UFO Voice

Saturday, July 30, 2005

UFO Researchers As Social Artists

Like others, I've been in the privileged position over the years of hearing thousands of first hand reports of UFO sightings and close encounters. Official sources have heard them too but for whatever reason have turned their backs on these witnesses leaving them to cope alone.

That leaves a handful of UFO researchers to struggle with lending support to thousands of people every year who can have difficulties with such life changing events. It adds another dimension to the researchers role that many were probably not aware of when they first ventured through the “UFO gate”. Nevertheless, here we are redefining what it means to be a researcher.

Sometimes we have to cope with being drawn into the drama of soul evolution for people who begin their UFO journey, for some “a dark night of the soul” experience for sure, coloured with a touch of the absurd. Many researchers have had no formal training in handling people who undergo this process let alone cope with the buttons it pushes in our own psyche?

Yes, we can be caught uncertain, unprepared and perhaps not fully realising what’s happening right in front of the collective nose on our face. Many of us are trying to figure out what’s really happening and understand the momentous process of societal evolution that is occurring from the peppering of close encounter experiences throughout our civilization.

Whether we like it or not, for many the role of UFO researcher has changed into that of a social artist. This means we can be required to provide guidance for individuals undergoing changing paradigms, values, belief systems and myths as they move into a new version of their lives.

Regardless of our state of preparedness we don’t seem to have the luxury of avoiding the part we are to play, not if we listen to our hearts anyway. The call has gone out and each of us has to answer it in our own way.

Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Creating The Vision

“Like most genuine social movements, it defies easy definition. The borders are fuzzy, and the participants are all too diverse and changing to be pinned down by a set of words. This movement compounds these problems by the unusually broad scope of topics it addresses, as well as its deep resistance to being limited by labels and boundaries.” – A description of the Sustainability movement.

Recently on the UFO Updates list the question of how ufology might make a collective move forward has been raised. I guess people will have their own theories and I have mine. From my perspective, I believe the biggest reason there is a lack of unification in ufology, therefore no seeming move towards collective change, is because the UFO community holds no collective vision of what it is about. For some it’s about exploring the idea that ET life might exist in the universe, while for others that life already exists and they want to understand what that may mean.

For a cause to become a force for change it must hold a clear vision, a set of values and a strategy for people to focus on. If these don’t exist then logically there is no point of focus, no avenue for commonality to emerge and no growing power to move in any direction on a large scale. It's a bit like firing arrows wildly into the air with no target. Since Ufology is defined very differently by individuals I'm asking myself if it is even realistic to request or expect a shared vision?

I know some will rebut this idea with suggestions of egos being too big and getting in the way therefore the UFO community will never pull together, it's just too much of an ask etc. etc. Upsets due to the varying degrees of individual personal development is a challenge in any community whether it be the scientific community, religious groups, in education, sports etc. Human dynamics are exactly the same whatever living space you pass time in, so in that respect the UFO community is no different. But to say this is the reason why the UFO community does not make any movement forward misses the mark and fails to approach the crux of the challenge – lack of vision, values and strategy.

When a vision of the heart, mind or soul is shared and focused on by a group a lot can be achieved but this needs to be consistently supported via a process. This process involves social dialogue where community members engage in respectful discussions where they are open to learning from one another. This dialogue starts where we are at about our current stories and issues, and the concerns or perspectives that they raise. Then we move on to envisioning a new society/civilization that has incorporated those stories thereby creating a new perspective and consciousness born from the UFO subject. We then end with our personal contributions to transforming the subject, and inevitably ourselves and society.

What seems to be currently happening in the UFO community is that it is stuck in the first stage of this social dialogue, discussing current issues and stories over and over. It’s time to move to the second step of envisioning a society where these have been incorporated. This is a great challenge and tends to divide the UFO community because some are not ready to move to step 2, still deciding if ET life is a fact or a figment of people’s imagination. What we need to remember is there are forces that don’t want step 2 to be taken, and whether their source is from various institutions, of a metaphysical nature or the fear in mankinds psyche makes little difference.

But for those who are willing to take step 2 its time to learn about society and how change happens, question myths and assumptions both mainstream and our own, and seek to understand this from a planetary perspective as well as locally. We need to look at the world systematically and break it down to understand cause and effect and take an historical and future oriented view on change and development towards the emergence of a cosmic society complete with ETs.

In the middle of all this we need to understand that our current society is breaking down and a new civilization is evolving that will require strategies we haven’t even thought of yet. Running parallel to this process we need to use approaches that help those in the UFO community generate creative ideas and possibilities, mining it for the richness of it’s diverse ideas and perspectives rather than letting them become a dividing factor.

It is imperative that the UFO community creates a shared vision because any society that lacks this will stagnate and die out while those with a positive vision prove to be quite successful and retain a healthy longevity. If the UFO community can create a shared vision it will no longer matter if we have different perspectives because the vision will help us rise above our differences while even possibly learning to appreciate them.

In the end, the UFO movement must embody the values of the new culture that is being born from it. This new culture is one that has accepted that we are not alone in the universe and the flow on effect this awareness will bring. We are at the point where we need to change our focus and approach to this subject and move on to integrating it within our psyche and our lifestyle. We need to embody its vision, live its values and employ strategies that will bring about the change we would like to see. Only then will we see a real movement in the true sense of the word.

Sunday, July 24, 2005

Is Enough Enough?

For a long time now I, like many others, have sensed that Ufology is falling short of it’s potential. Researchers have meticulously gathered UFO sighting reports, close encounter reports, official UFO records and whistleblower evidence. We have it all and a mountain of it too, but despite that we feel like the mountain isn’t moving the UFO subject forward in a way that gets us past the confirmation that we are not alone in the universe. Is that it we ask? We seem to have run into a brick wall not knowing where to go with that knowledge next. We can have small insights from this knowledge but in general we feel stuck. Yet uncannily we sense that we’re standing in a pool of water looking for somewhere else to drink knowing that we already have many answers buried in the mountain we’re sitting on. It’s a very common intuition.

We moan – how much information gathering do we need before we get somewhere with this subject?

What we don’t realise is that the repetition of gathering all this evidence does actually serve a purpose. by allowing us to go deep with it. Just like the art student who draws a hand, a face, a tree or a bird over and over, gradually her consciousness changes while doing so. Similarly long term meditators repeat their daily meditation practice always coming back to the basics of breath and stillness, again and again realizing they haven’t yet experienced it completely.

Likewise, the practice of gathering UFO evidence allows our perception and recognition of something profound deepen within us via steady, attentive repetition.
This repetition has a certain cunning forcing us to bide a while allowing the passage of time so gained to alter us. It affords us the time to develop our resilience that will stand us fast to face the change our subconscious is about to reveal. It helps us to move through change so our world will not crumble on the other side of it. Preparing for a new world model where humanity will truly regard itself as no longer being alone in the universe requires immense internal preparation, the amount we can only guess. If we are to move beyond our current world view into another where our view may no longer cohere, a certain robustness of the psyche will be necessary to accept the experience and only when we are utterly ready for it will it come.

Saturday, July 23, 2005

Pass The Zen Please

When I was a young girl I would look at the many beautiful stars in the sky and wonder if there was someone in outer space on another world looking back towards Earth wondering the same thing. I guess that was my first introduction to the world of Ufology. Little did I know then that those early musings would take me on a journey into a rather strange, if not curious and interesting life.

It took me 30 years to return to my original destination, after being sidetracked by the ambitions of western society. Although I will never regret having those ambitions it has only been since I began my UFO trek that I have come to realise how unusual and complex humans truly are and what cosmic potentials still await us.

Although the world of Ufology has taken me on many mental trips to the stars and along Earthly avenues where I have made connections with thousands of people that I would not otherwise had the privilege of knowing, it has also taken me on an inner voyage that has plunged me into a shamanic-like initiation where I’ve been challenged to let go of preconceived ideas, transcend my own ego and expand my consciousness. I haven’t been too successful in any of these areas so for me the journey still continues, but I have come to appreciate the marvellous tool for personal development that UFO research can be.

There have been some pay offs on this UFO journey and at times I have been able to look at life through extraterrestrial eyes giving me a greater understanding of how humanity can exist in a more profound and wholistic way. This ET perspective has also helped me raise my tolerance level, even if only a fraction, and I can now feel compassion for those in the world that fail to pay attention to the UFO subject and our cosmic birthright rather than be angry and frustrated by their inattention. It’s not humanity’s fault after all that we have evolved a psyche that serves to protect us through denial and conditioning.

I’ve also been able to gain glimpses into more developed ET societies and how they lay down a model for our own world, a “fast track for dummies” to human evolution if you like, if only we’d learn to read the instructions. Extraterrestrial perspectives of Earth as a kindergarten ruled by bullies, and conquests made through fear and lack of reaching for the stuff we’re truly made of, are far closer to the truth than I’d like. ET perspectives cause us to look into our darkness as well as our light and this is truly the Zen way, for it’s in our darkness and at our weakest that humanity often finds it’s spirit, it’s light. It’s obvious after all that where spirit and light seem most absent and most needed is where they should be expected to show up, isn’t it?

While my unseen UFO life runs beneath the surface like an underground water course I am always very aware of it. Every day it becomes a more dominant aspect of myself where I feel far more comfortable and enthusiastic about walking it’s path. It pops up daily like the seedlings that somehow manage to find anchor in my concrete garden path, surprising me with it’s will to emerge.

Yes, I have a secret UFO life that only my peers know about while the rest of the world remains oblivious to it’s existence and I grapple with my own alien within too. Zen helps me explore that part of me by bringing my outer exploration of the UFO subject inwards, as only Zen can. Once the inner journey is begun the world we know fast disappears and we can’t go back, but in this new world we can explore the interior realm of our consciousness and map out how the acceptance of a universe abundant with ET life can create new territories in our thinking.

However, the UFO path does have it’s down side too and can ostracise us from our human tribe so we can come to feel like the alien. We go about our daily business seeming to be like everybody else but inside we are quite aware of the yawning gap between ourselves and others who have never given the UFO subject a second thought. We’re the same, yet different, but funnily enough I wouldn’t have it any other way. If I were to say it in Zen fashion it would be like a descent into night while loving the dark, and the courage with which we bear the darkness frees others from having to carry it for us.

Friday, July 22, 2005

Welcome To UFO Voice

Over the years many people have encouraged me to write my ufological thoughts so others could share in them. I don't know why but they seem to think I have something of value to say so maybe by the time I finish saying it all I will too.

I've read a lot of UFO information but never found anyone voicing my own thoughts so i've felt like an outsider even within the UFO community, which is now where I call home. Yep, it's where I now comfortably dwell, live, think and climb all over the UFO subject, even if it is on it's outskirts. I'm hoping that by writing my thoughts, even if no one reads them, I can learn even more about the subject and gain insights I don't yet have.

Why write my thoughts via a blog? I enjoy blogs because I love people. I like the fact that blogs are not mediated, are interactive and it's a whole lot of fun just letting your mind hang out. They also provide people with a platform for skeptical analysis, critical commentary and alternative perspectives, all badly needed requirements in the UFO community today. I also enjoy blogs because whatever community is reading them can act as their editors. If someone gets something wrong the public can say so...and we all like that.

Another reason I chose a blog is because they're an amateur media that is often full of raw emotion, something that is lacking in our external world today. We've ended up living with an arms length attitude to just about everything, none moreso than the UFO issue.

It looks like blogs are here to stay too because they're catching on fast and in the long run I think they will add an invaluable dimension to Ufology. So welcome to the blogosphere.