Abraham is a pure embodiment of kindness and generosity. In kabbalistic terminology, his connection is with the Sefirah of Chesed. The energy of judgment and severity associated with the Sefirah of Gvurah is foreign to him – and that is precisely what the Adversary has revealed as an opening. As a foundation of the spiritual circuitry that must be flawlessly constructed if the redemption of humanity is ever to be realized, Abraham must be made a complete soul. That is the purpose of this last trial, as the Zohar makes clear.

"There was no judgment in Abraham previously. He had consisted entirely of kindness (Chesed). Now water was mixed with fire; kindness was mixed with judgment (Gvurah). Abraham did not achieve perfection until he prepared to execute judgment and establish it in its place." – The Essential Zohar, p. 148

This passage is in regard to the story of Abraham whereby the Creator demands that he make a sacrifice of his son, Isaac. I think – I'm no expert on biblical stories. I just have vague recollections of bits and pieces I've heard. And in "The Essential Zohar", the chapter name is "The Binding of Isaac".

The Sefirah (or Sephirot) mentioned are described differently by different sources, but I gather that they are energy states between the ultimate divine and material, human existence. They describe humanity's "distance from God", which is also a concept in Sufism. So they separate human from the divine.

There are about 10 Sephirot, and from the divine down, they each describe an energy state removed from the divine state. Or in reverse, they are like a ladder to be climbed towards the divine. Several of the Sephirot are directly associated with certain Jewish patriarchs, and here, Abraham is associated with Chesed, or mercy, sharing, loving-kindness.

Abraham is described as incomplete because he is purely Chesed, without a drop of Chesed's "negative" counterpart Sefirah, Gvurah, which is judgment or restriction.

The Adversary mentioned above is part of the divine mechanisms. Angels who are testing God's creation, partly out of spite for being told that Adam was closer to God than the angels. The Essential Zohar likens them to criminal defense attorneys, who might seem to be despicable, defending criminals and degenerates, but they serve a vital function in the justice system by creating balance. They ensure the legal process maintains the highest standards to protect citizens from possible abuses or over-zealous prosecution.

They see Abraham's perfect Chesed as a possible fault and request permission from the Creator to test his faith – would he maintain his faith when asked to do the unthinkable? So the Creator commands this perfect believer to make the ultimate sacrifice of his own son, who was born after much difficulty.

Abraham passes the test with flying colors, but in doing so, his being is infused with Gvurah, which was necessary to offer Isaac as a sacrifice until the Creator stopped him at the last second. Having the energy states of Chesed and Gvurah, Abraham is described as having his soul complete.

I love the description of the Sefirah as divine circuitry to connect humanity with the divine, angling for the ultimate redemption of humankind in the Garden of Eden.

What I get out of these concepts is that the Jewish patriarchs created the circuit pathways up the ladder of Sephirot for all humanity, all following generations. Abraham completed that particular connection for all of us so that we don't have to by ourselves. All we have to do is acknowledge Abraham's accomplishment within ourselves.

For example, living in a major urban city, I witness a lot of behavior that can be described as unmindful or even stupid. If I were 100% compassionate, I would cow down to such behaviors and just let them be and not be critical or judgmental.

But that's not necessarily the best course of action. Sometimes it's better to act in a way that's rude to them or even threatening to try to bring to their attention that they need to be mindful, too. That's Gvurah.

The intention must be correct, i.e. balanced with Chesed. If it's just Gvurah, then it's aggression or spite or anger. If the intention is compassionate, then an aggressive act is balanced with Chesed.

Abraham completed that circuit for me, and to the extent that I have it, I am grateful to Abraham.

I think these ideas can be linked with karma. Regarding the theory of reincarnation and karma, we don't take anything with us from one life to a subsequent one except our karma. And the establishment and recognition of the sephirotic circuitry is karma. It's one more step up the tree of life.

I had another lucid dream, but it was different from the previous time I was successful. This time I don't know if it was my dream. I'm pretty sure I wasn't me in it.

Also I don't remember whether the last time I came up into the lucid state from a lower dream state, but this time I felt I went down into it from a waking state. I was lying on my bed watching my breathing, aware of the constant chatter and internal conversation going on in my head, which gets more intense when you haven't had direct in-person social contact in months.

Then as I fell into a quasi-sleep state, I was aware of things in my mind becoming really vivid. I was only quasi-aware of this as well. I'm not sure what those things that were becoming vivid were, if it was my awareness, or my sense perceptions, or the thoughts.

But then I was in a dream state and still fully aware of myself, but the content of the dream suggested it wasn't me or my dream. I actually don't know how to describe it or what was going on. I was totally clueless in the dream.

All I can describe are the very basic impressions and those I'm really squeezing to interpret into physical words and are nothing like the experience.

There were two groups of people, one male and one female. The male portion came first and it was like some white boy institution, like a frat house or military academy. I did feel a basic fear being in that situation, but when I realized they weren't treating me differently or being racist, I just went along with the flow of the dream, the content of which I've completely forgotten.

I had no idea who I was and I don't think I said anything, I just played it cool, but at the same time I was fully aware I was dreaming and that as a dream it was completely unfamiliar territory.

Next I wandered "down the hall" or something to the female section of the dream, and when I walked in a door. A person behind the door closed the door and accosted me. At first I think it was a guy, but then it was clearly female and she was hostile and pinned me down, and I get the sense that it was some issue over a guy, and then I realized I must've been female.

I wasn't resisting or doing or saying anything. It wasn't my dream, I didn't know what to do so I just remained passive. But then I don't know if it was me consciously changing the tenor of the dream, but then the whole incident with this woman on top of me changed and started getting intimate. She was no longer pinning me down and there was a sexual energy beginning. This, no one should be surprised, I tried to encourage and maintain.

The way I came out of it was interesting, too, because the scene transitioned without me changing my position. Still on my back, I was suddenly in a room that had the atmosphere of maybe my uncle's house in Kaohsiung 30 years ago. I was lying on a bed trying to maintain the lucid dream and the feel of intimacy from the previous scene.

I think someone was there, maybe a cousin, bumping or making some noise on a bed next to mine and I was thinking, "darn, they're going to wake me up out of this", but I also thought that I was already awake and vainly trying to maintain the lucid dream.

But then I realized that no, this isn't my room. I tried to imagine my room but couldn't, so then I realized I was still in the dream. But trying to imagine my room was irresistible, and when I did, that's when I woke up.

I don't know if this has any significance, but right after I woke up, I started feeling a sharp pain in my gut, similar to several months ago, but then it resided. Then I felt I should go to the bathroom and surprisingly took the BIGGEST FUCKING DUMP EVER. It felt great, like all the pipes got cleaned out. If someone were to have told me I was full of shit, I would've replied, "Not anymore!!".

I've heard about people who practice lucid dreaming as a way to prepare for traveling through the death bardos. There's more than one source suggesting the closest to the Tibetan bardo experience we can come to while living is dreaming, and lucid dreaming is analogous to being in control through the bardos, rather than swept through like in a stormy current.

I did get the sense after this lucid dream that my reactions in the dream were the result of my practice and how I would ideally like to handle myself through the death bardos. However, my experience was still a duality, I still had a sense of me and everything else as other.

It is said that enlightenment comes when one realizes a non-dual oneness. If one can realize in the bardo that everything is a manifestation of oneself – no separation between oneself and everything perceived around us – that would be enlightenment. I didn't think of that in the lucid dream, but I did remain unattached to what was happening around me.

Short of enlightenment in the bardo, I think that's the best way to go through it: Not being pulled in by what you're perceiving, and not thinking it's real and reacting to it as if it were real, either positively or negatively, which is a function of one's basic karma, which is a function of one's experiences and actions during life.

If what I've been practicing and cultivating as I go about my daily life led to my reactions in this lucid dream, then I should have a good degree of confidence heading into the death bardos. It's not a cold detachment, which could lead to a lack of compassion, but a concerted effort to not be attached or feel aversion to my perceptions and experiences.

It's true that I'm not engaged in life going on around me, but I do think it's important to maintain a base attitude that's prepared to be engaged and to engage it with compassion. The fact that I'm not engaged is circumstantial. And I know it's a reality that I've created by myself.

I saw the sun today!! I even sallied forth into it!!! I couldn't believe it when I craned my neck looking up from my window, which otherwise looks out into an alley, and saw evidence of blue skies. This entire past week was completely rainy or cloudy. I kept track.

I didn't know what I wanted to do out there. I was still too suspicious to try to get on my bike because it still could cloud over quickly and start raining. I thought of going up to Danshui where I've decided should be the site of my next attempt, or I could go to the library and re-read more of The Essential Zohar.

I went out realistically thinking that I would end up in the library, but for all the resistance in me against going to Danshui, I rebelled and pushed myself towards that option and was finally on a bus towards the MRT that would take me to the northern-most station on the red line.

The MRT loosely follows the Danshui River northward and takes about 30 minutes to the terminal station. From there, it's still a bit of a hike to the mouth of the river where it empties into the Taiwan Strait – open seas. I'm not sure I would call today's trek a dress rehearsal; more just scouting out coastline locations.

And I did stand on the sand of the shoreline. The surf was rough and I wondered if I could even make it far enough out so that I would be taken out to sea and not pushed back to shore by the waves. I felt I didn't want to do it. I felt I couldn't do it. But I have to do it.

And if I do it, I confirmed this was a good location. I walked along the beach towards the touristy Fisherman's Wharf area. The sun was setting in the west and it was a bit windy, but not chilly. I couldn't believe it wasn't raining.

The midrash teaches that when Moses stretched out his hand over the waters, nothing happened. It was only when one man actually walked out into the waves that the Red Sea parted – but not until the water had reached his neck and he kept walking. Then and only then was certainty in the tools of Kabbalah really made manifest . . . Before we can live in this universe in a meaningful way, however, we should rid ourselves of the belief that we are helpless human beings about to drown in a stormy sea. – p. 107, The Essential Zohar

I love how this scene contrasts Christian portrayals, whereby Moses dramatically stretches his noble hand outward and by the grace of GOD the waters of the Red Sea part and he leads his withered and weathered people across. Here he stretches out his hand and nothing happens. Um, Moses?

It's not even Moses that heads into the water, it's "one man".

I jest. One man can be interpreted as the unity of the chosen people, that it's when all the people believed and were certain in their belief enough to just head into the surf that the Creator's miracle was manifested.

It wasn't the prophet Moses leading his unenlightened followers, it was the entire nation that manifested the miracle. I think this chapter was written about certainty as a requisite energy or attitude in the pathways to the divine.

I think it was written that the Jews left Egypt with their "weapons", and the Zohar interprets "weapons" as miracles, but access to these miracles was contingent upon certainty that they were thus armed. They had to be confident and positive.

There was a very slight drizzle in my neighborhood after I got off the bus coming back from Danshui, but it didn't develop into a full-blown rain.

In the study of Kabbalah and the Zohar, we begin to see that any activity that connects us with another dimension of consciousness – be it drink, drugs, sex, meditation or prayer – draws Light to us. Rarely, if ever, is abstention recommended by the Zohar in regard to any of these vehicles. Rather we are guided to recognize temperance as the appropriate approach. To deserve a greater amount of Light, we must work on and strengthen our spiritual Vessel. If we allow ourselves to "imbibe" large amounts of Light without having done that work, we will not be able to contain what we receive. We will become "drunk", incapacitated, and allow chaos free rein. Noah's sin was not in the physical act of drinking, but in drinking's metaphorical connotations. His drunkenness represented connection to a more intense level of Light than his spiritual Vessel could tolerate. - p. 104, The Essential Zohar

It was interesting coming across this passage after the last post (I'm re-reading the book at the library, copying parts). I think I had been flirting unintentionally with alcohol poisoning, leading to how I got to be feeling, but perhaps also exceeding my "spiritual" tolerance.

The passage reminded me that even through this downward spiral of maybe drinking myself to death, that I need to keep in mind what is important and try to keep certain "channels" clear. That's another thing I like about Kabbalah – its explanation of channels to the divine; energy paths similar in Tibetan Buddhism.

The "amount of Light" we can handle is also a concept I learned about in college as "spiritual aptitude". Buddhism in general reflects this idea as "expedient means", whereby the Buddha – also Jesus according to the gnostic teachings – identified who was ready for what level of teachings, and taught selectively.

Don't even try to teach kabbalistic ideas of the first five books of the Old Testament to a white, conservative Republican in the U.S., among others, because their spiritual aptitude is so low that they can only be allowed the dimmest amount of Light through a literal interpretation of scripture. It's still Light, however, so just let them follow their path. At least they have some meager sense of spirituality in their karma. And all of us who believe in these ideas were once at that point.

At first, I thought the above passage was making an analogy between drinking and getting drunk with the amount of Light one has the spiritual aptitude for and taking too much, and that they were different things. I thought it meant my drinking should be seen as an analogy of what I'm doing spiritually.

But it's not an analogy, it's literal and interconnected. The passage prima facie states that drinking has a spiritual dimension and abstention is not the purpose of the teachings.

Even through my drinking, I have to maintain awareness of my spiritual energies and not fall into chaos, which my last post seems to hint at. "Wasting away in my apartment" is chaos. It's losing the meditation.

I recognize that nothing about Kabbalah justifies drinking myself to death. It's a risky path even for me, but it's one that I've tried to keep narrowly well-defined. The most important thing for me about moving towards death is to not let chaos take over.

I'm wondering what I'm holding onto as my life unravels and falls apart. I put down my thoughts and ideas while realizing none of this has any meaning. I look at my life from all kinds of different angles and I can't see any meaning. I know my time on this planet hasn't been useless, I do think I have impacted some people's lives, but that doesn't mean it has meaning.

It's just plain ridiculous that I'm still here, letting things get bleaker and bleaker. I never would've guessed I would go out so pathetically, wasting away in my apartment.

My health may be taking a nosedive. My body feels like it's becoming unable to cope with my drinking (it's about time). I'm noticing more changes, but insomnia has also hit hard recently and isn't showing signs of relenting, and insomnia fucks you up real good.

The weather isn't helping, either. Relentless drear contributing to the decline.

Lots of nausea recently. Lots of feeling like throwing up, but having nothing to throw up as I don't have any appetite left, so there's not much in my stomach to throw up.

Not helping that matter is that I am forcing myself to continue drinking. My body is starting to resist. I don't know if it's psychological or physiological, but my body is trying to tell me to stop. It's getting hard to get shots down, and gagging has become part of the process as I force the poison down.

Generally feeling bad all the time. I'm not complaining, it's what I want, it's what I've caused. I just wish I can get it over with.

This autumn has been a boon for K-pop girl groups with a plethora of comebacks by top acts. In Korean entertainment, "comeback" doesn't refer to a return from some fall from grace. It just means a new song from a group that has already debuted.

They're called "idol" groups, which I think has become a palatable term because of shows like "American Idol". In Korea it just refers to pop music celebrities, and it's a term adopted from the Japanese pop music scene, "idoru", which of course is taken from "idol".

When I first heard the Japanese use of the word several decades back, I didn't like it because the idea of an "idol" or something that is idolized was an afront to respectable musicianship. An idol was something superficial and glossy; an image that could be manufactured. "Real" musicians and songwriters garnered respect.

For the Japanese, any singer or music group popular enough to appear on TV shows was considered an "idoru", including what I consider legitimate rock bands that aren't corporately manufactured, and who write their own music and play their own instruments.

In Korea, that latter group, from what I gather as an outsider, doesn't get much international exposure or attention. Music is almost all corporate and manufactured with relatively few national artists who write and create their own product. And even though that's something that generally offends me everywhere else, I've somehow accepted it in Korea.

I tell myself it's because the songwriting is good. I still think I'm a discerning listener. Otherwise, I'm not sure where my change of heart occurred. It may be midlife crisis, watching these girls half my age strut their stuff, but I insist it's not prurient interest. If the music isn't good, I'm not going to watch or follow them no matter how "sexy" they are.

And I think I've mentioned before that I still can't stand Western, Japanese or Taiwanese pop music on the basis that the songwriting is still offensively bad. I'm still not discounting the possibility of the future life resonance idea, and the fact that I've out of the blue honed in specifically to Korean music and no other, adding that music is my big love in this life, might speak to that.

So be warned, major K-pop girl group geeking out follows, stop reading if it's not a place to which you're willing to go:

So far, this autumn has seen four top acts make their comeback stages. Kara was the first, followed by Brown Eyed Girls a few weeks later, and then finally Secret and Girls' Generation (SNSD) simultaneously began their new promotions head-to-head (note my consistency: members of all four groups were on Invincible Youth).

My personal tastes rate Brown Eyed Girls' "Sixth Sense" as the best quality of these comebacks. The lead track off their album was actually a song called "Hot Shot" which I initially liked better for its Latin groove, but their main promotion was for "Sixth Sense".

Brown Eyed Girls are a bit of an anomaly in the idol scene because three of the four members are considered advanced in age at 30. Only one member is 24 (Ga-in). But they are with a smaller agency and I gather they have a lot more creative and artistic control than younger idol groups on bigger labels. I also heard that Je-a and Miryo earn copyright royalties because Je-a writes and Miryo takes credit for her own raps.

And even though their stage performances have choreography, they are recognized for their vocal talents, and the media has covered their vocal skills during this comeback, highlighted towards the end of "Sixth Sense" after Miryo's rap section when first Je-a hits a big note, followed by Ga-in and Narsha hitting high falsetto notes (I would also note the subtle background vocals during those high notes which are pretty cool, but not necessarily noticeable unless paying attention to them).

When top acts first make their comeback stages, they're usually allowed to perform two songs, one a truncated version of a second song (in this case "Hot Shot") before going into their main promotion:



Secret's "Love is Move" hooked me immediately, so I would rate it as a very close second.

I thought the only thing that would prevent it from taking number one spots on TV programs is that it was directly going against SNSD's comeback, a Daniel and Goliath battle where Secret didn't have a chance. The thing is that SNSD's comeback was supposed to come a few weeks earlier, but then they changed their plans and ended up releasing simultaneously with Secret.

I applaud Secret for not changing their plans as other groups did to avoid competition with SNSD. Secret and their management seemed confident about their product and even if they wouldn't get number ones on the TV programs, they weren't going to change their plans. That I respect.

It's just a rocking, bopping romp that's a lot of fun.



Kara made a splash with the first autumn comeback, "Step", and I rate it third best among them. The synth blare kinda put me off at first, but the track grew on me:



Finally, SNSD came out with their much-hyped comeback, but it was quite a disappointment for me, if not for SNSD fans. The song is still dominating, but to my ears it isn't great. Certainly not as catchy as their two previously promoted songs, the Japanese language Mr. Taxi and last year's Hoot.

The song was hyped as being created by Teddy Riley who was behind Michael Jackson's "Dangerous", but to me that's a big so what? and indicative of what I don't like about corporate pop music in general.

This track has some good qualities and has grown on me through the promotions, but I wouldn't go out of my way to listen to or watch this track. I'm not a big fan of the fact that there is no bass, and therefore lacks oomph.

I can't fault SNSD's execution as they present their parts and choreography professionally and flawlessly. But in the end I think the success of this track lies in the fact that it's SNSD.



Autumn comebacks are still anticipated by Wonder Girls and T-ara (another Invincible Youth member group).

It is just a decision I just have to make now. Nothing's pushing me, nothing's pulling me.

I'm just here, just existing in a basic metabolizing human existence without any social function or meaning, waiting for myself to make a simple yes-no decision. Or rather a when decision, which will then determine the yes-no decision which I can't make until I'm at the brink again.

Then there's my fallback position of cowardly hoping that renal failure comes swiftly. "Cowardly"? Yea, I'll own up to that being cowardly, as it would be the result I've forced indirectly because of the failure of being proactive in this aspiration.

Letting go of this life in an affirmative act of deeply acknowledging the impermanence of any given human lifetime, with faith that it is an understanding and a step towards enlightenment and the belief that reincarnation is a natural cycle that has developed on this planet until enlightenment is attained to escape that cycle. Enlightenment possibly just a natural energy state of the universe.

That's a whole nother discussion, though, about why we live our lives, why we exist, why we suffer, why not, what's wrong with living life even if there's suffering, why should we try to escape, what's so great about enlightenment, etc., etc.

Me, I can barely get out of bed. When I get out of bed, I can barely get off the internet. When I get off the internet and don't go back to lying on my bed, I barely can get out of my apartment. I get out of my apartment to get something to eat and buy alcohol.

But I've more or less lost my appetite. When I do get something to eat, I feel bloated and nauseous afterwards. I'm thinking of trying an even unhealthier diet of just snacking out of convenient stores. Sandwiches, onigiri and salads.

My alcohol consumption has increased, and my general habit of buying a bottle of liquor every other day has slightly increased, whereby every few days I end up buying a bottle on a consecutive day. I'll determine I need to buy a new bottle while looking at a bottle that I just bought yesterday.

And I'm starting to feel the effects of alcohol more acutely. It's making me feel sicker. Sometimes it's hard to drink, sometimes the smell makes me nauseous. Sometimes I feel some sort of alcoholic lethargy in which I just crash and end up lying in bed drifting in and out of consciousness or sleep while the TV drones on in the background for hours until I recover and then get back on the internet and drink again. Woof, maybe a little too honest here.

I mentioned the constant cloudy and rainy weather here, but these past two days have been bright, sunny and warm, and even with constant self-entreaties to just get out into the sunlight, I've been unable to.

So all I have left is this one decision to make. The decision of when I'm going to go out to the brink and either do it or face up that I can't do it. And realize that if I don't do it, things get bleak. Nothing about living on looks in the least appealing. Going back to the U.S. would signal the start of some sort of nightmare. Yet, it's strangely possible.