The final day of March 2026 and the occasional venture was a trip out to Wheaton, Illinois to visit the headquarters for the Theosophical Society of America. A bit over an hour to reach the destination by car, counting nearly becoming stranded from running out of gas until a Shell station finally appeared for it and some coffee.
Getting to the location I was greeted with a scene which seemed right out of a Supernatural episode by its aesthetics coalesced together: overcast, greener surroundings and a red brick and stone building full of esoteric thought. Center of focus within the bricks being the Henry S. Olcott Library chock-full of archived Theosophical journals, pamphlets and racks of philosophical works from Blavatsky to Zoroastrian literature.
In my browsing I was led along the walls to focus on a few publications which seemed of note. Most interesting of available material being that of a four volume collection archiving a journal publication called The Light Bearer from 1993 up until 2008. Flipping through it presents as largely Buddhist leaning streams of thought with degrees of (syncretic) Gnostic lacing and interpretation. An interesting title for what is presented; in most contexts the term 'light bearer' conjures up a Luciferian or Promethean ideal. Pipeline separating though with connection to Satanic or adjacent thought evident (as well as within Blavatsky's Doctrine) with comparative analysis. Satanism being the closest the West, or specifically the USA, can ever get to the Eastern philosophy; its means of attaining this Gnosis is via indulgence in the existence whereas Buddhism's enlightenment is through a negation of said desires; both going into the introspective results. 
A small hardcover pamphlet was the next item of captivation, A Theosophical View of Human Races. Short, brief and syncretistic bit it is a largely symbolic posit regarding the idea. Going about explanation by historical mythos such as Atlantis, Hyperboreans and Aryan's with a purported new (at the time of the pamphlet being made) American on the way; detailing that it is more to do with era's of existence and the evolution humanity has during said segment rather than an ethnological determination as with breeding, the species is technically always evolving. In a sense the view given is akin to that of Mark Fishers' conception of 'disidentity politics': a fluid form adopted as method to dennunciate the dissatisfying institutional impositions. It's reminding in the Theosophical sense of a personal omnipotence, or elevated consciousness-- spiritual enlightenment; while Fishers' would be more hardline agnostic sociopolitical, awoken and reasoned with more of a depression.
Lastly looked at in the Olcott Library was a small hard leather covered translation of The Book of Devotion from the Bhagavad Gita; and then a larger red book which was an exploration of power through a Hindu lense, which I find to be of so much interest I plan on returning soon to read it through...
