Reflecting Self in Physical Connection AKA Sex as Medicine

Neither one of us knew that the moon was nearly full. Each moment between us brimmed full, too, pregnant with possibility. 

Just 24 hours prior we were two well-acquainted strangers who had been soul gazing for a some number of years, months, or an eternity, depending on how one fancies slicing the illusion of time. But in one brief moment of serendipity the day before, our paths crossed yet again — BAM! an inflection point. They shyly and boldly handed me their phone number, and I got in touch. 

<Click.>

Here we are.

—

I have explored this hidden canyon a handful of times. Today we are taking a more adventurous route in, scrambling over the fins. I remembered my first walk down the wash back in October of last year...  

Then, in a single moment, I drop out of memories, out of the mind, and into eternity — fast and hard — just like I did the moment we first locked eyes, and in every moment thereafter. 

I appreciate the depth and spaciousness of a landscape unparsed into discrete objects. I appreciate the spaciousness of our connection unfettered by mentalizing, cogitating... agitating. 

The only potential agitation present (still completely unrealized) is the electrical differential between us – the palpable polarity I sense with every iota of my Being. Words between us rise and fall with waves of sandstone and breeze, not too many and not too few, easy as breath, flowing effortlessly, ebbing softly between stillness and form. 

—

We stop at the top to take it all in. There's so much Light. It's all here, it's all whole, it's all perfect; there's nothing left to add, and nothing left to take away; everything is no-thing, everything is nothing. 

—

We're physically close as the winds are whipping your long hair into an entangled mess alongside and inseparable of mine.

I gaze into your oceanic eyes ablaze by the sun on a seamlessly blue sky. I'm lost and found and falling into your infinite soul.

I don't even know where my awareness ends and yours begins. 

I don't even know if words are happening. 

But sound, soft and gentle and earnest, is happening. 

And I’m drowning, happily drunk in your endless eyes, welcoming the Beloved.

And here you are, reflecting me, beautifully and wholly and clearly.

I see You, seeing me, and see my Self therein. 

Here, now, there is no separation; in fact, it never occurred. 

My body lights up electric the moment our lips brush, little bitty kisses whispering with gentle winds eternal. You're so soft, and so solid, and so strong. Your spirit is so beautiful. Fuck. I want to linger here with our fingertips entwined forever. And in this perfect moment, I do. 

Something tells me we've both been here before. And nowhere. And here we are again.

And we're standing too close to the edge in this particular configuration of spacetime.

Yes, falling off the fins is physically dangerous. 

Let's keep moving. 

Just some more easy fourth class scrambles into the wash. 

—

We're standing at the pour off, the birds serenading this symphony of existence, and flowing like water ever-washing the sands of time. 

How is this reality? How is any of this real? This is too beautiful for thoughtforms, let alone words. 

We're naked in the sand, simultaneously fluid and firm, hot and cool. Our bodies know this ancient dance of creation.

Are those your echoes reverberating within the canyon walls, or mine? 

Who is shivering? 

Are you within me, or am I within you?

I'm dissolving into nothing and everything, both, fully and completely, and all at once.

I know we're deep in this conversation, singing the timeless song. We're co-creating, collaborating, co-authoring this chapter right now, and in real time. We are primal, we are animal; we are infinite, we are spirit; we are uncontradicted, simply lit up from root to crown and unto the Void.

Wait, are there words happening? Fuck, it’s cold. We should go. So we go.

I feel like I'm in a dream. 

I know all of this is a dream. 

I'm in a waking dream of the most epic proportions, awake and aware and in awe of it ALL.

I AM THE MAGIC | YOU ARE THE MAGIC | WE ARE THE MAGIC

Everything is magic.

—

Today, I remember slash learn a few things from direct experience:

I remember that I prefer this connective, connected, and connecting embodied experience to the magnificent, infinite peace of The Void.

I remember that I need exactly THIS with my future long-term partner, I need this openness of Spirit, I need this intangible "It" betwen us: I need not only to see the Beloved in the form of my partner, but to be seen as the Beloved by them in return (!), and I need this reflection of a serial, infinite Beloved mirrored back to me ad infinitum. Let's get eternally lost in one another's eyes and in the radiant beauty of our Soul's Home.   

I remember that in partnership, I need this It, manifest as uninhibited lovingkindness that matches my own. The giving and receiving of Love through unfettered awareness, in deep presence, and with intuitive action, without ever using words. 

I remember that in partnership, I need this It, manifest as electric, embodied awareness beyond the level of form. We talk, enjoy conversation and exchange of ideas, but the connection resides at the energetic level of Beingness and not within the thoughtforms; similarly, we touch, but the connection resides beyond the simplicity of shared sensations. Our connection is born and nurtured in this infinite awareness.

I remember that in partnership, I need this It, manifest as polarity. I need to experience my Divine Feminine and my Divine Masculine energies weaving, dancing seamlessly, flowing forever within, into, and through your own Divine Feminine and Divine Masculine.

—

Oh, Divine and Embodied Being, I am so deeply grateful to you, and for you. I didn’t know I needed this, and that I needed you to show me this. You are a most precious treasure, a priceless gift. 

I’m grateful that you see, reflect, and treasure the elements I most value in myself, the elements that make me, “me,” the Authentic Self. I’m happy you’re as into me, and as into this, as I am. 

I don’t attach, cling, grasp at or tighten my palm around the mystical creature that you are. We’ll continue making our magic until perhaps the winds of time shift again, and I’m okay with that. I am so grateful to continue exploring, adventuring with you in this priceless eternity of now.

Thank you, my Beloved, Dear One!

I AM THE MEDICINE | YOU ARE THE MEDICINE | WE ARE THE MEDICINE

————

N.B. I don’t engage in physical intimacy with every person (or even most people) with whom I am capable of connecting. I’m able to meet most anyone where they are. Doesn’t mean I’m going to. My discernment in this regard is a reflection of Highest Self, Intuitive Knowing. 

Just because I can, doesn’t mean I will.

Kay, thanks for reading! ;)

Sitting with San Pedro (AKA Plant Teachers, Psychedelics, Aren't Medicine, part I).

This weekend I had the privilege of co-creating plant ceremony with a small group of magickal beings and Grandfather Huachuma. I had zero expectations of how things might unfold, and I was sitting with the simple intention of learning or experiencing whatever I am meant to learn, so that I may be of greater service to every being and the whole my community. Our group's collective goal was to connect as a leadership team in preparation for a community plant ceremony we will be anchoring at the end of May (May 25-27; open to all; feel free to reach out to me directly if you're interested in learning more).  

We gathered early in the day, caravanning from a friend's place in Millcreek to a huge tract of private land south of town – a 50-acre off-the-grid ranching enclave surrounded in barbed wire. The desert landscape was breath-taking, and the cave system embedded in the massive sandstone cliffs even more so. It was quiet and private, and the sunshine and blue skies above set the stage for what was to be one of the most pivotal and mundane experiences of my adult life.

–

We set intentions in front of our altar arrayed with sacred woods and plants, stones, oils, and musical instruments. 

The concoction tasted gross, like a green juice or smoothie gone wrong. 

But the moment San Pedro kissed my lips, I felt The It – I felt Grandmother Ayahuasca, I felt the Mushroom Children, I felt the asexual orgasm of complete and utter interconnectedness within and among All that I experience regularly in my sober, waking state... I felt myself as my Self – I felt Love. The psychoactive compound active in San Pedro cactus, mescaline, hadn't even entered my bloodstream and I was highly aware of myself as Pure Awareness, I physically felt the whole of my embodied being as Love.

After the second generous cup of sufficiently strong medicine, I felt much as I did after I drank three generous cups of yagé two weeks ago – that is, I felt no different than I do in most moments of completely sober, waking reality: I was open-hearted, loving, generous, attuned and completely present to my fellows. I was completely free from all thought forms – of judgements toward myself or others, of analyzing, commentary, chatter, and senseless mentalizing. The Ego's narratives about this thing or that thing were simply not present. I was simply clear. I was simply myself as my most authentic self – I was my Self. 

In our co-created space, I shared my voice in song, I shared my dance, I shared my heart, my smiles, and my laughter; I shared my presence. The lesson was digested and assimilated into every fiber of my being – It is simply my Being – It is always my Being, there is nothing but my Being – there is nothing to seek, there is nothing to find.

That which I thought I needed to seek, to understand, to discern, to know, to experience is always available to me in every contiguous waking moment of "now." 

Many, many ancient traditions teach this very same universal lesson. I just fully digested and actualized this teaching with the plants as my guides. 

It's all here and it's always been right here. 

It is me: I AM.

–

It's easy to feel "crazy" when my experience with all the plant teachers seem to differ so much from other's plant seekers' experiences. I don't see hallucinations. I don't feel emotionally or psychologically very different. I don't go anywhere outside of myself to experience anything outside of myself. I just seem to meet me: me, my self, and I.  

–

I remember feeling like there was something wrong with me the first time I had the experience of "tripping" but not "tripping." It was back at UPENN, maybe 2003 or 2004, when I took a copious amount of beautiful mushrooms and sat in the botanical gardens next to the Biopond, adjacent to the Medical School. I sat... and, nothing. I simply experienced unity consciousness. It was easy, it was blissful, but it certainly wasn't psychedelic – I simply met myself, truly, for the first time.

After a small handful of identical experiences with mushrooms, I stopped exploring the psychedelics altogether. I knew that if my experiences with the mushrooms were always essentially the same, nothing would shift until I, myself, shifted. 

So I took a fifteen year break to pursue other means of awakening and healing, mainly through meditation and yoga, but also through nutrition, study, and traditional therapy. When I re-visited the mushrooms over a decade later, two years ago, I was a different person. I generally felt whole, happy, and at ease. I didn't have a "reason" to seek anything; indeed, I had stopped seeking anything at all. And so when I revisited the mushrooms, the "answer" they gave me was no different than what I had always been taught: "here you are, complete and whole unto yourself; be here, now; you are Love, just be the Love that you are."

I get it. I get it. I get IT.

I just didn't trust IT until I spoke with Etheric.

–

Etheric and I spoke at length after ecstatic dance (a weekly practice that feels qualitatively no different for me than communing in plant ceremony) about the San Pedro and other plant teacher ceremonies. 

I told him I felt vulnerable and somewhat heretical to be saying this:

"Is there something wrong with me here? That I keep getting the same answer from all the different plant teachers? Why do I feel like I've gotten The Answer, and that there's nothing else for me to learn? Is it possible that I've learned everything I'll ever learn from the plants? Is this hubris (it doesn't feel like it)? Am I delusional or is this real? Am I doing something wrong; am I wrong?" 

The doubting module of the small ego mind wanted some kind of external validation of its conclusions (even though I was familiar with this story of Ram Dass and his guru, Maharaji). The programming that "there's something wrong with me; my beingness is 'wrong'," or that "my logic is wrong" (even though my IQ sits at the top 1% of the bell curve as tested by the WAIS-IV) runs DEEP!

Without quoting him directly, I can say that Etheric affirmed the validity of this, my most mundane and magical reality. We also talked about how these plants aren't medicines... they're teachers... teachers that show us the reality of the work we need to do in sober, waking reality, in every waking moment of conscious awareness. 

We all can, and perhaps should, outgrow our teachers. I know that the plants want us to.

– 

I felt – and feel – so grateful to be seen and heard and held and appreciated by another human being.

I feel so grateful to be reflected wholly and whole-heartedly.

I feel so grateful for those who have done the work themselves, who can reflect to me the reality of who I Am, and reflect the hard work I've done for myself, the effect of all the self-healing practices.

I am so grateful that this person and those I most admire respect and value me for my open-heartedness, my trust and confidence, my willingness to discard old ideas and elements which no longer serve me, my capacity to love fully, whole-heartedly, and unconditionally.

Fuck, I'm just so grateful for all of this. All of The IT.

–

I am the medicine. I am magic. I am Love. 

We are the medicine. We are the magic. We are Love. 

All is medicine. All is magic. All is Love. 

Embodied, sober life is The Work of realizing this!

–

Next: 

I'm going to talk about missing the The Message by seeking, via plant medicines or any other means of learning – about realizing that the thing that is seeking (the mind) is that which blocks us from the Truth. That by calling plant teachers, "medicines," we're perpetuating a falsehood – the idea that we are somehow sick or need something outside of ourselves to heal. That by seeking Truth via external substances we're missing The Truth that we already all whole, complete, and that which we seek.

Note: 

I'm not saying plant teachers don't have their place; they can be wonderful for addressing trauma, can help us get "unstuck," etc. I just see people falling into the trap of consistently reaching for this "medicine" or that "medicine" to change how they think or feel, under the guise of "studying," or “healing,” instead of doing the hard work of actually sitting in their sober, waking embodied experience and learning to shift from within.

Plant Teachers: Lessons on Heartache, Self, and my IUD

I sat with plant teachers this weekend. Hours before the medicine and the ceremonies began, my then significant other broke up with me because they just "weren't feeling It." My heart was crushed, and I felt blindsided. I've sat in enough ceremony to know that everything that arises from the moment we commit to ceremony to the post-integration period (well after the closing of the ceremonial space) is all part of the ceremony; in some way, all of my life is ceremony. 

I allowed the painful feelings to flow, cracking open my heartmind to whatever lessons the Universe would offer.

–

My then partner had, and still has, the utmost integrity; I whole-heartedly love and respect them as a human being and truly honor they way they exist in this world. When they gently and lovingly shared with me that they just weren't feeling a romantic partnership between us, it hurt, aching deeply and powerfully. And through this pain, I gained two invaluable lessons.

The first came in the beautiful way in which this person approached me in sharing their feelings with me. This allowed me to begin healing the old wounds of feeling discarded by men; the romantic interest prior was especially traumatic to me with his callousness, and so this loving human being is allowing me to rewire that trauma alongside some much deeper traumas with men. Indeed, we're still processing, still in authentic relationship even though the form of our relationship may be shifting; and I'm grateful that they're willing to go on this journey with me, allowing me to realize greater wholeness and efficacy as a human being.

Note: Yage is not a cactus. Yage is a blend of the ayahuasca vine (Banisteriopsis caapi) and a shrub called chacruna (Psychotria viridis), among other Amazonian jungle plants.

–

A second lesson arose most unexpectedly. I brought the topic of relationships more generally into the medicine space. The clarity didn't come in the way I expected, and definitely not in a domain I could have become aware of on my own. And the clarity didn't arise with respect to anyone outside of my own relationship with my self. 

I see clearly that this is not about my relationship with any one man or woman, or men or women more generally – I realized that my "problems" with relationships arise from problems with my relationship with my own Self. 

Most importantly, when I make right on my relationship with my Self, when I am in integrity with myself, I will naturally be in right relationship and integrity with others. 

I realized that I haven't been authentic with myself, I haven't been in integrity with myself, I haven't been in right relationship with myself – because of the hormonal IUD's I've put in my body since 2012 – I haven't been allowing my body to cycle naturally. I haven't been willing to listen to the incredible wisdom of my physical body. 

I have disrespected the intelligence of my Creatix/Creator-given female embodiment, telling myself I didn't want to cycle because it was inconvenient, or that I didn't want (accidental) kids... when in fact I put an alien device in my body which was sending its own messages to my mind-heart-body this whole time, hijacking this masterful machinery of the human body with its own indifferent purposes ("NO KIDS"). My intellect (which selected the damn thing in the first place) was just engaging in post-hoc rationalization. 

I put it there, and its false, inorganic signals have affected not only my relationship with my own self – my perceived needs, wants, and desires – including the specifics of my attraction to men – as well as the pheromonal signals I'm sending potential mates and their resultant attraction towards me.

Mind. Blown.

There's a whole other post in here about true freedom and perceived autonomy – the extent to which my mindbody is constrained to think and feel in certain ways, the degrees of freedom I actually have versus I feel I have as an embodied being – but I digress.

–

I feel so sad that I was so unaware, and for so long. I feel sad to have dishonored myself and my soul's deepest desires (to be fully and completely and wholly embodied) in this way. I want nothing more than to live in complete integrity with myself on all levels. 

–

I feel like I wouldn't have come into this new, deeper self-awareness – and committed desire to step into deeper integrity with the whole of my self on all levels – without this person telling me he wasn't feeling It towards me, and then me bringing this question about relationships into the medicine ceremonies with me. 

I'm grateful to the yage and to the star people. 

I'm grateful for the clarity and awareness brought forth by all this pain. 

Note: Yage is not a cactus. Yage is a blend of the ayahuasca vine (Banisteriopsis caapi) and a shrub called chacruna (Psychotria viridis), among other Amazonian jungle plants.