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Post by Admin on Jul 28, 2019 14:58:42 GMT
Transcult Psychiatry. 2019 Jul 16:1363461519861842. doi: 10.1177/1363461519861842. [Epub ahead of print] Psychosis or spiritual emergency? A Foucauldian discourse analysis of case reports of extreme mental states in the context of meditation. Kaselionyte J1, Gumley A1. Author information Abstract Meditation is becoming increasingly popular in the West and research on its effects is growing. While studies point to various benefits of meditation on mental and physical health, reports of extreme mental states in the context of meditation have also been published. This study employed Foucauldian discourse analysis to examine how the experience of extreme mental states has been constructed in case reports and what kind of practices were employed to address them. The study analyses how extreme mental states associated with meditation are framed within the scientific literature and how such differential framings may affect the meaning making and help-seeking of persons experiencing these states. A systematic scientific literature search identified 22 case studies of extreme mental states experienced by practitioners of various types of meditation. The analysis suggests a discursive divide between two dominant framings: a biomedical discourse which constructs such experiences as psychiatric symptoms and an alternative discursive, which understands them as spiritual emergencies. Both approaches offered distinct therapeutic avenues. This divide maps onto the disciplinary divides within the mental health field more generally, which may obscure a better understanding of these experiences. However, the two discourses are not necessarily mutually exclusive and authors of three articles chose to blend them for their case reports. A supportive environment could help those experiencing extreme state integrate them into their lives. Our findings encourage collaboration between clinicians, therapists and spiritual teachers in order to make a range of approaches available. KEYWORDS: discourse; meditation; psychosis; spiritual emergency; transpersonal psychology www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31311435journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1363461519861842?journalCode=tpse
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Post by Admin on Oct 23, 2019 15:47:53 GMT
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Post by Admin on Nov 6, 2019 10:46:12 GMT
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Post by Admin on Sept 1, 2020 8:30:42 GMT
The Mystic and the Madman
"It’s said that only the mystic or the mad see God. And the most natural thing in existence to love madly is God or the source of life itself. There’s only a fine line between a mystic and a madman. The mystic has to be willingly reduced to nothing and somehow contain the reaction of the emotional self now exposed under the penetrating light of the spirit – without going mad. The love of God is mad in the eyes of the world; for God is nothing and the world always loves something as an object, icon or new experience.
As the world exists to keep everyone busy and distracted from the truth of life, the human race wilts under the pressure to discover of value. But because there’s nothing of real value in their lives, most people become psychologically and emotionally attached in their relationships, and consequently become vulnerable to the fear of loss. Thus they are inwardly on the verge of madness because the truth of life is that all must leave or die. However, for most people the prospect of death is so shocking that it remains the ultimate taboo subject. It’s far more reassuring to believe that we’re all progressing towards a better future, when it’s demonstrable that things are becoming progressively worse.
There are three phases of madness in the spiritual process. The first phase is the entry of the spirit into the brain, which initiates an inward turn towards the source of reality within the body. In some extreme cases, the effects can be so overwhelming that people are institutionalised for their own protection. The second phase, perhaps some years later, is the realisation of the possessive force of the psychic self – the madness now exposed as the thinking disease and emotional suffering. The challenge of the spiritual life at all times is to remain vertical and true through being as practical as possible in the everyday affairs of living. In this way, the madness is prevented from becoming excessive and a relative harmony is maintained.
The third phase of madness, possibly a decade or so later, is the realisation that the whole world is mad and that I, the man or woman, am not. But who would believe it? The integrity of the spiritual process is that to be liberated from the constraints of ignorance, I must confront all that has yet to be faced as unconscious living in the past. Just like walking the high wire where the balance between life and death is minute, so in the inner descent the line between madness and sanity can be precarious. But all is well, for there is something more infinitely profound which supports the entire production of life. This is the virtue that will preserve the essential dignity of the individual, even unto death or derision by the world."
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Post by Admin on Sept 22, 2020 20:21:59 GMT
Psychosisalchemyrealm.com/psychosis.htmlPsychosis is widely misunderstood throughout society. Even the so-called professionals of the psychological and psychiatric communities do not understand its genesis or what is actually occurring. As with all so-called mental problems, metaphysics is essential to a proper understanding. Without the knowledge of how consciousness incarnates into matter and the various subtle bodies and energies required there will always be confusion. Most psychiatrists and psychologists work from a framework of beliefs which state that consciousness cannot exist without the brain and therefore the brain is you. They will freely admit that there is no proof that this is the case but have decided to base their research and theories upon the assumption that the brain is where consciousness comes from. It is a shame that when you base a theory on something untrue that your theory cannot be accurate. So the professionals who treat psychosis patients, as well as schizophrenics and other disorders, do not really understand what is happening to the patient and therefore do not know how to treat them. Often such patients are locked up in psych wards and seen by the doctor once a day (if that) for a few minutes. The treatment is basically a resume of anti-psychotic drugs which adjust the various neurochemicals within the brain. As well as these drugs the patient will be told that they are sick, they are experiencing delusions and hallucinations etc and that this means they are psychotic. The doctors do not delve into the patient’s subconscious with regression or hypnosis techniques as they themselves are not experienced in these areas. If a doctor has not thoroughly explored his/her own subconscious with such techniques and meditation then they are not qualified to perform them on others. They would be dealing with issues that they cannot understand and the technique could actually be dangerous if used by such a doctor. The drugs used to treat psychosis affect the brain in such a way that the astral body and chitta are disconnected. This disconnects the patient from many of their Samskaras and also reduces the vibration of their etheric and physical bodies which slows down mental activity. A disconnection from the lower chakras also occurs, leading to a loss of sex drive and loss of feeling in the genitals. So in effect the drugs reduce all sensations coming from the subtle bodies of the patient. The extreme symptoms are therefore reduced and the patient seems much less chaotic. The problem is that the subtle bodies are still in chaos, they have simply been disconnected and so the chaos does not incarnate as strongly. The chaotic astral body and chitta have not been healed or cleared in any way and when the drugs are stopped there is a good chance that the psychosis will reoccur. For this reason it is often the case that once someone has a psychotic episode they are told by doctors to stay on the drugs for a long period possibly the entire life “just in case”. So what is psychosis? To understand this we must look at the ego structure which is basically crystallization in the astral body and chitta. The crystallizations are formed in the first place to protect the individual from emotional pain coming from within (because of past traumas and disconnection from the person’s essence or spirit) and to keep negative outside influences at bay. On top of this there is further conditioning which are learned responses to the outside world and how to navigate through society. The successful ego structure keeps internal emotional pain to a minimum and successfully deals with the outside world with a minimum of anxiety. The very successful structure will fulfill its desires through interaction with the World. An unsuccessful structure can be seen as one that fails to keep internal emotional pain to a minimum, and/or cannot deal with everyday life effectively and without high levels of anxiety. Of course the actual ego can be anywhere between these two extremes. If the ego structure fails to keep internal emotional pain at bay, the structure is not solid and may be in a state of flux. Similarly if the environment is hard to negotiate, the anxiety from outside could lead to the instability of the ego structure. So for whatever reason, if the ego structure is unstable it is possible for parts of it to change suddenly. For example a major Samskara could suddenly come to the surface and release the emotions locked within, causing a part of the crystallized astral to open. When this occurs, higher vibrating parts of the light body may enter into the astral body which may raise its vibration and make it even more unstable. So the astral body becomes chaotic very suddenly and at the same time higher energies have entered into the person’s consciousness. The person experiences the higher energies and feels invincible, spiritually awakened and extremely special. To a psychiatrist these symptoms are called grandiose delusions. As the person still has a very chaotic astral body or ego structure they misunderstand what is happening. The ego feels these forces of higher consciousness and comes to its own conclusions such as "I am Jesus reincarnated", "I have reached Enlightenment", "I can fly" etc. The forces that the individual feels are of higher consciousness and feel so powerful. It feels so real because it is real. Spiritual realities are far more real than life on Earth and when experienced through the ego the person cannot help believing its truth. As they have no foundation or true knowledge to put the experience into context they interpret the spiritual forces they are experiencing and create delusions like "I am Jesus". To a psychiatrist, who also has no basis for conceptualizing such experiences and who has not had the experience themselves, it is simply delusion but what use is it to tell someone they are completely delusional when they feel as though the experience is more real than anything they have ever felt before? Part of the experience is completely real; the feelings of grandeur are exactly how the spirit feels. Do you think God does not feel grand? It is only the interpretation that is a delusion. Because of the higher consciousness, the person will likely see the falseness of others egos, society’s norms and values and indeed the fakeness of themselves. Their own ego is exposed as a fraud very suddenly by their experience of higher consciousness. Seeing yourself as a fraud is not easy but while the higher forces are incarnating it feels great and it can be seen clearly. Unfortunately the very same ego that has been seen as a fraud is the one that is creating the delusions. Also if the person’s Third Eye is activated sufficiently there will be hallucinations. Even though the Third Eye is seeing into other realities and the hallucinations are based on this actual vision, they will often be distorted by the ego. With the activated Third Eye and chaotic chitta the imagination of the psychotic can be so vivid that it seems real. Indeed some of what the psychotic may see is actual hallucination. Because the astral body’s vibration has been raised by the influx of light and possible activation of chakras and other structures, it becomes extremely chaotic. All the crystallization and ego structure that kept certain thoughts and emotions separate and kept things running smoothly is thrown into absolute chaos. The chitta is whirling around at amazing speeds and the person can think very fast. Their IQ has probably risen significantly as a result but there are so many thoughts running around that they cannot stay sane or focused. The past merges with the present, hallucinations with delusions of grandeur, and the person has gone insane. The person can no longer grasp reality, cannot read other people and may think that the whole world is against them. Paranoia becomes amplified and the types of delusions created become worldlier: “Mum wants to lock me up in a mental hospital”, “my girlfriend wants to kill me”, “everyone is out to get me”, “the FBI is watching me”. After a while the astral body will calm down and the higher forces will disconnect gradually. The extreme delusions will reduce and thoughts slow down. The astral body and chitta's vibration will slow down to normal but they will have been affected greatly by the episode. The realization that your ego is a fraud is far more painful when you end up right back in it and lose the grandeur of higher consciousness. The astral has been shaken up by higher consciousness and will take a long lime to settle down. Depression and anxiety are very likely and a slow process of rebuilding the sense of self will begin. At this point the patient can try to become normal again or begin the clearing process and try to reach higher consciousness for good and with clarity. For this the vibration of the etheric and physical must be gradually raised while the astral body is cleared of all past emotional conditioning. The decisions made will likely rest on what beliefs are held after the episode. Does the person believe that they simply had a psychotic episode which needs to be treated by anti-psychotic drugs or do they believe that they experienced a spiritual awakening which needs to be treated by further spiritual transformation and incarnation? __________________________________________________________________________ Schizophreniaalchemyrealm.com/schizophrenia.htmlSchizophrenia is quite similar to psychosis but usually lasts for the entire life. Psychosis usually comes in short bursts and afterwards the individual goes back to a relatively normal state. Psychosis may or may not reoccur for someone who has had one episode. Schizophrenia on the other hand is seen as a disease which has no cure but which can be treated by drugs to reduce symptoms. Often schizophrenics keep on deteriorating as they grow older. Around 1-2% of the population of all cultures and races suffer from schizophrenia so it is a "disease" or condition that affects many people’s lives. The treatment for schizophrenia is anti-psychotic drugs which do reduce symptoms and can be useful. The older drugs used to treat schizophrenia had many side effects which almost outweighed the advantages but some of the recent drugs have fewer side effects. As psychiatrists can only look to the physical body for answers they do not understand the metaphysical aspect of the disease and so some possible methods of treatment are completely overlooked. From a metaphysical point-of-view, schizophrenia has many of the same problems as psychosis. It is my belief that psychosis is the beginning of schizophrenia and if treated early enough with some new methods, schizophrenia could be averted. So if this is true then why do some people experience a psychotic episode and never progress to schizophrenia while others do? The reason lies in the subtle bodies of the individual and in how badly damaged they become during the psychosis. Keep in mind that a psychotic episode can also be brought on by drug use or abuse and that this type could also lead into schizophrenia. Basically if a psychotic episode is intense enough and the astral body has very rigid crystallizations, it can be cracked by the sudden raise in vibration. If the damage is not too bad and the astral body is fairly well balanced the person may be able to heal. The support network of family and friends will be vital in the healing process. A much greater chance of recovery will exist with good social supports. If the astral body is cracked or damaged severely it will not work well enough after the episode for adequate healing to take place. The person may be left very confused and with hallucinations and delusions continuing for longer periods because the astral body never slows down enough. With large cracks present, some higher frequency forces may continue to shake up the astral body which leads to continued confusion. Another problem is that this state can lead to a very open aura with holes and weak spots. Malevolent non-physical beings and entities will be able to disrupt the subtle bodies and the person will easily resonate with negative astral planes. Hallucinations and delusions may continue, especially if the Third Eye remains activated while other chakras are blocked and the chitta is unclear and unstable. During prolonged episodes of psychosis such as those experienced by schizophrenics, there is a possibility that some astral shattering may occur. This usually happens at death but in advanced Alzheimer's and schizophrenia it can occur while in the body. If shattering does occur, the parts of astral body lost cannot be replaced. When this occurs the patient will seem to have lost large portions of their personality and will become even more confused and lost. When this type of damage is done to the astral body, the etheric body and nervous system will also suffer greatly. The brain loses its contact with astral forces in the chitta which make its cognitive functions work. This leads to loss of brain tissue and brain damage as the physical brain needs the chitta to keep it healthy and functioning. Many doctors and scientists assume that the brain damage is the cause of the symptoms and that therefore the disease is based in biology. I believe that the truth of the matter is that the mental and emotional disharmony and chaos (in the astral body and chitta) lead to the physical brain damage. If you could stop the deterioration in the astral body and chitta the brain damage would not occur. One of the physical consequences of advanced schizophrenia is that the three brain ventricles become enlarged as the tissue around them deteriorates. The ventricles are located roughly in the middle of the brain and are filled with cerebrospinal fluid. Nobody really knows what they are for or what they do because they do not study metaphysics. The ventricles are actually essential parts of the brain which work kind of like a mirror for consciousness. They are a physical counterpart of the Third Eye and are essential when it comes to spiritual vision, dreams and even imagination. The ventricles are like mirrors that reflect pictures, images and colors into the physical consciousness of the brain. If you had no ventricles you would not be able to dream or imagine anything and you would not be able to use your Third Eye at all. For all the chakras there are physical organs which incarnate their various inter-dimensional aspects into the physical body. The ventricles are one part of the Third Eye's physical structure that incarnates non-physical vision. When a schizophrenic reaches advanced stages of deterioration their ventricles become enlarged which leads to more vivid hallucinations as well as intensifying other symptoms. Unfortunately once schizophrenia gets to the advanced stages there is not much that can be done. The new anti-psychotic drugs are an important part of slowing down the progress of schizophrenia as they do reduce the pressure on the patient’s subtle bodies. I believe that with the proper techniques of clearing the astral body, strengthening the etheric body and eventually incarnating the Light Body that schizophrenia could be averted. It would have to be caught in its early stages and it would require much effort by the individual themselves as well as someone experienced enough in the required metaphysical techniques. If extreme damage had already been done to the astral body it may never be healed completely but with the right techniques and required effort the outcome would probably be much better than not doing anything. In mental hospitals around the World schizophrenics are sedated, locked up in rooms with no pictures, treated like they are crazy and dehumanized by staff. No credence is given to their experience which is often multi-dimensional in nature and their perceptions are labeled as hallucinations. What chance of recovery do these people have?
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Post by snowstorm on Sept 23, 2020 8:43:01 GMT
The above post is complicated yet it makes sense to me - that healing is required at different levels.
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Post by Admin on Sept 23, 2020 11:32:23 GMT
The above post is complicated yet it makes sense to me - that healing is required at different levels. The whole e-book is good (on the drop down menu at the top right). i think it's interesting combining aspects of the esoteric / spirituality / Eastern philosophy with neurology / psychiatry. It's not denying that psychosis / schizophrenia / severe mental illness exists & at the same time it is offering metaphysical perspectives to it all.
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Post by Admin on Oct 23, 2020 19:43:30 GMT
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Post by Admin on Oct 24, 2020 19:02:11 GMT
Dr. Joseph Campbell - Inward Journey: Schizophrenia and Mythologywww.wnyc.org/story/dr-joseph-campbell-inward-journey-schizophrenia-and-mythology/National Educational Radio presents the Cooper Union Forum, a program recorded at the Great Hall of the Cooper Union in New York City by station WNYC. This presentation, a lecture by Dr. Joseph Campbell entitled "Inward Journey: Schizophrenia and Mythology" is introduced by Dr. Johnson Fairchild. WNYC archives id: 152441
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Post by Admin on Mar 3, 2021 13:10:55 GMT
Spiritual Enlightenment and Mental Illnessby AMARA modernawakenings.com/spiritual-enlightenment-and-mental-illness/So many of the effects of sudden spiritual enlightenment are similar to those of the mentally ill. What if you are just insane? This is a really important issue. If you are having a psychotic break, then you need help. If you are going through sudden spiritual enlightenment, you should not be mistakenly diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. But how can you tell the difference? I do not have any easy answers for you. I have never been mentally ill, so I have nothing to compare it to, personally. I have been around people who were having psychotic breaks and believed they were finally enlightened. It was pretty scary, really. Here are some things to look out for. Mania
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Post by Admin on Oct 26, 2021 9:55:29 GMT
The Changing Meaning of “Mysticism” People who don’t follow organized religion sometimes describe themselves as spiritual. But this idea isn’t a recent invention. daily.jstor.org/the-changing-meaning-of-mysticism/“Mysticism” is a slippery word. People may use it to discuss medieval Christian saints’ communion with God, 3,000-year-old Vedic texts, or twenty-first-century Wiccan sex magic. Others use it to attack religious practices they see as irrational or unserious. Leigh Eric Schmidt, a historian of religion, explains the history of the concept. Schmidt writes that “mysticism” arrived in the English language in the eighteenth century as a derogatory term for Christian fanatics. Some critics dismissed mysticism as a minor sect, associating it with Quakers or contemplative French Catholic Quietists. Others used the term to cringe at early Christians’ painful “bodily exercises.” Henry Coventry, an eighteenth-century writer of the English Enlightenment, helped bring “mysticism” into general usage. Schmidt quotes him as contrasting “the seraphic entertainments of mysticism and ecstasy” with religion as “a liberal, manly, rational, and social institution.” Coventry argued that mystical religious practitioners—especially women—might believe they were passionately devoted to God, but were actually transferring frustrated sexual love onto an imagined divine object. In fact, he argued, sublimated sexuality made up “the far greatest part of female religion.” It was only in the middle of the nineteenth century that people began using “mysticism” to describe their own direct efforts to experience the divine. Schmidt focuses particularly on New England. Ironically, some of mysticism’s biggest advocates there were Unitarians—a Protestant denomination closely associated with the kind of liberal rationality Coventry had favored. Starting in the 1830s, Unitarians associated with the Transcendentalist movement began embracing mysticism. Among them were theologian and abolitionist Theodore Parker, writer Ralph Waldo Emerson, and feminist journalist Margaret Fuller. This was a cosmopolitan group eager to try out varied practices from other cultures in the service of a universal spirituality. As Fuller later wrote of herself, they were ready to “plunge into the sea of Buddhism and mystical trances.” The focus on direct personal experience helped liberal Protestants imagine a future free of sectarianism and—at least in theory—equally open to all of the world’s religions. Unitarian minister Octavius Fronthingham declared that mysticism was “found equally among orthodox and heterodox, Protestants and Catholics, Pagans and Christians, Greeks and Hindoos, the people of the Old World and the people of the New.” At a time when scientific rationalism was challenging many religious claims, Schmidt writes, the intuitive, irreducible nature of mystical experience was also an “intellectual shield” against a purely materialist worldview. Mysticism continued to thrive in the twentieth century. William James’s two-volume The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902) presented an influential model of universal direct religious experience. And countercultural experimenters in the 1960s and beyond leaned heavily on this view. But, Schmidt writes, since the 1970s, the concept of mysticism has faced new criticism. Scholars like Wayne Proudfoot and Grace Jantzen warned that it irresponsibly removes religious experience from historical and cultural contexts, and from political analysis of power. By the time he was writing, in 2003, Schmidt could declare that “there is hardly a more beleaguered category than ‘mysticism’ in the current academic study of religion.”
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Post by Admin on Mar 16, 2022 18:53:30 GMT
THE ART OF TRANSCENDENCE: AN INTRODUCTION TO THE COMMON ELEMENTS OF TRANSPERSONAL PRACTICES We must close our eyes and invoke a new manner of seeing … a wakefulness that is the birthright of us all, though few put it to use. – Plotinus By Dr. Roger Walsh MD., PhD.,& Dr. Frances E. Vaughan PhD., from The Journal of Transpersonsal Psychology, 25:1 – 10, 1993. When historians look back at the twentieth century, they may conclude that two of the most important breakthroughs in Western psychology were not discoveries of new knowledge but recognitions of old wisdom. First, psychological maturation can continue far beyond our arbitrary, culture-bound definitions of normality (Wilber, 1980; Wilber et al., 1986). There exist further developmental possibilities latent within us all. As William James put it, “most people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being. They make use of a very small portion of their possible consciousness …. We all have reservoirs of life to draw upon, of which we do not dream.” Second, techniques exist for realizing these “reservoirs of life” or transpersonal potentials. These techniques are part of an art and technology that has been refined over thousands of years in hundreds of cultures and constitutes the contemplative core of the world’s great religious traditions. This is the art of transcendence, designed to catalyze transpersonal development (Walsh, 1990; Walsh & Vaughan, 1993). As such it is based on two fundamental assumptions about the nature and potentials of the mind. The first assumption is that our usual state of consciousness is suboptimal. In fact, it has been described in terms such as clouded, distorted, dreamlike, entranced and largely out of control. This has been recognized by psychologists and mystics of both East and West (Huxley, 1945; Mikulis, 1991; Tart, 1986). For Freud (1917) it was the culture-shaking recognition that “man is not even master in his own house … his own mind,” that echoed the Bhagavad Gita’s despairing cry two thousand years earlier: Restless (the) mind is, So strongly shaken In the grip of the senses: Gross and grown hard With stubborn desire ….. Truly, I think The wind is no wilder. (Prabhavananda & Isherwood, 1944) In the words of Ram Dass (1975), “we are all prisoners of our own mind. This realization is the first step on the journey to freedom.” Or as Pir Vilayat Khan put it even more succinctly, “The bind is in the mind.” The second asswnption is that although the untrained mind is clouded and out of control, it can be trained and clarified, and this training catalyzes transpersonal potentials. This is a central theme of the perennial philosophy. For Socrates: In order that the mind should see light instead of darkness, so the entire soul must be turned away from this changing world, until its eye can bear to contemplate reality and that supreme splendor which we call the Good. Hence there may well be an art whose aim would be to affect this very thing (Plato, 1945). Likewise, according to Ramana Maharshi (1955), “All scriptures without any exception proclaim that for salvation mind should be subdued.” Although practices and techniques vary widely, there seem to be six common elements that constitute the heart of the art of transcendence: ethical training, concentration, emotional transformation, redirection of motivation, refinement of awareness, and the cultivation of wisdom. The purpose of this paper is to provide a synoptic introduction to the art of transcendence and its common elements in the hope of stimulating appreciation, research and practice of them. mysticexperiences.net/category/psychiatry/
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Post by Admin on Apr 20, 2022 16:34:31 GMT
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Post by Admin on Aug 27, 2022 17:32:10 GMT
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Post by Admin on Apr 28, 2023 0:47:11 GMT
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