The Divine Feminine

I didn't go to Yemaya Festival this weekend to reconnect with my feminine side, I went to a bush doof, as usual, to dance. But the universe had other plans for me.

Adorned with feminine colours, designs, shapes and symbols, Yemaya was representative of the mother goddess of the ocean, the divine feminine. I like to look at the divine feminine at its core aspect - Yin.

Yin is feminine, water, earth, soft, night, dark, shadow, passive, receiving, yielding, gentle, slow, consuming, cold.

In contrast, I am a rather yang person. I am very upbeat, extroverted, bright, bubbly and energetic. I like to control, and I am stubborn and unmoving, unlike the soft, accepting and allowing qualities of the feminine.

But this weekend at Yemaya has changed how I use feminine energy in my life, and it all happened in an extraordinary didgeridoo healing session.

At 7pm on the Saturday night, our group was pretty high and we were in the process of figuring out what we all wanted to do (A mighty task while on LSD). I tried to dance at my usual favourite place at a bush doof, the main stage, with high energy psychedelic trance booming from the speakers. But after a few minutes by myself, I wanted to go back to my friends. 

My best friend declared that she would be attending a didge healing session at 8pm. I'd never participated in the healing spaces at a bush doof before, and was keen to try it out.

We entered the space a bit early to settle in before the healing. It was a large dome-like space, with pink silk sheets drooped from the middle of a ceiling, where a crystal chandelier hung like the crown jewel. I had seen a vagina sculpture in crystal healing space a bit earlier, and noted again the vagina-reminiscent decor.

To tell you the truth, this vagina stuff was quite confronting for me, even as a female (I wonder how my male friends took all of this in). It wasn't until later that I realized that our culture shames female genitalia, and this is why it was so confronting to see a vagina sculpture blatantly staring me in the face.

Despite this, the warm pink sheets and the mood-lit space were highly inviting. There were people snuggled amongst blankets and pillow, with my friend smack bang in the middle. Feeling like a deer caught in headlights, thanks to the overemphasizing effects of lysergic acid, I went straight over and sat with her.

There was a kind of open-mic thing going on, and a young dreadlocked woman named Megan came to sit up at the mic to share her poetry. I immediately thought that this was an amazingly brave thing to do, to open yourself up to a bunch of strangers and trust they would pay you respect. (And that they did, which is a wonderful thing about bush doofs.) Megan, with a strong spoken word and conviction, proceeded to read us multiple poems that are all beautifully blended in my memory, exposing her life with themes of womanhood, children, love, heartbreak, and the body. One that touched me in particular was about fat on the body. I have always hated my stomach fat, wishing it wasn't there, and at the end of the poem she encouraged us, with her soft, kind voice, to touch that problem part of our bodies, and tell it we love it. Light giggles echoed as the room filled with love for our bodies. And when I gently held my stomach and told it I loved it, unlike the other times I have tried, this time I actually meant it.

Megan had set the scene for the healing with her poetry, uniting the room with laughter and love. There was a sense of solidarity within the space as the didgeridoo healing man began to set up. We lay down with our heads on pillows, and a beautiful stranger covered my friend and I with a blanket. The healing ceremony started with a light drumming beat to ground the energies. And as I closed my eyes, the the man said "Let yourself fall into the earth"...

My breath flowing out let me fall deeper and deeper. I was restless at first, trying to relax to the abrasive sounds of the healing didge, which were unlike the more melodic sounds we usually hear from Aboriginal educators who come to schools and cultural centres. I kept opening my eyes to make sure I was still in the room, and my friends were still there. My closed eye visuals were confusing and full of colour. But after a while, I was deep within myself. Deeper than I had ever been before. My breathing was so slow, and with every breath, I felt my body let go of tension. And after the bodily tension was gone, my breathing was penetrating my very inner layer. My whole being was opened by my breath, my inner self expanding and expanding. I was seeing and feeling places so deep within my self that I was sure would take YEARS to access without the help of the LSD (which I like to think of as a spiritual lubricant). My breath finally reached a tiny red tent like structure right at the middle of my being. I was sure this was me, hiding away in there. By now, I had forgotten I was even on LSD, or that I was at yemaya festival, or that there was time. I was now in the deepest meditative state I had ever experienced.

It was about now that the didgeridoo sounds "clicked" into my body. I had started letting go of control and trusting, and my deep breathing had allowed the sound to enter my being and start healing me. But to heal, you first need to get the dirt out. I started seeing all this dark stuff being scraped out of the particles that I consisted of. I was far more than a 3-dimensional matrix, a vast rainbow pixellated like structure that was woven into the space around me and beyond. The didge sounds were like rakes on my being. It kept raking and raking the soul crap into a pile, until a climax was reached and the sounds gently brought us back down, releasing it all, and bringing us back for another round. I surrendered to the sounds which were now making my body arch and twitch, and my breathing got faster as the energy rushed through me and whirlpooled out, taking all the stagnant stuff with it. My gut even churned as if the didge was cleaning out my physical body! I had never experienced healing like this before. When doing more gentle, subtle healing in my old psychic development class, we were told that stuff would come up for us as it was released, but this was like everything was released through me at once. It was super intensive, and there was no denying that it was real.

All of this was uncomfortable at first, I had never experienced anything like this before, nor trusted anything to come so far into my being. I hadn't even seen this much of me before! My body is so much more than anything I could have ever dreamed of. On the very inside, it is as big as the sky, and all of this is contained deep deep deep inside the very center of me. But I never looked! We're always too scared to look, afraid of who we are and afraid of what we might discover. But by letting go and relaxing everything, I was able to peek in, and eventually, let the healing right into me at a deep soul level. I could feel the transformation happening. The didgeridoo reached right into my soul and pulled out chunks of darkness like they were thorns embedded deep into the skin. Now that I had gotten used to it, and I could literally see how beneficial this was for me, I could have stayed there for hours. But eventually I had to get up.

I got up way too fast, like when your alarm wrenches you out of a super deep sleep. I pulled myself out of the deepest parts of me, stood up, literally stumbled out of the healing space, disoriented, and was gasping from the intensity of the healing. It took me a while to be able to think clearly again but the most amazing thing I was feeling that I was VERY grounded. I was right into my body, I could feel every part of it and could feel my feet on the ground. This is a huge deal for me, as a double Aquarius who spends most of her time in her head and the sky. I was stomping my feet on the ground like it was the best feeling ever! And it was - I have NEVER felt to connected to my body, and the earth beneath it. Just, wow.

I was pretty spent and we all wanted to chill away from the intense energies of the party, so we all went back to our campsite. To my surprise, it was only 10pm. My estimate at this point was 3am or 4am. Long story short, I stayed up all night chatting with my dearest friends. I had a sleep, and in the morning, as I walked into the bush, the sun greeted me. I felt it all over my skin, bathing me in warmth. I walked, feeling all the movement in my legs and feeling the solid earth beneath my boots. I took my sweet time, gently stretching in the morning sunlight. So much peace filled me in all the places I had discovered the night before, in all the places that darkness had been removed from. I felt bigger, expansive, and deeply relaxed.

Later that day, I tried to sleep again. It didn't work, so I spent a good couple of hours just lying on my back in my tent, breathing deeply and stretching. I took my time that I never had before, and I stretched my body like I never had before, feeling every stretch as deep as it went, and observing how my body thanked me for it, for taking my time.

That's what I learnt at Yemaya. To take my time, like Yin, like the feminine, which is slow, and gentle, and soft. I learnt how to fully embrace myself, like a loving mother; embracing my body, my whole being, and embracing the chance to heal.
I learnt to yield, to be vulnerable, to let go, accept and receive. Like the vagina yields to the male, yield to the present moment; accept it, embrace it. Let yourself breathe, let yourself relax, and slow down.
Breathing IS acceptance! The deeper the breath, the deeper the acceptance. Slow down, breathe, and accept every part of yourself. Accepting is connecting... Slow down, breathe, and connect to your body and to the Earth. Allow yourself to feel, and be vulnerable, even though it is scary... Allow yourself to receive love and healing with grace, even though it is scary... Allow yourself to let go of control, even though it is scary!

When you let go, when you become soft, when you embrace all that is Yin, the feminine, you literally open yourself up to possibilities, knowledge, love and peace.

You open yourself up to YOU.

Sin and forgiveness

If you take the offical version of God to be true, then when you confess, you are confessing to a loving deity who will immediately release you and fill you with forgiveness. If you take God as I described it in my last post, then when you confess, you are admitting to the core of your being that you did something wrong. This is how I confess. I feel the guilt heavy in my gut, and I say to myself with no words, "alright, I did the wrong thing.. what now?"

The difficult thing about my type of confession is that it takes work to be forgiven. First you have to truly recognize and feel what you have done. Then you have to find the strength and love to let go of that feeling. You don't just say sorry and then your remorse is magically scooped up by the light and taken away. You have to fight your way past the ego, and the ego does not forgive. It wants you to suffer so you remember the pain you have caused yourself and others. This may be a protection mechanism, but it only holds you back from liberating yourself. Once you access the God self, the part of you that is everything, the part of you that loves you and knows you are worth unconditional love, you can forgive yourself and you can can finally let go of the past. You are freed from the pain by forgiveness, but you'll never forget that lesson. The day you can remember the lesson and not feel the shame and misery is the day you have truly forgiven yourself.

The thing about this is, how would psychopaths confess, if they don't feel deeply for what they have done? If they can't confess, they can't be forgiven. In my opinion, psychopaths, who have different brain structures in the areas of emotion and empathy, are the furthest removed people from their true selves. They are so far removed that they cannot even recognize when they have hurt another being, a being who in truth has always been part of them. They are so far removed that they would not ever be able to find a true and lasting love for themselves or anyone else. I wonder how a spiritual being could get so far away from themselves. I guess if you have had a parent with pain, or if your own life pain was so deep that it was unbearable to feel, then the ego would block out anything and everything to protect yourself. Even if it means blocking out your emotions, a release and expression of your energy. And the further they fall, the harder it is to feel again, and they become living demons; a human image of their dark, black hole energy. And you can see it in their eyes, the light has been extinguished.

I'm glad I'm not a psychopath, but I see why they exist. Feelings are hard to feel sometimes. Especially those of remorse and guilt. You can see why their ego protects them from it when you have felt it. I feel terribly guilty for a lot of things I have done, and somehow cannot find it within me to forgive myself for some of them. Maybe it is because I have not received forgiveness from the other person or being. I feel if they are still hurting then I cannot forgive myself. But being attached to their pain isn't doing me any favors. If anything it is probably binding them to their own pain at a deeper level. Still doesn't help, it is like my mind thinks I need to be punished.

Now that I think about it that is such a common mentality in western society... we want to see people suffer for what they have done. We see it as justice. We say "they deserve it". And the reason we can't forgive ourselves is because we treat ourselves the same as we treat others. Deep down we think we need to suffer for the pain we have caused others, rather than being loved and forgiven. Maybe the reason I beat myself up so much is because that's what I've been taught is right.

That is actually pretty messed up.
I guess that's why Buddhism focuses so much on compassion; compassion and forgiveness for others will help us liberate ourselves from our own guilt.

I think it's time to exercise that long lost spiritual muscle, and learn to forgive myself.

Word vomit of illusion and love

I have been doing some thinking over the past week, after a bit of a stint in struggle street, and today the spark has come back in a big way.

Something terrible and unexpected happened to someone close to me, and it snapped me straight out of the illusion I'd gotten stuck in. That illusion is the material world. Yes it's here, and we have to live in it and survive in it, but its not the very essence of our being.

The fact that we are in this amazing universe for a fleeting amount of time makes us insignificant in the scheme of things, and that insignificance brings with it great freedom. We all live in a world where no one can tell us what to do or give us instructions on how to live life. We just somehow evolved here and no one can ever tell us why. So why do we let anyone else on earth control what we do? They don't know any better than we do how life should be. When eventually our whole earth ceases to exist no one is going to remember us. So why do we strive to make such an impression? Who do we do it for? Ourselves? Why do we feel we need to impress ourselves? Is it because we are our own inner judge? The only judge, the only 'god', that rules your life is you. Your intuition is that god part of you speaking to you in a language which isn't tangible and therefore not valued or not deemed 'real' by a materialist culture. In this culture (Alan Watts describes culture as an operating system- a great analogy), we use the 5 senses, mostly the eyes, to determine what is real. A physical, tangible reality. How do you define feeling in those terms? We can describe what feeling is like but there's no way to show another person exactly what you're feeling because it comes from within, not from an external source. So Materialist cultures value those external, easy to see and easy to believe things over internal things. They base our reality on the material realm, thinking that because its real, it must be the source of happiness. And of course god must be some tangible entity external and separate to your own self.

We have so many problems trusting that god self within because our cultures have us so focused on the external that we don't even think that inner self is real, in a sense. I know if I had a physical entity in front of me telling me 'yeah you can do it!' I would be way more inclined to believe it than the invisible inner self that I sometimes forget is even there because I can't see it, I can only feel it in a way that I can't be taught about. You're sposed to get to know it and trust it from the beginning but culture distracts us and we begin to distrust it because it has become unknown, a stranger. A lonely wail at the bottom of your being crying out for you to listen and be friends with it.

Your inner self, is kind to you. Be kind to your self and it can blossom like a friendship. It will be the kindest and most honest friend you can get, and you will find that you will never be alone. You will learn to love your self.

So right now I am hearing loud and clear instructions to go out and make a difference in the world. To unplug myself from this material world and open up to the reality that we are free and nothing lasts forever. There's no need to feel so attached to the physical world, because the end of you is the end of the illusion. There is no need to fear. We are all scared and that is more reason for us to connect with each other. We are so scared of people, but taking chances and risks with people can lead to some beautiful and magical life moments which would never be possible if we didn't trust that foreign stranger who offered to fix our bag at the airport, if we didn't take a chance to do something nice for someone that you don't even know, or if we didn't talk to each other about our feelings. But that part of us is ignored, and we are too scared to connect with others, we were never taught how. Its because no one knows!! Except for ourselves...we already know how to connect. Trust that inner want, the want that seems to terrifying to do but the most rewarding! And helps other people access that deep forgotten part of themselves too. Two awoken souls recognise each other immediately, its that feeling described as 'connection', which is really a re-connection. True reality is that we are all one and even though we are physically separated by our bodies, our soul connection is stitched together like a patchwork blanket in an invisible realm layered right over our environment. Don't ignore that fundamental part of reality. You can't ignore the physical part too, but don't take it so seriously, because it will not be the thing that brings you true happiness.

That's it for Stoned Saturdays.
I'm the rainbow lady, signing out for a good nights sleep.

Peace and love
<3

Intermission

The other weekend my old friends and I were sitting by a pool, our crystals laid out on deck chairs to cleanse in the sunlight. We had just been smoking a leisurely joint and began to talk about life and beauty, you know, the usual. Earlier I had seen my friend rescue a spider from the pool. I looked down beside me and I saw a ladybug on a tiny feather, floating near the edge of the pool. I scooped it up in my palm and lay it down on the concrete. Instantly, our conversation was diverted. We became transfixed at this sign of luck, the orange ladybug. We got on our bellies and watched with amazement as this incy wincy creature lifted its symmetrically patterned shell to reveal its tiny wings. As it attempted to dry its wings in this way, we noticed how intricately designed its shell was. Orange with little black patterns, almost as if they had been drawn on with a fine liner. It had two little eyes and legs smaller than the width of a hair. It was too perfect to be real. But there it stood, drying itself, preparing to fly off to safety.

I'm usually scared of bugs. Even ladybugs. But the love I experienced watching this creature overcame any disgust I could have felt. I'm sure the pot helped, I find it actually helps my brain detach from the feminine chaos of thought stream and focus in on one specific thing. But that's beside the point. We are so busy playing with our phones, worrying what we look like, trying to please other and our own egos, that we forget what a magical place we live in. We strive for our idea of perfection, when perfection already exists all around us. In the tiny ladybug, the veiny leaves of a plant, our own bodies that work effortlessly to keep us alive...

We take so much for granted... I take so much for granted.

I've been a bit disconnected lately, from myself. But what goes down must come back up again, and death always makes way for birth. I thought I was at a spiritual dead-end but when I think about it, I have learnt so much in the past two weeks, and a new theme is coming up for me: Yin and Yang.

Hopefully I'll be posting some more pretty soon :)

My love-hate relationship with religion

When I was in the third grade at my small Catholic school, everyone was preparing for their "Reconciliation" ceremony which would lead onto their receiving of the Holy Communion. While everyone else was nervous at the prospect of confessing all their sins to a priest, I was relieved that I didn't have to do so. My school had told me that I could not take part in these religious ceremonies, as I was baptized Anglican, not Catholic. In every subsequent monthly mass, while everyone else stood and lined up to receive the 'body of Christ', 'the bread', or 'communion', I would have to sit in silence and watch them. This was the beginning of my break from religion. We were taught that God loved everyone. Yet, my school basically told me I was not allowed to enter God's kingdom. As a small child, I recognized that if there really was a God, he would not exclude me based on my baptism or any other factor.

Since that moment I had a strong dislike towards Christianity, and Catholicism in particular, which I haven't been quite able to shake, even in my quest towards tolerance and acceptance of others. I felt that God could not have been real if he killed people or imposed rules on people. I disrespected the church every time I was there for weddings, baptisms or whatever reason. I really disliked (putting it nicely) the last Pope and what he stood for, though the new Pope is kind of more favourable. These beliefs about the church have also not been helped by all the bible bashers in America who want to convert Gay people because of a couple of passages in a book that is centuries old and should not be taken literally, at all. I still don't understand how people don't believe in magic, yet they believe there is a man in the sky who created us all. Go figure...

Anyway, religion has made a few appearances in my life where I have been forced to challenge these ideas that formed when I was so young. By the time I started to think about conspiracies, I had concluded that the Bible was a bunch of crap orchestrated by a patriarchy who desired to control the world with strict doctrines and fear. I then stumbled upon my first conspiracy thread, which talked about how the revelations was a prediction of the Roman Empire and how it had continued into modern day America. That was an extremely long but highly convincing thread about the parallels between society and the ancient text's account of our downfall. It was very compelling to me, but it required me to re-evaluate whether the Bible really was a bunch of bullcrap or whether it was something else, maybe a metaphor or a prediction, rather than a literal transcript of actual events. Some while later, I watched the documentary Zeitgeist, which highlighted the parallels between ancient religions and modern day religions. This again, was compelling to me, as that meant that the Bible had not been simply put together as fiction. It had some basis in history.

The most recent catalyst for a change in attitude has been beginning psychic development classes with my cousin, who can contact spirits and is into what people call "New Age" spirituality. And yet, he believes in angels, specifically Christian angels such as Jesus, Mary, Archangels Michael and Gabriel, and so on. He also refers to the "higher power" as 'God'. I have preferred not to do so, as just the word God symbolizes, to me, restriction, compartmentalization, strict beliefs and doctrines. But as I have developed throughout these classes, and developed more open-mindedness, I have realized that God is just the name for this thing that we can all feel within us. God does not need to mean "a man in the sky who kills people if they disobey him". God can just as well refer to the universe, or the cosmos, love, or the singularity before the big bang.

Maybe the God in the Bible doesn't even refer to an actual being. Maybe it is a metaphor of a symbol for the thing that connects us all. Reading "The Lost Symbol" by Dan Brown tonight has really opened my eyes to the potential symbolism of the Bible. I find it funny that God was the one thing I have strived to reject, when all along I have been lead along the path to find God. I still feel uncomfortable calling it God, I prefer calling it the universe, or love... To me, the universe is God. God is the universe. The universe is within me and it is within everyone else. It's also funny that throughout school we were constantly told that God is within us, and that God is everywhere at once. Because now I can see that this is SO true! We are all connected through God. It's just that everyone takes it too literally and thinks God is a man with a white beard who sits in the clouds! The truth is much more profound than that!

Indeed, we came from God and will one day return to God. But God will not meet us with open arms or a warm embrace.. we will one day return to the gigantic web of the universe where no physical boundaries exist between us. We will not be able to hug God, but we will feel as if we are a PART of God. Oneness!

It still feels wrong saying God. Too Christiany... I feel like a preacher. But there is no wrong way to say it, as long as we are all talking about the same thing I guess, so saying 'God' is a good exercise to reduce my own prejudice.

It feels good writing again! I plan to do a lot more soon :)

Until then,
Peace <3

Faith

Had a great chat at uni the other day with a vibrant girl from the Christian Union who approached me to talk about faith. After viewing a short cartoon, she asked me how it related to my own faith. The whole conversation that stemmed from there was surprisingly awesome, and I found that I connected well with this Christian girl, that in fact we shared very similar ideas about the world and the same values. It reminded me that we see the world from all different perspectives but what really unites us is love and understanding! 

I want to share with you a few things that I shared with her, as through this conversation I realized how very little I get to talk about something that I am so deeply passionate about. I also never thought of myself as a person with a faith, maybe because I don't name it. I just think of it as my set of beliefs.

God, or the Source, is for me, like in other religions, where we all came from. I like to think of the God concept as the Big Bang. At the moment, the widely accepted theory is that the Big Bang originated from a singularity- a single point of mass in a void where space and time did not exist. Considering that everything in our universe supposedly came from this singularity, it's rational to say that, since we were all 'one' when this happened, that we are still 'one' with everything around us. Everything we are made, the stars are made of, even what space is made of, originated from this point. This is why I love to say that we are all pieces of the puzzle; The puzzle of the universe! 

Another thing about my faith that aligns with others is that I have a similar set of values. When talking with this girl, we both believed that we should have love and compassion for one another, and that we are too selfish now and scared of connecting with people in this 'dog eat dog' world. For me, this stems from the belief that we are all one... If you are me, and I am you, what am I afraid of? Why would I want to hurt you? For me it's really sad that we compete and are jealous and hateful of one another because this reflects on and creates how we treat ourselves... We did an exercise at Reach once where we had to make a criticism of another person, and then ask ourselves whether we had said the same thing about ourselves too... Every time. Another one of my favourite sayings is 'you must love yourself before you can love others'.

She also spoke to me about her underlying feeling that there's something wrong with the world, that its not working in the way it was meant to... I get this a lot. I got it from a young age. I always questioned why we work all our lives and then rest when we're too old to enjoy life properly. Now I question it in a deeper way, and try to remember that while I can't change how it works, I can work around it. I can do things to avoid having to rely on money and greed, such as remembering that my worth isn't dependent on my looks or possessions. Everything is impermanent, so it makes no sense to attach myself to anything. I can go natural, buy organic or grow my own food, which is like growing your own money, but allows my body to absorb pure, rich nutrients rather than the chemically altered crap that they sell in supermarkets. I can center myself in a more natural environment. All these things make me more at ease and closer to nature on this dying planet. 

The last thing she asked me is where my beliefs came from. I thought about it for a minute, and realized that my beliefs materialized one day out of nowhere. I was always drawn to spiritual and space talk when I was young. I think when I watched zeitgeist I really awoke. Everything sort of clicked into place and I thought, this is right. My morals stem from my empathy as well, which allows me (or forces me) to feel others' pain, to really absorb it in my mind and heart.

I really believe that we can only find the answers within. I always want to know things, and I keep reminding myself that all I have to do is look within to find what I'm looking for. The trouble is trying to find the time and also the discipline to let the material world go and meditate without the interruption of my mind or anything else. I always plan to. But what if I am planning until I am old, and one day I realize I never did it? I was always waiting for the time when really, time doesn't exist, it is an illusion of the material world. I have to let go of time as well in order to properly explore consciousness....

I have a lot of self work to do. 

Open your mind

I am 3 weeks away from the end of uni and I am keen as hell for a trip! I'm sick of this mundane  routine based, 3 dimensional reality. I want to learn something new, explore the nature of my existence, explore the nature of the universe. That is my deepest desire and has been for some while.
In this blog post I want to take you on my journey with psychedelic 'drugs'. So far, I have only really tried LSD and psilocybin (magic mushrooms). They have distinct differences that I have tried to observe and figure out how each one is useful in different ways. I am keen to get onto DMT, as that's when the real shit happens. But anyway, here's what I have gathered from my trips.

LSD. Acid. Tabs. Cid. Lucy. Alice. Such beautiful names for something that can make you so fucked up. All psychedelics give you clarity, in the sense that you KNOW when things are happening that you didn't while you were sober. For instance, once I took it at my ex-housemates house, where I lived at the time. I was looking at the seating arrangements; it was a square loungeroom, but the way the couches and seats were positioned was kind of in a triangle hierarchy shape. The ones sitting at the top of the triangle were in computer chairs so they were higher up than everyone else. I saw this, and I knew that they were the ringleaders, that some kind of sick game was going on and we were all under their control. I hadn't sensed it before this trip, but a couple months down the track, and their game became clear. I don't talk to these people anymore. This is why you can't trip with people who you are uncomfortable with; you can't run from those feelings or push them down like you do when you want to be civilized. The feeling, their vibes, overcame me and I was scared. I wanted out of the trip. The thing is, once you get into a state of mind on acid you can't get rid of it. At least that's the way it is for me, I know everyone finds it different. But for me, the beginning of a bad trip means the rest of the trip is doomed.

In saying that, I have had some interesting experiences that weren't exactly bad but were frightening in some way, or just peculiar I guess. In my first big acid trip, it started off with throwing a large beach ball around. The colours trailed behind it, and it was as if it flew in slow motion. I could feel my eyes shining as I smiled. Everything was sparkly. It was like I was a kid again, finding the largest joy, laughing and feeling elated, at the sight of a ball in the air. Then things started turning weird.. I noticed that I would go off in a cycle that repeated itself. Like reality spun out of control, weirder and weirder, and then I would find myself feeling 'normal', almost sober, again. Then reality would spin out again. The same things would happen. It was freaky. I carried around a lollypop to bring myself back everytime I lost control. Soon I started to run around the room, and everytime I would get to the same point, it would be the same point in time but in another 'level' of reality, getting closer to 'normal' with each circle. It was like I was running up a staircase of time and space.

The last one I had was with my boyfriend. This was the biggest one I have ever had... we didn't expect our tabs to be that strong. We listened to music, and I could hear every tiny particle of each note of the song. Everything went so SLOW. I thoroughly enjoyed every second, although I had no concept of what a second was. Then, with each song, we began to slip out of reality into what I termed 'trips'. The same spirals I mentioned before, things would repeat and spin out, and then we would snap right back, and try to explain to each other what we had just experienced (we really should have recorded our voices, but the trips pulled us in so strong that we couldn't stay in reality for all that long). Soon, reality disappeared before my eyes, slowly fading out pixel by pixel, until I was standing in a black void. No kidding. I remember thinking that I didn't know what happened to my body, and hoped that I wouldn't wake up to find myself in an asylum. I also remember thinking I shouldn't walk anywhere because I might walk through a wall in 'normal' reality and wake up to find myself in a different room of the house... how would I explain that to his parents? I would have been way more scared, but I had my boyfriend with me in the void, so it was okay. The trip intensified to the point where we were standing atop our own 'trip slides'. Basically like a strong vortex pulling our minds in. The trouble was, we had separate ones. Eventually, we decided to jump. All I remember of this, is a lot of yellow, and colours, and that I knew that I was seeing the past and the future, and that time collapsed into one point. Time was an illusion, it's all happening at the same time. Unfortunately I don't remember much of this either! But I do remember what I thought as I observed all this. Fascinating. It was like I was still able to think to myself, normally, but I couldn't control what happened to reality.

Another interesting phenomenon I have discovered is what I call 'the grid'. It is like a lattice grid made of blue and pink/red laser light that cuts through the air in 3 dimensions (Up/down, Forward/back, side to side). The thing is, there is so many of these lines that it appears to be a fabric. Even the squares of it appear to have some sort of laser webbing, like liquid, swirling about. Others have also seen this grid. I am fascinated by it. I believe it has great potential to reveal the nature of space. Almost all the time on acid, the air feels thicker. I feel like I am viewing the world at a different angle. Somehow, it's like another dimension has unfolded before me. I called it 'High definition reality'. Like HD TV,  it is so much more detailed and rich than 'normal reality'. I feel this has something to do with the grid. So yeah, this will be what I explore in my next acid trips.

Mushrooms are so much more smoother, for me at least. Acid makes me feel like I'm exploring a digital world, but mushrooms make me feel like I am some absurd kind of theme park. Everything seems rounder, and funnier. Much funnier! But also, like acid, you get that instant knowledge and clarity. I haven't had many mushroom trips at all, but I found them easier to control, so I prefer them over LSD. In my last magic mushroom adventure, my friends and I watched a video montage called Planet Earth . If you watch a tiny bit of it, it speaks for itself. The orchestra music was the clincher - watching this, I was SO amazed, that we lived on such a beautiful, alive place like this, and that stuff like this was happening that we would never see! It was so beautiful and so amazing that it was almost ridiculous that we had the privilege to live on this thing, and we never appreciate it. I just, laughed, a lot, to the point where tears rolled down my face. So many thoughts melded into one realization, and it seemed impossible that I had never come to this conclusion before. I don't remember the essence of it now because I'm not on mushrooms, and can't possibly think that many thoughts in that space of time. I think alot, but not that much! It was like doing a 26 page math problem in 2 seconds... quite overwhelming, and a beautiful experience. At one point, I decided to look at myself in the mirror. How often do you stare into your own eyes and appreciate the unique soul that you are? I know I don't, but this experience makes me want to do it more. I never felt more connected to myself, never felt more love and care, because I saw who I really was when I looked into my eyes. There is nothing like a good trip to throw everything about, and leave you with nothing but yourself, and nowhere to hide.

I really wish I could draw my trips. I've tried, but there's no way. It's just not of this world. And I don't have enough skill. Sigh. I would love to be able to express these experiences in a better way than with words. These experiences have changed how I see the world. It's like an awakening -  my mind has been stretched so far that it can never go back to what it was. And I am thirsty for more.

Hmm, well I hope at least some of you have enjoyed reading this drug riddled post. I am aware that a lot of you will be shaking your heads in disapproval, and I was reluctant to post this at first. But then I thought of my favourite quote at the moment...

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind" (Dr Seuss).

Thanks Dr. Seuss, and thanks to those that appreciate the real me, drugs and all. 

Another look at the Existential Givens

One of my earliest memories of self-talk, or thinking to myself, is one of Existential Isolation. Only today have I discovered this term and its meaning, and this memory came to mind.

I remember as a young girl, maybe 6? ...I thought it was younger, I'm not sure. It was probably when my sense of empathy began to develop, so around the age of 6-7. Every now and then I used become aware that I was looking at the world through my own eyes and I would say to myself, "This is MY life". This was the predominant thought, accompanied by the general sense of 'knowing' that other people were also living and experiencing life, but I would never see the world through anyone elses eyes. I wondered what they were seeing and why I could never see it. I must have been so unconsciously scared by the thought that another voice would always jump in and say "Shut up, Katie, you're an idiot".

As weird as this seemed to me at the time, this now holds a lot of significance to me. After reading about the 4 Existential givens/Ultimate concerns (mentioned in my last blog, see 'Love's Executioner' by Irvin D. Yalom), I realized that the voice that told me to shut up was protecting me from the concern of existential isolation. Existential isolation refers to the barrier that exists between the self and others, even in the presence of deep relationships. It is the fact that we are born alone and we die alone. This causes anxiety, and much like the other givens, we try to protect ourselves from this. A common way is to form a passionate relationship whereby we perceive that two become one. Yalom states that this attitude to a relationship is destined to cave, because we can never fully be one with another (at least in this physical form). This anxiety and how I use my relationships to combat it is definitely true for me, but I thought it was just because I haven't been so kind to myself in the past, and I am scared of how I will speak to myself when I am alone ("Shut up, Katie, you're an idiot" demonstrates this well!)... but this theory and my memory have opened me up to consider that a lot of my anxiety is about being alone, not just physically, but existentially.

Yesterday I was pondering about which attachment style I have (anxious - this theme pops up a lot in my life) and now I'm thinking about this. So many theories in psychology, so many possibilities. But nothing is concrete, I guess any explanation is a good one as long as it makes sense and helps with overcoming major problems in life!

Now that I think about it, Existential Theory is applied in a lot of places. Landmark Education (based on Scientology) did actually address the concerns that life is meaningless and that we have the freedom to live however we want. There was a great discussion about how we are responsible for everything that happens in our lives, and once we assume that responsibility rather than blaming it on external sources, we can free ourselves from our barriers and create our own meaning for our lives. That was probably the only good thing I got out of it, aside from learning how to spot a cult, and to be careful of self-help seminars as they will turn their beneficial learnings on you so you feel obligated to attend and fork out hundreds for future sessions...

Live and learn, every day.

Healing

So I am in the hospital with my boyfriend today. Pretty much the day after I posted that blog, he texted me telling me he was in hospital with what they thought was a ruptured kidney. Later he was airlifted to a larger hospital, thankfully much closer to my house. Turns out he is ok and healing well.

So this could have come at a slightly better timing, since I was still distressed from the incident which prompted my not so friendly blog post. I feel bad about my anger but I think I handled it way better than I would have in the past. Letting out my anger in a constructive way was very helpful.
Unfortunately, more problems arose and I ended up being abused by the same people all Friday morning for a minor request, and it all got too much for me. I had a massive breakdown and left class to see a counsellor at uni. He was actually amazing, he did so much for me in that hour than any other psychologist had ever done, and he was still provisional. I am so grateful for his help as I have avoided slipping back into a highly negative state. I am still angry and hurt, but I am in no way depressed and have managed to maintain some of my Zen. Yay.

I am still pretty resentful today though, as I am in the hospital visiting my boyfriend, and these people decided to come and visit too. So I am bored, sitting in a cafe, writing this blog post, waiting for them to leave. I am trying my hardest to let go of this resentment, as it is draining me a lot and I am very aware that I am putting out negative energy. But as you can imagine my guard has gone right up and I'm not ready to open up and relax any time soon. Having an anxiety problem also doesn't help. Sigh. Baby steps I guess.

Maybe I should try and meditate or something.
Yesterday in my tute for Psychopathology, we discussed Existential Therapy. Apparently the case study (the Fat Lady Yalom case) presented this therapy in a negative light, but I was late and didn't read the case study, so I am very enthusiastic about reading more about this therapy technique. Apparently, it is based on the theory that inner conflict is due to 4 Existential Givens, or Ultimate Conerns in life. These are:
1. The inevitability of death
2. Freedom and associated responsibility
3. Existential Isolation and
4. Meaninglessness

Without having read anything about this, including any critiques, I am naturally drawn to this theory as I believe a lot of my own internal conflict is due to these existential givens. For example: today I am trying to let go of my anger because I feel that with freedom I must be responsible for my own emotions and reactions to events, but I am finding it hard to so. So this results in conflict. Also meaninglessness troubled me for a while there, like there was no point in life so what is the point in living, but now I have created my own meaning so it doesn't bother me that much anymore. The inevitability of death also creates conflict within me as I believe this is where a lot of my anxiety about work and uni comes from. In my mind there is no time to waste as I have limited time to enjoy my life, but as I have to succumb to these seemingly meaningless responsibilities (again freedom and responsibility comes in) which take up so much time, I get frustrated. I am not too sure about existential isolation as I'm not sure what it means exactly so I don't want to comment on it. Apparently it's the same as phenomenology. Forgot what that is too. I am hella tired.

Anyway, hopefully I will get to go back into the hospital room soon.
Thanks for reading guys, again I would appreciate if some positive vibes could be sent my way, and more importantly healing vibes for my boyfriends kidney!
Peace.

Insomnia and energy

So I woke up at around 3am and it seems I'm not going back to sleep any time soon. I've never had insomnia before (or as far as I can remember), so now I can say I really sympathise with those of you who have it. There's not much to do in the wee hours of the morning, except blog I guess. Or if you're my brother, playing games which involve world domination.

For those of you wondering why I'm up at this time, it's because I have cut down heavily on my pot use. Upsides include constant euphoria, feeling more, waking up easily in the morning, clear-mindedness and less pressure on my lungs. Downsides include writing this blog post at 4am. If anyone would like information on their pot use, withdrawal, and tips on cutting down or quitting, I found Know Cannabis very useful and straightfroward. Also, Addiction Dirkh has some more complex and neurological information on marijuana withdrawal.

Well... I have had an exhausting week. Not to say it's been shit, just very fast paced and crazy. It's definitely the full moon, this happens every time. Work is always busier and life is more hectic. I have hardly had the chance to talk to my boyfriend or write a blog post. Thank God for insomnia?

On that note, I'm not actually religious, but I do attend these weekly spiritual/meditation classes run by my cousin, who is also a psychic artist and an author. Check out his art and soul blueprints here. I'm really enjoying putting links in my text just so you know :) Anyway, this class pretty much turned me from self-loathing, cynical emo girl to an optimistic, world-loving hippy. This Wednesday's class was one of the more magical ones, let me tell you all about it.

I rocked up to the class, euphoric as ever, high off no pot (I still think this is funny). There was another Aquarian dude there who has also been bouncing off the walls all week, which helped me feel less crazy. But being an Aquarian, feeling crazy is sort of normal. Anyway, we were told we were going to bring up some negative emotions and express them through art. Art therapy, in a way. It wasn't really my ideal class at this stage because of how happy I've been, but I gave it a go. I went right into my heart and brought up a sadness that I had not acknowledged was still there. It was surprisingly easy to cry and draw it all out on paper. Once it was over, I recovered my good mood with a renewed sense of strength, feeling way more grounded. An amazing thing for me, always with my heads in the clouds. I realized that maybe why I've been so high is that I run away from my negative emotions. When I feel happy, I cling onto it like my life depends on it. But you know what? My life doesn't depend on it. I discovered I can still feel less desirable emotions and feel happy about life at the same time.

Lately, I have been feeling so much intense love for the world and everyone in it. All my emotion that I've pushed down with pot has come up. My fear has been replaced with courage, my loneliness has been replaced with oneness, and my anger has been replaced with sadness. Sometimes I feel like this is too much emotion for me to deal with at once. Even feeling the love has been exhausting, because I am constantly radiating it out to everyone around me. It has been a great couple of weeks, and I absolutely love having more than enough energy to share with those who have less. But I think I need to save some for myself, or at least put it into things I love or need to do, like my university studies (already falling behind, as usual), and... well, I don't know what else. I feel too guilty doing art, reading or music because I have uni work to do.

It's 4:20am... ;) But I will be going to sleep naturally now.

Love and Peace to you.

Awake

The other morning I was having a blast listening to The Beatles while driving to uni. It was a beautiful sunny morning and I was keen to attend my first lectures for two of my subjects. As I was driving, I started thinking about how amazing my friends and family are, and how loved I am, and how I'm in such a good place mentally at the moment. At this point, singing along to Hey Jude, my thoughts shut off, paving the way for a flood of emotion. I actually teared up as the feeling of gratitude and love expanded in an infinite space inside my soul. I felt pure love for myself and everything around me. A feeling of completeness, oneness.

I am 99% sure that this only the second time in my life that I have ever felt anything like that without the aid of what I like to call... "spiritually enhancing substances". It first happened in my weekly meditation class, when we were doing a meditation themed around expanding the aura with energy. This time I was meditating - just being - without trying. I instantly tapped into myself and my energy in its purest form. High on life.

This experience was then followed by an amazing weekend with some of the most open and loving humans I have ever met :) Saturday night, (yes, with the aid of "spiritually enhancing substances"), was another magical night, where I felt absolute clarity and peace. We talked about so many things, real, raw and no bullshit. We expressed out love for each other without fear. It was such an amazing vibe. Some people may think this isn't real. It's influenced by drugs, it's just a fake feeling. I disagree. I tend to think that all these feelings are there already, waiting for us to unlock them. This has been supported by my experience the other day, when I was completely sober. These substances, these compounds... essentially change the way our consciousness works. We are able to tap into different perspectives, and come up with different ideas that we already know, but are yet to be discovered, or realised. These substances either unlock buried parts of the mind, or block certain perception processes that keep us grounded in 3D. Once you can shut the ego off, you become just feeling, just energy, and can access higher levels of reality. I guess this is pretty much a shortcut to a meditative state. However, I do feel that you need to be somewhat open to yourself and the world to be able to utilise the spiritual effects of certain drugs. Otherwise they just become another blanket for your issues, another escape from reality, a destructive addiction pattern. What a waste of potential magic.

At some point during our Saturday night shenanigans, as a lot of people who partake in such shenanigans would relate to, the subject of being "awake" came up. What does it mean to be awake? My chemically ridden brain came up with this explanation (as accurately as I can remember saying it):

"To be awake, is to know... that we are all one. We all came from a single source. We are the same; you and me, we are the same, so are you and (friend's name), and him and me... All of us. And to be awake is to know that to change the world, you must switch to love. Not fear, only love."

To switch to love requires conquering fear. Conquering fear requires courage. And courage comes from a confidence in yourself. Start to treat yourself better, and become so confident in your amazing unique self, that challenges no longer scare you and negativity no longer poses a threat to your spirit. Then you will learn to forgive and love everything unconditionally, for all its good and bad.

It all starts with you. Love yourself and love others... love yourself and love everything. And realise that you ARE everything.

Getting to know me and my nut

So my name is Katie and I am a 3rd year Psychology student.

Welcome to what is my 5th blog if I remember correctly. I'm only 21, but I have been writing journals and blogs since I was 9 years old. That makes this my 12th year of writing.... am I a veteran yet?

I should start by introducing who I am and why I am writing this blog.

So as I've stated I am a psychology student. Ever since I had to pick a career in high school, I have been all about psychology. There is nothing else I would want to be studying at all. I hate studying, but I love learning. I like to do things on my own terms.

Anyway, I got into psychology because of my own mental problems. People have said to me that psychology students are a 'bunch of weirdos' and I have to say I agree. I doubt any well adjusted person would be as interested in how the mind works as we are. I began my degree intending to help adolescents with eating disorders and depression. I am still interested in this field but my fascination has stretched into other areas such as sexuality, meditation and spirituality, and mind-altering substances. Right now I am in a massive psychedelic phase where all I want to do is trip out, paint and figure out the nature of humanity and the universe we reside in. Why are we here? That's what I want to know.

There is also more to me than psychology. I play music and sing, I read, I write, I paint, I draw, I meditate...
I love cats, fresh fruit juice, family, my friends and my boyfriend, food that doesn't have numbers in it, hippy pants, comfy clothes, clubbing, space documentaries I am a firm believer in the power of nature. I like to let my spirit sing and soar free.
I try not to hate, but I'm not perfect. So I hate money, capitalism, greed, social exclusion, large companies, bigotry and bureaucracy.
I stand for the rights of the LGBTIQ community, mother Earth, small businesses, animals, women and all those who are oppressed for speaking the truth.

Again, I am not perfect, so I may deviate from my core values every now and then. The important thing is that I recognise it and rectify it ASAP! Every slip up, mistake and every challenge life throws at me is another chance to become a better person, more adaptable, strong and independent.

The largest challenge I face at the moment is my boyfriend of (almost) 3 years going to work in the snow for 3 months. This is my main reason for starting this blog. I actually hate spending time with myself, which stems from a history of self-hatred, loneliness and just generally having a shit time unless I was distracted from my own thoughts. This challenge is probably the only chance I will get to build my independence and regain my self love, as I have no one to fall back on, or spend 24/7 with just so I don't have to face myself. It's been a week. And this blog will document my journey towards being content with my own company, as well as my thoughts about the things I learn in my last semester of my undergraduate Psych degree.

Thanks for reading, I hope you'll all join me for what will probably (hopefully?) be an interesting blog on my lectures at uni tomorrow. I am starting Diversity, Disability and Social Exclusion, Cognition and Behaviour, Social Psychology of Relationships, and Psychopathology.

Should be a good semester :)