West

Astrologer Pagan Moir takes us on a journey of discovery ‘dancing with the world’

I was a voracious reader from a really early age. I was really interested in Greek and Egyptian mythology. I was interested in cultures that kept some form of magical practices. I became very political as well – I read Orwell when I was eight – so I had this really curious mixture of being politically-aware and mystically-interested, which is an odd mix. I spent a lot of years travelling, exploring different subcultures. I even lived “alternatively” down in Victoria and on the North Coast. That sustainable conscious lifestyle really appealed to me. I always had a problem with our society and the status they give to highachievers. I wanted a life based on valid principles. Religion failed me, given it is so anti-female. But I am still deeply religious. So that’s when I went to India searching for a spiritual path that I wanted to be part of.

I got my first tarot deck when I was 15. I’ve been using tarot for nearly 30 years. You can learn tarot, but you get deeper meanings the longer you spend with it and the more conscientious your study. It’s really structured. You have some freedom with interpretation, but the cards have very specific meanings. The person receiving the reading controls the order. They’re the one who shuffles the cards, cuts them into three and puts them back together again, then they come out in the order that they come out. What influences that is the great question. It’s the one that science can’t come at and religion can’t come at. We believe it’s the life force that flows through us. What we call it the ‘ether’.

I’ve been studying astrology for as long as tarot, but only seriously for the last 10 years. I just did the calculations exam, which is one of the four exams you have to do to become a qualified astrologer in Australia. And the maths just turned my brain to jelly. There’s a lot of cookbook astrology going around, but to do astrology well, you’re studying at university level. It’s quite funny because everyone sees astrology as mystic Medusa, but there are all these people running around studying ancient Greek. What I don’t think secular society and religious society want to recognise is that there’s a human hunger for magic in their lives. We’re not talking the magic of David Copperfield, we are talking about the magic of magical things happening. It’s not a harmful magic, it’s not about spells or spell-casting or curses or any of that negative stuff.

It’s feeling that deeper connection. It’s like dancing with the world. You dance with the world instead of this linear progression, step-by-step thing. It’s a bit of guidance which people can take on if they want – or they can ignore. Something outside their normal perspective that maybe points them in new directions.

There is also a confessional aspect to it. People can tell you their concerns and know they are not going to see you again. They’ve been allowed to express themselves freely in all their weakness and maybe they receive some helpful insights to take back with them. And that is the real strength of what I do.

I’m really careful what I say. It’s very difficult because when you get messages through, they are completely understandable, but translating them into words that work for a person, that’s where the skill’s involved. You have to be very careful the way you say things. You can’t be too insistent, you’ve just got to leave it there for the person to take if they want or not . . . no agenda. One thing that people don’t realise about messages that are channelled, is that it’s coming through that person’s consciousness and their frame of reference. Sometimes the person channelling doesn’t have the framework or the vocabulary. Some of the words are very precise, but they can have different meanings.

I love the fact I have a job where people’s lives can be enriched and they can be who they’re really meant to be. A lot of people have dreams and it is great to be able to encourage them. Also a lot of people have super talents, magical talents from the people they were in their past lives, but they’ve come through and they’re completely normal. Those talents are still there but blockages are in place. If you help remove the blockages, the talents manifest. Or sometimes they don’t even realise about the talents. Just talking about the talents they possessed bring it into being again. ‘In the beginning was the word’, after all.

When I’m channelling, I’m getting messages through, but not from a ‘who’. Because I communicate in a human way, it comes through in a human-like manner. They come in pictures and words. Once the messages start to come in, they are quite thick and fast. I try my best not to let my frame of reference destroy the message or dominate it. The thoughts can be quite insistent too, which at first was quite frightening. We live in a very rational world. Odd thoughts are automatically thought to be suspect, especially insistent ones. Now it’s not alarming. It’s more, ‘okay, this is an insistent thought . . .’ where does it need to be expressed and how. I’ve never got someone’s going to die, or they’ve got cancer. Even though I’ve had contact from the dead, I’ve never had anything negative. I’ve been really fortunate like that.

The last message I got which was a really strong is there is something really major happening in September/October. I got a frisson of fear around that, because I’m thinking another tsunami, another terrorist attack– something really big happening on a global scale. I didn’t get that it was a terrorist attack, but I got that it was something major that will change the way we perceive the world. I don’t know what it is though. It’s a message. You take it with a grain of salt . . . you don’t believe that it’s gospel. That’s how you check your sanity.

Past life tends to come through in flashes. I think most people experience it but they don’t recognise them as past-life flash. I don’t see that as psychic. It’s like when you get a real interest in say 15th century Italy or when you’re really drawn to something. Or when you meet someone and the relationship seems immediate. I just see them as past-life flashes. There’s a lot of debate amongst the past-life regressionists. You have the traditionalist that say everyone has past lives and there’s this new theory of thought that, for some people, this is their first life on earth. They are called Star Seed. The literature on it is quite far out. Often they can’t handle life on earth and they tend to be inclined to suicide and depression. It’s just too harsh for them, unlike us battle-hardened veterans.

Everybody has the capability to see all this. The only thing that stops them is the belief that they don’t. In fact, many people would surprise themselves.

 

East

Venerable Meegahakumbure Dhamagavesi is the Chief Incumbent of Lankarama Buddhist temple in Schofields. he has been a Buddhist monk for 25 years and spends his days practising the teachings of the Buddha

Buddhism is the teaching of the Buddha who was born 2600 years ago in India. He was a human being, but not a normal one. He actually realised the whole of the truth, so he became known as the Buddha. Buddha says ‘I am a human but not just a human being. I knew what should be known, I have practised what should be practised, I have eradicated what should be eradicated, hence I am called the Buddha.’

The first one means he knew the reality of this world, then practised morality, concentration, wisdom. Finally he eradicated all kinds of ailing to humans and the world. The Buddha teaches us to have confidence of oneself and he explains how to see things as they really are. Buddhism is more concerned about human capacity and ability to achieve liberation. That is what we believe in. Not anything else outside. One has to believe in oneself and have confidence. And that is the Dharma – mindfulness, concentration and mental stillness are very important. Most of all, one has to calm down one’s own mind by practising meditation.

When one can achieve concentration by practising meditation, that person can see things as they really are, not as they appear to be. When you see as it is, you can see the ultimate truth of everything.

According to some scholars, (Buddhism) is the fastest-growing religion in Australia. A lot of people are interested in practising meditation to calm down their minds, to relax. I think people are interested because it emphasises  harmony, unity and friendship. I think the important features that we need to practise in daily life are universal love, unconditional love and compassion, joy and happiness, and also equanimity when we encounter different kinds of vicissitudes in our life, which we will be able to equalise. That means we have to have a balanced mind in front of all these things.

(Love) is a universal. If we have unconditional love, that means you love without attachment. It is not easy, but it is not impractical. If you have that thought of love and friendship towards yourself and towards others, you can do a service for others’ benefit without expecting anything in return.

Instead of the term ‘reincarnation’ we have to use the term ‘rebirth’. It happens depending on karma, what we do in our daily life. The meaning of the word karma is action, but in Buddhist concept, the action is not the karma, but intention or will. Any type of words or thought with intention or will becomes karma, and that means you are creating some sort of energy within you. If your intention is good, then you are creating good karma. If your intention is wrong, bad, lustful, then you are creating bad karma. If one has bad karma, that person has to undergo different kinds of suffering in this life and hereafter. If one does good deeds with good intention, he can have a pure, simple life and hereafter, he can experience the happiness of that karmic energy . . . It all centres on morality, concentration and wisdom.