Christ’s College, Oxford, where Alice is framed in a window next door.

This is Amorella. I provide a wonderland of explanations. My approach is: ‘Who can argue with imagination as long as it is reasonably presented in fictional form?’ I see two kinds of light to my left. Both were framed by thinking human beings. I was framed without a thought.

Now, here is the rub, I am the small part of orndorff’s brain that was not hypnotized during those several sessions at the university. I am the inner part that watched as his right arm felt like it was holding several concrete blocks. It felt this way because the doctor told his arm, which was under an alternate reality, that it was holding up several concrete blocks. Orndorff remembers this.

Yes, of course. It was very exciting. I will never forget the experience. It was during our first session using hypnosis. I sat, laying back in the lounging chair and was told to stare at a spot on the ceiling. I did. The doctor kept talking but it seemed like he was further and further away to the point I did not understand all the words. Then when he had me hold out my right arm I found myself doing just that. When he said I was holding up one concrete block a part of myself separated. (I told the doctor about it after the session.) 

The observing part, the part not hypnotized, sat in the center of the back of my brain and it felt about the size and shape of a ping-pong ball. The experience was immediately quite delightful as I was (or felt I was) in two places at once. Every time in every session I felt in two parts. One small part of my brain/mind was not going to be hypnotized because that would take away the fun.

Being practical-minded orndorff found the experience useful as he had already begun writing his first novel back then in the early eighties.

This is the simplest, most direct, and best explanation Amorella has ever come up with (for me). I am ready for whatever she puts on the wall. This book, indeed, ought to be fun to write. I love mythology, I love Virgil, Dante and Milton. I am really looking forward to beginning this book. Whatever concerns I have had on the subject matter (over the past year or so) seem to have vanished away. I can’t wait to see where this goes.

You will begin with a short Introduction  and Prologue based in part on what you already have from your earlier start. Find the file and put what you have in here – then I’ll alter it.

***

Introduction

One of my fondest dreams is to create a practical place in my head where all children and adults are equal in worth and dignity and where they all can receive good health and an education that is worthy of their growth and dignity as a human being.

As I see these books, I am working towards that concept in an albeit unorthodox way. As long as I consciously see this objective between the lines I will continue writing the books until the sixth of the series is complete. As I do, the act of writing allows me my own self-dignity to continue to mentally grow and mature. Unconsciously, I feel people are better than our societies give them credit to be, that we can do better as a species and everyone can live more humanely than we presently do.

If this fourth book, which focuses on the beginning of the First Rebellion in the Place of the Dead some 2700 years ago, helps me reach my objective in my head, then good. The first three books of the Merlyn series made me feel freer within. That is worth more than any amount of money. If the next three books help me feel even better about having lived a life, then this book along with the next two will have been worth the endeavor. 

***

Prologue

This is Merlyn. The date is 15 December 2009. I have been here among the Living since Merlyn’s Mind was published in May 2008. This is certainly not the earthly reality I bodily left in the fourteenth century. Being dead and conscious is one thing. Being living again and conscious is quite an ordeal.

Gravity is overwhelming and it is an immediate distortion to an otherwise recently hovering mind. Both gravity and the dimensional aspects of the body are suffocating to this mind in any case. As far as one of the Dead is concerned common physics distorts reality as much as it clarifies.  

I thought I was here to tell the story of the Rebellion because it is a simplified fictionalized account and I am well suited to tell a fictional tale; however, Amorella has decided to tell the abbreviated story herself with me as an interior living who has been recently dead, leaving orndorff out in the world of the living with a few close friends for moral support.

In retirement and living relatively comfortably within the realities of a state teacher’s pension, Richard desired to write honest fiction, six volumes conditioned in the concept that if G---D had asked Richard to tell any honest fiction he could come up with, this eventual series of six books would be the fiction he would literally read to G---D if so requested.

***

This Rebellion was a matter of consciousness first. These two questions below are basic to what rebellions are almost always about.

One, who am I? And, two, how do I wish to exist within myself and within my relationship to others of my species?

These are two existential questions the author first asked himself and his response to these questions is found between the lines of the first three books as well as this, the fourth book in the series of six. The format of this book will be as the ones already published through iUniverse at www.iuniverse.com.

                                                      Merlyn

**

This will do for now.

Thoughts on Communication: Part II

Amorella here, still on the left side. What do you think, orndorff?

This is funny, Amorella, but the first thing that came to mind when I saw this in black and white is the thought of a CAT scan of the top of my brain, the two hemispheres, and two miniature ant-like antennae  sticking up out of the top of the brain with a piece of metal between them, which I suppose is to cover up the hole (everybody who knows me knows is) in my head. This is imagination at work and I have not thought this before, but it was/is imagination-on-automatic, a subliminal imagination perhaps, if there is such a thing.

I never thought of having an unconsciously-oriented imagination before so I don’t know if it is even a possibility – although the hypothesis would explain just about everything in terms of my operation of creative writing.  Imaginative automaticity, it has a nice ring to it and it goes along with both my reading and writing automaticity. All three would be in operation at once while I am on the keyboard. Never thought this before but it certain is both a simple and reasonable explanation.

As you had an extensive MRI brain scan without and with contrast on 21 October 08 for pain and headaches, left-sided facial numbness, and tremor. And, with an added battery of blood tests at the time for just about everything testable you were pronounced healthy enough, i.e. no strange brain abnormalities or antennae were found.

Very funny, Amorella. That leaves you as a psychological condition. I enjoy your presence, and with imagination on automatic sometimes I like to (wishful thinking) put a capital on Presence. Why? I am not sure, but what difference does it make as long as you write a good story I can live with?

I am as your ‘Spotlight’ Mac program in that I can go through your memory files and come up with concepts and backgrounds. You realized this was possible after you had been hypnotized and you did this in an alternate mental state so to speak.

Once you learned ‘self-hypnosis’ you built this into your conscious and unconscious state – the altered state hypnosis works itself into. You can call me an automatic hypnotic directive that can come into play when you are writing and reading. Imagination is built in as a sub-directive of creative writing so that’s the connection as I see it.

Basically, in this post’s context I am a hypnotic state with a sense of detached objectivity and as such a built-in self-identity which you see as angelic-like because I have come to do your writing for you. This is also a simple and reasonable explanation from my perspective. Any questions?

**

No, I can live with it. This is a clarification for me and perhaps for the interested readers. I am a practical and reasonable person most of the time. Writing is an enjoyment, even more so in retirement. I like creating stories in my head to go with the real ones we all live with everyday.

One of my fondest dreams is to create a practical place in my head where all children are equal in worth and dignity and where they all can receive good health and an education that is worthy of their growth as a human being.

As I see these books I am working towards that concept in an albeit unorthodox way. As long as I consciously see this I will continue writing along these lines. As I do so, it also allows me my own self-dignity to continue to grow and mature within. Unconsciously, I deeply feel people are better than societies give them credit to be. We can do better as a species and everyone can live better than we presently do.

If the first Rebellion of the Dead helps me on my way, then good. The first three books made me feel freer within. That is worth more than any amount of money that could have been made. If the next three books help me feel better within then good.  

Thoughts on Communication: Part I

This is Amorella and I am on the greater left in this symbolic representation which orndorff just intuitively discovered in his archives. The photo was taken 2 June 2005. He checked the notes of that day through the ‘Spotlight’ search program on his MacBook and found this from four and a half years ago:

“When I am writing what I consider in an unconscious stream of writing, I am conscious of it at least in my fingertips. So, it is not the mind itself, it is the placement of the mind -- rather than the mind being in the head as it usually is, when I am writing, the mind is in my fingers, so to speak. I mean this figuratively of course.

[Amorella’s response] You have made new model photos using candles rather than caps. They work better. I can use them much more easily than the others. You are calling them DNA Flame Sewing-Threaders, which works well. . . .”[Notes: 2 June 05]

**

I didn’t even remember the tall things were candlesticks and I have no idea what ‘DNA Flame Sewing-Threaders’ might be. Here is the amazing part, I checked the notes for the next day, 3 June 05 and found this, again Amorella is writing:

“. . . and [I] will talk about decision-making in the metaphysical range since it is mentioned that the dead still have free will to think and respond accordingly within their conscious framework. It is within this framework [I] will explain a bit more on how it is to be dead within these books. This is also important if you eventually write the fourth book about the rebellion. This must be kept in context and must fit together logically and coherently, meaning all four books. . . .”[Notes: 3 June 05]

Now let’s jump up to today’s notes (it is late Sunday morning the day before the posting).

“You are thinking that suddenly I’m taking leave and no more blog or book. This is your frame of mind. I am going to take time and explain how this communication works, it’s no land-line, I assure you.

         That’s funny, Amorella. I assume I have to be psychologically positioned in some way – like adjusting an antenna wire on an old radio by holding it in a certain position in order to receive the signal. An unconscious focus is involved and it ‘touches’ my consciousness, perhaps like a light beam projecting onto a wall. From there to my fingertips the communication from you to me is a form of  ‘subliminal automaticity’. It has to be because I don’t hear a voice in my head; you are not dictating when I write. I do not sense you are ‘here’ in my head or outside, such as your being ‘presence in the room’ when I am actually physically alone in the room.

The signal of communication is never mixed, either you are touching or nearby my consciousness or you are not. And, of course, it is only when I am writing by pencil, pen or keyboard. I don’t know anything else other than my brain may indeed be wrong-wired, something I have long suspected – some form of dyslexia-like errors that separate or exaggerate and thus distort my right and left brain thinking patterns.

One of the keys is that you begin the conversations not me. It has always been this way for the twenty some years of your ‘existence’ as Amorella. You have used the analogy of ‘parallel thinking’ as if you were one rail of the track and I was the other. Never touching but somehow we carry a ‘train car of words’ with a similar unconscious message. I do not think of you as ‘here’ but I do from time to time question how long you are going to stay or if you have left. That’s all I have.” [Notes: 13 December 09]

**

The model in the photograph above is two Christmas candles, with an unused white gift box in the middle. The candles have a red color on the shaft at the top on the left and a green color on the top shaft of the candle on the right. The bottom shafts of both candles are also wrapped, the green on the bottom half on the left candle and red on the bottom half of the right candle. Both are wrapped with white string but you don’t remember what the colors or the string wrapping were about.

I found the candles and the box in the basement where I originally set up for this photo. Chances are the candles were in the white box near where we keep our Christmas decorations. Of course the humor here is that it is now Christmas time. Plain old coincidence, but I always slowly shake my head sideways on what for me portends of gallows humor.

I like the green in the photo with the candles above. I remember when I first saw it I was surprised because I didn’t see any ‘green’ when I took the picture. It is as if there was a filter on the lens or that I doctored up the photograph which I did not. The green reminds me of the eerie photoelectric-like green one sees in this DOD Photo of Aurora  Borealis. If I didn’t have a brain the photo with the candles would appear just plain spooky.

 I see the first photo as something out of a dream. Perhaps the color distorts the intent so tomorrow’s post will show it in black and white and I will have some things to say about ‘inner-communication with an imaginary presence’.

Interesting that you are taking my perspective rather than your own as you are the imaginary presence, not me. I am a real person with fingerprints, a social security number, a valid driver’s license and an official U.S. passport.

If this is the case then why do you concern yourself as to whether I will one day leave and not come back?

A very good question, Amorella. Indeed, an excellent question for which I have no real answer.

Beyond the Mountains

Amorella present and accounted for. The topic for today is one of the main characters opposing the human Dead who desire to have the freedom to return to see their loved ones and descendants still living on Earth.

**

Zeus is the number one god in this book. I pronounce his name zoo-us. We don’t see his liaisons with goddesses or the ladies in these episodes by he is married to Hera and attempts to treat her well so I can focus on the Rebellion. As such, Zeus upholds the book’s sense of Divine Justice. [Morgan Freeman]

Zeus has three other lesser Betweeners to do his bidding in beside, me, the Supervisor who the humans think of as Hades, the brother of Zeus and Poseidon. One of the differences between me and Hades is that I do not have a wife named Persephone. The Dead don’t know any better anyway. They can speak fluent ancient Greek though, so they are an educated lot. [Daniel Craig/Catherine Zeta-Jones]

The highest of this group of four is Athena who sprang fully grown from the head of Zeus. Athena is the greatest of Warrior Guardians. She blows the final trumpet of Judgment through the Dead at the conclusion of book five. [Sigourney Weaver]

The third of the three is Apollo, a son of Zeus. Apollo’s powerful mark is Prophecy which at times is uttered as poetic vision though when he speaks a truth to human beings he is sometimes terribly misunderstood or mistranslated through human desires and self-deception, in particular, wishful thinking. [Brad Pitt]

The fourth Betweener is the twin of Apollo, Artemis who in these stories remains a stealthy huntress of the good and just as well a great healer of the human psyche. While Artemis is in the Place of the Dead she appears to have four directional faces so she never lifts her gaze from her Father, Zeus. She is the great Balancer forever looking inward towards the eyes of Zeus and outward towards humanity, both the Dead and the Living. I, the Supervisor known to the Dead as Hades the older brother of Zeus and Hera. I am the second Betweener and the most invisible, ironically among both the Dead and the Living. [Angelina Jolie]

An aside: Helen Mirren (The Queen) would be good as Hera.

**

I have a question, Amorella.

Shoot.

It was fun picking out actors and actresses to play the parts of the gods. I want to know if you picked Catherine Zeta-Jones to play your female self or did I?

I chose her, and I chose Daniel Craig too. Why not?

What about the others?

Morgan Freeman, yes. The rest are fine, I agree with your choices.

Humanity playing the parts in my mind make it much easier for me.

The Betweeners have no need for imagination, thus they do not have any. Neither do Zeus or Hera for that matter.

That would be strange not to have access to imagination.

Humans have no choice. To have hope one must have imagination. 

Stage One

Amorella here. The stage for the fourth book’s Rebellion was selected long, long ago. This once blog-used photo of old Minerva Park will do for today’s visual highlight.

**

Once in a period before time Consciousness existed as a primordial state. How it came to be is an unknown story until now. Most is natural science as far as physical existence is concerned and science continues to refine its theories, especially the ones reinforced by direct and indirect observation.

First Consciousness, however, is something else again as it need none of the four basic elements, Earth, Air, Fire and Water. Self-awareness among human beings begins soon enough and as self-survival follows close behind ulterior motives are close behind. As one matures self-identity is the inner target and once that is found it is inevitably interconnected with family and/or friends.

First Consciousness is a continual growth – an Awareness of Self and Beyond. Growth requires self-discipline through simple inner rules, many of these can be found in physics. That’s the way it is in here. From these a sense of Values are formed. Balance in Nature is one of these objective Values.

First Consciousness by its Nature creates a First Dimension, Perception. The awareness of a dot on a page serves as an analogy. A dot is what it is unless it is preceded with a word, then the dot becomes a period.

If the word is not known then the dot stays a dot with unknown or unknowable meaning. Existence alone. With a previous word it is a period and has meaning in its grammar. As Supervisor of the Land of the Dead, I am another sentence altogether although I am located further down in the same paragraph.

Human consciousness exists in the second paragraph and the distance between the two is immeasurable though constant as it is on the same page. This is the simple basis of the metaphysics in these books.

**

Any questions, orndorff?

I did not expect this theme. First Cause. I always think of it as ‘What existed before the Big Bang (in theory)?’ I one time assumed G---D was before the Beginning, that G---D was First Cause. Then later I came to the assumption that Randomness was the First Cause. The Randomness was gravity or the lack of it (in my mind anyway). Below is a quotation on Collective Unconsciousness from Wikipedia:

“Jung stated in his book Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious (p.43) “My thesis then, is as follows: in addition to our immediate consciousness, which is of a thoroughly personal nature and which we believe to be the only empirical psyche (even if we tack on the personal unconscious as an appendix), there exists a second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals. This collective unconscious does not develop individually but is inherited. It consists of pre-existent forms, the archetypes, which can only become conscious secondarily and which give definite form to certain psychic contents.”

Jung also made reference to contents of this category of the unconscious psyche as being similar to Levy-Brul's use of collective representations or "representations collectives," Mythological "motifs," Hubert and Mauss's "categories of the imagination," and Adolf Bastian's "primordial thoughts." - Wikipedia

**

This is where it comes from in my mind, at least this is how I see it. The above with a dash of Emerson’s earlier sense of an Oversoul. This is the recipe used for your Creation of Consciousness.

I did not mention the creation of consciousness and by your capitalizing ‘creation’ you are implying what?

I am myself guilty of dropping G---D into the concept. I understand your point. I am not thinking fiction here. The implication is that every so often I unconsciously think of you as an ‘angelic-like’ presence.

Once I involved myself in the ‘thought’ I unconsciously added my cultural interpretation just as I did when I thought of G---D creating the Big Bang of G---D being the First Cause whether it is physics or metaphysics. I did this while still thinking of myself as an agnostic at heart.

I return to Sartre. One of his greatest fears was self-deception. Milton, however, took that fear earlier and dropped it in Satan’s lap (mind) and found good literary use for it in Paradise Lost.

Why don’t you just forget about explaining the ‘cause’ of the First Consciousness concept and just accept it for the time being?

The whole idea of First Consciousness bothers me Amorella. It is unthought and unwritten territory from my mind. Can some of this drop down a few notches and relate to the mythological Zeus? I would feel better if it does. I think my unconscious mind sometimes goes to places where Angels fear to tread as people used to say.

Seems some people still do as you just said it. Tomorrow I will talk about Zeus as he relates to the story in The Rebellion. 

Shoreline of the River Styx

Amorella standing by. This a slightly doctored photo of the Pacific north of San Diego will serve as the waters of the Styx. An analogy to be sure, but the current is lifeless, cold and deep, only a spirit naked in heartansoulanmind is unconsciously built and directed to survive it.

**

The psychological effects, both emotionally and intellectually take some getting used to. Mostly it is finding out who you are now that you were. Strange as it may seem, Elysium is more pleasant that hearts and minds are comfortable with. The soul has no problem, it is as attracted to Elysium as dirt is to Earth.

Hearts hold a tremendous amount of suppressed guilt, some of it real and some implanted by cultural propaganda of one kind or another. People have a tendency to slough this off after they get a sense of how much good it will or will not do them in getting on with a culturally successful life.

Personal moral values are mostly learned by example so family and close friends have an immediate impact early on. Acts of kindness are some of the first conscious acts that are recorded. Someone smiles and the first almost automatic response is to smile back.

Once the community sense of right and wrong is imprinted it is difficult to change. The moral value of justice is an example, particularly when a person sets herorhimself up as judge and jury.

Elysium is a just place where one learns to fit into the community or to think and sleep in a more private, sometimes less comfortable zone. The basic key for comfort and community is self-forgiveness no matter who else has or has not forgiven.

To forgive, in these books, one has to accept herorhis basic humanity. Imperfection is built into humanity as it builds a sense of sincere humility. The children need to be let go, to be free to explore and create their own path in the world. Each generation has its own time, speech and subculture. This is easily observed in Elysium.

Free Will is not an easily accepted heartfelt gift as it attempts to balance emotional memory with reason and intellect in the Place of the Dead. As in Life, it is up to the individual as to how sheorhe will proceed.

**

Were you expecting more, orndorff?

I don’t like this theme, it makes me feel uncomfortable. You said there would be no preaching.

I am stating the facts surrounding the books. You are equating them with a cultural religious orientation. This is an example of what I am discussing. If you were among the Dead in the books you would probably go to your room and think about why you are uncomfortable. Who knows when you would come out.

Maybe I wouldn’t come out, maybe I’d just stay in there and sulk.

That’s what children do, orndorff. Eventually, they come out. It is no different with the Dead. Humanity prevails, believe it or not.

Some people would never come out. You are more optimistic about human beings than I am.

That’s because you have misanthropic tendencies. I don’t care what you believe. You have to deal with it, not me.

Well, staying in my room would not be hell to me.

Everyone has their own private hell inside. You are ever afraid that writing these books will come back to haunt you.

Why?

Because you have made past mistakes in your own judgment. You want to be all-wise. Too bad. You know your imperfections.

I know enough of them.

It keeps you more humble than prideful whether you believe it or not.

You are embarrassing me, Amorella.

Again, too bad. Deal with it. That's exactly what I tell the Dead.

An Entrance into Elysium

This is Amorella in the hinterlands which, by the way, are closer by than you think. This photograph of a corner of a Roman bath was taken two years ago at Bath, England. No people shown, which is the way I want it. This works as another image of the setting of our imaginary Elysium.

**

If the Roman arch disturbs you as an anachronism, as being chronologically out of place with The Rebellion’s setting of the eighth century BCE, you have to remember that it is the Dead are who are out of place with Reality, which is the dimensional universe where you the Living are. Elysium is not a topsy-turvy world such as Alice discovers in her adventures in wonderland. I am orndorff’s guide around this Place, I am as the combined characters Virgil and Beatrice in Dante’s The Divine Comedy.

The pool of water serves as a representative of a primary conditioning agent of Elysium. Water, one of the four basic elements, can be readily seen in all three states, solid, liquid and gas. In this Place heartsansoulsanminds are reversed. As a gas they are invisible and cannot be seen as can be readily observed in this photograph.

If all human beings could be forever seen as solids as they pass through a particular space, say Times Square in New York City, a part of their individuality would be as transformed into a tiny dark mole of human clay. Humans would pass through the space while depositing a bit of themselves behind and one would quite quickly have the proverbial mountain made out of a human hill in moles piled skyscraper high on Times Square.  

This book’s setting, this Isle of Elysium, is created from the collective consciousness of a selected culture of humanity. This consciousness is as the gravity that keeps the Place together, the small island planet if you will.

The solar system, to continue the analogy, is the LOGIC, which holds this imaginary Planet of the Dead in place. Human beings have a higher level of reasoning ability and, as such, once the Place was found by the original planetary DNA Mother of whom all who are alive are connected, the metaphysical Pathway was completed from the Living to the Dead.

The Pathway is as a downhill running river from the Living to the Dead. It contains various branches which meander off to similarly comfortable communal and cultural histories.

In this case, the Pool in the picture above is the end-place the heartsansoulsanminds ‘swim’ into from life on Earth. Think of the individual, if you will, as a tail-like spinal column attached to a brain stem, connected to a brain in which the mind is encased.

These are leftover concepts from Living and it allows for an adjustment following the current down to stillness and climbing out of the pool as if sheorhe is in herorhis best of human health and usually comfortable (age-wise) altogether. The gravity of the human spirit brings them swimming and/or drifting to this place, no compass or GPS is needed.

Meetangreet begins immediately, usually with a close friend or loving family member who helps the recent Dead acclimate. If this appears strikingly similar to being born into the world in the first place, it is supposed to. Elysium, being created of a common human consciousness must remain comfortably human in orientation and setting.

The gift of Free Will continues. The psychological adjustment period of the recently arrived varies. Each is soon relieved to find one can escape into private conscious thought or slumber. Individuals as well as cultures need their space even when it no longer exists except in minds already rented into this timelessness. It is in this private psychological state that one finds herorhimself in ‘HeavenOrHellBothOrNeither’.

**

More on that tomorrow. Do you have any questions, orndorff?

So, you do not cross the river, you swim or float into the downstream current?

Yes, the River Styx will do for all the other rivers in Hades in this case, though it could represent the River of Jordon or any other river in a like analogy. This story is spiritual not religion specific as to time or place. The human spirit is the common ground.

How does is the sky lit blue without a sun?

The collective consciousness – as in a ‘super’natural, if you will, a mega-lucid collective dream.

Are people who died physically or mentally infirmed well?

They are. Those who lost their memories regained what they wanted to regain that will help them be humanly comfortable. Babies and others who have the free will to walk or the equivalent (to move about) are ‘educated’ in their culture and are allowed to mature to the age they wish. Everyone continues to learn and grow both emotionally and intellectually. Curiosity is a human trait as are both working and playing. People find an interest, if nothing else than to meetangreet which promote both listening and questioning.

What about the hero warriors? Do they continue to do battle if they wish?

Contests are usually singular. One on one, and in the conscious nature of things they are intellectually aggressive games. Video games are an apt analogy here. I’ll explain more in tomorrow’s post.

Thank you, Amorella.