants in this study played a question-and-answer game over the internet in which signals were transmitted from one brain to the other. This study is the first to show that two brains can be directly connected to enable someone to guess what is on another person’s mind.

“This is the most complex brain-to-brain experiment, I think, that’s been done to date in humans,” said lead author Andrea Stocco, an assistant professor of psychology and a researcher at UW’s Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences.

“It uses conscious experiences through signals that are experienced visually, and it requires two people to collaborate,” Stocco said.

“The first participant, or “respondent,” wears a cap connected to an electroencephalography (EEG) machine that records electrical brain activity. The respondent is shown an object (for example, a dog) on a computer screen, and the second participant, or “inquirer,” sees a list of possible objects and associated questions. With the click of a mouse, the inquirer sends a question and the respondent answers “yes” or “no” by focusing on one of two flashing LED lights attached to the monitor, which flash at different frequencies.

A “no” or “yes” answer both send a signal to the inquirer via the Internet and activate a magnetic coil positioned behind the inquirer’s head. But only a “yes” answer generates a response intense enough to stimulate the visual cortex and cause the inquirer to see a flash of light known as a “phosphene.” The phosphene — which might look like a blob, waves or a thin line — is created through a brief disruption in the visual field and tells the inquirer the answer is yes. Through answers to these simple yes or no questions, the inquirer identifies the correct item.”

72% of the time, participants guessed the correct object.

“They have to interpret something they’re seeing with their brains,” said co-author Chantel Prat, a faculty member at the Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences and a UW associate professor of psychology. “It’s not something they’ve ever seen before.”

Andrea Stocco and Chantel Prat received a $1 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation. This gave them the opportunity to broaden their studies on decoding even more complex brain interactions. Currently, they are exploring the possibility of “brain tutoring.” In essence, brain tutoring is simply transferring knowledge from a teacher to a pupil. This could also be used to transfer signals from a healthy brain to ones that are developmentally impaired, or ones that have been affected by strokes or accidents.

Another aspect of their experiments is brain-state transmissions. What this means is sending signals from an alert subject, to a sleepy one, or from a focused pupil to one who suffers from A.D.H.D.

“Imagine having someone with ADHD and a neurotypical student,” Prat said. “When the non-ADHD student is paying attention, the ADHD student’s brain gets put into a state of greater attention automatically.”

Both Stocco and Prat are excited to discover what possibilities lie uncovered in the human brain.

“Evolution has spent a colossal amount of time to find ways for us and other animals to take information out of our brains and communicate it to other animals in the forms of behavior, speech and so on,” Stocco said. “But it requires a translation. We can only communicate part of whatever our brain processes.

“What we are doing is kind of reversing the process a step at a time by opening up this box and taking signals from the brain and with minimal translation, putting them back in another person’s brain,” he said.



Friday, July 8, 2016

90,000 Classified CIA documents now available online: STARGATE and MKULTRA


The Stargate Project: Psychic Warriors and the CIA

Metaphysical and psychic phenomena have long existed on the fringes of conventional science and academia. ESP, Clairvoyance, Telekinesis and Astral traveling have all been relegated to the back seat of mainstream, accepted belief systems in spite of an extensive mention of these practices down the ages, across myriad cultures. It has always been challenging for practitioners of the science to be validated by the prevailing status quo.

That however changed in 1995 when the CIA declassified a top secret program that had been training individuals in the esoteric science of 'Remote Viewing' in which, it was claimed, people were able to envision ongoing activities in distant places and future events.

Although reminiscent of a Sci-Fi yarn, Remote viewing was tested and deployed under rigorous scientific conditions to obtain data about foreign espionage activities, counter terrorism efforts, secret military bases abroad and hidden missiles. It recognized the inherent psychic potential in humans and attempted to harness these special faculties or 'powers' for the purposes of intelligence gathering, often of a vital nature.

The initial testing was done at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) where extensive investigations were carried out into the human mind's capacity to transcend all bounds of time and space. SRI's research was supported by the CIA and other government agencies for over two decades.

Russell Targ, Hal Puthoff and Ingo Swann were the original founders of this once-secret program. Their task was to learn to understand psychic abilities, and to use these abilities to gather information about the Soviet Union during the Cold War. They found from years of experience that people can quickly learn to do remote viewing, and can frequently incorporate this direct knowing of the world — both present and future — into their lives.

They were the original 'Psi Spies' named after the title of Jim Marrs' exhaustive study of the phenomenon. The project produced some remarkable results. Among them were detailed renderings of secret Soviet bases, the whereabouts of Red Brigade terrorism hostages in Italy, location of victims in the Israeli hostage crisis, locations of Scud missiles during the first Gulf War and even the impending attack on the Twin Towers in NY! (done by a private contractor and ignored until after the event). The program eventually came to be called 'Operation Stargate'.

The initial media flurry (Ted Koppel's Nightline, ABC, The Washington Post, The New York Times, etc.) that surrounded the declassification in 1995 uncovered some surprising details. The names that surfaced at the time were of Ingo Swann, who initially helmed the project, Dr.Russell Targ, Pat Price, Dr. Hal Puthoff, Joseph McMoneagle and others, an interesting group comprised of respected senior military personnel, path breaking scientists and academic luminaries. On ABC's Nightline, one of the operatives, Joe McMoneagle was put to the test by none other than Ted Koppel. He was able to prove the authenticity of the system with flying colors.

Remote viewers can often contact, experience and describe a hidden object, or a remote natural or architectural site, based on the presence of a cooperative person at the distant location, or when given geographical coordinates, or some other target demarcation — which they call an 'address'.  Shape, form and color are described much more reliably than the target's name, function, or other analytical information. In addition to vivid visual imagery, viewers sometimes describe associated feelings, sounds, smells and even electrical or magnetic fields.  Blueprint accuracy has occasionally been achieved in these double-blind experiments, and reliability in a series can be as high as 80 per cent.

Case Studies

In 1984 Targ organized a pair of successful 10,000-mile remote viewing experiments between Moscow and San Francisco with famed Russian healer Djuna Davitashvili.  Djuna's task was to describe where a colleague would be hiding in San Francisco. She had to focus her attention ten thousand miles to the west and two hours into the future to correctly describe his location. These experiments were performed under the auspices and control of the USSR Academy of Sciences.  Djuna hit the mark on all counts and the experiment was declared a resounding success.

Ten years earlier, in 1974, Russell Targ and his colleague Hal Puthoff carried out a demonstration of psychic abilities for the CIA. Pat Price, a retired police commissioner, described the inside and outside of a secret Soviet weapons laboratory in the far reaches of Siberia — given only the geographical coordinates of latitude and longitude for a reference. (That is, with no on- site cooperation.) This trial was such a stunning success that they were forced to undergo a formal Congressional investigation to determine if there had been a breach in National Security. Of course, none was ever found, and the government supported them for another fifteen years.

Data from these formal and controlled SRI investigations were highly statistically significant (thousands of times greater than chance expectation), and have been published in the world's most prestigious journals, such as Nature, The Proceedings of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, and The Proceedings of the American Academy of Sciences. The twenty years of remote viewing research conducted for the CIA is outlined in ‘Miracles of Mind: Exploring Non-local Consciousness and Spiritual Healing', co-authored by Targ and Katra.

Recent research in areas as different as distant healing and quantum physics are in agreement with the oldest spiritual teachings of the sages of India, who taught that "separation is an illusion." The powers we are discovering now are described by Rishis as 'Siddhis', or fruits of deep penance and arcane Yogic techniques, verbally transmitted, only known to inner circles.  

The military and institutional exploitation of this timeless phenomenon is alarming. It is being harnessed by world governments in a game of cosmic brinkmanship, none of whom can possibly know the complete ramifications of unleashing such latently devastating forces without comprehending the holistic nature of the universe and interconnectedness of all life.

What is remarkable however, is the fact that the cat is out of the bag finally with regard to parapsychology, metaphysics and the occult. The so-called 'mainstream' has not only recognized the stunning potential of psychic energy but has gone so far as to harness it for territorial one-upmanship. The human race only needs to realize the vast reserves of raw power that it has at its disposal to effect profound and genuine transformation of the human condition on a global scale.

MK-ULTRA: The CIA’s Mind Control Program

“Can we get control of an individual to the point where he will do our bidding against his will and even against fundamental laws of nature such as self preservation? (CIA Document, Project ARTICHOKE, MORI ID 144686, 1952)
As cited by Dr Ellen P. Lacter, p57” 
― Orit Badouk Epstein, Ritual Abuse and Mind Control: The Manipulation of Attachment Needs

MK-ULTRA was the code name for a secret CIA mind control program, begun in 1953, under Director Allen Dulles. Its purpose was multifold, including to perfect a truth drug for interrogating suspected Soviet spies during the Cold War. It followed earlier WWII hypnosis, primitive drugs research, and the US Navy’s Project Chatter, explained by its Bureau of Medicine and Surgery in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request as follows:

It began “in the fall of 1947 focusing on the identification and testing of drugs (LSD and others) in interrogations and the recruitment of agents. The research included laboratory experiments on both animal and human subjects. The program ended shortly after the Korean War in 1953.” It was run under the direction of Dr. Charles Savage of the Naval Medical Research Institute, Bethesda, MD from 1947 – 1953, after which CIA’s Office of Scientific Intelligence continued it under the name Project Bluebird, its first mind control program to:

  • learn how to condition subjects to withstand information from being extracted from them by known means;
  • develop interrogation methods to exert control;
  • develop memory enhancement techniques; and
  • establish ways to prevent hostile control of Agency personnel.

In 1951, it was renamed Project Artichoke, then MK-ULTRA under Deputy CIA Director Richard Helms in 1953. It aimed to control human behavior through psychedelic and hallucinogenic drugs, electroshock, radiation, graphology, paramilitary techniques, and psychological/ sociological/ anthropological methods, among others – a vast open-field of mind experimentation trying anything that might work, legal or otherwise on willing and unwitting subjects.

Ongoing at different times were 149 sub-projects in 80 US and Canadian universities, medical centers and three prisons, involving 185 researchers, 15 foundations and numerous drug companies. Everything was top secret, and most records later destroyed, yet FOIA suits salvaged thousands of pages with documented evidence of the horrific experiments and their effects on human subjects.

Most were unwitting guinea pigs, and those consenting were misinformed of the dangers. James Stanley was a career soldier when given LSD in 1958 along with 1,000 other military “volunteers.” They suffered hallucinations, memory loss, incoherence, and severe personality changes. Stanley exhibited uncontrollable violence. It destroyed his family, impeded his working ability, and he never knew why until the Army asked him to participate in a follow-up study.

He sued for damages under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), his case reaching the Supreme Court in United States v. Stanley. Argued and decided in 1987, the Court dismissed his claim (5 – 4), ruling his injuries occurred during military service. Justices Thurgood Marshall, William Brennan and Sandra Day O’Conner wrote dissenting opinions, saying the Nuremberg Code applies to soldiers as well as civilians. In 1996, Stanley got $400,000 in compensation, but no apology from the government.

Perhaps MK-ULTRA’s most publicized victim was Frank Olsen, a biochemist working for the Army Chemical Corps’ Special Operations Division at Ft. Detrick, MD. On November 18, 1953, he was administered LSD. Immediately, he became agitated and severely paranoid. Nine days later, he reportedly committed suicide by jumping 13 stories to his death through a New York hotel’s closed window. His family members didn’t know he was drugged until MK-ULTRA was exposed in 1975.

President Gerald Ford apologized, granted a $750,000 settlement, but Olson’s son discovered documents suggesting his father was killed. In 1994, he exhumed the body, had it forensically evaluated, and the conclusion was homicide based on a previously undetected skull fracture suggesting a blow on the head and other disturbing evidence.

Stanley Glickman was another MK-ULTRA tragedy, an unwitting victim of hallucinogenic drugs and electroshock treatment. He became traumatized, couldn’t work, barely ate, suffered a psychological breakdown and never fully recovered. After learning about the CIA’s LSD experiments, he sued in 1983. The trial was delayed 16 years, he died, but his sister Gloria Kronisch pursued the case.

MK-ULTRA chief Stanley Gottleib was at issue, hired to run its Technical Service Staff (TSS) to develop poisons to assassinate political opponents, truth serum drugs for interrogating spies, and mind control techniques to create robot assassins or unwitting double agents. He used Nazi scientists and their state of the art methods, perfected on concentration camp victims. Some were known as programmers, skilled professionals in the art of breaking down and controlling the human mind.

Joseph Mengele did similar work, experimenting extensively with children and adults using mescaline, electroshock therapy, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, torture, rape, starvation, and trauma bonding. He was so successful with the latter technique that survivors expressed strong affection for him.

The CIA and US military copied the Nazi methodology through numerous programs, including MK-ULTRA, MK being an abbreviation for words “mind control” in German. According to obtained documents, it works best when severe trauma (such as rape) occurs by age three, the result often causing the personality to split or dissociate (called dissociative identity disorder or DID) to repress painful memories.

Therapists can cause multiple personality disorder (MPD) by mind manipulation, but early in life trauma makes victims especially vulnerable. Gottlieb focused on LSD for mind control and exotic poisons and drugs for political assassinations.

Under Operation Paperclip, 9,000 Nazi scientists and technicians were recruited to help undermine the Soviet Union.

In 1952, Gottlieb met Glickman in a Paris cafe, bought him a drink and laced it with LSD. After finally being held to account, he became ill. The trial was postponed, and on the eve of its resumption he died unexpectedly. At the time, New York Times and Los Angeles Times obituaries reported that his family refused to disclose the cause. The online WorldNet Daily explained it was after a “month-long bout with pneumonia,” saying that after being admitted to the University of Virginia Medical Center, he lapsed into a coma, never recovered, but foul play couldn’t be determined.

At trial against his estate, the judge died of a heart attack while exercising. The question again arose. Was it natural or was he killed, especially since his replacement was prejudicial to the plaintiff having thrown out his case two years earlier. Perhaps so after the jury ruled against Glickman’s family, denying them justice.

On December 22, 1974, Seymour Hersh exposed MK-ULTRA in a New York Times article. 

Headlined, “Huge CIA Operation Reported in US Against Antiwar Forces, Other Dissidents in Nixon Years,” it documented illegal activities, including secret experiments on US citizens during the 1960s and earlier. Church Committee Congressional investigations followed, headed by Senator Frank Church, on abusive intelligence practices, replaced by the Pike Committee five months later. The Rockefeller Commission, under vice president Nelson Rockefeller, also examined the domestic activities of the CIA, FBI, and military intelligence agencies.

By summer 1975, it was learned that CIA and Department of Defense had conducted illegal experiments on willing and unwitting subjects as part of an exhaustive program to influence human behavior through psychoactive drugs (including LSD and mescaline) and other chemical, biological, psychological, and other methods.


WARNING:

IF THERE IS ANY CHANCE that you suspect you are under the influence of mind control reading the following information can be DANGEROUS. If you are consulting a therapist for DID (also known as MPD), it is recommended that you consult your therapist before reading this material.



Wednesday, July 6, 2016

The Mystic and the Occultist


Form as used by the occultist and the mystic.

I would begin by a statement of fact. The mystic is not necessarily an occultist, but the occultist embraces the mystic. Mysticism is but one step on the path of occultism. In this solar system - the system of love in activity - the path of least resistance for the majority is that of the mystic, or the path of love and devotion. In the next solar system the path of least resistance will be that which we now understand as the occult path. The mystic path will have been trodden.

Wherein lies the difference between these two types?

The mystic deals with the evolving life; the occultist deals with the form.

The mystic deals with the God within; the occultist with God in outer manifestation.

The mystic works from the centre to the periphery; the occultist reverses the process.

The mystic mounts by aspiration and intensest devotion to the God within or to the Master Whom he recognises; the occultist attains by the recognition of the law in operation and by the wielding of the law which binds matter and conforms it to the needs of the indwelling life. In this manner the occultist arrives at those Intelligences Who work with the law, till he attains the fundamental Intelligence Himself.

The mystic works through the Rays of Love, Harmony and Devotion, or by the path of the second, the fourth and the sixth rays. The occultist works through the Rays of Power, Activity, and Ceremonial Law, or the first, the third and the seventh. Both meet and blend through the development of mind, or through the fifth Ray of Concrete Knowledge (a fragment of cosmic intelligence), and on this fifth ray the mystic is resolved into the occultist and works then with all the rays. 

By finding the kingdom of God within himself and by the study of the laws of his own being, the mystic becomes proficient in the laws which govern the universe of which he is a part.

The occultist recognises the kingdom of God in nature or the system and regards himself as a small part of that greater whole, and therefore governed by the same laws.

The mystic works as a general rule under the department of the World Teacher, or the Christ, and the occultist more frequently under that of the Manu, or Ruler, but when both types have passed through the four minor rays in the department of the Lord of Civilisation, then a completion of their development may be seen, and the mystic becomes the occultist and the occultist includes the characteristics of the mystic. To make it more simple for general comprehension: after initiation the mystic is merged in the occultist for he has become a student of occult law; he has to work with matter, with its manipulation and uses, and he has to master and control all lower forms of manifestation, and learn the rules whereby the building devas work. Before initiation the mystic path might be expressed by the term, Probationary Path. Before the occultist can manipulate wisely the matter of the solar system he must have mastered the laws that govern the microcosm, and even though he is naturally on the occult path yet he will still have to find the God within his own being before he can safely venture on the path of occult law.

The mystic seeks to work from the emotional to the intuitional, and thence to the Monad, or Spirit. The occultist works from the physical to the mental, and thence to the atma or Spirit.

One works along the line of love; the other along the line of will. The mystic fails in the purpose of his being - that of love demonstrated in activity - unless he co-ordinates the whole through the use of intelligent will. Therefore he has to become the occultist.

The occultist similarly fails and becomes only a selfish exponent of power working through intelligence, unless he finds a purpose for that will and knowledge by an animating love which will give to him sufficient motive for all that he attempts. 

I have attempted to make clear to you the distinction between these two groups, as the importance of the matter is great when studying meditation. The form used by the two types is entirely different and when seen clairvoyantly is very interesting.


(Excerpts from "Letters on Occult Meditation" by Alice A. Bailey)

Tuesday, July 5, 2016

Scientists use unnerving trick to plant false experiences into people's brains


The idea that people can interfere with others' thoughts and implant things in their minds was made famous by the 2010 film 'Inception'. But the concept is not completely science fiction, according to a group of researchers at Brown University.

The scientists have discovered a way to implant associations in people's brains, without the subjects being aware of it happening.

Working with colleagues in Japan, scientists at Brown University have been studying how a functional magnetic resonance machine (FMRI) can 'induce' knowledge in someone through their visual cortex by sending signals that change their brain activity pattern.

This process is called Decoded Neurofeedback, or 'DecNef'.

In a recent breakthrough, the group used a new technique to surreptitiously train a small group of volunteers to associate vertical stripes with the colour red and horizontal stripes with the colour green.

With volunteers in the scanner, the patterns of activity in two areas of the brain were first measured when the subjects saw different combinations of coloured backgrounds (red, green and grey) behind two different stripe orientations (vertical and horizontal)

The people taking part thought they were seeing the color red when looking at black and white stripes, and had no idea this was happening.  

The association was induced by specifically targeting two early visual areas of the brain.

Named 'V1' and 'V2', the areas are the first parts of the cortex to process basic visual information coming from the eyes.

But scientists had not previously seen associative learning happening in these areas.

After three days of training, participants were trained into seeing red when they saw vertical stripes.

'This is the first clear study that shows that V1 and V2 are capable of creating associative learning,' said Professor Takeo Watanabe, corresponding author of the paper published in the journal Current Biology.

The idea for neurofeedback technique grew out of research from the 1960s showing that a person could regulate his heart rate or temperature just by thinking about it. 

Because our brains regulate temperature and heart rate, Professor Watanabe wanted to see if we could regulate other aspects of brain activity. 

'Participants were not aware of the purpose of the experiment or what kind of activation they learned to induce,' Professor Watanabe said.

After the experiment, the researchers asked the subjects what they were thinking about when they got high scores.

'I imagined a zebra,' said one participant, reported Stat News.

'I imagined a gymnastics match in which I performed well,' 'I imagined a situation where I behaved violently,' others reported.

The participants were not hallucinating the color red, Professor Watanabe said. Instead their experiences were more similar to synesthesia, a condition in which people perceive coloors when they look at printed numbers and letters.

Associative learning and memory, the idea that 'this goes with that',  is pervasive in the brain.

But it was a novel finding of basic brain science to show that it can occur in early visual areas, Professor Watanabe said.

Professor Watanabe said he is eager to find out if scientists can use the study's technique of training subjects with (unwitting) MRI-based feedback to create associations in other parts of the brain for educational or therapeutic reasons.

'Our brain functions are mostly based on associative processing, so association is extremely important,' Professor Watanabe said. 'Now we know that this technology can be applied to induce associative learning.' 


Sunday, July 3, 2016

10 Ancient legends about dreams

Dreams have always been one of the prevailing enigmas of humanity. As early as 5,000 B.C., Mesopotamians made a habit of recording their dreams on clay tablets, and every culture in the world has their own interpretation of the realm that lies between wakefulness and sleep. In some legends, dreams are sent from the gods; in others, terrifying monsters lurk at the fringes of consciousness, waiting for their chance to creep into the shadows of our minds. These 10 legends encompass the dreams and nightmares of various cultures scattered across 7,000 years of human history.

10. Baku



In Japanese legend, a Baku is a dream-eater—a spirit animal that visits homes in the middle of the night and devours the nightmares of people who are sleeping. It’s usually described as a tapir, sort of pig-shaped with a long snout. In the realm of dream spirits, the Baku is a benevolent spirit who protects people from the terrors of bad dreams.The story of the Baku actually began in China, but was taken to Japan in the 14th century. From there, the description of the beast changed over time. By the 17th century, the physical form of the Baku had become a chimera—it had the legs of a tiger, the head of an elephant, and the piercing eyes of a rhinoceros. Its name changed to Mo, and the belief arose that in order for it to protect you, you had to draw a sketch of the beast before you fell asleep.

9. Morpheus



Few cultures delved as deeply into the world of dreams as the Greeks. As with most facets of life, they had a god that personified the dream world: Morpheus. He was the son of Hypnos, the god of sleep, and had the power to enter the dreams of mortal men to deliver messages from the gods. Morpheus first appeared in the epic poem Metamorphoses, which was written by the first century poet Ovid. Though he could take the shape of a human when he was delivering dream messages, his true shape was a demon-like figure with massive black wings that allowed him to pass quickly through the dream world. Morpheus was chosen as a messenger because, out of Hypnos’s thousands of children, he was the best at disguising himself as a human.

8. Mara



In Germanic folklore, a mara is an evil spirit that sits on your chest while you sleep, constricting your air supply and turning your dreams into nightmares. It appears in some form or another in all the Germanic cultures, although the specific name and description change with each language. Most notably, the English word for the mara is “mare,” which is the origin of the word nightmare. Croatians believe that the mara takes the form of a beautiful woman at night. She visits men in their sleep to torture them and slowly suck away their life force over the course of a decades. In other cultures, a mara is a thick-skinned goblin.

7. Dream Catching



The Ojibwe are a Native American tribe who originally lived near the shores of Lake Superior in the northern United States. According to their own legend, however, their people began on the mythical Turtle Island. There, the Spider Woman, or Asibikaashi, watched over the Ojibwe people. Every morning, she builds a lodge that captures the sun and brings it to her children. Since she’s a spider, the lodge is a spider web, and the morning dew reflects the morning sunlight, “capturing” it.As the Ojibwe people spread, Asibikaashi was no longer able to watch over every individual, so she allowed the people to build their own lodges—dreamcatchers—through which she would protect them from nightmares. According to the legend, if you hang a dreamcatcher over your bed at night, the good dreams will filter through the holes, but the nightmares will get stuck before they reach your head.

6. Phobetor and the Oneiroi



The Greeks had many different gods to portray different aspects of dreams. And while Morpheus served as the dream messenger, his brother Phobetor was the bringer of nightmares. His name translates from Greek as “to be feared.” Every night, he emerges from the land of eternal darkness as a winged demon to infest the dreams of the living. The poem Metamorphoses describes Phobetor as a shapeshifter who “forms the beasts and birds and long sliding snakes.” He is the son of Darkness, and is one of the most important figures of the Oneiroi. The Oneiroi are the pantheon of dream gods who live in Erebos, which was part of the Greek underworld. Phobetor’s children are the shapes of nightmares themselves, allowing him to extend his reach to all the sleeping people of the world.

5. Sleep Paralysis



This strange phenomenon of sleep paralysis occurs when you wake up suddenly and are completely unable to move or speak. For some reason, most people who experience it also have a feeling of being “watched,” and it’s usually terrifying. People describe demons, alien visitors, and spirits in the dark room with them. Even though it’s really just a trick of the mind, the idea of a stranger watching you in the middle of the night is definitely unsettling.It makes sense then that nearly every culture in history has had their own personification for sleep paralysis. The mara, which we mentioned earlier, were created to explain the phenomenon. In Kashmir, it’s caused when a pasikdhar—an invisible demon—attacks you in the night. In Turkey, a djinn sits on the sleeper’s arms, covers their mouth, and strangles them. The Pakistani legend is that Shaitan (Satan) himself has possessed the sleeper.

4. Brownies



In the Scottish Lowlands, there’s a legend about tiny men called brownies who come into your home at night and do chores for you while you sleep. They’re similar to hobs, which traditionally live on farmland and, as long as they’re appeased, will help out around the farm. But God help you if you offend a hob, because their capacity for good is only outmatched by their mischievous appetite for destruction. They’ll knock over pitchforks, spook the sheep, or even, if you’ve really upset them, steal pies from windowsills.The brownies, on the other hand, are usually good-natured. They don’t like to be seen by humans, so they’ll wait until you’re fast asleep and dreaming before coming inside. They’ll work even harder if you leave them some food, and they’re particularly fond of porridge and milk.

3. The Great Spirit



The Abenaki are a Native American tribe who lived around the New England area of the United States, with villages that reached up into Southern Quebec. Their greatest dream legend is also their creation story. According to the myth, the Great Spirit initially lived in a void, a world with neither form nor function. So he summoned the Great Turtle to form the lands of the world, and he piled clay onto the Turtle’s shell to create mountains. But then he came to a moment of indecision: What kinds of creatures would live on this world? As he thought about it, he drifted off to sleep and began to dream. In his dream he saw all the animals and people that fill the world today, and thought he was having a nightmare. When the Great Spirit woke up, he discovered that his dreaming had created all the animals of the Earth, and the more he looked at it, the more he saw how everything in nature worked together towards a beautiful purpose.

2. Nue



The nue is a chimera from Japanese folklore that serves as the harbinger of sickness and bad luck. It has the paws of a tiger, the face of a monkey, and the body of a tanuki. Its tail is a long, venomous serpent. Nue are some of the oldest creatures in Japanese legend, most prominently appearing in The Tale of the Heiki, the story of a 12th century war between two opposing clans. In the story, a nue took on the form of a black cloud and visited the Emperor of Japan. The emperor soon became ill, besieged with nightmares every time he closed his eyes. The emperor grew sicker and sicker, until a samurai fired an arrow into the black cloud and killed the nue. To this day, there is a mound at the shore of the Sea of Japan which is said to be the grave of the nue from the story.

1. Sandman



Every young child knows the story of the Sandman, a benevolent being who sprinkles sand into the eyes of sleeping boys and girls to make them dream. When you wake up with crusty residue around your eyes, it’s because the Sandman visited you the night before. The Sandman was first introduced in literature in a Hans Christian Andersen story, Ole Lukoje. But it was the 1816 story Der Sandman that tortured the minds of young children for years to come. In that rendition, the Sandman visited only children who wouldn’t go to sleep. His sand made their eyes fall out, which he gathered up and fed to his demonic children in his iron fortress on the Moon.


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