DiCarlo: Your work centers around a practice known as "Huna". What is Huna? A religion, a philosophy, or a method of healing?

King: It's more a philosophy than anything else. It's not a religion. It's a way of perceiving the world and how things work that is very ancient, so it would fall more into the category of being a philosophy. There are a lot of types of healing that derive from it, but it itself is not a method of healing-it's a way of looking at the world.

DiCarlo: Could you briefly trace its origins?

King: A lot of that is steeped in legend, but it comes from Polynesia. One of the legends says that it came from the stars, from the Pleiades through the people who are known as"menehune" also called the "Mu" and so it's an association with that ancient civilization that is still a valid, current word in Hawaiian language.

DiCarlo: How did you first become involved with Huna?

King: I was very fortunate. My father became involved before I did. He was adopted by a family on the island of Kuwai and trained in this knowledge. He in turn, trained me when I was young until I was about seventeen. When he died, the family adopted me as a grandson and I have been practicing it ever since.

DiCarlo: How has this practice of Huna changed your life?

King: It's hard to say it has changed my life, but it certainly has enhanced it. Since I grew up with it, I can't say it changed it. But it has enabled me to deal with a lot of problems, including my health. It has helped me raise a very loving family. It has helped me in my achievements and in my growth. It's been a tremendous part of my life.

DiCarlo: What would you say are the essential principles or conceptual underpinnings of Huna?

King: There are seven essential principles:

1. The World Is What You Think It Is. You create your own personal experience of reality through your beliefs, expectations, attitudes, desires, fears, judgements, feelings and consistent thoughts and actions.
2. There Are No Limits. There are no real boundaries between you and your body, you and other people, you and the world, or you and God. Separation is an illusion. There are unlimited potentials for creativity.
3. Energy Flows Where Attention Goes. The thoughts and feelings that you dwell on, in full awareness or not, form the blueprint for bringing into your life the nearest available equivalent experience to those same thoughts and feelings. Directed attention is the channel for the flow of biological as well as cosmic energy.
4. Now Is The Moment Of Power. You are not bound by any experience of the past, nor by any perception of the future. You have the power in the present moment to change limiting beliefs and consciously plant the seeds for the future of your choosing. As you change your mind, you change your experience. There is no real power outside of you, for God is within.
5. To Love Is To Be Happy With. The universe and human beings exist because of love. In Huna, love involves the creation of happiness. It is not just a side effect. Everything works better, is better when this principle is followed consciously.
6. All Power Comes From Within. There is no power outside of you because the power of God or the Universe, works through you in your life. You are the active channel for that power; your choices and decisions direct it. No other person can have power over you or your destiny unless you allow it.
7. Effectiveness Is The Measure Of Truth. In other words, all systems are arbitrary, so feel free to use what works.

All these principles have Hawaiian words at the core of them and proverbs that support them.

DiCarlo: What is the etymology of the word "Huna"?

King: Outwardly, it is usually translated as "secret" but it really means, "that which is hard to see". It refers to the unseen aspects of the world, what you might call spirit, or mind. If we take the word apart, as "hu" and "na", it refers to two aspects of the one source or foundation of the universe. It's very similar to "yang" and "yin". So "hu" is basically movement, and "na" is stillness. Everything that is manifested is some combination of these two.

DiCarlo: Has Huna been kept a secret from the masses?

King: No, that is not accurate. That comes from the problem with that other meaning of the word. When we translate things into English, sometimes the intent gets lost. It has not been kept from the masses, it is not a secret in that sense whatsoever. It was part of the whole Hawaiian tradition that was severely suppressed. The period of suppression began with an invasion of the islands around the year 11 or 12 hundred. The there were more problems that occurred after the missionaries came about 1820. In spite of some attempts by the king to revive the knowledge, it became more severely suppressed after the coup, after the country was overtaken by an American group and turned into a Republic and annexed by the United States. The knowledge was suppressed as was all of Hawaiian culture, but it was not kept a secret. It was supressed not because it was thought the knowledge was dangerous, but because it was thought that the Hawaiian culture was inferior.

DiCarlo: Please explain the Huna concept of God...Is there a Supreme, Absolute Being? If so, what is our relationship to that Being?

King: There are several terms, but one of the terms is "Kumulipo. " Another term, "Ke Akua Nui" can be translated as "Great Spirit". "Kumulipo" is more like "The Great Mystery." This is the foundation of all: that-is; it is, all-that-is. Everything is a manifestation of it. Our relation to it, is that we are part of it. We are an expression of it. It's something like, "Immanent God".

DiCarlo: God within?

King: God within everything.

DiCarlo: Are there any elements of Judeao-Christian thought that Huna would seem to refute?

King: In terms of the deeper understanding of Christianity for instance, no not at all. As an example, all Huna's seven principles can be found in the sayings of Jesus. The same ideas are repeated over and over again. They are not refuted. If you look at some of the ways that Judeao-Christian thought may have been interpreted by different groups down through the years, why of course, you will find that certain points are not agreed upon. But all of the principles of Huna are found in Christian teachings.

DiCarlo: Is there such a concept as "sin" in Huna philosophy? Is man essentially flawed?

King: Oh no, man is not flawed at all. Matter of fact, if you look back, Jesus never said any such thing himself. But the idea of sin, is very close to the original meaning of the word sin itself, which in Hawaiin means, "to make a mistake." That's actually what the word sin means, to deviate from a given path. To be off course. That brings us into another related concept, which is evil. In Hawaiian language, there is only one word for evil, and that is "ino" which means to purposely do harm. So "ino" is a conscious behavior in Hawaiian thinking.

DiCarlo: What is the Huna conception of the constitution of man?

King: We are one whole being, but we have different functions, and those different functions are talked about individually in the same way we might talk about our whole body on the one hand, yet talk about our hands and feet specifically. A good translation in English is "subconscious", "conscious" and "superconscious". But they are not separate things. They are functions or aspects of our whole being.

I've used an analogy of an astronaut in space to make these functions understandable. Basically the subconscious mind relates to the physical body-it's like the spacesuit that an astronaut wears. It has its own capabilities to operate in the physical dimension. The conscious mind is like the person inside the spacesuit-it manipulates the controls and the levers, makes decisions, gives directions, and gets the feedback. Spirit is like the powerpack, the source of power which provides the air, electricity, heating that which sustains life.

DiCarlo: How do these aspects inter-relate?

King: They each have their function. The function of spirit is creativity, which includes energy and inspiration, and therefore also manifestation. The function of the subconscious is memory and learning, and the function of the conscious mind is to make decisions, to direct attention.

DiCarlo: You make the distinction between the Higher Self and the soul, whereas other people use the terms interchangeably...

King: Yes, there's a lot of misunderstanding about some English words that are made to cover too much ground. That was always confusing to me until I spoke to a Christian minister once who pointed out very convincingly that in the bible, the word "soul" means the conscious mind. That impressed me a great deal and seemed to make a lot of sense. So, this is the definition I think is preferable, and workable. That's where that distinction is made, because you can't lose your spirit. They talk about losing your soul-well you can lose your conscious mind. You can give up your ability to direct your own life. But you cannot lose your essence.

DiCarlo: How exactly would the subconscious, conscious, and superconscious work together to manifest our life experience and personal reality?

King: We have to make a kind of arbitrary intrusion here because it's like the chicken and the egg. But an experience takes place... Let's say there is consciousness when the experience takes place. The conscious mind makes a decision about that experience. The experience itself and the decision are remembered by the subconscious. This pattern is used by the spirit or superconscious to manifest the equivalent in the physical world.

DiCarlo:In certain schools of thought we are told each of us forms our experience of reality through the way we frame our life experiences. Our attitudes and beliefs act as sort of a filter which color our perception in any given situation. So it's the old question, "Is the glass half empty or half full?" But doesn't Huna philosophy go a step further and say that, "out of these beliefs, thoughts, and attitudes, one actually creates the very fabric of one's life experience?"

King: At a higher level of our being, yes, of course. Certainly people aren't doing that consciously, unless they have a much broader and deeper perspective on life. But ordinarily, it is our spirit that is doing that. Our spirit which is a part of the Great Spirit. So of course that's happening. But on a practical basis of everyday life, we have an experience and we say that comes from spirit....well OK, fine. Then what matters is how we respond to that. That's where our learning and our growth comes from as a whole being.

DiCarlo: Let's talk about the creative process in greater depth....in Huna it seems like there are two venues for bringing things into our physical reality. The first one you already mentioned, which is that our spiritual essence creates our life experience based upon the patterns it finds in the subconscious mind. But we also create and manifest through the normal process of thinking, which can manifest their physical equivalent.

King: Well yes, this is what I said before. It's basically whatever you are focusing on, either out of habit or self-initiated thought which spirit uses to reflect back to you.

DiCarlo: If the superconscious is actually doing this, then why does it seem that technique is sometimes important-our level of focus, our level of concentration, our emotional involvement?

King: Because if we want to change the feedback, if we want to change what we are experiencing, then it takes conscious decision and focus. That is one way to go. See, sometimes people will spontaneously, or through the influence of others, change the way they think, and so their experience will change. Huna is simply saying, "yes, this is the way it happens and you can do it consciously."