Some years ago a friend of mine attended a conference and saw Darryl Anka ostensibly put himself into a trance, and then channel Bashar. From Bashar's website: "Bashar is a multi-dimensional extra-terrestrial being who speaks through channel Darryl Anka from what we perceive as the future."

After listening to several audio tapes of Bashar, the idea that such a thing as trance channeling could be possible became a topic of discussion with my friends that usually overshadowed what Bashar actually said. When we examined his rap, however, we agreed that his philosophy, as well as his delivery, was both hip and humorous, offering a lot to ponder.

Aside from descriptions of his space ship and his home planet, there was nothing in Bashar's philosophy that I had not heard in similar form from other sources. Some of those other sources have equally fantastic claims, for example, the exploits of the Hindu Gods or the Hebrew prophets. I find it interesting that older fantastic ideas seem to command greater veracity, and I wonder how much that has to do with the fact that they've been around longer. What I find most engaging in Bashar is his empowering optimism. Bashar believes that a rewarding course of action is always easy to identify if one can accomplish the goal of Yoga - unite your smaller self, the body and ego, with your higher self, that self which reflects the true mechanism of the cosmos. Like Joseph Campbell, who advised, "Follow your bliss," Bashar offers a similar model of action. Bashar says: "Excitement is the physical translation of the vibrational resonance that is your true, core natural being. Follow your excitement!"

Bashar's philosophy includes what he calls The Four Laws of Creation:

❖ Number 1: You exist.

❖ Number 2: The all is one, the one is all.

❖ Number 3: What you put out is what you get back.

❖ Number 4: Change is the only constant, except for the first three laws which never change.

- watch a video of Bashar presenting the four laws of creation -

I'm fond of these attractive ideas, but I'm also aware of a multiverse of views. When all is one and one is all, from an infinite perspective we may find an alternate Four Laws also exists:

❖ Number 1: You don't exist.

❖ Number 2: You and I are not in the same universe.

❖ Number 3: Everything you do is meaningless.

❖ Number 4: Change is an illusion, except for the first three laws which are always changing.

If you are trying to understand the second set of four laws, then you don't get the point. Like a Zen koan, the crazy wisdom found in inverting Bashar's four laws provides a mental journey less like a classroom discussion and more like a roller coaster ride, or Dzogchen Buddhism.

I'm making fun of Bashar's words as an exercise for freeing the intellect. It is easy to become so attached to an idea that any deviation becomes heresy. I don't believe in traditional heresy. Bashar has said: "You are loved so unconditionally by Creation that you can even choose to believe that you are not loved."

What rings true for one person, becomes that person's personal truth. Trying to determine if that truth is "The Truth" becomes a useless exercise in multiverse. If your ideas don't excite me, nothing you propose as law or custom has meaning for me. However, I'm optimistic. I'm sure that in some common experience, with some effort we can agree on some laws of this multiverse we share.