April 9, 2025 • 26 mins
Ever wonder why we decorate trees in December or hunt for eggs in spring? Beneath the surface of our most cherished celebrations lie forgotten origins and manipulated histories that would shock most holiday revelers.
In this eye-opening exploration of holiday consciousness, we peel back the layers of tradition to reveal how our most sacred and secular celebrations have been co-opted, stripped of their spiritual significance, and repackaged to serve various agendas. From Christmas's pagan roots to Thanksgiving's sanitized history, these revelations challenge everything we thought we knew about the days we mark on our calendars.
Aaron Scott guides us through how holidays function as both personal anchors and national myth-making tools. These ritualized pauses don't just give us days off—they shape our identities from childhood, create emotional architecture that lasts a lifetime, and reinforce cultural narratives that often suppress uncomfortable truths.
The journey takes us through the manipulation of our calendar system (did you know September through December are named for the numbers 7-10 despite being our 9-12th months?), the Roman Catholic Church's strategic placement of holy days, and how April Fool's Day emerged from calendar reform resistance. We examine how religious celebrations across traditions share surprising similarities, revealing a common human experience beneath seemingly different beliefs.
Most powerfully, this episode challenges us to question what happens when we celebrate without understanding. Are we practicing faith or participating in a ritual of ignorance? When we decorate, gather, feast, and repeat without questioning, do we become unwitting participants in our own programming?
This isn't about abandoning cherished traditions but awakening to their true significance—moving from autopilot celebration to conscious observance. By remembering where our traditions truly come from, we reclaim our power to decide what they mean and transform them from mechanisms of control into authentic expressions of our humanity.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello everyone and welcome to the twelfth episode
of the Manhattan Prophet Podcast.
I am the Manhattan Prophet as areminder, so that nothing is
lost in translation.
I'm here to ensure that allknowledge I give finds meaning
in a practical place in youreveryday lives.
It's only through properlydigesting knowledge, in this
case of ourselves and the worldaround us, that we see things
clearly enough to break oldpatterns of behavior and to get
(00:27):
a new path forward to aheightened state of
consciousness.
Today we're diving intosomething that touches every one
of us, yet most of us neverstop to question our holidays.
You see, most people celebrateholidays without ever really
knowing what they're celebrating.
We decorate, we gather, wefeast, we repeat.
But ask someone the true originof the holiday they're
celebrating?
We decorate, we gather, wefeast, we repeat.
But ask someone the true originof the holiday they're
(00:48):
observing and chances are theanswer is vague, commercialized
or flat out wrong.
In this episode, we'reexploring the hidden histories
and deeper meaning behind theholidays we've grown up with.
How many were co-opted,stripped of their spiritual or
cultural significance andrepackaged to serve agendas far
(01:11):
removed from their roots?
We'll talk about howmisunderstood holidays shape our
identity, regulate our emotionsand even act as mechanisms of
control.
But, most importantly, we'llask why knowing the truth
matters, because when weremember where something comes
from, we reclaim our power todecide what it means.
So whether it's Christmas,independence Day, thanksgiving
or Easter, this episode is aboutwaking up from the autopilot of
(01:34):
tradition and stepping intoconscious celebration.
Let's get into it.
Holidays are not merely breaksfrom work or school.
They are ritualized pauses intime, cultural mirrors through
which we remember who we are,who we've been and who we aspire
to be.
At both the personal andnational level, holidays
(01:54):
function as anchoring mechanismsfor identity.
They shape memory, belief,belonging, even behavior, and
often they do so quietly,invisibly and powerfully.
Let's unpack why holidays arenot just seasonal celebrations
but psychological scaffoldingand national myth-making tools.
(02:15):
On the personal level, holidaysare woven into our earliest
emotional and sensoryexperiences.
For many, holidays are thefirst rituals we participate in
Lighting candles, singing songs,setting tables, decorating
homes.
These rituals build memorythrough repetition, and memory
builds identity.
Ritual in its simplest form canbe understood as repetition
(02:36):
with meaning.
These repeated actions create asense of stability and
continuity in a chaotic world.
They tell us you are part ofsomething ancient, something
bigger.
Don't be so disconnected thatyou are not able to see the
potency of emotional memory.
A child might forget a schoollesson, but they remember the
warmth of a certain dish, thescent of incense, the sound of
(02:58):
laughter in the background.
These become touchstones of theself emotional architecture
that you, as an adult, oftenseek to return to.
At the macro level, holidays aretools of nation-building.
They are the mythological glueused by governments and cultures
to instill a shared story.
The most successful holidaysare those that merge national
(03:19):
myth with emotional resonance,creating a collective sense of
meaning and belonging.
The Fourth of July, forinstance, doesn't just celebrate
independence from Britain.
It reinforces a narrative ofliberty, rebellion and
exceptionalism.
Fireworks and patriotic songsaren't neutral.
They're performativeaffirmations of a shared mythos.
Bastille Day, australia Day,juneteenth, victory Day in
(03:42):
Russia each of these is morethan historical remembrance.
They are selective memory.
They reflect what the nationchooses to elevate, forget or
reframe.
This myth-making can bedangerous when it suppresses
truth.
For example, columbus City inthe United States once
celebrated discovery whileerasing Indigenous genocide.
The shift towards IndigenousPeoples Day represents an
(04:03):
evolving national identity, acollective confrontation with a
buried past.
Holidays, in this sense, arenot just reflections of culture.
They are battlegrounds forcultural definition.
Let's examine Thanksgiving,which may be the most acute
example of blind celebration.
The real Thanksgivingcelebration was when, in 1637,
(04:25):
massachusetts declared anofficial holiday after colonists
massacred over 700 Pequot men,women and children during the
Pequot War.
The Thanksgiving holiday weknow and celebrate today was, in
truth, repurposed to shapenationalism.
In 1863, president AbrahamLincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving
a national holiday during theCivil War, hoping to promote
unity and heal the wounds of thenation.
During the Civil War, hoping topromote unity and heal the
(04:47):
wounds of the nation, he washeavily influenced by Sarah
Josepha Hale, a magazine editor,who spent 17 years lobbying for
a Thanksgiving holiday.
This to promote morality,domestic values and a sense of
American identity.
So what we now think of as thefirst Thanksgiving was
retroactively romanticized togive America a clean, harmonious
origin story, one that erasescolonization, genocide and
(05:09):
indigenous resistance.
Since 1970, many NativeAmericans have recognized
Thanksgiving as a national dayof mourning.
On Thanksgiving Day, indigenouspeoples and allies gather in
Plymouth, massachusetts, tomourn the genocide of Native
people, the theft of indigenousland and the distortion of
history.
It's a day to rememberancestors, educate the people
(05:31):
and resist ongoing colonialism.
Over time, these holidayscondition us to associate
certain emotions with certainsystems.
Joy becomes tied to buying.
Pride becomes tied tomilitarism, gratitude becomes
tied to whitewashed history.
Without awareness, holidays canbecome tools of subtle
indoctrination.
Because holidays are public andrepeated, they are excellent
(05:53):
barometers of social change.
When values shift, holidaysshift or become points of
tension.
The recognition of Juneteenthas a federal holiday reflects
the US grappling with its raciallegacy and expanding its
national narrative to includeBlack freedom and resilience.
This shows us that holidays arenot static.
They evolve, expand, clash andsometimes fracture, depending on
(06:15):
what the society is willing orunwilling to acknowledge about
itself.
Ultimately, holidays operate intwo directions they reflect
(06:37):
back to the self and out towardsthe society.
They tell the individual thisis what your people value.
They tell the nation this iswhat we want our citizens to
feel, become simple tools forself-awareness.
But when we go through themotions without reflection, they
become mechanisms ofprogramming.
Religious holidays were nevermeant to be days off work filled
with generic rituals orcommercial fanfare.
At their core, they arespiritual markers guiding us
(06:59):
through cycles of life death,rebirth, forgiveness, harvest,
even light.
When we understand the originalintent behind these observances
, we're invited back intoalignment with something far
deeper than tradition.
We're invited intotransformation.
One of the most healingrealizations we can have is that
many of our religions aretelling the same story in
different languages shaped bygeography and culture.
(07:22):
The flood narrative spansMesopotamia, Jewish, hindu and
indigenous stories.
The winter solstice was a sacredturning point for ancient
people around the globe, longbefore it was absorbed into
Christian traditions likeChristmas.
This doesn't diminish anyone'sfaith.
It illuminates their commonessence.
By learning the history behindholidays, we realize that we are
(07:43):
not strangers divided bydoctrine, but siblings,
interpreting the divine throughdifferent windows.
Embracing this consciousnessdissolves the illusion of
supremacy, replacing it with anewfound understanding of
diversity.
When we don't question orunderstand the roots of our
beliefs, we risk surrenderingour agency.
Many have practiced faith notout of love or understanding,
(08:06):
but out of fear, tradition orcoercion.
History matters because itreminds us that religions have
always been intertwined withpower, used both to liberate and
to control.
Modern consciousness is obsessedwith facts, data and logic.
While useful, this linear lenshas choked out our ability to
see through symbols, metaphorsand myth.
(08:27):
But religious holidays aresteeped in symbolic power.
They reflect not only culturalmemory, but cosmic patterns,
solstices, equinoxes,agricultural cycles and
planetary movements.
When we rediscover what thesesymbols meant, like the
candlelight of Diwalirepresenting inner illumination
(08:47):
amidst darkness, or Yom Kippuras a day of deep soul reckoning,
we begin to live mythicallyonce again.
We shift from surface existenceinto a life that is layered
with meaning, purpose and andpoetic resonance.
Religion, when misused ormisrepresented, has left behind
deep scars forced conversions,inquisitions, genocides,
cultural erasure.
(09:08):
To heal we must first seeclearly.
Historical knowledge bringsvisibility to what was hidden or
distorted.
This kind of informedconsciousness refuses to repeat
past harm.
It replaces shame or denialwith accountability and
reverence.
In today's spiritualmarketplace it's easy to
romanticize cherry-pick orappropriate traditions without
(09:29):
context.
But when we know the history,we don't just mimic rituals, we
honor them.
If we're going to burn sagefast for clarity or celebrate
solstices, let it be from aplace of understanding and
respect, not novelty or ego.
Knowledge brings humility.
In a world addicted to speedand forgetting remembering is an
(09:54):
act of revolution.
Knowing the true history of ourreligions and holidays reclaims
what is sacred.
It expands our consciousnessbeyond cultural conditioning.
It reminds us that spiritualityat its highest is about
awakening, not controlling.
In remembering where we camefrom, we find clearer direction
and where we're going.
Our present-day calendar, knownas the Gregorian calendar, has
its roots in ancient Rome and isthe product of both political
(10:15):
and religious influence.
Though initially adopted byCatholic countries, it wasn't
universally embraced right away.
Protestant and Orthodox nationsheld out for decades or even
centuries.
Today, the Gregorian calendaris the standard governing
everything from businesscontracts to school years to
religious holidays, many ofwhich were strategically placed
or preserved to supportreligious and empirical agendas.
(10:35):
In order to illustrate just howdisconnected we truly are from
our own realities, the simplemonthly structure of the modern
day calendar is vastly unknownto most people.
Our current calendar is, intruth, a heavily revised version
of older timekeeping systemsthat have been altered for
political, religious andpractical reasons over thousands
of years.
One of the clearest signs ofthis shift is hidden in plain
(10:58):
sight.
The names of the monthsthemselves take September,
october, november and December.
Their names are derived fromthe Latin words for 7, septem, 8
, octo, 9, novem and 10, decem,even though they are now the 9th
, 10th, 11th and 12th months ofthe year.
This mismatch traces back tothe early Roman calendar, which
(11:21):
began in March, making thosenames numerically accurate at
the time.
Later reforms, including theaddition of January and February
to the beginning of thecalendar, shifted everything
forward.
Over time, emperors eveninserted their own names into
the calendar, such as July forJulius Caesar and August for
Augustus, further distorting theoriginal structure.
What most people don't realizeis that April 1st was once
(11:42):
celebrated as New Year's Dayacross most of the world.
Julius Caesar, advised by theAlexandrian astronomer Sosigenes
, restructured the Romancalendar to align with the solar
year.
He set January 1st as the startof the new year, made the year
365 days long, with a leap yearevery four years, and gave us
the modern month lengths wemostly use today.
So why January 1st for thefirst day of our new year?
(12:05):
January was named after Janus,the Roman god of beginnings and
doorways.
He literally looks both forwardand backward.
The Roman consuls, or chiefmagistrates, took office on
January 1st, so it became apractical administrative date to
mark a new year.
During the Middle Ages, january1st as New Year's faded into
popularity due to Christianinfluences, many parts of Europe
(12:26):
began the year at the end ofMarch or beginning of April.
Catholic countries adopted itquickly.
Protestant and Orthodoxcountries took longer.
England, in fact, waited until1752.
Greece until 1923.
Not sure if you know this one,but when the calendar was
reformed by Pope Gregory XIII,not everyone got the memo or
accepted the change right away.
(12:47):
Those who continued tocelebrate the new year on April
1st were mocked by those who hadadopted the new calendar, often
being sent on fool's errands ortricked into elaborate pranks.
Over time, these playful jabsevolved into what we now know as
April Fool's Day, a quirkycultural remnant of a forgotten
calendar revolution, remindingus just how little we know about
(13:07):
the origins of the holidays wetake for granted.
Many of the holy days celebratedin the Abrahamic religions
Christianity, judaism and Islamhave deeper roots in
pre-Abrahamic pagan traditionsthat were absorbed, rebranded or
reinterpreted over time asempires expanded and religions
sought to unify diversepopulations.
Ancient seasonal festivals,solstice rites and fertility
(13:29):
celebrations were oftenstrategically repurposed to
align with newer theologicalnarratives.
What we find is that modern-daymonotheistic religions and
their respective holidays arenot in fact an evolved way of
understanding our actualconnection to universal
consciousness, to understandingour connection to the divine.
Let's look into the facts here.
Christmas, for example, widelybelieved to mark the birth of
(13:52):
Jesus, is in fact a celebrationof the ancient winter solstice
festivals like Saturnalia andYule.
These celebrated the return oflight during the darkest days of
the year.
And Yule these celebrated thereturn of light during the
darkest days of the year.
Easter, too, is named after thepagan goddess Yistra, and
coincides with spring fertilityfestivals celebrating rebirth
and renewal.
This blending of old and new wasnot accidental.
(14:12):
It was a deliberate method ofcorralling and indoctrinating
people into new belief systems,making them more accessible and
culturally familiar.
Yet most people practicingthese religions today are
unaware that many of their mostsacred observances are built
upon older nature-centeredtraditions that long predated
the texts and doctrines thatthey now uphold.
We have Valentine's Day, whichwe have been taught to believe
(14:34):
is simply a celebration of loveor, if we looked a bit deeper,
is the honoring of a 3rd centurymartyr, st Valentine, hence the
name.
But the origin is actually acelebration of the pagan
festival Lupercalia, which was afertility festival dedicated to
Faunus and Romulus and Remus,and involved love rituals,
purification and matchmaking.
This manipulation didn't takeplace just with the commercial
(14:56):
holidays.
It did with those we assignedspirituality or divinity as well
.
Take Easter, for example, whichin truth is a celebration of
the spring equinox fertilityrites, or pagan goddess Isra.
You have been taught that itrepresents the day Jesus
resurrected from the dead.
This is but another fun fairytale legislated by the Roman
Catholic Church.
Then we have Christmas, whichis actually the pagan festival
(15:20):
Dies Natalis Solis Invicti,christmas, which is actually the
pagan festival Dies NatalisSolis Invicti, or Birthday of
the Unconquered Sun, celebratingthe sun god during the winter
solstice.
You have been taught that thisis the birth of Jesus.
Interestingly enough, when youinvestigate the origin story of
Jesus, you find that the RomanCatholic version of his
existence is nothing more than aplagiarized carbon copy of the
solar messiah story, which isused throughout history to
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establish the importance of thesun.
Pope Julius I in the 4thcentury set December 25th as
Jesus' birthday to spirituallyabsorb and redirect the masses.
The actual celebration is forthe pagan sun god, yet the
masses still to this day areblind to their own celebrations.
The Roman Catholic Church has inso many ways sculpted our
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common consciousness.
They did so intentionally inorder to shape, unify and
manipulate society acrosscenturies, and the Church
determined what days were sacredand effectively structured
people's time.
The calendar, generallyspeaking, determines when you
worked, rested, fasted, feasted.
There were over 100 feast daysper year in medieval Europe,
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which meant your entire sense oftime and meaning was
church-directed.
Whoever controls time controlsthe pace and pattern of society.
This wasn't just spiritual.
It had political and economicimplications too.
There were to be no marriagesor legal proceedings during Lent
, no farming on certain feastdays, or else risk of
excommunication or sin.
Market days were often alignedwith holy days to blend commerce
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and religion.
Fasting seasons like Lentregulated food consumption and
physical discipline.
Feast days created communalhighs, emotional and economic.
These were tied to the church'scalendar.
This constant cycle ofsacrifice and reward, controlled
by religious authority, shapedbehavior, expectation and even
emotional life.
This wasn't just religious, itwas a consolidation of power.
(17:09):
Days like All Souls Day, wherelast judgment-themed sermons
instilled cosmic fear.
You didn't just miss a holiday,you risked eternal consequences
.
People were, and still are tothis day, kept morally dependent
on the church for salvation.
These holidays made spiritualobedience and participation
non-optional, unless you wantedto risk your soul.
Of course, this is about morethan just religious history.
(17:32):
It's about identity, truth andhow a society shapes its own
soul.
This tradition of half-truthsand fables as the soul of our
holidays has been seamlesslyadopted by modern-day nations,
even in this country.
When a country sanitizes ormythologizes its history,
especially its origin stories,it creates a collective
consciousness that's unmooredfrom truth.
(17:55):
In the US, that means genocideis rebranded as gratitude.
Slavery becomes a footnoteinstead of the backbone of the
economy.
Colonialism is heroic, notpredatory.
When people are disconnectedfrom the painful parts of their
collective heritage, severaltraits emerge in the dominant
culture Compassion is extendedselectively, often aligned with
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national or racial identity.
Global suffering becomes easierto ignore, especially if
victims are not quote-unquote us.
Any challenge to national mythsfeels like a personal attack.
Western citizens often feelunrooted, anxious and
disconnected.
That's the cost of living in asociety that doesn't know or
denies its truth story.
(18:38):
There's no ancestral grounding,no collective ritual of
reckoning, no sharedmeaning-making that honors both
beauty and pain.
If the collective story isdishonest or incomplete, people
will retreat into self-brandinghustle culture, escapism or
consumerism to fill the void.
The I-am-what-I-buy-do-or orachieve mentality becomes the
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default identity framework.
When we deny the trauma ofgenocide, the theft of land and
labor, the legacies of perpetualwarfare and Western hegemony,
that denial does not disappear.
It seeps into delusionalnationalism, cultural amnesia,
even anxiety disorders.
These aren't just personalissues.
They are symptoms of a cultureavoiding its own shadow, not
(19:20):
willingly, but rather from acollective subconscious anchored
in complacent ignorance.
The path forward is not throughguilt, but through evolution of
consciousness.
When people start learning thetruth of their country, its pain
, its resilience, its stolenlives, something incredible can
happen.
Empathy deepens, identity,becomes more resilient, not less
(19:40):
.
People begin to see themselvesas part of a larger human story,
not just patriotic consumers.
They are more likely to votewith intention, protest with
compassion, create with justicein mind.
A collective that tells thetruth about its past becomes
capable of healing its future Onan even deeper level.
When we pray, celebrate orsimply identify with held
(20:01):
beliefs, we align ourselves witha force greater than ourselves.
It's an act of intimatepsychological and spiritual
tuning.
But when the object of ourdevotion is not rooted in truth,
when it's a projection, adistortion or a construct meant
to control rather than liberate,then what we are doing is not
celebrating.
It's psychologicalself-fracturing.
We're feeding our consciousnessto an illusion.
(20:29):
Religious holidays today are notcelebrations of truth, but
stories we were told to keep usin line with the societal power
structure.
If we don't know the history orthe astrotheological truths
behind the myths, we're notengaging in spirituality.
We're participating inpsychological programming,
celebrating a collective blissof ignorance on annual repeat
like a broken record.
For example, worshipping theevent of a resurrection without
understanding the inner alchemyof rebirth leads to an
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externalization of divinity.
We look outside of ourselvesfor salvation while ignoring the
God force or Krishna or Buddhawithin.
But don't worry.
In today's society, all ofthese religious holidays and
their fairy tale gods take abackseat to the ever-changing
line of popular false gods thatseem to rejuvenate every season.
We have consumerism disguisedas abundance, nationalism
(21:15):
disguised as divine destiny,institutional religion disguised
as spiritual truth.
Don't forget celebritiesdisguised as divine destiny,
institutional religion disguisedas spiritual truth.
Don't forget celebritiesdisguised as saviors or the fan
favorite, your own ego disguisedas empowerment.
When we anchor our spiritualenergy to false gods, our inner
compass gets corrupted.
We are not able to experience agenuine spiritual connection to
(21:35):
our higher selves, to thesource we are all collectively
in tune with.
False gods require followers,they need worshipers, because
they are empty constructs thatfeed off belief.
The true divine, the originalsource, needs nothing from us
but invites everything from us.
It invites wholeness,remembrance and sovereignty.
Yet when we spent our livesinvested in a false image, the
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truth feels threatening.
It shatters comfortingillusions.
But to stay aligned with afalse god out of convenience is
to continue praying to our ownchains.
To stop praying to false godsmeans more than rejecting
institutions.
It means going inward.
It means asking is what Ibelieve bringing me closer to
truth or just keeping meacceptable to the social status
(22:20):
quo?
Am I shorting a system or am Iin a relationship with something
eternal?
Do I feel more sovereign andloving, or more fearful and
dependent?
The reclaiming of ourconsciousness begins when we
stop outsourcing our spiritualpower and start embodying it.
The true quote, unquote holyday is when your inner being is
aligned with the truth of whoand what you really are.
(22:40):
When people are asleep in theirown existence, they become
easily manipulated, disconnectedfrom meaning, numb to wonder
and, most tragically, estrangedfrom their own soul.
Think about it In a society ofoverworked, oversimulated and
undernourished souls, holidaysbecome the state-sanctioned
dopamine drip.
You're given permission to rest, love or reflect.
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This illusion of freedom masksthe deeper reality.
The emotional life of thepopulation becomes
compartmentalized, controlled,somewhat argue, weaponized.
Myths matter, and holidays arehow these myths are reinforced.
By rewriting the origins andmeanings of holidays, the system
replaces spiritual truth withnationalistic fiction.
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Religious holidays aresecularized, stripped of
mystical meaning and used foreconomic simulation.
Check out Christmas, forexample.
National holidays promote heromyths, world-warification or
origin stories that eraseinconvenient truths, ie
Thanksgiving.
The people aren't celebratingreality, they're celebrating the
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approved version of reality.
Rituals are powerful tools ofconsciousness.
When engaged intentionally,they awaken.
But in other frameworks ritualscan hypnotize.
When people repeat holidaybehaviors year after year
decorating, pledging, shopping,singing without knowing the
symbolic or historical meaning,they become unconscious
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participants in their ownprogramming.
The repetition builds neuralpathways of compliance,
emotional associations withfalse narratives, social
pressure to conform, shamingthose who refuse to participate.
In this way, the system doesn'tneed to force anything.
The ritual enforces itself.
Control, conformity,complacency all thrive in
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forgetfulness.
Holidays end up helping peopleforget what matters and remember
what the holiday narrative hasbecome.
The original purpose of manyholidays was rebirth, awakening
or sacred alignment.
Now they serve to maintainsocial sedation.
The soul is put to sleep underthe comfort of nostalgia.
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Perhaps the most insidious useof holidays, as shown by Judaism
, islam and the Church, is theway they divert true spiritual
connection.
You are taught to externalizedivinity.
Islam and the Church is the waythey divert true spiritual
connection.
You are taught to externalizedivinity, to look to a nation, a
messiah, a flag, a product, asaint, instead of the divine
within.
You are given rituals butstripped of their true meaning.
You are offered reverence butdirected towards false gods.
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Gods of war, consumption andobedience.
Gods of war, consumption andobedience.
True spirituality liberates it,questions it, awakens inner
sovereignty.
That's dangerous to anycontrolling system.
So instead, holidays offer astate-approved spirituality, one
that directs your awe andreverence away from truth and
towards the system.
(25:35):
Holidays create mass rituals ofperceived togetherness parades,
fireworks, televised speechesthat produce a false sense of
communal harmony.
You're not actually united,you're synchronized.
The result is a population thatfeels emotionally tethered to a
nation or system, even if thatsystem is exploiting them.
The illusion of connectionbecomes more important than the
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actual reality when we celebratereligious holidays without
knowing their origin stories or,worse, without understanding
what we're actually celebrating.
We're not practicing faith,we're participating in a ritual
of ignorance.
In doing so, we willinglyaccept yet again someone else's
narrative, someone else'sconsolidation of energy
broadcast across the entirepopulation.
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It reveals just how controlledwe truly are.
Not only are our working hoursowned, but even our holy days,
our time of rest, reflection andsupposed spiritual alignment,
they're hijacked.
These days were meant to besacred moments to disconnect
from the machine and reconnectwith whatever belief system,
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spiritual path or divinepresence speaks to us.
But if you choose to ignore thistruth and write off this
message as irrelevant, askyourself this what are you left
with?
That's truly holy.
What are you left with?
That actually reflects truth?
What do you really know aboutthe beliefs you claim to hold?
Tolerating lies from theoutside is one thing, but
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internalizing them, making thempart of your identity, repeating
them without question, that'snot devotion, that's delusion.
As you continue listening to theManhattan Prophet podcast, I'm
going to unveil the true natureof the world that exists right
under your nose.
I'm going to analyze with you,out in the open, the systems at
play here and the ways we cangrow together and evolve.
(27:21):
I'm going to provide you withreal-world ways to touch higher
levels of consciousness andunderstanding through truth and
knowledge.
I want to make this clear I donot own these truths.
I do not own this knowledge.
I'm simply extracting it anddistilling it for you in an
accessible form.
I ask not that you follow meblindly, rather that you follow
me with your open mind and heart.
Episodes are updated weekly.
(27:42):
If you believe and want tochange your world for the better
and support this evolution ofconsciousness, please show me by
following and sharing thischannel with those you love and
leaving a review.
If you enjoyed our time today,please donate on BuyMeACoffee,
linked in the show notes belowUntil next week.
(28:05):
Let's level up and master youruniverse.
Hello everyone and welcome to the twelfth episode
of the Manhattan Prophet Podcast.
I am the Manhattan Prophet as areminder, so that nothing is
lost in translation.
I'm here to ensure that allknowledge I give finds meaning
in a practical place in youreveryday lives.
It's only through properlydigesting knowledge, in this
case of ourselves and the worldaround us, that we see things
clearly enough to break oldpatterns of behavior and to get
(00:27):
a new path forward to aheightened state of
consciousness.
Today we're diving intosomething that touches every one
of us, yet most of us neverstop to question our holidays.
You see, most people celebrateholidays without ever really
knowing what they're celebrating.
We decorate, we gather, wefeast, we repeat.
But ask someone the true originof the holiday they're
celebrating?
We decorate, we gather, wefeast, we repeat.
But ask someone the true originof the holiday they're
(00:48):
observing and chances are theanswer is vague, commercialized
or flat out wrong.
In this episode, we'reexploring the hidden histories
and deeper meaning behind theholidays we've grown up with.
How many were co-opted,stripped of their spiritual or
cultural significance andrepackaged to serve agendas far
(01:11):
removed from their roots?
We'll talk about howmisunderstood holidays shape our
identity, regulate our emotionsand even act as mechanisms of
control.
But, most importantly, we'llask why knowing the truth
matters, because when weremember where something comes
from, we reclaim our power todecide what it means.
So whether it's Christmas,independence Day, thanksgiving
or Easter, this episode is aboutwaking up from the autopilot of
(01:34):
tradition and stepping intoconscious celebration.
Let's get into it.
Holidays are not merely breaksfrom work or school.
They are ritualized pauses intime, cultural mirrors through
which we remember who we are,who we've been and who we aspire
to be.
At both the personal andnational level, holidays
(01:54):
function as anchoring mechanismsfor identity.
They shape memory, belief,belonging, even behavior, and
often they do so quietly,invisibly and powerfully.
Let's unpack why holidays arenot just seasonal celebrations
but psychological scaffoldingand national myth-making tools.
(02:15):
On the personal level, holidaysare woven into our earliest
emotional and sensoryexperiences.
For many, holidays are thefirst rituals we participate in
Lighting candles, singing songs,setting tables, decorating
homes.
These rituals build memorythrough repetition, and memory
builds identity.
Ritual in its simplest form canbe understood as repetition
(02:36):
with meaning.
These repeated actions create asense of stability and
continuity in a chaotic world.
They tell us you are part ofsomething ancient, something
bigger.
Don't be so disconnected thatyou are not able to see the
potency of emotional memory.
A child might forget a schoollesson, but they remember the
warmth of a certain dish, thescent of incense, the sound of
(02:58):
laughter in the background.
These become touchstones of theself emotional architecture
that you, as an adult, oftenseek to return to.
At the macro level, holidays aretools of nation-building.
They are the mythological glueused by governments and cultures
to instill a shared story.
The most successful holidaysare those that merge national
(03:19):
myth with emotional resonance,creating a collective sense of
meaning and belonging.
The Fourth of July, forinstance, doesn't just celebrate
independence from Britain.
It reinforces a narrative ofliberty, rebellion and
exceptionalism.
Fireworks and patriotic songsaren't neutral.
They're performativeaffirmations of a shared mythos.
Bastille Day, australia Day,juneteenth, victory Day in
(03:42):
Russia each of these is morethan historical remembrance.
They are selective memory.
They reflect what the nationchooses to elevate, forget or
reframe.
This myth-making can bedangerous when it suppresses
truth.
For example, columbus City inthe United States once
celebrated discovery whileerasing Indigenous genocide.
The shift towards IndigenousPeoples Day represents an
(04:03):
evolving national identity, acollective confrontation with a
buried past.
Holidays, in this sense, arenot just reflections of culture.
They are battlegrounds forcultural definition.
Let's examine Thanksgiving,which may be the most acute
example of blind celebration.
The real Thanksgivingcelebration was when, in 1637,
(04:25):
massachusetts declared anofficial holiday after colonists
massacred over 700 Pequot men,women and children during the
Pequot War.
The Thanksgiving holiday weknow and celebrate today was, in
truth, repurposed to shapenationalism.
In 1863, president AbrahamLincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving
a national holiday during theCivil War, hoping to promote
unity and heal the wounds of thenation.
During the Civil War, hoping topromote unity and heal the
(04:47):
wounds of the nation, he washeavily influenced by Sarah
Josepha Hale, a magazine editor,who spent 17 years lobbying for
a Thanksgiving holiday.
This to promote morality,domestic values and a sense of
American identity.
So what we now think of as thefirst Thanksgiving was
retroactively romanticized togive America a clean, harmonious
origin story, one that erasescolonization, genocide and
(05:09):
indigenous resistance.
Since 1970, many NativeAmericans have recognized
Thanksgiving as a national dayof mourning.
On Thanksgiving Day, indigenouspeoples and allies gather in
Plymouth, massachusetts, tomourn the genocide of Native
people, the theft of indigenousland and the distortion of
history.
It's a day to rememberancestors, educate the people
(05:31):
and resist ongoing colonialism.
Over time, these holidayscondition us to associate
certain emotions with certainsystems.
Joy becomes tied to buying.
Pride becomes tied tomilitarism, gratitude becomes
tied to whitewashed history.
Without awareness, holidays canbecome tools of subtle
indoctrination.
Because holidays are public andrepeated, they are excellent
(05:53):
barometers of social change.
When values shift, holidaysshift or become points of
tension.
The recognition of Juneteenthas a federal holiday reflects
the US grappling with its raciallegacy and expanding its
national narrative to includeBlack freedom and resilience.
This shows us that holidays arenot static.
They evolve, expand, clash andsometimes fracture, depending on
(06:15):
what the society is willing orunwilling to acknowledge about
itself.
Ultimately, holidays operate intwo directions they reflect
(06:37):
back to the self and out towardsthe society.
They tell the individual thisis what your people value.
They tell the nation this iswhat we want our citizens to
feel, become simple tools forself-awareness.
But when we go through themotions without reflection, they
become mechanisms ofprogramming.
Religious holidays were nevermeant to be days off work filled
with generic rituals orcommercial fanfare.
At their core, they arespiritual markers guiding us
(06:59):
through cycles of life death,rebirth, forgiveness, harvest,
even light.
When we understand the originalintent behind these observances
, we're invited back intoalignment with something far
deeper than tradition.
We're invited intotransformation.
One of the most healingrealizations we can have is that
many of our religions aretelling the same story in
different languages shaped bygeography and culture.
(07:22):
The flood narrative spansMesopotamia, Jewish, hindu and
indigenous stories.
The winter solstice was a sacredturning point for ancient
people around the globe, longbefore it was absorbed into
Christian traditions likeChristmas.
This doesn't diminish anyone'sfaith.
It illuminates their commonessence.
By learning the history behindholidays, we realize that we are
(07:43):
not strangers divided bydoctrine, but siblings,
interpreting the divine throughdifferent windows.
Embracing this consciousnessdissolves the illusion of
supremacy, replacing it with anewfound understanding of
diversity.
When we don't question orunderstand the roots of our
beliefs, we risk surrenderingour agency.
Many have practiced faith notout of love or understanding,
(08:06):
but out of fear, tradition orcoercion.
History matters because itreminds us that religions have
always been intertwined withpower, used both to liberate and
to control.
Modern consciousness is obsessedwith facts, data and logic.
While useful, this linear lenshas choked out our ability to
see through symbols, metaphorsand myth.
(08:27):
But religious holidays aresteeped in symbolic power.
They reflect not only culturalmemory, but cosmic patterns,
solstices, equinoxes,agricultural cycles and
planetary movements.
When we rediscover what thesesymbols meant, like the
candlelight of Diwalirepresenting inner illumination
(08:47):
amidst darkness, or Yom Kippuras a day of deep soul reckoning,
we begin to live mythicallyonce again.
We shift from surface existenceinto a life that is layered
with meaning, purpose and andpoetic resonance.
Religion, when misused ormisrepresented, has left behind
deep scars forced conversions,inquisitions, genocides,
cultural erasure.
(09:08):
To heal we must first seeclearly.
Historical knowledge bringsvisibility to what was hidden or
distorted.
This kind of informedconsciousness refuses to repeat
past harm.
It replaces shame or denialwith accountability and
reverence.
In today's spiritualmarketplace it's easy to
romanticize cherry-pick orappropriate traditions without
(09:29):
context.
But when we know the history,we don't just mimic rituals, we
honor them.
If we're going to burn sagefast for clarity or celebrate
solstices, let it be from aplace of understanding and
respect, not novelty or ego.
Knowledge brings humility.
In a world addicted to speedand forgetting remembering is an
(09:54):
act of revolution.
Knowing the true history of ourreligions and holidays reclaims
what is sacred.
It expands our consciousnessbeyond cultural conditioning.
It reminds us that spiritualityat its highest is about
awakening, not controlling.
In remembering where we camefrom, we find clearer direction
and where we're going.
Our present-day calendar, knownas the Gregorian calendar, has
its roots in ancient Rome and isthe product of both political
(10:15):
and religious influence.
Though initially adopted byCatholic countries, it wasn't
universally embraced right away.
Protestant and Orthodox nationsheld out for decades or even
centuries.
Today, the Gregorian calendaris the standard governing
everything from businesscontracts to school years to
religious holidays, many ofwhich were strategically placed
or preserved to supportreligious and empirical agendas.
(10:35):
In order to illustrate just howdisconnected we truly are from
our own realities, the simplemonthly structure of the modern
day calendar is vastly unknownto most people.
Our current calendar is, intruth, a heavily revised version
of older timekeeping systemsthat have been altered for
political, religious andpractical reasons over thousands
of years.
One of the clearest signs ofthis shift is hidden in plain
(10:58):
sight.
The names of the monthsthemselves take September,
october, november and December.
Their names are derived fromthe Latin words for 7, septem, 8
, octo, 9, novem and 10, decem,even though they are now the 9th
, 10th, 11th and 12th months ofthe year.
This mismatch traces back tothe early Roman calendar, which
(11:21):
began in March, making thosenames numerically accurate at
the time.
Later reforms, including theaddition of January and February
to the beginning of thecalendar, shifted everything
forward.
Over time, emperors eveninserted their own names into
the calendar, such as July forJulius Caesar and August for
Augustus, further distorting theoriginal structure.
What most people don't realizeis that April 1st was once
(11:42):
celebrated as New Year's Dayacross most of the world.
Julius Caesar, advised by theAlexandrian astronomer Sosigenes
, restructured the Romancalendar to align with the solar
year.
He set January 1st as the startof the new year, made the year
365 days long, with a leap yearevery four years, and gave us
the modern month lengths wemostly use today.
So why January 1st for thefirst day of our new year?
(12:05):
January was named after Janus,the Roman god of beginnings and
doorways.
He literally looks both forwardand backward.
The Roman consuls, or chiefmagistrates, took office on
January 1st, so it became apractical administrative date to
mark a new year.
During the Middle Ages, january1st as New Year's faded into
popularity due to Christianinfluences, many parts of Europe
(12:26):
began the year at the end ofMarch or beginning of April.
Catholic countries adopted itquickly.
Protestant and Orthodoxcountries took longer.
England, in fact, waited until1752.
Greece until 1923.
Not sure if you know this one,but when the calendar was
reformed by Pope Gregory XIII,not everyone got the memo or
accepted the change right away.
(12:47):
Those who continued tocelebrate the new year on April
1st were mocked by those who hadadopted the new calendar, often
being sent on fool's errands ortricked into elaborate pranks.
Over time, these playful jabsevolved into what we now know as
April Fool's Day, a quirkycultural remnant of a forgotten
calendar revolution, remindingus just how little we know about
(13:07):
the origins of the holidays wetake for granted.
Many of the holy days celebratedin the Abrahamic religions
Christianity, judaism and Islamhave deeper roots in
pre-Abrahamic pagan traditionsthat were absorbed, rebranded or
reinterpreted over time asempires expanded and religions
sought to unify diversepopulations.
Ancient seasonal festivals,solstice rites and fertility
(13:29):
celebrations were oftenstrategically repurposed to
align with newer theologicalnarratives.
What we find is that modern-daymonotheistic religions and
their respective holidays arenot in fact an evolved way of
understanding our actualconnection to universal
consciousness, to understandingour connection to the divine.
Let's look into the facts here.
Christmas, for example, widelybelieved to mark the birth of
(13:52):
Jesus, is in fact a celebrationof the ancient winter solstice
festivals like Saturnalia andYule.
These celebrated the return oflight during the darkest days of
the year.
And Yule these celebrated thereturn of light during the
darkest days of the year.
Easter, too, is named after thepagan goddess Yistra, and
coincides with spring fertilityfestivals celebrating rebirth
and renewal.
This blending of old and new wasnot accidental.
(14:12):
It was a deliberate method ofcorralling and indoctrinating
people into new belief systems,making them more accessible and
culturally familiar.
Yet most people practicingthese religions today are
unaware that many of their mostsacred observances are built
upon older nature-centeredtraditions that long predated
the texts and doctrines thatthey now uphold.
We have Valentine's Day, whichwe have been taught to believe
(14:34):
is simply a celebration of loveor, if we looked a bit deeper,
is the honoring of a 3rd centurymartyr, st Valentine, hence the
name.
But the origin is actually acelebration of the pagan
festival Lupercalia, which was afertility festival dedicated to
Faunus and Romulus and Remus,and involved love rituals,
purification and matchmaking.
This manipulation didn't takeplace just with the commercial
(14:56):
holidays.
It did with those we assignedspirituality or divinity as well
.
Take Easter, for example, whichin truth is a celebration of
the spring equinox fertilityrites, or pagan goddess Isra.
You have been taught that itrepresents the day Jesus
resurrected from the dead.
This is but another fun fairytale legislated by the Roman
Catholic Church.
Then we have Christmas, whichis actually the pagan festival
(15:20):
Dies Natalis Solis Invicti,christmas, which is actually the
pagan festival Dies NatalisSolis Invicti, or Birthday of
the Unconquered Sun, celebratingthe sun god during the winter
solstice.
You have been taught that thisis the birth of Jesus.
Interestingly enough, when youinvestigate the origin story of
Jesus, you find that the RomanCatholic version of his
existence is nothing more than aplagiarized carbon copy of the
solar messiah story, which isused throughout history to
(15:43):
establish the importance of thesun.
Pope Julius I in the 4thcentury set December 25th as
Jesus' birthday to spirituallyabsorb and redirect the masses.
The actual celebration is forthe pagan sun god, yet the
masses still to this day areblind to their own celebrations.
The Roman Catholic Church has inso many ways sculpted our
(16:04):
common consciousness.
They did so intentionally inorder to shape, unify and
manipulate society acrosscenturies, and the Church
determined what days were sacredand effectively structured
people's time.
The calendar, generallyspeaking, determines when you
worked, rested, fasted, feasted.
There were over 100 feast daysper year in medieval Europe,
(16:25):
which meant your entire sense oftime and meaning was
church-directed.
Whoever controls time controlsthe pace and pattern of society.
This wasn't just spiritual.
It had political and economicimplications too.
There were to be no marriagesor legal proceedings during Lent
, no farming on certain feastdays, or else risk of
excommunication or sin.
Market days were often alignedwith holy days to blend commerce
(16:45):
and religion.
Fasting seasons like Lentregulated food consumption and
physical discipline.
Feast days created communalhighs, emotional and economic.
These were tied to the church'scalendar.
This constant cycle ofsacrifice and reward, controlled
by religious authority, shapedbehavior, expectation and even
emotional life.
This wasn't just religious, itwas a consolidation of power.
(17:09):
Days like All Souls Day, wherelast judgment-themed sermons
instilled cosmic fear.
You didn't just miss a holiday,you risked eternal consequences
.
People were, and still are tothis day, kept morally dependent
on the church for salvation.
These holidays made spiritualobedience and participation
non-optional, unless you wantedto risk your soul.
Of course, this is about morethan just religious history.
(17:32):
It's about identity, truth andhow a society shapes its own
soul.
This tradition of half-truthsand fables as the soul of our
holidays has been seamlesslyadopted by modern-day nations,
even in this country.
When a country sanitizes ormythologizes its history,
especially its origin stories,it creates a collective
consciousness that's unmooredfrom truth.
(17:55):
In the US, that means genocideis rebranded as gratitude.
Slavery becomes a footnoteinstead of the backbone of the
economy.
Colonialism is heroic, notpredatory.
When people are disconnectedfrom the painful parts of their
collective heritage, severaltraits emerge in the dominant
culture Compassion is extendedselectively, often aligned with
(18:18):
national or racial identity.
Global suffering becomes easierto ignore, especially if
victims are not quote-unquote us.
Any challenge to national mythsfeels like a personal attack.
Western citizens often feelunrooted, anxious and
disconnected.
That's the cost of living in asociety that doesn't know or
denies its truth story.
(18:38):
There's no ancestral grounding,no collective ritual of
reckoning, no sharedmeaning-making that honors both
beauty and pain.
If the collective story isdishonest or incomplete, people
will retreat into self-brandinghustle culture, escapism or
consumerism to fill the void.
The I-am-what-I-buy-do-or orachieve mentality becomes the
(18:58):
default identity framework.
When we deny the trauma ofgenocide, the theft of land and
labor, the legacies of perpetualwarfare and Western hegemony,
that denial does not disappear.
It seeps into delusionalnationalism, cultural amnesia,
even anxiety disorders.
These aren't just personalissues.
They are symptoms of a cultureavoiding its own shadow, not
(19:20):
willingly, but rather from acollective subconscious anchored
in complacent ignorance.
The path forward is not throughguilt, but through evolution of
consciousness.
When people start learning thetruth of their country, its pain
, its resilience, its stolenlives, something incredible can
happen.
Empathy deepens, identity,becomes more resilient, not less
(19:40):
.
People begin to see themselvesas part of a larger human story,
not just patriotic consumers.
They are more likely to votewith intention, protest with
compassion, create with justicein mind.
A collective that tells thetruth about its past becomes
capable of healing its future Onan even deeper level.
When we pray, celebrate orsimply identify with held
(20:01):
beliefs, we align ourselves witha force greater than ourselves.
It's an act of intimatepsychological and spiritual
tuning.
But when the object of ourdevotion is not rooted in truth,
when it's a projection, adistortion or a construct meant
to control rather than liberate,then what we are doing is not
celebrating.
It's psychologicalself-fracturing.
We're feeding our consciousnessto an illusion.
(20:29):
Religious holidays today are notcelebrations of truth, but
stories we were told to keep usin line with the societal power
structure.
If we don't know the history orthe astrotheological truths
behind the myths, we're notengaging in spirituality.
We're participating inpsychological programming,
celebrating a collective blissof ignorance on annual repeat
like a broken record.
For example, worshipping theevent of a resurrection without
understanding the inner alchemyof rebirth leads to an
(20:52):
externalization of divinity.
We look outside of ourselvesfor salvation while ignoring the
God force or Krishna or Buddhawithin.
But don't worry.
In today's society, all ofthese religious holidays and
their fairy tale gods take abackseat to the ever-changing
line of popular false gods thatseem to rejuvenate every season.
We have consumerism disguisedas abundance, nationalism
(21:15):
disguised as divine destiny,institutional religion disguised
as spiritual truth.
Don't forget celebritiesdisguised as divine destiny,
institutional religion disguisedas spiritual truth.
Don't forget celebritiesdisguised as saviors or the fan
favorite, your own ego disguisedas empowerment.
When we anchor our spiritualenergy to false gods, our inner
compass gets corrupted.
We are not able to experience agenuine spiritual connection to
(21:35):
our higher selves, to thesource we are all collectively
in tune with.
False gods require followers,they need worshipers, because
they are empty constructs thatfeed off belief.
The true divine, the originalsource, needs nothing from us
but invites everything from us.
It invites wholeness,remembrance and sovereignty.
Yet when we spent our livesinvested in a false image, the
(21:58):
truth feels threatening.
It shatters comfortingillusions.
But to stay aligned with afalse god out of convenience is
to continue praying to our ownchains.
To stop praying to false godsmeans more than rejecting
institutions.
It means going inward.
It means asking is what Ibelieve bringing me closer to
truth or just keeping meacceptable to the social status
(22:20):
quo?
Am I shorting a system or am Iin a relationship with something
eternal?
Do I feel more sovereign andloving, or more fearful and
dependent?
The reclaiming of ourconsciousness begins when we
stop outsourcing our spiritualpower and start embodying it.
The true quote, unquote holyday is when your inner being is
aligned with the truth of whoand what you really are.
(22:40):
When people are asleep in theirown existence, they become
easily manipulated, disconnectedfrom meaning, numb to wonder
and, most tragically, estrangedfrom their own soul.
Think about it In a society ofoverworked, oversimulated and
undernourished souls, holidaysbecome the state-sanctioned
dopamine drip.
You're given permission to rest, love or reflect.
(23:02):
This illusion of freedom masksthe deeper reality.
The emotional life of thepopulation becomes
compartmentalized, controlled,somewhat argue, weaponized.
Myths matter, and holidays arehow these myths are reinforced.
By rewriting the origins andmeanings of holidays, the system
replaces spiritual truth withnationalistic fiction.
(23:23):
Religious holidays aresecularized, stripped of
mystical meaning and used foreconomic simulation.
Check out Christmas, forexample.
National holidays promote heromyths, world-warification or
origin stories that eraseinconvenient truths, ie
Thanksgiving.
The people aren't celebratingreality, they're celebrating the
(23:44):
approved version of reality.
Rituals are powerful tools ofconsciousness.
When engaged intentionally,they awaken.
But in other frameworks ritualscan hypnotize.
When people repeat holidaybehaviors year after year
decorating, pledging, shopping,singing without knowing the
symbolic or historical meaning,they become unconscious
(24:05):
participants in their ownprogramming.
The repetition builds neuralpathways of compliance,
emotional associations withfalse narratives, social
pressure to conform, shamingthose who refuse to participate.
In this way, the system doesn'tneed to force anything.
The ritual enforces itself.
Control, conformity,complacency all thrive in
(24:29):
forgetfulness.
Holidays end up helping peopleforget what matters and remember
what the holiday narrative hasbecome.
The original purpose of manyholidays was rebirth, awakening
or sacred alignment.
Now they serve to maintainsocial sedation.
The soul is put to sleep underthe comfort of nostalgia.
(24:51):
Perhaps the most insidious useof holidays, as shown by Judaism
, islam and the Church, is theway they divert true spiritual
connection.
You are taught to externalizedivinity.
Islam and the Church is the waythey divert true spiritual
connection.
You are taught to externalizedivinity, to look to a nation, a
messiah, a flag, a product, asaint, instead of the divine
within.
You are given rituals butstripped of their true meaning.
You are offered reverence butdirected towards false gods.
(25:14):
Gods of war, consumption andobedience.
Gods of war, consumption andobedience.
True spirituality liberates it,questions it, awakens inner
sovereignty.
That's dangerous to anycontrolling system.
So instead, holidays offer astate-approved spirituality, one
that directs your awe andreverence away from truth and
towards the system.
(25:35):
Holidays create mass rituals ofperceived togetherness parades,
fireworks, televised speechesthat produce a false sense of
communal harmony.
You're not actually united,you're synchronized.
The result is a population thatfeels emotionally tethered to a
nation or system, even if thatsystem is exploiting them.
The illusion of connectionbecomes more important than the
(25:57):
actual reality when we celebratereligious holidays without
knowing their origin stories or,worse, without understanding
what we're actually celebrating.
We're not practicing faith,we're participating in a ritual
of ignorance.
In doing so, we willinglyaccept yet again someone else's
narrative, someone else'sconsolidation of energy
broadcast across the entirepopulation.
(26:18):
It reveals just how controlledwe truly are.
Not only are our working hoursowned, but even our holy days,
our time of rest, reflection andsupposed spiritual alignment,
they're hijacked.
These days were meant to besacred moments to disconnect
from the machine and reconnectwith whatever belief system,
(26:39):
spiritual path or divinepresence speaks to us.
But if you choose to ignore thistruth and write off this
message as irrelevant, askyourself this what are you left
with?
That's truly holy.
What are you left with?
That actually reflects truth?
What do you really know aboutthe beliefs you claim to hold?
Tolerating lies from theoutside is one thing, but
(27:01):
internalizing them, making thempart of your identity, repeating
them without question, that'snot devotion, that's delusion.
As you continue listening to theManhattan Prophet podcast, I'm
going to unveil the true natureof the world that exists right
under your nose.
I'm going to analyze with you,out in the open, the systems at
play here and the ways we cangrow together and evolve.
(27:21):
I'm going to provide you withreal-world ways to touch higher
levels of consciousness andunderstanding through truth and
knowledge.
I want to make this clear I donot own these truths.
I do not own this knowledge.
I'm simply extracting it anddistilling it for you in an
accessible form.
I ask not that you follow meblindly, rather that you follow
me with your open mind and heart.
Episodes are updated weekly.
(27:42):
If you believe and want tochange your world for the better
and support this evolution ofconsciousness, please show me by
following and sharing thischannel with those you love and
leaving a review.
If you enjoyed our time today,please donate on BuyMeACoffee,
linked in the show notes belowUntil next week.
(28:05):
Let's level up and master youruniverse.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.