projections of self

Ever since I began my exploration with psychedelics what has intrigued me to no end has been the darkness or what some may call the lower self and I refer to him throughout this blog space as my shadow. I spent many years and ceremonies fighting him before I had an about face and started to get to know this aspect of self. We are brothers and we continuously fight however now that I’m awake and aware of my psychic split I have been making amends and am on my way towards reconciliation, inner peace, and harmony. I will get there and it will be soon.

I have written a great deal about this relationship and my intent in this post is to not rehash this part of my journey. Rather, I wish to explore what is called my higher self. It is another concept of the psyche and I have for the most part neglected it on this spiritual path of mine. Weird, right? It is strange because it is the ideal everyone on the vaunted and hallowed spiritual path heads towards and considers the pinnacle of spiritual achievement. The good old pure and holy sect. I’m very curious and eventually I do get around to examining all facets of what I have gotten myself into. Nothing is sacred or off-limits, demon or angel. Conceptually, this higher self is resembling the ideal that a great deal of the big religions push upon their flocks as the ultimate in spiritual attainment. I’m referencing here the Buddha Mind and Christ Consciousness. In Christianity, the ideal of Christ as being selfless and loving is tinged with the idea of judgment. You are being judged and are expected to become like Christ and as a human it is an impossible task.

Now, this aspect of judgment leads me to believe the God we humans created can be thought of as the psychological concept of the superego where the superego takes on the role of shepherding you into your place in culture and society and dictates what is expected of you. If you do not live up to these expectations, you are shamed into conforming. From birth to death there is always an authority figure in our lives beginning with our parents until we rebel as we mature. Society and government then assume the role of authority when we give in and decide to play the culture game in order to access the rewards of life. There is always this layer of conforming to someone else’s wishes that prevents us from being really free. So, when we transfer the authority figure onto the religious racket we get the ideal that the parishioners are trying to live up to and failure to do so leads one to believe they have a way to go before they become pure and holy. This understanding of the higher self leads me into thinking that this concept of the higher self we strive for is just another way we have transferred our need for authority onto the spiritual path when in truth the game is to become free.

I get this intuitive feeling that the higher self is an obstacle on the path that obfuscates and prevents you from accessing the inner knowledge of self and who you are that in turn will set you free. It’s an exquisite game and the game board designer was very crafty in throwing in these blocks and wrong turns in the maze of life that prevent you from ever solving the puzzle. The problem always comes from looking externally for the answer. It gets you every time and the ruse of the higher self accomplishes just this task. It points you towards an ideal of spiritual attainment or enlightenment that you will never reach and you devote all your energy to desperately trying to become like Jesus or the Buddha. You remain deferential to this external concept of God as the master ruling authority, to wit the king of the universe, and never realize the real master of the universe is you and you are playing a pretty good trick on yourself.

I see the similarities with my shadow because upon discovery and exploration of my lower self I was warned many times by him to turn back, that he will kill me, and to look no further. Ultimately, he was teaching me courage through transformation of my weak-assed self as in all honesty you are not going to get far on this path without massive helpings of courage and bravery. The exploration of the higher self does not result in overt threats of death but instead places before you an ideal you will never attain and then lords over you your lack of ability to reach the ultimate goal to keep you in your place and you never realize your divinity and connection in this most interesting game called life. It is only when you give up this crazy idea of becoming ultra-holy and spiritual that you get into the inner temple. As long as you cling to the belief in sinlessness you’ll never reach your destination.

These similarities in preventing the self from discovery of just who they are led me to believe the lower self and the higher self are the same psychic entity whom we treat as the other. In essence, the higher and lower self are projections of self. The higher self being something so great that is unattainable and the lower self being all the things about me that I bury. I objectify these traits and create psychic manifestations. I double down on who I think I am and use the higher and lower self to prevent me from seeing the truth. When you see the truth, it means the adventure is winding down because you solved the puzzle. It was fun to keep the game going as long as possible but now you are awake, the cover is blown, and you see past the veil. I look around at my fellow game players and smile because they don’t know. I’ll keep quiet about it and just enjoy the show.

Unfortunately, the show I can only enjoy for so long before I start to question why I did this to myself. I love the adventure and I love puzzles. The hero's journey is this adventure to figure out the riddle and after many incarnations where I lost my life, eventually like the addicted video game player, I made it to the end of the game. I beat the final boss; you know that dragon who kept laying waste to me and making me re-start my game while hopefully remembering some of the pitfalls that had previously tripped me up. So, here I am. I beat the game! It soon became obvious to me what's next on the path. This is my world and it is a mess. Now that I know what this all about, I have an eternal project which involves reconciliation of my opposites and tempering these extremes with love. This will get me out of the mess. I've got forever to accomplish the task. Now that I'm awake it's time to get to it.

good trip bad trip

Plant medicine experiences run the gamut of human extremes. In other words, a trip can be very enlightening or paradoxically it can send you into the darkest depths of your soul. The yo-yo is hard to take and is a major reason why a lot of seekers will give up the use of mind-altering substances on the spiritual path. They will develop a narrative which obfuscates the real reason why they eschew the plant medicine modality. After your first taste of the light and the dark with the master teachers, the clock starts ticking, the hour glass is flipped over, and you have a short time to reconcile the madness. You can run but you cannot hide and to continue with the plants demands one become a warrior. Strange enough, once you pick up your sword your courage multiplies exponentially and the game of good trip, bad trip becomes something to look back at and smile upon. What an exquisite game!

The plant medicine path is a path of reconciliation. The first obstacle is presented as the polar extremes of light and dark which come at you as good trip, bad trip, and without passing this test you are done. Failed the class and now the decision to retake the test or drop out. It's an ingenious way to determine if there is a hint of courage or bravery within the epidermis of self. Without the warrior mentality, failure is assured. Advancing beyond the fear grants one the opportunity to explore and in the process of searching for the answers, which originally led you to the plants, you develop a clarity that allows you to see beyond the veil and discover who you are and why you are doing this.

Good trip/Bad trip was the primer. Clarity reveals the creation of your world is the result of this paradigm where the objectification of your polar extremes enables the mind to go into default separation mode and bring the world to life. You know light and dark, hot and cold, happiness and suffering, pleasure and pain and everything in between. Life is made possible through separation and the experiences that populate the journey from one extreme to the other. All is well and good except that it isn't. The extremes that bring the game to life lack love and compassion.

The first part of the plant medicine journey which involves fear of the unknown is akin to the archetypal hero's journey. It's an adventure that takes you around the world in exploration to find the meaning of life and eventually the signs point towards going within. Upon exploration of your inner world, soon you encounter the dragon and this astronomical fear from the beatdown demonstrates that you are no hero. You are no warrior; just a soft human being living on the periphery of life ensconced in some mental adventure buoyed by books and the tales of others. This game is for keeps and this hero certification isn't handed out like a weekend workshop demonstrating you are good to go. Oh, hell no! You have a lot of work ahead of you and you have to demonstrate you are worthy or get out of the way and let someone else give it a go.

Crunch time asks the questions: Why are you doing this? What are your intentions? You start to see the available power and most take up the offer to enrich their human life. The majority of potential heroes fall by the wayside and the remainders still on the path are a scant few by this point. Your intentions are necessarily pure and have to revolve around a creed of service or there is actually no way to make it this far. Your choices determine your status along the path in a way that no flowery turn of phrase could fool the gods. You are an open book.

What does this service entail? At the core of service is the leading of one towards the knowledge of God. The knowledge of God is discovered by going within, walking through the door of knowing that is beckoning you to enter, and finding what you are looking for by yourself. One in service will point the way and support you in your journey. The knowledge of God is designed to transform by showing you that hurting the other is to hurt yourself. The suffering in the world is the result of this otherness. Love everyone, serve everyone, and remember God.

The hero's journey is the path of awakening. Bring forth the light within. Burying the light creates the suffering in the world. Your solemn duty is to cultivate and bring forth the spark that lies within you which has been buried by concepts of identity and culture. The hero's journey is essentially the quest to find God. Once found, we get down to business and the meaning of life. The meaning, if there is one, is to take our polar extremes which manifest creation and temper them with the love of the Goddess. God awakens and then searches for her. She is the one who makes him complete and transforms the metal into gold. It's the long way around to re-discovering that love is indeed the key to life.

speaking of tarot

What's that old saying by Lao Tzu? Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know. Similarly, we have an expression about how the fool opens his mouth and the wise keeps quiet, with the roots of this admonition coming from the Old Testament Book of Proverbs. Chapter 17 has these gems (New International Version):

27 The one who has knowledge uses words with restraint, and whoever has understanding is even-tempered.

28 Even fools are thought wise if they keep silent, and discerning if they hold their tongues.

I was thinking about these pearls of wisdom primarily due to becoming interested in Tarot. Within this peculiar subclass of the occult I marvel at the amount of people who go around calling themselves so and so. I'm a witch. I'm this. I'm that. I'll solve all your problems. It's a common human affliction which is not attributed to just this genre. I've kind of recently put two and two together in that the same game is played by the holy spiritual pedlars and the self-help gurus.

Imagine if you have a legitimate spiritual awakening at some point in your life and then you go on an adventure to try and figure out what happened? We are all fools at this point, just begging to be exploited. We open our mouth and the accepted cultural institutions such as the church are lying in wait, ready to inculcate you with their beliefs and extract their pound of flesh. Alternatively, the more exotic tentacles of the mysterious eastern paths are reaching out to pull you in along with a host of other modalities which promise spiritual fulfillment. The grift is they perpetually keep you a follower. You may become an evangelist of the method if you prove your worth but never will you become king. You may stay on the treadmill in search of that elusive enlightenment with the expectation someone is going to tell you that you are enlightened. Maybe you will get a certificate that says you are at the pinnacle of spiritual knowledge from a fellow game player who probably doesn't really know either and like the fool believes themselves to be wise. The Tarot teaches we all begin in ignorance and play the fool. The key word is begin and as you progress along the game board of life and observe the actions of the species, you become wise if you have kept your mouth shut and followed your own innate inner guidance system. If you want a way to separate the wheat from the chaff, in other words, the good teacher from the one who has their own best interests at heart it is this: The good one will tell you don't need them anymore once they see you are headed in the correct direction. They point the way and show you the door. This is shamanism at its finest. Here's the door. Walk in, all by yourself, and do the work. I see similar in the teaching of Zen where the teacher will get you to talk yourself out until mentally exhausted so you give up and thus begins the process of clarity where you will eventually realize the truth and become enlightened. Ultimately, the path being nothing special at all.

The self-help industry is huge. We are talking billions and billions of revenues and the helpers all jockey for their piece of that scrumptious pie. As a society we give accreditation to the psychologists because they have to go to university and spend lots of time and money to validate their accumulation of knowledge. They are the one-up specialist who can charge a pretty good fee in order to give you the help you need. As I have previously opined, I find in our society the therapist is usually the one most in need of help and is subconsciously using their position in order to get the help they need. They see their pathology in their patients and then experiment on them, hoping to find the answer that will free them. It's such an exquisite profession! A step down from the psychologist is the coach. The coach doesn't need the degree and usually has a certificate from a weekend workshop which then sends them on their way into the world of self-help. If you spend some time in these circles you will discover this peculiar secret: Most of the people they are helping are other coaches! A self-help coach is a neurotic who passes the baton of low self-esteem around in a circle hoping not to be in possession when the music stops. I followed a coach for a few years, mostly out of a sense of duty. They were smart and had good advice but ultimately, they still needed to sort out their demons. I mean man they were fucked up and they knew it. They would sink into the depths of despair only to re-emerge energized. But that was the pattern of high and low and they never found balance. Their coaching practice was a way for them to work out their own shit and in doing this they could acquire followers who related to their suffering. When you suffer you think you are making progress thus the appeal of such a path. What happens when they are shown a way out of the suffering? They won't take that path because suffering defines who they are. If they give up suffering then they lose their identity. If you are still reading this post, I think you already know about the spiritual path and the ego and therefore I won't need to explain why they can't get off the hamster wheel of self-sabotage.

The best methods of spiritual awakening self-destruct. A method's utility is in its ability to point you in the direction which will allow you to discover your truth about who you are and why you are involved in this game of life. The ninth-century Chinese Buddhist monk Linji Yixuan advised his students to kill the Buddha. Not only is this provocative teaching instructing you to let go of the teacher; ultimately, it is telling you to destroy the method because without the icon the spiritual system hangs its proverbial hat on, the whole thing falls apart. Buddhists won't admit to the last part as their whole game disintegrates without the supreme enlightened one the practitioners strive to become; much like the Christian Jesus who is so pure no mortal can attain his level and thus we are trapped forever in some perverse holier than thou game. In this spiritual game you identify as a Buddhist. The ego is very tricky and will prevent you from taking the final step. You're a human being. Why don't you explore the cyclical nature of your desire system and discover just who you are? Becoming a permanent Buddhist means giving away your innate power through attachment to method. You don't need to remain attached to the method of awakening. The utility of the Buddha lies in getting you to explore the nature of self; to question why you suffer and see the way out. When you discover the way out perhaps you'll find the middle way. All methods of awakening are traps but as a novice you need a method. Once the alarm clock on the method sounds it is up to you to turn off the alarm and not go back to sleep.

To come full circle in this blog post is to return to the idea that those who know don't speak. The former rational me would chuckle at folly such as Tarot. One who believes in this bunk and woo entertain the heights of irrationality. For sure the cards enchant and a spectacle can be created that entertains but come on you can't take this seriously. And therein lies the rub and the magic. If you don't believe in the cards then certainly they don't work. In fact, they will never work. If you want to believe in the cards that too is not enough. To understand Tarot is to intuitively know the secret and thus understand why they work.

How do the cards work? To be continued?

mycelium exploration

When I first tried magic mushrooms I got what I wanted in terms of a deep dive into the shadow and the experience was so strong I was unsure I wanted to do them again. This hesitancy was not due to fear but rather I found the whole night to be difficult and the draining of my energy was something to take into consideration as it takes a few days to recover. Within a few days, I knew I would trip again as the insights were very rewarding and now that I had some bearing on what the mushroom trip entails, I could prepare myself more for what is to come. I know I'm not going to experience the shiny and happy trips of innocent wayfarers as my introspective nature and prior experience with psychedelics will always usher me towards the fringes of the mystery.

Something I realized with the mushroom is how little an amount you have to ingest and how relatively easy they are to acquire. Because of this, there is a simple way to introduce someone who is interested in altering their consciousness into this mysterious world. It's all right there waiting for you. Just a slight alteration of consciousness will send you on a path towards waking up and once awake there's no turning back. It's all choice in how you want to use this knowledge and power. For sure, they are not for everyone and indeed I have been struck by the power and profundity of the experience from just two dried mushrooms. I feel confident in their solo use but for a novice explorer I would not recommend such a method because they are so powerful. They do have the capacity to scare you shitless, much like I experienced the second time I drank Ayahuasca. That session could have easily spiralled out of control into a bad ending had it not been for the ceremonial aides who kept an eye on me while I was having my freak out.

I tried a different strain of the mushroom, this one called "Amazon". Heck I know the Amazon jungle! It's where I first tried psychedelics. Nostalgia is calling out to me, lol! I measured out just under 2 grams, as that is my dose. Mushrooms for me are so strong and I don't need more in order to go off into unchartered territory. The visuals from 2 grams are as strong as Ayahuasca. The split in my psyche is present and I can explore. The intoxication as presented gives me the same kind of feeling as any prior psychedelic journey and the ripping of reality into energetic patterns is pretty much the same.

The first time I tripped with magic mushrooms I kept my eyes open for a lot of the initial phase and it resulted in my surroundings becoming fluid with a great sense of the hypnotic nature of the tryptamine intoxication. As I awaited the onset of the mushroom this time, I actually felt a little bit of fear and anxiety, which I couldn't shake. I kept my eyes closed for most of the journey with the result being a very intense visionary experience. The intoxication took hold as the song "Medicine Chant" by Anilah was playing. The visuals started in a familiar fractal presentation of a performance of the spectrum of light. I felt a little trepidation about how this journey was beginning, not being sure what this visual presentation would evolve into. I steadied the ship, kept my wits about me, and then this epiphany struck: I always fight these introductory visuals instead of just enjoying the show. I finally understood this light show was the Goddess putting on a divine performance. I don't know why I fear the onset; I finally realized this dance of energetic form is her giving me an otherworldly performance. I let go and realized this was the opening act to a grand adventure and then I saw the incredible beauty which was at hand. The symmetry and artistry in combination with the multi-layered brilliance of Anilah's musical composition was breath-taking. I cannot possibly describe what I witnessed so I'm not going to even try. What a show! This is something to look forward to in any subsequent trip now that I finally got it.

My first trip with the mushroom was centred on my inner masculine split and a lifting of the veil between us. I did not intuit the presence of the Goddess and thus categorized my mushroom trip as being a modality without her presence. She decided to have fun with me and school me right off the start of this second voyage. As mentioned, the night opened with a sublime performance of the grace and beauty of the Goddess. There she was in all her glory putting on a celestial show for the ages. Wow! A performance of legendary and cosmic proportions for the full 15 minutes of this stunning musical composition. I buried my face in the palms of my hands due to the emotional outpouring of love and the grandeur of the performance. I was stunned. Grateful. Head in hands emotional. I felt that if this was it for the night, it was complete and a smashing success. As the song concluded, the energetic outpouring which defined this performance tapered off and the visions became more scenic and playful in conjunction with the music of Trevor Hall which had an eastern flavour to it. I started to envision multiple dream worlds that would populate my mind's eye. With an opening of the eyes I could make the created world go away and upon closing my eyes a new world would form. I let go of my thoughts and the experience was all play. The magic mushroom trip sure was fun and blissful. I remembered the line from a Beatles' song, "turn off your mind, relax, and float downstream." I now definitely see the appeal of such a fun trip with psychedelics as it was indeed a gas to continuously create different worlds. My music playlist abruptly switched to two songs by the grunge band Alice in Chains. They are depressing songs and the first one called "Nutshell" has the singer lamenting he is not free and considering suicide. As the intro to the song played, the vibe in my visions became dark, almost like a sudden storm approached where the temperature drops and it gets dark. I felt the pull of the depression the singer was emoting try to pull me into that world with fellow travellers on a ship ahead of me beckoning and trying to seduce me into following them into the pit of despair. I know I love this song because of the heart wrenching pouring out of the guy's soul which translates into such a compelling tune. I resisted the pull and just observed how these feelings create and shape our world. How we actually perceive the world is a direct result of our inner life which is crafted by how we feel. The next song was "Would" and it was a raw live performance. From a bird's eye perspective, I saw a crowd of people cheering on the band. Again, I got a very dark feeling and a large dragon appeared in the middle of the crowd. The song is about drug abuse, specifically heroin, and the dragon is the great destroyer. I intuitively knew this and so I marvelled at this vision instead of the old me who would have been scared out of his wits at the sight of a menacing dragon. I felt empathy with the crowd who at this point were representing the addiction of the band. I saw the dragon grow in size and I intuited a connection with a world that is getting very dark. My playlist transitioned into four psychedelic Beatles songs and I relaxed and reclined in my chair and just enjoyed the show. Soon after, I tired of the visions and listening to music so I decided to turn it off and go lay down. About an hour and a half had passed which was about the same time as my first trip when I turned off the music and decided to lay down.

This strain of mushroom was decidedly more playful than the first. They were equal in their intensity though I'd say the second trip had less of a defined edge to it and I was more in tune with the visions. When I got up to go lay down on the sofa, I noticed the energetic pulse throughout the room, something which is familiar to me from drinking Ayahuasca. To describe it is as such - there is a slight discombobulation of the fabric of being where the illusion is slightly off, not all together, and I see it as this subtle pink, purple, and a green kind of presentation which is making up the world. It looks like it is revealing that this world is a vision as well but one we have convinced ourselves is real so we don't see that it is just another illusion. When I laid down the visionary activity did not want to cease and it took me into yet again another meeting with my brother, my shadow, much like my first experience where the veil between us was lifted and I had to play psychologist for almost three hours. This time I witnessed the utter domination and power which my shadow has over the world and how it manifests. He's the god of the world and has almost everyone worshipping him in some form. Power. We all want a slice of that pie. It was tough to watch. I objectified him as the other to stave off self-hatred as the suffering and depravity he caused was terrible. How is forgiveness possible for such acts? Think of the worst things that humans do to each other and that's what I saw my shadow was responsible for. The enormity of change and forgiveness required to reconcile seemed all too great. The reckoning soon came.

I'm complicit in this debacle because I do nothing about it. Indeed, I use it to my benefit. It's a zero-sum game and for myself to live in comfort someone else has to suffer. It is just easier and convenient to project this malfeasance onto my shadow and bury the knowledge of it. This way I can attribute the suffering to him, the other, and be horrified but done with it. It's not me so I'll try and make it better but I'm not the one responsible. Soon, I saw the error in my thinking knowing that I was objectifying the shadow as the other in order to escape blame for the world's suffering. He is my brother and I'm as much him as he is me. He creates and I introduce calm so there is some sort of balance and stability to the madness until the unencumbered energetic force comes pouring out again. I saw this dragon was me. I see this in my fellow game players. Wow - we are all masters of deception. Surely, I'm not the only one though I realize I'm one of the few who are awake and can clearly see it. My brother hates me because I'm the self-righteous asshole who tries to stand above the fray and take no responsibility. I'm the passive aggressive one who takes his share of the bounty and lives his life of comfort while others suffer and then points at the objectified nameless shadow and says, "Look, it's all his fault. He's the despicable one!"

Play! All we do is squabble. We created this world and instead of having a grand adventure we get under each other's skin and argue, fight, and then destroy. We create suffering as payback to being slighted in the tiniest of ways.

My shadow has always threatened to kill me when the veil drops and I enter his world. He didn't threaten me this time. It's because I know I'm him and even though I started out this experience by objectifying him as the other, as I searched for answers I had to accept he is me. Killing me is killing myself. I'm awake and trying to figure out the answers to why I need to continually fight my brother. Why am I loathe to admit I'm the scoundrel? I think that's the reason. It's easier to blame the other.

In the Old Testament, the Garden of Eden is a metaphor for the human heart. The four rivers flowing into and out of the home we long to return to are representing the four valves of our physical human heart. Upon gaining the eye-opening awareness from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil after the apple incident with the serpent, Eve and Adam are no longer pure of heart and thus thrown out of the Garden. Scripture then becomes a story of the longing to return to the heart. A careful reading of the conclusion of the Book of Revelation will reveal that Christianity considers itself the guide and answer which will lead the adherent back to this initial state of purity. Here are the first two verses from the concluding chapter 22 (New International Version).

1 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb

2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

We find only mentioned the tree of life from the Garden of Eden. No longer referenced is the tree of knowledge, which will lead your heart astray.

Now, it is definitely not my intention to shepherd you towards Christianity. I just like to point out connections and common human afflictions and their offered solutions as I see them.

This world is a creation of our own making. The masculine provides the infinite amount of energy and the feminine gives the energy form. Within each gendered provider are contending forces. I am privy to my split in the masculine coming forth of the energy. I see my brother as the raging source of power who has the ability to control all. I provide the balance so that the universe isn't just one big outpouring of non-stop creation that would fill up the room until no one could breath. I'm the AC to his DC. I slow things down allowing for a little calm, peace, and an independent experience so we can marvel at what has come forth and have an adventure. This universe and the earth we inhabit are awesome. We created this masterpiece in order to have adventures and play. Instead, our world is defined by strife and conflict and this mindset has permeated all our interactions with our fellow game players. We are divided and all we do is fight. I hate my brother and in return he wants to punish me. Why? Why do we hate each other? We have lost the spirit of sharing and co-operation. We both want it all for ourselves. Haven't we reached the point yet where we take it all for our self and then realize we have no one left to play with? Is that what we want? Do we want just pure obeisance to our omnipotent power? I want a playmate. I want everyone to live out their dreams. This universe was created so we could do just this and instead we are divided, we create new ways to stay separated, and we just fight. It is so sad. The way out as I see it is the path of the heart. The solution is to take our divided polar extremes and bring them to the centre, the axis mundi, the heart space, where we learn about love for all. Love and respect for all.

We are headed full on towards destruction. In the aftermath, we will sit upon the mountain top of eternity lamenting our failure to find love. Do we repeat the experiment knowing full well the suffering we caused by our inability to love one another? The Great Mother tells me the answer is love. It's the only way out. Don't ever put the other out of your heart no matter how pissed you get at each other. The love of the Goddess is the elixir needed. To change the paradigm of the world means to embrace radical and unconditional love. Practice it until it becomes second nature. It is our way out of this mess. The path back home begins with the first step towards love.

The night sure felt like a lifetime and the dazzling opening show presented by the Great Goddess seemed to be a long time ago. The clock was past the 6 am mark and I was exhausted. The trip with the mushroom leaves me drained of energy and at my age it is a two-day recovery process. For the first time I understood fully why at Ayahuasca retreats a day off is given in-between ceremonies. The night with Ayahuasca is taxing but I find the morning after is quite exhilarating and the afterglow allows you to recover faster from the outpouring of energy and I'm ready to go despite the lack of energy. With the mushroom, I find it is a constant outpouring of non-replenished energy. While I was creating new world after new world while reclined on my chair, my foot was shaking quite intensely with the power being exerted to create new worlds. I noticed the next day the total lack of energy. Usually when I smoke tobacco I can enter into a meditative state and feel the energy rippling through my body. This time there was nothing. It was a full two days before I felt the return of a detectable level of energy.

I have now journeyed twice with magic mushrooms and I have to say I am quite amazed by their power. I see the similarities with Ayahuasca as well as the differences. They are both psychedelic experiences and I can't say whether one is better than the other or make some proclamation that either will lead you to what it is you are looking for. I want to say you don't have to travel large distances to explore consciousness if that is not in the cards for you. That being said, I wouldn't trade my journeys into the jungle and mountains of Peru for anything. They remain an essential part of the story of my life and I'm grateful I had the opportunity to embark on these very special voyages. What I'm saying is if the universe is calling out to you to wake up, you can create your own story based upon your circumstances. Don't think you need to do it in some proscribed way in order to find what it is you are looking for. Ayahuasca is indeed magical however if it is not feasible there are other ways. I can compare it to the multitude of religious avenues available to one who has a calling towards that modality of spiritual exploration. Explore and examine what resonates with your circumstance and then witness the doors opening up for you to keep going on the journey. The omnipotent you wants you to wake up and all you have to do is to take that first step. Once you walk through the doorway, the path will light up, you'll see that yellow brick road, and all you have to do is keep following it.

peace pipe

Tobacco is a lifelong continuing education program in which the understanding of concurrent events in your life lead you towards connecting the knowledge back to what tobacco has been teaching you. I was exposed to Mapacho tobacco in 2013 but at the time had no interest in it and left its use into the hands of the shaman. Upon first use of tobacco in 2015 in the jungle, I noticed its calming effects despite the slight nausea I got from the novel experience. Later that same retreat, I found the more exposed I was to it, the more I was repulsed by the smell which curiously followed the trajectory of drinking Ayahuasca. In a cycle of work with Ayahuasca, I find I am done with it after the fourth round of drinking for the primary reason it is disgusting and hard to stomach. My relationship with tobacco changed in 2016 when after the requisite repulsion, I found it was calming to smoke after drinking a cup of Huachuma. Things really changed when in the final ceremony I witnessed the Maestro don Howard on the star deck at SpiritQuest perform this masterpiece of a ceremony with the manipulation of tobacco smoke being the star of the show. When given the opportunity to join in, I eagerly lit up my puro and ended up smoking two cigars in short order. Being a novice consumer of this potent jungle tobacco, soon my body was convulsing with the power unlocked by the properties of tobacco. I ended up being pinned to the ground with my lips pressed against the earth hoping the coursing power would soon dissipate. The experience was transformative and when I left the jungle that year I brought with me a bunch of the jungle tobacco and so began my education while integrating my lessons at home.

I am of the inquisitive and curious bent so it wasn't long before I began to examine and record the effects of tobacco after sitting with him on a nightly basis. Tobacco would take you to this tipping point where you are on the precipice of the oncoming rush and then whoosh the intoxication would overtake and possess you. At this point, I'd have to ride out the storm. If I was standing when he hit, I would be forced into a sitting position because of the intensity. I soon deduced this was central nervous system agitation and over time I built up a tolerance which would require more than one cigar in order to reach the heights I had previously felt. The strange thing about the experience was that after the rush of the oncoming freight train had passed there would be this incredible feeling of peace and calmness. Tobacco was teaching me. What a wonderful gift this tobacco where you can feel a surge of power followed by peacefulness.

What I described was five years ago and I have not stopped exploring the power of tobacco. Tobacco activates the power, strength, and protection within and nightly I spend time in communion with my friend before coming before my Mesa, this construct I affectionately call the "Mesa of Power" because the tobacco moves through me in conjunction with ceremonially lighting up my Mesa. I invite the maestro in and tremble as the power courses throughout my body.

I recently tried magic mushrooms for the first time in my life and the central theme of the experience was power. My shadow is power and I have the antidote to this surge in being able to radiate peace. At the same time, the juice I need to propel myself forward in life comes from my shadow. My shadow tells me the constant power drives him mad. I know my peacefulness will cause me to fade away without my friend. A few days afterwards I was out in the woods and as always took some tobacco with me and had a smoke out at one of my favourite spots. I took the time to feel the onset of power and connected it to my shadow. I let him take me over and my body started trembling uncontrollably. I just gave in to the tremors rippling through my body, allowing my shadow to demonstrate to me on a smaller scale what he is feeling. I get it. The power is awesome and here I was literally enthralled with it but I did realize I couldn't function in that state. It is fun to visit but a method is needed to express the power and let go. He doesn't have that. As I let the power rage and then fade away, I returned to a heightened state of peace. I took a deep breath and I understood.

Soon afterwards, there was a power outage in my neighbourhood due to high winds which lasted for sixteen hours. What an inconvenience to be without electrical power. As with most of my life now, this event was actually another teaching moment and due to my heightened sense of awareness, I easily connected the dots. You know what I did after the power went out and I completed my chores for the day? I went to bed. I took the opportunity to peacefully rest. I got up to eat and feed the dog but soon I laid down once again. Without power, I am content to just go to sleep with a longing to just rest in peace. The connection to the syllabus unfolding within my life is obvious. I need power or I'll fade away and conversely my shadow needs me to consume the power so he can find peace.

Now that I understand I know I can help. I have transformed into a warrior. I am a worthy opponent to my shadow self. He is the epitome of power and that power corrupts all it touches. He has tempted me with it but I learned the lessons of my life from icons of liberty and the admonitions of don Howard, who warned me of this very thing, and I took all the lessons to heart. I'm a good student. I could grab the ring and rule over all. My shadow has tested me out many times, beaten me into a pulp, placed before me the fulfillment of what it is I desire but I've let it all pass. I'm sure we all have our breaking point; I'm no saint but he knows my intentions. Through his teachings, I transformed into the hero and completed the quest. I have become the man he needed me to become. I'm his adversary and the medicine that will allow him to let go and finally find peace. I found the confirmation of this gambit through my friend tobacco. I know I can give him the peace he seeks. He can trust me not to take and abuse his power. The constant tests have demonstrated I'm good for it. He transformed me and now it's my turn in reciprocity to transform him.

What an exquisite game.