KŪKAI is a visually stunning documentary that brings to the screen the remarkable story of Kūkai, one of the most influential figures in Japanese cultural history. In 804 AD, he traveled from Japan to Tang China in search of knowledge, beginning a journey that would leave a lasting mark on art, learning, and cultural life across East Asia.
REVIEW: No. This is the worst kind of hagiography. We saw it in Beverly Hills on Sunday as part of its pre-release screening. It is as faith-based as it gets, and Japan is already infamous for its uber faith (bhakti) path Nichiren Buddhism. In the struggle between tariki and jiriki, it goes over the top that magic, mantra, and mumbo-jumbo are the path. It's not the Path the historical Buddha taught, and anyone could see that with the slightest amount of study. Faith (saddha, confidence, conviction) is an important step in walking the Path, but blind faith or an overdependence on some other force in the universe being invoked to come save us, it's not what the Buddha taught. It seems the antithesis of his message to a suffering world. The Dharma (Dhamma) is all about taking a good look at reality and our responsibility for ourselves. We're in this mess, we're keeping ourselves in this mess, and we have to make the effort (with help) to awaken ourselves. This is not a do-it-yourself project, but it is certainly not a Brahminical tantric secret of hocus pocus and everything working out. There were six "heretical" teachers and popular pernicious wrong views at the time of the historical Buddha. And he taught the Net of All-Embracing Views (Brahmajala Sutta) to counter those wrong views and bring about right view, the first factor or limb of the Ennobling Eightfold Path. What's wrong with this movie? What's right with it? Create a mechanical looking lead who never speaks, use a thundering "God voice" in classical Chinese with untranslated Sanskrit terms when they could easily be shown in English in parentheses, leave females out of 99% of the story, only including them as a footnote of grateful praying sycophants. Use AI to make the whole historical tale seem like a bad, one-sided fiction.
Woman who can see without her eyes leaves Danny Jones speechless | Dalia Burgoin
(Danny Jones Clips) Oct. 17, 2025: Can humans really “see” while blindfolded?
This episode shows Dalia Burgoin—a psionic woman who demonstrates mindsight vision under test-like conditions.
👁️🗨️
We take a walk-through what mindsight claims to be, how this session is set up, and what to watch for if curious and skeptical. See Dalia attempt tasks without visual input, while the ground rules are explained, potential cues, and the exact steps used to reduce bias.
There's no hype—just a clear look at the method and the results.
What's covered?
What “psionic” and “mindsight” mean in plain English
Why blindfold testing matters (and common pitfalls)
What counts as a real “hit” vs. lucky guess
How attention, memory, and pattern recognition might influence outcomes
Where claims like this fit within broader ESP and perception research
Whether a believer, skeptic, or just curious, let’s have a fair, transparent walkthrough designed for everyday viewers—no advanced science degree required.
By the end, know how to evaluate demonstrations like this and what questions to ask next.
🧪
Enjoy balanced, easy-to-follow breakdowns of unusual human abilities?
Young students of fraudulent Indian sex cult guruNithyananda also demonstrated this ability and reported to us that they really did learn this ability. They did not seem to regard it as "magic" but rather as a normal human capacity that can be learned. The physically blind need not be blind, just as a man may make sounds and learn (by the brain restructuring itself with consistent practice) echolocation. Those children showed us this ability at Wisdom Quarterly and displayed it in front of hundreds of faithful Hindu onlookers at the now defunct Nithyananda Ashram on the outskirts of Los Angeles County East.
“Jagadis Chandra Bose’s wireless inventions antedated [preceded] those of Marconi.” [Bose was the Tesla of India in England, with a lab at Cambridge, inventing the most sensitive instruments of his day. Marconi is credited with developing the radio and wireless telegraph.]
Overhearing this provocative remark, I walked closer to a sidewalk group of professors engaged in scientific discussion. If my motive in joining them was racial [Indian] pride, I regret it. I cannot deny my keen interest in evidence that India can play a leading part in physics, and not metaphysics alone.
“What do you mean, sir?”
Read the original first edition.
The professor obligingly explained. “Bose was the first one to invent a wireless coherer and an instrument for indicating the refraction of electric waves. But the Indian scientist did not exploit his inventions commercially. He soon turned his attention from the inorganic to the organic world. His revolutionary discoveries as a plant physiologist are outpacing even his radical achievements as a physicist.”
I politely thanked my mentor. He added, “The great scientist is one of my brother professors at Presidency College.”
I paid a visit the next day to the sage at his home, which was close to mine on Gurpar Road. I had long admired him from a respectful distance. The grave and retiring botanist greeted me graciously. He was a handsome, robust man in his fifties, with thick hair, broad forehead, and the abstracted eyes of a dreamer. The precision in his tones revealed the lifelong scientific habit.
If John Travolta were a genius (Phenomenon)
Journeys with Plant Spirits
“I have recently returned from an expedition to scientific societies of the West. Their members exhibited intense interest in delicate instruments of my invention which demonstrate the indivisible unity of all life.1 The Bose crescograph has the enormity of ten million magnifications. The microscope enlarges only a few thousand times; yet it brought vital impetus to biological science. The crescograph opens incalculable vistas.”
“You have done much, sir, to hasten the embrace of East and West in the impersonal arms of science.”
“I was educated at Cambridge. How admirable is the Western method of submitting all theory to scrupulous experimental verification! That empirical procedure has gone hand in hand with the gift for introspection which is my Eastern heritage. Together they have enabled me to sunder the silences of natural realms long uncommunicative. The telltale charts of my crescograph [2] are evidence for the most skeptical that plants have a sensitive nervous system and a varied emotional life. Love, hate, joy, fear, pleasure, pain, excitability, stupor, and countless appropriate responses to stimuli are as universal in plants as in animals.”
“The unique throb of life in all creation could seem only poetic imagery before your advent, Professor! A saint I once knew would never pluck flowers. ‘Shall I rob the rosebush of its pride in beauty? Shall I cruelly affront its dignity by my rude divestment?’ His sympathetic words are verified literally through your discoveries!”
“The poet is intimate with truth, while the scientist approaches awkwardly. Come someday to my laboratory and see the unequivocable testimony of the crescograph.”
What secrets do plants hold?
Gratefully I accepted the invitation, and took my departure. I heard later that the botanist had left Presidency College, and was planning a research center in Calcutta.
When the Bose Institute was opened, I attended the dedicatory services. Enthusiastic hundreds strolled over the premises. I was charmed with the artistry and spiritual symbolism of the new home of science. Its front gate, I noted, was a centuried relic from a distant shrine. Behind the lotus3 fountain, a sculptured female figure with a torch conveyed the Indian respect for woman as the immortal light-bearer. The garden held a small temple consecrated to the Noumenon beyond phenomena. Thought of the divine incorporeity was suggested by absence of any altar-image.
Bose’s speech on this great occasion might have issued from the lips of one of the inspired ancient rishis.
“I dedicate today this Institute as not merely a laboratory but a temple.” His reverent solemnity stole like an unseen cloak over the crowded auditorium. “In the pursuit of my investigations I was unconsciously led into the border region of physics and physiology. To my amazement, I found boundary lines vanishing, and points of contact emerging, between the realms of the living and the non-living. Inorganic matter was perceived as anything but inert; it was athrill under the action of multitudinous forces.
“A universal reaction seemed to bring metal, plant and animal under a common law. They all exhibited essentially the same phenomena of fatigue and depression, with possibilities of recovery and of exaltation, as well as the permanent irresponsiveness associated with death. Filled with awe at this stupendous generalization, it was with great hope that I announced my results before the Royal Society—results demonstrated by experiments. But the physiologists present advised me to confine myself to physical investigations, in which my success had been assured, rather than encroach on their preserves. I had unwittingly strayed into the domain of an unfamiliar caste system and so offended its etiquette.
“An unconscious theological bias was also present, which confounds ignorance with faith. It is often forgotten that He who surrounded us with this ever-evolving mystery of creation has also implanted in us the desire to question and understand. Through many years of miscomprehension, I came to know that the life of a devotee of science is inevitably filled with unending struggle. It is for him to cast his life as an ardent offering—regarding gain and loss, success and failure, as one. More (crystalclarity.com)
Ancient Buddhist monks found alive in remote Himalayas: Experts fear what they’re guarding
In Lhasa, Tibet, 1924
(Voyager) April 28, 2025: In the remote, icy Himalayan peaks, ancient monks have been reportedly found alive, sitting in deep meditation and untouched by time. These mysterious figures, seemingly defying death, have sparked awe and fear among experts. What secrets are they guarding, and why are they hidden in isolation? Whispers of divine rituals and ancient relics have surfaced, leaving the world to wonder if these monks hold knowledge that could reshape humanity—or destroy it. What lies beyond the veil of their silence? #Voyager Subscribe ➡ @voyagerspace
For centuries Tibet has been known as the last home of mystery [excluding the even more mysterious Bhutan, Sikkim, and to some extent Nepal], the hidden, sealed land, where ancient mysteries still survive that have perished in the rest of the Orient (Asia).
Many people have written about Tibet and its secret lore, but few have actually penetrated it to learn its ancient wisdom. Among those few was Madame Alexandra David-Neel, a French Orientalist.
A practicing Western Buddhist, a profound historian of religion, and linguist, she actually lived in Tibet for more than 14 years.
She had the great honor of being received by the 14th Dalai Lama;
she studied philosophical Buddhism and Tibetan Tantra at Tibet's great centers;
she meditated in lonely caves and on wind-swept winter mountains with yogi hermits; and
she witnessed forbidden corpse-magic in the forests.
Magic and Mystery in Tibet tells the story of her experiences on the Rooftop of the World, among lamas and magicians.
It is neither a travel book nor an autobiography but a study of psychic discovery, a description of the occult and mystical theories and psychic training practices of Tibet.
She tells of great sages and sorcerers that she met, of the system of monastic education, the great teachers and their disciples, Tibetan folklore about their spiritual athletes, reincarnation (rebirth) and memory from previous lives.
She also discusses elaborate magical rites to obtain the siddhis (supernormal powers), the horrible necromantic magic of the pre-Buddhist Bonpa shamas (Bon shamans), mental visualization exercises to create disembodied thought forms (tulpas), visions, strange phenomena derived from physical yoga postures, control of the body-heat mechanism (tumo), breathing exercises; sending “messages on the wind,” and much similar material.
An unusual aspect of Madame David-Neel’s book is that she herself experienced many of the phenomena she describes, yet she describes them with precision and in a matter-of-fact manner, permitting the reader to draw his own conclusions about validity, interpretation in terms of psychology, and value.
Particularly interesting for the modern experiencer are her detailed instructions for tumo (the yoga of heat control) and the creation of thought projections. More
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Author becomes an adept in Tibet, 1933
At the age of 18, Alexandra David-Néel had already visited England, Switzerland, and Spain on her own, and she was studying in Madame Blavatsky's Theosophical Society.
"She joined various secret societies – she would reach the thirtieth degree in the mixed Scottish Rite of Freemasonry – while [both] feminist and anarchist groups greeted her with enthusiasm...
"Throughout her childhood and adolescence, she was associated with the French geographer and anarchist Elisée Reclus (1820–1905). This led her to become interested in the anarchistic ideas of the time and in feminism, that inspired her to publish Pour la vie (For Life) in 1898.
"In 1899, she composed an anarchist treatise with a preface by Reclus. Publishers did not dare to publish the book, though her friend Jean Haustont printed copies himself and it was eventually translated into five languages."
In 1891, she visited India for the first time and met her spiritual preceptor, Swami Bhaskarananda Saraswati of Varanasi [7].
She was 21 years old when she converted to Buddhism in 1889, according to Raymond Brodeur, which she noted in her diary published under the title La Lampe de sagesse (The Lamp of Wisdom) in 1896. More
Shocking superpowers beyond human limits science can't explain
(GlobeGo) Premiered Nov. 2, 2024: Welcome to GlobeGo, which dives deeply into the world’s most mind-bending mysteries. This travel documentary uncovers the secrets of strange people who seem to violate the laws of physics. Yes, that's right — bizarre individuals defy science in ways no one can yet explain. From impossible strength to mind-boggling speed, some people violate the norm with superhuman feats beyond imagination. How do they do it? What hidden truths lie behind their supernatural powers? Join the journey into the unknown and witness some of them. It may lead some to question reality.
Key Moments
00:27 Number 21: Rickshaw saver violating the laws of physics
01:21 Number 20: The mystic who survived without food and water
03:09 Number 19. The Iceman Wim Hoff
05:06 Number 18. The girl with X-ray vision
06:31 Number 17. The Monkey King
07:14 Number 16. The King Tooth
08:36 Number 15. The Rubber Boy
09:26 Number 14. Man with the Stretchiest Skin
10:31 Number 13. The Magnet Man
11:44 Number 12. The Battery Man
13:21 Number 11. The Wolverine
14:11 Number 10. Telekinetic office worker
15:36 Number 9. The Bee Man
17:26 Number 8. The Masai jumpers
18:59 Number 7. Children who see like dolphins
20:48 Number 6. Buddhist monks who warm their bodies with just their minds
22:38 Number 5. Indian chef with magic (fireproof) hands
24:11 Number 4. The lion whisperer
25:20 Number 3. Teleportation girl
26:19 Number 2. The fastest human calculator
27:16 Number 1. The incredible memory
👇 Watch more fascinating videos about cultures and people around the world: 👇
People who are at another level | amazing skills and talents
(Retrocast) Sept. 22, 2024: People who practiced to progress are now at another level altogether with these amazing skills and talents. Subscribe: @retrocast1
(SLICE) TIBET, Himalayas, the Rooftop of the World. The Buddhist nun Ani Rigsang has chosen a nomadic lifestyle in the Land of White Clouds.
Feminine power is divine
On the occasion of International Women's Day, SLICE wanted to portray the quest of a very special and courageous woman, who decided to leave everything behind -- her safe life as a nun in a convent in the city of the capital Lhasa -- to pursue her dream to find a hidden convent on sacred ground [with energy vortices] in Eastern Tibet where they still practice an ancient teaching called the “Yoga of Magic Heat.”
With breathtaking shots, director Hamid Sardar accompanies Ven. Rigsang as she makes her way through Tibet (overtaken by communist China), from snowy mountains to green valleys, from Buddhist monastery to Buddhist monastery.
This is a short extract from the documentary “Tibet, the Path to Wisdom”
directed by Hamid Sardar. Produced by DreamCatcherMotionProductions, les gens bien productions, France Télévisions & Ushuaïa TV.
The nuns of Gebchak Abbey
Rainbow Body in Gebchak Nunnery (Guru Rinpoche Bumo, Jan. 14, 2024) Homage to the accomplished yoginīs of Gebchak Abbey in Eastern Tibet. Nuns give advice on obtaining the rainbow body through the practices of tummö (inner heat generation) and trekchö ("cutting through").
Video posted for cultural, educational, and spiritual purposes only. All of its contents, visuals, images, audio, and music used belong to their respective owners. May all living beings benefit! See full video: • Tibet, The Path to Wisdom | SLICE from the SLICE documentary "Tibet, the Path to Wisdom" by Hamid Sardar.
ABOUT: TRACKS publishes unique, unexpected, and untold stories from across the world every week. Facebook: trackstravelchannel. Content licensed from Sky Vision. Any queries, please contact: owned-enquiries@littledotstudios.com.
ABOUT: SLICE wants to fill viewers with curiosity.
Accessible to anyone from anywhere at any time, this channel is a weekly dose of short docs about curious facts, discoveries, astounding info, unusual stories that are weird, fun, and instructive. Be smart and have a slice!
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Ani Rigsang, Hamid Sardar, SLICE, March 8, 2022; Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson, Pat Macpherson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly
Ancient Aliens: Otherworldly Magic and Witchcraft from Outer Space
They gave Maria Orsic her oracular powers
(HISTORY) Oct. 26, 2023: Where did the origins of "magic" begin? Could it be that angelic (deva) and demonic (asura) light beings came to earth to give secrets to humanity that have served as a blessing and a curse in accordance with how we have used them? See more in this compilation from Ancient Aliens.
D. Copperfield; Mystic Knights; Dhr. Seven, Jen (Dharma Bud Meditation), Wisdom Quarterly
Who could fly, even with stage wires, across the great expanse of the smaller U.S. Grand Canyon or the far larger though far less famous Copper Canyon of Mexico? Not a trickster magician.
First we get still, then stillness sets in.
Wisdom Quarterly has always been interested in one magic feat above the others: the possibility of real yogic levitation. This is achievable through successful stillness (samadhi)meditation. But what does it take to still the mind, to still thought, to still the heart, to still emotions, memories, intrusive thoughts and feelings, loops, ruminating, planning, distractions, monkey mind frenzy, restlessness, sleepiness, laziness, lassitude, boredom, inattentiveness, ADHD, yearning, pining, speculating, skepticism, in brief, the many and varied manifestations of the Five Hindrances?
The goal is not control. It's not being controlled.
Those are the first five obstacles to even remaining on the cushion to begin to get still. Stillness temporarily purifies the mind/heart so that coherence can set in, when everything is in its place and doing its thing. That is the beginning of samma-samadhi, what we have for so long been misled to think means "right concentration." Unfortunately, in English, "concentration" seems like a doing, an intentional act, a strain, a holding of the breath, gritting of the teeth, a strong determination, and force... It may be. But this is not samadhi.Samadhi requires no hard doing, only allowing, accepting, awareness of what is (not embellishing, distorting, or departing the scene for some place more interesting or stimulating, more pleasant or profound). Be here now. It's so simple, it's impossible at the beginning. Just "be"? No, but LET IT BE. Allow. Exhale. Find contentment in this moment.
Right Concentration: Jhanas (L. Brasington)
Rest. It begins with calm, and calm begins with relaxation that is founded on simply letting things be just as they are and radically accepting them. Stay (rather than departing).
Mindfulness (sati) is wakefulness, bare (unembellished, undistorted) awareness of what is, whatever it is, vigilance (keeping a vigil), coming back again and again (if by habit the mind turns away in search of sensuality, anger/aversion, restless states, drowsiness, or skeptical disquietude).
Begin with quiet. If we are quiet on the inside, it will be easy to be quiet on the outside. Therefore, be quiet on the outside until the inside quietens. This will be the first step to the first absorption, being pulled into the object of meditation (the breath or whatever it is).
When there is no this-and-that but only that being with this (a nonduality between that meditation object over there and this meditator over here because of being so absorbed, so interested, so zesty for the sweet release of calm and bliss, piti (rapture). Stay with it. It gets better. Bliss increases. Then next bliss loses its charm, and calm is better. And next stillness is better. These first four stages are the ingredients of a solid foundation for learning to meditate.
And this is odd. We meditate to learn to meditate. That is, we let the natural happen -- this natural state of stilling and absorbing -- so that we can use that strength of mind to investigate two very important things, ultimate-materiality and ultimate-mentality. But that will come.
Practicing Jhanas (Snyder and Rasmussen)
For now, we must perform a lesser miracle, a mundane marvel, a magic that is no trick. It's time to levitate. The ancients knew how to do it. Non-Buddhist yogis knew how to do it. Catholic saints, sometimes not taking themselves too seriously, took themselves so lightly as to float, ascend, be raptured up. There are historical accounts of this in the West. Look them up.
We are going the way of the East, so it is more systematic. The secrets are buried in Buddhaghosa's manual of Buddhist meditation, The Path of Purification. It gives the instructions, not that they'll make much sense to the layperson, the nonpractitioner. Find a teacher who knows-and-sees. They exist. (Here's a list).
It will not even be possible to do anything in the first paragraph without morality, virtue, self-restraint. Immorality leads to disquietude, to worry, scruples, rumination, remorse, regret, repentance, fear and foreboding of what may come as a result. So take up virtue because, as the great musician Danny Elfman so aptly said so very long ago: "Peace of mind, peace of mind, hard to keep, hard to find, look ahead, look behind, looking for, peace of mind, peace of mind, can't relax, can't unwind, deep inside, secret mind" ("I'm Afraid" by the Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo).
That is all for now.
What about the magician David Copperfield? You don't think he took up Buddhist meditation or the Ashtanga (Eight Limb) Yoga and actually learned to sit cross-legged and move through the air like a bird, do you?
I don't know how he did it. It looks completely fake, a trick of the camera, an early version of green screen technology, using filming methods made famous by David Blaine street magic.
What kind of "magic" was that?
If a sign of light comes, don't look. Let it be.
Because he was on the street, we assumed it was all filmed as performed on the street. But actually he was just filming real reactions to tricks. The tricks were enhanced later so that what we saw was assumed to be what the people on the street saw, which looked amazing. In fact, those people on the street were tricked with set up scenarios and magic helpers. They were illusions. But the real illusion is what we saw, people seemingly verifying on the street what we thought we were watching at home. For instance, he claims to levitate. From home, this is shown as coming up a foot or more off the ground. In real life, that is to say, on the street, he only came up an inch or two. And that he did by turning his body, having them stand at an angle, then tilting one foot, which from a particular angle looks like two feet leaving the ground. From another angle, it's clearly just one foot. He's supporting his weight totally on the other foot. It's laughable. But it freaked some people out because he's so weird, intense, and convincing. And something (a trick) happened that the people on the street react to -- not all of them -- but the very best reactions got put into his TV specials to vouch that he was "really" doing what he misled us to believe he was doing. Easy. Relatively easy. He's a very skilled deceiver, and that the stage magician's stock and trade. We're all in agreement with it. Ask Houdini. But that is not to say real magic doesn't exist. It does.
What technology exists in GC?
The nimitta, if it comes, is a "sign" of progress; elation ruins it
Binaural beats in headphones may advance progress by years
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