Everything's an Illusion and Nothing is Real
You Can Change It Any Way You Want
Mark Rushton’s Abundant Spare Time is a weekly email on Substack where I talk about my ongoing work as a recording artist and visual artist. This is my 162nd weekly email.
This week’s topics:
The 40 Year Reunion
Radio Promo
Neville Goddard - Climbing the Ladder
Van Morrison - “Enlightenment”
The 40 Year Reunion
I was in the Class of 1985, but we didn’t have our 40th high school reunion until last weekend - the first one I’ve attended. I’ve been out of town…
It was a small bunch out of the 465 graduates. Some are dead, of course.
I felt like a time traveler.
The bar where we met was a bit too loud inside, so I mostly stayed on the patio. But I got tired and split after three hours. It was nice to reconnect with those who I talked with.
Clearly, nobody had Googled me. Nobody asked and I didn’t talk once about my side career as a recording artist.
Honestly, I had hoped to avoid all that! Ha ha! Mission accomplished!
Radio Promo
I mailed out the 10 promo CDs I got from Kunaki a couple weeks ago. Some stations only accept physical media, like SiriusXM and WMFU, or syndicated shows like Star’s End, Echoes, and Hearts of Space.
Every week, I send out a promo email from my DISCO account to over 400 radio stations, terrestrial and internet-based. I’m still building my list of contacts, so the number of stations will go up. I’ve been getting some airplay.
Music directors at radio stations should take their role seriously, even if it’s a volunteer gig. Submissions by indie artists should be managed and occasionally played. You never know what you might be missing.
The role of the human curator still has a place in this age of streaming, bots, and internet scams. People who listen to the radio should have a premium listening experience.
Neville Goddard - Climbing the Ladder
This past week, on YT, I happened across some guy talking about Neville Goddard and what Goddard said about “climbing the ladder”.
I thought that was interesting. Never heard of the guy before.
Here’s what one of the word robots said about it all:
Neville Goddard (1905–1972) was a mystic, lecturer, and author who taught that imagination creates reality. Born in Barbados, he moved to the United States and became a prominent figure in the New Thought movement, delivering lectures in cities like New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. His teachings blend metaphysical interpretations of the Bible with practical techniques for manifesting desires, emphasizing that God is the human imagination and that individuals can shape their reality through focused mental imagery.
One of his most famous techniques is the “Climbing the Ladder” exercise, designed to demonstrate the power of imagination in manifesting outcomes.
Here’s how it works:
The Technique: Before going to sleep, relax deeply and visualize yourself climbing a ladder vividly, as if it’s happening in real life. Feel the physical sensations—your hands gripping the rungs, your feet stepping up, the motion of your body. Immerse yourself in the experience until it feels real, then fall asleep while holding that mental image.
The Test: Goddard instructed students to imagine climbing a ladder but to avoid physically climbing one in real life. The goal was to see if the imagined act would manifest as a real-world experience of climbing a ladder, proving the creative power of the mind.
Purpose: The exercise is a practical way to test Goddard’s core teaching: what you vividly imagine with faith and feeling in a relaxed state (called the “state akin to sleep”) can impress your subconscious mind and manifest in reality. It’s not just about visualizing but feeling the reality of the desired outcome.
Van Morrison - “Enlightenment”
I bought this album when it came out in 1990. Pretty much all of Van’s 80s and 90s albums are very good. In the early 80s he did flirt with Scientology (gasp!), although he quickly got away from that.
By 1986, he had an album called No Guru, No Method, No Teacher.
Hymns to the Silence, a double album from the early 90s, is one of his best. If you haven’t heard it, find it.
Van tried everything. Ultimately, he kinda stays on the sidelines with the questioning in the lyric, which I think makes it rather perfect. Van can’t provide the answer, other than to say it’s up to you, the way you think:
Enlightenment says the world is nothing
Nothing but a dream, everything’s an illusion
And nothing is real
Good or bad baby
You can change it anyway you want
You can rearrange it
Enlightenment, don’t know what it is
All around baby. you can see
You’re making your own reality. everyday because
Enlightenment, don’t know what it is
What a classy tune. Great singing. Restrained synths. That harmonica!