Peter Martin is a writer from Napa, California.

Stop. Put down that copy of zen poetry. Put down that I Ching. Take a deep breath. Yes--anything from Asia will do. Put down that Bhagavad Gita, that DVD of Seven Years in Tibet, yes, even that copy of The Beach. Sure--the remote control.
That counts too.

Put it all down.

Theerrree we go.

Alright. OK.

Now another deeeep breaaaath. Think calm thoughts.

Now. Yes. Pick up that James Redfield. Pick up that L. Ron Hubbard. Feel those vibrations. Those cosmic vibrations are 100% American--red, white, and blue cosmic vibrations. Read of the Maya and the Great Tuna God and the Volcanoes.

Yes the Maya were Americans. Listen to the Maya. They tied their prisoners into balls and rolled them down the steps of the pyramids, or cut off the prisoner's lower jaws and kept them alive, sometimes for years but--they were Americans. But they were sure snappy with those calendars and they're not around to dispute our revisionist histories. Of course they lived in perfect harmony with everything!

Ganesh, Vishnu, Buddha if you're going to come in you need to do your time. Work fast food. Learn English first. Then you can begin influencing our spirituality. We need you watered down and Americanized, spouting off positive aphorisms because well, life is different here.

Here life ISN'T suffering. God Bless America here we spin the wheel of fortune. Here life is this process, this search for self and identity and meaning, this personal quest for relevance. Here we ask, How can I have the coolest career ever and matter? How do I become a superstar? It's ok--and because it's all relative, you're already relevant. Your QUEST makes you relevant.

Dude you're, like QUESTING, how many people do that? Woah! You're like, one-in-five-million or something!

Here we pay people to stroke us and tell us what we want to hear. Our vision quests are vanity quests. What's your spirit animal? What's mine? What's mine! Do me next! Do me next!

So yes. All of you ALIEN Gods please wipe your feet before you come in. Please get translated into a myriad of crap texts, reinterpreted on the backs of Hallmark cards, reinvented in our American Pantheism, tattooed onto the sexy hollows of our bodies because THAT here is the meaning of affirmation and spirituality here. Here we dangle you on the dashboard or the sternum, and if it can't come across on a bumper sticker then it's just not coming across. We don't have the time or the patience for reflection in that way anymore.

Here we are fighting against the right and--if they're not going to show critical thinking or a thoughtful, comprehensive and balanced world view--Why should we?

We are the equal and opposite reaction to their unthinking dogma!

Right?

We take our wisdom in catchphrases and fortune cookie snippets, conveniently forgetting when they don't add up, memorizing it and turning it to mantra if it appeals to our vanity.

Ganesh is the cool guy with the elephant head and Kali--Kali comes at the push of a button. And China, well in China they
appear to be obedient and productive. China is the faceless enemy to our individualism. China through its size shows us that the individual is insignifigant. China through its ancient wisdom shows us that really, we are just part of one big machine, and our path to salvation is actually, a trick of the light.