About hornets, spammers and subtle attacks…
When the summer was rising I noticed an increased activity of “flight operations” in front of my balcony windows: Big insects arrived with some speed, landed on the roller shutter and seemed to do an inspection there.
They were too big for wasps – hornets! They had invaded the roller shutter box and disappeared through some holes. I googled, found out that they were less aggressive than wasps – which had visited us on the other balcony in the past years – and that they were protected animals.
Fine, I thought – but each time I tried to air the room they managed to come inside and were vagabonding around. In the morning and evening I could easily guide them to the toilet by switching on the lamps there, opening the window and closing the door – gone. During the day it took more time to get them out again.
It was getting hot – something had to be done. One by one I stuffed the chinks along the roller shutter with plastic bags – they could get in through tiny holes. When they noticed my activities, they increased their efforts. They could not really remove the plastic though they tried to gnaw it away. However, they managed to dig a little hole into the wall.
A group of hornets stayed together in one corner while the others brought food – a bigger hornet – the queen was sitting in the center. I didn’t dare to go too close with my camera.
I observed it for about two weeks and tried to deter them with clove oil – no effect. When some days it was raining, there seemed to be less hornets – and I found dead ones on the balcony. Then – three hornets, two, sometimes just one, the lonely queen. Sometimes I thought they were gone again but then several hornets flew an attack against the window, clashing against the glass. But window and door were closed.
Then about a week ago finally they had disappeared – though not totally. I sometimes still see them flying around but they must have found another save haven. I pondered on the meaning of this experience… They reminded me of my vagabonding thoughts in a turbulent meditation – how to keep the windows closed? Wakefulness, discrimination, “non-refoulement”…
Two weeks ago, there was another kind of attack:
My provider informed me that my “spam@” e-mail had been hacked; lots of e-mails had been sent from the account so that the provider had to shut it. At the same time I was flooded by return e-mails blocked by other providers. I quickly changed the password – my provider told me that after a few days the flood might go down again.
It did not but increased: The “spammer friends” used my e-mail address without sending from my account to distribute their e-mails where lonely ladies were longing for lusty lovers… Each day 1-2 thousand return mails from other providers – from east, west, north, south, in varous languages ….
My provider installed some filters on my server but it only had a small effect for two-three days, then again over thousand return mails popped in. My provider told me that the only thing I could do is to put filters in my webmail. And so I defined a number of filters deleting the return mails. I suppose that the mail flood abusing my e-mail address is still going high but there is again silence in the spam inbox.
And again, I pondered on the meaning of the experience – shut out any unwanted “over-activity” of outer impulses trying to drag us away from ourselves.
A third kind of experience:
A few days ago, the daughter of a friend skyped me and explained about some strange experiences in her neighbourhood – I don’t go into details but she described how she received subtle attacks draining her energy. I rate her as an alert and quite down-to-earth person not prone to fantasies. She knew already a number of things of how to protect herself from attacks but wanted to know more about it. (I had blogged already about protection from energy vampirism before, see also here.) We spoke about mantrams and exercises like the double pyramid to insulate oneself of destructive intrusions.
Like with the other attacks, of hornets or spam mails, you need to keep your protective shields strong and your thoughts pure. You find interesting hints in the books of Agni Yoga, esp. “Supermundane“:
“People protect themselves from poisonous gases by wearing gas masks. But they should provide themselves with one more mask — the protective mask of pure thought — for only thought can shield one from the poisonous breath. People should admit that there is such poison, and remember that thought has the power to resist the most harmful vibrations. ” (Supermundane 291)
“You may also ask how to counter unwelcome visitors — only through the valor of the spirit, not permitting them to contact your essence. Urusvati knows how these unwelcome guests have recoiled; it was not even necessary to drive them away, for they could not penetrate the protective net. Such natural protection is always the best, but for this, training of the spirit is required. Depression is the most gloomy magnet, and irritation also entices these ugly guests.” (Supermundane 430)