11/11/25. I reflect on Socialism . . .

November 11, 2025

. . . as the human drive towards connectedness run amuck.

Okay, speaking off the top of my head here . . .

Remember: we humans are born with free will to chose good or evil, at every itsy bitsy intersection of 3D time and space. This enormous, and constant opportunity requires nourishing our innate capacity to navigate and integrate two “opposite” drives:  “service to self” (selfishness) and “service to others” (selflessness).

Unlike animals, we humans have self-serving egos, of which we are aware, or could be/should be; that — in itself! — is a distant goal, involving a more or less painful journey! The awareness of one’s own ego, whilst in the midst of using it. That is the key: a doubled awareness.

There’s no sense trying to “transcend” ego, because basically, it’s impossible, while we are in bodies, unless we are asleep, in a coma, anesthetized, or otherwise “unconscious.” Furthermore, our egos serve as both a directive force and a demarcation between inside and outside. We learn this profound lesson at the age of two, when the planet Mars returns for the first time to the degree it occupied at birth. From then on, we can learn to use Mars consciously. The result? “Me!” “Mine,” and “NO,” for awhile; what we mothers have humorously labeled “the terrible twos.” And yet, as the child practices utilizing this beautiful egocentric Mars power, he or she can then begin to learn, through constant trial and error (Saturn), to achieve goals over time.

And of course, we can be “unconscious” (of the inherent self-directive power of Mars) also in the sense that our awareness can be and usually has been, taken over, and/or masked, by both early abusive conditions, as well as by so-called modern “education,” which is really, as more and more of us recognize, hypnotic, mind-controlled indoctrination. Stripping our real selves of that cultural patterning, that mass formation, is a profound journey, and essential, if one desires true freedom: not freedom to do whatever you want, but freedom from identifying with the desire to do whatever you want.

Okay, enough on that. No how about service to others? Well, this is what socialism pretends to be. In actually, it’s self-centered (egocentric) pride, but projected out, into the world: aren’t I wonderful for wanting everyone to have the same material wealth? (I think of especially the prideful transcend the ego “new age” movement here). That’s it, basically. Big difference from a natural empathic desire: to want everyone to have the same opportunities in the material world, while recognizing that every person, though equal, entered this world with different talents, skills, material conditions. That these differences then tend naturally to lead to different material conditions, wealth and poverty among them.

Add to this karmic conditions brought in from other lives. Some individuals have very heavy karma: as souls they chose to come into an extremely traumatized life with the aim of rectifying the situation, despite its seemingly overwhelming impossibility. Will they succeed? Probably not. Not all the way. But even just the attempt is not just worthwhile, but utterly praiseworthy.

How many of us, on a soul level, actually chose such excruciating early life conditions this time around? If we didn’t, then either we decided to be a bit lazy in our current lifetime, to coast through life, gifting ourselves and our larger purpose a welcome break; or: we really are well on our way towards mastery, thus releasing us from personal karma so that we may, indeed, and in reality, begin to utilize our own life force to serve the whole. Christ, Krishna, Buddha come to mind.

 

Okay, all that said, here are a few memes illustrating what “socialism” brings, when taken to an extreme (which is always the goal: erase the individual in favor of the “group”).

We can thank Mamdani’s election as Mayor of New York City for promoting socialism  to its blowback extreme. (Q: “What cannot be said must be shown.”) I hear that he is now having trouble financing his pie-in-the-sky goals of free food and housing for all; I hear that thousands upon thousands of creative, wealthy, and otherwise accomplished people are about to exit the state.

BTW: don’t get me wrong: capitalism (the opposite of socialism) also has its disgusting extremes. The point is, in the exercise of our innate free will, we are here to learn how to balance the opposites: to get and remain present in the dynamic middle ground between them. Both have their virtues, and both, their vices. When taken to extremes, both not only fail, but cause immeasurable harm.

Or put in other words: to identify with one opposite and polarize against the other is always what we must watch for in ourselves, because we’re all constantly required to choose between those two drives, self-orientation, and other-orientation. Both are needed. Too much of the first degenerates into greed, anarchism, chaos; too much of the other renders complete loss of identity, freedom. We become as bots.

Notice, both these poles are mentally generated.

Another obvious polarity is that between mind and body.

As long as we identify only with our minds, we’re in trouble as a species. Our bodies are connected to earth’s body, and she is very much alive, ensouled, conscious, and at this crucial point in his-story, at risk of being blown to smithereens.

 

Cackling Crones Caw for Chaos . . . Oops! NO!

November 10, 2025

I was speaking with my dearest old friend, Claudia, on the phone last night (we check in three or four times a year; she lives with her adult daughter and two standard poodles on an island off the coast of Washington). She and I began resonating together back in 1985, when I was a practicing astrologer, who, at her invitation, would travel to San Francisco from Jackson Wyoming to read charts for her gay friends enduring the AIDS crisis in the Castro District, where she then lived.

Her first remark last night, after hellos, wryly, caustically: “Well, we signed up for this.”

We both laughed heartily. Thank goodness we can still laugh! In fact, laughter may be what saves us!

She went on to say, after I confessed my serious addiction to screens, “Hell, keep it up! I very much enjoy it!” That made me laugh even harder.

Then she pivoted to the time recently, when she had called some number to try to deal with a technical situation of some kind. A voice answered that she recognized as decidedly foreign. For me, that’s usually a red flag. But for her, at least this time, the situation veered in an unusual direction.

First, she recognized that English was not his native tongue, but even so, that he spoke it flawlessly. She praised him for this, said how unusual it was, and asked him where he is located. “Egypt.” Turned out he was Egyptian. She asked him how he learned English so well. “We watch movies!” That really set her off. She was thrilled, excited. “You should learn French, Chinese, German! You obviously have a gift!” He thanked her modestly and proceeded to help her deal with the technical issue.

A few minutes later he called her back: “I could marry you!” he exclaimed. She said, “Well, you might want to, but I’m nearly 83 years old!” Well, he continued, “in any case, I very much appreciate you.”

So, said Claudia, to me, “At nearly 83, I got a marriage proposal! My first!” (She had been the one to propose to the man to whom she was briefly married in her early 20s.)

Well, you can imagine how we laughed at this one. Suddenly proposed to, over the phone, sincerely, at 83, by an Egyptian who speaks perfect English!

Laughter truly is “the best medicine.”

 

Oops! It snowed last night. All of a sudden, huge weather change. Not even “Fall” anymore, and it’s not even mid-November.

Everythings’ changin’, all the time, all at once. I personally, am dealing daily, hourly, minute by minute, with huge complexities, each of which involves myriad, intricate complications . . . and most of them in the realm of electronic media and my nervous system’s chaotic relationship to it. Meanwhile:

Meanwhile, “Geez, Ann, watch your mouth!”

I was in the nearby branch of our dear local Credit Union (accompanied by puppy Scampi) the other day, when, upon finishing up with the clerk, I burst out, without having any idea I was going to, but humorously, I thought: “I hope the U.S. blows up!”

Oops! Shocked look on everybody’s faces . . .

Castigating myself on the way out of the bank. “Please, Ann, stay with what we all have in common, rather than what seems to be inexorably tearing us apart. Okay? Don’t be part of the problem; not even humorously. That’s not funny.

And don’t get caught up in this “Ascension” business, either. Because no matter what happens . . .