drugo

@ Roopey + Kalika. Since the 80s, anthropologists have been coming to grips with an incredible complexity of cross-cultural insight into shamanism. The high majority of researchers, who are savvy to the evidence, now speak of shamanisms (in the plural)-- emphasising humanity's rich diversities of (and often healthy contradictions between different) magico-religious systems and practitioners. The terms 'shamanism' and 'shaman' often tells us more about the person wielding knowledge than the realities of those being categorised and understood -- after all, 'shamanism' is a construct of the western imagination. Taussig (1989:44) states that ‘shamanism is... a made-up, modern, Western category, an artful reification of disparate practices, snatches of folklore and overarching folklorization, residues of long-established myths intermingled with the politics of academic departments, curricula, conferences, journal juries and... funding agencies’. Geertz claimed that the term ‘shamanism’ is a meaningless and convenient abstraction invented by anthropologists to sort their material (cited in Porterfield 1987:725). Wallis comments that it is an ‘academic construct and a word for the West, its meaning inevitably universalized, repeatedly re-fabricated, its definition contested’ (1999:4). Over a century ago sociologist Van Gennep (2001 'Rites of Passage' [1903]:51) declared the term ‘vague and dangerous’.

Yeah, I think I know what you mean. I wonder if traditions, as historically generated intelligence, may provide assistance on responsibility -- on ways to respond to the 'experiences' and place them constructively with everyday life (offering such jewels as cosmological and soteriological maps, itineraries, and frameworks) -- given that may a folk has walked a 'mind-manifesting' path in the past. I thought the etymology is psyche(soul]delic[to open]. Same same but different. @Roopey. You may be interested in checking out this talk by Ferrer on religion and mysticism

Has anyone experimented with this sort of techno-mysticism? I've got an album by Coil that I'm pretty sure experiments with frequencies outside the ear's range and inside certain neural rhythms. But coil crafts art, meaning, and emotion into torment/clarity frequencies. Brainwave entrainment technology

Below is great and lucid take on the history of the psychedelic movement from Byron Bay local Gregg Lahood. The whole article can be found at http://relationalspirit.com/ I wonder what cultural-religious hybrids await the future of the Aussie psychedelic scene? Perhaps Judaism mixed with Sufism and inspired by the religious codes of Scientology, Ayahuasca shamanism, Bevis and Buthead, Muhutma Gandhi and Oprah Winfrey. No, but in all seriousness, it appears that the shamanism-indigenous and Eastern-orientalism psychedelic memes are beginning to fade from our culture, making way for new myths. So, what do you think are the next meta-narratives for our psycheledlic realities?

Convincing 'gnostic' or embodied divine experiences tend to challenge and reconfigure one's abstract understandings -- causing a 'drift' in belief. Cartesian dualism, and the alienation of thinking from the body, is a peculiar retardation of intelligence. While, yes, the body and its profound abilities are often subordinated by modern folks, there is no need to castrate, alienate and trap our sacred ability to think from our abilities of perception, emotion and entheognosis entheonauts love to talk about the ineffability of 'gnostic' experience -- a rather strange irony in itself. Thought may be limited (*abstract), but so is perception. Careful to not throw the baby out with the bath water. People often bag-out 'thought' when there own thoughts are being seriously threatened -- a kind of unconscious defence.

!!! cosmic mongrel-ology

Hi Bretloth, great shhpeel there, I really feel your affirmation and drive for human-ecosystem harmony and ethics. I find this part interesting and curious also: It appears to me that entheogens often cause one to 'drift off into abstract dreams', into that peculiar territory of paraperception, voices, visions, entities, myths -- a place that is perhaps indespensible -- the vectors of chaos where order finds its resource. One of the biggest difficulties I'm seeing in the Aussie entheogenic community (and I imagine that it is not confind to Aus) is the huge and complex challange of 'grounding' and integrating the fertile and chaotic resources of order, vision, and knowing that may emerge from entheogenic journeys. I don't think that entheogens are the answer to stopping us from 'drifting off into the abstract', in fact, it seems that entheogens often intensify the ability to reconfigure reality by offering a 'drift' of sorts. Of course, if you drift too far you might get eaten by chaos, madness and reptilian-insect nomads. And while I agree that there are many philosophers, scientisists and priests (do you mean theurgists and mystics also?) that advocate types of 'dreams' (or realities) that are not worth crossing the road for, there are also persons working under those categories that are worth collaborating with to co-create rich religious and cultural worldviews. For example, I think that you'll find that deep-ecology, environmentalism, and certain forms of feminism can offer great resources for your ecological sentiments. The idea of 'detraditionalisation' taken to the extreme often results in nihilism and world-annihilation -- one man takes on the world -- by claiming that all is corrupt and steeped in dogma. I prefer to co-create and collaborate with my fellow peers, negotiating what works and doesn't work for us -- inquiring into life in the here and now -- while standing on the shoulders of the giants that have come before me.

Tonight you walk outside alone to bask in the calm and brisk evening. While gently gazing into the stars, contemplating the days events, a tinny blue and white light moves through the sky and grasps your eye. Your chest and torso begin to gently open as if the pores of your skin are sightly breathing light. The blue and white point in the sky suddenly comes swiftly towards you, leaving a tail of fine geometric-patterned light behind it. The light turns-out to be a kind of space craft. It arrives in front of you. And then they appear. An alien life form of indescribable beauty and grace. They are technologically, ethically and spiritually far more advanced than anything you have ever ever imagined - let alone seen. They communicate telepahically and you are %100 sure that they are extremely technologiclly, ethically and spiritually advanced -- eminating an immense form of love that you have never ever felt. They propose, "Come with us to our lands. You will be taken in as one of us and treated with none other than the hights of respect and love [*remember, they are an ethically advanced culture]. Your fleshly body will be instantly upgraded to the latest immortal light-body that the universe has to offer. However, if you do join us you will never be able to return to Earth... Or, alternatively, we leave you here, now, and you never hear from us again". Would you go?

huh? attachment vs illusion. What do you mean?

Hey that's a good point. VIVA LA FREEDOOOOOOOOOOM!!!! These 'beautiful and graceful' aliens are beginning to seem like Nazi's inviting Jews onto the death trains. If they weren't dishing-up rhubarb pie, then I definitely wouldn't go

A copy of bob dylan's 'when you gonna wake up'... oh and perhaps reflecting on those wounded qualities that cause one to unconsciously project salvation onto 'Arrogant Know-it-all Charlatans' at the expense of critical reflection and reality. yet maybe in certain circumstances such a projection doesn't come from a place of unconscious wounding but is simply a normal process of social maturation, ie. learning different ways to discern, judge, feel, reason and contemplate while relating to other people; the 'pulling-back' of projections and finding your own centre so that you may interact (or not interact) with the centre of the other

I just read a great article entitled 'And end history. And go to the stars: Terence Mckenna and 2012' by Wouter Hanegraaff, in the book: Cusack, C. (2009) 'Religion and retributive Logic'. One of the central arguments is that Jose Arguelles (perhaps the leading foundational figure behind the 2012 prophecy movement) only published his ideas on the now famous Mayan Dec 21st 2012 date after meeting with Terence Mckenna in 1985 (p.309). And that although Mckenna announced that his timewave zero theory (which claims Dec 2012 as the end-of-time) was disproved (see below) it hasn't stopped numbers of people believing that the 2012 phenomenon is some sort of 'divine-more-than-human-prophesy' and not fabricated by sloppy mathematics and mushroom-channeling hybridising with Arguelles' highly critiqued thoughts on Mayan time systems. The article demonstrates a sympathetic udnerstanding of T. and D. McKennas story and is highly worth reading for those interested in this sort of thing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoXPZPnmBTU

Hmm.. Like puting theo back in theory?

Hi Angel, thanks for the illuminating thoughts, and welcome to the forum. I very much like the sounds of moving beyond pedestrian perennialism and the idea of intentional religious hybrids. Yet, what exactly do you mean by: I like to chew Kenyan Khat leaves, though should I honour the coercive structures of female circumcision that the Kenyan Kikuyu peoples notoriously practice? Or perhaps by protesting against such practices I am honouring the females who don't want their vaginas (and orgasisms) mutilated. Is it possible to 'honour all', including those values and practices that contridict each other? Perhaps I am miss-understanding your use of 'honour' here? ................ A spirituality that works to liberate relationships. This sounds timely. Especially given the plight of rampant individualism and social-disintegration in the modern world. What do you mean by psychedelic use oriented towards liberating relationships? It sounds extremely fascinating.

So here we have it, a probably young, white, Aussie DMT-enlightened prophet declaring that 'the transcendent state' of all religions is more or less a disembodied Wilberian-Vedanta non-dual reduction. Hubris, inflated, bolstered, naive, imperialistic and clumsy all appear to fit the bill. While Non-duality, 'the void', and emptiness, are popular teleologies imported from the East to the (New Age - psychedelic) West, the traditional sources of these doctrines are not in agreement over the nature and truth of 'the non-dual transcendent state'. For example, in the Hindu tradition nonduality (as Satchitananda) is not categorically the same as the Buddhist doctrine of Nirvana. In the theistic religions (eg. Judaism, Islam, Christianity) the 'One-truthism' of non-duality is further problimatised. For example, for certain Persian mystics non-duality is not the ultimate end, but one important phase on the road to certain kinds of embodied angelic theophanies. People often cling to the non-duality telos (ultimate end-point, purpose) because it destroys person-to-person relationship including the possibility for dialogue and argument. Therefore his position is protected, or hidden, in the oblivion beyond; a psychological defense bleeding into narcissism and authoritarianism. ..................... So when persons says that 'all religious rivers lead to the same cosmic ocean', I become very suspicious over the way they are pushing their own creed.

worth and value are only measured by how much a person is 'destined to discover anything or start a movement that helps the human race'? Man that's a tough value system. Most people I know don't really fit that destiny, but the world is still much the richer with them. If you did join the super-evolved aliens, Thunder, your humility and honesty would surely be missed in this forum, i know that much

I find Schreiber's constant declaration of a perennial religion/spirituality (the idea that all paths lead to the same destination) extremely imperialistic and neo-colonial. There are many diverse religious ultimates that sit in stark contridiction to each other, for example, from theistic theophany to non-dual emptiness. Do all roads really led to the toad road??? When he proclaims that 'all paths lead to the same destination' the worlds cultural and spiritual diversity is rubbished in the name of prophetic rhetoric and the mobilisation of his own movemet. A common political move to enlist believers. I do enjoy a good story teller who can weave the imaginal and causual worlds, but when the underlying ethics are corrupt, I do fear for the followers. ....... The US supreme court recently agreed that Mr Dan Winter is in fact a crpto-tyrannical alien from the planet Arcturus sent to earth to manipulate and mutilate young New-Age entheogenic minds.

I like this.

I'd stay. There have been certain times in my life when I might have accepted a 'cosmic ticket' outta here. Though, really, I personally wouldn't toss all this away for anything, regardless how novel it is. Though I can feel and see the attraction! It's interesting to use a Weberian spectrum of 'world-accepting to world-denying' to analyse peoples answers to the story. as for the 'maybe it's a trick'... just go with it, hypothetically, that you are sure they are legit, and feel-into whether you'd go or not.

There is a lot there. I'm not entirely sure what to respond to but I'll try and choose the major things that come-up for me. The view that there is a 'landscape' of real reality which each culture or person perceives in cotnridiction to THE ULTIMATE REAL reality of things, aligns with the Cartesian-Kantian vacuum that I critiqued in the previous post. I think that 'maps' are dynamic realities. Cultural-linguistic maps appear to be constantly co-created through consensual interplay with an always undefinable pregnant mystery. We participate with interfaces of embodied sensitivities (sight, hearing, movement, memory, speculation, dreaming, desire, ethical, aesthetic) and it appears that our 'maps' are REAL yet peculiar or specific dimensions of this overall experience of embodiment. I guess that broadly speaking, I am actually really interested in rationalising the structures and dynamics of life by participating in philosophical and theurgical dialogue, yet I do try not to get too carried away with intellecual bondage when it comes to the big questions. I think that the pragmatic (or practical) dimensions of belief often reveal greater truths than the intellectual-rational dimensions. So like William James and other pragmatists tend to push, I like to consider, 'well what does this or that belief DO to the process and experience of my life, including the life of my peers and the worlds I inhabit'. World as illusion makes me shrivel up and hide, or bolster with grandiosity above and beyond the world, both forms of narcissism if you ask me. Back to my initial critique of 'map' vs 'real reality'. Such a belief leaves me feeling like the world is not quite real, nearly true, but ultimately just a map of a real terrain that I will never truly know. It makes much more sense to see epistemic landscapes (thinking) as real yet subject to peculiar dynamics, including particular relationships to embodiment and interpersonal becoming. Rather than primarily separating the cogito (Cartesianism), as an alien artefact that can't REALLY relate to the world, that cannot ever be in TRUE accordance with other dimensions of embodiment, that is, in interbeing agreement, I prefer to see thinking as a faculty of existence that is born intimately in relation to the broader phenomenon of experience, and thus the experience of given reality itself--- of things appearing REAL in any given moment. The findings of quantum physics and the inseparable relationship between perceiving and perceived suggests that we are harmonically attuned in a reciprocal bipolar symmetry to the world. It seems that the world is being constantly made real by the experiencer (and this 'making real' is subject to embodied experiences, interpersonal action, thinking, contemplating, dreaming, and a whole gammat of other dimensions which include yet are not separate from forces of 'nature'; gravity, wind, heat etc.). I therefore think that the cultural-linguistic 'maps' are vital forces in the construction and manipulation of our dynamic realities, including what tends be called material phenomena. Once, as an organism, humans couldn't see colour. Yet what is colour without an eye to see? Surely there is an intimate interplay between the psychic geometric gases of thought and the physical structures of life. We do not generally listen to music with our eyes nor paint pictures with our olfactory system (smell). Our eardrums resonate with TRUE sound, our eyes resonate with TRUE light. Sometimes we might hear things or see things that no one else present perceives but they are simply true sensitivities particular to the laws of different dimensions of being. Thinking is played out in a unique dimension of being, one that traverses past and future, space, and dabbles in the illustrious imaginal plane. Sensitivities (including thinking, or devising 'maps', and not simply hearing, seeing, smelling, intuiting, erotic feelings; aesthetic, ethic, imaginal etc.) are all part of this world, may influence and be influenced by each other, yet are each peculiar to certain non-fixed laws, a la, the multidimensional relativity of co-creative participation. Truth, or truths, therefore appear to me as relative points that may reveal transconceptual realities (excite other dimensions of experience). We might not 'see' the ALL in ALL due to organic partiality, yet we are indeed nibbling on true slices of the cake. Try smelling the wind at the beginning of spring and tell me that it ain't completely real?

Hi Archaea. Great thoughts and questions. The logos of existence and the cosmos in reference to the experiencing subject is big stuff--- no easy answers there hey! Thanks for offering such deep contemplation and clear articulation. I found your thoughts creative and much of it inspiring. For me... I personally don't completely buy-in to the appropriated Eastern ideas of emptiness, nirvana and non-dualism as the telos and salvation or drive of my life. In fact, it appears to me that spiritual practices which attempt to completely do away with the self (i.e. anatta, non-dualism, world as illusory etc.) denote forms of pathological world-escapism; the ignorant by-passing of everyday life, up-and-out fleeing, dissolving of self to dissociate from the realities of human embodiment. I can see how such ideas may be so appealing... it isn't easy being embodied and facing the challanges of life (family, friends, work, health, purpose etc.). It makes so much more sense to MY experience (not the 'holy' truths i read in teh Rig Veda, Bible, or Shipibo myths, but MY immediate and primary being) to see the given world as REAL, including my self, body and intitmate relation to all there is. To say that the world is an illusion sounds utterly propostrous to me. In contrast, to see the world (including me) as made of God, to divinify the self and the relational fields I have with other persons, allows reality air to breath. So for me and my dealings with reality, it appears that I am at once world-unified and world-seperate , a human node participating in a unique self-disclosure of spirit, in collaboration with other nodes or selves. Last time i check I was here, writing on a computer, drinking tea, listening to the wind blow outside, as A REAL PERSON in a REAL WORLD. It tend to see myself as an agent that is produced by and creatively participates in cultural-linguistic frameworks (language, beliefs, symbols) and multidimensional sensualities (sight, hearing, intuition, imaginal, erotic, aesthetic, poetic) to co-enact reality with my peers. I do indeed think that interpersonal action is the real juice of spiritual life (not individualised and narcissistic self as nothing, self as illusion, dissociation from world). If the self is illusion, then it follows that the other is illusion. It is such a far-out and detached position and seems to increadibly fragment and mutilate the potential harmony and divine presence which the REAL persons around you may provide. I much prefer to peek into a friends REAL eyes, hold the hand of my REAL beloved, hear a story from a REAL friend, than to negate my self from the world to dodge suffering. Toughen up, I say. Keep chopping wood, or better yet, carving your life's wonderous sculpture, yet try not to get too carried away worrying about the splinters and wounds of embodied labour. A little bit of ointement now and then should do the trick... and there are many different 'ointments' on offer ;) so my telos is here and now, in the REAL arena of spontaneous creativity that is born 'between' persons... or through interpersonal action. That is, the transpersonal, or divine, is in the interpersonal (though with the notion of person extending to other-than-human domains). below is an excerpt from a peice i am writing on particiaptory spirituality. I'd really love to hear your opinions. The participatory turn is based on notions of religious pluralism (multiple truths and multiple religious ultimates) and the co-created nature of reality as disclosures that are born from different types of participation in the ultimate and dynamic eternal mystery.

Organ aesthetica and reciprocal action The clouds are nourished by a fusion of sun and land. In return, the land is hydrated and vitalised by clouds. Animals eat fruit, digest seeds into fertile pods of excretement thus transporting and ‘planting’ future trees—and in a reciprocal action, the ‘seed-carrier’ animal receives sugars and energy from the fruit. Humans tend to give their personal efforts to those who are enacting related forms of effort. It appears that systems of reciprocity are undertaken by all life-forms, each gearing towards various types of cyclical balance or homeostasis in worlds that are shared. The multiple conquests of existence seem to unfold through kinds of relational multidimensional companionship; a great voyage where ‘ships of companions’ (beings) negotiate and bask in reciprocity with others. Yet, why is 'beauty' in such a world? When humans perceive forms of beauty in the world, for example in a cloud, beach, or forest, a type of reciprocal action is being experienced. In other words, our unique ability to discern and feel beauty—our aesthetic organ or gaze—emerges in resonance to that which is beautiful. Based on my personal experience, the capacity to perceive beauty appears to be but another example of shared reciprocity. The clouds are nourished by a genuine moment of perceived beauty. The forests are invested with eros in the act of receiving honest, embodied and emotionally-fuelled perceptions of beauty. The ‘organ aesthetica’ is a unique spiritual limb that may touch things from a distance, blessing certain beings in certain circumstances with love, eros and good fortune. Yet a strange and familiar consonance often arises when beauty is perceived. The perceiving ‘self’ and the perceived ‘other-than-self’ may harmonise together collectively generating a novel surge of life-force. The act of perceiving beauty intoxicates the person who is pouring the other a glass of wine. In such a case, both persons are implicated in the presence of beauty, resulting in a dynamic merging and transformation of self and other as the two hybridise the spontaneous might of eternity. Such an experience is intimate, spectacular and numinous. If perceived beauty is truly received by the other then both members may dive into the ecstatic waters of embodied heaven where co-created felt beauty reconfigures the dull, cramped, and heaviness of being into a divine courtship. Organ aesthetica is therefore the prized dish at any organ-ic banquet. It is an advanced technology of cross-being relationality par exallance. Ability aesthetica is a corroborated and pragmatic device that enables spontaneous emanations of love, truth and creative wonder. Yet, our aesthetic organ or gaze is not limited to sight in order to bloom. Olfactory, tactile, auditory and the imaginal mind are also mediums in which organ aesthetica finds its presence. We touch and are touched by the world when surrendering to beauty—birthing a strange, and often fleeting, moment that unites apparently disparate entities in a unique reciprocal symmetry—a collaborated miracle of divine proportion.

Sorry, I did write it from my phone. Though it still does looks pretty clear to me. What part aren't you's getting? I just thought that I should mention certain psychodynamics which are often (*but not always) associated with those of a theophanic persuasion-- the drive to 'meet' God, become God, ascend to the heavens, dissolve the self and personality into God etc. (God as the All in All). It is well documented that people commonly (unconsciously and/or consciously) turn to religion and spirituality from a position of lack, failure, social and family alienation including the subsequent ill-emotions that come with these types of typical human challenges. Theophanic quests may appear attractive to those who feel 'out of place' in the world. What better answer to feeling out of place than to 'ascend' out of this place. This form of escapism tends to be supported by group or consensual cultural codes, myths and roles - the bolstered individual striving to be God (to be 'every-thing' as opposed to 'some-thing') and the similar individual who is professing 'absolute' truth both find a new home among similar psychopathological characters -- folks who tend to compete with and feed on the cultural capital (status) of each other -- ironically continuing to live alienated from themselves and each other. For an example --*read the following with an arrogant messianic tone-- ("I am not me, I am the all" -- "I am beyond the self, beyond social dynamics, I am THE dynamic of All, the Almighty Self, God, and therefore I do not have to consider other 'selves' as I am The Self of everything"). This not considering the 'other' is commonly discussed in the discourse on narcissism; self-inflated egomaniacs. One of the common problems in the case discussed above, is that the everyday challenges of embodied spiritual realities (interpersonal negotiation, ethical harmony, work, family, and sense of place in the world) are replaced by shallow narratives of otherworldly ecstacy and God-All-Mightiness; the ultimate power 'above and beyond this pesky earth realm'. The world is denied as the initially alienated person becomes more alone in their self-obsessed yet culturally validated disorder. "I am the All, not held responsible for MY past, my family and friend relationships, my work disputes, my interaction with the law, because I am **THE LAW of LAWS**, and am GOD o mighty! That is, I am not personal, I am transpersonal, God. ................ This map of social-individual sickness very roughly describes what is perhaps the greatest disease of contemporary western spirituality - including entheogenic circles. Though having said all that, not all people who desire to be touched by the hand of God, explore the divine erotic with an angel, melt into the God-head etc. are wounded life-escapists (yet as I mentioned, currents of narcissistic escapism appear to dominate much new-age (inc. entheogenic) thought and practice, and it takes practice and the right perspectives to see this in its subtleties and dramatic moments). In response to this epic malady that cripples our social sphere like cancer, I acknowledge that we are pack-animals, and work better attuned as collectives rather than each alienated as narcissistic messianic escapists, and there I advocate an embodied, grounded in the 'here and now', sensual and interpersonal spirituality that participates in the unfolding of being while remaining anchored here on earth, as "a" being that is separate and unified to "the" being, God. As Terence Mckenna said, it is the differences which make the world the wondrous and magnificent place it is -- He appears to be saying, be wary of people who are advocating a 'becoming-all' process for humanity, that is, a becoming God or All (as in the 'ultimate similarity', the All in All). Chances are these people are narcissistic escapists trying to feed of your insecurities by professing a wonky authority that is apparently backed up by access to 'being Everything'... how messianic and deranged can you get??? Also, in response to the division between micro-cosm and macro-cosm, self and all, Henry Corbin the French philosopher cum Persian mystic speaks of the mutual resonance between perceiving and being. In order to see an angel, you must be an angel. If you happen to stumble upon an angel, reflect back on yourself and see how you are, chances are you'll be an angel too! Same goes with witnessing beauty and ugliness in the world; it is a kind of calibrated mutual harmony between self and other. Therefore the division between man and god is not necessarily a hindrance. anyway,,,,,,,, so hopefully my original comment is a bit clearer now?? If i was Blake and did see the universe in a grain of sand i'd ask, well what does this change in my life, with my feet on the ground?.. Universe, god, be more pragmatic (or practical)!?!

Theophanic tendencies often cover or hide a subtely distressed presence that dodges the dramas and pains of embodiment by dissociating into etheric states and principles... by drowning out reality with an escapist consensual imaginarium. If i was Blake and did see the universe in a grain of sand i'd ask, well what does this change in my life, with my feet on the ground?.. Universe, god, be more pragmatic!?!