Tagged with Initiation

After a very long initiation, I've come to the conclusion that initiation is overrated. The problem with any initiatic journey is initiation itself: Why, after all, is it necessary? Why are we never content in our own skin? (more)

Sandy supports what I have been writing for years about this time as one of intense transformation and planetary initiation. At the end of the process, we will either have transformed as a species and reached a new level of consciousness, or we will be on our way toward extinction. The choice is ours to make. (more)

The current global crisis represents the greatest challenge our species has ever faced. The very structures that support life are being rapidly dismantled, and our daunting challenge is to come together to engage our collective wisdom, compassion, and creativity to preserve as much life as possible. This requires an authentic, heroic humility. (more)

[The Ayahuasca Monologues] • In the summer of 2004, I was set to travel to South America for a ten day Dieta to work with the plant medicines Bobinsana and Ayahuasca.  Prior to departure, my father died a harsh and tragic death. A new phase of my life began with these two seminal events. I found my understanding of this earth to be changed utterly, and a terrible and loving beauty was born.  (more)

The daimon overturns the conventional view held by psychotherapy: that what happens early in life determines what happens later. We are not the products of our history; we are a-historical creatures for whom events in our childhood and later development are mirrors in which we catch glimpses of our primordial image. (more)

The actual lesson provided by hallucinogens seems relatively simple: let go. Hey look, the walls are bleeding. Let go. I'm fifty and my life is a wreck. Let go. That hawk headed God has giant tits and it's starting to unnerve me. Let go. If you hold on, it can become a demon, and if you let go, it becomes bliss.  (more)

A modern myth is a living myth, it cannot help but borrow inspiration from historical sources -- the lives and thoughts, myths and images of those who have come before -- but it is transformed, re-forged we might say, in the heat of our personal experience, and may come out looking quite different from any of those original sources. (more)

Initiation is evident in one form or another in nearly every culture prior to the industrial age, at which point it became notably absent, at least on the surface. This absence has produced a widespread psychological crisis. In many ways the initiatory impulse has merely transferred itself, oftentimes to behaviors and beliefs which only shallowly fulfill that impulse. (more)

When one enters a major spiritual transition, it can be so painfully unnerving that it not only devastates one's self esteem, it also undermines our ability to fulfill even our most basic survival needs. This process is designed to cultivate the inner strength needed to face your deepest fears and learn how generous the universe really is. (more)

The call to indigenous shamanism is similar to the vocation of the Western medical professional. But medical training can disconnect the trainee from the larger community. Shamanic practice brings the trainee back to his or her healing roots. (more)

After a terrific and scary psychedelic journey, I realized that I needed a mentor. I found Terence McKenna. Several years later, during an Ayahuasca ceremony, a vision of Terence taught me to stop relying so heavily on my intellect and reach out from my heart. (more)

A new Eleusis would make us aware that we have read but the first few pages of the great book of nature, and make our decisions regarding the environment, foreign relations, the economy, science, and social structures more informed, humane, and sustainable. (more)

Atem is the Opener of the Way; his task is to create the possibility for a whole new pantheon of entities to come forth into the world. Each of us has the potential to engage in the art of bringing forth entities into the sphere of human awareness. (more)

During meditation, I activate a pattern of acupuncture points on my back and ask for "The Wingmaker Frequency." Then an astonishing thing happened: Wings sprouted from my back, I shit you not. Have homo sapiens reached the next phase of our evolution? (more)

Initiatory rituals have been an essential part of human cultures for thousands of years, yet in our modern secular culture they have been abandoned. If we hope to overcome our current global crisis, we need to attain a more sophisticated understanding of the world of the spirits, as well as techniques for dealing with them. (more)