Center of the Center of the Center

The Verde Island Passage

Between Batangas and Mindoro, there is a passage of the sea where Verde Island is located which is alluded to by marine scientists as the “center of the center of the center of the richest marine biodiversity in the planet,” where if one were to dive into its depths would discern in its mists the splendid spires of sunken temples. But who would dare venture into these unfathomable depths? One diver died in its waters bereft of oxygen. There have been others. The current belief is that the body of water is guarded by spirits, and so it is dangerous for deep sea divers even the expert ones to venture freely under its tricky cross undercurrents making the sea passage very threatening to sea poachers and malevolent (to the guardian spirits) fishing vessels to navigate.

What cannot be seen with the eye, but that whereby the eye can see: know that alone to Bhraman, or God, the Spirit and not what people adore. What cannot be heard with the ear but that whereby the ear can hear: know that alone to be Bhraman or God, the Spirit and not what people here adore. What cannot be thought with the mind, but that whereby the mind the ear can hear: know that alone to Bhraman or God, the Spirit and not what people here adore. What cannot be thought with the mind, but that whereby the mind can think: know that alone to be Bhraman or God the Spirit, and not what people here adore. God, the scriptures is saying is formless consciousness and the essence of who you are. Everything else is form, is “what people here adore.” from the Upanishads

Most people are so identified with the dimension of form, with sense perception, thoughts, and emotions that the vital hidden half is missing from their lives. Their identification with form keeps them trapped in ego, as an ancient Kabbalist would speak about form.

A new modern Kabbalist I know is Ekhart Tolle who in his best-selling book, A New Earth, challenges us in our comfort zone when he says: The collective disease of humanity is that people are so engrossed in what happens, so hypnotized by the world of fluctuating forms. So absorbed in their lives, they have forgotten eternity, which is their origin, their home. Their destiny. Eternity is the living reality of who you are. In archaic Tagalog, you would in pure essence be considered taal na tao.. Translated: You are, in essence, a human being if you feel Eternity is your living reality. You are taal na tao . You are in pure essence, a human being.


A VOLCANO WITHIN A LAKE

The arcane Tagalog word taal for Taal volcano within a lake, in Luzon island of the Philippines, means pure essence. In his book The Mysteries of Taal, Thomas Hargrove, a scientist who worked at the IRRI (International Rice Reasearch Institute) in Los Banos, Laguna, writes about how Taal’s beauty and serenity is so ethereal, it makes one think of Eternity, one’s original abode, and one’s Essence Self, as one who visits the volcano within the lake, suddenly becomes aware of her powerful Presence which had held Hargrove captivated. I know, I felt that way too when I went down down there beside the misty lake with a group of friends, not above the ridge. Down beside the lake, I thought I was transported to another world, another dimension, but I was, and I want to go back… I’ll write more about this mystical dimension of Taal Volcano in another time………
Hey, I have to return to Hargrove who realized that Taal wanted him to write a book on her mysteries. He planned to go to Vietnam to explore an area there but shelved it,feeling Taal volcano was calling him. Lake Taal has her secrets and her underwater ghost towns but she makes you earn the right to share them. Hargrove had to go on many dives with others to discover some of her secrets, in the face of many dangers, mostly coming from venomous sea snakes that guard her sacred fresh waters. The untamed lake can darken her waters, becoming murky like her past…Most lakes within 500 km. of Manila have been hopelessly polluted. Man has stripped most of the forests from Taal’s caldera slope. Only her violent reputation has frightened industry from building factories along her shores, and desecrating her waters with polluting wastes.

SHADES OF LEMURIA

Reading about Taal volcano’s tempestuous temper brings to mind the equally mysterious Verde Island Passage which happens to be in the same area, in the province of Batangas, to be specific in San Juan town near the sea. We visited this place by the sea, entry point to the coral triangle called the Verde Island Passage, alluded to by scientists as the Center of the Center of the Center of the richest biodiversity of marine life in the planet. Google has much more to say about it. Last Thursday, May 27th 2010, on a mystical quest we made a trip to make Full Moon rituals of restitution for damages done by humans who attempted to develop the locale as a modern resort for tourism. It reminded me of Taal volcano, the smallest in the world but with the mightiest temper. No ambitious modern industry has ever dared carve out an installation of greed there. It has a reputation for sinking towns around its grounds, centuries ago, and recently a boat of visiting foreign visitors capsized without any sign of a coming storm.

Back to seascape, San Juan, Batangas: They said there was a road built around the crystalline core of its primal waters on its shore and other constructions like a ship that served as a restaurant jotting out in the sea which was part of a sea resort development for tourism. But this was later struck by ferocious waves of an angry sea driven by a series of typhoons that dislocated both vertically and horizontally some of the rocks that formed the earth’s seawall guarding the star portal of the Center of the Center of the Center of the richest marine biodiversity, there, causing it to become a polyhedron of a few fragmented mountain faces. Yet it wasn’t tough for our group to hike over the sharp edges of its broken rocky slabs as I discovered, they had flown over fast so it seemed to me while I fumbled but felt an invisible force was pushing me to hurry past over the holes where the ground had caved in for that made it all the more primordial and exciting. Shades of misty Lemuria of which this island kingdom was a part in unrecorded time…

It was a bit scary to walk that way for one who is a newcomer to the place. Nothing to it of course, my venturesome spirit becalmed me as I got excited by the idea that this was ancient Lemuria… the energies are charged with unseen power…. Yet I was modern enough to wear rubber shoes of a stylish brand so I managed with an occasional nanosecond heave-ho to walk on along with reaching out to a helping hand from a friend, to skip a mix of strewn dry broken branches of wild flora above us that would trip me up before I can reach the other side where our modern day - babaylan Grace Odal- Devora was to do her sacred dance of healing.

At times, Grace was seemingly floating in her gossamer white robe with a flowery regal headdress (which she said she got from under the bridge of Quiapo) that quaint colorful headgear to me made her a radiant bouquet of cosmic mysteries as could only arise from the garden of God/Goddess. From what ancient realm does her magicianship emerge may I ask?

Calling forth to Bathala, Bathala, Bathala..…our modern age babaylan Grace O was chanting her greetings to the root Source of life, the support and nurturance of primary being, she glided and swayed gracefully around our circle of offerings of fruits, and nuts, and what leafy things we could gather; she danced and sang her language of light around a bon fire later that two members of the Wiccan Society – Ishilta and Aldrin had set up. Two women who were with us come from the esoterically famed Pila Laguna society of new-age babylans, two others were visitors, one was taking a video (see Facebook) and the town consejal who’s the caretaker of the sacred site. Lifting supplicating arms to the skies where stars twinkled down on us,I noticed one twinkler got far and far away into space…? Ano kaya, an unidentified space ship? I sensed we were being watched and observed … Meanwhile, our friend Grace from UP (note: the University of the Philippines works in tandem with San Juan Batangas in a scientific study on phenomenology) continues as a focused shaft of light to ask for more unconditional love and shower wisdom and light on all simple human beings around the world as magic’s dimensional doors open …

On the horizon the Full Moon was reigning, her light shimmering on the bluest primordial sea I have ever seen in which sound, light, ecstasy, time, space, and form were born. In her powerful but gentle Presence she was presenting to us her receptive vibration as the primordial Mother in sacred union with the spiral of God. Oh, the night was pure magic as we offered prayers for these chaotic times, aggravated by an oil spill in the Mexican gulf in the US that can’t seem to be plugged that’s spreading its pollution over vast areas and so we meditated … knowing that divine nurturance will provide what is needed in our quest for undivided primal waters, symbolic of unis mundis. An awareness that we were right there where the Center of the Center of the planet Earth’s richest biodiversity of marine life, exists. It was truly awesome…sensing its high electrical charges or rising frequencies where all else dances… as we all did in the manner of aligning your will with the Divine, looking inside, not outside for answers through the lens of heart-knowing. Think with your heart. Allow yourself to be danced in divine innocence (Ramon took care of the music, Ishilta and Aldrin the drum drum, others the dreaming, droning tinkerbells, next time, I’ll borrow the sleighbells of old Santa K but it must be more Tibetan-like) as a channel for the highest magic. I think it was the sound of the waves that created more power, more enchantment and the heaving living closeness of the mighty sea under the luminous Full Moon....inducing you to be deeply meditative, attuning your breath to the Divine …ti’s heaven on earth.

As everyone knows, the Philippines is considered as the center of psychics in the world….Many of these psychics and prophets who are also healers or hilots, regard the existence of Lemuria/Mu as a physical reality in the Philippines. In fact, there are a number of them who have recalled former lives as citizens on the legendary lost continent of Mu. A world-renowned psychic surgeon, Alex Orbito was subjected to medical examinations by medical scientists in the West purposely to find out if he is an ET, an extraterrestrial being. Sooner than expected we may discover our own original home in the worlds beyond... . . .