Saturday, October 23, 2010

Subjectivities and Culture


From the moment we are born into this culture (and any culture), we are fed a story. This story informs us about everything; indeed the very nature of existence. To fail to acknowledge this is to be blind to reality (the only true reality is that there IS NO objectively true reality). Robin Anton Wilson has said that true intelligence can be defined has taking a step back from one’s conventional reality tunnel, and merely being aware of it- the majority of human beings rarely discover this awareness, and live their entire lives confined to one reality tunnel. Underneath the dogmatic disapproval and condemnation of psychoactive substances by Western authorities, lies a powerful source of love, passion, understanding, awareness, and insight. This source has been deeply respected and experienced by most indigenous groups for hundreds of thousands of years. Adolescent psychedelic quests/journeys are very common in these aboriginal tribes; children discover themselves, and their own interpretation of existence, at a very young age. After all, at the age of nine years old, most indigenous children are capable of independent survival (no needs from adults).  Psilocybin fungi, peyote cacti, ergot derivatives, Ayahuasca, and various other natural plants, are invaluable spiritual elements within today’s detached, isolating, and disoriented culture. Within our living systems (political, educational, social, etc.), the pace and velocity is ever accelerating. Institutional schooling (which was initially created during the Industrial Revolution to ‘produce’ robotically identical, mechanized, automated workers) indoctrinates children at a very early age into believing this culture’s story- a story of scarcity, survival anxiety (get a job and work in a glass/metal cage for 9 hours a day to receive green pieces of paper), fear, and illusion. Human beings ensnared in Western life (today, about 98% of world population) usually never get a chance to truly identify themselves, to locate their inner ‘beingness’ and underlying passion. As briefly highlighted in “Thoughts”, before entry into adulthood, children emanate a universal life energy that is squandered when they are told to “mature” and “grow up”. Psychoactive plants infuse this life energy back into the soul. It’s like being reborn again into the magic of life- a transformation in consciousness occurs. This metamorphosis is not at all alien or unfamiliar. Actually, quite the opposite. It’s like returning to a warm, intimately known reality that was, until now, a dormant fragment of consciousness waiting to emerge. This feeling and way of being has been smothered and inundated for so long by what Daniel Quinn calls, ‘Mother Culture’, that sometimes we forget that it’s always there, and it’s always BEEN there.

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