The Journey

"Every morning when I wake up I do three things.

First, I remember that I'm going to die. This gives urgency to the way I will live that day.

Second, I spend five minutes in thanksgiving to Nature for being permitted to live, to have this chance to experience, to learn, and to achieve.

And third, I resolve not to cheat my consciousness during the day. As long as I don't cheat my consciousness nothing I do during the day can stain me, [...]

And there is a practice which I follow every night before going to sleep. It is very simple, but it has helped me immensely and it can help anyone who uses it. It involves only three questions:

Have I lived? Have I loved? Have I laughed?

Have I lived? - Have I made the best use of the time provided me during that day to grow, to learn, to develop?

Have I loved? - Have I reached out to everyone I met and made them aware of the love in my heart and eased their burdens of self-mistrust and self-doubt?

Have I laughed? - Have I seen the humorous side of even the most painful incident?

If the answer to any one of these questions is no, then it is a matter for remorse. One more day has passed and I am another day closer to my death, and I have not exerted myself to my fullest potential. This is enough to make me work harder the next day and try to make amends, before Mahakala comes and catches me unawares. It is this intense desperation to live life to the fullest which is the hallmark, the stamp, of a true Aghori."

- Robert E. Svoboda: Aghora. At the Left Hand of God.

Krishna Das recommended to his listeners who wanted to read the most relevant book about Karma to only read Aghora III. He specifically said to NOT read the first two books because "they will mess with your head and give you nightmares.

Well, that was motivation enough for me to get started with the first one. And I didn't regret it.

My interest in Tantra (more specifically, vedic tantra and left-hand tantrism) had increased recently (especially since my vedic astrologer read in my chart that I must have dabbled in tantra and kundalini practice in past lives and seem to have 'unfinished business' there) and together with me leaving the self-righteous brotherhood of the "Golden Dawn" and its right-wing acolytes behind during the dawn of the covid19 crisis, I started to open my eyes to the forbidden paths - that is, forbidden for those who self-identify as "white magicians" and condemn the likes of Aleister Crowley to the deepest pits of hellfire.

Going back to Asian traditions was warranted - monotheistically indoctrinated Westerners are too "black and white".

A Brahmin would never condemn an ascetic, half-naked Sadhu - he would recognise the same seeker, the same Atman in him and bow before a brother of a different path.

Blaming and finger-pointing is the way of the west, it is not conductive to spiritual advancement.

But I disgress. Robert Svoboda was the personal disciple of an Aghori - a particularly wild specimen of a tantric holy man. Aghoris worship the female divine, often in its ferocious forms. "Ma", the great mother, may come in the form of Bhairavi, Kali or Durga - the names and the particular forms are secondary. Behind them all is the play of the divine male (Shiva) and female (Shakti) in all its forms.

Aghoris are extreme Sadhus - they go to great length, often practicing for years in the smashan, the cremation fields, living among corpses and human bones, searching for that inner light beyond the forms of our physical existance.

Sigh.

Why do I even have to bother with this shit?

It's become increasingly popular among "the young and weird in the west" to feel somehow intellectually superior by supporting the "simulation theory" of existence.

To me, it always felt as shallow as "The Matrix" movies once Neo woke up and I realized that he is now merely living in our reality - with even less of a clue about spirituality, the nature of reality, transcendence and everything else our philosophical, spiritual and religious traditions have dealt with over the millenia.

Here's the thing: if you look me straight in the eyes telling me "Bro, we live in a simulation!", you'd better shield your nuts if you're a guy. Becaues I will aim to hit them as hard as possible just to see how the simulation makes you react to the pain.

And with that I want to convey more than just the warning that believing shit like that has the very real risk of transforming you into a nihilist, a monster without morality (because there are myriad other ways, many of them religious, just look at the news, to achieve similar results).

I have issues touching on the ontology (the study of the nature of being), holistic perspectives, spiritual and epistemological nature of things concerning this "theory". If you need a break to look up them big words, go ahead and look em up while I make myself a cup of tea.

1/ The ontology of it all

So, ontologically (nature of being) speaking, the "we live in a simulation" theory raises really hard questions on the nature of the beings living in this simulation (that is: you, me and everyone else). Are we "real" in any meaningful sense? This can lead to what is also sometimes called "infinite regress", where each layer of "reality" might itself be a simulation. We who are supposedly in a simulation, but also those who run this particular simulation might be in one, and so on and on and on...

This also means that casuality is an illusion, or just programmed. So all the casual connections we see in our lives and in the world are just lines of code. If this doesn't feel wrong to you, probably speak to a pro?

Creator and Purpose issue

Who created this simulation, and to what purpose? This is the "infinite regress" I just mentioned: if our universe is just a simulation, what about the universe of the simulators? Are they also in a simulation? And if not, does THEIR reality have spiritual, transcendental etc meaning?

To sum up this point: this line of questioning doesn't provide any meaningful answers, it just creates an unnecessary layer of complexity on already complex issues.

Nature of existence

Are we just code or digital entities? If so, what does it say about our consciousness, our free will, and the meaning and depth of our experiences? I fear that the "simulation theory" can lead to a state of mind where our self of sense and reality become damaged. It's not helpful or healing.

2/ Holistic issues

A "holistic" worldview assumes that everything is interconnected and that we are part of a bigger whole. In the 1960s and the New Age movement, this became a popular thing, also around the "Gaia" movement that postulated that "mother earth" and all creatures living on her are part of a bigger, not only biological, but also spiritually connected system.

As corny as this may sound from today's point of view, the "Gaia" theory was way more beneficial for people's sense of self vs the world and had a healing influence on our souls. The "simulation theory" does none of that.

Interconnectedness

If we are all part of a simulation, the just mentioned interconnectedness might be merely a programmed feature, not a fundamental truth. This undermines the depth and meaning of these connections. It leaves us bare and naked in a cold, uncaring universe. Camus & Co would love that kind of thing...

Meaning through "emergent properties"

A part of holism is the belief that so-called "emergent properties" arise from complex systems. You know, that well-known "the thing is more than just the sum of its part" kind of saying stems from that.

If we are living in a simulation, the properties are just "fake", their significance and authenticity will become obsolete.

In plain words Did you ever have a significant religious or spiritual experience? Did you ever feel bliss, closeness to the divine? Yeah, well, too bad. It's all simulated and you are not even real. ...

3/ Spiritual Issues

So, let's get to the heart of the matter. What disturbs me most about this so-called "theory" is of course a spiritual matter.

Every time I read about it or someone tries to involve me in a discussion about it, I feel that inner emptiness, quite similar to the feeling of meaninglessness that I felt while watching the "Matrix" movies. Yes, also the first one, that is after the point where Neo "wakes up" as the naked and clueless worm that he and his fellow "awoken ones" are.

We live in very materialistic times and the popularity of this theory (esp among lunatics like Elon Musk) is just another example of how shallow and meaningless the lives of so many people have become.

Meaning and Purpose

For many, if not all spiritual and religious traditions, life has inherent meaning and purpose. If life is just a computer simulation, this could imply that our sense of purpose is artificially constructed (so would be the lack of such feeling in hardcore-materialistic people). All of our spiritual experience would therefore be meaningless.

Transcendence

One of the ever recurring elements of spiritual and religious traditions is a view that "transcendence" is important: to arrive at a point where we are attuned enough to the nature of reality to perceive the subtle reality behind our everyday reality. In New Age circles people often speak of "energies", which is also very, very questionable and the wrong word for something sensitive people perceive - but I guess most of my readers know what I mean.

It's a world-view that, in the Western world, is deeply tied with Jewish mysticism. In the Western Occult tradition and in Hermeticism, the usage of a Jewis glyph, the "Tree of Life", as a model for the manifestation of the universe from the initial, pre-material god-head all the way down to our material plane of existence is a helpful tool, and it's extensively used in these more hidden traditions. This model is also "just a theory", but it's a deep and vast one. Studying the Sepher Yetzirah alone can be a life's purpose, something that this knee-jerk "simulation theory" will never come close to.

Moral and ethical implications

If we live in a simulation, our actions and experience are all fake. This means nothing we do has any consequences outside the cause-effect results that are programmed into the simulation. It would, thought to it's consequential end, mean that we can butcher and rape whoever we want - it wouldn't matter. Their suffering? Simulated! Their cries for mercy, their tears? All part of the simulation.

If I look at the news and the authoritarian butchers at work, I'm not surprised that the alt-right and the tech bros subscribe to this "theory" so much. It gives them "carte blanche" to do whatever they want, whenever they want and to whom they want.

It is therefore no surprise that the lunatic billionaire Musk is one well-known advocate of that theory. It sprang from the world he helped create. It goes very well with materialism, capitalism and is a 21st century tech-version of colonialism and imperialism.

4/ Epistemological Concerns

Knowledge and Truth

"What can we truly know?" If we accept the simulation theory as a given, this becomes a shallow, meaningless question. If our senses and experiences are mediated by a simulation, our understanding of truth and knowledge is completely unreliable.

5/ Occam's Razor

Occam's Razor states that if you have two or more competing explanations for a matter, usually the less complicated one is the one you should prefer. It's about simplicity. The "simulation theory" introduces unnecessary complexity into our already way too complex reality by positing that an advanced civilization creates simulations of lives and we are just one of them, which, if you really think it through, raises unanswerable questions about THAT civilization's reality.

6/ To sum a stupid thing up

So, to sum it all up, there are too many unanswered questions remaining when accepting the "simulation theory".

The purpose of it all and the nature of the creators of the simulation, and their world - it's a stupid, useless thing to even think about. It provides no real answers, no solace but just creates new, unnecessary layers of "useless mystery".

The nature of existence... are we just code or digital entities? If so, what does that say about our consciousness, free will and our experiences? This can all lead to numbness and a diminished sense of reality. Real spirituality has the opposite effect.

Lack of transcendental answers: this is a biggie. As Neo waking up to a harsh, cold and meaningless existence in the "real physical world" in "The Matrix", there are no answer whatsoever to life's big questions. Everything humanity ever cared about (meaning, purpose, morality, spirituality) all remain unresolved by this "theory".

It's a lazy cop-out - the simulation theory just shifts the context of all of these questions onto another layer.

It is, to bring it to one point, absolute philosophical laziness. It avoids real thought, because this simulation "theory" doesn't engage at all with the complexities of existence. It posits an unverifiable scenario and doesn't provide actionable insights or meaningful answers. It's like a religion made the stupid way.

And, last but not least, as already mentioned, it bears heavy moral and ethical risks. Nihilism is more than a funny group of people in "The Big Lebowski". It's an empty world-view that eats away at your soul and either throws you into the arms of depression or makes you into a monster - often both.

All of this and more is why reading about the "simulation theory" always felt shallow and pseudo-philosophical to me.

It's like watching a cheap movie (and here, I don't mean the Matrix, I enjoyed the first one none the less).

But for people who feel intrigued by the simulation theory, I have one line of thought for you that might be worth exploring: try real spirituality.

By that I do not mean traditional, established religion (they mostly suck and can lead you down a similar road with their fake promises and dogmas). I mean real spirituality. I mentioned the Kabbalah and the Tree of Life. That could be one point of interest. It will provide you with way more meaning and answers (and yes, new questions!) than any cooked-up, knee-jerk theory out there can ever do.

I said what I had to say.

I think one of the most insightful learnings from my time studying Religious Sciences (aka Religious Studies, Religionswissenschaft) under a Graecisist and an atheist-communist professor was to learn about all the misunderstandings we (as in: we, the so-called 'modern' western people) have when thinking about, judging and studying other cultures and their traditions.

(For those who don't know it: Religious Studies, sometimes also Comparative Religious Studies) has nothing to do with Theology. It is basically its opposite and comes from a social studies, sometimes cultural studies or philological point of view of scientific neutrality).

During my 8 or so years at university, and to this day, some of the lectures of these two professors remain the intellectual highlights of my life.

And of course we also studied the history of the discipline itself, which was born in western Europe, and first done by protestant priests who were among the first to apply non-religious rules to the lecture of the holy scriptures and dared to ask "blasphemous" questions.

On the very first day, my professor warned every new student: if you come here because you are searching for truth and meaning, or because you want to study your current faith deeper: go away! You will find nothing here but pain, because quite frankly, our discipline doesn't care about your subjective truth. We don't care about anything that can't be studied scientifically. All we care about are the texts and the behaviours / deeds of members of any given creed. And during all the years of your studies here, one topic will never go away (and never get a satisfactory answer): the question "What is religion?"

One of the first paradigms I was confronted with, was that view of "evolution" in human and religious history. It stems from people like Frazer and other Englishmen who were active during the time of Industrialization, where progress was the paramount power and everything was seen as and placed on an arrow coming from an uncivilized past and pointing towards an increasingly civilized future.

That world-view is deeply European, and if you grow up in Europe, you are not even aware of it. A fish doesn't think about water until he's finding himself on dry land, right?

So when studying religious traditions of diverse peoples around the globe, one of the many pitfalls is that we fall quickly into traps of judgment.

People living in the jungle of Papua New Guinea surely have a more "primitive" religion than Methodists in the US, right? Beep! No. Your judgment doesn't apply. And it suffices to read a bit of Malinowski to become aware of the deeply complex structures of believes and practices in that region of the world, and how "religion" is interwoven with daily life to a degree that even the concept of "religion" as a separate thing all of a sudden appears to be.... a modern, western construct.

And then you realize: this separation in the mind between some things being "religion" and other being not, it's quite recent, really. It usually was, for most human beings during our long history, and independent of the culture, all one thing. It was all life, with its many interwoven parts.

The next thing is to think that the past was primitive, the present is modern and the future surely must be even better. Beep! Wrong again. And then you realise, this applies to most fields. We think we are the pinnacle of human evolution, we think on that straight arrow-line - which is an illusion. Just look at the Roman Empire at its height and look at the dysfunctional nightmare that the USA have become under oligarchic capitalism. This is in no way a "mandatory evolution", it's just one development that happened (for many evil reasons), but there is no "natural law", it's just the result of many little decisions of many individuals accepting the concept of countries and borders and obeying the rules of the land.

I'm writing all of this to make one specific point: we are in no way at a point in history that is "better" or "more evolved" than past points in time and space. And that also means that there is no higher power (other than the police states that govern us) that dictates that things will continue as they are now or that change is inevitable.

Change will come. And people have power. But they have to be aware of the invisible thought patterns and concepts they are caught in.

For me, studying religious studies was an eye opener not only because I discovered such a diverse variety of expressions of faith around time and space on this planet, but because I experienced the meaning of "bias" and of cultural programming.

Michael Pye, a famous scholar of the field, wrote an article "Religion: Shape and Shadow" where he points out that those who undertake the study of religion must be careful about the shadow of their own cultural and religious upbringing they stand in and who will inevitably warp the way they perceive other religions.

He gave one example. When Western Christians first started to discover, study and write about Buddhism, they had a tendency to call it a "religion without god".

Which is true, but also utterly besides the point. Michael Pye continues with the little thought experiment: "Imagine the Study of Religions would have started in India, and as Hindu scholars would travel to Europe and study the local varieties of Christianity one of their key take-away would have been that Christianity is a religion without Dharma. That statement would be utterly true, but also utterly pointless and besides the point. It would not help at all in understanding what Christianity is all about."

Some people have sadness as a constant companion. And I don’t mean clinically depressive people. I don’t mean the glaring abyss, present all the time. I mean more like a veil of melancholy. It might by times fade into the background, and be nearly forgotten, but it’s always there. The truest companion.

Then, ironically often during lifely times, say a family function or a party or any other happy occasion (cliché: a picnic in the sun!) that companion silently appears again and acts like an invisible veil between one’s soul and everything else.

This sadness that never fully lifts, is probably my oldest friend.

I have pondered first about it at age…. 9 or 10 I think? I don’t remember exactly. My aunt Nora was visiting from France. I was a child on the brink of becoming a teenager. The adults were tipsy and laughing. The smell of my father’s couscous wavered through the apartment. I suddenly felt the urge to retire to my room. To lie on bed. To cry. I felt in that moment, felt so strongly, so real, that this will all end one day. Everyone I love will die. In the end, there will be darkness, loneliness and sadness. I didn’t think about it in THAT much detail, but the feeling conveyed such images, and it was more than my young heart could take.

My mum opened the door, wondering if something was wrong. She saw my tears, comforted me, laughing.

This was… what?... 40 years ago? My parents are still there. Are still enjoying good food and wine and company. We have lost people, the whole grandparent generation, of course. We know that time doesn’t wait. 

That feeling, it never went away. Business keeps it at bay.

But so does writing.

The act of writing is like a conversation with… god. I lack a better word. There is me, the instrument with which I write (a pen or a keyboard), and the blank, passive medium (be it a sheet of paper or the screen of a computer). Then there is a conversation happening. It’s in my head, but if flows through my fingers and onto the medium. Is there someone on the other side? Probably not, but I’m not sure. It’s in the world, physically or electronically, but I have manifested it with my hands.

I have conveyed a feeling, a concept or just a recipe. A memory, a thought. It is there now. I have done an action, and there must be, however subtle, be a reaction somewhere. If not within the reader, within the “field”.

The field is what surrounds us. I don’t think we live alone in this world. I don’t mean other people, animals or bacteria…. I think our spheres of existence are much, much deeper, vaster and broader than we imagine. Our conscious mind is very limited, but if I put out a message: be it something I write, be it a prayer or a mantra… there is resonance. In the receiver (whoever that might be), in nature, in the broader spheres of existence that I prefer calling “the field”. The field makes it nearly sound like Star Wars (Hey, its May the 4th today!), but that’s not a bad comparison.

The field reacts to our actions. Even a thought or an emotion is an action.

The act of writing is an act of creation. It is an act of magic.

A writer is a magician, and the pen is his wand. The keyboard is his Ouja board.

Tu vas perdre toi-même !

Tu vas servir aux autres.

Pour leur bonheur, pas le tiens!

Il faut pas aimer.

Il faut aimer.

Tu vas perdre toi-même !

Tu vas servir aux autres.

Et leur bonheur sera le tiens.

Il faut aimer.

The funny thing about history is "hindsight".

In hindsight, things are clear(er), even though most of the time written by the victors. But for the most part, things felt very differently for people living through these times.

In our time and age especially, things don't happen as they apparently happened in the past. With a clear attack that launches a war, and everyone is aware: "we are at war now".

What adds to the problem is that our cultures, our brains, are now used to cinematic formats. If things don't happen in nearly real-time, or at least in digestable chunks (like, say, a 3 hour Peter Jackson movie), we often fail to realize what is actually happening.

Now, I don't have proof and I won't bother searching for and putting in sources and citations (tempus fugit), but I wouldn't be surprised if future generations would claim that World War 3 started - at the latest - in 2014, whith the illegal annexation of Crimea by Russia.

Already then the silence of the West was deafening, and we went of with our lives as if nothing had happened. We were already at war back then, but we didn't know it.

While Ukrainians, also those I knew at colleagues back then while working in Dublin, were acutely aware that this was only the beginning.

The peace loving people in most European countries warn already since the break-out of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine (which, other than the Crimea annexation, no one could pretend to ignore) that delivering weapons to Ukraine might "escalate" the war. They fear atomic bombs. They are cowards.

Like the Dark Lord Sauron in "The Lord of the Rings", Putin's power was growing over the years. At the beginning of his reign he looted Russia's economy, resources and political system. Once firmly established in power for good, he worked in the shadows. Many western politicians believed him a democrat at heart (like former German chancellor Schröder, who became dependent on Putin's grace after his political career - to a point where he refused reality even post-invasion of Ukraine). Like Sauron, he sent his secret agents into the west, and it seems that the current president of the United States Trump was recruited as a KGB agent even as early as in the 1990s. Putin must have made sure to bring him to his heel and make him his puppet - Trump's behaviour during his second term only makes sense in that light.

Which, again, is a parallel to the Lord of the Rings. Saruman the White, which could be symbolic for the USA as strongest and most important power of the West, became a turncoat and is now a puppet of Sauron/Putin.

The Free people of Europe (that is: Middle-Earth) must now gather their strengths, seek new allies, be smart and united - looking at the history of the European Union, which is basically an apparatus of bureaucrats, and of the constant disagreements between member-states, a nearly unsurmountable task.

In my opinion, only the "cutting the Gordian know" method can succeed here. Instead of making the EU ready for warfare, those countries of the West willing to withstand the evil from the east must form a new alliance, separate from the EU and NATO, a new military alliance without the US (and without Turkey), that does what it can to build up its army, amass atomic weapons in order to make one thing clear: should the Dark Lord attempt to attack us, he will also transform his country into a proper, real Mordor.

World War Three started properly in 2022 with Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Like it or not, we are at war and no one can say if it will end with a full-scale effort that will costs millions of lives or if we find ways of silencing the Dark Lord before his weapons and his hordes sweep over the old continent.

Today, February 12th 2025 at exactly 17:10 Paris time, Surya (Sun) enters into Kumbh (Aquarius) sign of the zodiac.

Kumbh Sankranti is for me a special time of year as my Lagna (Ascendant) is Kumbh and these past 2.5 years, my ascendant lord Saturn has therefore been transiting my first house. And I can say that the "me" before summer 2022 and the me of today have not too much in common - it was quite a transformational transit.

What's special for the past three years is that every transit of the Sun through the sign of Aquarius has been a particularly difficult one, as it also brought about a conjunction of two major celestial ennemies: the Sun and Saturn are not well together.

People born between the 11th of February and the 14th of March had probably particularly difficult day during this month between 2023 and 2025.

The Sun is the emperor, it's the absolute ruler and enforcer of a strict hierarchy. In the vedic tradition, Shani (Saturn) is a bastard son of the sun god Surya, and he rejects his father. Saturn is the big democrat of the sky, someone who wants that the rules apply to all and someone who does not recognise any hierarchy, especially not one that is not well merited through hard work and suffering: the birth lottery should not exist according to Saturn.

Also on the level of the five Bhutas (Pancha Bhuta), both are very different. While the Sun is hot and fiery, Saturn is the master of the element air, but in Saturn's case it's a cold and slow moving air. Talking of the ayurvedic doshas, Sun is fiery pitta and Saturn is vata.

The conjunction between Sun and Saturn happens annually, so it's obviously not the end of the world, but it's never an easy time. Especially versus the end of the transit, arount March 11, when the conjunction is at its strongest, the sun burns (combusts) Saturn and weakens him, all the while Saturn is in his own sign and dignity, so very strong.

Add the eclipses (lunar then solar) around that time and we're in for even mor turbulent times, also on the world and political scene (would you believe....).

In my personal case, the sun entering my ascendant sign at this time of year has another strong significance: on February 20th I start a new planetary sub-period. After nearly three years of a sub-period of Venus, a short but probably intense sub-period of the Sun will succeed, between then and the end of December.

While my main period of Mercury stays the same, my natal sun has some very important significations around my health and longevity, my inner transformation, my progress in the world of the occult, but also - looking at some of my divisional charts - for my ability to find and keep a job and to earn money, ultimately to get rid of very old and oppressing debt.

So my hopes are high for 2025: I do a lot of vedic (mantra and other) practices around the Sun, among others, and will re-inforce them now.

For those interested in Vedic Astrology or "Jyôtish", hit me up if you want to book a consultation. They are not free but I am reguarly told that they are powerful and transformative to my clients.

And if you want to learn more about the vedic conception of the Sun, I can recommend a short but insightful book that covers the major aspects of the Sun God Surya in vedic tradition, mythology, astrology and yoga.

Sarva Mangalam!

tl;dr As "Hakim" I applied for 156 jobs within 7 months and got 2 first round interviews. With the fake name "Joaquim" I got 4 interviews within 2 weeks.

Please spread. I don't think my story will ever go viral, which is a shame because people need to be aware of this, especially here in #France and #Germany where this one applies.

I'm a 49 year old white male with German looks (50% of my DNA is German, from my mother's side). I also grew up in Germany and even after 13 years living and working in #Ireland, and now 5 years in #Paris, as soon as I say something in English or French, people go like "Ah, you're German!".

I love good food, craft beer and wine, a good scotch whiskey is for me the perfect ending to a perfect evening (well, the perfect family safe ending to it anyways). Just to point out the obvious: I'm not a #Muslim. I never even saw the insides of a Mosque (or of the Quran, for what it's worth).

All that said - my official first name tells a different story, and while I didn't really encounter racism while growing up (remember? German looks!), that all changed when I became part of the "job world".

Because, you know, my first name is "Hakim", proudly given to me by my #Algerian - #French father when he was still young in the 70s and didn't think twice about what that could do to his child.

Back in 2006/2007 Germany, despite having finished a commercial apprenticeship pre-University and having done my masters with the highest possible marks, after around 100 job applications, I gave up - I had exact 0 interview invites.

So I put an English version of my CV online and also marked that I'm open to work in the UK and in Ireland.

Recruiters started to flood my inbox and on a fateful Easter Monday in 2007, a headhunter from Google Ireland sent me an innocent looking email wondering if I was willing to come work for Google in Dublin.

At first I thought this must be spam, but it looked legit, sender address and all, so I wrote back. Several phone, three on-site interviews and 4 months later and my wife, our guinea pigs, our turtle and I packed all our belongings and moved from Stuttgart to Dublin.

I became a Googler! A dream I didn't even know I had come true!

The next 13 years I lived and worked in Dublin. 9 years at Google, where I started as an Associate Account Manager end left as a Senior Sales Manager and Agency Lead, 1 short year at Indeed (didn't enjoy the culture) and 2 years at what was then just Facebook. During all that time I had job challenges, but they had to do with good and bad managers, senior leadership decisions and my own job performance. Nothing more and nothing less.

After 13 years in Ireland we decided in 2019 that we do not want to grow old there. And hey, didn't I have to passports? And look, rent in central Paris is really cheap (haha, the Irish salary and rental prices perspective!), let's be bold and move to Paris! Hurray!

It was actually easier than I expected. Found an apartment a stone throw from the Eiffel tower, and while my wife was working and living in Paris with our pets (the turtle was still there, the guinea pigs had morphed into cats), my job at Facebook was still in Dublin, so I spent every second weekend in Paris.

And then #covid19 hit. A blessing in disguise for us, as it allowed me to work from home, so of course I went to Paris just in time for the lockdowns and while at it, decided to leave Facebook and join the start-up space. Everything seemed possible and a friend working at a Swiss-Irish start-up had asked me to jump on board.

Things were good, but then... I didn't enjoy myself at that job and started to look for a Paris based one, or one back in Germany.

I somehow never found a full-time job with a French or German company, with one exception, but that only lasted 8 months.

When I lost that job in February 2024, I started to apply for jobs all over Europe, but especially in France and Germany, like crazy.

I already had my suspicions, but this time I hit rock-bottom. No one even wanted to speak with me. Despite my very strong CV. I was sure that my name must have something to do with it.

I went to my local "town hall" here in the 7th arrondissement of Paris where I live and demanded the addition of a new, second first name. In my case, Joaquim, to honour my father's male ancestors who were Spanish descendents. My grand-father (who I never met) was Joaquin.

Anyways, the officials at the town hall received me with ridicule. I had no proof of discrimination, and by the way, unless I could prove that I am already using that name in some shape or form (they suggested a gym membership under that new name!), my demand would be hopeless.

And so it was - a couple of weeks later I received a letter of decline. They did not believe that I had any disadvantage as "Hakim" in France.

I then decided, and this was in September 2024, to do what I was told: to start using that name in official ways. I changed my name from "Hakim" to "Joaquim" on LinkedIn and on my CVs.

The difference was staggering.

Between February and August 2024, so in the span of seven months, I applied to 156 job openings. Which led only to two (!), I repeat, 2 first interview invites (side-note: with a US and a Dutch company).

After changing my name to Joaquim, and after 20 or so applications in the span of only 2 weeks, I had 4 interview invites in my inbox.

It continues to go well and I am now counting to find a new job within the next couple of weeks.

But the main story here is that no one, really fucking no one believed me!

When I told the officials at the unemployment office (#FranceTravail) that I don't think that as Hakim I will find a job, I was met with ridicule. "Mais non, Monsieur!". I would imagine things. Times had changed etc..

They have not!

Hiring is deeply biased. Racism is EVERYWHERE. And a CV bearing an Islamic sounding name gets sorted out. A name sounding European / Christian gets more attention.

It is that simple.

Please spread my story.

Contact me if you are a journalist and think we can make this a story to hit the public.

I don't want to do another LinkedIn post. These usually have little resonance or consequence.

I want this to feature in journals, magazines or newspapers. A TV show.

I want this to become a topic people talk about.

Where to start?

The world seems to fall apart. Again.

Of course it never really does. Even the darkest times have ended. And while the horror clown is back in power, this time with a league of billionaire sycophants kissing is orange ass - this too shall pass.

Of course it will be very difficult four years. For people unfortunate enough to live in the US, because they will be under this lunatic.

For the rest of us because his Crazyness will dominate the news. I'm really sick and tired of this asshole.

We should be better as a race. We should be further.

Growing up in the 80s and 90s (the 70s I was too young and barely remember) I always assumed that the future will be awesome. That technological advancements will go hand in hand with a more and more "enlightened" species.

We would get our shit together, find unity, increase global prosperity and conquer the stars.

Yeah, conquer the stars, my arse.

We were so blinded by visions like Star Trek that the biggest scammers of them all enticed us with visions of clean cars and a mission to Mars. The stuff of dreams...

... until it wasn't. And all the dystopian nightmares of 20th century authors seem to come true, all at once.

Right now, the US seems to slip into a "Handmaid's tale" meets "1984" and "Blade Runner" direction that nobody really wanted. It makes me wish for a "Terminator" future where AI takes over and wipes us all out.

What a time to be alive...

Wait, didn't I start on a positive note?

Well... I admit looking at the short-term future is depressive. The achievements that took decades of activism to finally come true are being stripped off within minutes, it seems.

But this is only temporary. If, and that is a capital letter IF, I admit, if there will be fair, free and democratic elections in four year's time, things might change again.

Of course, other indicators I follow (coughs and it sounds like *jyotish*) indicate that around 2030 (coincidentally the same time when quantum computing will crack all our passwords and kill cryptocurrencies) a big, global war will first bring terrible pain, loss and destruction especially to the Western hemisphere (US, Europe) of the world. And that institutions like the UN and the EU will most likely cease to exist in their current form. But the Jyotish practitioners formulating such claims underline that it's an important step towards a more evolved, more peaceful and more humane world. Where capitalism takes a step back and we finally get some of our shit together as a global people.

Last night I had strange dreams of other dimensions, Zombies and cats and... time spent with the Trumps.

I sat next to Melania and while talking to me she pulled out a pair of small scissors and cut off a strand of my hair, only to put it neatly into a plastic wrapping, next to many other hair strands of different people.

I was quick to realise her Voodoo shenanigans and to point out that I practice powerful counter-magic, rendering her efforts to control me utterly useless.

Donald, in the meantime, was sitting to my right and all he did was pulling stupid faces and touching people inappropriately in their face while they spoke.

Some deep truths hidden in a lot of blah with a punch of vanity and obvious fraud.

This is not an easy topic. There are multiple sides to consider, I will take the approach from my own biography to explain my very mixed feelings towards this book. While part of me is a very rational, science focused person, another part of me is deeply involved in ancient wisdom traditions, both of the orient and occident. I have first-hand insight into vedic tantric practices and traditions as well as into the occult traditions of the west, namely of the "Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn" practices (the hidden ones, not the ones you find in books or on websites) and I know that "they work", even if the reason they do work might be different from what these organisations and traditions claim the "truth" is.

Another aspect is my academic background (I hold a Master degree in [comparative] Religious Studies, with a special focus on new religious movements and cults), which of course helps me in numerous ways to "zoom out" and not get caught up in belief systems that always narrow one's mind and objectivity.

I had studied the religious-economic complex that is the "New Age" movement and Joe Dispenza's book clearly falls into that (wide) bracket of things.

Let's start with what I really dislike about this book:

Too much repetition, too long, badly structured Reading this book is partly very painful, because it is full of endless repetitions of concepts and the author seems to like writing long paragraphs repeating and repeating things. The useful meditation techniques are hidden gems that one has to 'bookmark' in order to find them again, and best write the essential part into an external journal so they are actually practicable. Every chapter repeats a lot of content of previous chapters and I had the impression that part of the reason behind this (other than the fact that 'repetition drives ad recall') is an underlying urge of the author to re-assure himself and his audience about the legitimacy of what he is proposing, again and again. It's boring and time consuming and it made me stop reading for weeks on multiple accounts.

In short, reading this book is a drag! 2. Too much "technobabble"! The author obviously is at least well informed about the ancient wisdom traditions that I mentioned above. I wouldn't be surprised if he is a member of diverse occult orders or at least a practitioner of some of these traditions. Yet in his book they get zero reference. All he does is coming from his own, apparently "scientific" background and displaying everything he shows in a way that seems as if he is the genius behind all of this. Which can't be true. He obviously stands on the shoulder of giants and connects dots between the occult and his scientific past. But he's not transparent about his sources. Instead, and I assume partly for marketing and sales reasons, he spins his own narrative, invents his own terminology and "system" and makes it appear as if he unearthed all these things. This is, in my opinion, not helping his agenda and I can only assume that he wants to avoid at all cost to be put into the "magic and new age" category.

3. Insistence on all of this being "science" and a pinch of vanity. He seems to try and cover up the obvious fraud behind all of it. What I find pathetic: even his website is "drjoedispenza". Really? Dude, you left the scientific community the moment you entered the New Age complex! But he seems aware of it - on Google it becomes evident that he puts a lot of energy into SEO and avoiding the existence of even a Wikipedia article about him (at the time of writing this review, only a Spanish language one, very short, exists, which is strange). He made sure that the first search result page on Google is full of links that seem to underline his narrative of being a scientist who helps people unlock their power.

One has to dig deeper and pro-actively look for criticism on Joe Dispenza in order to find out that he is a fraud - he is NOT a neuroscientist, an impression he creates in his book also by referencing again and again the many brain scans featuring across that volume, but a Chiropractor fallen from grace and losing his license. He is, in fact, a prime example of an aspiring cult leader, making a ton of money from running "retreats" and charging money for his meditation techniques. It gets worse. While his book is full of success stories about people "realizing their dreams" and also finding healing, there are news stories out there about people dying of cancer because they preferred his teaching over chemotherapy…

So, is there any good in it? Well, that's the problem: yes. Provided one has the stamina to read through tons of technobabble and repetitive claims of "science" behind the exercises and those endless "brain scans" that apparently prove how his "students" (he should call them "clients", really, but that would be too obvious, wouldn't it?) changed their brain waves during meditations etc…

Some of the exercises and concepts he explains are actually based in techniques and concepts one can find in hindu / vedic tantrism, and, even more so, in the meditation and visualization exercises of higher degrees of the "Golden Dawn" occult secret society.

But I admit he has a way to "update" these exercises and make them vividly accessible to a modern day audience, and that is the only credit I would give him.

If one can skim through this book, take notes of the "How to" of the exercises and then actually integrate them into a daily practice, one can most possibly benefit from it.

Because the "golden classics" of the Dr. (again…) Joseph Murphy initiated "positive thinking" movement are only moderately effective. The unique value of Joe Dispenza's contribution, as I see it, lies in how he changes from static mantra repetitions and visualizations of images into his "mind movies" concept, and marries it with not only siting, but also standing and walking meditation.

Creating a desirable future using the law of attraction (which is, in fact, just a way to re-program ones mindset and let go of harmful believes and trauma, leading to better decision making and increasing the possibility of success going forward, also by changing one's behavior in everyday situations) is in fact more powerful if one moves away from simple 'images and words' and goes "full 3D, even 4D", immersing oneself, also with enough elevated emotions, into a vision of a desired future that transcends the past and the present.

The above paragraph is, from my point of view, actually all that this book is about, but that's of course not enough to sell courses, retreats and workshops, is it?