Customer Reviews

Toward 2012: Perspectives on the Next Age

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I saw this book in the "new non-fiction" section at Borders. With all the hoopla lately surrounding 2012, I figured I'd pick this up. Now, I knew about Dec. 21 2012 and the end of the Mayan calendar before this, but had only seen video and snippets online (i.e. David Wilcock's Enigma 2012 which is pretty fascinating)

First, let me say this book will NOT be sufficient for information specifically on 2012 and what may or may not happen (depending on who/what you read/see). It isn't designed to be. The second part of the title says it all: Perspectives on the next age.

I've found there are pretty much two categories of 2012 believers: That the world is going to end (in some type of apocalypse) or that there will be a massive cosmic awakening of consciousness. If you fall in the latter, this book is for you.

In other words, it discusses many ideas for those WANTING to change consciously/spiritually. 2012 in my opinion can be used like any religion, as a placebo. A placebo to change who you want to be hopefully for the better. So, for example, if you've never heard of Abbie Hoffman (like me) you'll be introduced to him and what he and others did in the 60's and 70's as kind of a mini-revolution of the mind through action. As well, it talks about all of the "typical" subjects that would be associated with 2012 like meditation, yogi's, dreams, shamanism, psychadelics, etc.

I have a philosophy to "be open". This book is perfect for that type of philosophy. Just the right mix of "say what?" with "now that makes sense!"

Toward 2012

OK. This book is for the very open minded. It will not appeal to everyone. Some of it did not appeal to me, initially. The reason? It's not because it's a New Age book (it is); it's not because it's about end-times (it is and it isn't). It's because it's just simply, in total, going to be way to far-out for most. Its advantage? Mayan end-times are little understood (it doesn't go into that though); it has several very interesting (and down-to-earth) essays of historical significance (Section III of the book titled "Art" has several, including one on Stanley Kubrick. Section V's section "Sex" and has an has an interesting essay on Abbie Hoffman of the NYSE infamy entitled "Engagement").

There is a great intro by one of the editors, Daniel Pinchbeck. Let me quote his opening paragraph, "A long time ago, Karl Marx realized that modernity was based on successive revolutions in which `all that is solid melts into air,' as the force of capitalism reshapes society and tears apart ecosystems. In our time, this process of melting down and vaporizing has reached a new level of speed and violence. When we face the future, there seems to be nothing we can grasp with certainty. Not only our economic system and the future of our civilization, but the integrity of our environment and the continuity of the human species--along with most other species who share this planet with us--are immediately endangered. At such a threshold, everything is up for grabs, and all beliefs are open for questioning."

In this intro he also let's us know why he wrote the original 2012 work "The Return of Quetzalcoatl" which was "to argue that personal and global change are inseparable" (a point I agree with) and to propose "that our Western knowledge system was severely limited because it denied the value of intuition, visionary and psychedelic experience." He also, in that work, "sought to assemble an alternative paradigm, encompassing older ways of knowing and mystical thought, without denying the validity of the modern scientific method." He goes on to state "that we might take indigenous people seriously in their prophetic views of this current era, since they preserved access to those dimensions of the psyche that our society has systematically suppressed." Although I'm not convinced we need to "take indigenous people seriously", we do need to understand and accept that these "dimensions of the psyche" are available to everyone (everyone has them) with or without the use of psychoactive drugs (these simply speed up or accelerate the process of bringing the experiences latent within each of us to the conscious forefront of our lives).

The reason I'm quoting extensively from this book's introduction (which includes details above on his previous work) is to help explain the origins of the collection of essays that make up "Toward 2012". The book is broken up into six chapters and subsequent essays which I list below to peak (or not) the reviewers interest:

I Initiation
Meeting the Spirits, Daniel Pinchbeck
Homo Luminus: You with Wings, Stella Osorojos
A New Understanding of the Psyche, Stanislav Grof
Exorcising Christ from Christianity, Adam Elenbaas
The Wounded Healer, Paul Levy

II The Shamanic
Jaguar Medicine, Alberto Villoldo
Mayan Shamanism and 2012: A Psychedelic Cosmology, John Major Jenkins
Ayahuasca and Kabbalah, Jay Michaelson
Psyching Out the Cosmos, Daniel Pinchbeck
Shamans and Charlatans: Assessing Castaneda's Legacy, ST Frequency
Blood and Breath, Barbara Alic Mann
Insects, Yoga, and Ayahuasca, Padmani
Gnosis: The Not-So-Secret Hisotry of Jesus, Jonathan Phillips

III Art
Burning Men, Erik Davis
The Kubrick Gaze, J. F. Martel
Harry Smith: American Media Artist, Paul D. Miller aka KJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid
Xenolinguistics I: Aspects of Alien Art, Diana Reed Slattery
Paint into Words: Alex Grey Interview, Michael Robinson
Is That a Real Reality, or Did You Make It Up Yourself?, Steven Taylor
Moby Click, David Rothenberg
Reality 2.0, Antonio Lopez

IV Sex
The Testicular Age, Charles Eisenstein
Transforming Repression of the Divine Feminine, Wahkeena Sitka Tidepool Ripple
Finding Peace Between our Sheets: Talking with Marnia Robinson, Adam Elenbaas
Gender Evolution, Kal Cobalt
V Engagement
Impossible Dream, Stephen Duncombe
Yoga as Spiritual Activism, Sharon Gannon
Cleaning Up Soap: Why the Bronner Family Is Washing Out a Few Mouths, Jill Ettinger
If You See Something Say Something, Michael Brownstein
"I Know We Won"--Abbie Hoffman Speaks, Ken Jordan

VI Community
Transition Town: A Tonic for the Peak Oil Blues, Alex Munslow
Become an Urban Homesteader, Homegrown Evolution
Sumerian Economics, Peter Lamborn Wilson
Mutual Aid Revisited, Anya Kamenetz
Radical Interdependence and Online Telepathy: How Twitter Helps Us Find One Another, Jennifer Palmer
Writing Source Code for Democracy, Ken Jordan

In his first 2012 book Daniel tackled the subject matter of personal transformation himself. As ideas for a second book took shape, he became aware that "writing my own work no longer seemed enough of a way to contribute to the larger process of transformation." Thus, Toward 2012 ended up drawing not just from his own writings, but from essays submitted to a website he cofounded with Ken Jordan called Reality Sandwich.

Both books center around personal transformation and global transformation and the oft times radical nature of both. Both transformations bring with them subject matter that are complex, confusing, misunderstood and end up often being simply quite polarizing (you either agree with the metaphysics and its "methods" or you don't). But, transformation happens to all of us in one way or another. In Toward 2012, use of psychoactive substances is covered in the Chapter II. The Shamanic. Transformation is complex because it is mistaken to be, in this context, more real if it is reached through the use of psychoactive assistance. In fact, the altered state of mind reached with these agents, is in my opinion, are a distraction and, in fact, given meditations ability to do the same, is unnecessary. In fact, I will go as far as to say that it is more like using drugs in sports to gain an advantage over the rest of the field. In both cases, the result has not been earned. When, in sports, hard work and patience is replaced with use of performance enhancing substances, the sporting world bans the participant from further competition. This is done as the competitive playing field must be level. No such leveling need be done in life as in life there are no real competitors playing by rules agreed to by the participants before play begins, however, the analogy of gaining something that has not been completely earned stands up in my mind and should be taken seriously by anyone considering reaching a transformation of consciousness in the manner suggested in this book. I highly recommend using meditation over any other method of reaching altered states of consciousness.

For those who aren't quite satisfied with the content of the book, I must encourage any readers to visit the Reality Sandwich website. Most of the articles in the book appeared there first, and there are, in some cases, very long and interesting discussion threads accompanying each article - often involving the author of the piece. I personally enjoyed the book as is, but after going to the website and delving more into each article, I found that I was much more satisfied with the overall experience.

Here's hoping that there will be more books from Daniel and his editorial team...it's refreshing to see so many viewpoints, and no one claiming that "this is the only true way!"

Nice collection of thought provoking essays from the crew at Reality Sandwich.com.
To quote the blurb on the back cover,for those readers who are expecting a book on doomsday predictions.

"While some see 2012-the end of the Mayan calendar-as a doomsday deadline,the authors of these challenging and engaging essays envision an ongoing transformation of human culture and consciousness."

The date is more about being a destination that we are heading towards
(and through),and the planning for our journey onwards,past that year,and into the future of this planet that we all live on.With some ideas to mull over while we are crossing the threshold to the next age...not necessarily a new one.

Toward 2012 brings together some of the best articles from the Reality Sandwich website, making it on of the most interesting and wide ranging books out there on the transformational times in which we live. Its not just a book its a flight manual. See you in the non-ordinary realities.

Very interesting set of essays from Reality Sandwich. Thought provoking. Found it less interesting than Pinchbeck's other books, but alot of data for accessing many websites. A good read.

This book is just a collection of articles, with no dates attached so you have no idea when they were written. And most of them have absolutely nothing to do with 2012. Is he just cashing in on the attention 2012 is getting? Not that 2012 is not a serious topic, but there doesn't seem much relevance of the articles he chose, to 2012. It is just more a collection of seemingly unrelated sort of interesting articles, by sort of famous folks...

I Just purchased the book Toward 2012 from Mr.Daniel Pinchbeck I did not complety read untill now because of no time to continue but I can already say that this literature is very, very futurist and to really capt the mensage withing you must not only read the book but take it as a study book for a while untill you can really understund the mensage it brings.

Looks interesting, but personal issues have kept me from reading. Hope to in the near future.