“If then you do not make yourself equal to God, you cannot apprehend God;

for like is known by like.

Leap clear of all that is corporeal, and make yourself grown to a like
expanse with that greatness which is beyond all measure; rise above all
time and become eternal; then you will apprehend God. Think that for you
too nothing is impossible; deem that you too are immortal, and that you are
able to grasp all things in your thought, to know every craft and science;
find your home in the haunts of every living creature; make yourself higher
than all heights and lower than all depths; bring together in yourself all
opposites of quality, heat and cold, dryness and fluidity; think that you are
everywhere at once, on land, at sea, in heaven; think that you are not yet
begotten, that you are in the womb, that you are young, that you are old,
that you have died, that you are in the world beyond the grave; grasp in
your thought all of this at once, all times and places, all substances and
qualities and magnitudes together; then you can apprehend God.

But if you shut up your soul in your body, and abase yourself, and say “I
know nothing, I can do nothing; I am afraid of earth and sea, I cannot
mount to heaven; I know not what I was, nor what I shall be,” then what
have you to do with God?” 
― Hermes Trismegistus, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum 

“But this discourse, expressed in our paternal language, keeps clear the
meaning of its words. The very quality of speech and of the Egyptian words
have in themselves the energy of the object they speak of.

Therefore, my king, in so far as you have the power (who are all powerful),
keep the discourse uninterpreted, lest mysteries of such greatness come to
the Greeks, lest the extravagant, flaccid and (as it were) dandified Greek
idiom extinguish something stately and concise, the energetic idiom of
usage.
 normally acoustically modulated processing of language flows over into the
voicebox and you begin to literally articulate syntax. You begin to make a
noise which is a tracking noise for this ongoing syntactical stuff that’s
organising gestural intent. And it’s like going from carving in stone to colour
TV: your listener immediately transfers loyalty to this much more
spectacular form of behaviour. And so it’s like literally that the word burst
forth full-blown, based on a platform of gestural syntax that had been
maybe millions of years in its formation. It was just this ability to redirect the
energy of syntactical intent through the body, so that instead of coming out
of the end of the fingers, it came out of the end of the tongue, flapping in
the airstream, and this thing happened.

“Just as anyone who listens to the muse will hear, you can write out of your
own intention or out of inspiration. There is such a thing. It comes up and
talks. And those who have heard deeply the rhythms and hymns of the
gods, can recite those hymns in such a way that the gods will be attracted.” 

“The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe” 

“I think it was Nietzsche who said, “Be careful lest in casting out the devils
you cast out the best thing that’s in you.”

“All life stinks and you must embrace that with compassion.” 
McLuhan’s phrase comes to mind, the Gutenberg Galaxy. The spectrum of
effects created by print, you know, the classes the conceits, the industries,
the products, the attitudes, the garments, all of the things created by print.
And we are living in a terminal civilization. I don’t want to say dying
because civilizations aren't animals but we are living in an age of great self-
summation.

we are somehow prisoners of language and that somehow, you know, if

we’re prisoners of language then the key which will set us loose is
somehow also made of language. 
 Introduction to a strange subject. Running riddle and fluid answer, Finnegans Wake is a mighty allegory of
the fall and ressurection of mankind. It is a strange book, a compound of fables, symphony and
nightmare. A monstrous enigma beckoning imperiously from the shadowy pits of sleep. Its mechanics
resemble those of a dream, a dream which has freed the author from the necessities of common logic
and has enabled him to compress all periods of history, all phases of individual and racial development
into a circular design of which every part is beginning, middle and end. In a gigantic wheeling rebus, dim
effigies rumble past, disappear into foggy horizons and are replaced by other images, vague but half
consciously familiar. On this revolving stage, mythological heroes and events of remotest antiquity occupy
the same spatial and temporal plains as modern personages and contemporary happenings. All time
occurs simultaneously. Tristram, Wellington, Father Adam and Humpty Dumpty merge in a single precept.
Multiple meanings are present in every line. Interlocking allusions to key words and phrases are woven
like fugal themes into the pattern of the work. Finnegans Wake is a prodigious, multifaceted monolith, not
only the cauchemar of a Dublin citizen but the dreamlike saga of guilt-stained evolving humanity. The vast
scope and intricate structure of Finnegans Wake gives the book a forbidding aspect of impenetrability. It
appears to be a dense and baffling jungle, trackless and overgrown with wanton perversities of form and
language. Clearly such a book is not meant to be idly fingered. It tasks the imagination, exacts discipline
and tenacity from those who would march with it, yet some of the difficulties disappear as soon as the
well-disposed reader picks up a few compass clues and gets his bearings. Then enormous map of
Finnegans Wake begins slowly to unfold, characters and motifs emerge, themes become recognizable
and Joyce’s vocabulary falls more and more familiarly on the accustomed ear. Complete understanding is
not to be snatched at greedily in one sitting (or in fifty, I might add). Nevertheless the ultimate state of the
intelligent reader is certainly not bewilderment. Rather it is an admiration for the unifying insight, economy
of means and more than Rabelaisian humor, which has miraculously quickened the stupendous mass of
material. One acknowledges at last that James Joyce’s overwhelming micro/macrocosm could not have
been fired to life in any sorcerer furnace less black, less heavy, less murky than this, his incredible book.
He had to smelt the modern dictionary back to protean plasma and reenact the genesis and mutation of
language in order to deliver his message. But the final wonder is that such a message could be delivered
at all.

"If we really want the world's spiritual leaders to help us out, then we
need to see the Pope and the Dalai Lama agree to change costumes for
one week, because if we can't see that degree of play and absurdity then
they have nothing to say

"It's not about going into trance, it's about being awakened."

"…we were born to fully be embraced by bliss."

"The original forms of healing and being in relationship to the great
mystery was wild, and the last great taboo for us today is opening the
door and inviting the wild, that which is uncontrollable, unpredictable…

"Move over meditation and welcome heightened arousal and ecstasy."

“I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery—air, mountains, trees,

people. I thought, "This is what it is to be happy.” 

“Reality doesn't impress me. I only believe in intoxication, in ecstasy, and

when ordinary life shackles me, I escape, one way or another. No more
walls.”

Man lies in the woman's womb only to gather strength, he nourishes

himself from this fusion, and then he rises and goes into the world, into his
work, into battle, into art. He is not lonely. He is busy. The memory of the
swim in amniotic fluid gives him energy, completion. Woman may be busy
too, but she feels empty. Sensuality for her is not only a wave of pleasure in
which she is bathed, and a charge of electric joy at contact with another. 

“Downtown. Lights on buildings and everything that makes you wonder.

And in that moment, I swear we were infinite.” 

“So, I guess we are who we are for alot of reasons. And maybe we'll never
know most of them.
“I think that if I ever have kids, and they are upset, I won't tell them that
people are starving in China or anything like that because it wouldn't
change the fact that they were upset. And even if somebody else has it much
worse, that doesn't really change the fact that you have what you have.” 

“Enjoy it. Because it's happening.” 

“We didn't talk about anything heavy or light. We were just there together.
And that was enough” 

I hope the people who wrote those songs are happy. I hope they feel it's
enough. I really do because they've made me happy

“please believe that things are good with me, and even when they're not,
they will be soon enough. And i will always believe the same about you.” 

 You have to do things. I'm going to do what I want to do. I'm going to be
who I really am. And I'm going to figure out what that is. And we could all
sit around and wonder and feel bad about each other and blame a lot of
people for what they did or didn't do or what they didn't know. I don't
know. I guess there could always be someone to blame. It's just different.
Maybe it's good to put things in perspective, but sometimes, I think that the
only perspective is to really be there. 

“I am both happy and sad at the same time, and I'm still trying to figure out
how that could be.” 
I walk around the school hallways and look at the people. I look at the
teachers and wonder why they're here.

“Sometimes people use thought to not participate in life.”

There is an ecstasy that marks the summit of life, and beyond which life
cannot rise. And such is the paradox of living, this ecstasy comes when one
is most alive, and it comes as a complete forgetfulness that one is alive. 
This ecstasy, this forgetfulness of living, comes to the artist, caught up and
out of himself in a sheet of flame;

Not too long ago thousands spent their lives as recluses to find spiritual
vision in the solitude of nature. Modern man need not become a hermit to
achieve this goal, for it is neither ecstasy nor world-estranged mysticism his
era demands, but a balance between quantitative and qualitative reality.
Modern man, with his reduced capacity for intuitive perception, is unlikely
to benefit from the contemplative life of a hermit in the wilderness. But
what he can do is to give undivided attention, at times, to a natural
phenomenon, observing it in detail, and recalling all the scientific facts
about it he may remember. Gradually, however, he must silence his
thoughts and, for moments at least, forget all his personal cares and
desires, until nothing remains in his soul but awe for the miracle before
him. Such efforts are like journeys beyond the boundaries of narrow self-
love and, although the process of intuitive awakening is laborious and slow,
its rewards are noticeable from the very first. If pursued through the course
of years, something will begin to stir in the human soul, a sense of kinship
with the forces of life consciousness which rule the world of plants and
animals, and with the powers which determine the laws of matter. While
analytical intellect may well be called the most precious fruit of the Modern
Age, it must not be allowed to rule supreme in matters of cognition. If
science is to bring happiness and real progress to the world, it needs the
warmth of man's heart just as much as the cold inquisitiveness of his
brain.” 
― Franz Winkler

If you ask a question, you have to question the question itself first – we
use words, without really knowing what they mean.

"Language can only deal meaningfully with a special, restricted segment

of reality.
The rest, and it is presumably the much larger part, is silence."

Our reality-tunnels are being constructed during the course of our lives
by our experiences, thoughts and belief-systems.
As our thoughts base on language, thinking and all resulting belief-
systems are hence built upon language. 

So, unless you are the kind of very fortunate person who speaks many
many languages fluently, and has a sense of this relativity of the intent to
communicate, you are barred from realizing the context-dependency of
your own language.
 You see that what is happening is we are, as a global culture, abandoning
ourselves in a way, to the image.

That's worth hours of the other stuff. Well, I hope, I assume most of you
recognize that as Lewis Carrol's Jabberwocky, which was an example of
verbal intentionality and syntax overcoming absence of inscribed meaning.
This is what's happening here, that the intentionality of meaning is so great
that it overcomes the absence of conventional definition.

 But, in fact, a person's sexual choice is the result and sum of their
fundamental convictions. Tell me what a person finds sexually attractive
and I will tell you their entire philosophy of life. Show me the person they
sleep with and I will tell you their valuation of themselves. 

“Anyone who is in love is making love the whole time, even when they're
not. When two bodies meet, it is just the cup overflowing. They can stay
together for hours, even days. They begin the dance one day and finish it
the next, or--such is the pleasure they experience--they may never finish it.
No eleven minutes for them.” 

“Anyone who is observant, who discovers the person they have always
dreamed of, knows that sexual energy comes into play before sex even takes
place. The greatest pleasure isn't sex, but the passion with which it is
practiced. When the passion is intense, then sex joins in to complete the
dance, but it is never the principal aim.” 
“I don't know the question, but sex is definitely the answer.” 

“The excellence of the soul is understanding; for the man who understands
is conscious, devoted, and already godlike.” 

“My discourse leads to the truth; the mind is great and guided by this
teaching is able to arrive at some understanding. When the mind has
understood all things and found them to be in harmony with what has been
expounded by the teachings, it is faithful and comes to rest in that beautiful
faith.”

TAT: Is God then in matter, 0 father?

HERMES: Where could matter be placed if it existed apart from God

[who is infinite]? Would it not be but a confused mass, unless it were
ordered? And if it is ordered, by whom is it ordered? The energies
which operate in it are parts of God. Whether you speak of matter or
bodies or substance, know that all these are the energy of God, of the
God who is all. In the All there is nothing which is not God. Adore this
teaching, my child, and hold it sacred.
TAT: Do not the living beings in the world die, 0 father, although they
are parts of the world?

HERMES: Hush, my child, for you are led into error by the appearance
of the phenomenon. Living beings do not die, but, being composite
bodies, they are dissolved; this is not death but the dissolution of a
mixture. If they are dissolved, it is not to be destroyed but to be
renewed... Contemplate then the beautiful arrangement of the world
and see that it is alive, and that all matter is full of life.

HERMES: The intellect, 0 Tat, is drawn from the very substance of

God. In men, this intellect is God; and so some men are gods and their
humanity is near to the Divine. When man is not guided by intellect, he
falls below himself into an animal state. All men are subject to Destiny,
but those in possession of the Logos, which commands the intellect
from within, are not under it in the same manner as others. God's two
gifts to man of intellect and the Logos have the same value as
immortality. If man makes right use of these, he differs in no way
from the immortals.

Say no longer that God is invisible. Do not speak thus, for what is more
manifest than God? He has created all only that you may see it
through the beings. For that is the miraculous power of God, to show
Himself through all beings. For nothing is invisible, not even the
incorporeal. The intellect makes itself visible in the act of thinking;
God makes Himself visible in the act of creating.

All that is, He contains within Himself like thoughts: the world,
Himself, the All. Therefore, unless you make yourself equal to God, you
cannot understand God; for like is not intelligible save to the like.
Make yourself grow to a greatness beyond measure; by a leap [of
intellect], free yourself from the body; raise yourself above all time,
become Eternity; then you will understand God.

Believe that nothing is impossible for you; think yourself immortal and
capable of understanding all, all arts, all sciences, the nature of every
living being. Mount higher than the highest height; descend lower than
the lowest depth. Draw into yourself all sensations of everything
created, fire and water, the dry and the moist, imagining that you are
everywhere, on earth, in the sea, in the sky; that you are not yet born,
in the maternal womb, adolescent, old, dead, beyond death. If you
embrace in your thought all things at once-all times, places,
substances, qualities, quantities-you may understand God.
The eternal [Logos] is the Power of God, and the work, of the -eternal
[Logos] is the world, which has no beginning, but is continually becoming
by the activity of the eternal [Logos]. Therefore, nothing that
constitutes the world will ever perish or be destroyed, for the eternal
[Logos] is imperishable. All this great body of the world is a Soul, full
of intellect and of God, who fills it within and without and vivifies
everything.

Contemplate through Me [the Divine Mind], the world and consider its
beauty. ... See that all things are full of light. See the earth, settled in
the midst of all, the great nurse who nourishes all earthly creatures,
All is full of Soul, and all beings are in movement. Who has created
these things? The one God, for God is one. You see that the world is
always one, the Sun, one; the moon, one; the divine activity, one; God,
too, is one. And since all is living, and Life is also one, God is certainly
one. It is by the action of God that all things come into being…