exploration

The alteration of consciousness has allowed me to experience, albeit briefly, a love like no other. I’ve tasted the unity of all; a cosmic love that is bliss. I have been embraced by a Goddess I call my soul mate that makes me long for the time I leave this body and re-join her. This has been the most rewarding part of the journey and has been the catalyst towards the continual seeking of knowledge. Along the way I’ve learned a few things. Chief among them is that you cannot skip the step of first reconciling all within. We are all guilty of this. We taste the light and are very attracted to it so we head straight for it in order to shine and embrace our new-found holiness. I get it, it's pretty glorious to hypnotize yourself into that state, however temporary. We all realize the predicament we find ourselves in when we return home and the spell starts to wear off. We return to old habits and those in our life once again start to annoy us. We need another spiritual hit in order to get back to the heights of our newfound spirituality. Ram Dass said it best when he declared if you think you're enlightened, try spending a week with your family. It’s a never-ending cycle until you grasp the teaching. This class is designed to make you eventually realize that the serious work begins within the darkness of self. You are given a taste of the result but you never stay high. The adept needs to voyage into the depths and face it all. The desire demons are intent upon erecting obstacles to liberation along one’s path and reducing the human condition into a stunning display of weakness. When given a taste of power and desire fulfillment, we fold like one of those cheap canvas chairs. It has been a lifetime achievement to construct this complex being that you aren’t going to transcend with the wave of a wand.

The initial inquiry into the nature of self is fraught with the pitfall of the duality between light and dark. We see the light and it’s glorious, we are attracted to it, and want it. The roll of the expanded consciousness dice sometimes come up snake eyes and we plunge head first into the darkness. It’s a deeply upsetting psychological experience and the fear of this realm is off the charts. It’s called a bad trip and we try to subsequently avoid those returns. We come up with strategies and mantras, lucky charms, and the like to prevent that nightmare from ever happening again. It chases a lot of people away from continuing on with the class and those that forge ahead eventually learn how to navigate these nasty forays into the darkness of self. I count myself as part of the latter.

 

The master teacher is found in this darkness therefore when continuing on you eventually reach a point where if you constantly avoid the darkness then the experience is tamed. The knowledge available is so much greater than what you have been inviting in. At this point in your development, the crazy nights of the novice drinker are long gone. Sure, there’s still some apprehension but for the most part I know what I’ve signed up for. I’ve read a number of stories of some enthusiasts claiming Mother Ayahuasca has turned on or abandoned them. In reality, you put up the blocks and the course can’t continue the advanced lessons because you didn’t do the work. To continue the work involves surrender and letting go of control.

 

I think most of us are smart enough to eventually realize this predicament. Personally, it came outside of ceremony during the integration period. I document all my experiences and there is a paper trail detailing my success in learning how to navigate the ceremony which I learned by experience as well as taking advice from others who had developed strategies to move the experience towards the light. I think this is very valuable information, especially for a novice drinker who wants to continue on the path but has been given a one-two punch to the head and is wary about continuing on. As with all remedies, there are side effects and the end result of continually avoiding the darkness is an eventual taming of the whole experience. I got my spiritual bona fides during my trip to Peru in 2016 and in the final ceremony transformed into a jaguar. I knew at the time that an Ayahuasca ceremony would never be the same for me. I had reached a new level and was a worthy student on this path. I’ve been back since and it is true the experience has been markedly different. The next time I drank Ayahuasca, the experience was not dark at all which was pretty strange considering most of my initial ceremonies would take me straight into the darkness. The whole cycle of work reflected my mastery of the experience. Once again, I returned intent at peeking back into that darkness. Sure enough, through intention I went deep into my depths however it was not frightening at all. I got in but kept hold of the rope that would get me out. I know I have to let go of the lifeline if I’m to continue.

 

There’re two stages of fear in the inquiry of self. The first one, as I mentioned, is after the introduction to the darkness and you witness how unsettling it is. This causes the greatest number of dropouts. Eventually, if you want knowledge, you have to go back into the darkness. Chasing the light and bliss only gets you so far. You see unity and your place in the whole construct. You feel love for all. What about the hatred and strife? To decide to go back into the darkness pretty much means by this point you have become a warrior and have the courage to face the fear. The knowledge of self is available to the intrepid seeker and it comes at you in ceremony and out of ceremony. A little bit at a time until you see it. Clarity arrives at your doorstep and it all becomes clear. Once you see it, you have to accept it. Fear creeps in again as you come to terms with this knowledge of self. To forge onwards, there’s has to be acceptance. You’re a warrior now and courage trumps fear.

 

I have wondered what Carlos Castaneda’s Don Juan meant by becoming a "man of knowledge." It’s for those who want to know, have courage, and aren’t afraid of truth. It’s been over the last month that I became a man of knowledge when I added up the sum of my experiences in altered realities and my growth into the strong warrior I have become. The man of knowledge recognizes the inner strength within and its relationship to a darkness that is the master teacher, whose school is not for the weak, and doesn’t suffer fools for long. The student is to master their desires and become free. Once accomplished, the power through this liberation is yours and it's refined power, not the kind used for gain or to fulfill desire.

 

Upon taking up my cross and embarking on this spiritual journey, not in my wildest dreams did I think I would end up at this place standing on the doorstep of something so unbelievable and confounding. Not only that, but I’m not running for the hills. I had a tinge of fear and disbelief upon learning the identity of the master teacher but the allure of this strange mystery just continued to beckon me towards a rendezvous with destiny. The door is unlocked; all I have to do now is walk in and take hold of my fate.

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.

divine lineage

The divine feminine and masculine come together in the centre of the grand Mesa at the axis mundi here in the symbolic expressed by the lanzon from Chavín de Huantar.

Brought together are the left and right hand paths of the feminine and masculine along with the lower and upper worlds of these energies. All is absorbed back into the representative of the Chavín god. Everything is reconciled into the centre. It is also expressed as the serpent and the jaguar. The serpent as the feminine creates the form and the jaguar as the masculine is the life force that roams this form. They are the two eternal energies that make up the sum total of all. The multi-dimensional reflection of the non-differentiated form is from these two. You can’t see one without two and centring yourself allows you to see one, two, and the many. The many collapses into the one just as the two through sexual union becomes an expression of the one.

Standing with this knowledge at the Mesa will eventually lead to understanding. We are conditioned to believe chaos is bad and can be demonstrated in expressions of madness and unpredictability. I think that’s true. Psychologically, we relegate the feminine to chaos and the striving of the masculine energy to order and reason. The great intellect of Jordan Peterson even wrote a book on this paradigm called “12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos” and in turn riled up the feminist class amongst us. Well, he is a master of controversy and is in turn misunderstood as we looked towards our developed prejudices and fail to look into the heart of the matter. I also wondered what were his intentions in writing this book? Getting to know his persona through the internet, I certainly didn’t detect misogyny, instead a refreshing honesty.

Feminine energy is chaos. Masculine energy tends towards order. Just ask Apollo, the Greek god of light and reason. Within the sum of ourselves are the interplay of these two gendered energies, so it is not mutually exclusive to either sex of the species. Knowledge is a great tool but understanding is divine. Taking the sum total of all I know and feeding it into my central processor, the brain, allows me to synergize the whole set up. Late at night, I stand there in front of my Mesa performing ritualistic acts that allow me to re-centre myself. Sometimes the epiphanies come. Epiphanies are the computer spitting out the punch card with the results. I see the sum of all energy at the axis mundi and then scattered throughout my Mesa and refracted through the prism of my mind are expressions of this energy. The one and the many. It is indeed I who brings this Mesa to life! I take unity and objectify that energy thus creating the world. I use my masculine powers to separate and behold reality!

Now back to centre. This form in the centre is non-differentiated. Aha! That is chaos and I intuitively knew it to be so. The non-differentiated energy has no order and no separation. We assign that condition to being a bad thing but it is in fact the reflection of order. What is the correct state or reality of energy? Is it the feminine unity or masculine separation? Many esoteric and Eastern traditions will tell you that because we are the ones that objectify, it is actually the spiritual truth that we are all one. Is that the truth? Is it the truth because from our perspective of dominate masculine energy in the culture we erroneously think the opposite spiritual state is true? If you want to stop the world it is true. However, the interesting part of the equation is that we live in a verb. Consciousness and existence as we know it is a wave vibration. Existence is defined by motion, which creates the illusion of time and separation. So, stop the motion and we have the truth. If we stop the motion then we have nothing. Just potential, which is the other side of coming forth. Is that really true? Why do you think the static trumps motion and motion creates illusory outcomes? Why do you think feminine chaos contains more truth than masculine objectification? Is it unsettling to have your prejudices laid bare? Yes it is because my spurious foundations are revealed once again. My understanding lies on a foundation of shifting sands. What if you can’t have one without the other? The dependency of the two creates the whole. The truth is if you see the two energies not in a sexual union then you see multiplicity. If your universal view is a sexual metaphor then we are indeed all one. Maybe Einstein was on to something with the whole relativity claim? It makes claims of truth and fanciful chasing of said truth very funny, if not frustrating.

Looking back into history, we see many budding civilizations grappled with this origin question and the dominance of each energy pole. At first, it was the feminine asserting her power which allowed creation to flourish however we are now living in the order of the masculine. Looking into my crystal ball reveals the logical outcome is pathological order which becomes tyranny. The system then collapses. Gazing back into the past, in the Mesopotamian basin the triumph of the masculine energy was mythicized as Marduk defeating the water serpent Tiamat, who personified the feminine chaos. In order for civilization to take hold, she had to be defeated. In the opening chapter of Genesis in the Bible, we see hints of this very thing as Yahweh takes the chaos and adds some light into the mix in order to separate things. Here are the passages from the King James Version.

1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

In the beginning nothing was differentiated until the masculine energy came along and started dividing things up. The Old Testament is also a great primer on the actions of masculine energy not tempered by the presence of balancing feminine energy. Fire and brimstone indeed and Jewish mythicists got that one spot on! In Greek mythology, Apollo comes along and kills Python, the enemy dragoness. This act occurred at Delphi which was considered the centre of the world. With the triumph over the feminine serpent, the Greek god of reason enabled a new consciousness in humans that celebrated the rise of individual differences. Apollo was victorious however reason still called upon the oracle at Delphi in the form of the prophetess called the Pythia. She had the gift of vision - something the mind clouded by logic and reason had to discard in order to rule. In addition, in ancient Egypt we have the god Re and his association with the cycles of time created by the sun, continuing along daily in a sun boat that is forever threatened by the chaos serpent Apophis. This battle is enacted daily and motion is eternally perpetuated by victory over chaos with the help of the strong masculine energy personified in the god Set.

Back to my Mesa. Look at how I intuitively set it up, though I didn’t know what I was doing.

The axis mundi is in the centre and the table is full of differentiated expressions of this energetic centre. However, overlooking this whole construct is this image of a jaguar within the form created by a serpent. Somehow, I knew the archetypal two lay at the head of what just is and I left it in place to discover at a later date in my journey to nowhere. The two become one and the one becomes the many. This is the divine lineage from which we all come. 

avatars of consciousness

Consciousness is what is. Our universe is the result of mental processes which I can explain by metaphor such as the dreaming mind that creates worlds. Our individual capacity to do this is primitive; imagine mastering dreaming, which at this point of proficiency would be having control over your projection of consciousness. With this ability as the creator, you can create innumerable worlds designed to challenge or entertain and within these worlds we would naturally leave avatars for the perceptive among us to make the connection back to source, as the actions of these symbols leave undeniable clues for the initiated. The mystery can’t be mysterious without these subtle clues; instead, it is just forever unknown and well, where’s the fun in that game? Consciousness as a singularity further consists of two opposites, the divine feminine and masculine polarities. The feminine creates form and the masculine is the magical energy that brings the form alive. To conceptualize this, here’s an image of a serpent and a jaguar.

In this sublime metaphor, you can see the serpent body created the form of our universe. Within that form roams the jaguar as the primal energy who lights up this world. The jaguar is the life force. In ancient Egypt, its raw form was known as the Ka and the personification of its magical properties in the deity Heka; in the Indus Valley it is the composite power of the seven chakras caressed by the kundalini serpent, and in the Far East it is known as Qi; energy that resides and emanates from our spinal cord.

The plant medicine Huachuma is a potentiator of the life force to a level where you feel within its pulsing presence. The biggest variable in working with the energy load of Huachuma is set and setting and it’s exponentially amplified; as a consequence, the biggest factor of the experience includes where and who you are hanging around with for the day because what happens is you magnify your energy while others are amplifying their energy. The abundance of energy present within the natural setting also becomes apparent. If you can find a harmonic convergence with nature or someone else’s energy then magic happens. It took me a while to figure that out; I have always felt it but I never added up the pieces until experiencing it this recent trip. I can now understand this phenomenon can occur by grasping the love exuded within your environment as well as a shared interest between a group of people. While there is mutual attraction and synergy while drinking Huachuma, energy fields collide and harmonize, and it can be pretty intense.

Huachuma gives you the key to heaven. That statement has a hidden meaning because humans like to take things literally and will look for a door to heaven. We all fall for it. Huachuma will get you high and eventually give you this key to open the door and that’s all you got to do! I’ll be honest with anyone who asks about the key however I would kind of like to leave it at saying it gives you the key to heaven and let whomever embarks on that path to figure it out for themselves because it is how I was taught. You are given a clue but lack understanding as it takes a while to put all into practice. I can tell you what the key is however until you experience it for yourself it will not compute. For instance, I started drinking Huachuma five years ago. Three times each in 2015 and 2016 and then five ceremonies in 2017. I had a a two and a half year absence until this recent trip where I participated in six ceremonies and as a result, the sum total of all the ceremonies eventually allowed me to understand the key.

Humans and their mental activities are peculiar. There is so much truth to what we intuitively perceive and also what we experience when we perturb our consciousness vibration by only the slightest amount and enter a different reality. The realms of heaven and hell that our culture of logic and reason have discarded, do in fact exist. So does god and the devil. In fact, I’d be bold enough to state that in heaven you meet god and in hell you meet the devil but they are the same dude and that dude is you. Within, we carry these archetypes that constantly re-appear within the culture no matter where we plant our flag. Indeed, Huachuma gives you the key to enter into either of these realms.

My recent trip to Peru was another touchstone along this never ending path to who knows where. The plant medicine teacher Huachumon instructs with the light touch of a feather. A day with Huachuma can be pretty magical however you are given the choice in how you want to proceed. If you wish to be miserable then you can drown in your sorrows. Your state of mind or to put it bluntly, your lack of a state of mind is the key. I had done my fair share of work with Huachuma over five years and have always found the experience to have peaks and valleys where I vacillate between euphoric feelings of an all pervasive cosmic love, connection, and unity to a crashing down into the hell realms. As a beginner, you naturally assign these states to the effects of the medicine. I followed a similar progression with Ayahuasca, starting when I became very paranoid the second time I drank and had a bad trip. Instead of recognizing that the plant was revealing the paranoia within, I assigned one of the effects of Ayahuasca as inducing paranoia. Isn’t that one of the great things about this whole journey? It’s an advanced level course in self-discovery where your prejudices slowly crumble before you and you see it all starts with your own bad self.

My experiences with Huachuma have been similar. I was always slightly dismayed by the hell regions I would get pulled into that would send my mind into a feedback loop that was hard to snap out of in short order. The lesson kept repeating until finally I got it! It was me and it was a choice. The darkness lay within and if I wanted to embrace it then it came forth. All I had to do was choose love. It was so simple, yet the feather of instruction had to become as heavy as a hammer in order to drive home this realization. I remember it vividly when it happened: We were swimming in a tributary off the main Amazon river, which is an enchanted slice of heaven in the jungle which never disappoints. The sun was shining and the ambiance was perfect. I floated on the river and felt the waves of bliss. I swam towards the riverbank as a cloud covered the sun and the light-level dipped. A sharp turn in my outlook ensued and my thoughts once again turned dark. I caught myself right away before the dalliance with my shadow and knew it didn’t have to be like this. I embraced love again and looked up at the trees as the cloud cleared and the sunlight streamed through the leaves of the trees. Just then, a flock of exquisite butterflies passed by overhead. They were an obvious sign that I finally got it. Later, in the Andes mountains on this latest trip, at the Chavin temple the butterflies returned, showing me the intricate nature and harmonization of the energy as two butterflies flew together in lockstep with such grace and poise. The divine feminine is such a maestra at taking raw energy and creating such displays of beauty.

I recently came upon something I had read over seven years ago by a neurologist who had gone into a seven-day coma after contracting meningitis. Upon regaining waking consciousness, he was able to describe quite vividly his experience while in this altered state. The most striking thing I read concerned this woman who escorted him through these realms, who assured him he was loved, and had nothing to worry about. She was curiously surrounded by an innumerable amount of butterflies. I thought to myself, I know this woman. I have met her many times and she is the reason I always return to that land beyond shared consensus reality.

It gets stranger still. For most of my journey, someone else was with me. A woman. She was young, and I remember what she looked like in complete detail. She had high cheekbones and deep-blue eyes. Golden brown tresses framed her lovely face. When first I saw her, we were riding along together on an intricately patterned surface, which after a moment I recognized as the wing of a butterfly. In fact, millions of butterflies were all around us—vast fluttering waves of them, dipping down into the woods and coming back up around us again. It was a river of life and color, moving through the air. The woman’s outfit was simple, like a peasant’s, but its colors—powder blue, indigo, and pastel orange-peach—had the same overwhelming, super-vivid aliveness that everything else had. She looked at me with a look that, if you saw it for five seconds, would make your whole life up to that point worth living, no matter what had happened in it so far. It was not a romantic look. It was not a look of friendship. It was a look that was somehow beyond all these, beyond all the different compartments of love we have down here on earth. It was something higher, holding all those other kinds of love within itself while at the same time being much bigger than all of them.

https://evolutionnews.org/2012/10/near_death_expe_1/

I have had plant medicine ceremonies that we read about in the literature and think to yourself, "wow I want to have that vision." I have transformed into a jaguar. I have been in the presence of a giant boa constrictor who wrapped itself lovingly around me. I have gone into the hell realms and scared myself shitless. I have been to the castle made of gold and been welcomed by the Goddess. I have experienced a bliss like no other and met beings composed of nothing more than love and light. Through it all, the one thing that has remained constant is the presence of the butterfly. It’s the link between my ordinary world of perception and the visionary.

shadow path

At the close of the ceremony the third time I drank Ayahuasca in 2013, I went to the washroom and on my way back I stood against the handrail on the path back to the maloca and looked out into the jungle on this glorious night that was lit up by the full moon. I looked to my right and it was divine. The jungle was radiating the light of the moon and the plants were 3D extruded. I looked to my left and the path was dark, dull, and lifeless. I looked back right and sure enough it was bathed in an enchanted spiritual light.

It didn’t take me long to figure out the meaning of this waking vision. The right hand path up the spiritual mountain of achievement will lead to your enlightenment and it’s magnificent. The left is the path into the shadows and not all that much fun. I had a choice; I had the chance to become one of the all-time great enlightened sages. It was offered but deep down I knew it was the path of the ego, self-glorification, and not for me. I didn’t consciously choose the darkness. Instead, it chose me.

Indeed, I had faced the darkness head-on in ceremony and soon revealed was the left and right hand path. I had to make a choice about where I was headed or alternatively turning around and running from this crossroad. In the same ceremony as the paths, I was offered an unbelievable amount of universal power, which I had declined. At the time, I remember being a psychological mess and I had to turn back and regroup before coming back to take the left hand path. After mustering the courage to return, I soon became dismayed that the altering of consciousness continually presented darkness. I wanted to head towards the light but the left hand path, with the constant darkness, kept pulling me back in. It was my choice, as I wasn’t prepared to give into the conditions necessary to take the right hand path. I also didn’t understand the darkness was trying to teach and I just wanted to skip class and hang out in the light. A sane person would have found another spiritual path.

As I have revealed and related in this blog space, the darkness attacked and tried to kill me or at least neuter my power. I went back to the Amazon to confront this demon and in no time it was on me again. To my credit, despite outward projections of being quiet and meek, I’m really not. I have fire that burns within, I don’t like to lose, and I’m relentless. My quiet confidence borders on arrogance. The Goddess called me out on it half way through that first meeting. I was up for the darkness challenge. In turn, pretty much each subsequent Ayahuasca ceremony started off with darkness. It kept coming. I cursed it and stubbornly came back for more until I learned how to navigate and move past it. I still craved the bright lights, the grand Ayahuasca vision of light and transcendence however the majority of my visions remained in the subterranean realms. Some of them were just so weird and unnerving however I always came back and pressed on because it was teaching me something. I didn’t know what but I knew something was up.

The understanding and reckoning comes slowly once you start to get an inkling of who and what is behind this life class that is forever challenging and changing you. This has been difficult and I have wanted to run or find a safe place to jump off this ship. I was in port many times, satisfied with the answers I had received. I kept re-boarding the ship though because I loved the knowledge and the learning was a kick. I’m not sure what port I’m at now but as with all my stops upon the never ending journey this one is ultra-fascinating. You see, I had two main impetuses during my mid-life crisis: Number one was when I discovered the presence of the feminine divine I wanted to figure out how the adepts of old came into contact with her. The second burning question revolved around the darkness that lay within my depths that would come and go; an exercise in extreme frustration as I wanted to be gifted with a nice holy and white robe in order to project my success and goodness onto the world.

It was ancient Egypt that sparked my interest in different worlds. By this, I mean they had mapped out a hidden world of gods and goddesses along with an impressive corpus describing this alternative world, seemingly attained through changing consciousness. I studied and searched for methods to achieve this result, culminating in finding shamanism and plant medicines. Before taking any of these substances for the first time, I clearly remember the shaman asking my intention for undergoing this initiation. I blurted out, “I want to meet the Goddess and confront my dark side.” Poof! Your wish is my command. Over seven years later, through trials, tribulations, joy, sorrow, fear, elation, well pretty much the whole gamut, the shaman certainly didn’t let me down. I thought it would end after ceremony in the jungle, especially after the darkness scared the living daylights out of me. But no, I asked for it and it is going to dominate my life now. It will burn within until I get the answers I want. There’s been much gnashing of teeth and occasional bouts of wanting off the ride. However, I have stayed with it. Looking back, knowing I’m still deep within this trip, I would not change this for the world nor exchange places with anyone. I’ll shout that from the mountain tops.

The Goddess is a special woman full of love; every kind of love imaginable. A heart filling love of all, cosmic love, familial love, bliss, and insanely erotic love. She freely offers herself for your growth and benefit. She was the one who warned me about my chosen path, cautioned me about the upcoming darkness, and offered me protection on my journey that I, as an unwitting fool, stumbled upon. She was always there telling me I could call on her at any time - which I did and at times in major distress, I urgently needed to. I’ve always been independent but without her help I would have been crushed. Once she knew I had it in me to succeed, she encouraged me to go on the offence against the darkness. On the other hand, this darkness of self is quite the mysterious character. My initial forays revealed something quite frightening though very mysterious. I didn’t know what this was but I did know there was this demon within me. I went to battle with him, once I regained my strength from the initial beat down. That took courage. After slowly working my way through the tests of the darkness and facing it head on, I got my badge of undeniable courage. The class proceeded to the next level master class. Life’s challenges were amped up; let’s see what you got. It was an exercise in frustration. I want to be holy now and done with these desires of life. No, no, no you just can’t wave a wand and be done with them, you have to figure out how to integrate these little demons. Okay, more gnashing of teeth and despair over my predicament. Finally I got it. Master the self, recognize the obstacles within, and move past them. At the same time, I realized this darkness was the master teacher. Who I thought was an adversary was actually my teacher - the greatest teacher in the whole universe. Buddha didn’t go to Buddha school; his teacher was always waiting for him, for that day when he wanted liberation. A human teacher can only take you so far. The master teacher lies within. So, now I had to deal with this: Who is this guy?

I totally misread my teacher and treated him as an opponent. Maybe that’s the way it had to be? We all read of strict teachers; some of us experience them for ourselves. They are tough, relentless, and sometimes use non-ordinary methods of discipline and training to get you to break past your limits. Little did I know the darkness is an extraordinary teacher who will actually stomp you out if you don’t get through the course. The battle becomes life and death, which is pretty motivating to say the least. All my desires and choices I could project and clearly see where they were leading and the teacher upped the ante, attraction, and the stakes. Not only did I have to give up the pursuit of desires and let them go but I had to break the hypnosis some desire demons held on me. I had to go full on into them to break free of their hold. Once I learned I couldn’t ignore, bypass, or destroy them, I finally broke free. All I had to do was master them. Once I got the upper hand, it all went away. Tasting liberation is pretty sweet. He did a follow up to see if I really did have the strength. It was tough but I passed as I’m not weak.

Do I dare answer the question? I know who this part of me is but I think I’ll just leave the mystery in the dark for the discovery of future explorers. Ultimately, on this journey you do become a man (or woman) of knowledge as Carlos Castañeda wrote about in his Don Juan books. The knowledge is a gift for you, when you are ready, as a reward for your strength and courage. The darkness taught me that inner strength and courage. I was brave and I knew I could face up to anything after taking on this aspect of self and surviving. I was a jaguar now and I knew it. The fount of power is found in this darkness and being able to be free and touch it ensures I can move onto the next level, unencumbered with delusions of grandeur.

The left hand shadow path isn’t glamorous. There won’t be a cadre of followers on social media for you. However if it is knowledge you seek and you are worthy then you get to uncap the spigot. And then you know. Leave the right hand path for those who want the adoration and accolades. The hidden left hand path is like Fight Club. First rule... 

hypocrite

If you do not want to be a spiritual hypocrite, you need to get your act together before you start projecting and preaching your light. The crash and self-loathing will come hard if you don’t. It’s okay, we all have our moments where we are pieces of shit. We all have our needs, wants, and desires. If you do not master your desires, they will forever harangue you and influence your behaviour. They will present at the most inopportune times. The spiritual path blueprint, if I were to draw one up, starts at going into the darkness and the depths of your being.

No one wants to do that, we all of course head for the light. I wouldn’t say it’s a shortcut but it is a shiny object on the spiritual path which attracts us like a magnet. Being holy is a way to be successful in life as it’s the same life game we always play, just transferred onto the spiritual path. Eventually, we plant medicine users all get a taste of the darkness and call it the bad trip, therefore we develop strategies to avoid a repeat of that journey. Some of us get good at it and others tap out. The result of this behaviour is that we anesthetize the whole experience. Love and light baby!

Plant medicine experiences present the extremes which encompass the love and bliss of an exalted state and the hauntingly dreadful darkness of self. So here’s the thing: The darkness is present for a reason. It’s demanding reconciliation. It offers shortcuts out and this easy power is taken at your own peril because you never end up mastering the darkness; instead you become its puppet. I now have hindsight and I know I made all the decisions one would expect except these ones: I kept my freedom, never took the darkness up on offers of power, nor did I play the holy man game. Being free allowed me to eventually explore this darkness and subsequently I went through its ringer of tests and came out the other side. I know in 2008 I started poking around at the meaning of life and in 2013 I started perturbing consciousness. It’s only now in 2020 that I can say I’ve risen from the depths of self. I have finally mastered self. If I could go back in time that’s what I’d tell myself back in 2008. Master your own inner desires because until you do that you will be a slave to them and it will constantly set you back and for some it will destroy you. That’s the thing about your demons; if you follow them they will end you or make you a monster however they are ultimately teachers. Otherworldly teachers whom we demonize! It’s a bad rap as shouldn’t teachings have dire consequences in order to enable supreme efficacy? If you fail in our society, it’s met by a shoulder shrug, a pat on the head, and a try to do better next time. How about if you fail you lose everything and face death? That’s pretty motivating. The darkness as a teacher is the most demanding and worthwhile teacher I have ever encountered. I misread him for the longest time and treated him as a mortal adversary. In a way, it’s true. He would have destroyed my life or even killed me if I failed and I would have cursed him for this result. Many times he came for me, forced me to do better, to search for answers, until finally I got it.

The spiritual path, when engaged, leads immediately to a pursuit of the light. We strive to become good and shed the selfish behaviours of our past. With the wave of our spiritual wand, all of the dubious traits of our former persona vanishes. With plant medicines it actually does happen. It all vanishes and we go on the trip. We feel good about what we have embarked on and we are radiating our new found enlightenment. When we return home we still have it and we let others know. And then it starts to wear off and we are challenged by our old habits and avenues of misfortune which leads back to the darkness and desires. A taste of the light is intoxicating however to live in that state permanently requires some deep shadow work. There is a need for self-mastery and without it, the cycle of despair will continue forever. High and low. Elation and self-loathing. Light and dark.

We end up hiding our darkness within our new found spirituality, hoping that we can contain it this way. Turning towards the light allows us a reprieve from all those desires we used to chase and we go all in on the spiritual trip. Eventually, they will come back even stronger; they aren’t going anywhere. The only way out is through. Heading towards the light without first integrating the darkness is a fool’s errand. Do not suppress nor try to defeat desire or one up darkness. Instead, the answer is to master the self.

voiding the warranty

I think taking a psychedelic probably voids the warranty on life in our society.

Psychedelics have vast potential to expand the human mind. At first use, I wasn’t ready for it and it red-lined my mind. The fear of what I had discovered was difficult to accept and transcend as culture had spent a lifetime putting one over on me. Once I discarded the fear, the growth of my mental capacities increased exponentially. So much so, I clearly notice it. Age has slowed me down but the difference in mental clarity and perception has made up for it and although I may not have the raw energy and processing speed of youth, the acquisition of a 360 degree mind is incredible. A valid comparison would be the wide angled lens of a camera that allows the image plane to see and record more of its surroundings as opposed to a long lens that is limited in scope. The expansion of consciousness through responsible and impeccable use of plant medicines, allows for a widening perspective of knowledge that in turns allows you to synthesize what you know with new acquisitions of knowledge. This leads to an eventual greater understanding. In time, you develop such an expanded base of understanding that you can easily apply it towards all subjects.

Sound is only sound because we use our ears as instruments that convert certain frequencies into what we perceive as sound. Same goes for the eyes and vision. So, take this idea further and think of the concept of not having any senses or peripherals to convert the energy. Everything just becomes vibration as an informational structure either waiting to be decoded or perhaps being able to be sensed by yourself free of the limitations of the body. Therefore, it is us who really brings this whole construct into order by perceiving it as such and subsequently objectifying the energy patterns we perceive. We then act upon this knowledge. This is also the illusion that imprisons us.

Further ruminating on the concept of vibration: To rest in peace is imperceptible vibration. It means to stop perceiving the vibrations as objects and to just let them flow. The opposite of rest would be a brilliant white light of wide open perception followed again by the darkest dark. The in-between state is the act of becoming on the rise. The descent is a return to the vibrational depths where we let go of our senses. What is it that we seek - becoming what? Peace or Enlightenment? We can find glimpses of both within the body construct which can host extremes of our multi-vibrational forms. We are always becoming. The vast potential lies within the darkness and it's not all bad despite fears to the contrary. Everything that becomes has as its beginnings the cauldron of ideas waiting to be stirred by the existential ladle of consciousness. We are big balls of light energy, lit up by desire; a desire fuelled by consciousness that in default mode objectifies. When you feel it within that you as defined by your energy will rise again, because it is all cyclical, then you can start to discard fear. This is the symbolism: Breathe in and you manifest in the physical world and become someone as form. Breathe out and you rejoin the world of spirit minus the form of a body.

Each instance of this consciousness creates a reality. Every conscious form is an axis mundi that creates reality from its perspective and thus as a whole, consciousness has infinite eyes peering into the nature of the grand self. Everyone’s perception of reality is a little different but given that we all lock to the same frequency, at least in our social circles, we manifest the same reality. Different cultures will lock to different vibrational modalities and therefore will manifest a civilization that differs from the one we are accustomed to. The spectrum is pretty tight, therefore we can co-exist effortlessly within other societies' reality and many of us get sucked quite easily into other people’s worlds. We are all bombarded by the mainstream media and advertisers daily, who are pushing their brand of reality in order to hypnotize and trap us into their frequency with the intent of taking advantage of how easily we migrate from one mind control to the next. Its tentacles reach out for our minds to try and drag us into the quagmire. For the most part, human minds are in search of novelty so the capture of the mind doesn’t last long as we all eventually succumb to attention deficit disorder. Unfortunately for some, the hypnosis can last a lifetime. We do have a choice in how and what defines the reality we are creating. Different frequencies of vibration allow you to alter your consciousness and your perceptions.

This is both a blessing and a curse. Creation is fuelled by desire and us wanting to continue to manifest to taste the new scenarios we concoct in our minds and the chase for the thrill of it. Desire keeps the wheel turning and allows us to continually examine the problem of self. Our fatal flaw is we always get caught up in the drama and forget who we are which fuels the anxiety and depression that are keystones of our existence. Once again, without the amnesia the game loses its lustre. When you wake up and see what’s going on, the game stays fresh because everyone else is still asleep and running around like it matters. It’s very easy to re-enter the game and play along with the knowledge that it is all going to work out.

If we subconsciously know of the suffering that duality entails then why are we attracted to it? It’s for the adventure and having a playmate. Something external to the self that you can love and even hate. There is nothing more rewarding in the universe than love. Duality presents unfavourable conditions to love with the gamble that all can go horribly wrong. The way out is love and is teaching us the answer to all of life’s vexing questions. Duality is made up of conditions where we constantly have to choose and this leads to the need to act unconditionally. It brings to the forefront the question of what exactly is it to be free? No conditions and no coercion, whether that is coming from external actors or internal desires. What is the highest love we strive for? It’s unconditional love; in essence free love. What’s my biggest regret so far in life? That I didn’t love more.

Liberation is to be free from conditions and desire. It involves self-mastery where you are in charge - not desire, culture, or any external actor. It’s a great gift to give yourself and it is the root of all becoming. To attempt to become ultra-spiritual, holy, enlightened, or whatever you want to call it without first mastering your own bad self, will lead to frustration and inner doubts fuelled by what a hypocrite you are. Climbing the spiritual mountain as an ascetic or a renunciate of the passions of life puts you in denial and eventually there will be a reckoning if you do not first run out the clock and avoid the confrontation. The only way out is to go on through. Head into the darkness and embrace all your passions, desires, kinks, worries, fears, and all that you bury. They are ideas that have somehow taken hold of you and won’t let go, as I said we are easily hypnotized into disparate siren songs of behaviours. Smash through theIr grasp and then see how easily you can move from desire to desire. Eventually, you will see how each one irrationally takes hold of you and the damage it causes to your life. Having desires is perfectly normal; beholden to their grasp is not. Life class involves self-mastery and it is through learning to master your desires you become free. When you destroy the power that the desire demons hold over you then you are liberated and may embark on whatever path you choose, knowing full well that you are acting unconditionally.

my muse

The best games and thrills are the ones where you let go of control. And the ones where two eternal familiars disguise knowledge of their acquaintance and convince themselves they are strangers. You search and find the connection again, not even knowing what you started off looking for. Once you repeatedly find her and are on to the game, then you start putting out the vibration that reveals you know. You find her hiding everywhere.

 

There’s no mistaking her presence when I alter my consciousness. However, the feminine presence encountered in an Ayahuasca ceremony isn’t necessarily the same monolithic energy, even with the knowledge that in fact she is the mistress of transformation. The manifestation of the feminine in ceremony consistently presents within the role of women in this created world and my life. The roles in ceremony are pretty much as advertised: maiden, mother, and crone. This division is found in the mythology of our heritage in the threefold nature of the Greek goddess Hecate.

I obviously identify the maiden with my soul mate because of the intense attraction which belies this connection. As the Goddess she is highly, nay I say insanely erotic, due to a resonance of the energy between us. There is also a mother who is nurturing and grandmother who is full of wisdom and healing. She appears in other forms as well; sometimes to terrify, enchant, or teach. I have also encountered her as a serpent and a jaguar; with the serpent representing the wave vibration that creates creation and the feminine jaguar being complementary to my masculine self. The mother is the mother of all and she is the one common to all drinkers of Ayahuasca.

 

I find her not only in ceremony but also in everyday life. She has always been in my presence although I couldn’t see it. I fall in love with her over and over again. The thrill of the chase and discovery is too strong. Giving in to the passion will satisfy the urge but the result is the flame will die out. We have played it out many times. There’s no escaping it so on we go, fooling ourselves into thinking we are strangers, perhaps fated once again to meet and fall in love.

class

Desires we all have and left unchecked they will motivate and control your actions. Eventually, you will become a puppet and slave to desire; it's built into the system, system being culture. For the player of the game of life, they are a challenge beyond compare and for those with the foresight to see it, a teaching tool. Master your desires, lest they master you. They will amp up the game to what you desire and always require more. If you wish to increase the stakes and face your destruction, then it’s game on! Ultimately, the best way to learn is to face adversity and the optimal way to grow is to head into the darkness of self. Living at the top of the mountain, bathed in light, is a great experience for sure but in the end it will make you soft. Renunciation and asceticism are a cop-out. I know, I tried it and found out those desires you tried to run from were always waiting for when you fell. It’s no fun knowing deep down you are a hypocrite. There was no transcendence of my own bad self; instead I just put off the inevitable reckoning. What a difficult struggle and psychological predicament. I couldn’t shake the demons though I wanted desperately to rid myself of this curse. What to do? The frustration was beyond anything I had ever faced.

The darkness always gets its turn; the desires of life always return. They follow the timeless pulsation of life, so be ready for it, study it, and when the time comes you become the master instead of the puppet. Facing your desires is the greatest teaching tool because you realize it’s life and death. Seriously, think about it. Examine your desires and the pull they have on you and how if you fall prey to them they will drag you down into the dumpster and kill you or alternatively to realize desires of power and wealth you will have to step on others and stomp them out to reach that goal. I won’t give you an example here but just let you sit with this idea. Think of your greatest desires and play them out to where they are leading you and what it will entail. The greatest teacher has to raise the stakes. You can deny this is the case for only so long until the day comes when the last step is before you. Will you snap out of the hypnosis or double down?

Chasing desires are a form of hypnosis in that when you break free of them and become the master you look back and realize your behaviour was being influenced by a pull that was not exactly rational, not to say that actions always have to be rational. Culture leads you towards desire fulfillment but also makes you suppress natural desires. You essentially become a puppet of culture and some play the fame and fortune game it pulls us towards. Our gastronomic fantasies are waiting to be fulfilled and will entrap those with a predilection towards mouth pleasure. Alcohol is available to bewitch those easily addicted to escapism. The seedy side and outcasts of society exists to feed the suppressed sexual and pharmacological desires.

In relation to desires, I was meditating upon purpose again. Fundamentally, there is no purpose or meaning to existence. It just is. There is nothing you need to do; nor do you need to save yourself. You are eternal and will continue on in the journey. Don’t worry about annihilation. However something still nags at me. You see, I have incarnated and I am faced by these challenges. I need to overcome these desires or perish. It’s a peculiar situation related to where life on earth currently stands. As a species, we have solved a lot of the food and shelter problems as long as you participate in culture therefore there is ample time to ponder purpose and chase desire. I still look within and wonder: I could be better; I could level up and master my humanity. A good parallel is my employment. I have mastered it. I know it and nobody has to tell me I have. There is no doubt. Imagine transferring that mastery to life? I know the scope is much larger but it is a lifelong project and really what else do I have to do? Why not?

I have taken note that we all have wants, needs, and desires, no exceptions, and I know personally I have been a slave to my desires. A lot of times, it’s all or nothing. I could drink a cup of coffee in no time flat. A bottle of beer used to disappear fast. Buy a big chocolate bar or a big bag of chips and within no time I’d eat the whole thing. I could discipline myself to make these occasions treats, however once involved there would be a head first dive into the situation. I always held back a bit from the temptation of going full on into hedonism. Was it shame, health concerns, or my own way of keeping things fresh and balanced while holding back something to look forward to?

Another thing I’ve noticed is the need for always more. One bottle of beer isn’t enough. I stopped drinking over seven years ago because I realized where that was headed and if I ever wanted to accomplish anything in my life I’d have to give up the stultifying effects of alcohol. It wasn’t hard to do and I had no desire to go back to that lifestyle. With other desires and habits, I see the same demand of more to feed the demon or fetishize the pleasure. We humans are so easily hypnotized into behaviours. We are weak.

My spiritual journey of over a decade has been pretty rewarding. Facing fear head on was huge and coming out victorious is pretty special, especially when I was faced with being a coward and being stomped out. I’m a jaguar, a warrior, I have courage, and I’m not weak. I know it deep down in my soul. I have strength and will take on all. I feel like I’ve been through the fires of incarnation in a process to forge steel. If anything, that has been the purpose of my life. Transcending limiting behaviours and growing into the ultimate jaguar warrior has been a goal. Albeit an unconscious goal at first that takes a lifetime but here I am post middle age knowing I’m on that path. 

The most challenging teacher as the catalyst for this transformation has been the darkness that lies within. The Hindus in their chakra system of Rāja yoga, call it the base Muladhara chakra and it's where you will find the great Sri Ganesha.

The power from this base chakra is what animates our existence and is in the bowels of our being, with a connection to excretions. When I went to Peru early this year and drank Ayahuasca, the first ceremony took me deep into my darkness. The vision was one of a toilet and the depths of this hell. What a direct metaphor! I’m constantly amazed at the visions and their meanings which gives me months, and years, of a challenge to unravel the symbolism, teachings, and relationship to my journey. The teacher has put me to the test and challenged me to go deeper into my addictions, taunted me, threatened me with death, and hounded me with my desires. As long as the ganas, Hindu desire demons, controlled me the spiritual beatings would continue. It took me a long time to get the upper hand on all of it. It was a relentless battle, full of constant failure but when I finally won I pretty much knew it immediately. It’s that intuitive knowledge of mastery I related earlier about work. 

Another name for the great Ganesha is Ganapati, which basically means lord of desire. Ganesha is the master. He appears with his fat and satiated belly and a bowl of sweets, reminding you of desires and our western seven deadly sins. He is the master of the ganas and they are desires placed in your path to teach you. The renunciate, sitting atop the mountain in his asceticism, has fled from them thinking he can run out the clock on desire. This school of life involves mastery and it’s a serious game. You must master your desires it you want to become the ultimate warrior.

I have had a massive realization concerning the darkness I have dealt with all my life and the darkness I have faced when I have altered my consciousness. At first, I feared this realm and the entity that inhabited it. I ran from it. I returned and I faced up to it. I was threatened, challenged, avoided it, watched it come back, and realized I could never transcend it. Most importantly, I kept at it. Once I had the courage, I became curious and inquisitive. I have been relentless, though a little guarded. Anyways, I am at the point where I finally realized something amazing. It’s a huge test of strength and courage. Fear will constantly challenge you and get you if you are weak. It will run you into the ground and turn you into a cowering mess and even try to kill you. It’s definitely not something for the timid. I get it now. On this path, most come to a fork in the road: Stop and take the path back to safety and give up the seeking or head right to the light, climb the spiritual mountain, and become holy and righteous, though somewhat intolerable. Nobody sees the hidden path on the left or they pay no mind to it. It’s dark, uninspired, unpaved, and full of obstacles. Keep going where the path heads into the dark and carve out the path no one dares to tread, or if they do they get lost or seduced by power. I’ve been there, survived, and I know the darkness within respects me because I have courage, resolve, and I see it for what it is. It’s the ultimate challenge and it’s where you will find the greatest source of available inner fortitude and strength. It’s unassailable. I stand at the ready to claim my inheritance. The last hurdle in my way, bent on destroying me, I have defeated. I’m ready now.

If there can be ascertained a purpose to life then this has to be it; well in the case of my coming forth in this incarnation as a member of the masculine polarity. I finally mastered my desires before they decimated me. It was a helluva battle. I feel so strong right now. I can’t rest on my laurels or accomplishments. I’m heading into that darkness and exploring. You see no one has ever done this. Those who touch and engage in a dalliance with the darkness are the insane and depraved. I’ve declined the offers of power and defeated the onslaught of the army of my own making. I’m unencumbered, free, and taking notes.

Suicide, insanity, depravity, and paranoia. Going into the darkness of one’s self is pretty much up there with having a cage match with a shark in an underwater arena. And you have no scuba gear. You are going to get knocked around, bloody and beaten. Sometimes we foolishly venture into the ring and other times life beats us down into the depths of despair from which we can’t escape. The all-encasing suffocating despair is deadly. What I’m trying to say is the darkness either kills or psychologically alters you forever. I fall into the fool category and I saw it and I ran. It profoundly affected me psychologically to the point where I had to fight back and then muster the courage to face it once again. Something though happened along the path and I discarded the fear. I was still gun shy though about the whole return. Eventually after levelling up to embrace the jaguar and become a warrior, I traced this stunning evolution of self back to the darkness. I understood it was the master teacher. This readies the student to now go further.

Our western concept of a demon involves thinking it is evil. It represents those behaviours and desires that haunt you. The devil made me do it. Desire led me to this behaviour. It’s an antagonist and adversary bent upon your destruction. Look at it another way and find the truth. These evil spirits are your greatest teachers. So great they will kill you if you ultimately fail the course. Best to drop out than continue on this path.

Go into the darkness, embrace the riddle, as here the mystery lies. You can't bypass the darkness. Running from fear, owns you.

In the battle with the adversary within, at one point he offers the shortcut to power. Most will take it; it’s the easy way. Power acquired this way has consequence. Giving into desires and accepting unearned power reveals instantly you aren’t worthy. It’s a device used by the master teacher to discover your true intentions. Power will only not corrupt when wielded by someone who has attained self-mastery and will not give in to the temptation to use the power to fulfill desire.

It’s warrior training school to transform you from being weak into a forged block of strong steel. The darkness within can become your ultimate ally and source of unmatched inner strength and fortitude. The only catch is it doesn’t suffer weaklings. You will be put to the test and want to run and hide. He will keep coming for you, especially once challenged. It’s the fight of your life. You can back down and go cower in the corner and hope he doesn’t come for you and end it. If you can muster the courage and stand up for yourself, take the punches, and fight back you’ll earn respect. It’s not over. Forging steel is tough work. The jaguar comes to check out its prey and see if you are willing to fight. You’ll still think of ways to transcend the darkness, give it up, and become pure and holy. Fair enough but that was your chance. Hardly anyone makes it this far as something sidetracks or gets you. If you keep going eventually you’ll realize it. You can never transcend the darkness but you can harmonize it with the light. Only then do you get let in on the secret. A vast reservoir of strength and power lies in the darkness.

The fight of my life is over; I’m through to the other side. My weaknesses I have moved passed. I can navigate my inner word now with impunity and am free to explore this gift.

I’m not sure I can teach this to others. It’s hard to recommend, embrace, or explore something that can kill you. That’s better left to individual choice. Counsel can be offered and hints provided of what lies within however everyone has to make their own choice whether they want to pursue it. The pitfalls are too serious to take responsibility for someone’s choice. And I think the only way through is by yourself. I’ll can lend you a flashlight. 

warrior

Why do the lessons of Ayahuasca begin in full on classes months before I go drink again? I understand the integration period and the importance of continuing with the lessons received from the previous round of work. I understood where I was on the path of becoming a fully realized human being and knew I was avoiding a full on trip into the darkness of self. I had become brave enough to take brief forays into it and peek below, somewhat satisfying my curiosity, however I’d never fully gone back as I’d leave a lifeline that would get me out of the labyrinth and I was still guarded a bit. The time has come to revisit the horrors of my original forays into the world of plant medicines now equipped with knowledge and understanding. I set my intention for my next journey hopefully in 2021 to explore further the nether regions of self. As always happens, the preparation for in-person class comes fast and furious.

Jaguar training school is run by the darkness that lies within to train the human to release the jaguar out into the world. The darkness is not malicious; I know that now. It is relentless and can be perceived as malicious but understand it is tough love, so tough it can be deadly to enter into its advanced teachings. The teaching methods of the darkness are unique, somewhat cruel, and the training wheels are off in that it can kill. To forge steel is a heavy process and there will be casualties along the way. This isn’t for everyone; in fact I’d reserve it only for a select few. You will be exposed to everything that makes you tick and it will be intensified. You will be in a fight for your life as you confront everything. You will curse the darkness and try to bury it within again. Nothing is off the table in terms of outcomes. If you want to run - run. If you want to become an alcoholic to numb the pain and escape - drink. If you want to castrate yourself to escape desire - cut. If you want to run towards comfort - eat to obesity and numb the mind on culture and social media. There are no requirements to continue on the path and many ways off. I don’t know about you but I was never comfortable with failure. I was extremely uncomfortable however with the darkness that lies within.

Over a year before I drank Ayahuasca for the first time I wrote a poem about the darkness I perceived bent on destroying me.

I wanted to get rid of it and was at the point in my life where the crossroads of existence became centre stage. I was primed to start climbing the mountain towards enlightenment in order to receive my holy robes and be declared a winner of the game of life. I started searching for the meaning of life and wanted to transcend the human. It’s an exercise in frustration and I constantly was interrupted by the darkness within, always at my side, laughing at me and my fellow humans for their folly. I found plant medicines and went off in search of transcendence that way as a shortcut to my beatitude. My second time drinking Ayahuasca I was punched in the gut. The resulting beat down and paranoia chased me back home to live out life a cowering mess. I had a choice in whether I wanted to accept defeat or get up off the mat and fight. In reality, I had no choice if I wanted to live life fully. If I didn’t want to fight back I’d have to find a way to numb consciousness. Eventually, step by step, with the help of the feminine divine I battled back. I got pretty good at it and was able to right the ship and continue the journey. The darkness was still lying in wait; however it was abated while I figured out my plan of action.

I went back to the jungle to confront the darkness. I was scared and sat in the first ceremony prior to drinking wondering why I was back and going through this? I wanted to run again. Little did I know this mountain of a man was sitting beside me to my right, smoking away on mapacho, who would help me on this path with his encouragement and positivity. It was help that was huge and beyond anything I could ever payback. I was immediately confronted by the demon. I stood my ground that night and earned respect. In a way, the darkness accepted me as his student that night though I wasn’t aware I had enrolled.

I have subsequently been challenged with being strong, brave, courageous, and standing up for myself in both ceremony and in life. I have definitely not received straight As. I mean who really could? This is serious and difficult life lessons. My third visit to the jungle and successfully navigating the treacherous waters resulted in my transformation into a jaguar. Ultimately, the darkness is teaching you to become a warrior and invite you into the order of the jaguar. I got my spots for my courage. I faced the darkness and then was charged by a jaguar. I stood toe to toe with that jaguar and he became me. What a rush. It’s something I’ll cherish forever and a graduation planned out to perfection. That’s why don Howard coined the sanctuary SpiritQuest.

School was by no means finished. Higher education beckoned. I demonstrated I had the fortitude to be successful though I still had a lot of work to do. The darkness flooded me with all the desires and behaviours that were holding me back; so much so it was overwhelming at times. I cursed the darkness, wondering when it would ever stop? I wanted to be a shining example for everyone. I knew love was the ultimate answer. I could project that but lying within was still my humanness. How do I get past that? It’s lying within and making me a liar.

To become a warrior is hard work. Strength of steel comes from being battle-tested in life’s foundry and facing one’s own demise. Gladiators aren’t anointed and coddled or issued certificates acknowledging their bravery. It’s strange that I didn’t realize this seven years ago. I defined the darkness as being an adversary instead of being a teacher. The greatest teacher I have ever known. Without the darkness I could not lay claim to the following:

Courage

Bravery

Strength, not being weak

Standing up for myself

Confidence

Fortitude

Resolve

Rising to the Challenge

These attributes are the domain of the darkness that lies within with an assist from the heart. This is what the teacher wants to teach you. It is a difficult path and he will stalk and kill you if you do not transform. He will dig down deep into your soul and pull all that shit up and make you confront it. He will imbue it with power and have it relentlessly stalk you. I slowly passed each test and was left with one more to go. I remember the night it happened last month. I finally broke free of the spell of culture and tasted complete freedom. I knew it immediately. This battle was over. I am a warrior. I now wait to return to the jungle to see what’s next. As don Howard would say, “There’s always more."

Onward ho! The journey continues towards becoming an adept of the darkness. 

within the one is found the two

The spiritual chorus preaches the one. Everything is derivative of the one and all of creation can be folded back into the one. To express this one, us humans have come up with a bunch of terms, including the polarizing concept of god which we in turn fetishize and transform into an object of worship and sometimes assign to an ideal that is used for human pursuits of power and monetary gain. The understanding of your place in all of this is your connection to all, in that not only are you a product of the universe but you are indeed the universe and from your perspective you are a point of that universal consciousness that is looking out upon itself. It is not only an empowering vision of creation but it also lowers anxiety about what happens to you when the body dies. If you like adventure then I wouldn’t worry about what happens next. You can go even further with this concept and discard the one. Grasping at the one is still objectifying and truthfully there are no objects. We delineate what just is, conjure duality, and selectively take subjective forms of energy and solidify them into objects.

Okay, I think the above is a pretty good explanation of what heady spiritual people preach, if I do say so myself. In our culture, science is king and therefore in modern spiritual pursuits we try and reconcile the two. Using core concepts of Eastern philosophy allows us to bridge the gap and transform the woo into nuanced metaphysical speculations that allow consensus and eschews wishful thinking. This is all well and good however I like to push the envelope past the chains of what others think. I want experience and subsequently I want to put the experience through my filter and come up with my own concepts.

I have walked the desert sands of Egypt and explored their pyramids and majestic temples. I’ve sweated in the jungles of the Amazon basin. I’ve climbed mountains in the Andes and visited valley temples. I’ve spent a night out in the arid and unforgiving wilderness of the American southwest. I’ve ingested multiple plants that have altered my consciousness enough that I know there are many dimensions to this magical mystery tour we call life. I’ve tried to figure it all out. I’ve tried to grasp this elusive enlightenment. I’ve wondered where do I get my certificate telling me I’ve made it?

I understand the philosophy and I feel the universal connection. It’s undeniable. My experiential journey suggests instead of the one, all truth lives at the door of two. We are a reductionist culture and because of this, one is the holy grail. For me, it’s two and everything is derivative of the two. I’m talking about the divine feminine and divine masculine and their coming together creates the one which then reflects back out as a multiple duality of many twos. Envision this construct that comes from the mind of a human, if you will. It is a centre-point that contains two polarities. As a flow chart, the two as the divine feminine and masculine come together into the one which brings you to the unified centre-point. From the centre-point flows out all of creation into multiple instances of this duality into creation. The two must become one before they become the many.

I see this in ancient Egypt as the great mother and her son, who is also the father; this peculiarity known as kamutef, the bull of his mother. In their literature and on temple walls, I see it also expressed in the concept of creation emanating from an androgyne source that contains the sacred two. In the Ennead of Heliopolis, of which this dual-sexed god Atum is at the head, it is said that the masculine light source Shu and the feminine water source Tefenet are always with and are Atum. The androgyne is the combination of the two and there is no getting around it. Even in the word hermaphrodite is presented in clear view the union of two great deities in the Greek wisdom god Hermes and Aphrodite, the goddess of love. These two go back into the hazy scrolls of history to the beginnings of Egyptian thought and the primordial beginnings of the Ogdoad at Hermopolis where the Egyptian counterparts of these two, Thoth and Hathor, stand at the head of all creation that comes forth from the primordial swamp of 8-town. The concept of union and attempts at artistic expression is depicted on temple walls such as this painted relief masterpiece inside the Khonsu Temple at Karnak temple.

The dual-sexed Kamutef

I see this concept in the sacred mesa of the Andes where the reconciliation of the two gendered polarities brings everything back together into the centre at the axis mundi. The great stone idol of the Chavin temple, the lanzon, brings together the feminine and masculine in this depiction of the sacred world centre.

Lanzon in the temple of the jaguar at Chavin

The temple grounds are made up of dualistic constructs such as the set of black and white limestone stairs leading to the temple as well as finding dualistic principles in the raised and lowered opposite hands of the idol in which the masculine points to the upper world and the feminine to the lower world. The temple grounds rest at the meeting point of the coastal and jungle civilizations in a valley where two great rivers merge into one. This reconciliation of all was called tinkuy. Achieved is balance and from this position the healing can be empowered and love for all can flow. In the jungle are the symbols of the feminine serpent and the masculine jaguar. There are exoteric and esoteric understandings of the two.

Those that live off the land and in primitive dwellings we culturally denigrate as simple. Simple people paradoxically have the most profound symbolism. The modern symbolism from our culture of excess is bereft of ideas and suffering from malnutrition. Hidden in the jungle is the most profound teaching accessed by the brave and the courageous. I’ve searched high and low but never have I come across such a direct communication of what it is all about. Obviously, the serpent is feminine and the jaguar is masculine and they are ubiquitous symbols of the jungle. It’s a pretty simple exoteric depiction of life, creation, destruction, and renewal.

There were big teachings this last time through Peru earlier this year in the jungle that carried on into the Andes mountains. It included the direct experiencing of and understanding of the life force common to all, that connects us all, that originates from a common feminine and masculine vibration symbolized as the serpent and the jaguar. The serpent creates the vibrational body that undulates from on to off and the jaguar traverses this path. The jaguar moves freely. As visualized and communicated by Hindu adepts of yesteryear, when you raise your consciousness and enlighten all the subtle body chakras, energetic touch points you break free of, you meet the jaguar who roams the chakras as an expression of the power of the kundalini serpent which in the pre-Columbian South American religious thought are the three shamanic worlds. And finally you become the jaguar.

Everything comes from this one vibration with vibrations within each vibration. It pulses from off to on. Creation is the pulse with two extreme states and everything in between. From a holistic point of view it is one vibration. Within the one is found the two. The one can’t be without the two. The two always have their opposite. Try it; try to cut off the bottom end of a piece of string. What do you end up with? For the feminine and masculine there is no one. There is always the pull to rejoin your opposite, like a magnetic pull that creates the constant oscillation that creates life. How’s that for the esoteric? I’m so humbled by this knowledge that gives me the power to transcend any thoughts of annihilation and head straight into the gale force of life, full of courage and resolve. As the hero, I set out to rescue the princess; my feminine polarity. They seek each other and afterwards separate once again to keep this all going. It’s universal and timeless.

It's as close to the truth as I can get. There is a serpent and a jaguar and that’s it. The serpent’s body represents the pulsing form while the jaguar is the energy rushing forth along this serpentine highway. It also dawned on me the ancient Egyptians had something close to this idea in their great mother goddess Hathor and her son Ihy. The serpent lady would give birth to the wild bull Ihy, who would also be described as the perfumed effluence coming forth from her body. The rattling of a sistrum, an energetic vibration, much like the shacapa of the shaman in the Amazon, brought forth the Goddess and the power scent she gave off is the naked child come forth in wild abandon.

The clever adept proclaims non-duality. It all just is. It’s true. Within all, the is-ness is consciousness and once the pond is disturbed, duality becomes king through objectification. Trying to define non-duality is trying to define a state of existence; like taking a snapshot in time. Whatever it is we are living in, one thing for sure is it is constantly on the move and in motion therefore beyond definition. From the perspective of the realization of the one, being at the centre, where you become the axis mundi you see it all splinter into shards of duality made up of the feminine and masculine polarities. When I stand at my mesa, I envision I am the lanzon, the centre, the chaupi. I am everything. I look to my left and I see the feminine. I look right and it’s the masculine. I see everything. Lower world, upper world, and then back to self. My mesa represents the self, my self, and the totality of everything that comes from me. It’s all me. I am non-dual and I see it all break down into duality. All aspects and qualities of existence, psychologically and biologically, contained within it all. Which is the correct perspective? Is it from the standpoint of non-duality or does it originate from duality? What are your prejudices?

I look up at the sky, see the clouds, and I am stunned by the vastness of it all. I come to the realization it is the image of mind I am looking at. This vastness is consciousness. I am privileged and privy to having the ability to image mind and see how creation is the representation of the twinning pattern of consciousness and energy, yin and yang, feminine and masculine, serpent and jaguar.

The game is fascinating and I have a fascination with the game. It’s like being at the beach and grasping a handful of hot, white sand. It just slips through your fingers.