Post by Empress Palpatine on Jan 4, 2009 0:25:33 GMT -5
How I Met the Force:
I have not yet told my story here even though I am a long time member and guide here. Perhaps it was because my story was as yet incomplete. To make my Force story complete, there was one more thing I had to do. Since I have gotten to a certain point in that thing, now it can be told.
I was raised Baptist and attended a Christian school, graduating in 1981. I spent one year at a Christian college and three years at an art school. I saw the first Star Wars movie in 1977 when I was 14. I remember liking the Force idea. I just assumed it was a sci-fi way to express a belief in God. The tendency of people I was around was to Christianize the movie. Someone even wrote a Christian book about it. The fact that the movie also had eastern Buddhist type ideas never dawned on me as I had no knowledge of other religions at that time. Let’s face it, I was a brainwashed funde.
To make a long story short, I spent my young adult years engaged in radical leftist politics. There was no internet then. Newspapers and leaflets was the way we did things back in the olden days. I had my own small political newspaper, about 200 copies zeroxed every one to three months and mailed to a mailing list. I remember when typewriters made a “ding” sound and I had to use liquid paper. I did line drawings with a rapidograph pen because they zeroxed well. I associated with at least three different political parties where I carried banners, went to protests, handed out literature, sold the party’s paper at subway stops. Needless to say, I was not pursuing a spiritual life then.
It was when all that ended. I turned to other things, more inner things. I had a lot of “why” questions, many of which had to do with why God did not hold his end up. This caused me to investigate religions other than the one I was raised in. The first book I ever got that was another religion was a book of runes. I took up that practice. The Norse religion was about the mastery of energies. The Norse gods were different than the Judeo-Christian God. The gods come second. Everything comes from the “magically charged void.” The runes represent energies and by meditating on them, I got in touch of the energy of that rune. Later on, I studied Freemasonry, eastern religions, Gnosticism, Kabbalism, even some dark and spooky religions. When I averaged them all together, I concluded that the idea expressed in Star Wars is the most correct one.
When the prequel trilogy came out in 1999, my enthusiasm for Star Wars was reborn. More ideas about the Force were developed, particularly the Dark Side. Even the Jedi were more developed, and I particularly liked Qui-Gon Jinn. I was not yet on the internet. I knew nothing about computers. They were only just beginning to get affordable to normal people. In 2002, I got my first computer; but for two years I languished because I had trouble using it. I briefly was logging in to a Qui-Gon Jinn group. It was not until about 2004 that I got a handle on how to use a computer. This was because I took a computer graphics course. Then the second movie of the trilogy came out. To me, the Sith were winning the argument. I joined a Sith board. (Some may remember Sithism.) I got involved. I gained rank. I got entangled in the soap opera. The experience showed me all the various interpretations of Sith out there. I visited Jedi boards too so I could learn the point of views expressed there. This was all very startling and new. The idea of sitting down at a keyboard and having instant communications with the whole English speaking world was mind-boggling! I got involved with a few other boards as well and eventually this one.
Then it seemed things got really quiet. Jedi and Sith message board activity slowed down. Some was due to soap opera and infighting, but I think it goes deeper than that. Usually soap opera means the aggrieved party stomps off and makes a new board. This I saw happening a few times. Really, I think things go quiet when people run out of things to say, that is, when it has all been said. What now?
What got it all started and fed the flame was this passionate desire to use the Force. The Star Wars movies presented a religion/philosophy that was directly experienced. It is so much better than reading about dusty old miracles that no one is really sure actually happened. The Force is a real thing/entity.
Actually using the Force is proving to be a bit more difficult than the movie portrays. I have witnessed dozens, even hundreds of people logging on to Sith or Jedi sites asking how to use it like in the movie. Where it ends up is with some repackaged new age techniques. Many get disappointed and drift away.
I am not so willing to give up the quest. There is just enough real evidence of possibility to keep me searching. I moved on to science to offer some clues, especially the physics of electromagnetism, which, I believe, is the Force that people tap into. My intention is to return with the information that I gather. It has taken me months so far because it is a very complex subject. I think that when I am finished, I can offer lots of food for discussion. I believe it will get things going again in both the Jedi and the Sith worlds.
I have not yet told my story here even though I am a long time member and guide here. Perhaps it was because my story was as yet incomplete. To make my Force story complete, there was one more thing I had to do. Since I have gotten to a certain point in that thing, now it can be told.
I was raised Baptist and attended a Christian school, graduating in 1981. I spent one year at a Christian college and three years at an art school. I saw the first Star Wars movie in 1977 when I was 14. I remember liking the Force idea. I just assumed it was a sci-fi way to express a belief in God. The tendency of people I was around was to Christianize the movie. Someone even wrote a Christian book about it. The fact that the movie also had eastern Buddhist type ideas never dawned on me as I had no knowledge of other religions at that time. Let’s face it, I was a brainwashed funde.
To make a long story short, I spent my young adult years engaged in radical leftist politics. There was no internet then. Newspapers and leaflets was the way we did things back in the olden days. I had my own small political newspaper, about 200 copies zeroxed every one to three months and mailed to a mailing list. I remember when typewriters made a “ding” sound and I had to use liquid paper. I did line drawings with a rapidograph pen because they zeroxed well. I associated with at least three different political parties where I carried banners, went to protests, handed out literature, sold the party’s paper at subway stops. Needless to say, I was not pursuing a spiritual life then.
It was when all that ended. I turned to other things, more inner things. I had a lot of “why” questions, many of which had to do with why God did not hold his end up. This caused me to investigate religions other than the one I was raised in. The first book I ever got that was another religion was a book of runes. I took up that practice. The Norse religion was about the mastery of energies. The Norse gods were different than the Judeo-Christian God. The gods come second. Everything comes from the “magically charged void.” The runes represent energies and by meditating on them, I got in touch of the energy of that rune. Later on, I studied Freemasonry, eastern religions, Gnosticism, Kabbalism, even some dark and spooky religions. When I averaged them all together, I concluded that the idea expressed in Star Wars is the most correct one.
When the prequel trilogy came out in 1999, my enthusiasm for Star Wars was reborn. More ideas about the Force were developed, particularly the Dark Side. Even the Jedi were more developed, and I particularly liked Qui-Gon Jinn. I was not yet on the internet. I knew nothing about computers. They were only just beginning to get affordable to normal people. In 2002, I got my first computer; but for two years I languished because I had trouble using it. I briefly was logging in to a Qui-Gon Jinn group. It was not until about 2004 that I got a handle on how to use a computer. This was because I took a computer graphics course. Then the second movie of the trilogy came out. To me, the Sith were winning the argument. I joined a Sith board. (Some may remember Sithism.) I got involved. I gained rank. I got entangled in the soap opera. The experience showed me all the various interpretations of Sith out there. I visited Jedi boards too so I could learn the point of views expressed there. This was all very startling and new. The idea of sitting down at a keyboard and having instant communications with the whole English speaking world was mind-boggling! I got involved with a few other boards as well and eventually this one.
Then it seemed things got really quiet. Jedi and Sith message board activity slowed down. Some was due to soap opera and infighting, but I think it goes deeper than that. Usually soap opera means the aggrieved party stomps off and makes a new board. This I saw happening a few times. Really, I think things go quiet when people run out of things to say, that is, when it has all been said. What now?
What got it all started and fed the flame was this passionate desire to use the Force. The Star Wars movies presented a religion/philosophy that was directly experienced. It is so much better than reading about dusty old miracles that no one is really sure actually happened. The Force is a real thing/entity.
Actually using the Force is proving to be a bit more difficult than the movie portrays. I have witnessed dozens, even hundreds of people logging on to Sith or Jedi sites asking how to use it like in the movie. Where it ends up is with some repackaged new age techniques. Many get disappointed and drift away.
I am not so willing to give up the quest. There is just enough real evidence of possibility to keep me searching. I moved on to science to offer some clues, especially the physics of electromagnetism, which, I believe, is the Force that people tap into. My intention is to return with the information that I gather. It has taken me months so far because it is a very complex subject. I think that when I am finished, I can offer lots of food for discussion. I believe it will get things going again in both the Jedi and the Sith worlds.
