Notes from early drafts cobbled together

these are a handful of excerpts and copy/pastes from digital and hand-written journal entries related to my personal experience in trying to live a more awakened life. As I find more, I will post in the appropriate dates.

(Oct 24 2021)

I accept the responsibility of being the author of my own life

(Oct 4, 2021)

In order to do no harm, to be truly benevolent, we must understand the interconnectedness of all things

— humans, animals, plants, the earth, the stars, the universe — the systems are interconnected and inter-contained — feeding and fed by one another — information exchanged and iterated on through interactions visible and hidden within this reality and into the numinous realm from which reality is formed (Kant, Heidegger, Plato). The information from the numinous is perceived (Merleau-Ponty) by the limits physical and too-often-hindered metaphysical senses so that what we see/hear/touch./taste/smell are representatives only.

We cannot assume that what we experience is reality because if we do, we miss the interconnectedness of all things and the importance of the minutest of details, events, plants, etc. To do no harm means to recognize the infinite potentialities of all events and to live in such a way that only the benevolent events transpire. To live any other way is to invite chaos and suffering. It isn’t enough to relieve offering in ourselves, but we must find ways to teach others, each other, ourselves, and the earth as a whole.

To disrespect anything is to disrespect all things because disrespect transmits along the same channels as respect, so Buddha’s teachings about compassion go beyond compassion for, but need to extend to compassion in order to. Teleological resonance in a ll we do.

(Oct 3, 2021)

Kant – numinous; Plato – forms; Heidegger – numinology

Spirituality – esoteric, numinous forms

Esoteric reality underpins observed reality. We should be trying to understand thee esoteric in order to make the best decisions about the observed. As it stands, we are manipulating representatives of things rather than the things themselves. If we can find a way to affect the actual things, maybe we can affect how they are represented in the world as we experience it.

(Oct 2, 2021)

… my dissertation is an attempt to give tools to humanity that can be used to see the system that controls us and find ways to deconstruct it with careful attention to the integrity of the world as the source of life in the universe. It ties into all wisdom traditions, but attempts to provide tools that can be used w/in consensual reality to reset the board to essential create the ability w/in all people who choose to become like Ash and Embla to see the game as it was played, change the rules, and reset the board.

It ties into Plato, mythology, plant medicine, wisdom traditions, and post/human ideas. The post/human ideas are the best tools available w/in the controlling system that can reach the broadest audience.

Kalina is right in that the UN can’t possibly see the solution, and that the hierarchical/patriarchal structures are blocking the path in ways so complex that a single dissertation won’t make a difference. I am not writing it for the UN. I’m writing it for all other people trying to wake up, to help them place themselves in a field of infinite potentialities w/in the controlling structures, to see the boundaries of that system as mutable constructs that are arbitrary in their illegible of rules, and that block/obfuscate truth and forward motion.

The mutability of rules is an important concept, and I think post/human views can help with that for people stuck.

(Oct 1, 2021)

In a systems view of the world, all events are symptomatic of other, grander activity. The birds in the jungle don’t just wake up. They respond to another part of the system, which responded to a separate part of the system. The “city” wakes up because the entities inside the city system are waking up.

Systems view creates a map of integral connections in which no single part is separated from each other and its a sequence/series of events that happen in an order that create the sense of time passing. Time passes because we observe events in sequence.

Lean into the infinite possibilities of an experience before deciding on a manifestation of one realized potential.

(Sept 29, 2021)

(From the jungle) … The world breathes as we breathe and it mourns, cries, laughs, dances as we dance. The cycle of illegible is so vast and important. I write these thoughts here and someone else may think them on their own as well. Ideas and words, language and stories, music. All of this is how we breathe for the world. The amazon grows and storms and writhes with life every moment of life beyond and through it all, and that is how it breathes for the world. There is little difference between it and us except the visible tangible ones. The numinous differences are negligible enough that we can say the Amazon and us are the same. Life is expressed in one way here, one way in Vermont and one way through ourselves. But life is always expressed. To try and understand this, we have to move beyond quantification and categorization and step through the veil of consensual reality to try and see — if not the numinous — at least the closeness we all have to the source of everything.

The word “eden” is overused as a descriptor of paradise from an anthro-centric mindset. Eden is a cradle, source of life. The jungle, an oasis, an island in the ocean, the ocean itself — all of these are “edenic” in the sense that life begins w/in them. Wombs of the world give rise to that which sustains the universe. All life comes from warmth and heat and moisture and damp and soil, humus, illegible, flowers, insects — these are all signs of what life is and will/can become. To be edenic is not to be perfect, but to be transcendentally weird. To buck the trends of entropy and strive to fill the universe with warmth is what life is. That is the job of all life — to stoke and provide fuel for the furnace of the universe — the heart beat of the universe is life, and life is so rare and special that it seems absurd to me to ignore its importance.

A furnace w/out fuel is a cold, ashy box that serves no purpose. Without life, the universe has no purpose and will cease to exist. There will be nothing left to observe it. Nothing left to prove the warmth it needs. …

WE MUST BEHAVE AS THOUGH THIS PLANET IS THE LAST SOURCE OF LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE

Small segment of the heart/lungs of the world/universe —> as far as we know, this is the only planet in the universe w/the Amazon jungle and we should assume it is and treat it accordingly. Basic games theory.

(April 23, 2021)

I took 200 micrograms of LSD yesterday to try and unlock some issues I have been having under the surface. It was a long and complex journey, but I feel like I came out of it with some things to hold on to.

1. I unearthed my feelings about mom’s death; my feelings of survivor’s guilt surrounding it and can now face that head on
2. I gained some strength with my resilience: conversations with Odin; holding on to the trip space and consensual reality as much as possible; learning to be kinder to myself; letting go and learning from misadventures;
3. I believe in a greater consciousness that I am a part of; I saw that every tree is Yggdrasil, and the rhythm of life is on display in broader patterns. The snow fell in helical patterns while the birds danced in and out of the frame looking for food and the squirrels raced up and down the tree;
4. I feel taller, more comfortable in my body, though I have a ways to go before I can check that off my list;
   

I feel good. There is still a thin fog of reluctance and negative perspective I have sometimes when I imagine doing something with my life beyond this, but I notice it and recognize that it has no power over me. There are little shadows like that still.

Kalina and I were talking earlier, and she likened my experience yesterday to the idea that a bunch of old lime and calcium deposits were scraped up and are now floating around. It feels like that: messy and chaotic, but on its way to being cleaner than before.

(April 17, 2021)

1. Enter fully the stream of time
2. No more battling the ghosts from my mother: emotional aikido
3. Glowing orb from one of my emotional wounds placed on a staff that became my spine with the phrase “this is you”
   

(January 2, 2021)

Ayahuasca vision. Me sitting. Astronaut helmet clear glass like tintin on my head. I float above myself, observing as though I was being described with an animated ikea diagram. The astronaut bubble helmet lifts up and off my head. A 1” thick smokily transparent screen is placed between my perception and understanding. It is not of me. It is an add-on that I do not need and will have to remove.

I realized, though, that I am not my trauma, it forced to witness life through my trauma, which made me feel like I can overcome this.

(September 23, 2020)

The ayahuasca journey last night was really interesting. It was far more visual for me than usual, which I appreciate. I think I gained some understanding of the multi-armed deities of various religions, and I certainly saw into the center of the world. I ended up being embodied by a feminine spirit for most of the night. I don’t really know how to explain it other than that, to be honest. I just felt, well, like I imagine a woman feels. Like my muscles and joints were in different places and moved slightly differently, but also that my understanding of my role as a man in the world was altered by a different-gendered perspective that I don’t normally have.

I know that we are made of energy, light, space, gaps in matter. We are mostly this space with a few particles here and there, but even the particles are mostly space. The energy that binds these particles together is tied to the energy of the rest of the universe, and we are a necessary part of all of this. Our hands are the hands of the universe, our thoughts are its thoughts, our love, our joy, our pain, our works, and our destructions are all of the universe. We are the conscious entities that provide the universe a consciousness of its own, because we are not separate from its workings, but integral to its existence. Our birth, our life, our death: all part of how the universe understands itself and counters entropy, but even the universe itself has a cycle of birth, life, death. We know this because entropy increases with it just as it does with us. We are only able to perceive a small portion of this reality because that is what is required of us by the universe in its own quest for knowledge and life. Just as the bacteria inside of us serve singular and unique purposes within the vastness of their existence, so do we serve our own purpose within the vastness of our existence.

Our journey is what it is because it is what the universe needs from us. It is up to us, then, to understand what we offer that is unique among the other denizens of reality and do that to our utmost. This is what being human should be about. The petty politicking, warring, bickering, torture, death, and ennui are the symptoms of entropic invasion and we need to be able to resist as much as we can. Because even if we don’t fully understand what we are supposed to be doing, we can understand what we’re not supposed to be doing: killing each other, destroying nature, torturing ourselves, etc. These are actions that give rise to entropy and death which is anathema to the goal of the universe which is life.

(May 2, 2020)

First vision: in response to “why am I here?” Then “why am I there?” view from inside a grey closet of some kind, I can’t move. There is daylight to my left. I realize that it is Scrhödinger box. I can be either here are there. Then I realize there has always been more than two boxes. I ask where I am and see the network of boxes. I realize I am in and not in the box. I can be anywhere.

• Second vision: In response to “Who am I?” I am shown a vast field bathed in red light, Pre-dawn or from distant fires. There are thousands of soldiers/entities. I can’t make out faces. But I can see all the way to my left and all the way to my right: lines of people hundreds of people deep. It really does look like a vast army, but of bald-headed user-sketch type people. I say “this doesn’t make any sense”
• Third vision: I am told to stop being so negative. I am shown all of the instances where I have said something negative in response to someone else, or felt that someone is being annoying rather than appreciating their connections. I should be meeting the world with patience and curiosity. Patience and curiosity.
• No entities. Incomprehensible moving fractals, though. Reminded me of a kaleidoscopic version of the 3d puzzles from the 1990s, but then I realized that trying to see these animations/motions in that way diminished their existence and I looked at them through feelings, instead.