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Tibetan Book of the Dead

It’s dying to take you away..turn off your minds, relax and float down stream maybe quintessential Beatles or trippy mantra but some of these words connect to an ancient text via Timothy Leary’s The Psychedelic Experience.

But it was Aldous Huxley who introduced the Tibetan Book of the Dead to Leary via Walter Evans-Wentz’s translation of the Bado Thodol (1927, Oxford University Press). Evans-Wentz chose the title because of parallels he saw in the Egyptian book of The Dead.

The intention of the the text is to guide one through the experiences of consciousness after death and intermediary stages between death and rebirth. These transitional stages are known as Bardos. The text also includes rituals to undertake for the dead or dying.
The 3 Bardos are, 1) the Chikhai Bardo or Bardo of the moment of death or the clear light reality, 2) the Chonyid Bardo or Bardo of the experiencing of reality or the experience of visions of various Buddha forms and 3) the Sidpa Bardo or Bardo of rebirth hallucinations leading to rebirth and karmically impelled hallucinations.

According to Leary, the Tibetan Book of The Dead is a key to the innermost recesses of the human mind and a guide for initiates and for those who are seeking the spiritual path of liberation.

The Psychedelic Experience (1964, University Books) attempts to explain the symbolic nature of the hallucinatory experience when taking LSD. It’s not surprising those who’ve taken the drug describe experiences of intense white light & letting go of the ego, hallucinations of a karmic nature and another stage liken to rebirth or re-entry.

Whether or not this is the same as the inner journey as outlined in the Tibetan Book of the Dead is debatable.

John Lennon wrote Tomorrow Never Knows (1966) having read The Psychedelic Experience but felt LSD only exacerbated his personal problems. Other initiates weren’t so lucky stranded in permanent psychosis, the casualties of a drug phenomenon.

Barron

Trump

Praying Mantis

Help! A giant egg laying creepy crawly with a swivelling alien head and human-like upper body that cannibalises its mate. This is the stuff of science fiction. Maybe it’s the inspiration for horror movies (think Alien for example). Perhaps this earthling really is the the source of our greatest fears and nightmares having been around for at least 135 million years.

Two enormous eyes atop a triangular swivelling head enable the Praying Mantis to see stereoscopically and detect movement as far as 60 feet away.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantis#/media/File:Large_brown_mantid_close_up_nohair.jpg

It catches its prey with two oversized raptorial front legs. The name ‘praying’ refers to the folded forelimbs as it waits motionless, ready to snatch insects and even small vertebrates such as lizards and frogs. Death occurs with a paralysing neck bite while the female Mantis decapitates the male and cannibalises it during mating so as to provide nutrients for the eggs. Some Mantis species do not ambush their prey when stationary but instead scamper along the ground to hunt.

Camouflage gives it ultimate advantage. Perched on a branch it merges undetected with its twig like anatomy and vegetative colouring. What’s ‘preying’ in the grass you ask? (see pic). The Mantis gently sways from side to side as it propels itself forward mimicking twigs and branches as they sway in the breeze. Males are capable of flying (see wing anatomy, main pic) and have developed aerobatic manoeuvres avoiding predators such as bats and have auditory senses to hear echo-locating calls.

So remember, if you have sleepless nights and are spooked by alien looking creatures that creep around and fly in the dark, be reassured they couldn’t possibly be the Praying Mantis..