intentions

My intention: Walk the path of the heart. Whoa. It just hit me hard. That's what I'm doing. This sucks. The course puts you through the wringer. "Teach me to love." Okay, you asked for it.

The serpent as the Goddess takes her place at the top of the tapestry encircling the jaguar.

She is in her divine and exalted place. The pinnacle of the spiritual path is the path of the heart. After completing the various grades and assignments you enter into the last phase of the journey. The path of the heart. It sounds like bliss and a reward for the long climb. I was ready to open my heart and love all. Bring it on.

I went to Peru in January to drink a lot of Huachuma and let my heart shine. My beatitude awaited as I completed a ten-year plant medicine odyssey in addition to fulfilling a quest I started at middle-age. I've got the knowledge. I have understanding and a little bit of wisdom. I answered the questions about existence. The wisdom lessons said I'll never have all the answers nor will the seeking end - there's always more. The burning questions were answered, and I turned towards my heart. The Goddess was the catalyst for my plant medicine experiences and she is the one who made me come back for more, especially when times get tough, I was scared, and wanted to run far away.

My perception of the path of the heart and reality were at odds. This course is the toughest of them all, but it turns out I was predestined for a tough time because I don't know how to love. This deficiency meant starting from the bottom and re-experiencing the mistakes from my youth which had the result of locking away my heart. I had to go through the process once again and all the old feelings of despair returned. My go to was to lock her away. My heart was breaking, and I couldn't go through the pain. I soon realized that wasn't what I had been taught. My plant medicine journeys allowed me to release my heart from the castle made of gold; a castle my alter-ego the Dragon had constructed and locked her away in. My seeking and plant medicine use was a multi-year project to free her and here I was at the first sign of love trauma ready to lock her up. I got past this lesson, maybe a D+ as I wanted to imprison my heart, but I knew better.

So, I had to face a familiar heartbreak and despair. I had to project into the future a life without the one I had fallen in love with. I had to contemplate loss and how I'd never get back with her. I spent the nights longing. Why can't she remember how good we are together and come back to me? Why did her feelings change? What did I do? I hate this. This emptiness is killing me.

I forgot I was walking the path of the heart. I was walking the path of personal sorrow and seeing the collapse of my world. When I finally accepted the loss, I stood at my Mesa, and she looked at me and reminded me I'm walking the path of the heart. This is what I asked for and I was getting it. It's the toughest course. You're a good student Paul. You are going to do well, though you will fail parts of this course. Remember, this is what you asked for. The next night is when I looked at the serpent jaguar tapestry and saw her over all. She's the best and allows you to lock her away as part of the teaching. To the aspiring student she then sends you off to slay the dragon so you can make the discovery you are the dragon. You are the one who imprisons her. She sacrifices self to teach you. I've got this far and now see it. Why did you lock me away Paul?

I cried. I did it because my love is possessive. I need you and will do anything to hold on to you. You will leave me because I'm not good enough, so I must imprison you. By making myself jailer I also imprison myself. I create a mess out of everything because I don't know what love is. I think I do, yet my actions prove otherwise. One taste of you and I will spend the rest of my days trying to get back with you. You showed me this clearly during my first ever Ayahuasca experience. I didn't understand it at the time, but I see it completely now.

Teach me to love Goddess.

Love must flow freely and without conditions. If love is tied to conditions, it's not true love. Do you see it? You may think it is love but it will spoil and wither on the vine. It won't last because conditions will change. The lessons affect us all and how you get the lesson is dependent on your circumstance. You chose to be a man this time and so you get to see it from this perspective. If you chose woman, then you will see how attaching conditions to love you in exchange for security is indeed a vexing problem to overcome.

As my previous life course concluded I was told to kill myself in order to live. The rub was I didn't know how to live. The pandemic hit and I was given three years grace to ready myself for the destruction of my life. When life resumed, I dutifully followed the path that was laid out for me and saw my destruction was nearing. Events unfolded, and this external force ignited the wick upon a bomb that would go off. This time there was no way out. The story of my life arced towards freeing myself of my lifetime of self-inflicted chains. The freedom from my mediocre life was waiting for me and I walked to the edge of the cliff. Everything fell apart in my world before I jumped. Instead of liberation, I retreated to a world of hurt and then was witness to an external world that was grappling with change and destruction. I sat with my misery and felt the pain envelope me. My sentence was two months until I found the answers I was searching for after I slowly let things go. The Goddess proactively instructs in the path of the heart course, and she was waiting for me to get over myself. She looked into my eyes and asked if I was now ready.

I see it. My shadow closed the last course by telling me to kill myself in order to live. As with all divine advice, I didn't understand it at first. I thought it meant to blow it all up and walk away free. This rallying call was preparing me to walk the path of the heart. Myself is the one who builds the prison. My fear of losing others and feeling the pain of heartbreak and loss causes me to imprison my heart. As the jailer, I cage myself because someone must watch her. I had to do this one more time, see it play out, and then understand why it happens. Killing myself means letting go of possessiveness. In order to be free I must let others be free and not create dependencies.

I have received the lesson loud and clear. The Great Goddess - my heart and my mother - is the teacher of the most important class that you will need to graduate from the University of Higher Consciousness. I've enrolled and got my ass kicked first semester. I'm a good student, not a quitter, and I know I will continue on, all the better, for the lessons learned from the ultimate school of hard knocks.