Initiation

Had a personal epiphany this morning that rocked my boat a bit. Been trying to wrap my mind around the nature of my life for quite some time now. Check it out, because this by no means applies to just me.

Something very important happens in the indigenous cultures that does not happen in this American culture. Not just indigenous cultures, but almost all of the old cultures, that is to say, the cultures that lived in harmony with Nature. This event happens for women too, but I'm obviously a dude. I've never had male role models, mentors, none of that. One of the purposes of my life has been to figure it out alone. In those cultures that live in Harmony with Nature, they initiate boys, and males are not men until it has happened. Warriors I should say.

As always, I am overlapping two syntax's; always the Jungian depth psychology, and this time South American shamanism. Last night I was reading a shaman book called Shapeshifting by John Perkins. Excellent book. Not a big one either, easy to read, the guy is a good writer. You all should check it out.

Let me sum it up with some context. This John Perkins guy was kinda like me, living a paradoxical life. On one hand, he was learning shaman techniques, and on the other he was working for a company that profited off of the Elites, that is to say, some of the richest people in the world. He ends up in the Middle East, because they are wanting to develop the desert. As we all know, the Middle East has been being looted for some time now. So he's over there, doing work, and a local hits him up wanting to talk. Slipped a not under his door.

This guy wanting to meet is a Persian, Bedouin. His name is Yamin. They don't want the desert to go away, because as they say, "they are the desert too." Basically, before completing his job, this Bedouin guy wanted John to see the other side of the fence, because the people standing to profit the most were hard selling only their side, of course. So in his efforts to show John the other side of the story, while having dinner, he tells a story about himself when he was a little boy. It was the story of his first initiation in the desert.

Yamin, at the age of ten, took a vacation into the desert with his family like all Bedouins do. His father told him he was old enough to learn a secret about the desert. One morning during the vacation his father woke up him, they grabbed water bottles, and began walking. Being only ten, by the time the heat was bumping, the boy was already spent. But before giving out, they came to an oasis. A family lived at this oasis, and it happened that his father knew them. The boy passed out.

Later, after awaking from his nap, they had a meal with this family. After the meal his father told him to go out into the desert with this Bedouin man. Without question the boy followed. They took sleeping gear, water, and took off walking. They walked a long ways, before the man finally said they could rest. The boy again, immediately passed out. Exhausted having to keep up with these men.

When the boy woke up in the morning; he was alone. The man was gone. Slowly but surely, the boy degraded into a panic. Fear over came him. He was only ten. This is important, remember being ten. Remember how vulnerable being ten is. So the boy goes through this whole ordeal, takes off running, nothing but dunes. He's basically pissing himself. He did not keep track of anything on the walk. He knows he has no clue where he's at. After running in panic, he tried to retrace his steps, but the wind already covered his tracks. At that point, he's out the water bottle too. He's fucked himself running from his water. 

He finds his own foot steps! He can get water! Following his own trail he ended up going in a circle. The heat is at this point unbearable. No water. He goes delirious. Claims he heard voices screaming only to realize it was him.

From the book:

"The sands blew around me, I thought about them, allowed them to enter my cells, my mind, my dreams. Drowsiness overcame me. I closed my eyes, releasing the fear, opening myself to the desert.
"It was then that I heard a voice. "The desert is kind once you accept it." the voice called out. "Once you learn that you are part of it." I accepted the voice as Allah's. 'It is never cruel, but may seem that way when you resist it.'
"I opened my eyes. Standing over me was the Bedouin man.

I wanted to transcribe the whole story, Perkins writes so well, but college people seem to think that is immoral or something. I pray people transcribe my shit. Anyways.

Let's break this down. The main reason fasting is important in spiritual life is because it heightens one's senses. So if one meditates, and then also fasts, it's obvious what happens; one is more aware. If you fast, you will see that your body changes it's energy. Everything changes actually, because being in a state of starvation is a different type of consciousness. It's the same thing with physical fatigue. So here we can see, this boy was purposefully fatigued.

It is also important to realize that he had absolutely no clue what was going on. Zero. Another critical aspect of this ritual is that there were no women involved. There was absolutely no one to save him; not even his mother. Most importantly not his mother. Yamin was probably not going to tell John about how much he cried for his mamma while lost in the desert. Becoming a man means saying good bye to mother. Not like you never talk to her again, but that you never go to her for help.

A man is on his own.

These critical factors created an enormous sensitivity in the child, and in that sensitivity, one realizes the universe, in this boys case, the desert is in his own mind. He becomes aware of the numinous, the spiritual. His unconscious spoke to him, and as most monkeys do: thought it was god.

The universe is the unconscious. Your unconscious, mine, everyone's; IS THE UNIVERSE. Spiritual said, All is One.

This is so important, because only this type of situation will bring about that jump into the unconscious. What type of situation was it? Death. Imminent death, or at least the sense there of. Tricking someone into thinking they are going to die will almost assuredly open a window into the spiritual realm. It will make one become aware of reality. Such a gem.

Switching books now. Time for the Jungian Syntax.

I want this book so freaking bad. All time top three books I've ever read. Trauma and the Soul: A Psycho-Spiritual Approach to Human Development and it's Interpretation by Donald Kalsched. It gets a 4.62 rating on Goodreads which is a really high rating for that site. If you want to know why I don't have it, it is because it is 210.00$ right now on Amazon, so ya.....

The main premise of the book was that early childhood trauma opens a window into the unconscious. In other words, one becomes aware that the Universe "does things" on one's behalf. One hears voices and thinks it's god, or spirits, or whatever. Pretty much the same thing happens that happens in an initiation.

In the Jungian syntax we all have all these different "personalities" inside of us. Our psyche is incredibly complex. It is only the way the culture indoctrinates people that has everyone thinking everything is simple. Has people believing they are some one way, etc. Normal. That kind of shit. Conformity.

The issue is of course, the fact that the boy was initiated by men who knew what they were doing. The boy was also of a certain age and maturity. It doesn't go that way for boys here in America, and as you all know, here in America there are no shamans to heal the broken psyche of people who were abused as children. Shit doesn't exist.

That's a big deal to me. Obviously. My journey has been about healing myself, else I would have manifested a healer a long time ago. I'm up for it.

In the shaman literature, it's said that if one is called, and refuses the call, one's life does not go well, and it can even end in death. Refusal to listen to one's own unconscious is a death sentence. That is to say, once a person's own unconscious has had enough, there's nothing the ego can do to get out of it. Go mad and die; or wake the fuck up.

From that little boys perspective it was life or death; that is reality, and nothing else can get one in touch with reality in that way. So here we have a clear distinction between a man, and a boy.

"The average man is hooked to his fellow men, while the warrior is hooked only to infinity." -- Carlos Castaneda

Once the unconscious has exploded into consciousness, and this is indescribable, one must experience it first hand; there's no turning back. Am I saying it clear enough? This experience causes what used to seem to be "out" there, to suddenly be in "here."

It was one of my favorite lines in the Castaneda books, don Juan said something like, no one takes the path of knowledge willingly, they must be tricked into it, because like I just said, once it has begun, there is no turning back.

You ever seen me smile?