advice not judgment

The awakening process involves searching externally for answers and eventually finding out what you are looking for is found within. You are everything and the answers are contained internally. The progression on the spiritual path is not over at this point. When you see this, a funny thing happens. In the external world you can then see with clarity what you are looking for.

I've started heading down this path and one of the initial lessons I received was enlightening. When you see the divine in the external then it becomes easy to love all. It's the secret sauce I was looking for because I finally had to admit I don't love the other. I find so many people fearful and greedy while holding them in contempt. I now see those traits within and realize the other, who is me, has incarnated into the flesh on this planet of the damned in order to satiate greed, work through trust issues, and become a warrior. Everyone has a path they are walking. I might not approve, get pissed off at them, or condemn them but the path they are walking will lead to a resolution of what brought them here, even if it means repeating the grade. I understand this and can now look everyone in the eye and have compassion for all. We will all get there, and I can honour that spiritual journey.

When I signed up for the plant medicine experience, I was cautioned it wouldn't be easy. Don Howard warned of the tumult to come in your life. Ceremonies were indeed difficult as the fear and unknown aspects of them were challenging to the point of wanting to run and never return. As hard as that was, I can say the life challenges thrown your way during the interval of the integration process are far more difficult. They are made hard by a stubborn refusal to take stock of oneself and apply the lessons to the situation you have received repeatedly. Service and doing things without expectations. Unconditional love. Reciprocity. Love Serve Remember. I've tried my best to not do this. Eventually, the hard knocks to the head get through and the approach mirrors what you have been taught.

What are plant medicines teaching me? What am I here to teach you? Did I learn my lessons or even understand them? I know why I took the course. I wanted to delve into the peculiar human condition which involves love. We strive to love all which is difficult. We passionately fall in love with one which seems easy. That love is more precarious, and failure has the potential to shatter your world. Loving all doesn't contain this outcome. There is always lots of love to go around and time to wait until others get aboard the love train.

The teaching starts to become clear. To escape the cyclical nature of being is to love all. Walking the path of the heart to this fork in the road has been a ride. I wonder how the next chapter plays out as I draft this story?

It's the weight of your heart not the size. Those are great lyrics from the 90s grunge band Alice in Chains in a song called "Angry Chair", describing the condition of your heart resulting from a lifetime of living. Some people grow a big heart in terms of being generous. The weight of your heart is determined by attachment. Getting emotionally attached to others in love and then suffering heartbreak will give you a heavy heart. Loving all with no preferences will make you lighthearted. You see the good in all and love everyone for their journey and contribution to this game of life.

When I started out on this path of discovery, I invested heavily into learning about the civilization of the ancient Egyptians. I came across what was called the judgment scene.

It involves the recently deceased having their heart weighed on a scale against a feather in the Hall of Maat in front of 42 divine beings. If the heart was heavier than a feather, then it would be devoured by the hybrid demon Ammit. Our modern take on it was that you'd be destroyed and sent to the depths of hell if you couldn't pass this test. If you did pass the test, off you went to see Osiris and get access to paradise. Ammit will constantly gorge on your heart if it is not as light as a feather. Do you need to wait until death for this scene to play out? It's available now and is on repeat.

We called this scene judgment because of our Judeo-Christian influence. The elements are suggesting this with the various divine figures looking on in addition to surmising the Hall of Maat is set up for judgment. The concept of Maat in ancient Egyptian thought is referring to the natural order of things, comparable to the Hindu concept of Dharma. Our western thought processes will immediately connect this to judgment. I'm not so sure about the inference. Maat is just the way it is. To go against Maat will bring upset into your life, but that's not judgment. Instead, it is your own doing. Thus, another way to look at Maat is not as judgment but just a product of your own choosing, to wit Karma. If you spend your lifetime becoming attached to others this will weigh down your heart and you will return to this heavy plane until the lesson is learned. We all know there's no escaping the eventuality that everything we hold dear here on earth is going to perish one day, including our own life. I think within this is found a cause for continual celebration. To rejoice in what we have and to let go when the time comes. Not to be sad but to be happy someone has completed their journey. From this can be derived a light heart. To love all.

We have a preoccupation with death and not living in the moment. We look at such a scene from the ancient Egyptians and immediately think this is the afterlife and we are going to be judged. The bias is because of our upbringing and applied by default. It's easy to bypass the default way of thinking if you just do it without thinking. That seems like an oxymoron, think by not thinking! Don't filter your thoughts before the expansion. Just see them in perfect form and try to grasp what it is they are showing you. Okay, got it? Look at the hybrid crocodile goddess Ammit devouring hearts. Internally, the Goddess is your heart. A heavy heart is the result of choosing to love only a few rather than all. When the select few leave for whatever reason, your heart becomes heavy and once again the monster will devour it. The lesson becomes strikingly clear. Love all. It's not judgment - it's advice. You are being shown the way to eternal bliss is with a light heart.

My heart, who is my mother, who is the Great Goddess, asked me, "Why can't you fall in love with one and still love all? Why do you have to be selfish and exclusionary?"

Yeah, why? 

nutcracker

Do I want recognition? I peer deep down into my motivation for making public my thoughts. When I first started writing in this blog space, I had low expectations. The process was a way to coalesce the swirling thoughts and ideas in my head. I felt a release from the mind dump. Along the way, I discovered that the process allows for the distillation of knowledge into understanding. The curious thing about the writing process is the flow which allows words to just magically come forth and then within the corpus of what you commit to alphabetical form comes understanding. This gift of understanding through the writing process has happened so often that it is a given if I want to understand some idea more succinctly, all I have to do is write about it.

So, my motivation for this space is to attain a level of understanding of all the knowledge I have crammed into my brain. The discovery of plant medicines super-charged the acquisition of knowledge. I would list as the number one personal benefit from the use of plant teacher medicines is the acquisition of knowledge. A great deal of the knowledge is metaphorical and the process most beneficial to my own personal journey is the integration of what has been revealed to me. Without proper integration, the plant medicine experience is not fully unlocked and may lead to much unprocessed knowledge that will become contradictory over time.

The integration period is long and challenging work in order to crack the nut of understanding. The writing process is the nutcracker. It is for this reason that I would still write even if I were all alone in the void. The process would give me the understanding for which I was searching. I'm the luckiest man in the world. I know that all the reasons I came here to earth for are in my hands, ready to be cracked. I've shelled most of my questions and fulfilled my desires. The last road I walk is the path of the heart. Everything I've sorted through has led me to this one last proverbial mountain to climb. I've been shown the bliss of living head up and heart forward and know it is my duty to integrate the lessons into my daily life. I separated from my eternal bride in order to become a better man; not to return until I became that man.

The process of my understanding of what I have been taught is profound. I acquired knowledge through my mind; the mind being an indispensable tool on my journey. However, my understanding did not come through my thought processes. Understanding is a succession of aha moments as the knowledge marinates and combines with the rest of the knowledge ingredients. Eventually, something incendiary, a chance happening, or a catalyst will up level the knowledge into understanding. In my case, it is the writing process which is the master key.

So, back to the beginning and the question of fame and fortune. I've had success with other arts such as photography and was encouraged to monetize that skill. I didn't want to because I like photography! Monetizing pleasure for fortune invites discord. Art is best left alone. The best artists are poor. Hey, we all need to make a living and I'm no different. I have wondered what if my blog went viral? What if I became a best-selling spiritual guru ala a Tolle or a Ram Dass? I'd become cynical and would gravitate away from the reason I ventured out on this path. Fame and fortune are at odds with the path of the heart unless one becomes devoted to using the gain for service. My answer to remaining unknown is I'm stubborn and selfish. I'm doing this process of transformation in order to prove to the Goddess I can do it. She has told me to come home, and I don't have to do anything. It doesn't matter. However, I made a promise and set up a mysterious system of pain and suffering which would lead me back to the heart. This is the greatest gift I can offer to the Mother of all.

service as the way forward

Without the pandemic, I would have gone on collecting experience and attempting a reconciliation during ceremony with the darkness within. Who knows where this would have led? I can speculate after frustration it would have led me towards the much-maligned visionary plant that is called toé in the Amazon. I am familiar with this sacred plant from my first foray into the world of plant medicines which has progressed from being scared of the plant to becoming curious due to understanding where the magic leads. The spirit of toé is prevalent the world over and maintains a connection within the roots of all the interconnected species. I say that experientially; when I returned home from the Amazon the first time, I was running scared and I remember walking past a bush of brugmansias in the dead of night and hearing this whistling in my direction. I know it sounds insane but it happened! Toé is an accelerant into the deep darkness and madness of self; ultimately leading towards a reconciliation with the god within. I reconciled with my darkness within through intensive integration forced upon me by this pandemic, helped by Mapacho tobacco; tobacco being the grandfather of the nightshade plants. The intended path forward to fully understand my darkness with more plant medicine ceremonies was instead all revealed and reconciled simply through integration. I had all the answers and just needed to add them up to enact understanding. The pandemic forced these insights upon me and made me alter my plans and the route forward on this magnificent journey.

My journey and intentions coalesced into understanding and brought me to the next crossroad. I have all the answers I seek and I am forever grateful. I did not see a path forward with the main plants I had been in communion with as they had taught me all I need to know. I feel a responsibility to close my relationship with them for now but I know I have to take my leave. At the same time, I was given the answer to the darkness within and I realized my path forward because it was through tobacco I was able to integrate all my lessons. It was because of tobacco that I received strength, protection, power, and the ability to calm the mind and add up all my experiences. Staring me in the face was my destiny; a destiny revealed in 2016 during a Vilca ceremony. I am to heal through the use of tobacco.

How utterly preposterous! No wonder the plants teach you to break free from culture. The first stop is liberation and it is gained by dropping the stories of self and telling the truth. Without these twin pillars of experience, you are destined to remain a puppet of your tribe. You must set yourself free with the tools given to you. Once free, what was once preposterous becomes truth. Tobacco is a magical plant. Tobacco is a dangerous plant. Tobacco demands respect. Tobacco is humanity’s greatest ally.

My nightly ritual involves giving thanks. I embarked upon this spiritual journey of awakening fourteen years ago and everything I asked for I have received while all the time reminding myself to continuously give back and honour the grace I have received.

I don’t think I’m alone in being impatient. What I mean is when I have asked for boons from the plants there is a part of me that thinks the reward should be immediate. In the ensuing weeks the disappointment sets in. I asked for the secrets of the universe to be revealed to me. Why didn’t Mother Ayahuasca come within ceremony and show me how it all works? Isn’t this what is supposed to happen? I asked her to show me and expected results that night.

I haven’t been greedy and maybe I should have asked for more; I mean it’s all available so I could have. The Goddess told me when I first directly met her in an Ayahuasca ceremony that I could ask her anything and she’d give me the answer. I kept my asks from the plants pretty light. I wanted to understand how the universe works. I wanted to know my destiny. And from a curious standpoint, I wanted to decode the Book of Revelation as it was something that fascinated me in my teens. I’m at the point now where I have received all the answers and was guided by the plants along my path of awakening. You have to put in the work and the work is rewarded. My own personal hero’s journey was a necessity if I wished to understand how the universe works and my destiny. In conjunction with self-knowledge is dropping the narrative you tell about yourself and live in truth. It all intrinsically ties together and without self-knowledge you cannot fathom the understanding of the nature of the universe. In other words, all unfolded as it should and the answers I sought were revealed in time.

This blog space is a testament to what I have received from the plants and the eternal spirits I have encountered. Everything I have asked for has been delivered to my door. I have in turn kept my end of the bargain. The promises I made in reciprocity I have fulfilled or am in the process of fulfilling. I made a promise to be of service to the great Mother and to be of service to the plants. The call is strong within and the fulfillment is coming. I couldn’t sidestep this calling even if I wanted to. The strong current of the river of life pulls me along towards my destiny.

My journey of self-knowledge has been fulfilled. I know it will continue on and I’ll never know everything until I return to the vibration of omnipotence however I see now what happens to one who embarks upon an intimate relationship with the plants. There’s an upcoming fork in the road and ultimately the choice is to give the plants up while appreciating and integrating their lessons into your daily life or to be unconditionally of service to them. Alternatively, you could stall out, turn back, and continue unconsciously with them, perhaps being enchanted with ceremony or wowed with fireworks, in essence, taking a conscious path and turning it into the time-honoured path of trivial visionary thrills. Anyway, I have learned so much through this pandemic that has forced me into integrating and reconciling all my plant medicine experiences that I could take these lessons and live a fulfilling life, leading by being a shining example for someone who has levelled up their consciousness. To continue on the plant medicine path is to become of service. I don’t see any other way once you reach this crossroad.

I don’t have the option to choose my path. The calling is loud to continue along the path of service. It’s the only way I see forward and this path obviously involves tobacco as what was revealed to me in a Vilca ceremony five years ago. So much has been subsequently revealed to me about the healing properties of tobacco and the fire burns within to learn all I can and bring the symbiosis back to humanity to reduce suffering. I know by way of past experience whatever I take up in earnest I am successful at and will eventually excel at and master. It’s my calling and I will honour the call.

In early 2020 in the northern highlands of Peru, I participated in a Huachuma ceremony that honoured Mother Earth, Pachamama. The ceremony was one of the finest experiences of my life. So moving and I felt her warm embrace and renewed my pledge to be of service to her. My way forward is to be of service to the Great Goddess. It’s my act of reconciliation and why I dreamt this world into existence, realized it through the form created by the feminine, and how I will ultimately demonstrate my love for her. I discovered my soul mate and Mother Earth she is. Through tobacco I will leave behind the morass of selfishness, be of service, and I will lessen the suffering in the world. That is the way forward. I’m not going to completely heal the world but I will make an impact through service and example and hopefully inspire others to do the same. Love is the lesson. Love is why I’m here. 

chapter 4 tobacco

There are concurrent lessons within my life curriculum that are currently in class however they started at different periods in my life. The end of the current teachings are coalescing, propelling me on towards the next chapter. The lessons plans that are congruent involve my destiny to be of service in which I will become a healer through the use of tobacco. This was revealed to me five years ago during a Vilca ceremony in the summer of 2016:

I continued ascending to the place that is the upper world or heaven as we like to call it and saw the souls that reside there. There was a knowing metaphorical feeling about all of this. Directly above heaven was the place curanderos and curanderas go at death and also the place where they obtain the power to heal. These healers are sent to our world by the Great Mother in order to help heal in service to her. Anytime they are sent down there is a chance they won't wake up or return which makes it a perilous journey to undertake. Then I was told I have within me the power to heal and to go ahead and enter this place and claim my power, so I did. It was explained that the red life force energy I had witnessed I had an abundance of and that's why the Huachuma activated in me makes me vibrate so intensely. I understood this as having an abundance of serpent energy. To heal I was told to hold ceremony and use mapacho smoke to activate my healing power. I was cautioned to be of service, to not be in it for personal aggrandizement, and to always give credit to the Great Mother.

This vision was in conjunction with an Ayahuasca ceremony the previous week that showed me that the time was not now as I still had worldly obligations to fulfill:

The scene tilted up and I saw an apartment which made me very emotional because it meant the house had been sold as the kids had grown up and moved out and my dog Luna had probably passed away - it was the retirement years. The lesson having to do with the relentless marching on of time. The Goddess pointed out my children are 14 and 12 and time flies so to be as good a husband and father I could be. When I was ready after that we would discuss more about being of service as I had wanted to discover my path and how I can become more of service to the Goddess.

The path ahead at this time appeared to be about a seven-year thread towards the next chapter. It’s been over five years since those revelations and I can see it all coming together from seed, to root, to stem, to flower.

The first chapter of my awakening involved middle age in 2007 and becoming curious about life. I took on a lifetime of learning in under five years, and now educated, I woke up. Egypt instilled in me the magic and I went searching for the Goddess. When I knew I had found her, I prepared to go meet her in the Amazon jungle in 2013 and thus began the second chapter. Chapter two is the exciting drama of my hero’s journey, taking on a dragon, and returning a warrior. This chapter closed in 2016 at which time I had transformed into a jaguar and received a vision of my destiny. Chapter three was when I turned 50 and completed my climb up the mountain in 2017. I was the conquering hero, I was shown the underpinnings of all, and given the keys to eventually realize just who I am. I was presented with the challenge to burn away all the obstacles that hold me back. I learned about consciousness and vibration. I was a really good student. In Ayahuasca ceremonies in 2019 and 2020, it became clear I was to move on. I love the jungle; I love ceremony and the magical nights with the seduction of Ayahuasca and the bliss of a lifetime in a day with Huachuma. The chapter is ending. I clearly see why I have to move on; the omens are all pointing towards this outcome. I’d like to honour all my teachers and give my heartfelt thanks. I just need to write a proper ending later this year.

The last five years I have spent taking a couple steps forwards and a subsequent step back. I’d slip in and out of vibrations that were trapping me and not allowing me to escape their hold. These blocks were strong and draining to which I developed and tried many different strategies to overcome these obstacles. I came to accept my predilection towards second chakra pleasure seeking and just recently the idea of sacrifice entered into my world. I’ll always maintain the power within to fulfill whatever fleeting pleasure I wish to chase however if I wish to move past this block and fulfill my destiny, sacrifice was required. You give up something to get something. It’s western spiritual speak for reciprocity and it touched a chord deep within. I can do this. And so, I sacrificed in preparation of writing the next chapter.

In conjunction with my sacrifice, immediately my path forward became clear and the knowledge of tobacco and the strength and protection he offers greatly increased. I discovered the symbiotic relationship between the human and tobacco and my interest being piqued I started in earnest to look towards the next phase of my education. I started looking around for a Tabaquero, who is a master of tobacco, in order to begin the process of becoming a healer through the use of tobacco. I knew I’d be pointed in the direction of where to go once I was shown all the options. The coincidences and omens would lead me towards where I am to head. I have the clarity of vision to know when I have found what I’m looking for.

The ongoing pandemic has forced me to integrate all my plant medicine experiences and get a handle on where I am in my journey. The use of Mapacho tobacco has been the most important aid in this reconciliation of my experiences. I can process my experiences out in nature and then at night time after being in communion with tobacco and conducting ceremony, the movie projector gets fired up and the dreaming begins, allowing me to explore consciousness. I can see it. This chapter is ending. There’s a touch of sadness in that I’ll have to leave things I love for now and take up my sword and fulfill my destiny.

This is my destiny and the tides of life are pulling me along. To not swim with this strong current would lead to a suffocating non-fulfillment. The pull is as strong as the force that originally drove my obsession with ancient Egypt and later the mysterious force that compelled me to naively journey into the Amazon. The call is out there and I’m to answer. I have no choice but to heed the call and let the force take me where it may. Heroes are called to adventure. Once again, I will polish my sword.

rewriting experience

Remarkable! Six years later I now understand a majority of the lessons of my plant medicine experience in April of 2015. Lately, I have written much about knowledge and understanding where the plant medicine experience is overflowing with knowledge. It is one of the major draws of the experience as knowledge is power. Each ceremony reveals so much knowledge of self, others, and your place in it. The caveat is the understanding level of all you take in is pretty poor, often your initial takeaway from ceremony in the following days is filtered through what you want to believe, and thus all good practitioners stress the integration period where you go home and sit with all that has been unveiled. The time away from the immediate experience is when you gain insights into what you directly experienced. Knowledge alchemizes into understanding and when you are ready and want to continue along the plant medicine path you return for more lessons. Every time I have undergone the experience, I have written about it. I can’t stress this enough. It doesn’t have to be the written word - you can record it into your phone, draw an image that captures the essence of the experience, or remain in contact with others where you can continue to discuss what happened, almost like psychotherapy.

The catalyst for my understanding is the tobacco maestro Mapacho. I go off into the forest with him plus my dog and the magic happens. From a visual standpoint, the experience of having consciousness altered by Mapacho reminds me a lot of Huachuma in that there’s a clarity that envelops your senses. With a medicinal dose of Mapacho comes a visual acuity and a sharp increase in my ability to clearly hear sounds as well as noises from a distance. Anecdotally, I'd connect this to all plant species from the nightshade family because of my experience with Toé which caused a sharp increase as well in my senses. That condition lasted for days which for a novice was a challenge. I would guess my sense of smell is also increased however due to years of allergies that sense is very poor and even an increase in its efficacy doesn’t register. Allergies also impact my ability to taste, maybe explaining why the shamanic dieta poses no problem for me! For the most part food is utility for me. Anyway, I have a pretty good idea that the increase in clarity offered by Mapacho also affects my intellectual capacities for understanding because I gain a sharper focus upon what it is I have been lately thinking about. In this instance, the clarity and similarities with Huachuma brought me back to my first experience at SpiritQuest and riding in the boat on the Amazon river while in the midst of the grace of the plant medicine Huachuma. In re-living this initial encounter, I realized how closed my heart was at the time and these feelings that were enveloping me were so alien and strange when in retrospect I was being flooded with love. I remember looking up at the clouds and being engulfed with this cosmic love for all. It was the greatest feeling and experience. I felt connected and one with all of the universe so much so that I recognized it as a deep cosmic love and realized the power within love to change and overcome any obstacle in the way. In the sky this rainbow patch formed letting me know that we can live in harmony if we weave together our differences and embrace our commonality. We don’t have to live in constant strife and separation. When we reached land, I remember feeling such a brotherly and sisterly love for the tribe we were visiting. Since the experience was new to me, Huachuma was intent upon teaching me the introductory lessons of heaven and hell. I remember spiralling from the highest high to the lowest low. It was the lesson on states of mind and my influence on the process. Of course, I had no idea what was going on at the time and initially I was like, "wow Huachuma shows you so much love and then takes you into the dark" not realizing it was all me! On the boat ride back to SpiritQuest, I sat beside the shaman don Rober and was flooded with love however I didn’t know what it was and thought it so strange. When we returned to the sanctuary, I recall being in my room when the sensations of love returned and I was so uncomfortable with it at the time. Imagine being so closed off from love for more than a lifetime that when exposed again to this universal love, you reject it as something so foreign and just wanting the experience to end so you can return to your closed off way of life.

It’s only now I clearly see this. The whole two-week experience with don Howard was a process of ripping my heart open whether I wanted to or not. Ayahuasca, Bobinzana, Mapacho, and Huachuma in conspiracy with the maestro were prying open my rusted-out heart like the proverbial Tin Man from the Wizard of OZ. I don’t think I ever thanked don Howard enough for what he did before he passed.

As an aside, the movie “The Wizard of OZ” really is a great encapsulation of the hero’s journey as seen through the eyes of plant medicines. In order to progress along this path, one does need a brain the Scarecrow seeks for understanding, the heart the Tin Man longs for in order to realize the commonality of us all and integrate the power one unlocks from the experience, and from the Cowardly Lion one must develop courage and bravery or you won’t get very far before packing it in.

I see now don Howard was like a parent to all the human children that came to see him and he would go about being of service to enact change within all, one person at a time. His course was challenging and tough, always with an eye on the big picture. The big picture is the evolution of consciousness and his program revealed within you the power to do so mixed with the love that will sustain the transformation. 

Mapacho was not done with me yet yesterday evening. Instead, he helped me put two and two together. In 2016 I passed the tests of courage, bravery, and perseverance and became a warrior on the spiritual path I walk. I wrote about it at length and called my blog post “I am Jaguar.” This experience that culminated in that trip to Peru was transformational as I discarded my fear of the whole process which in turn opens you up to receive more of the teachings, as you are no longer running scared or wondering what’s around the corner. I did not drink Ayahuasca after that experience for over two and a half years. Once I returned to drink again, the experience was remarkably different and in the eight times I have now participated in ceremony since 2016 every experience starts off with a high-speed experience of some sort. I finally realized the why. In the last few months, I have written about the fundamental makeup of the two powers that create our universe which are the divine feminine and divine masculine powers. She is deceleration that creates form and he is acceleration that causes separation. That’s the condensed version! So, it was just a matter of time that what was ultimately revealed is the Ayahuasca experience of high-speed chases was an omen of the coming of the divine masculine in ceremony and how it courses through me now with the Jaguar. During the second ceremony of the last trip to the Amazon, I was engulfed with an unbelievable amount of this power. My whole being was highly vibrating, no visions, I just sat in a complete highly vibrational form wondering what is going on. Thanks to Mapacho, I now know. When I went to sleep that night, the lessons continued. I was on a hybrid of a motorcycle and snowmobile going down a hill at a high rate of speed. I had smoked so much Mapacho that day that this dream was so unbelievably real. I felt all the sensations of accelerating and going as fast as I could push it. Later, I ended up in my parents’ basement where this exotic woman with tattoos on her arms was waiting for me. The Goddess made her mysterious appearance just like in my plant medicine journeys.

Burning within, is a desire to return and expose myself to more direct experience on this path as I find this is the joie de vivre of life. I give thanks for my life and being able to discover this path. I wouldn’t trade this for anything in the world. 

liber pater

I could proffer you some advice if you are to go off in search of meaning, answers, enlightenment, a spiritual journey, or whatever you wish to call it; the guidance would be straightforward: your first stop along the path is liberation. Free yourself from culture and expectations; plus the old story and baggage you haul around. Like countless others, I didn’t do that and subsequently had to re-trace my steps and work to become free. I made my climb long and difficult due to a constant struggle with letting go of expectations, image, and self. All these chains and traits are the product of human social constructs that bind you to their mental prison.

 

From a wider perspective, you can see the chaos and breakdown happening within society, can’t you? As humans, we long to be free but don’t know how to go about getting liberated. In the mythic Greek literature, Dionysos is an outsider and he arrives from a foreign land. He’s an enemy of order and is embraced by the malcontents and those in opposition to structured society. He is scorned, derided, and chased away. Dionysos’ arrival on the scene gives you permission to be free. Everything becomes fluid. Where does hermaphroditism, gender identity issues, and the questioning of the social fabric we hold dear come from? Everyone is puzzled. Ask the Greeks - they intimately knew a god named Dionysos the libertine who would always pay a visit, especially when order became oppressive. Do you fight it or just observe? Are you concerned or smiling?

 

Dionysos is always coming to destroy order, whether that be society or your nice and tight life you have crafted. We men build and champion order and like a good Jenga game, the structure eventually gets knocked down. It’s the natural flow of the universal vibration common to all and we get pulled along. Culturally and individually, we face the dissolution of all we try so hard to maintain. It’s constant and really hard work protecting and ordering order. Seriously, you have to work at it or literally go to work, earn money, and use that money to keep your life together. Doing nothing leads to collapse. Funny how that works. I sat with that truth and finally realized I’m motivated to go to work because I’m addicted to order. I know I am because when I overdose on conformity and order, Dionysos always returns and questions me. I subsequently follow him on some kind of adventure to escape this hell I create for myself, all emanating from a proclivity towards order. Hell is spawned because of my pathological need to maintain order.

 

My life has been a struggle between these two polarities. I am constantly frustrated that I can’t maintain my facade and always drift back into some sort of hedonism or chasing of a thrill. I define it as a problem, unable to accept the flow. I’m pulled towards the liberation which I seek, yet I fight it and try to maintain order. I walked past a homeless person the other day and the voice inside me whispered, "he is free." I could not deny it. Think about that for a second. Freedom isn’t glamorous. As a society, we offer the dispossessed shelter and food which they accept but they don’t fall into the societal trap of having to earn a living and eventually go back out into the streets. Why don’t they want to play our game of social conformity? We can clean them up and get them a menial job. It’s mental illness we reassure ourselves, as we take great pains to not look into our own mirror of self because we might question our own sanity for the game we are playing. So, we try even harder to offer social services to invite the homeless back into our game. The plight of the homeless, unbeknownst to them, validates our life choices. We need them more than they need our handouts.

 

Ultimately, liberation involves dissolving all boundaries, letting go of attachments, and returning to the chaos always knocking at our door. You can taste liberation in this lifetime; I have and it’s sweet. I’m talking about being on a boat on the Amazon river forgetting about the worries of life and just being so goddamn high and in love. Being free allows you to finally exhale. I’ve learned it’s only the appetizer. To go all the way to Liber Pater involves dissolving the idea of who you are. Carlos Castaneda said erase personal history. Basically, kill your identity in order to be free. This expression brought me back to said boat ride in February in the grasp of Huachuma when Dionysos appeared in the clouds and he kept telling me this very same idea. Fuck me and my failure sometimes to listen to the plants.

 

On the boats heading off to the main Amazon river to visit the Murui Huitoto tribe I was so into the medicine and as high as the clouds. I was flooded with two sayings that summed up my bliss of forgetting who I was and how I was expected to act:

 

“Kill yourself in order to live.”

“The pious can go to hell.”

 

My intention revolved around learning now to stay in that high and loving state all the time. I sure got that answer and more all laid out for me. When I drank in the beauty of nature, of friendship, of the awareness of the wonderful world around me I was drunk in that state of bliss. When I engaged the mind at all it was clear that was the hell world. My thoughts went dark, I came down, I worried about the future, I wondered if I had the strength to complete this journey and so on. It was very unsettling. It was clear that it was a choice whether to live in hell or heaven and not even all that difficult a choice. Hey you! Give your mind a rest. The old “Be Here Now” choice; just live in awareness without spinning any thoughts or ideas.

 

I put this revelation off for a bit and here we are eight months later with the integration process challenging me and asking for a reconciliation with freedom and mastery. Castaneda writes about making yourself unavailable while erasing personal history. The reason for this line of thinking is primarily liberation. Having a history, means expectations of behaviour, and living a lie. Acquaintances and culture can manipulate you like a puppet because you don’t want to deviate from the identity you have created. If you have left nothing for these constructs to grasp onto then you can act independently. That’s one way through however for most of us our personal history is our life we have created. Sure at times we feel trapped but I would hazard to guess most of us don’t want to blow up our whole backstory and be left holding a big bag of nothing. That seems pretty extreme. It brings to mind the role of the Bodhisattva, a holy man who has seen through the game but re-enters into the game in order to help others see through it. It’s a noble call of service.

 

After seven years of plant medicine use, the information provided doesn’t upset me anymore. By this assertion I mean that when I first drank and met these archetypal spirits I was frightened and in awe of their presence as well as my newfound ability to lift the veil and peek into this obfuscated world. Now, I am able to listen and study the wisdom being offered. “Kill yourself in order to live.” Yeah it’s metaphor, don’t worry, I know that. My teacher has a twisted sense of humour. When I first drank plant medicines and he scared the shit out of me, he told me if I kept drinking the medicine and stayed on the path eventually I’d walk into the direction of an oncoming train and kill myself. I remember vividly that conversation with my shadow because he told me to stop drinking plant medicines, go home, and don’t ever come back. Live out your life, grow old, and don’t question existence. I left the jungle and he followed me home and harangued me; trying to put the final nail in the coffin so that I wouldn’t continue on this path. I did come back and I know my shadow now has a great deal of respect for me. I’m pretty sure he figured I was a weakling. Ha! I sure fooled him.

 

Seven years later, I can finally see what he originally meant by walking in front of a train and killing myself. It was metaphor as well, however at the time it was used to make me question this path I had embarked upon. I had to understand why I wanted to continue. I now sense he doesn’t readily accept students, as suggested by the fear induced and threats of death hurled my way. The adventure and chance at knowledge was too great to keep me away. Now here I am, standing on the train tracks. I understand what he was telling me. If you want to be free, you got to let the story go.

 

I see similar paths of earned respect with human teachers. For instance, my flesh and body teacher, don Howard, was very accepting to anyone who was sincere about walking this path. And I think he was genuinely surprised and happy when someone returned for another go around in the wringer of plant medicines. It’s very difficult and takes commitment but I remember just showing up again and I could feel the respect growing. There’s something divine about just showing up and facing the head wind of adversity, not knowing the outcome. Don Howard knew what it takes, what you are going to face, and have to choose. He let you progress at your own pace and had your back. I love that man.

 

How do I get liberated? It’s through mastering the self. That means all the attachments, desires, and pull of culture that call out to you are mastered. You become the King of Selfdom. You cannot ever defeat these challengers, that’s a tough one to learn, however you can rule them. After the continual frustration, you will learn this secret and that puts you on the path towards liberation. The only way to do this is to investigate the darkness within. Chasing the high will will never allow for a reconciliation with all.

 

There is a difference between liberation and enlightenment. Beginners in the world of spiritual seeking hear much of liberation and enlightenment. Spiritual enlightenment without liberation is still beholden to cultural expectations of religious experience. You know what I mean, don’t you? It all begins with being free. It’s the foundation upon which everything must rest. In order to love unconditionally, you have to begin from the tract of being free. Free of conditions. To become free you give up judgment. You give up conceptions of right and wrong. You give up morality. Free means free. Sounds crazy, right? Murder is immoral. Being free naturally extends to wanting others to be free. Being free would mean not imposing upon others. Murder is an act of imposing your will upon someone as a last resort because you couldn’t control them. Frustration on this spiritual path I have chosen could have been avoided if I would have went into the darkness of self to begin with and reconciled that part of me. The high would have been tempered with the low and I could have seen where I was at.

 

I have to admit though I wouldn’t change this journey for the world. Everything that has happened has been perfect. It has all contributed to my growth. Through these trials and frustrations, I have been pressured and forced to find answers. The natural inclination is to wave a spiritual wand and reach the highest highs without having to work for it. You know, take a pill or drink a cup of brew and find that elusive enlightenment. My difficult journey, on the other left hand, has been perfect.

teachers

Access altered states by changing your vibration. The plant teacher Ayahuasca explained that to me the first time I ever drank that potent brew. The plant teacher Huachuma then physically showed me how this works the second and third time I drank with grandfather. The second time it was vibration overload and a coursing of energy surging throughout my body. The third time I remember sitting in a boat on the Amazon River and my frequency had tuned into the great cosmic love spectrum band. Wow! And then I looked up in the sky and saw this patch of rainbow. It was phenomenal. Huachuma then a few years later gave me an advanced course in the Andes mountains in Ecuador. Grandfather challenged me to do the homework afterwards and figure it out. As I sit here writing, the preparation stage of my upcoming journeys two years later with Ayahuasca and Huachuma have those lessons coming back into my perception and thoughts.

Ram Dass passed away shortly before Christmas. I knew who he was, read his book “Be Here Now,” but that was about it. I haven’t listened to any of his lectures or followed his life until the news that he had died. I guess I lumped him in with Timothy Leary and then Terence McKenna in that he was probably entertaining but ultimately not what I was looking for. I’m at the point in my life now where all the elders I looked up to have passed away. I really wish I had a chance to meet Alan Watts; in fact if I could sit down to dinner with anyone past or present it would be Alan. He passed away when I was a toddler and I didn’t discover him until forty years later but am thankful for the profound impact he has had on my life. I did get to meet don Howard and spend a good deal of time with him. The world also lost his physical presence this year; his voice and gentle teachings live on through media and his family, both immediate and the SpiritQuest family. Just after New Years I happened upon a lecture of Ram Dass in which he talked about the journey of his life, changing consciousness, realizing the power of love, and how changing consciousness is a matter of accessing different levels of vibration and not getting locked into the same one we naturally all tune in to. Bingo. It’s like the homework I was instructed to investigate by grandfather had reached a point where he had to help me because I wasn’t getting very far with it. I now spend the day arranging my schedule so I’ll have an hour or so free to listen to Ram Dass. Of course he just passed away and I have to realize the time is now. Life is a journey and the teachers eventually move on in their spiritual destiny. Who becomes the new teachers? Is this why I have a mirror in my house?

Ram Dass talks about at first getting high and wanting to stay there. He investigated and pursued this goal, finally realizing through his pilgrimage and meeting of his guru Maharajji, that it is a state of consciousness and by trying to access it through LSD or whatever would always result in him coming down. He realized that to live in a state of being high, in other words bliss, meant to cultivate within his life, through love and service, this state of consciousness. Alan Watts would say about the use of consciousness changing substances that once you get the message, hang up the phone. Read into that what you will but one of the messages you may be blessed with receiving is this unconditional love for all. You may have to repeatedly get that message much like Ram Dass did but once you finally grok the message then hang up the phone and go do the work. If you have any knowledge of the plant medicine scene you will know what I mean. People fall in love with ceremony and with getting high. Of course we do! Ceremony and ritual give you a peek at the profundity of life and a glimpse of the mystery. Getting high and feeling the universal sisterhood and brotherhood is awesome. However continually coming back to ceremony without integrating what it is you have been shown or not having made any attempt to try and figure out the message will lead to triviality. Compounding ceremony after ceremony where you get the message over and over but don’t try to understand or put into practice eventually leads to either you tuning it out or the messenger stops giving you the message and the whole experience becomes chasing visions and trafficking in storytelling.

There’s more than one message but I think you get the point. Changing your consciousness through a substance can show you bliss and reveal eternal truths but the homework and integration becomes exploring those truths and cultivating a natural state of consciousness that allows you to remain in bliss as much as possible. 

integrity

There are a million ways to run from your truth, from facing what it is you uncovered. There are many methods, diversions, and things we tell ourself to get away. When you embark on the plant medicine journey it is a major commitment and those with a vested interest in your well being recognize this and will offer ways of navigating not only the immediate experience but the challenges you will face after the ceremonial candle is blown out. Integration, you are forewarned, can take weeks and months. I think you are told this in order to get you to realize it is not a quick fix, that it will take work, and the work will not always engender overnight results. What you aren’t told however is that in reality it sticks with you going forward. It sometimes gnaws at you and presents your failings front and centre. It reminds you of promises you made to the medicine and how you have either not fulfilled those promises or have gotten a little lapse with them. There’s no reckoning, just an inner knowing to make good. The medicine does its part and selfish you took what you wanted and haven’t given back like you promised. You are within ceremony, and then post ceremony, faced with challenges. It is a progression and once you navigate through different stages of fears, blocks, and self-limiting beliefs you level up and then face more challenges. It is difficult and you want to run, maybe invent excuses, because hey the course has gotten hard and I’ll rationalize it by saying it isn’t working for me anymore so I am going to stop. You devise all these things in your head to stop, and most do stop, but I’m determined to keep going and make good on my promises. If you stop you give it all away and there’s no guarantee it is going to come back. Why should you be trusted? Your word is all you have. It’s ultimately a lesson in and of integrity. There’s no cosmic police at the ready to hold you to it. Reciprocity is a voluntary act and thus the best kind of test. Continuing on and making good, embracing reciprocity, keeping your word, and living with integrity are presented to you and you are faced with the challenge. Like anything truly meaningful in life, you are not forced to reciprocate but you do it out of your own free will and volition because you want to. In a way it is like love. You can’t force someone to love you, nor can you try to love someone. It just happens as feelings are non negotiable. 

Don Howard talked quite a bit about love, reciprocity, your word, being impeccable, and integrity. At the time you figure he is giving you life lessons and stressing a way to go about life living your truth. It is sage advice and at the end of the day as humans it is a way of life that if practiced is something you can be proud of and I don't mean pride in a way where you lord it over others. Instead it is a feeling of I did my best, was honest, and tried to help others. Sure it strokes the ego a bit but every dog needs a pat on the head. You know what I finally realized though? There is another meaning to what the maestro was talking about. I fully admit it sometimes takes me a while to clue in; in this case almost five years. You see when entering into a relationship with plant medicines don Howard made damn sure you were clear why you were doing it, had you meditate on your intention, and make a reciprocal offering to the plants. There is clarity and meaning that grows out of the exercise however there's more to it. We go into ceremony and take. We receive healing from the plants and then for a lot of us that's it. But wait a minute, you made a promise to the plants. Are you going to fulfil that promise or are you going to run, basically as a thief and a coward, or just announce your lack of integrity because you are not going to keep your end of the bargain? Is it too difficult or did you never intend to try to fulfill your promise?

The primary force at work in plant medicine experiences is free will. You are entrusted to decide what you want to do with the power that is being presented to you by the plants. You asked for it and they delivered. You can reciprocate as promised, or you can take and ignore, or you can take take take and aggrandize yourself. We humans are good at that, especially when we find a game that we can rig and profit off of to our advantage. Maybe even become a celebrity shaman, do battle with other shamans trying to step on our turf, or just take advantage of others for your own personal benefit. Perhaps start investigating those sorcerer plants once the medicine ones sour on you. We all know there is an eventual reckoning; I mean eventually you have to come to terms with what you have done or live with that gnawing feeling in the pit of your stomach. The choice is yours.

Integrity means to keep your word and you made a promise and an exchange with the plants in return for their healing virtues and knowledge. They took you at your word. Are you going to fulfill your promise? Deep down you will live with your decision. Energetically you have integrity or you don't. What I am trying to say is why would the medicine plants continue to work with you if all you do is take? I think you see it clearly. To continue to walk the plant medicine path requires you to uphold your end of the mutual agreement. It's the honourable thing to do.