Adam Gorightly
It was not long after my own encounter with strange aerial phenomenon that I began to see a link between UFOs to such seemingly disparate topics as psychedelics, psychotronics, and ritual magick. As the years pass, the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis (ETH) makes far less sense to the observer than other theories ranging from mind control conspiracies or — on the other hand — fissures in the space-time continuum which provide a portal of entry for ghostly apparitions that can be saucer-shaped or even take on the form of Moth-Men, Chupacabras or the Blessed Virgin Mary.
UFOs encompass a wide range of phenomenon and cannot be categorized simply in terms of little gray skinned buggers from Zeta-Reticuli shoving probes up human rectums (Ouch!). To me the term "UFO" simply suggests something unexplainable hovering in outer or inner space, whether it is machine-like elves encountered under the influence of DMT, or nuts and bolt craft performing inexplicable aerial maneuvers over Area 51.
UFOs are limited only by our imagination, and to consider them merely craft from another galaxy is as narrow a view as postulating that newborn babies are delivered exclusively by storks. UFOs are also — in my estimation — a product of altered consciousness, which is not to suggest that all sightings are in part, or in whole, complete hallucinations. What I'm suggesting is that in order to observe UFOs, one must often enter into a more receptive state, much like a psychic or channeler tunning into voices or subtle energies. Channelers must first induce in themselves a trance state before being able to contact "voices from the beyond". The same goes for magickal workings wherein magicians carry out rituals in order to invoke spirits and/or demons.
A corollary to the above statement is the famed Amalantrah Working of legendary occultist Aleister Crowley, which consisted of a series of visions he received from January through March of 1918 via his then "Scarlet Women," one Roddie Minor. Throughout his life, Crowley had a number of Scarlet Women, who acted as "Channels" for otherworldly transmissions of angelic and/or demonic origin. The Scarlet Woman also played a large part in Crowley's notorious sex ritual, at times combining drugs and bestiality to stir up those strange energies into which good ol' Uncle Al was trying to tap. To quote Crowley chronicler Kenneth Grant from Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God:
“Crowley was aware of the possibility of opening the spatial gateways and of admitting an extraterrestrial current in the human life-wave... It is an occult tradition — and Lovecraft gave it persistent utterance in his writings — that some transfinite and superhuman power is marshaling its forces with intent to invade and take possession of this planet... This is reminiscent of Charles Fort's dark hints about a secret society on earth already in contact with cosmic beings and, perhaps, preparing the way for their advent. Crowley dispels the aura of evil with which these authors (Lovecraft and Fort) invest the fact; he prefers to interpret it thelemically, not as an attack upon human consciousness from within, to embrace other stars and to absorb their energies into a system that is thereby enriched and rendered truly cosmic by the process...”
It was through the Amalantrah Working — which
included the ingestion of hashish and mescaline in its rituals
— that Crowley came into contact with an interdimensional
entity named Lam, who by the way just happens to be a dead ringer
for the popular conception of the "Grey" alien depicted on the
cover of Whitley Strieber's Communion. Crowley called them
"Enochian entities" because he purportedly contacted them by using
"Enochian call", a Cabalistic system/language devised by 17th
century Elizabethan magician, Dr. John Dee. From this alleged
encounter, some have inferred that the industrious Mr. Crowley
intentionally opened a portal of entry through the practice of
ritual magick, which allowed the likes of Lam and other "alien
greys" a passageway onto Earth plane. Dr. John Dee and his
"scryer", Edward Kelly, had their own strange encounters with
— as they call them — "little men" who moved about "in
a little fiery cloud", thus a pattern exists in the lore of ritual
magic connecting UFOs to sorcery.
Some now believe that what Crowley tapped into was the same unconscious reservoir of high weirdness that helped launch the current rash of alien abductions, as reported by such "experts" in the field as Bud Hopkins, John Mack, David Jacobs et al. When making these connections, bear in mind that many abductees recall their encounters with these gray skinned creatures only after they've been hypnotically regressed. Once again, we see that trance state — not unlike those ASC's produced during rituals such as the Amalantrah Working — are often the triggering factor which opens up a portal for these strange entities. According to Kenneth Grant, this tradition has been continued by current day adepts of the Great Beast, who follow in his footsteps practicing ritual magic to invoke these "alien entities".
In Outside the Circles of Time, Grant writes:
“Some believe that the UFO phenomena are part of the "miracle", and a mounting mass of evidence seems to suggest that mysterious entities have been located within the earth's ambience for countless centuries and that more and more people are being born with innate ability to see, or in some way sense their presence... Prayer for deific intervention in ancient times has now become a cri de coeure to extra-terrestrial or interdimensional entities, according to whether the manifestations are viewed as occuring within man's consciousness, or outside himself in apparently objective but often invisible entities. New Isis Lodge has in its archives the sigils of some of these entities. The sigils com from a grimoire of unknown origin which forms a part of the dark quabalahs of Besqul, located by magicians in the Tunnel of Quliefi. The grimoire describes Four Gates of extraterrestrial entry into, and emergence from, the known Universe.”
What Grant is speaking of is a form of ritual magic(k) practiced by such groups as the Golden Dawn, and the Ordo Templi Orientis(O.T.O.). "Sigils" are line drawings and diagrams that serve as signatures of entities accessible to a trained magician familiar with "Enochian calls" and other methods of summoning "spirits". A grimoire is a directory of such sigils, and a manual for their use.
A noted disciple of Crowley's, Jack Parsons — one time head of the California branch of the O.T.O., and renowned rocket scientist — carried on this tradition of interdimensional contact when, in 1946 — with the aid of "Frater H." — he made contact with some sort of entities not at all unlike Crowley's "Lam". This all took place during a series of magic rituals deemed the Babalon Workings. What makes this story all the more bizarre is that Parson's accomplice in this endeavor — the aforementioned Frater H. — became more commonly known afterwards as the charismatic cult leader L.Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.
Apparently, Hubbard played a role similar to that of Edward Kelly, "scryer" for the aforementioned Dr. John Dee, of whom Crowley was an ardent admirer. A scryer works as a receptor of otherworldly communications, often using a crystal ball or similar device in conjunction with the magician's rituals and ceremonies to summon beings from other dimensions. Together magician and scryer work hand-in-hand in summoning these otherworldly beings: be they angels, demons or spirits of the dead. Crowley's Scarlet Woman, in many instances, performed this same function; for instance Crowley's first wife, Rose Kelly — while in a magical trance — received the first three chapters of the infamous Book of the Law, the manuscript that laid the foundation for Crowley's "religion", Thelema. Furthermore, the portal of entry for the extraterrestrial beings that Crowley theoretically opened (when he invoked the entity "Lam") may have been further enlarged by Parsons and Hubbard with the commencement of the Babalon Working, thus facilitating a monumental paradigm shift in human consciousness. As Kenneth Grant wrote, "The [Babalon] Working began... just prior to the wave of unexplained ariel phenomena now recalled as the 'Great Flying Saucer Flap!' Parsons opened a door and something flew in." Such researchers as John Carter suggest that the detonation of atomic bombs over Japan — during the latter part of World War II — may have also played a part in opening this door between dimensions or, at least, attracted the curiosity of our intergalactic neighbors.
As Thelemic history instructs, 1947 ended the first stage of the Babalon Working, as Parsons and Hubbard parted ways amid a cloud of turmoil.(Apparently, Hubbard split with Parsons wife and a large part of his fortune.) It was the same year the Modern Age of UFOs flew into view with the Kenneth Arnold sightings over Mt. Rainer in Washington state, followed not long after by the legendary saucer crash in Roswell, New Mexico.
1947 was also
the year that marked the passing of the Great Beast, Aleister
Crowley. Not long after these monumental events, in 1948, Albert
Hoffman gave birth to LSD, which indicates that strange things were
indeed aloof in the collective unconscious of humanity between the
years of 1946-48. Connecting all this high weirdness up even
tighter is conspiracy researcher John Judge, who — in an
interview on KPFK radio, Los Angeles on August 12, 1989 dubbed
"Unidentified Fascist Observatories" — stated that Kenneth
Arnold and Jack Parsons were flying partners, though I have as yet,
been unable to find additional corroboration to support his claim.
As for L. Ron Hubbard — though it is not well publicized by current day members of the Church of Scientology — much of his "religion" was based on a bizarre cosmology he apparently concocted, perhaps to see how much his flock was willing to swallow, a thesis which suggested that several million years ago the souls of dead space aliens (Thetans) entered into the body of Earth humans, and that is part of the reason why today were so screwed up as a species.
Another interesting "UFO" parallel to note is that Parsons and Hubbard's "visionary experience" with these alien-like entities transpired in the California desert, which during the late 40's and 50's was a hotbed for flying saucer activity. It was in this setting that such famous "Contactees" as George Adamski and George Hunt Williamson invoked their own brand of cosmic messengers transported by saucers, cigar-shaped vessels and the like, often originating from nearby Venus, or other seemingly uninhabitable planets in our solar system.
In the 1930's — prior to his "Space Brother" encounters — Adamski operated a monastery dubbed "The Royal-Order of Tibet," which afforded him a permit to make sacrificial wine during the Prohibition. After the Prohibition ended, Adamski's monastery suddenly closed its doors, and he afterwards opened a burger stand near the Mount Polomar Observatory. While there, Adamski claimed to have helped astronomers photograph several UFO's — a claim that afterwards was never verified by anyone at the observatory.
Adamski's first encounter with the "Space Brothers" occurred in the Mojave Desert on November 20, 1952, when — in the company of George Hunt Williamson and some other friends — he witnessed a cigar-shaped craft being pursued by military jets. Just before disappearing from sight, the craft ejected a silver disc, which landed a short distance from Adamski and his party. When Adamski arrived at the saucer he was greeted by a man with long blonde hair, wearing a one-piece suit.
Telepathically, the "man" informed Adamski he was from Venus, and that he was concerned about the possibility of atomic bomb radiation from Earth reaching other planets in the solar system, and that various beings from throughout the galaxy were visiting Earth harboring these same concerns. According to Adamski, he was taken aboard one of the alien ships and flown around to several venues throughout the universe, including the dark side of the moon. During the course of his ariel foray, Adamski took an array of spurious photographs that have been widely viewed as a hoax. In "Unidentified Fascist Observatories", John Judge asserts that Adamski was an asset of the CIA, who in his lecture tours throughout the 50's and 60's dispersed disinfo on behalf of the Company.
Adamski's colleague — George Hunt Williamson — went on to author several UFO books, such as Other Tongues — Other Flesh, and promulgated the idea of a cosmic good-versus-evil battle taking place between the "good guys" from the dog star, Sirius, versus the evil shit-kickers from Orion. Strangely enough, the planet Sirius is a recurring theme found throughout Occult and UFO lore.
Of note in this regard is Robert Temple's The Sirius Mystery, published in 1977, which documents the history of the Dogon tribe in Africa, and their fabled meetings with the Nommo, a race of three-eyed, crab-clawed beings from Sirius. It was these intergalactic emissaries — as Dogon legends record — that passed onto the tribe as far back as 3200 B.C. various astronomical data, among which that Sirius has a companion star invisible to the naked eye. These legends far predate the advent of telescopes, and were later confirmed by astronomers. This "companion" star — Sirius B — wasn't even photographed until 1970. In addition to this knowledge regarding Sirius B, such as the fact that Jupiter has four moons; Saturn has a ring around it; and that the planets in our solar system orbit around the sun. All of these facts, of course, were later confirmed by science.
In the Sirius Mystery, Temple traces contact with the Nommos all the way back to Sumeria circa 4500 B.C. At that time, he says, these three-eyed-crab-clawed creatures appeared in their mighty space ships from the stars, bestowing unto humankind vast secrets; revealing mysteries and esoteric knowledge passed on to initiates in various secret societies in Egypt, the Near East, and Greece. These initial contacts Temple contends, planted the seeds for the various mystery religions, whose offshoots include the likes of Giordano Bruno, Dr. John Dee, and the overall foundation which laid the stones for Freemasonry, and other secret schools of esoteric knowledge such as the Knights Templar and the Rosicrucians. In fact, Freemasons believe that civilization on Earth was initially formed by initiates from the Sirius star system, whom they equate with the Egyptian Trinity of Isis, Osiris, and Horus. In these legends, Osiris has been portrayed as a precursor to Christ, who was first crucified then later resurrected, forming the basis of an Egyptian priesthood that worships Sun gods.
The adepts of these mystery religions have always referred to themselves — in one form or another — as the Illuminati; those who have been "illuminated" by their worship of the various Sun gods/Moon goddesses.
In his treatise, Temple further notes that the entire Egyptian calendar revolved around the movements of Sirius, and that the calendar year began with the "dog days" when Sirius started to rise behind the Sun. According to Phillip Vandenburg in The Curse of the Pharaoh: "An archaeologist named Duncan MacNaughton discovered in 1932 that the long dark tunnels in the Great Pyramid of Cheops function as telescopes, making the stars visible even in the daytime. The Great Pyramid is oriented, according to MacNaughton, to give a view, from the King's Chamber, of the area of the southern sky in which Sirius moves throughout the year."
The brightest star in the heavens, Sirius is used for navigational purposes because it usually remains fixed in the sky. Comparatively speaking, it's approximately 35 times brighter than our own sun, and is regarded in occult circles as "the hidden god of the cosmos." The famous emblem of the all-seeing eye — seen hovering above the unfinished pyramid — is a depiction of the Eye of Sirius, and is a common motif found throughout Masonic lore. It is no secret that many of our nation's founding fathers were Freemasons, which explains the odd appearance of the Eye of Sirius on the dollar bill; a symbol seen everyday by millions of people across the globe, imprinting it's image forever in our psyches. The imprinting of such imagery has been called into question in recent times by a whole host of conspiracy theorists, who — in their New World Order scenarios — connect such fraternal orders as the Knights of Malta, Freemasonry and Rosicrucianism with the "insidious" symbol of Sirius, the eye in the triangle. At the top of this pyramid — the conspiracy theorists suggest — is the dreaded illuminati, tying all of these fraternal orders and secret societies together in a far flung plot intended to bring mankind to its knees under a futuristic Orwellian nightmare; a totalitarian society masquerading as a libertarian democracy, which uses Masonic imagery to program the masses.
As if this entire story wasn't already jumbled enough, the dawning of the 20th century ushered in a new generation of contacts paying homage to the "Dog Star", expounding ever further upon the legend of the hovering eye upon the pyramid. Right around the turn of the century, a gentleman named Lucien-Francois Jean-Maine formed an order in Haiti called the Cult of the Black Snake that used rituals borrowed from Crowley's O.T.O. in combination with certain voodoo practices. In 1922, these rituals reportedly summoned forth a disembodied being named Lam, the very same entity that Aleister Crowley made contact with a few years earlier. In fact, Kenneth Grant has stated that Crowley "unequivocally identifies his Holy Guardian Angel with Sothis(Sirius), or Set-Isis."
Later — in the 1950's and 60's — the aforementioned saucer "contactee" George Hunt Williamson once again summoned forth certain denizens purportedly from Sirius, conversing to them in the same "Enochian" or "Angelic" language used by John Dee and Aleister Crowley. Williamson — in his various books an lectures — also spoke of a secret society on Earth that has been in contact with Sirius for thousands of years, and that the emblem of this secret society is the eye of Horus, otherwise known as the all-seeing eye.
As previously noted, Williamson was a close associate of George Adamski, perhaps the most famous of the early UFO Contactees, who claimed to be connected with astronomers at Palomar Observatory in California, in whose company he allegedly witnessed several UFO sightings. In a fascinating essay entitled "Sorcery, Sex, Assassination, and the Science of Symbolism", author James Shelby Downard describes a "Sirius-worship cult" reaching all the way to the highest levels of the CIA. In this provocative piece, Shelby describes one of their rituals taking place at the Palomar Observatory under the telescopically focused light of Sirius, bathing its participants in luminance of the majestic Dog-Star; a true Illuminati ritual on high.
A rash of Sirian references continued on into the 1970's, perhaps inspired by Robert Temple's book. In 1974, Science fiction writer Phillip K. Dick had some sort of "mystical experience" which at first he attributed to psychotronic transmissions," as he called them, commenced on March 20, 1974, showering him with endless reams and streams of visual and audio data. Initially, this overpowering onslaught of messages that Dick received was extremely unpleasant and, as he termed them, "die messages." Within the following week, he reported being kept awake by "violet phosphor activity, eight hours uninterrupted." A description of this event in a fictionalized form appears in A Scanner, Darkly. The content of this phosphene activity was in the form of modern abstract graphics followed by Soviet Music serenading his head, in addition to Russian names and words appearing there, as well. Dick's original theory was that Russian mind control agents were targeting him with these transmissions.
At the outset, Dick felt the emanations invading his mind were of a malevolent nature, although in time he began to believe they were something entirely different. In a letter to Ira Einhorn dated February 10, 1978, Dick went into more depth on those psychotronic transmissions, claiming that they "seemed sentient". He felt that an alien life form existing in some upper layer of the Earth's atmosphere had been attracted by the Soviet psychotronic transmissions. Apparently, this alien life form operated as a "station", tapping into some sort of interplanetary communication grid that, "...contained and transmitted vast amounts of information."
What Dick initially received were the Soviet transmissions, but eventually this alien life form — whom he called Zebra — became "...attracted or potentiated by the Soviet micro-wave psychotronic transmissions." In the months that followed, this alien entity — according to Dick — vastly improved his mental and physical well being in a number of ways. It (Zebra) gave him "...complex and accurate information about myself and also about our infant son, which, Zebra said, had a critical and undiagnosed birth defect which required emergency and immediate surgery. My wife rushed our baby to the doctor and told the doctor what I had said (more precisely what Zebra had said to me) and the doctor discovered that it was so. Surgery was scheduled for the following day — i.e. as soon as possible. Our son would have died otherwise." (Dick's wife Tessa and others have since confirmed this story regarding the medical conditions of himself and son, Christopher.)
Phil Dick felt Zebra was totally benign, and it held great contempt for the Soviets and their psychotronic experiments. Furthermore, Zebra informed Dick that the Earth was dying, and that spray-cans were "...destroying the layer of atmosphere in which Zebra...existed.
It was not until several years after his "mystical experiences" with Zebra that Phil Dick finally wrote about these events in his classic novel VALIS. Prior to the publication of VALIS, Dick had never made any mention of Sirius in connection with the events that so drastically impacted his life. However, in his classic work, Dick renamed Zebra to VALIS (Vast Active Living Intelligence System) and identified it as a product of Sirius star system, identifying it's operators as three-eyed crab-clawed beings.
During this period — 1973-74 — noted author Robert Anton Wilson was having his own experiences with "Et denizens" which at the time he thought were "telepathic communications from Sirius" as recounted in his mind-blowing book, Cosmic Trigger. Although Wilson and Dick knew one another — and Wilson was aware that he had had some sort of transcendental experience in March of 1974 — Dick never mentioned Sirius in any of their conversations, or anything in reference to being contacted by "aliens". It wasn't until many years later — when he read VALIS — that Wilson became aware of this revelation. It should also be noted that in the late 60's/early 70's Robert Anton Wilson traveled down some of the same paths as Aleister Crowley, dabbling in ritual magic and psychedelic adventurism as a means of opening certain doors of perception, perhaps the very same ones that created a portal of entry for "Lam".
Also in the early 70's, popular English mainstream novelist Doris Lessing began a series of Sci-Fi novels revolving around particular entities from Sirius, which was a definite departure from her previous literary offerings. In the third novel of this series, The Sirian Experiments, Lessing relates a tale with stunning similarities to Dick's VALIS experiences. When Robert Anton Wilson met Mrs. Lessing in 1983, she said she had never read a lick of Dick — or Wilson, for that matter. It's hard to tell how much of this was cross-pollination; be it intentional or a subconscious filtration process that leaked in and out of a few cracked brains fixated on the Dog Star. Another somewhat unlikely source for such conjecture was the heavy metal rock band Blue Oyster Cult. At face value, one might consider BOC another in a long line of head banging guitar slingers, but upon closer examination many of their lyrics allude to subjects occult or arcane, often referring to amphibian-like beings from outer-space, as well as Sirius in their song "Astronomy". "...and don't forget my dog, fixed and consequent. Astronomy...a star!"
But not only has Sirius cropped up time and again in Occult and UFO lore, but the ubiquitous Dog Star has also been mentioned in relation to certain mind control experiments which fall under the nefarious umbrella of the CIA’s MKULTRA project. Purportedly started in 1953 — under a program that was exempt from congressional oversight — MK-ULTRA agents and “spychiatrists” tested radiation, electric shock, microwaves, and electrode implants on unwitting subjects. The ultimate goal of MK-ULTRA was to create programmed assassins ala The Manchurian Candidate. (The CIA also tested a wide range of drugs in the prospects of discovering the perfect chemical compound to control minds. LSD was one such drug that deeply interested CIA spychiatrists, so much so that in ‘53 the Agency attempted to purchase the entire world supply of acid from Sandoz Laboratories in Switzerland. In fact, for many years the CIA was the principal source for LSD, both legal and otherwise.)
In recent years, various info on remote mind control technology has filtered into the conspiracy research community through such “alternative” publications such as Full Disclosure, Resonance as well as a Finnish gentleman by the name of Martti Koski and his booklet My Life Depends On You. Over the last decade, Mr. Koski has been sharing his horrifying tale with the mind controlled world at large, documenting as it does the discovery of rampant brain tampering committed upon himself and countless others. The perpetrators of these evil doings allegedly include the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), The CIA and Finnish Intelligence, among various other intelligence agencies. Where Sirius comes into the clouded picture is quite interesting: at one point during a mind control programming episode, the “doctors” operating on Koski identified themselves as “aliens from Sirius.” Apparently, these “doctors” (or “spychiatrists”) were attempting to plant a screen memory to conceal their true intentions. What this suggests is a theory that a handful of researchers — namely Martin Cannon, Alex Constantine, David Emory and John Judge — started kicking around in the early 90’s: that Alien Abductions were a cover for MK-ULTRA mind control shenanigans perpetrated by Intelligence Agency spooks.
According to Walter Bowart — in the revised edition of Operation Mind Control — one alleged mind control victim related an incident along these lines, purportedly occurring in the late 70’s. In memories retrieved by way of hypnotic regression, it was revealed that the victim had been the recipient of a mock alien abduction, the intention of which was to create a screen memory that would conceal the actual mind control programs enacted on the victim. The subject in this instance claimed to have seen a young child dressed in a small alien costume, similar in appearance to the aliens in Speilberg's ET. None of this, of course, dismisses outright the ETH; nor does it mean that ET’s have never visited us. Nevertheless, it's implications are staggering when one considers the impact and subsequent commercialization of the Alien Abduction Phenomenon, and how it has challenged and reshaped the belief systems and psyches of millions upon millions of the planet's inhabitants, in essence creating a new paradigm that prior to thirty years ago was virtually non-existent.
As chronicled in Walter Bowart’s Operation Mind Control, in the late 70’s Congressman Charlie Rose (D-N.C) met with a Canadian inventor who had developed a helmet that simulated alternate states of consciousness and realities, much like the VR eyegear-unit postulated in the movie Brainstorm. One such virtual reality scenario played out by those who tried on this helmet was a mock alien abduction. Congressman Rose took part in these experiments, which consisted of aforementioned alien abduction programme. Much to Rose’s amazement, the simulated scenario seemed incredibly realistic. This device sounds quite similar to Dr. Michael Persinger's much-touted "Magic Helmet", which has been receiving a fair amount of press in recent years. Equipped with magnets that beam a low-level magnetic field at the temporal lobe, the “Helmet” effects areas of brain associated with time distortions, and other altered states of consciousness. Although Bowart did not specifically name the inventor of the helmet in Operation Mind Control, chances are it was Persinger to whom he was referring. Persinger's name has also been bandied about by mind control researcher, Martin Cannon — in his treatise The Controllers — as a behind the scenes player in intelligence operations related to MK-ULTRA.
Persinger is a clinical neurophysicist and professor of neuroscience, whose work over the years has focused on the effects of electromagnetic fields upon biological organisms and human behavior. Persinger is an adherent to the theory that UFOs are the products of geomagnetic effects released from the Earth’s crust under tectonic strain. His “Helmet” — it has been noted — approximates the characteristics of Temporal Lobe Epilepsy (TLE) of which many a armchair theorist have attributed as being responsible for Phil Dick’s VALIS experiences. One of the most common attributes of TLE are visions of the divine, in the form of direct communications with God, or gods — in whatever form — be it aliens, angels, fairies or elves.
Early on — in his efforts to explain his own abduction experience — author Whitley Strieber entertained the possibility that he might have been one such victim of TLE. Because of this, Strieber underwent extensive medical examinations — including several CAT scans and MRI’s — to determine if such was the case, but the results of all these tests came up negative. Aside from such speculations, there is an undeniable magical component to Whitley Strieber’s experiences. After his initial hypnotic regression — when the presence of the “visitors” were first revealed to him — Strieber subsequently practiced a form a mediation to further conjure their image in his mind, so as to better identify their features. The first time he attempted this approach — much to his surprise — an alien grey immediately appeared in his “mental field of view”, allowing Strieber to delve deeper into the mystery of the phenomenon. This meditation experience — as recounted in Communion — seems nothing less than a magical conjuration, although Strieber may not have been entirely aware of his actions in the context of ritual magic. In a sense, Strieber perhaps performed unconscious — or subconscious — magical workings on several occasions, in essence summoning forth these beings from behind the veils of perception. Furthermore, it is my belief that hypnotic regression can, under certain circumstances, perform a sort of magical working, and it was through hypnotic regression that Strieber was able to come to terms with his “visitor experience” — at least to a certain extent. Bear in mind that hypnosis approximates a trance state, and it is just this form of altered consciousness that has allowed many an abductee to “recall” their experiences. Strieber was also, prior to his “visitor” experience, a member of the Gurdjieff Foundation, a self-transformational organization dedicated to a system of techniques devised by the famed mystic G.I. Gurdjieff. As Strieber explained: ”I believe that the techniques I learned in that training — particularly a form of double-tone chanting — have enabled me to remain conscious in some experiences with the visitors where I otherwise would have been unconscious.” What Strieber doesn’t acknowledge is that Gurdjieff himself was in contact with certain denizens of Sirius via this method of double-tone chanting, which could also be describe as “Enochian chants”.
It was in the early stages of his “visitor” experiences that Strieber made the acquaintance of famed alien abduction investigator Budd Hopkins, who sat in on some of Strieber’s early hypnosis sessions. Later, when Strieber was working on the early drafts of Body Terror (the original working title of Communion) he sent Hopkins excerpts for comment. Hopkins — though he was convinced that Strieber had indeed been visited by alien beings — was somewhat distressed by the amount of “high weirdness” contained within the manuscript, although there were many parallels with other known abduction cases. During the course of some group abductee meetings attended by Bud Hopkins, Strieber has been quoted as saying that “some people began volunteering stories about having left their bodies or other psychic experiences after their abductions. Budd wasn’t interested in that, and would tell people to get back to talking about their abduction experiences. He refused to see a possible link between the experience of abduction and some kind of spiritual or psychic awakening happening in the people to whom experiences occurred.”
Curiously enough, elsewhere in Communion, Strieber points out that the mental state produced by his encounters with the “visitors” could be approximated by a rare drug called Tetradotoxin, which in small doses causes external anesthesia, and in larger doses may bring about “out of body” experiences. Even greater doses of the drug can simulate near death experiences. According to Strieber, Tetradotoxin is the core of the “zombie poisons” of Haiti. What he doesn’t mention is that Tetradotoxin was just one in a vast number of psychoactive compounds utilized by the CIA for their fabled MK-ULTRA project. Throughout Communion, Strieber makes (perhaps) veiled references to mind control (of the MK-ULTRA variety.) At one point in the narrative — as Strieber is haphazardly tossing around various theories regarding these “visitations” — he brings up the possibility that the Greys may not have been actually using mental telepathy to communicate, but that something of a more technical nature might have been occurring, such as extra-low-frequency waves beamed into Whitley’s boggled brain, thereby producing the requisite “voices in his head”.
Along these lines, Strieber adds the interesting aside “that the earth itself generates a good deal of ELF in the 1 to 30 hertz range. Perhaps there are natural conditions that trigger a response in the brain which brings about what is essentially a psychological experience of a rare and powerful kind. Maybe we have a relationship with our own planet that we do not understand at all, and the old gods, the fairy, and the modern visitors are side effects of it...” Part of the appeal of Communion and subsequent books were, in my opinion, Strieber’s ability to entertain a whole host of theories, and in the process open the reader’s eyes to the various possibilities attempting to explain the UFO phenomenon, from fairy lore or travelers from alternate dimensions — to the very real possibility of some sort of ELF wave/mind control machine being responsible for his haunted reveries.