Author: Heidi

Hi, I'm Heidi. I believe Amor Omnia Vincit which means love conquers all things. I believe politeness garners respect from other people. Be nice. People make mistakes. We’re all in this together. Sometimes life kills you before you die- don't let it. Live the music that is in your soul. © 2025 Heidi Wiechert/The Light Congress

The Ballad of a Small Player: a Metaphysical Movie Review

The Ballad of a Small Player: a Metaphysical Movie Review

I recently had the opportunity to watch Colin Farrell’s latest film, The Ballad of a Small Player, and I liked it far more than any of the other reviewers that I could find online when the movie was done. I shall attempt to explain why here.

Also, fair warning, this discussion will have major spoilers for the film. Please do not proceed if you haven’t seen it yet.

Again, major spoilers ahead. Due diligence done.

First, for just a little bit of context if you haven’t seen it, the film is set in Macau, an exotic locale that I have never visited but the crowded and brightly lit casinos were quite familiar as I have been to Las Vegas. In some ways, the bright lights and lavish interiors of the rooms are beautiful and they are meant to be so in order to lure high rollers through their doors in order to take their money at the casinos.

Beauty and lavishness aside, I really don’t understand the draw of a place where day blends into night and back again while you gamble away the very thing that keeps a roof over your head and food in your mouth. But, I’m fortunate in that gambling isn’t one of my preferred vices.

We meet the protagonist of the film, Lord Doyle played by Farrell, as he’s waking up in one of these casinos. The room is a mess which suggests he’s been gambling for quite some time. It also leads the viewer to think, despite the evidence of high living, that Lord Doyle has not been successful. If he was, wouldn’t have he allowed the cleaning folks in to help him out?

The next few scenes continue this storyline with the bell boy at the front of the hotel encouraging Lord Doyle to visit another casino because they “may” be willing to extend the unfortunate gambler a line of credit which the current casino is declining to do. Lord Doyle is also given a short deadline to pay off a very major bill and threatened with legal action if he does not comply. It all adds to a growing feeling of pressure and dread which lasted throughout the film.

Thus, the stage is set for the rise and/or fall of our intrepid hero. I was completely drawn in by Lord Doyle’s desperate attempts to win money back and delay those who are looking to collect on old debts. From the cut of his brightly colored jacket to the yellow gloves on his shaking hands, Lord Doyle presented the picture of a well-to-do European on a holiday, whiling away his idle hours in luxury and excess.

The reality is actually quite different from this and the exploration of the differences of the image he’s presenting versus his reality are fascinating. I think all in existence present images of what we want the world to believe while hiding our true selves behind various masks. Why does Lord Doyle do this? Read on…

Enter Dao Ming, played by Fala Chen, a woman who offers lines of credit to struggling gamblers who don’t want the game to stop. Lord Doyle and Dao Ming have an awkward encounter where she offers him money if he pays off his bar tab, but he can’t, so the deal doesn’t go through. That’s when the film takes a major turn into another version of reality.

While walking through the streets of Macau, Lord Doyle describes himself as a “gweilo” or “ghost man” which, a little research on the internet has revealed, is a historical term used by locals to describe foreigners. The term has been called a racial slur and other times not, depending upon the context. In this film, Lord Doyle embraces the phrase and says he walks among the others of Macau like a shadow.

As soon as he said that, I realized the film wasn’t actually about gambling at all but about the deeper spiritual realities that we all exist in and move through whether we acknowledge them or not, like fish in water. Some claim that heaven or hell only enters our existence after death but I say we make our heaven and hell in the here and now. Lord Doyle lives in a hell that he created through his inability to walk away from the gambling tables and unshakeable belief that his luck is always about to change. He does indeed move through the world like a shadow, always on the move to find the money to make a new bet.

It is in this larger spiritual metaphor that The Ballad of a Small Player truly finds its footing. I could go on more about the role of Dao Ming in helping Lord Doyle rise from the depths of his created hell (or does he?) or the interesting role of Cynthia Blythe, played by Tilda Swinton, but I would prefer to stay in the realm of the metaphysical. Further discussion of the plot itself may be made at any of the other reviews floating out there in the ether.

The “naraka” or hells of the Buddhist world that get a brief mention in the film was fascinating to research. So, like Dante’s vision of hell, the narakas are layered with each successive layer being worse for the unfortunate residents of each. There are hot and cold narakas where the beings within experience various tortures based on the way they moved through life and the suffering they created through their existence. I think, with the multiple scenes of Lord Doyle being covered in sweat, that he lives in a hot naraka, suffering under the weight of his accumulated karma caused by his gambling addiction and those he harmed in his pursuit of it.

But which naraka it is is definitely up for discussion. In which realm do you think Lord Doyle finds himself? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naraka_(Buddhism)

I’m loathe to pick any of them except to say that Lord Doyle is wandering the earth as a “hungry ghost” or spirit who has an emptiness inside of him that he is always seeking to fill whether that be through winning at the gambling tables, plates of sumptuous food, dancing with the beautiful residents of the hell around him, or just existing in his own head.

It is eventually through this realization, that he has a wound that will never heal, that Lord Doyle finds his way out of the shadows of existence and back into the light of self knowledge and non-attachment.

Alive or dead, I believe all create their own reality. Lord Doyle tells himself throughout the movie that all he needs is for his luck to change and then he’ll be in control of his life again. But then, when his luck finally swings up, he finds himself feeling even more alone than he did before. In many ways, the movie suggests, he was alone the whole time.

Do the residents of hell know they are in hell? How about heaven?

Some have described the character of Lord Doyle as unrelatable or even repulsive for his repeated failures, his exposure as a fraud or for his physical body’s reactions to what is going on around him including uncontrollable sweat, endless hunger and thirst, and the never ending need to find money to gamble away. I think it is those failures that make the character absolutely relatable. Who among us has not fallen in some way throughout our lives and disappointed those around us? Who has a spirit made of stone who can take the stresses and disappointments of life without a hiccup or panic attack or sleepless night?

No one, that’s who.

And, at the end of the film, the one thing that pulls Lord Doyle out of hell is the redemptive act of returning the money he stole from Dao Ming. She gives him access to the treasure he needs to return to the gambling tables. She, it is suggested, stands behind him as a ghost and gives him the luck he needs to make those few big wins and leave the casinos behind forever. Even in hell, the film seems to say, there are those who will help you get out of your hopeless circumstances.

When he is informed that Dao Ming died days before his big win and he can therefore not return the money to her, Lord Doyle burns the money ritualistically at the temple to give her the cash back even beyond death, even though he is quite likely dead himself. Will this penitent action be enough to change his behavior for all time? The film is ambiguous about this possibility, but I’m ever hopeful for the best outcome for all. In my vision of what comes next, Lord Doyle leaves the casinos and the hell he has discovered/created, never to return because of the gift of a pathway out by another suffering member of the naraka.

I did a little research into hungry ghosts while I was gathering my thoughts about the film and stumbled onto the concept of “hell money“. The idea is that spirit money or false bills are burned to provide those in the afterlife with money to help them through whatever realm it is in which they may find themselves.

Curious custom. I wonder if the practice could possibly work the other way, with spirits burning whatever counts as cash over there for their living relatives on this side of the veil.

Hell money ruminations aside, The Ballad of a Small Player is an excellent examination of the suffering that can be created in one’s own life through attachment to material things which leads to a cycle of suffering perpetrated not only on the self but also on those around oneself. It is a finger pointing at the moon on the sad state of reality and the lost souls who inhabit it.

Highly recommended by movie-watchers who like to contemplate these types of themes. If you watch the film yourself, please do let me know your thoughts about it.

Thanks for reading. -Heidi

Otherwhere: A Field Guide to Nonphysical Reality for the Out-Of-Body Traveler by Kurt Leland

Otherwhere: A Field Guide to Nonphysical Reality for the Out-Of-Body Traveler by Kurt Leland

Kurt Leland’s Otherwhere is the first out-of-body memoir/guide (that I’ve read, so far) that discusses the importance of the individual’s consciousness in how the inner worlds are perceived.

It’s not a new idea, being repackaged and sold throughout time, lately in the New Age/New Thought movement, that one’s beliefs shape one’s reality. But, as Kurt Leland points out in other dimensions where thoughts literally are that reality, this individual viewpoint takes creation to a whole different level.

He suggests that what Robert Munroe, Jurgen Ziewe, and so many other consciousness explorers experience when they are in their various out-of-body states is archetypical energy, though he doesn’t use that terminology. Leland calls the perception of this energy: one’s own personal translation tables.

Rather than taking the figures that one encounters at face value or judging them based on ingrained religious beliefs, Leland encourages the Otherwhere visitors to examine what the figure does. It’s very similar to what dream interpreters teach about how to understand your dreams.

Like me, Leland believes that anyone can have out-of-body experiences. He has this to say about why more people don’t: “It’s my firm belief that what prevents people from having out-of-body experiences and exploring nonphysical reality on their own is fear of the unknown. In my experience, the best way to overcome fear of the unknown is to familiarize oneself with the personal accounts of people who have overcome that fear themselves. I believe that personal accounts of out-of-body experiences are far superior to how-to manuals in stimulating people to venture into the unknown.” Preface, xii

He goes on to say: “In my opinion, our fear of the unknown is really just anxiety about becoming unlovable as a result of having had unfamiliar experiences and being changed by them. If we attempt to explore nonphysical reality and succeed, we’re afraid that we’ll be rejected, disbelieved, or thought to be crazy.” pg 27. Time to get over that. Don’t you think? 🙂

Lelend uses lucid dreaming as his method of exploring other worlds (Otherwhere). I’ve explored a few books about lucid dreaming one of which you can read here. If you are interested in my explorations into nonphysical reality, you can read those here.

I found this episode of a woman that he encountered there to be very illuminating. In this passage, he is talking to his Otherwhere instructors about her: (the Instructor saying) “As you can see, my colleague and I intended every image in the dream to contribute in some way to the lesson we wanted you to learn.” (Leland asks) “What about the woman reading the book?” “As you recall, she was facing the door into Otherwhere. There are many people in the world who have an interest in exploring psychic phenomena. They love to read about other people’s adventures in altered states of consciousness. But if a door that would allow them to undertake such explorations on their own were to open, they would make up excuses not to go through. The most common one is that they don’t have time.” pg 99

Let’s not be that woman.

The importance of physical life- in this excerpt, Leland is listening to an instructor in Otherwhere: “While it’s true that I no longer feel regret about anything I’ve experienced during previous lifetimes on Earth, I wouldn’t say that I’m grateful to be among the dead. That would imply that life over here, in Otherwhere, has a greater value than life on Earth. From our perspective, that isn’t true. There are things that can be learned only here and not there. But there are also things that can be learned only on Earth. Learning is all that matters, and no lesson is more or less valuable than any other. pg 152

Keep on learning, check.

In this passage, Leland examines the availability of teachings on other dimensions: “There are many maps of nonphysical reality… scattered throughout the history of your art and literature. These can provide useful translation tables for orientation within nonphysical reality. Why should every individual who explores nonphysical reality start from scratch?” pg 158

Why indeed… with the modern age and the easy availability of formerly difficult-to-discover information through the internet and public libraries, one can stand on the shoulders of giants to begin your own personal studies.

Everyone is an artist: “Every human being is immensely creative. But unless that creativity is channeled into some art or craft, it will be used instead to generate illusion. It could be said, therefore, that every human being is an artist, at least in potential. Developing this creativity is an essential part of every person’s life purpose, even if it isn’t the main focus of one’s career.” pg 238.

I believe that too. I’ve read a bunch of books about creativity, one of which you can explore here.

“How you choose to represent to yourself the ways of gaining access to any zone of Otherwhere is up to you. The validity of such images lies in their usefulness, not in some kind of absolute truth. The only important thing is that you give yourself some way of identifying the zone into which you’ve traveled, so that you can return on future occasions. Whether this manner of identification is the name of a subway line or station, or the number on a gate in an alley, is your choice. The identifying function of such names or numbers is all that matters.” pg 262

Or, like in my own personal explorations, tarot cards.

Leland finishes his account with a modern version of Dante’s Paradiso in which, he traveled to Otherwhere and discovered different areas within that place where the dead came to terms with the life they had just completed. Absolutely fascinating stuff.

Then he talks about ways to remove your consciousness from the ordinary to experience what he and others (and me!) have experienced- whether that be through meditation, lucid dreaming, shamanic drumming, etc, and, the librarian in me loved this part, gives book lists for learning each type of technique. He saves consciousness explorers a lot of time, which is a kind thing to do.

I highly recommend Otherwhere for folks beginning their consciousness exploration or the experienced traveler. It is a how-to guide, a journal, and an encouraging, exploratory ramble through Otherwhere, a place where anyone can go, if they only set their mind and heart on doing so.

Thanks for reading!

Psychic Dreamwalking: Explorations at the Edge of Self by Michelle Belanger

Psychic Dreamwalking: Explorations at the Edge of Self by Michelle Belanger

Psychic Dreamwalking has some instruction on lucid dreaming, but it is interspersed with a lot of personal background information and some psychic vampire stuff. That didn’t bother me, even though it isn’t my particular realm of study. I’ve found that the mind is a very powerful tool for interpreting reality and people seem to believe all sorts of things that I find to not be compatible with my life experience. But, if that kind of thing annoys you, just stop reading Psychic Dreamwalking before Chapter 9 and you’ll avoid most of it.

I rather liked author Michelle Belanger’s opening dedication, “Prayer of the Dreaming”: “I commit myself to you, Lord Morpheus! Open wide the Gates of Dream. Grant me safe passage in your realm So I may return with tales to tell. -from the Introduction. She mentions that this prayer is based on The Dream King from Neil Gaiman’s Sandman series. I haven’t read that comic yet, but it has a great reputation. I’ll have to get to it sometime.

What is dreamwalking anyway?: “Dreamwalking is the art of sending forth a part of the self in order to make contact with others through the medium of dreams. Anyone can learn how to dreamwalk, and, as we explore the concept throughout this book, you will find that most people already do. … The lack of available information on dreamwalking exists in part because there is no consistent nomenclature for the technique. There are accounts of dreamwalking mixed in with experiments in astral projection, dream telepathy, and lucid dreaming, but they are rarely identified as such.” pg 1

It is so difficult in consciousness experimentation to come up with a vocabulary to discuss not only your experiences but to be able to communicate something very personal and individual with someone else who may have had completely different experiences and who are approaching the same topic from a different background. The name of the game in this book is “dreamwalking” which I find to be a rather poetic way to describe a universal phenomenon.

“But this the fundamental premise of dreamwalking: on some level, the dreamspace is real. It is not real in the sense that the physical world it (sic) real, but it is certainly as real as the astral planes described by writers like Madame Blavatsky and Dion Fortune. Like the astral planes, the dreamspace is a subjective reality. As much as it is a place we can go to, it is also a place that we shape with out (sic) hopes, desires, and fears.” pg 25

I think this is a part of the human experience that deserves a far broader investigation than experts and laypersons have given it so far. But there’s always time to get started! Who’s with me?

Belanger talks about Carl Jung a lot in this book. I wonder what he would think about dreamwalking…: “Jung’s concept of the collective unconscious, a layer of myth and symbol deep within each of our minds that connects all of us in mysterious ways, hearkens back to the ancient notions that the dreamspace is a realm unto itself, a hazy place of twilight where men can sometimes meet with gods.” pg 36

It reminds me a great deal of the Dreamtime of the First Nations of Australia. This is not a new concept but one which, as I said before, deserves more experimental research than it has yet received.

The main technique that Belanger uses to access this world within dreams is one that I am very familiar with, namely building a gate: “The Gates of Dream are an archetypal image that I return to again and again in this book. Archetypes and symbols have some objective reality within the realm of dreams, and the Gates of Dream represent the point of passage from your personal dreams to the wider territory of the dreamspace. You can harness this archetypal image in your dream haven, creating a crossing-over point that can later serve as a focus for when you seek to dreamwalk.” pg 51

If you’d like to learn about my experiences with walking through gates, I invite you to explore my blog: https://thelightcongress.com/

Belanger touches a bit on shamanic practices, but not in depth: The shamanic dreamtime, as a realm of myths and images that is peopled by animal totems and celestial teachers, can very easily be equated to Jung’s collective unconscious, the psychological repository of humanity’s collective myths, dreams, and symbols. Many of the totems and other mythic figures encountered in the shamanic realms are Jungian archetypes transported from their existence as simple concepts to vivid, potent entities. … There is a kind of travel that occurs in dreamwalking, but it is, at first, an inward journey. This inward journey, however, can lead the dreamwalker elsewhere. Traveling within can sometimes lead you out. pg 67

I’ve explored a few books about shamanism. You can read those reviews here:

The Goddess and the Shaman: The Art & Science of Magical Healing by J.A. Kent
Spirit Hacking: Shamanic Keys to Reclaim Your Personal Power, Transform Yourself, and Light Up the World by Shaman Durek
The Way of the Shaman by Michael Harner

In this passage, Belanger discusses the importance of lucid dreaming in various religious traditions: “From the monks of Buddhist Tibet to the 12th century Spanish Sufi Ibn El-Arabi, mystics the world over have proclaimed the benefits of lucid dreaming. For religious thinkers, lucid dreaming has long been seen as a way to illuminate both the nature of the Self and the nature of reality. Tibetan Buddhists were pursuing lucid dreams as early as the eighth century C.E. According to their philosophy, the mastery of lucid dreams was a necessary step in the pursuit of enlightenment. The ability to recognize the illusory nature of the dreamstate directly correlated to the ability to recognize the illusory nature of all things. pg 139 Fascinating in how the study of dreams can be applied to other areas of your life!

Belanger captured my feelings about psychic vampires very well in this passage: “Ultimately, you and you alone can judge the validity of your experiences. You should never surrender this right, but you should also not use it as an excuse to indulge in wish fulfillment. Make a thorough investigation of every experience and decide for yourself. pg 181. Cura te ipsum.

Though I feel that Psychic Dreamwalking contained a lot of superfluous information, there are some solid dreamwalking techniques in here. I think that the main hurdle to this practice is simply becoming lucid while dreaming in the first place. So, for now, I’ll stick with going into trance. But, for those who already have the ability to lucid dream, this may be something that you’ll want to investigate. Pick up Otherwhere by Kurt Leland for a first person account of dreamwalking or Multidimensional Man by Jurgen Ziewe.

Thanks for reading!

Archetypes on the Tree of Life: The Tarot as Pathwork by Madonna Compton

Archetypes on the Tree of Life: The Tarot as Pathwork by Madonna Compton

Archetypes on the Tree of Life is a dense spiritual text exploring the Tree of Life through the use of Tarot cards.

It’s kind of funny- I think my favorite part of this book wasn’t actually the book at all but instead the brief introduction which was written by Hans Nintzel. Nintzel was a student of the western mysteries who describes himself as “living down the street from Israel Regardie.” As I used the writings of Israel Regardie to do my own explorations into the Tree of Life, I found my mind blown right there. How cool would that have been, to have lived on the occult teacher’s own street? Too cool.

Here’s what Nintzel had to say that was so compelling:
As Qabalah evolved, it was discovered that, using this glyph or map called the Tree of Life, one could move around the geography of the consciousness, so to speak, contacting or balancing various personal energies by contemplating various aspects of the God energy using myths, legends, visions, and dreams, represented by the archetypes of the Tarot.”pg 4

I have yet to see a more concise description of what pathworking is than that. Now why Nintzel didn’t write his own book, I simply don’t know. Being the librarian that I am, I did a bit of digging into his background and it seems that he was a prolific lecturer and a translator of alchemical texts, but didn’t write his own. Disappointing. Here’s a link that I found of works that he helped to bring to the US which were listed in his obituary: https://www.alchemywebsite.com/rams.html

As for Compton’s 300 or so page contribution, I found myself to be disappointed. Archetypes on the Tree of Life is in the main, rather obscure Qabalistic/Kaballistic theory. It reads almost exactly like Regardie’s Garden of Pomegranates or Fortune’s The Mystical Qabalah. That’s not to say that it doesn’t have some gems of interest, but mostly it’s slow going and not as accessible as the publisher (Llewellyn) promised it to be in the page where it described the goals of its Spiritual Perspectives Series.

Compton’s most interesting point has nothing to do with traditional pathworking but is instead a hypothesis that she and her meditation partner have constructed about potential alternate paths across Daath. They’ve chosen a five pointed star to create the paths, but I would perhaps lean more towards a six pointed star, which still sort of works. The six pointed star is a combination of an upwards and downwards facing triangle, an ancient alchemical symbol for self actualization. Though, admittedly, the five pointed star has definite Tiphareth associations… and so the debate continues I suppose. 🙂 Anyway, if you’re interested in Compton’s theory, turn to page 304 to save yourself some time digging through the other stuff.

If you enjoyed this book, may I recommend reading either of the two books I mentioned earlier: The Garden of Pomegranates by Israel Regardie or The Mystical Qabalah by Dion Fortune. If you want more examples of modern pathworking, see my book: https://thelightcongress.com

Thanks for reading!

The Goddess and the Shaman: The Art & Science of Magical Healing by J.A. Kent

The Goddess and the Shaman: The Art & Science of Magical Healing by J.A. Kent

“I discovered the presence of a mystical and magical tradition that was largely concealed within our culture that had its roots in ancient pre-Christian Paganism, alchemy, Hermetic philosophy, the holy Qabalah, and elements of Greek, Egyptian, and Gnostic mysticism. It is generally referred to as the Western magical tradition. I tend to see it as the lost shaman tradition of the West.” -From the Preface

J.A. Kent, PhD, examines various occult and healing practices from a variety of traditions by interviewing practitioners as well as providing case studies of her own patients in order to present, what I can only call, her doctoral thesis of her personal magical paradigm. Her paradigm is the title of her book, The Goddess and the Shaman.

“There are strong social and medical pressures in Western-style thinking that regard those who have psychic experiences to be either fraudulent or psychotic.” pg 16

Let me briefly explain this paradigm, though I highly recommend reading the book to get it in Kent’s own words.

“The Goddess” is another name for what Kent calls the “Elphame,” essentially the other non-physical worlds that exist either alongside or on top of (depending upon who you speak to) our normal every day world. “The shaman” are the lightworkers and healers who explore these realms for various reasons including healing others of sicknesses both of the body and spirit.

I think it took a great deal of bravery to write a book like this, especially with the prevailing worldviews at work today. Well done, J.A. Kent!

The world is an enchanted, mysterious, and magical place that will reveal its many secret powers and energies to those who have the persistence and determination to unlock them.” pg 64

The trouble with spiritual healing or any type of work in the Elphame, Goddess, or whatever you want to call it, is that the practitioner exits the consensual reality of the every day world and enters non-consensual reality- the abode of the dreamers, lovers, poets, musicians, mad, etc. I have come to believe that the Western world, Western medicine especially, is not kind to those who venture outside the bounds of the normal.

Kent discusses this in depth in multiple places of this book. Suffers who could find no mundane explanation for their troubles turn to her in order to find some relief. And, encouragingly, many found healing.

“Ultimately they rejected the reductionist psychiatric explanation and embarked on their own magical journey of healing.” pg 159

Recommended for therapists and spiritual healers who are looking for more ideas about how to assist those who come to them seeking help. I enjoyed this book very much.

Thanks for reading!

The Legend of the Tailless Prince by Shadi Halliwell

The Legend of the Tailless Prince by Shadi Halliwell

In The Legend of the Tailless Prince, a young elephant goes on a solitary adventure and loses his tail. After this calamity, he learns what really matters is what you do, not how you look.

I thought the artwork of this book was quite beautiful with brightly colored drawings illustrating the tailless prince and his exploits.

The actual story part was not so strong- I wanted to know more about this young elephant. How else does he help his herd, other than being strong and brave? What actions did his feelings lead to besides fighting the other bulls for dominance?

Also, I wanted to know more about the tailless prince’s mother. In nature, it is the female elephants of the herd that lead as they have a matriarchal society. A lot more could have been done with that character.

Recommended for children who like stories about animals as well as positive tales about how to be a shining light in the world.

I read this book on the recommendation by Chelsea Handler from her latest non-fiction tome entitled, I’ll Have What She’s Having. You can read my full review of her book here: https://thehelpdeskbookblog.com/2025/09/22/ill-have-what-shes-having-by-chelsea-handler/

Thanks for reading!

I’ll Have What She’s Having by Chelsea Handler

I’ll Have What She’s Having by Chelsea Handler

In I’ll Have What She’s Having, Chelsea Handler shares amusing (often hilarious) stories and anecdotes about her family, relationships, pets and other memories from her life. The focus of the essays is all about uplifting and encouraging others through sharing the gifts and love that Chelsea has experienced throughout her life.

“This woman I’ll become, she will never be silent.” pg 4

Through the use of meditation, exercise, professional therapy, and various psychedelics, Ms. Handler has reached a relatively stable and positive stage of her life. As someone who has enjoyed her books and stand-up comedy for years, it is such a pleasure to read that she is both happy and thriving.

“None of the things other people have called me has ever really mattered. What other people say about you only matters if you believe what they are saying is true.” pg 18

She not only stands up for herself in these pages- defending her choices and lifestyle from both naysayers and judgey people of all types, but she also stands up for others. Ms. Handler has a talent for seeing how someone else is hurting and bringing them the comfort that they need most at that time.

It is a rare gift.

“Sitting around and thinking of all the people who don’t love you or don’t want to hang out with you diminishes your own light. … There are many moments in life when your own light is all you need.” pg 104

As someone who is childless by choice, Ms. Handler does not use this as an excuse to be standoffish when the young people in her life need assistance. In this book, she discusses at length how she is a matriarch/patriarch to both her family and her friends’ children. She sets an example for how to be and interact in the world- as a strong woman and parental figure.

I believe it is this type of behavior that builds strong communities, which uplifts everyone. Well done, Chelsea!

Highly recommended for readers who enjoy Ms. Handler’s comedy but also anyone who is looking for a pick-me-up in book form. I took great courage from I’ll Have What She’s Having and I hope others do too.

Thanks for reading!

Your Highness by Sean Phillips

Your Highness by Sean Phillips

Your Highness, a two comic collection, is the prequel to a film called, you guessed it, “Your Highness”.

In these pages, Fabious, the elder prince, goes on a quest to slay a monster who was unleashed by an evil sorcerer. The younger brother, Thadeous, is sent by his father, the king, to secure a treaty with a nearby dwarven kingdom.

Both princes encounter adventures that they were not prepared for.

I wish, in preparation for reading this slim tome, that I had had the chance to rewatch the movie. But I didn’t. So, until then, I’ll just have to rely on my memory of the film from twelve plus years ago.

In the comic, as in the movie, both princes are caricatures of the angel/devil archetype of consciousness.

Fabious, the elder brother, stands in for our “angelic nature”. He is driven to bring justice and safety to those around him while carefully protecting his honor throughout the quest. The flipside to this personality is he suppresses his baser urges, leading to some amusing innuendo with his fellow knights.

(Sexual innuendo and clever word play isn’t something I necessarily find funny, but for those who do, Fabious provides this in spades.)

The other brother, Thadeous, represents humanity’s shadow mode of consciousness. He delights in excess whether that is food, marijuana, or sex. And though he is tasked by his father with as important a mission as his brother, readers know immediately that he will probably fail- not because he’s is incapable of doing what is required, but because he will most likely chose to indulge in his baser instincts to the detriment of his goal.

Overall, I liked the artwork in Your Highness. I thought the panels flowed nicely and the dialogue was well done too.

As for the story itself, I felt it was a tad predictable, but still enjoyable.

I wish, in the Thadeous storyline, the dwarves’ weed had had some magical properties that elevated it beyond bringing an excellent high. Maybe using it could cause one to see where minerals were hidden beneath the earth?

Anyway, recommended for fans of the movie and readers who enjoy fantasy comics in general.

The Key: A True Encounter by Whitley Strieber

The Key: A True Encounter by Whitley Strieber

Originally Reviewed on April 12, 2015

I enjoyed this book not necessarily for its message but because it’s a stunning example of a clear communication from a mysterious source of non-human/non-physical intelligence. It’s not a huge surprise to me that Strieber was able to make such a connection as he details his daily transcendental meditation practice and has previous experiences with the worlds and beings beyond the everyday waking world. (For an example, see his story in this book about meeting the small, withered old man or one of his numerous other non-fiction works.)

If you pick up this book, you’re either going to believe what Strieber has to say or dismiss the information- there’s not a lot of wiggle room. Let’s continue this review with the assumption that you, like me, believe Strieber saw and heard something or someone, received a message, and wrote it down. If you don’t believe that basic assumption, then this review is going to be a waste of your time. I’d suggest moving on to the next one. Peace.

Now, I believe that there are all manner of spirits that inhabit the unseen world. Like the “Master of the Key” described in Strieber’s midnight conversation, I believe there are forces that allow things to thrive and forces that deny this. I think the way to decide which force is what is to examine how the communication makes us feel and the actions that we feel compelled to take after the encounter.

What was the ultimate impact of the “Master’s” words for you, the reader? I felt fear- deep, bone-chilling fear.

First of all, I felt fear for the being’s assertion that the Earth is going to be destroyed in a climate related disaster that no one can stop now because we ruined the atmosphere. That not only affects me, but my children’s children’s children. There are always steps we can take to make the world, and the future, a better and brighter place. I will not give up this agency to anyone, despite what hidden knowledge they may profess to have.

Second, I felt fear for his idea that none of the major world religions (Christianity, Buddhism, Islam) reveal the full truth of conscious evolution, which, in one fell swoop, denied the inner truths for a majority of the people on this planet today. And, the quietly implied addendum to this revelation, that none of the major religions know the truth, BUT I DO- this mysterious guy who shows up in the middle of the night, dumps all of this in Strieber’s lap, then makes him drink a concoction to have him forget everything that he didn’t write down. This doesn’t feel like a benevolent act to me. It feels like a play to make Strieber feel afraid, directionless, and unwilling to seek out help from anyone from a major religion, which is a lot of people and shuts a lot of potential open doors.

Third, I felt fear for this mysterious being’s assertion that the world will be lost because of a child who was never born because of the Holocaust. What sort of creature/being/visitor would know the full extent of the evil caused by one of the worst atrocities in human history, save that knowledge until fifty years after the fact, and tell it to someone who, by his own admission, doesn’t have the power to do anything about it? Fiendishly clever, no?

And, again, this third bit of information seeks to remove Strieber’s, and any reader’s, feelings of hope for the future. I reject the idea that nothing can be done about future events. Everyone exists in the Now moment, which is quite a powerful place to be. It is here that we can change the world, not by ruminating on past horrors and the terrible fallout from them. I will not abandon hope. A dream of mine is that others will not give up also.

I find it interesting that the “Master of the Key” in the book planted enough prophetic tidbits in his fear-filled message to impress Strieber with a feeling of truth from the communication like with the gas-holding memory idea for machines. But, for me, the nature of the messenger himself is clear, given the underlying effect that almost everything the visitor had to say was to sow fear, create a feeling of impotence or divisiveness, and to manufacture a driving need to consciously evolve now, now, NOW in this brand new way or everybody’s going to die and be chained to a dying planet forever until the end of time.

Let’s go back to our existential questions again for a moment: what sort of being wants people to feel afraid, separate from the source of your being, feeling like you have forgotten important knowledge that is required to save your soul that only the mysterious being knows? What sort of being would counsel a soul to not go into the light because that isn’t God, it’s oblivion?

When Strieber asks this being his name, the reply was something like “You could call me, Michael. Or, you could call me, Legion. I would be honored to be called human.” This was a red flag for me. “Who’s in there with you, Legion?” would have been my next question to the being.

I think what Strieber experienced was real. I think that it was a cleverly packaged hodgepodge of truths, possible futures, and small twists of religious dogma designed to make Strieber doubt everything, even his own inner guidance. Strieber himself said that, after everything that had happened, what he most wanted was to talk to this being again. If I was in his shoes, I’d feel the exact same way. There are quite a few things that could use clarification. The first of which, in my mind, is why does this being instill such a feeling of fear in those he communicates with? Is that really necessary to get his message across or is it some kind of unfortunate side effect of the type of energy the being is emitting?

Despite my thoughts on the true nature of the “Master of the Key,” if you liked The Key and were able to distill some truths that rang true for you from all of the fear-mongering, you might like troubling predictions of Heaven is Real But So is Hell by Vassula Ryden. I got the same kind of vibe from her book. I feel like there may be truths there to be found but the large part of the message felt devoted to making the recipients of that message just quake in fear. Proceed cautiously.

Thanks for reading!