reconciliation

The shy god who wants to remain in the shadows.

The probing into my psyche this latest trip to Peru to work with the plant teachers has been quite fruitful. I’ve never experienced full blown depression so in my life my only way in to see what makes me tick has been through the use of plant medicines. Initially you get in, are gobsmacked by the experience, but then the defences are thrown up as the hidden dark side of the self puts into action various methods to prevent you from going further. They work for the most part and you stop looking for a while, partly because it is so upsetting to turn your world upside down or face the truth. The answer is always present just waiting for you to admit it to yourself.

First off you believe through these experiences that you are to dissolve your ego. The literature tells you that, others repeat it, and you know something is going on in that mysterious mind of yours so you figure it must be all about your ego. Ego death puts you face to face with the light and the dark. You believe that the reason you are not better is because your idea of who you are is preventing you from moving forward to the light and succeeding. In reality your ego has always been weak and transitory; acting as a foil for something deep within your subconscious that doesn’t want to be discovered. This shadowy figure in reality is the big fish to catch. After having fingered the ego as the bad guy you then embark on a spiritual journey of some sort in order to become a better person, without realizing that in truth all you are doing is transforming and strengthening the same ego you had fingered as the bad guy.

It is a double edged sword. The exploration of consciousness is difficult, unsettling, and with many roadblocks put in place, whether psychological, pressure from society, or those close to you to drop the search. If you clear those hurdles, which grow higher everyday, then you get up the path that leads to spiritual enlightenment and a sense of accomplishment. All well and good but you kind of let the whole probing into the depths slip in exchange for a white robe. You are still wearing a mask and buried your dark side, the obfuscated scapegoat, an undeniable part of your true self, once again behind the veneer of being a better person. What am I hiding?

Why was I taught as a child to hide my feelings away? Big boys don't cry. For shame. Bury that shit. Then I grew up and in my quest to be righteous I threatened my dark side once again with annihilation. Self-preservation isn't just for the acknowledged self.

The one behind the mask doesn’t want to be discovered now. Can you blame them? The one behind the mask is all of us; the divine actor. If discovered, the show ends. There is no more drama. If superman is found out to be Clark Kent then for some reason he can’t hide out in this world anymore as a regular guy. If god is discovered as me then I can’t hang out in this world anymore as a regular guy. The story is over and all the elements that make the play grand and the game worth the candle all become trivial and the drama meaningless. I mean I’m omnipotent, eternal, and created this whole charade. My own overarching task was to stay hidden.

I’m contrarian by nature and this whole spiritual enlightenment game always smelled a little funny to me. I kept coming back to plant medicines so I could peek a little bit more into the darkness. I’m curious and good at solving riddles. I wasn’t scared off by them anymore and even with their dwindling efficacy I still found value and I also realized it was another tool of the dark side to send me packing so I’d stop looking. They intended to leave me frustrated but I saw through it and realized my dark side was playing another game where they would stop showing me what I wanted to see. My Ayahuasca visions would last an hour tops before the show was over. I wondered if I needed to drink more? That idea was shut down one ceremony where the medicine was so strong I could barely stand up to go to the washroom and the energy was so overwhelming and present it was palpable in the air. It’s not the medicine; it’s me that is blocking the visions. Okay why then? Part of the solution was in the block I had to drinking the cup. It made my stomach turn just thinking about it. Something within me wanted this to stop. Not to be deterred, I kept pursuing and eventually went down deep into the depths through this visionary tunnel where I came face to face with the truth. I finally realized the one who does not want to be discovered is my dark side and as big a part of me as self and higher self. The dark side who is full of passion, desire, lust, love, takes risks, is creative, compassionate, and wants to keep the game going at all costs. Finally I saw the simple truth. My dark side of course I keep hidden and construct an ego to throw others and my own damn self off of this truth and the search for it.

The ego I constructed to keep others away from my truth. Internally I construct blocks to prevent myself searching for and from finding out the truth. In plant medicine ceremonies I told myself I’d walk in front of a train and commit suicide if I continued on this path after conjuring a demon the previous ceremony. When that didn’t work and I came back to Peru, I threatened myself with a plane crash and said I’d never get home from Peru unless I dropped the seeking and surrendered to the church. My ceremonies went incredibly dark, strange, and unsettling. Ten out of eleven of them started out with such darkness that I couldn’t shake. The only ceremony to not start off that way involved the Great Goddess which gave me the strength to forge ahead. When I pierced through the many veils, she was always there welcoming me in order to keep me wanting to press forward. My threats to myself I figured out were empty. I kept coming back. My dogged persistence eventually led me to see this truth. I accepted it and made peace with myself. I have anger, jealousy, lusts, male possessive traits, a thirst for knowledge and meaning, a need for control, a hurting heart, a tendency to get annoyed at others, and a desire to help those in need.

Ayahuasca and Huachuma allow you to probe into the things that make you tick. Now that these peccadilloes are freed from hiding and I’m good with it all then I can now work with the medicine to explore and integrate them. I wonder why I wanted to keep them hidden from myself? Do I have a problem with acceptance and not wanting to own these traits?

The higher and lower self are the constituents of the self and shape who we really are. We don’t want to accept our dark and lower self and do everything to deny this part of us and relegate it to something we can transform. It can’t be done but instead we can acknowledge it and harmonize it with our higher self in order to create a more fully integrated self. That to me would be peace. The pursuit of the higher self is understandable. On the journey we want to become one of the perfected and transcend the morass of humankind. When we do that we ignore those traits that also make us who we are, thinking we can leave those behind. The clarity I have acquired on this trip has allowed me to finally come face to face with my dark side, have a good laugh, and then just accept it is a part of who I am. This is the true liberation I have been seeking all along.

The universe was created in order to separate the great self into its constituent parts in order to come to terms with these traits and reconcile all. There is a great reluctance to face up to it all and we acquiesce and allow the darkness to stay hidden at all costs.

Once we reconcile all, the long separation can end.