read nightly before bed (often before reading Kryon channellings, of which I saw many parallels) in our little trailer while WWOOFing. a book recommended by Chrystel our gracious and wise WWOOF host who described Jitterbug Perfume as within the realm of the esoteric (say no more), and as one of the few books she re-reads! honourable mention to Jordan for also nodding towards Jitterbug months prior. pretty funny, silly, extremely playful use of language, some uncomfortable eroticism, sprinkled plenty with celebratory wisdom, interfaces with the divine, and many reasons to extend the will to live (forever, eternally, immortally as human beings - a real possibility in my heart/mind).

excerpts from Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins, published in 1984 by Bantam Books

"…mankind has been too puny in his mind and heart and soul to deserve immortality. And certainly, to have conquered age to the extent that thou hast, thou must have done good strengthening work in thine own mind and heart and soul. Someday, however, a thousand years from today, there wilt be men who seek to defeat death by intelligence alone. They wilt combat age and death with potions and the like, medical weapons that their minds have invented, and age and death will shrink back from them and their medicines. Alas, because they fight with reason only, making no advance in the area of soul and heart, true immortality whilst be denied them. Thus, thou must vow upon this day that should thou be living still when these events transpire, that thou wills battle them and refuseth prosperity to any immortality thrust that doth not rise from man’s soul and heart as well as his mind.” p. 151 Lalo, asking Alobar and Kudra for a promise to uplift heart + soul as well as mind in the quest for immortality, in Pan’s lineage.

"When life was a constant struggle between predators, a mnute-by-minute battle for survival, reptile consciousness was necessary. When there were seas to be sailed, wild continents to be explored, harsh territory to be settled, agriculture to be mastered, mine shafts to be sunk, civilization to be founded, mammal consciousness was necessary. In its social and familial aspects, it is still necessary, but no longer must dominate." p. 322

"We live now in an information technology. Flowers have always lived in an information technology. Flowers gather information all day. At night, they process it. This is called photosynthesis. As our neocortex comes into full use, we, too, will practice a kind of photosynthesis. As a matter of fact, we already do, but compared to the flowers, our kind is primitive and limited. For one thing, information gathered from daily newspapers, soap operas, sales conferences, and coffee klatches is inferior to information gathered from sunlight. (Since all matter is condensed light, light is the source, the cause of life. Therefore, light is divine. The flowers have a direct line to God that an evangelist would kill for.)" p. 323

"Christ and Buddha came into our psyches not to deliver us from evil but to deliver us from mammal consciousness. The good versus evil plot has always been bogus. The drama unfolding in the universe—in our psyches—is not good against evil but new against old, or more precisely, destined against obsolete." p. 326

jitterbug perfume

mindfulness teachings: on forgiveness

moving west