paths

When you engage the modality of plant medicines they put you to the test pretty early on in the journey. You don't even know you are being tested, but there are offers to see what your intentions are, or maybe not even intentions but just to see how easily you can be knocked off the path you have embarked upon. If you accept and go down a different road, a highway designed to facilitate your use of this new found fount of power travelled by many others, you will get the carrot dangled in front of you, however I'm sure waiting are many unintended consequences of that choice. Although hardly noticed is any hint of the transformation of consciousness, perhaps that is one of the reasons many who have this experience then encourage others to follow in their footsteps. It is a perverse need to see if others will follow that shiny right hand path to power because, hey, we are all human. Looking back at my journey with the plants that started almost six years ago, it was the second time drinking Ayahuasca when I was accosted by that strange demon who scared the wits out of me. It was a stark reminder that all is not well in my world so there will be a need to face up to it. This demon came back the third time I drank Ayahuasca two nights later, though not as in my face. He offered me a share of ultimate power in the conquest of the universe if I would join forces with him. It was a direct invitation to take the ring of power. I didn't accept it but just endured the sales pitch for the night. When I left the jungle this fucker followed me and kept calling to me and I thought I was going crazy. Things got better once I got home but I was periodically harassed. It reached its peak six months later where he'd wake me every night because at that point he knew I was trying to get away from him. Eventually I vanquished him, well that wasn't a fait accompli until I returned to the Amazon and drank Ayahuasca again. He was there waiting for me and I endured his taunts and rage for the whole ceremony until he fucked off for good. The Goddess the next ceremony told me he wouldn't bother me anymore.

In retrospect if I would have grabbed that ring as offered I'm sure I would have developed an inflated sense of self along with self aggrandizement. Success in life would have been assured with material success and the new and shiny girlfriend, while doubling down on this new found path to glory. Of course the requisite emptiness inside would result but that's what booze and drugs are for until you sink into a hole and expire.

I bring up this tale because it was a questioning of intention and you might as well figure out from the get go why you are doing this because along the path you will be continuously tested. If you can move past the first big one then you got the others, well at least you can spot them. All my life I have had an inflated sense of self, I was shy so I kept it under wraps, but let me explain this: I knew I was smarter than everyone else and sure enough the scholastic testing would always prove that out. I always had that to fall back on when things got tough or I had to prove my worth. From this I developed a cocksure self confidence that given a reasonable amount of time I could figure anything out and then excel at it. Two later life results of this are first when I was 40 I decided I was going to figure out the meaning of life and I was actually serious about it. Talk about hubris but I knew I could do it if I put the time and effort into it. So that was the path I chose and how I ended up where I am today. In retrospect it probably saved my life or at least saved me from a miserable post 40 life so for that I am thankful as well as guiding me toward the left hand shamanic path. The other result is because of this pursuit to find meaning I didn't care about riches, material success, or power. That was not my game, my deal was to figure it all out. However I learned that too will be tested, how far will you go to figure it out? You know the try this, try that, oh this drug is the one that will bring on ultimate enlightenment. Hinduism, Buddhism, do you have a guru? Have you tried transcendental meditation? Uh no sounds exotic and fancy; maybe it will give you the secret? 

I found this place four years ago called SpiritQuest run by this unassuming wiseman don Howard. He called this shamanic work, work. There was a structure to the program, I maintained a discipline, and didn't over do the whole trip. In a way not rushing through the course is tough because you want to hurry the process along, but the post plant medicine use integration period was stressed, so I went on about a 15 month cycle for three years of plant medicine use. It was a good path to enlightenment and once there I could shine for all to see. 

Along on the journey to the top of the mountain to become the most high, to attain enlightenment, are within all the constituent parts you thought you were going to ditch when you got that prize. It doesn't work out that way. All the parts of you, you can't pick and choose, pile in for the joy ride. Your ego sits in the front seat and jumps out of the car first when you get to the top. It's so dazzling at the top of the world. Your psyche, your base desires, and your peculiarities didn't go anywhere, you may have suppressed them, but they're with you now on the mountain top. It is a whole new set of problems, even more so then before. At least when you were just a flawed human you had an excuse for all the things you didn't like about yourself or desires that would erupt from the subconscious at inopportune times. Now what? The stakes are even higher since you have declared yourself enlightened. You have to double down on the suppression and so many are waiting for you to fail, so they point out you and your path are frauds. Well guess what? You're still human, so come down off that mountain and embrace what it is to be human.

That was my weakness that was to be tested and exploited to the greatest extent. I wanted that carrot, I wanted the knowledge and assurance of what this all meant. Like I said, SpiritQuest gave me the discipline to do this in a sane manner and by doing so I realized what was happening when I reached the summit of enlightenment mountain. I was one up on the universe! I knew what it all meant and then I realized in the end it didn't mean anything without Love. Finding meaning meant nothing without realizing that all that matters is Love, for yourself and for all others. So come down off that mountain and share that Love you found with everyone else. I owe that all to don Howard and the impeccable program he created at SpiritQuest. Without this guide I'm pretty sure I would have reached the top of the mountain and lorded it all over others instead of coming back down and being of service. To say I have led a blessed and fortuitous life is an understatement. The call is strong to give back now because as I have learned, all are my sisters and brothers. 

trinity

My idea of a trinity involves the sacred marriage of the divine feminine and masculine within that creates through this union the all encompassing hermaphrodite. Bringing the two powers together creates a wholeness of one and also the three. The one is both. In order to access or see it I have to reconcile within these sacred powers. Then I see it. I look into a mirror and I see it, my reflection is the all. I see her and I see him and we are one. I stand at the head of my Mesa and I see us together. I know she is there within me and when combined we transform into the divine couple. When we come together and reunify we will birth new worlds. This universe is the child of the divine couple.

At the conclusion of the movie 'The Matrix' the song 'Wake Up' by Rage Against The Machine exhorts us to wake up. The lead singer Zack de la Rocha pleads with us. He screams "WAKE UP." It worked. Years later I'm in a small town on the equator in the Andes mountains in Ecuador.

I have discovered within my long hidden soul mate. A rooster continuously crows trying to wake me and prepping me for the sacred marriage. I write this down to acknowledge the parallels.

It required a great deal of time, knowledge, wisdom, and understanding to not only figure it out but to actually feel it; to know deep down the answer. I've had the answer for a few years now, probably since the summer of 2016 when I returned from the Amazon jungle. I wasn't able to add it all up and see it though until a few weeks ago. I stood at the head of my Mesa and I saw the answer looking back at me. The realization washed over me and I felt it. I am it. I felt her within and I felt the union. I looked into the union of the serpent and the jaguar and saw it. That's me! And I'm everything. The sacred feminine and masculine were combined as one and acting as my reflection. You know, Jesus is nothing without Mary. Together they are 'god'. They are within us and externally we reenact the sacred coupling with our marriage ceremony. Many ancient cultures had divine couples or dual sexed gods: Isis and Osiris, Virachoca, Shakti and Shiva, and of course my favourite the Ancient Greek god Dionysos - the ecstatic, effeminate, passionate, and liberating one who is eternal and indestructible. The masculine comes forth but underlying everything is the feminine and this is the essence of Dionysos.

The Hindu hermaphrodite Ardhanarishvara - the union of Shakti and Shiva

When I alter my frequency I can access the hidden and forbidden; we call this the occult and are discouraged from entering into these worlds. It's all here now. I've spent time with her in these realms, most of it not understanding our relationship or who I am. She asked me to come away with her, pleaded with me the first time I did it. I said no; I still have things to accomplish in my earthly life and my family to take care of. The second time she invited me into her golden castle and we combined as one through the heart and mind. The third time was an erotic get together in the ancient Egyptian temple of the Goddess at Denderah.

Temple of the Goddess at Denderah

It was the most exotic scenario and incredible feeling of pleasure I have ever felt as she moved over top of me. I didn't pursue this; I was taken aback by this visionary sexual tryst and I guess I wasn't ready to find out about desire plus how it makes the world go round. I did come back for more. She's always around. She became a fairy and enchanted me with her grace and charm. She transformed into a serpent, a large green boa, and entered into me and ended up resting upon my left shoulder. She came back to be at my side after I transformed into a jaguar as my Queen. We married last December in Ecuador on a mountain straddling the equator during a Huachuma ceremony. A rooster crowed repeatedly to wake me up and get my attention. There was someone there playing a drum like I had never heard before. There was a lightness and joyful feeling. Then she transformed into a cow and lay in the grass field next door.

I have told her I'm done with searching in my lifetimes. I have been wandering through millenniums, lost in search of the answer, stubborn in my desire to solve the mystery of the great game. This incarnation is it for me as everything I have wanted to learn and solve has been satiated. I know there is always more to learn and I'll keep digging at it but it's all gravy now. I need to finish this book I'm writing that will free a great many humans from a mental prison. That is a promise I made to her and the plants concerning my sacred journeys. The maestro don Howard calls it reciprocity; it's giving back, a thank you. After that I will return home when the time comes. We will be together, start a family, and birth another universe. 

the game

Culture sets up rules plus goals to accomplish and from the placement of the goal posts, you strive to try and win the game. We get totally involved in our contests, whether it is scholastic, employment related, or a competition we are playing. It gives you a thrill when the outcome is on the line and a sense of satisfaction if the goal is accomplished. Conversely, if you fail at the game or lose a deciding contest, there is a sense of disappointment or worse despair. Humans love games; so much so, that I think gaming is divine and is something universal that creates adventure and excitement. Take it from the standpoint of being omnipotent with the power to control everything. You would be totally bored; so, you would start relinquishing this power in order to create outcomes that are not predetermined. The thrill is there but you still hold onto some control so you don't get lost in the game. We are adventurous and like to take chances so you give it all away and enter into your own creation, perhaps leaving the key to get out with a trusted friend but they are not to use it unless you really foul up your game.

We judge success in anything and everything by wins and losses and we must compete. In our capitalist society business is all about competition; even as a worker you are in competition for employment as well as the constant striving to move up the corporate ladder. Have to kill it at work and become the best, better than all the rest. Gotta get the latest fancy and trendy car to let others know I've made it! Have to get the hard won degree from an institution of higher learning, an institute created by other game playing humans, that demonstrates how smart I am and that my hard work is rewarded. Even set is the trap that in order to gain enlightenment you have to climb the spiritual mountain and win that game. Making the announcement you are enlightened is the ultimate in absurdity.

Do you see it? We create all these artificial cultural goals and then we attach this way of thinking onto everything we do no matter how altruistic and holy we make the game. So, what will happen when I die? Well, if you were good or did the religious institution of choice's bidding then you get rewarded in the afterlife. You can see it now that I have pointed it out. How good do I have to be? Do I need a perfect score? Who decides? Is it the celestial arbiter that grants me the ultimate win?

We have done this to ourselves.

There's no game you have to win, you are creating your game and all that goes along with it. You know when you sit in meditation and finally come to the realization that letting go of thoughts leads to you just being aware? Well, it's a similar situation I am describing with the game. A game is in the same category as a thought. Stop playing games and what are you left with? Experience. This journey in human form is an experience. There's no competition, nor winners and losers. It’s like playing music or dancing that has no ulterior motive. You are just playing for the sake of playing.

Remember to play I was reminded of often last fall while travelling through Peru and Ecuador. Play for the sake of playing.

Unconditional Love for all will come from dropping the need to play the game for gain; to not compete with your fellow humans but to come together, share, and create harmonious bonds.

Most of us play the game all our lives down to our last breath. We are so ensconced in it we don't want it to end. And then posthumously we are offered the chance to roll the dice and play the game one more time. Okay, weeeeee let's go! When it is finally time to go home, you step off the merry go round and leave the carnival via the main gates. The game was fun but I don't want to play it anymore.  

three times' the charm

Three times' the charm - cliche, spell? This can speak to the dissemination of falsehoods in that if you repeat a lie enough then eventually it becomes accepted. Salesmen learn this trick early; it requires a suspension or bypassing of that inner voice that might flag this as being dishonest and they learn to drown out that voice. The top sociopaths are masters at this and then beguile themselves into believing the lie. Referenced within this strange cliche are also language spells that reveal how easily humans can be fooled with words. As Terence McKenna proclaimed "The world is made of language!" It's true we bring this world into existence through the objectification of abstractions with flimsy boundaries of what constitutes the object and then we assign attributes to these abstractions using tricks of descriptive language. It would be an oversight if I did not lump the advertising industry in with this charming phrase. Not only do the pushers of product sell a lifestyle of expectation which appeals to our egos with their clever advertisements but the top manipulators know they must buy enough advertising time in order that their message is repeated and thus becomes one of those mental worms ingrained in the psyche of their unsuspecting victim. Television especially lulls you into a stupor so the hypnotic advertisement can do its work. The only downside to the advertiser is the hypnagogic ability of television to put you to sleep. No matter however, the message is repeated online, on highway billboards, on the transit system you use to get to work, and so on. Another trick is using the inability of most people to think on the spot, especially when challenged. In that case we resort to what is most easily recalled and this means spouting out one of these cliches or an easily remembered claim from a commercial. The ego being what it is and not wanting to be called out for changing its mind or thinking about something, will then double down on these beliefs regardless if they still or ever believed in them.

plants and unselfishness

Plants are of a higher consciousness and evolution than humans. They have physically evolved to the point where they can take in the energy from the sun and convert it into foodstuff. The animal must constantly kill living creatures in order to survive. There's no way around it, whether it is taking the life of animal or plant. The plants give freely of their virtues and gifts to animals. The plants heal and if you are open minded you can learn they also teach. The plants offer all this unconditionally. There is no expectation for a reciprocal offering; that is up to you and your free will. The plants teach us unconditional love if you open your heart and connect with them.

merry go round and round

Scientists can explain what we think are the fundamental physical underpinnings of the universe but the child's love of the merry go round remains a mystery. It's a psychological/psychospiritual connection to this inviting place where we are promised the chance to live out all our dreams and so we desire to give the carnival one more shot. Las Vegas writ large baby! We are cosmic gamblers and desire another roll of the dice in this great game to try and get to the top of our proverbial mountain.

I made a pact before returning this time to the merry go round in the search for the wizard, that I'd have to stumble through the process of self discovery and be allowed to persist in my own folly to determine if I could see through the game and end my fascination with it. I keep returning and going round and round, blowing out my game, probably because I got sidetracked by some desire. Some of us chase fame and fortune; some are here to help; some want to celebrate the self; some are unabashed hedonists - I want to figure it out (why not how) and this is the passion that keeps my flame burning. Ultimately that is the allure of plant medicines and the SpiritQuest Sanctuary. They will help you figure it out with a dose of needed discipline. Don Howard gives you the space you need to come to terms with the fascination and unwavering belief that you can game the system and make these plants work for you. I call it the school of hard knocks because even though he directly tells you the answers you need to successfully work with the plants, you go rogue because nothing beats experience and then beating yourself up repeatedly until bruised while eventually you think well maybe I should quiet my mind and be more accepting of self and this magic carpet ride. Don Howard sees this and you can detect a slight smile and a twinkle in his eyes as he addresses the group, casts a quick glimpse towards you, as he then gives advice to the new initiates about to go through the ringer. At this point a wave of humbleness washes over you.

Whatever formula, shuffle of the deck, or magic potion I used this time seems to have worked. I side stepped a bunch of pitfalls. I stumbled onto the mystery in the Amazon and got chased away the first time I went exploring. Not sure how I pulled it off, but I came back, scared, but I had courage. Eventually I got my answer. I am no longer fascinated and I'm walking home now.

mirror image

When you work with the plant teachers the class doesn't end the next day after a good night's sleep. Often the immediate experience under the influence of the plant is a menagerie of strange visions, fear, ecstasy, and a feeling of relief as the roller coaster comes to a stop. Over the course of the next day or two you gather some insights about the experience but a large part of what took place remains mysterious. I have learned though that you will eventually find connection, or a teaching, with all the content of the class. I have dutifully recorded via pen and paper all of my forays into these realms. However that's not all. In your everyday life things start to happen that you then connect back to a ceremony and you get these epiphanies interspersed throughout your life. The plants are now with you always.

I first went to SpiritQuest in April of 2015 and worked with Ayahuasca and Huachuma. In the ceremonial maloca is this Shibipo tapestry of the head of a jaguar intertwined with a serpent.

It is so impressive and pretty iconic of the sum of my whole experiences in the Amazon jungle. You cannot help but look at it and be enchanted by the artistry and combination of these two motifs. I returned to SpiritQuest in June of 2016 and during the cycle of work with Ayahuasca had some really profound events and revelations during ceremony, all pretty much revolving around my ability to finally quiet my mind and observe. The end of the third ceremony, after a major breakthrough, was serpent charged. A large green boa slithered along the floor of the maloca and entered into my head and wrapped itself around me coming to rest on my left shoulder. Another white snake with flecks of black then entered into my mouth and made its way down to the base of my spine. When I lay on my bed later that night I felt the serpentine waves of energy throughout my whole body. Then during the fifth Ayahuasca ceremony I transformed into a jaguar, allowing me to feel the awesome power of an animal that rules his domain without fear. Just prior to this ceremony we were visited by a group of Shipibo artisans selling their crafts and I was able to purchase a replica of the serpent jaguar tapestry. I have printed out on canvas a picture of this tapestry and also use an image as a background on my personal computer. So I am constantly in contact with this image throughout my daily life.

The last month or so I have internally felt the coming together of the sacred energies within and have sat with them, thought about them, looked for connections with them in nature and mythology, and written quite a bit about this experience in this blog space recently. It's the discovery of the power archetype that combines the sacred feminine with the sacred masculine and this power is... how do I put it? Well it is it. I found the power in mythology that I experience epitomized as the Greek god Dionysos. Dionysos is an effeminate man surrounded by crazed women and horny men.

Love, community, play, nature, intoxication, and mystery cult are what he is all about. It is the sacred marriage of the two polarities of the feminine and masculine found in nature that symbolically combined present as the hermaphrodite.

The serpent jaguar motif of the Amazon is the harmonious combination of this coming together of the feminine and masculine energies. It is the sacred marriage that creates the internal union of the opposites, the intertwining of yin and yang, or the glorious hermaphrodite swan of mythology that ferries the two representatives of the sacred powers, Hansel and Gretel, to safety. I hung my tapestry in my room devoted to my spiritual explorations and I stand at the head of my mesa and look at it every night. A couple years now of looking at this magical image. Two nights ago I stood at this privileged spot and the magical bestower of the sacred epiphany visited me once again. When I stand at my mesa and look at this tapestry I am looking into a mirror. 

magnum opus

The Greco-Roman sculptures and depictions of Dionysos we have passed down to us show him with wine in a relaxed pose.

In the Roman Bacchanalia we read of intoxication and orgies associated with his cult. I was standing the other night at my Mesa where I have a miniature statue of Dionysos on the left hand feminine side and I started laughing because he is holding a bunch of grapes. The mysteries should be hidden so why not just hide them in plain site? Any observer would say cool, the Greeks had a god of wine and licentiousness! And so hidden remains the mystery cult. When you start pulling back the veil he's there, everywhere. When Apollo is absent from his Temple at Delphi in the winter months Dionysos is there with his ecstatic female followers, the maenads.

ecstatic maenads

At Eleusis he's there; he's the light born under cover of darkness. The mystery of Eleusis is a story about the abduction of Demeter's daughter Kore by Hades but Dionysos is somehow mysteriously involved. The light always returns. The popularity of the ancient Egyptian goddess Isis and her mystery cult in the Greco-Roman world is due to the connection of Isis and Osiris to Demeter and Dionysos. Initiation into mystery cult begins and ends with Dionysos: birth, life, death, and rebirth, along with play, laugh, love, sensuality, commonality, unity, and nature. The feminine is given the permission to let loose and the masculine to become a lech, well represented by Dionysian coterie such as the maenads and satyrs which are our base instinctual natures liberated and coming out to play.

satyr

Cultures, fads, and civilizations come and go and expectations of behaviour and morals are flimsy, forever changing with the times. Dionysos reminds us our root instincts, some say 'animal' natures, don't change. 

There's this undercurrent in the appearance of Dionysos in Greek history and culture that goes all the way down into current scholarship where he is considered a foreign god. The post Bronze Age epitome of Greek reason was not accepting of this undisciplined behaviour, neither were the gods of Olympus. Reason and enlightenment are something cultivated by mature and disciplined civilizations. But that's just it; reason is a byproduct of culture. What we term instinct is always there transcending culture. Nature isn't subject to reason. Dionysos is indestructible and ever returning with the returning aspect giving him the aforementioned foreign designation. When society shutters itself into a nice and neat nuclear family full of patriotic citizens, Dionysos the ever coming returns in a frenzy; the 60's an example of an outbreak of peace, love, and anti-establishment behaviour. The authorities put an end to the revelry as they sensed the breakdown of their decades long social engineering project. The turn of the 21st century has seen a doubling down on authoritarian measures in the western 'free countries'. The threat of international terrorism gave the totalitarians among us the opportunity to put the lock down on society. Well guess what? The dam is going to break again and soon. It's already happening and this time it's not stopping. Dionysos is the eternal return.

I have written previously about what I consider to be the all. My contention is that everything is derivative of the separation of the ecstatic embrace of the divine feminine and masculine. We are in the post orgasmic state after the release of energy of the two primal powers. It's humorously called the Big Bang by physicists. However nothing lasts as we well know from just being aware. The universe is defined by movement and change and any attempt at objectification leads to delusion. The state of the universe we are in now will not last forever, it will return once again to unity. The divine couple will reunite once again and after the requisite foreplay will once again create another universe, the universe essentially a child of these two. Curiously within all of us are these two powers and we can reenact the divine play of creation with others and also within. And it isn't a microcosm of the grand movie, it actually is it playing itself out and you are it. Within the energy that animates all is latent omnipotent potential to birth as many universes as you can imagine in your philosophy. Externally we create by coming together sexually with a partner of the opposite sex which is a pretty good mirrored example of the dance of creation. Our externally manifest self physically mirrors the all pervasive energy of creation. Unbeknownst to all is hidden within the ability to unite both energies. Take myself as an example. I have a head start on feeling the masculine energy because that is my gender. However the feminine is within me, it is just hidden and due to culture and gender roles is locked away. Within all of us are the two polarities, this peculiar truth recognized by the alchemists of the Middle Ages. They had a funny way of going about it but essentially what they were trying to do is awaken and transmute the two natures and combine them in a sacred union. From there they envisioned immortality. So within she is calling to you: to free her, to rescue the princess. This is your quest, my quest, the only quest, and that road is long and winding. First is a need to recognize your power and throw off the dragon along with the chains of culture. When you find her you find love, wisdom, and happiness. At some point you will realize you are it, you are the divine masculine and the divine feminine. Then preparations for the internal sacred marriage commence. The sex is fantastic.

The union of these two powers that plays out repeatedly in creation conceptually creates the hermaphrodite. In fact think about this: when you are participating in the sexual act you combine and become one, essentially becoming the hermaphrodite. How then do you represent this combination in terms of a 'god', a strange one at that? As a culture you would say he is foreign as there is no place in society for such a god. He is effeminate. He talks about community and free love. You see where I'm going with this. This god is Dionysos. Dionysos represents the union of the sacred feminine and masculine. Dionysos is the state of creation totally unified. When he is torn apart then we have plurality. Eventually the energy wants to return to a state of coalescence. That is the state of higher consciousness, a current you can try and swim against but it will pull you along. Go with the flow.

sacred marriage

When you combine the feminine with the masculine what do you get? Culturally you get the marriage union. Sexually the end result is a baby. Mythologically you get the hermaphrodite. What about from the human psyche standpoint of enacting an inner transmutation while physically remaining the same? Isn't this what Dionysos is all about? Embraced are the feminine attributes of love, unity, play, pleasure, and a connection to nature and animals. All this whilst in a body and culture designating the masculine as stoic, hardworking, with an appeal to self and strong individualism, along with a strong dose of reason thrown in. This describes where I am currently in this most amazing journey of discovery. Both sides have great attributes and can be complementary. Forge each side through the fires of multiple incarnations, burning off the dross, and then the two sides become ready to be united. The shamans of pre Colombian South America called this two fold process tinkuy where the masculine was mediated into the best qualities put forth while extinguishing the desire to control, to judge, the anger, and the holy righteousness. The masculine focused and structured impetus when combined with the feminine artsy and chaotic side has an effect of a whole being greater than the sum of its parts.

In the myth of Dionysos he is torn apart by the Titans after his birth, with the only thing remaining being the heart. The remains of the Titans, after Zeus zapped them with a thunderbolt in punishment, formed the human body. Looking into this myth, I see Dionysos representing the world soul being torn apart upon entry into our world. We all have a piece of this heart which resides in the Titan body we share, much like a concept of an eternal soul. Indestructible Dionysos represents a primal unity, an ability to return to that state, and in this combination are the feminine and masculine attributes. The sacred marriage of mythology called the Hieros Gamos in essence reconstitutes Dionysos as the dual gendered all. The dismembered Dionysos within creation is recombined into the primal whole. He exhorts us to come together whether that is through wine, dance, sex, or community.

The Goddess I have sensed calling to me all these years would be the buried feminine half of me longing to reconnect with the masculine that has come forth. My soul mate. Are my complementary gendered natures on different cyclic scales and I need to synchronize them? Arrange them on the same vibrational frequency? Are we all individually microcosmic representations of the all and all in a process of tinkuy in order to individually recreate unity? Or are we it, nothing microcosmic about us, pretending we aren't? We all must mediate the feminine and masculine within. And then once we all do it the whole then comes together as one. Externally we look for completeness in a partner while ignoring the call internally. This is very interesting in that not only would we look towards cosmic unity as the divine embrace of the sacred feminine and masculine that are derivative of the ultimate unity but within you and I now are these two halves in a dress rehearsal playing out within all that will lead to a reconnection to source. The ultimate answer to the mystery of the origin of the universe is within us all as well, waiting to come together again.

Marriage is a dress rehearsal for the union within between your two gendered halves and all they entail. It is convenient to put the genders in a box and say feminine and masculine while ignoring the multi variations of the spectrum that each gender contains. The first work, if you are in for example a male body, involves recognizing all the masculine traits within. To become a candidate for the sacred marriage involves mediating all the good and all the bad of what it means to be a man. To be a protector of the sacred feminine; a medieval knight in shining armour. In the human act of marriage two people come together as one, complementing each other, and from that union they produce something even greater. Two halves come together as one and multiply. Within us are the fundamental workings of existence and to realize your full potential we have marriage to remind us that within is also expressed in this same outer construct. I am a man but I also do sense a feminine part of me that is buried. When I become comfortable with my masculinity then I can more easily connect with my feminine half. It was around eight years ago I first noticed her. I have awakened her within through an understanding of who I call the Goddess. She is a source of Love, healing, teaching, and wisdom and within my interactions with her there is a longing to be reunited and she has shown me how she has been locked away. She has asked me to come away with her, she has united with me on an intellectual level and an erotic physical level. Last December there was an afternoon I spent with the plant teacher Huachumon and during this time the most magical drum playing started up and there was this happy and erotic celebratory vibe. It felt like a marriage celebration. No union is perfect and there is work involved to grow however I feel we are together now and need to harmonize our relationship even further. This mirrors the human marriage and a need to work at it.

The connection with Dionysos involves an understanding of my relationship with the Goddess within where this union between us is enacting what is fundamentally the workings of all creation which is the ecstatic embrace of the sacred feminine and masculine. This oneness I see encapsulated in the representations of Dionysos. He is an effeminate man but he embodies attractive masculinity, has this wild band of frenzied female followers called maenads and these erect playful male followers called satyrs. He is ever returning and indestructible and leads us to discovering within are both traits that we can bring together in a sacred marriage to find wholeness. He reminds us with his connections to theatre that this is a grand stage to perform your song and dance and is there so we remember to play. Play, Love, and making connections with others is what it's all about.

eternal return

I sense your absence, I curse your return. I wrote a poem five years ago about the cyclical coming and going of an uncontrollable force within who made me crazy.

The struggle is eternal and I had no idea what it was or who I was up against so I mistakenly assigned it to the darkness and thought it was something to try and control and ultimately vanquish. I locked down my mind and filtered all my thoughts. I purified myself to the point where a monastery would probably give me one of those honorary degrees if they knew about my success. And then one day I went back to the dance and I found I had only suppressed the power and he was waiting for me; ready to pick up the relationship where we last left off. The force is desire. I have at least been educating myself over the last five years, both bookish and experiential, so though I could never get rid of the power, at least I discovered what it is.

When the cycle returns, which in truth it never leaves but fluctuates, trying to control the energy doesn't work. It has to flow upward and outwards or it will leave you a quaking mess. Desire has to be the strongest drug known to us. Desire is serpent power; it comes from the heart being an aspect of Love, and it affects us sexually, our well being, and can be used for spiritual growth. Its exclusive use in one of these areas will turn you into a human who is hard to be around. The power can also be wildly misused in terms of uncontrolled violence and aggression as well as affecting the sex drive, which leads to unfortunate consequences of unbridled passion and lust. It was through my use of the plant medicines and teachers, Ayahuasca and Huachuma, that I came face to face with this power. I didn't know what this power was at first but after getting lesson after lesson it clicked and I eventually passed the course and knew what it was. Serpent power is the life force energy that pulses through all living things. With Ayahuasca it is a requirement of most traditions that the drinker abstain from sexual behaviour a few weeks before drinking and a few weeks afterwards. If you are expressing this energy out through sexual behaviour then there will be less energy accessible for healing and spiritual work. As well, I have also experienced where the body's use of this power to heal itself of sickness can be curtailed by engaging in sexual behaviour and temporarily deplete the self of this power. There is then a need to rebuild up stores of this energy. When under the influence of Ayahuasca this has been presented to me very clearly. My body has been in a heightened state of vibratory ecstasy where I was feeling the love, and I felt this energy coursing in me and rising on up out of my body. At this point my visionary activity became inundated with sexual imagery, in particular writhing, sexually charged women. I understood this at this time to be the direct result of this serpent power and that there is always a choice to channel this energy into the sexual or the spiritual.

Now, the question that needs to be asked and answered is why do I call it serpent power? The presentation of this power within plant medicine ceremonies has been accompanied by visions of serpents or an association to the snake. The first unmistakeable stirring of the energy within ceremony was the final Ayahuasca ceremony in 2015 where the Goddess appeared in her ancient Egyptian temple at Denderah in my vision. The manifestation of power was the ancient Egyptian goddess Hathor in her guise as the Goddess of Love dressed in a red corset and as she approached me and lay over top of my body I experienced the most erotic sensation which I have ever felt, nothing even close to this. Full body ecstasy. Among many connections in the iconography of Hathor is a connection to the serpent Wadjet who represents the power of the rising serpent. The energy undulates in a serpentine pattern and courses through the bodies of ecstatic dancers for Hathor.

dancing in ancient Egypt

It is an eternal flowing and pulsing of energy. When the presentation of this awesome power totally engulfed me it was the second time I drank Huachuma. My whole body was fluttering and I closed my eyes and witnessed the presence of two huge serpents which were flanking this magical light. The light I later learned was myself and the serpents represented this power lighting me up. A year later during a breakthrough ceremony with Ayahuasca, I had an open eyes vision of a green boa slithering along the ceremonial Maloca floor towards me and then entering into my mouth and wrapping itself around me before settling on my left shoulder and arm. I then experienced another snake enter me before I went back to my room and laid down on the bed and experienced the energy pulsing through my body in librating serpentine waves.

So, what I want to explore now is this eternal return of the cyclical power using myself as the test subject. My initial speculation is it is related somehow in man to the feminine menstrual cycle and has a connection to the moon. It is intriguing to think this because ultimately the power comes from the feminine and is then activated within the masculine. I have felt an uptick in power around full moons. This of course leads into mythology and specifically the werewolf and horned creatures of the forest. Looks like I have some research to do. Preliminary thoughts regarding the mythology tie the phenomenon to the full moon, unbridled passion, frenzy, and seducing willing maidens. There is something in this myth to delve into. I'll report back soon.

The beliefs of a great deal of ancient cultures seem to have similar myths of the dying and resurrected god man which when studied we see in them the connection to the grain cycle. The book "The Golden Bough" by anthropologist James Frazer in the 19th century is one of the first and more popular books describing this phenomenon. As well, the typical scholar of religion and mythology tends to relate these nature myths to the development of agricultural societies. Some of the gods and goddesses we put into a neat scholarly box are Osiris in ancient Egypt, the mysteries of Dionysos and Persephone in ancient Greece, and Attis in Phrygia. Jesus Christ of Christianity, though not a typical grain god, incorporated this ability into his all encompassing lordship and gave hope to all believers in a life after death. The impetus for the disappearance and reappearance cycle of these gods is as I have stated serpent power. It's an eternal cycle that comes and goes and riding the wave allows for an eternal return.

In researching these gods, the grasping of the connection to the omnipresent agricultural cycle seems to lead to a confidence in decoding the myth and therefore a probing deeper into the real mystery stops. Dionysos is a prime example as there is his unmistakable connection to the grape and wine but the agricultural cycle is just one example and an aspect of how the power works; serpent power in actuality is everything! Sit with yourself or record how you feel over the course of a few weeks and you’ll discover everything is shaped by this mysterious and rhythmic power. There are these cycles of hunger, sleepiness, and desire to give a few examples which repeatedly come and go. Oh, lusty desire is pretty special and it can make you horny, just like all the randy horned gods of antiquity. Dionysos is a madman, a charmer, and a seducer. He breaks down societal mores and expectations of chaste behaviour. Our modern, hidden, and latent Victorian attitudes makes us a little put off by the sexuality of these gods like Dionysos as well as his crazy followers - the maenads and satyrs, and the depictions of these fertility gods being fully erect is a mental block which prevents us from exploring the mysterious power further.

Satyr

Sure, we all feel it but where does it come from and why does it go away and then return, always knocking on the door once again? How about when the power returns you start to channel it into healing or a passion for something else besides sexual activity? Like Love. It is the eternal returning power and it forever comes and goes. You can't control it, but you can definitely recognize it, and then channel the power instead of wasting it. This is unchartered territory for a modern. I have no template for this but I know the power and when it returns and so I can do something with it. And I know it is the answer. It’s the holy grail. It's indestructible life. I feel like I'm on the game show Jeopardy where you are given the answer and you have to formulate the proper question.

I convinced myself at some point on the start on this mystical journey while researching and figuring out the origin of beliefs that the observation of nature and the heavens was the impetus behind myths and gods and why cultures believed in concepts like the resurrection, the underworld, and the drama and battles taking place in the heavens. I deduced the ancient seers then projected these concepts onto their own lives and I guess the human condition being what it is, they found solace in beliefs that allowed for the continuance of some form of life post mortem. However, let's look at this another way: Perhaps instead of this approach, they were first in touch with the awesome power which flows through their very core and developed an advanced understanding of this power ebbing and flowing. They sensed it was indestructible and always returned. Understanding this gave them a sense of being eternal and the fear of annihilation upon physical death was assuaged to the point where human sacrifice could be thought of as a noble endeavour as opposed to the horror we think it is. From this core belief and understanding, they would then observe the environment and discover this power at work in everything. When you really feel this power within it is like the waves on the ocean, it is the the undulating movement of the serpent, it is the cycle of the moon waxing, becoming full, and waning. You start to witness it everywhere. And now today from the loss of the ability to feel this, we stand on the precipice of history as a blind man ignorant in regards to the fundamental core of who we are, our indestructibleness, and the eternal return all the while creating an impressive world based on the wonders and marvels of technology.

Okay, so back to trying to observe this power and how it manifests. I was at a Trevor Hall concert in late July and I noticed a few things. I haven’t been to a concert in a while and back when I used to go I obviously didn’t know what I know now. First of all, I noticed the women and how they move. About one in ten women get lost in the rhythms of the music and enter into trance. Their movements become very serpent like. Another half of them present feel the beat way more than their masculine counterparts and are compelled to dance and move. The other thing I really noticed was how this generation of people are really connected to a different paradigm of sensing spirit and the earth mother. Part of it is probably because of the popularity of North American practices of Yoga as well as an adoption of hippy culture and an acceptance of marijuana over a strictly alcohol based modality as a culturally sanctioned activity for altering consciousness. The reason I suggest this is Trevor Hall’s songs and stories are very spirit based and reference the great earth mother which always drew a reaction from the crowd. I also sense in this generation the struggle to break free of the older generation's insistence on Christianity and perhaps its prevailing counterpoint which is the atheistic response to that Christianity. It’s almost like they are waiting for permission to completely throw off the chains that these two modalities have upon society and return to an earthy and feminine type of reverence and within this is the room for the masculine as the protector of the sacred feminine as the knight in shining armour. The last thing I really noticed was this aura that surrounded Trevor on stage. It was especially present when the use of stage lighting enveloped him in a purple light; this purple light being very representative of the Goddess. He truly radiates love, light, and peace.

The second time I drank Ayahuasca I had the most dreadful experience though in retrospect I wouldn't trade it for the world; it was a necessary part of this journey. So, in my descent into this hell, when I reached the bottom this very shadowy character appeared; he was sitting in a floating lotus position and his eyes were droopy like I had disturbed his nap or awoken a demon. To my left I was being audibly addressed in a sinister tone repeatedly as "Apollo". I cannot remember in my lifetime where I was more frightened than I was at that point. Fight or flight took over and I ran from this nightmare. This all led to profound self discoveries, an awesome fearlessness, and I came to embrace the moniker Apollo. I also started to sense the split in myself; there's a part of me that is brilliant and wants to be intellectually challenged and there is a part of me that wants to find deep connection within this world. Apollo is going to figure out the great mystery. Dionysos wants to Love, delve into the passions, and experience life.

Dionysos from the Royal Ontario Museum

Dionysos is born under the cover of darkness, forever coming forth after being torn apart; this alluding to patriarchal societies that are always suppressing manifestations of Dionysos. Greek reason rose on the back of Apollo after the influence of Dionysos was repressed. The scant mention of Dionysos and mystery cult in Homeric epics is a testament to the suppression of his influence. He gets a mention in the Iliad as being scared off and fleeing into the sea a coward after a confrontation with the Thracian king Lykourgos. The lack of Dionysos' presence in Homeric epics led scholars to speculate Dionysos was a later addition to the Olympic pantheon and was probably of foreign derivation. This speculation was all refuted with the discovery of commerce tablets from matriarchal Bronze Age Greece and Crete written in a proto-Greek language called Linear B that contain the name Dionysos. The conclusion is the Homeric epics are patriarchal propaganda; it is the ideology of the ruling class, though very good reads. Dionysos however is the eternal return and not even the literary giant Homer could suppress and crush him forever. When you crush the grape it comes back stronger as wine. The major Greek mystery cults conducted at the sites of Eleusis and Delphi both contained elements of the mystery of Dionysos. In Roman society, the mystery cult of Dionysos was sometimes tolerated but mostly suppressed. The Bacchanalia, as it was called, was for the most part comparable to today's after hours club or the "speakeasy" of prohibition times. Dionysos ultimately represents a return to the left hand path of the feminine. To sensuality. To transgressing society's morals and repression. To unity. He appears androgynous, he cross dresses, he encourages drink and drugs, and flaunts his sex appeal. It's this orgy of Love to which Dionysos returns. It reminds us he's indestructible. 

The most liberating act in my lifetime is the discovery of this guy Dionysos. I too, like Homer, have sent him away repeatedly, shamed him, belittled him, and tried to vanquish him but he is indestructible and always returns. He harangues Apollo and causes him no end of frustration. I see now the many times Dionysos took control and steered my desires towards fulfillment; he still does because I haven't integrated this dichotomy into a wholeness. It's out in the open now so I can at least laugh. I was going to say study it but that's Apollo talking again hoping to get one up on this guy. There is this capitulation on the part of Apollo in deference to Dionysos. An acceptance of the need to form a partnership instead of trying to get one up. To let go of the identity of self as Apollo that excludes Dionysos. In our modern culture, Dionysos has been reduced to the Greek god of wine and licentious behaviour. Fair enough I suppose because he epitomizes the lust for life. Dionysos is the elixir that powers up and makes the world go round and round. He is our base desires; the id. We kind of recognize this and attempt to trivialize it which leads to psychological outbursts and fulfillment of this suppressed power.

Following the concert, I had this dream about licentious behaviour and here is my interpretation of the early morning dream of Tuesday September 4th. It’s been a few months since I first asked Dionysos for help. I imagine he correctly deduced I wasn’t ready for his help. Actually, that’s pretty much the truth. I had to get a bunch of unquenched desires in order before embarking on this journey. I settled up last week and prepared myself in earnest. A week later it begins.

Major characters present in this dream were Eddie, Jimmy, and my mother in law. I was at a party. Due to the age of people attending, the party was winding down around 11pm. Jimmy was off somewhere with his Asian friends and invited me out with them, with the promises of lasciviousness. I then tried to figure out how I'd get there, oblivious it seems to the time and effort it would take to get to this place out of the way, not to mention the late hour. The alternative was Eddie and his bong which he had just brought out and was firing up. My mother in law, who was at the party, seemed okay with the bong which was strange. She represents the judging aspect in my dreams. She has appeared before in other dreams to represent disapproval of my actions. The dream didn't progress beyond the bong as I woke up. There's a Dionysian aspect of this dream and since I have asked him for help it isn't surprising. I have consciously entered a phase of work where I am trying to move my passions into the heart. I know Jimmy represents going all in for pleasure and Eddie is just a fun loving sort who used to be a Jimmy but has become tamer in his maturing. But thinking about it, they do both represent the untamed Dionysian aspects and they never disappoint in that they were always fun to be around. Subconsciously, I need to access that power once again and there is the element of the judging world which prevents you from doing that openly. Our Dionysian impulse in this society has to be kept under wraps. So my mother in law, representing the judge within, which is the psychological superego, was present for the beginnings of the movement of this power and it seems it was given the stamp of approval or at least a recognition that Dionysian power is under the watch of the judge in our western culture.

When activated, the Dionysian impulse causes a tendency in most to either bury or to keep it under wraps, occasionally letting it out under cover of virtual darkness. This keeps your non-approved behaviour away from the prying eyes of others who would judge that behaviour, thus causing a degree of shame in your life, and also they would claim a touch of control over you. This is the first lesson from Dionysos. He’s making me rethink my attitude towards him. My request of him is to move the passion of this madman into the heart and he is telling me that it is not going to work if you hide away your heart. You have to be open hearted and you have to embrace your passions and desires. Plus, he is reminding me to have fun.

A big part of Dionysian revelry is drama and the theatre. The development of theatre in Western Civilization comes from the ritual performance of mystery cult. Initiates would take on the roles of the supernatural and act the part along with singing and dancing as an element of the ritual. The mask, representing the ability to change persona, is a reminder we are playing a role on the grandest stage of all.

mask of Dionysos

Dionysos is the master player. He creates pathos, tragedy, and the triumphant return.

Through the unity of opposites Dionysos is trying to teach us to find balance in the centre. The power of Dionysos unmixed will destroy you. It is too much. Add some rational Apollo and you find harmony. Dilute the power of Dionysos, much like in ancient Greece no one would drink unmixed wine. Dilute the power of Apollo so he doesn't judge and condemn. Once the masculine is harmonized with all his parts he is then ready for the sacred marriage to the feminine. This spans many lifetimes acquiring wisdom along the journey. When ready, she will appear. That's why she is here and she is different things to different people or not even registering with most. There's the danger, or not really danger, but a good chance others will wonder what it is you are talking about. When ready the teacher appears. When ready to be reunited with the Goddess in a sacred marriage, the Hieros Gamos, she appears. Then there is this the performance of this enchanting music and someone comes along playing a sacred drum. When you are ready to go home you will know. It's very mystical. This is supremely unable to be quantified because if you are at a different points on your path or a different path you will manifest different experiences. And then I will think you are nuts. And they will think I'm nuts. I'm dancing with Dionysos along the mountain ledge of the eternal return contemplating going home. For now, day breaks and Apollo returns.

freedom

In western culture freedom is stressed. We are told we are free, we value freedom, we consider it a right, and we fight and die for freedom. Looking back into the annals of history, an indentured medieval serf or an African slave would have freedom at the top of their wish list. The old economic systems that relied upon indentured servants and slaves came to end in both the 19th century and the first world war of the early 20th century and the United States became the model for freedom. Today, we think we are free. I doubt we will ever be free but we are less controlled since we have more jurisdiction over our situations and can make choices on how we wish to live our lives. Ultimately, in order to eat and be sheltered it is a requirement to join the workforce or start a business to make money. Starting a business is a way we are more free however there is still a reliance on banks for capital in order to launch the business but you assume responsibility and directly benefit from profits or shoulder the burden of losses. As a worker, you have a choice of where to work however that is curtailed by your level of education. You are paid a wage that allows you to raise a family of more potential workers, feed, clothe, educate, and shelter them. Health care is provided for the worker to maintain their level of productivity. Some money is left over so you can enjoy yourself a little bit. We call this freedom. It's not freedom. It's an escape from a historically miserable existence however don't delude yourself as you are working for someone else and making them lots of money so they can try and win the I am the most materially successful game and accumulate the power to control others. Whatever level of the game they are playing, whether small business or large corporation, make no mistake you are generally subsisting while they try to get to the top.

The second time I drank the profound teacher and plant medicine called Ayahuasca I had a dreadful time. One of the visions presented to me was this strange hypnotic scene accompanied by a feeling of being captive in the jungle where I was a slave to a faceless owner and living in a ramshackle abode in the middle of nowhere. I had this eerie feeling that I had lived many lives in similar situations. At the time I felt like the jungle was enslaving me. Upon subsequent visionary experiences where I gained valuable experience, I have come to realize visions deal in metaphor and they don't necessarily explain themselves right away. You know when you listen to someone tell a joke and you don't understand it but then later on you get it and laugh? Well, that in a way is a big part of working with plant medicines. Some will call this an integration period because a largely overlooked part of the plant medicine experience is sitting with them afterwards and figuring out what was meant by the visions or the conversations with different entities. A great deal of the time it is revelatory or an epiphany while you are doing something unrelated. It is the most magical and humbling experience when the answer reveals itself to you. And the kicker is sometimes the lesson was pretty basic but you totally missed it at the time. Well, that's what happened here. Ayahuasca was telling me, "Hey dumbass you are still a slave. You can candy coat it however you want but here is the stark truth." I was so beat down by the novel experience that it just played into my paranoia and delusion at the time. That's why you write down your visions and interactions so that in the following months and years you can then one day realize what the experience was getting at.

So what? I am enslaved. I have a good family and decent life. Isn't that how they want me to feel so I don't become angry and rebellious? It has been ten months since I went deep in a plant medicine journey. It was with Huachuma in the Andes mountains of Ecuador and the day with this Grandfather plant was spent describing the world system, all its connecting nodes, and the wiseman talking to me in my altered state described this system as sucking Satan's cock. I was shown how ingrained into our lives it is, the many nodes that pulse this noxious frequency, and the monumental effort it will take to change it. The change comes one at a time through the opening of the heart in conjunction with developing socially responsible technologies that work for the betterment of the world as opposed to being devices for profit and greed. The blockchain is a step in the positive direction. There will be setbacks; the blockchain will be co-opted and crypto-currencies that are free of state manipulation like Bitcoin will be preyed upon by those looking for a quick score but eventually the flood of a new technological era will enable us to throw off the chains.

This leads to artificial intelligence and maybe AI is the superman George Bernard Shaw was talking about in that play "Man and Superman" I had to read in high school? It all depends on perspective and your view of the fundamental view of what we call reality. If you believe consciousness is the result of tiny particles that exhibit charge, spin, and mass coming together until they reach a breaking point of awareness which develops into individuated consciousness then AI becomes something that eventually we will have to treat as sentient beings when they reach this perceived switch point. From artificial intelligence will develop artificial consciousness. The majority of scientists, psychologists, and philosophers take this worldview as reality without reservation. I bring this up really just because I want to espouse my viewpoint and knock down the robot consciousness one. There is only one consciousness; it is a top down system. The universe is energy and awareness of the energy. Awareness activates the energy; non-awareness allows the energy to coalesce. Thus energy creates form which catches the eye of awareness and through desire awareness becomes conscious and brings the universe to life. Fundamentally, that is the everything from which everything is derivative.

AI will be the golden child of the new technological era and AI in my estimation has the ability to lead to our emancipation as long as it remains open sourced. Imagine a world where a human at birth is gifted an AI double which does the work required of them for survival? We can then create a collective world of philosophers or pleasure seekers. Or both. Or, have we just exchanged one problem for another? Well, anyway I can dream.

motion and thought

Been thinking more about time. Ultimately, it is motion. Time is the vibration of the eternal song, the Great Goddess, which creates the perception of a past as we hear the echoes of her song trailing into the distance. From this perception, we can then project and create a future. It's a peculiar human trait. The future is hardly a sure thing but just something humans can curiously construct and try to predict from available data. Why is the concept of time slippery and why will the eternal song forever remain a mystery? It is because humans objectify all and in truth the mystery is not solid; it is change, and therefore the antithesis to objectification. Just when we think we can grasp time, it slips away, just like the serpent. This process illuminates the Hindu concept of maya as illusion, in that all objects are illusions and by that it is meant they are transitory. Nothing lasts. The only constant is a lack of permanence. We recognize this, call this time, and see a world in constant flux. It is a dose of acceptance of change that we need. Embrace the music she creates and the now moment in which the song of creation eternally comes forth.

In the world of objects we have created for ourselves, we need time. We cling to a belief in permanence; and in order to continue the charade, we need the conception of time. An object lives in a dimension that includes time. What happens if the idea of objects is smashed? Everything becomes a no thing; instead what we have are vibrations cresting and falling. When we think about the past we understand the movement of the wave creates events that can be construed as being part of a timeline. Two necessary ingredients for the conception of time are therefore movement and thought.

The ancient art of astrology is given new life, once you realize nothing lasts. The occult practice is revealed as a way the ancients, desperate for a way to capture the moment, devised a scheme where a snapshot of the universe could be recorded with the expectation that the wheel of fortune eventually would revisit this same setup. It was as good a concept they could come up with knowing that when the wheel returned the body will have aged, the river will have changed, and this truth was captured by the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus who explained, "No man ever steps in the same river twice." However, there was the expectation that the universe, when arranged in a specific pattern, would repeat the actions and events that previously transpired under such a set-up, Heraclitus be damned.

The lessons of cyclical time inspired by horoscopy add insight to the quest for understanding the eternal song. The tune goes on forever but if you listen closely you can detect the familiar rhythms, pulses, riffs, and the backbeat that give us a feeling of familiarity with the rhythmic cycles of creation's daughter.