“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.
–Rumi
Walking in the woods as a kid, I always wanted to go off the trail into the unknown, convinced that there was something magical out there; something mysterious, sacred, divine.
The times I did wander I never quite found it. It always seemed just out of reach.
A similar feeling hit me as a teen, when I first heard about raves happening in the city. Growing up in a small town, me and my friends had begun to hear stories about these all night parties in warehouses. They were mysterious, with the location only announced the day of the event via an infoline, rented school buses picking us up at town hall, taking us out to industrial spaces transformed into epic parties.
It was like entering an alternate reality. Thousands of young people from all over the city coming together, wearing wide legged pants, big beads, bright colours, dancing all night to loud rhythmic music, glow sticks and fog machines and lighting making it feel truly otherworldly. All of which was enhanced by an abundance of psychedelics and empathogens. It was wild.
For me, stepping into a world so different and experiencing the bliss of dancing all night (enhanced by psychedelics), was both transcendent and clarifying.
It’s not surprising to learn how many people have turned to Buddhism as a result of their psychedelic experiences. We get a taste for transcendence, realizing there is a deeper dimension to life, and that there are disciplined traditions that explore this.
I believe that all that partying, combined with growing up in a Buddhist family, really opened me up to exploring spirituality. It was actually J. Krishnamurti that hooked me, a spiritual teacher who rejected the title of spiritual teacher, and instead hoped to guide people towards true freedom.
Krishnamurti wanted people to awaken their inner intelligence instead of looking outside for guidance. He was very clear on the topic of belief; that all belief only serves to solidify reality into concepts and ideas, but reality is not fixed, and ultimate truth cannot be reduced to ideas or beliefs.
“Belief is a form of prejudice which prevents you from seeing clearly. To find truth, the mind must be free from belief.” -J. Krishnamurti
I took the advice seriously. Although I was raised by Buddhist parents, they were not dogmatic, and decided not to force any worldview on their kids. I had long found the ideas of karma and reincarnation appealing, but I wouldn’t go so far to say I believed in these things.
Similarly, the big question of God came up often in life, and after reading Krishnamurti and having my transcendent rave experiences, I thought the binary “yes” and “no” were missing the point.
I didn’t believe or disbelieve God. Instead I wanted to know what people meant by “God”, and the definition never seemed clear. So my contemplation instead was “What is the nature of God?” or “What is the nature of existence/reality?”.
I had a vague notion that there was something divine about the world, something that connected all life. I was content enough to remain in the unknowing, continuing to inquire, and not have any clear answers.
Until everything changed.
Around my 30th birthday an old friend came back into my life and invited me to accompany him on a road trip to British Columbia to attend a big music festival.
The festival had some unexpected consequences for me. I was reintroduced to psychedelics, and this time in a totally new environment, one that felt playful and fresh. It broke me out of a crusty shell of cynicism that had become hardened by city life.
A photo I took at a music festival in BC during sunrise
It was like re-encountering the magic I had experienced in the rave scene, but this time in a more mature way. It was that same feeling I had while walking in the forest as a child, a sense that there was something magical there to be discovered. I felt a strong pull to this new mystical world, and started to make regular trips west.
On one such trip, I attended a friend’s cottage party on a remote island. I felt that I was approaching something meaningful in life, so as I took a relatively light dose of psychedelics, I made the intention to simply be contemplative, hoping some clarity about my life would come.
We hung out near the ocean for a while, admiring the stars. I had my first experience of bio-luminescent algae, which covered the rocks on the beach as the tide receded, lighting up each step with a gentle explosion of wonder.
I went inside the cottage, which had been transformed into a dance party, and as I moved my body to the music something began to happen that I had never experienced before.
I started to have ideas enter my mind that had a distinctly different quality from my regular thoughts. These didn’t feel like my thoughts, more like fully formed concepts that were being dropped into my mind from some outside source.
It began as a vision or understanding of culture and energy, and how we humans essentially channel the energy of our culture, carrying and amplifying that cultural energy.
I visualized culture as something living and growing like a moss, and this was a clear message that culture is alive. Whether we are passively engaging with it, or pushing its boundaries into new territories. My takeaway was that we can intentionally evolve culture into a better direction. That if we engage in our culture with more compassion and care, we can move culture in that direction.
I recognized the power that each of us has, that our actions are constantly impacting those around us. This insight was in direct opposition to the apathy I had felt about the individualistic and materialistic values I saw driving much of the world.
I was in awe of what was happening. It wasn’t like I had never thought about these types of things, but at that moment these ideas felt like divine messages that were being given to me intentionally.
I left the cottage party and headed back to the beach where I could find quietude and focus on what was coming through, walking along the water until I found a big rock to sit on where I wouldn’t be disturbed.
Sitting there that night, I could feel a divine presence of profound love and wisdom. It was so deeply loving and wise that I don’t feel those words accurately portray the experience. It was like the deepest love I had ever felt, or even could imagine, was only a distant reflection of this truly profound love. It was the ultimate source of all love, and I don’t know how I knew that, but at the time it was undeniably clear to me. This was the source of everything, the heart of the universe, the origin of all life and consciousness, and it was loving beyond comprehension.
The only label that felt fitting for this experience was “God”. Although I had been somewhat agnostic before, uncertain of the true nature of God, this was a clear revelation. I felt a kinship with all of the saints and prophets from all the various traditions, understanding their devotion and conviction.
I could easily see this type of experience converting someone to a religion. Had I been raised only in a Christian environment, I’m sure I would have deemed myself born-again and started to attend Church regularly.
But having been exposed to many religious and spiritual perspectives, I recognized the truth in all of them, that they are all genuine paths to the divine, as this presence was universal and indiscriminate. It was clear to me in that moment that we are all connected to this divinity, whether we realize it or not.
There was another vision that came through. I could see the Earth in my mind’s eye, covered everywhere in specks of light. The meaning was again somehow clear, that these specks of light were humans who were embodying this love and divinity and bringing it into the world.
I had begun the night looking for some direction or inspiration on what I should do with my life, and now I was getting this message that what you do isn’t nearly as important as the energy and presence you bring to it.
This experience shook me to my core, in the best way. It inspired deep devotion towards the divine and compassion for all beings. I spent the next few months in a subtle state of bliss, sensing the presence of the divine everywhere and in everything, and feeling deeply grateful for the fact that anything exists at all.
I went back to the rock I’d been sitting on the next morning and this seal carcass had washed up on shore in nearly the exact spot.
This experience made me feel that I better understood the world and my place in it, and helped me get clear on what I want and how to focus my energy. But despite a renewed commitment to my meditation and daily prayer practices, I eventually felt myself slipping back into a more isolated consciousness, the connection with the divine becoming more faint.
As the spiritual highs faded and I came back to a more grounded reality, I was confronted with the real challenge of the spiritual path: integration. For me it came by seeing everything in a new way.
Spending time simply observing nature began to inspire wonder and awe. Contemplating everything from trees to flowers to insects to mushrooms to moss to animals to birds to rocks… The beauty, variety, and complexity in nature is truly unfathomable.
Many traditions all over the world see reality as animate, meaning the world itself is alive and intelligent, that all things are conscious and have an essence or spirit that we can engage with. The more open I became to receiving messages from the world, the more it seemed to speak to me.
More and more I began to feel a sense of dialogue with the world. I would express my hopes or desires or curiosities — either through prayer or a more elaborate ritual — and would often receive some sort of response, whether through life’s synchronicities or through a sense of intuitive clarity.
Meditation is ultimately about dropping as much of the framework or understanding as we can, and beholding directly the mystery of existence. The more we shed our ideas about what the world is, the more intimately we can encounter it.
While getting out of my comfort zone and having new experiences was a big part of my path, I’ve recognized more and more that the magic and mystery of the world is right here, right now. My practice has become about the full embrace of life, recognizing the sacredness of each moment and seeing the divinity in everything and everyone.
So join us this month as we wander down unexplored paths of practice to see what magic and mystery awaits!
****