I went into the Witching Hour workshop having the intent of having a relaxing, laid-back time. The description entailed laying on the ground with pillows and a blanket. What did I have to lose?

What I wasn’t expecting was the soul-cleansing, self-transcendent work I would be doing on myself. This workshop had me so deep in my feels, I thought I was never going to come out of them.

For the first fifteen minutes or so, the workshop instructor philosophized on how us humans go through our life journeys all fighting an internal war for peace.

We can’t seem to let go of hard experiences of the past, letting them linger in our present mind and taint our perspective. No matter how much pain it brings, we find ourselves clinging onto repressed memories and emotions instead of simply letting go.

The way he broke down the human condition and the suffering it entails definitely had me deep in reflection. He discussed the spectrum of emotion that life entails. The negative side of this spectrum consists of fear. He stressed how any negative emotion, thought process, or

perception we hold is all rooted in fear.

Since I will be graduating this semester and have been filled with a deep dread and anxiety of what the future holds, this struck a chord deep within me.

The claustrophobic and anxious emotions I’ve been experiencing, the stressful thoughts of finding a job, it all boils down to fear. Fear of the future, fear of the unknown, fear of screwing up, its the causation of all the suffering I find myself under.

It is through its opposing force of love, however, that this fear can be washed away. He stressed the importance of seeing everything as divine. Even though a person, experience, or emotion currently facing you may have a negative feeling connected to it, we must look for the silver lining in it all.

In addition to seeking guidance and insight through love and positivity, some individuals may turn to psychic readings as a way to gain clarity and perspective on their fears and anxieties. While some may be hesitant to try psychic readings due to skepticism or uncertainty, Get a Free Online Psychic Reading and it can be a great way to explore this practice without committing to a full session. By connecting with a trusted and experienced psychic, individuals can receive personalized insights and guidance on how to move forward with confidence and courage. Whether facing a difficult decision, a major life transition or simply seeking a deeper understanding of oneself and the world around us, psychic readings can offer a unique and valuable perspective on our fears and uncertainties.

At the end of the day, we are all still standing strong after all of the hardships we have faced in our past.

Through this workshop, he aimed to tune our collective mind to the all healing love frequency, and to come to peace with ourselves and the outside world. For the past 400 or so years, these giant bronze bells have been the door to the love dimension, getting used by spiritual healers and shamans across the globe.

Regardless of your spiritual views or religious affiliation, you can’t help but feel the power of these gongs. For 45 minutes, I laid back on the Englert Theatre stage, and let these sounds reverberate through my body and mind. If we’re being real here, I completely lost track of time and where I was because I was so washed away by these resonant sounds.

It seemed like a 15 minute experience at tops, and I was literally soaring through my mind and imagination like a madman. It may have been because I was tired and a bit hungover, but that is of course besides the point.

I couldn’t help but feel spiritually cleansed walking out of the Englert theater after this workshop, feeling much lighter on my feet and with a fresh, healthier perspective.

The post Witching Hour : Doorway to Intuition: Gong Bath and Sound Healing Meditation @ Englert Theatre 10/21/2017 appeared first on KRUI Radio.

If you consider yourself a fan of horror films, you have probably seen some pretty messed up stuff. You have seen so many limbs cut off, eyes gouged out, and demonic possession-enhanced projectile vomit that these things don’t even affect you anymore.

Whenever I’m talking to my friends, coworkers, or even my wife, I feel like I have to avoid divulging the most juicy details for fear of people thinking I am a serial killer. There is a reason why no one liked Gabe from The Office.

“Why do you watch so much fucked up shit?” This is a question I have heard and asked myself the many times. I honestly don’t know. I just find it entertaining. No other genre of movie requires such defending. No one asks me why I watch comedies or action movies. The answers are obvious: I like laughing and watching shit blow up. So allow me to get a little meta-cognitive on you and figure out just why people enjoy watching horror movies.

Like comedies and action movies, there seems to be an obvious answer: people like scary movies because they like to be scared. Not necessarily scared all the time, but in a controlled setting. While that may be the case for some people, it’s not always the case for me. I will visit a haunted house around Halloween or have a prolonged stay with my in-laws to get that feeling of primal fear, but I don’t usually get it in movies. That primordial rush of terror some get when viewing spooky stuff may be reason enough to enjoy horror movies, but I think there is more there. Perhaps there is a more personal link.

When I ask what types of movies scare people the most, I generally get a similar answer: films that portray our real life fears. Home invasion movies (The Strangers), films involving personal paranoia (Enemy), or movies that center around our more modern insecurities (Unfriended). Hush, a 2016 Netflix offering is a great new example of this very real type of fear people get when watching scary movies. In the film, a deaf-mute author retreats to the woods to finish her next book, where she is stalked and attacked by an unknown assailant. The film plays on our fears of the unknown with both the killer and the isolated setting, as well as the extremely uncomfortable feeling we get when our personal space is violated. The fact that our protagonist cannot speak or hear makes the danger even more threatening. The film was a triumph, and many people would likely agree with the fact that is was, indeed, scary. I found the film to be taut with tension, creepiness, and even riveting at times, but never truly scary.

Maybe I’m just broken. After being exposed to The Evil Dead around the age of five by my mom (what the fuck was she thinking), perhaps I just don’t scare easy when it comes to movies. Or maybe I’m not looking to be frightened. I like to think I’m looking for new experiences or gut reactions that I have never found in other types of films. When you watch a Cristopher Nolan movie, you want to come away with this intangible sense of awe along with the feeling that you are not 100% sure what just happened in the past two hours. When you watch a Guy Ritchie film, you want to be lost in a slick and darkly comic world where, yeah, people die left and right, but it’s all in good fun.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PNLVp66leng

It’s the same with horror movies. Some aim for pure terror, a feeling you are not going to get nearly anywhere else, unless you are a professional skydiver with short-term memory loss. Think Hellraiser, The Conjuring, or Dead  Silence. Other horror movies aim for something similar, but not necessarily for mile-a-minute scares. It Follows doesn’t attempt to shock you with gory visuals, jump scares, or the other common horror tropes. The film aims for a more perilous sense of dread. In doing so the film relies on more open shots compared to the claustrophobic nature of most horror films. Rosemary’s Baby is another movie that is not trying to terrify its audience. It’s a slow burn picture focused on the paranoia of its lead actor, and as such, functions not only as a horror film but also as a character-driven drama.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, there are horror comedies. Movies that are meant to make you laugh while simultaneouly questioning your moral fiber for thinking that a guy being fed to a wood chipper was funny in the first place. That simultaneous feeling of unease and amusement is a good thing! We all saw Inside Out, so we know our most memorable experiences are not comprised of one emotion. If a movie makes you sense something new, I think you should embrace it, no matter how weird, horrific, or unnatural it may be. We grow primarily through new experiences, and I think that horror films are a quick and effective, if not always easy, method for getting these new experiences. So go ahead and queue up a scary movie. And if you think all my talk on “feelings” and “new experiences” is bullshit, at least you’ll be scared (maybe)!

Watch and Talk is an alternative look at film. It is a column that discusses movies from all different genres. Movies are not necessarily reviewed, they are simply talked about. Watch and Talk looks at not only the entertainment value of various films, but also the cultural aspects and impacts that films can have.

The post Watch and Talk: Why Do We Like Horror? appeared first on KRUI Radio.