An Opening

A long time ago (to me) I was born. I had a reasonable childhood with its mix of joy and agony, peril and progress. I grew up in a religious household where my parents were both devout Jehovahs Witnesses. Surprisingly this was a fantastic childhood, despite what I would later try to tell myself. I was loved, supported, and had a lot of friends.

I realized when I was fourteen that I didn't believe in the faith of my parents, but I would continue to deny that fact even to myself for the next seven years. This crisis of faith led me into a spiral of denial, materialism, hedonism, and addiction. I tried my best to find the carefree happiness of my youth in over-drinking, drug use, sex, career, food, and hobbies. Nothing satisfied.

Nothing satisfied. I feel like I need to say that several times to put it into perspective. Everything over the next (nearly) twenty years would be in pursuit of this sense of satisfaction. I was rushing somewhere as fast as I could while never knowing what I was after, or why. I stopped regularly to consider myself, but I didn't know how to truly examine my feelings beyond the emptiness and guilt I constantly felt, so I learned to ignore them by drinking myself to sleep and dosing whatever drugs I felt weren't that bad. Occasional expired pills I found in family and friends medicine cabinets (they would never miss them), and plenty of marijuana. It wasn't all-day-every-day, so it was fine.

Then my wife and I had our first child. Surely, this would be the thing that I was looking for. After all, I had wanted a wife and kids since I was little—my family was so happy, this must be the key to happy fulfillment! The years passed, and we had two more sons. Surely now I would be even happier! I continued to drink heavily and use recreational drugs at leisure and grow my career and my material assets.

During these years I found my career needing a motivation boost. So I used my wit and guile to procure a "legitimate" prescription for ADHD stimulant medication. As a child I had been treated at the Drake Institute but not officially diagnosed, and some of the symptoms persisted into adulthood which did interfere with my work. Now I surely had the answer in my hands to boost my career and find satisfaction!

But the medication caused restlessness and mild anxiety when it wore off. I didn't want to keep drinking like I was, so I asked my Psychiatrist for anxiety medication. I was going about this the right way, by talking to a doctor, so surely I would find the peace and satisfaction I needed. It took two months to become hopelessly physically dependent on the pills and during a family vacation during my wifes second pregnancy I got to experience my first withdrawal. I had never, to this point, experienced actual darkness. This was a revelation, but no the last. The post-acute withdrawal symptoms lasted over six months, during which I tapered off a longer acting anxiety medication while being introduced to the darkest of my own thoughts over, and over, and over. But I recovered.

At some point I discovered that I could buy all-natural opiates over the internet, unregulated, as a powdered leaf called kratom from an Indonesian vendor. I pretended that my use could be occasional and non-habitual. I felt the warm embrace of nostalgia wash over me that echoed of the memories of my earliest childhood memories laying in the afternoon sun as an infant at my parents house (my first memory). I had found my oasis.

Then we bought a house. Finally, I had made it! I never dreamed I could have my own house. Surely this would finally cement in my mind that I had made it and I would be happy and satisfied. I continued to self medicate with drink and drugs and pretend that satisfaction was right around the corner.

I was incredibly good at drinking. I was a model drunk. I drank only in the evenings. I was rarely sloppy. I played with my kids. I loved my wife. I had a great career, a house, several cars, an RV, went on frequent vacations, and had wonderful friends and extended family that all loved and supported me. Nobody counted the drinks I had—even I didn't always count, but it was always in excess of five per night and sometimes close to ten.

I was not a model drunk. I sometimes drank in the mornings, secretly. I would flop around the yard with my children playing, drunk, and fall asleep in their beds reeking of booze. I would snap angrily at them over trivial "kid" things. I would have a drink or two before baseball practice, and wash down my kratom powder with a shot. I would drive back from family dinner after consuming far too much. I was convincing myself that I wasn't that bad, because I had it all under control.

Then my wife got sick. It was only mono. People get mono all the time, and yeah it sucks but they get over it. Her acute symptoms lasted over six months. Six months of being mostly bed bound with phantom fevers, pain, and extreme lethargy and exhaustion. The symptoms got slightly better with time, but changed to add more symptoms. Joint pain, skin pain, and the persistent never-ending exhaustion. I continued to use drink and drugs through these times.

Then I had my second withdrawal. I didn't recognize it for what it was because I was still drinking so much and so often. I thought I had a bad cold, and then a sudden and profound bout of horrific obsessive compulsive thoughts, anxiety, and crippling depression. I consulted a therapist who specialized in CBT and started mindfulness meditation. I will be honest, I didn't do a lot of meditation, but the idea intrigued me and so did Buddhism. I was a rationalist materialist though, so I did my best to extract the benefits from Buddhism (as we do in Western society) without subscribing to the spiritual implications of those practices.

I had a breakthrough with my therapist which assuaged my guilt, temporarily, and provided relief from my symptoms of obsession, anxiety, and depression. Of course I started drinking again and using kratom. I was feeling better, so I deserved a reward. This would continue in fits and spurts of sobriety and relapse for the next seven years.

During that time I found new friends and new interests. Psychedelics were all rage in the tech scene, and Michael Pollan introduced me to the idea of changing my mind. Surely changing my mind with psychedelics would provide me with the satisfaction I was looking for. So I grew my own psychedelic mushrooms, partook, and had several interesting experiences. I even had God talk to me! That's funny. I didn't believe in God. Apparently, according to God it was "always here" and had never left. Strange.

UFOs were in the news at that time and the idea of interplanetary travel gave me a sense of hope. A glimmer of something that wasn't the slow decline and death of Western society that I was observing, and self-medicating to forget. I threw myself into investigating the phenomenon and all surrounding literature. Psi, remote viewing, astral projection—I read on all these things and tried them all with little effect. Robert Monroe's writings in his "Journeys" series were fascinating, but I could not reproduce them myself. I was very much still in the materialist mindset of reducing all phenomena to a set of emergent experiences in the brain, while struggling to make sense of accounts of near-death experiences, consciousness modifying random number generators, and the experiences of close friends with discarnate apparitions of their deceased relatives.

My close friend, Byron, and I sat in my driveway one evening discussing the UFO phenomenon and the meaning of psychedelic and religious and magical experiences when he proposed I try something. Have faith even if I didn't have any. Try. Faith was so absent in my life, even from my childhood. As a child, my faith was defined by my fear of the vengeful creator so re-approaching that meant a reprogramming and modification of my relationship with the fundamental aspects of doubt. DOUBT which had served me so well. Doubt released me from my religious convictions as a youth. Doubt allowed me to venture outside the political landscape that I had inherited and grown up around. Doubt was an ever present companion that had served me so well for decades, but now doubt was doubtfully useful. I needed to reframe my entire relationship with what I considered to be me.

So, I did. I performed magical rituals even though I didn't believe in them. Even though it felt silly. Even though I thought it was ridiculous. Magic was the stuff of the crystal waving astrology consulting borderline schizophrenics too deluded to see their own nonsense for what it was. And now I was intentionally turning myself into one of them. I read Robert Anton Wilsons Prometheus Rising. I found Alan Chapmans Advanced Magick for Beginners. I practiced Josephine McCarthys Quareia. I created sigils and servitors for mundane things. Despite all my doubt, they worked.

We were trying to get financing to put an addition on our house. My kids were growing up and because of their fighting they needed more space and their own bedrooms. Our house had appreciated considerably over the last few years and the equity should have allowed for us to take out enough money to cover the cost of a second story addition. Well, the appraiser felt differently despite similar houses down the street appraising for hundreds of thousands of dollars more. This is where things began to change. I created a sigil and servitor, following the instructions of Alan Chapman, to have our house appraised for at least $80,000 more than than it was just appraised for (the minimum required to secure financing for the addition). I charged the sigil, birthed my servitor, and called back our contractor to try again for another appraisal.

Our house was then appraised for exactly the amount required. Exactly. I was floored. However, doubt crept back in quickly. I mean, that was an amazing coincidence, but maybe the contractor did something sly and paid the appraiser off. Maybe they were old friends and a favor was done. Maybe it didn't matter. A result is a result. I continued to do magick, but with significantly less efficacy than that initial result.

I also continued to use kratom, marijuana, and alcohol.

I loved reading about magick during this time. Reading about magick while intoxicated allowed me to feel like I was doing something. I got the reward chemicals while reading other peoples experiences. I continued to try occasional magical rituals, astral projection, psychedelics, and meditation but didn't get anywhere very fast. In fact, I was in the exact same place I had been for the last twenty years. I was chasing my own tail in circles looking for something I didn't remember and had no idea where to turn or what to do. I was lost, blindfolded, in a downward spiral of self-destructive behavior and self-centered materialism masquerading as spirituality. I was miserable.

During my online travels I found myself fascinated by the podcast Adventures in Woo Woo with Tommie Kelly, especially his TaSTA (Tommie and Spud Talk About) Ritual experiences with scrying using the Estes method. I joined his discord and talked with a few people, including Jason Mendel who had performed the Estes scrying on the show several times. There was a channel on the server that seemed out of place. A strange spelling of Magic—Magia? So I clicked. There were links to Alan Chapmans personal website with audio recordings from a retreat in Greece where he gave twelve teachings and prophecy. This was all tangled up together and I was trying to make sense of what it meant, and what it to me at this point in my life. Was I really interested in mysticism? I certainly enjoyed thinking that magick meant something more than acquisition of material things and power but a seemingly religious philosophy felt like the opposite direction of where I wanted to go. I had come from religion, why in the world would I entertain that again especially when it was the (seeming) ramblings of one (ex?) chaos magician / author / guru convinced he was the next incarnation of Crowley? And they all seemed obsessed with Peter Kingsley, who I had judged as having a massive ego and righteousness complex.

I have no idea. But I entertained the idea. I bought the book. I tried the practices. I took a personal vow for three months, then another three months, and practiced daily. I gave up drink, and the drugs. I went through withdrawal. This wasn't satisfying—this wasn't even fun. I laid down on my mat in my home office for thirty to forty five minutes daily and got nothing out of it. I usually just fell asleep. After my vow I started using kratom again, daily.

My wifes health had been up and down for years with some reprieve during summer months, but largely her pain and exhaustion consumed her. And me. I did magick for her. I prayed for her. I prayed to any god I could find that promised health and healing. I met a someone on Discord who I hit it off with immediately. A chaos magician who thought Estes was awesome too. And he was a blacksmith too (one of my hobbies), and his political beliefs lined up with mine, and he lived within thirty miles of me! Nobody ever finds new friends like this in their late thirties. We went on magickal adventures together. Sigils and servitors, divination, Estes sessions and spirit evocation. We made contact with one particular spirit who, through my friend, gave us a ritual to perform at approximately midnight that night of the full moon. This was progress! Surely this would be satisfying!

After the ritual was performed to the best of my ability and when I did not immediately see the "seven entities in a line" that I was promised I was disheartened. Further consultation with this spirit resulted in being informed that we misunderstood the timing and actions to be taken. We continued speaking to this spirit for months, daily sometimes, and testing its ability to read our minds and predict the roll of dice. It was surprisingly good at this. Surely I would find satisfaction in this. After all, I had discovered that life included more than the material!

I continued abusing kratom through all this, occasionally stopping and dealing with minor inconvenient withdrawal. New Years eve came around. Another year lay before me. What would I do? I marked the occasion with a shot of my favorite kratom extract which quickly turned into a raging headache, vertigo, tachycardia, and crippling anxiety. I knew what I needed to do. I knew I was on a circular treadmill going nowhere fast. I was self destructing in slow motion, but I knew where this was heading. I toyed with stopping the kratom and made it a few weeks, relapsing again for a few weeks. The final decision was made on April 21st and I did something I had never done before.

I asked God, as I understood it, for help. I don't think I even believed in God really. As a concept, maybe. Maybe this is what faith is—allowing for something to just be and letting it meet you where you are because you can't go any further right now.

I went to my first Twelve Step meeting that week.

Withdrawal was over, but I was dealing with bouts of depression and anxiety that seemed to be building into something. A shadow that rose over me and blotted out the sun as the storm overtook me. The anxiety and depression were like nothing I had ever felt before. It was overwhelming to a degree that I did not think possible. My resting stable state allowed me to respond to work requests for minutes at a time, after which I had to lay down and cry or sleep (or try to). The emotional and physical exhaustion laid me out in bed for weeks. I would sleep from 5pm until 5am where I would startle awake with dread, fear, and guilt coursing through me as my heart raced to keep up with the ice in my veins.

A good friend of mine, mentor and confidant, recommended that I perform a binding and invite the shadow of whatever-this-was in. Invite the fear, the guilt, the terror in and let it show itself for what it is. I was desperate and knew that I didn't have any answers or places to turn. I performed the binding. In the middle of the binding I saw a vision of myself sitting on the floor of my home office in my underwear, wet with sweat and tears, crying out "This is it!". I startled awake and drew out the scene as I saw it in the binding, tracing it back to its origin. Where had I felt those feelings before—the hope and relief. Relief? Had I known that? All I could remember was the false relief: the drug and alcohol addiction, the joyless sex addiction, the empty hobbies, the mad scramble to cure my wife's illness. It was late, and I was exhausted and the anxiety had returned and redoubled. I was desperate but I couldn't deny sleep any longer.

The next day I performed the binding again. I remembered a prophecy I was given during a previous group Estes session telling me to stop relying on my own "skill" or understanding and allow the divine to take over. "Okay!" I said—"You've got this one!". I laid down and did my practice, allowing space for the shadow to show itself in vision once more. I noted the sounds outside my window, the breeze against my skin, and the rug under my chapped elbows. Wait, I couldn't feel my elbows anymore. In fact, where are my arms and legs? I cannot really associate any physical sensations with specific areas of my body, but I am still having physical experiences. Sudden vertigo and it feels like my body is being turned inside out starting with my head—then fear. Am I dying? I decide to let go. I let go and allow the experience to unfold however it is going to unfold.

As I do this I find that there is a sense of peace that has replaced the fear. A feeling that is warm, but not really the sensation of warmth—more like the feeling I had when I was an infant. A feeling of complete safety and love. Home. This feeling was HOME. I could still hear the carpenter hammering outside, and my kids arriving in the driveway, the cars driving by, and the crows cawing. However, none of those things changed this experience of absolute abiding peace and contentment. The sounds and experiences all seemed to rise up and out of the "lake" of "home", but were suffused with it so that they were made of it. They existed within the peace, contentment, and sense of home. They were of the same nature. I heard then the voice of my oldest son and made the choice to come out of this state. I sat up, sweating, and let the tears flow.

This was it. This is what I had seen the previous day in my vision. This is what I had been looking for my entire life. This was the light shining through the cracks in my broken heart. This was the home I was trying to remember whenever I took a drink—whenever I did a shot of kratom—whenever I downed a hand-full of pills. It wasn't a place. It wasn't a feeling. It just was. I sat there and sobbed for several minutes with pure joy at finally opening my eyes and startling awake to a reality that had always been there. I had just forgotten.

And then the anxiety returned. My several minutes of joyous hope were crushed with a tidal wave of immobilizing fear and disquiet. This was awakening, wasn't it? I had seen my anxiety and fear for what it was: a shadow of awakening, so why did I have this dread pouring over me and drowning me? I didn't have time to think about it deeply—my youngest son had baseball practice forty five minutes away and I had to drive him. I got him into the car and drove off, heart pounding in my head, swimming with fear and depression. As I sat in traffic in the roasting heat, I found myself contemplating the fear and physical manifestations of that fear. The pounding pulse in my ears. The shaking limbs. The cold and hot sweats. The raging and burning in my guts. However, right at the center of all of it was my observation of all those things. They formed a circle of sorts in my perception, like the eye of a storm, around which they swirled and crashed. However, in that eye was placid and unaffected—simply abiding. A simply abiding sense of peace that was not affected by any sensation or appearance. I had found the essence of my peak experience of "abiding home" existed in the middle of all this chaos and fear and arose within it.

I had found in my peak experience that the conditional (sounds, sensations, etc.) was arising within the unconditional. Now I had found that the unconditional was arising within the conditional. This was new. Or was it? Where do I go from here? What does this mean ontologically, metaphisically, fundamentally? What do I do with this? Do I have to wear robes and speak differently now? I honestly have no idea, but I don't think so. I think that I just have to keep up this cycle that I've established. Faith and knowledge. Faith leads to knowledge, which in turn leads back to faith.

Hebrews 11:1 says "Now faith is assurance of [things] hoped for, a conviction of things not seen.". I think I finally understand the idea of faith after a lifetime of looking the other way. I have a tiny taste of knowledge now, but I don't know what the next insight will be. The bridge between the experiences of insight is faith—faith that there is something to find at the end of a period of dry practice, shadows and darkness and fear. Faith that if I turn around I will find the shadow that I was cowering from is just a modification of the light of my own awakening, and that it was always my choice.

It's my choice, and I say yes.