It wasn't until 1984, after I heard Terence McKenna interviewed by Michael Toms on New Dimensions radio, that I became interested in the other materials that Lux Natura had to offer at the time, including The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens and the I-Ching, and Terence's Collected Talks. Having heard someone who had the courage to speak out publicly about the psilocybin experience as something sacred, having validity and truth at its core, I found myself responding with joy to what had always drawn me toward itself as an authentic spiritual call to awakening. Right after that interview, I bought the True Hallucinations audio tapes and began corresponding with Terence by snail mail (all that was available then), discussing, among things, group experiences I was having with fellow graduate students. I finally arranged to meet with Terence when he presented a weekend seminar in Chicago in 1989 at Oasis Center. I will always be deeply grateful to Terence for making the mystery of the mushroom more widely available and allowing it to "take its place in my life as the shining light that it is."
Following listening to Terence's inspired expositions of his experiences with the mushroom, I eventually found my way to Alvaro Estrada's autobiography of Maria Sabina, as well as the writings of Enrique Gonzalez Rubio on Maria and the Mazatecan cultural traditions and the place of the mushroom in their cosmology. I actually had not read R. Gordon Wasson's The Wondrous Mushroom: Mycolatry in Mesoamerica until March of 2006, when a friend sent me a copy as a birthday gift, and which I cannot recommend too highly. I feel that the mushroom has drawn me into its deeper mysteries in the same way that Wasson was drawn in by it on his first experience. It represents a spiritual compass in my life. I am still bowled over by the almost continuous wave of synchronicities that it has made me aware of as the inner and outer worlds continue their merger into the one reality.
Terence's willingness to speak out about these things, whether well formulated or not, misguided or not, served to cheer on those of us drawn to the light in the natural psychedelic experience, to find the courage to explore it more deeply and discern what is potentially there. Some of us have been graced with the blessings of the deeper initiations it holds in store. For myself, encounters with "los santos ninos" continue to be deep and profound, even after 33 years of experience. They have been a source of guidance and inspiration through some of my most difficult as well as most joyous of times. There is something inside the mushroom that is ancient, deep, and vast. It speaks for itself, for those willing to listen.
I have been listening to a set of CDs from Peter Kingsley, Return to Eternity, which expresses the mystical perspective of the deeper mystery underlying the birth of our Western civilization. He asserts that Empedocles, Parmenides, Pythagorus, the pre-Socratic Greek philosophers, came out of the ancient Central Asian tradition, also known as the Kwajagan, and intentionally sowed the seeds of our modern civilization, based on rationalism, with some trickery behind it all. He goes further to insist that he has been initiated directly by Empedocles, an immortal being, into this ancient tradition, much like Henri Corbin was initiated by the twelfth century Sufi martyr, Suhrawardi, through forceful intrusion into his inner and outer life. Suhrawardi stated that the Sufi tradition had its roots in the ancient Greek philosophers, specifically Empedocles. That this tradition is a reality, I have no doubt. My life too has been turned topsy-turvy by contact with these immortal beings of the tradition that has its roots in Central Asia.
The mushroom has shown itself to me as a manifestation of a spiritual force that has its root in the realm of these higher, immortal beings, as well as deeper into the formless realm, and beyond either. On this Earth, it migrated from Central Asia to the Americas across the Bering Straits over 35,000 years ago, where the mystery remained alive in Mesoamerica. Mystics generally remain silent about these things for good reason. Attempts to put them into words limits what can only be understood as a living mystery and opens it to misinterpretation, misunderstanding, and denigration. The secret of the mushroom protects itself, and requires some basic virtues to be approached. What we are looking at with the mushroom, when approached with humility and respect, is a living spiritual mystery. It has drawn me in completely. I simply encourage people to approach it using the ancient method of incubation: lying down in silent darkness, attending to sensation; singing, chanting, praying, as inspired. Simply ask for "los santos ninos" to come and teach you. Approached in this simple way, they will speak directly to your soul and will show you mystery beyond mystery. The world is deep. Deeper than we can know.
recent report from a friend who is working with the Golden Teacher strain of cubensis:
I'm going to make this brief, as I'm still swooning and at a loss for words. My account has not yet been languaged, so I will give my fiance's account of last night's vigil/velada:
In the early part, as it was coming on, I was drumming and singing...and fell into a complete trance. In her words,
'as you fell into the trance, I turned towards you and in the drum saw an image of a mountain at the base of which was a hole. In the hole was a light, and coming out of the hole was a rope that was strung through your throat. As you were singing, souls were emerging from the hole and emitting immense sighs of relief. Then I turned my gaze towards your face, and I could not believe what I saw...you had wings, Chris...you had wings that were rising above your head.
At first they were closed, and I saw a light behind them that was shielded. Then your singing built in intensity and everything started dancing and sheening, and your wings flared out and I saw this light coming out of your entire body: it was cyan blue and glowing and I was terrified. Then you looked at me unblinking and pointing towards the hole in your drum said,
'this is where your soul alone must go,' and turning your winged back towards me, you flew out of the room and I was alone in utter darkness...'
I remember circling the mountain, it was alive...I could hear it's voice, it was somewhere in the himalaya's or something, then I was somewhere in the stratosphere and the planet was telling me something about respiratory distress, and I was feeling it's pain...there's more
I came to ~3hrs later and I was in the livingroom...I wasn't able to perceive my own body for another 2hours, though I was fully functional...I just couldn't see it. If I danced around, I could vaguely perceive swirling energetic patterns...
We are spiritual beings who have chosen to interface with the physical plane
On the seventh day after our initial experience, I dreamt I was sleeping again on the couch and awoke to the sound of a voice, 'I will show you what happened'
I looked into the space above me and saw a circular outline that then brought the atmosphere of the surrounding space into a crescendo of perceptual intensity and pitch. Then, flaring outwards, the sphere enveloped the entire room in flaming white light...
I looked at everything around me and knew that I had utterly and completely lost my mind, it was all beyond real, beyond the domain of rational/preceptive thought, beyond consciousness itself, flaming and burning out everything, unendurable and endless, life/death/pleasure/pain inextricably bound up in one self-sustained burning instant, expanding stardust. Through this week, this burning has endured within the heart reaching across space.
In the days since, both my fiance and I have been waking up to the sight of these glowing blue orbs floating in the space above us. My fiance has seen them, on ocassion, become more tubular and pressed out like discs. Two nights ago, as I awoke to these orbs...I was very clearly able to make out a face...it was as if the orb wanted me to see it's face, 'thus am I called'
In a vision, as I sat with friends, I opened my eyes and everyone had vanished. The house was empty and the windows had been blown out, everywhere was covered in white snow...
it was all silence and emptiness, peace and forever...
Recent experience with ps. mexicana species:
I ate 5 pair of fresh Ps. mexicana, while Evenstar consumed only 1. As the transition came, I sat in the easy chair in the family room and eased into it by resting attention on the breath, my old and familiar friend. As attention settled on the breath, I closed my eyes and became aware of space extending into infinity all around. The mind became silent and still, identified with emptiness and the infinite extension of space. Peace filled the room. Evenstar came and sat with me, resting on the couch beside me. We sat together, drinking in the silence, stillness, and peace for hours. As we were returning, Evenstar noted that we had been sitting silently together for the entire afternoon. She said she felt as if she had just had a good night's sleep, recharged, and filled with energy. Such wonderful, deeply healing energy in these little mushrooms. So amazing....