By Rose Bryant

“Spend less, live more” was a slogan I recently saw related to an advertisement for a mega-chain super-store….the first thought to arrive in my mind was, at the expense of whom? 

“The urge-to-separateness, or craving for independent and individualized existence, can manifest itself on all the levels of life, from the merely cellular and physiological, through instinctive to the fully conscious….it can be the urge of a part within an organism for an intensification of its own partial life as distinct from (and consequently at the expense of) the life of the organism as a whole….Let us consider first the suffering inflicted by living organisms on themselves and on other living organisms in the mere process of keeping alive…” - Huxley

As a society, we have become trapped in a perpetual pattern of consuming, which is driven by the need to fill a void. We have been conditioned to compartmentalize – an ambiance of separateness ensues.  Possessions are subconsciously connected to power. Do we work jobs we hate in order to buy things we don't need to impress people who don't really matter? Our thought patterns have, in a way, been “trained” to flow a certain way, so as to not question much in order to be a conforming ‘well-behaved’ human of the world. After all, an agreeable mind is much less difficult to deal with, right?

It seems that at certain points a person may see no other way to survive other than abiding by what is socially acceptable as a means to traverse through life. What I mean by this is that one may feel a natural obligation to move through the motions of ‘normal’ human behavior as it functions best in the particular society in which they may reside – such as obtaining an education, establishing a form of stable income (career path), becoming a homeowner (supporting the economy) etc…. Because if you do not do this, what happens? Things may not flow as easily, one might say – met with resistance and a lack of resources.

Often, the most brilliant and creative ideas are held by those who have no financial means in order to transmit the idea – in fact, at times one may feel that the only thing between them and their dream is some cash flow. In this day and age, how is it exactly that one might ‘get ahead’? Many people work tirelessly to merely survive – eat, keep a roof over their head and breathe. What I am inquiring is that under said conditions, stress could potentially be rampant, which in turn may inhibit creativity – thriving of an individual. Therefore, is it possible to thrive when overwhelmed by merely trying to survive? And what impact does this have on populations experiencing this as a whole?

We know from science – the impact of stress on the human body – not only can overwhelming stress lead to serious mental and physical health problems, it can also disrupt your relationships at home, work, and school.  There is a very long list of health outcomes related to body, mind and behavior, which have been correlated with chronic stress – diabetes, depression, anxiety, loss of libido, sleeping problems, quick to anger, headaches, substance abuse and hormonal disruptions such as increases in cortisol. How do we see this playing into the ‘sick care system’ health care model we see in America? For those who cannot afford health insurance for example even though they work full-time – waiting until the last moment possible to seek medical attention – usually at an emergency room or urgent care – as long as the model supports treatment instead of prevention we will always be upside down – because who ends up paying for those emergency visits? - Ultimately costing much more than preventative measures would have to begin with including education…

“For one minute, walk outside, stand there, in silence, look up at the sky, and contemplate how amazing life is” – said not very many single moms with 2-3 jobs and not a penny left at the end of the month or a full night’s sleep. Unfortunately, those without time, financial means or energy – more often than not – find it extremely difficult to mentally or physically seek pieces of life, which might bring fulfillment, joy or the ability to escape from the repetitive cycle they may be in. There is something tremendous to be said about doing a hobby vs. doing a hobby in which your survival depends upon it. Can one be enjoyed more than the other? 

What I have found is, those who have experienced the most hardship in life often give the best advice – they emanate wisdom like light beams – that is if they chose to channel their energy in that way. Of course, some may choose to harbor an element of bitterness or cynicism, which is a misuse of the vital force and still – there is something to be learned from this reaction as well. There are plenty of people who have everything in the world, but are still miserable – and then plenty of people who have nothing and are extremely at peace. Is it then a matter of perspective and/or level of consciousness?

One thing that seems very clear to me is that, no matter the circumstance of life you might be in, you must find a way to make time, there’s that word again – a conscious effort to further oneself, to meditate, to move your body, to love yourself, to find connection, to breathe, to express gratitude, to think one thought at a time or none at all – even if only briefly each day – a way to find your center, to be grounded – even if the rest of your day is totally chaotic. It is inherent that we do this – in order to thrive and not merely survive as a robot on this rock orbiting through the universe.

By Rose Bryant

Time, time, time. How exactly do we describe something which is difficult to find, catch, define or achieve? People are either obsessed with controlling it, frivolous with it, live in fear of it or completely disregard it all together. Sometimes we go through life and are so busy that chronological time keeps passing by and we may not even realize it. It's like that auto-pilot thing, when you're driving home and arrive there, but don't remember the in between part. Many people get stuck on auto-pilot-hyperdrive and plow through life like an aimless bull, missing things that may have seemed insignificant, but actually were substantial pieces of the human experience. 

Others, with endless to-do lists - in a race against time to conquer, complete or feel satisfied. The trouble is, we ride a wave believing we'll be happy "when" or "if" this or that happens . Some people wait an entire lifetime without a fruitful outcome. A repetitive cycle of waiting for something huge to happen in our lives and not feeling like we've ever done enough or completed enough tasks on the imaginary ladder to achieving happiness.....or perhaps what we believe is happiness while living in our glass house, clouded with illusion. 

And then there is the 'fear' of time - the passing of it, either too slowly or too quickly - the anxiety about how it should be one or the other. Somewhere we get lost in the suspension of the web. It all kind of flows together and we are not sure which direction to take. We are under the impression that we are allowed a certain amount of time, which we want to make tangible, but tango with the impossibility of that regularly. It's like a hurricane - sucking everything up in it's path - so concerned with the past or the future that we don't even see this moment. And we certainly do not consider that this moment is all that we have - that it's the only thing for certain in the entire universe. 

Time in Sanskrit is 'Kala'. Time is a measure of change and prana. 15 prana = 1 minute. 900 prana = 1 hour. So, in Vedic & Yogic teachings it is believed that less respirations - thus less expelling of prana, will result in a longer life span. Pranayama daily, holotropic breath work and meditation are some tools to use to conserve your prana and thus, time. 

Chronological time is based on the movement of the Earth, in which one rotation = 1 day and one revolution around the sun = 1 year......while Psychological time is made up of the movement of thoughts.....thought builds on memory.....memory = past, present and future experience. Time = movement of past into present and future.....thought = linear movement of time.....once entering inner space beyond thought, one goes beyond psychological time. 

In Chinese medicine, the theory does not separate cause from effect; instead, time transcends in an ever-repeating cycle of metamorphosis. Life is a game of leapfrog with events tumbling over each other in a perpetual cascade. All states, events and moments are said to be characterized by either Yin or Yang, related to an alternating cycle which is along a single continuum.

No matter how we would like to define time, it is ultimately elusive and influenced by perception. Just like how you feel like you've known someone forever that you only just met on the subway an hour ago - the way you wake up one day and realize that every moment that has passed will never occur again - the way you wish so badly that you could 'grow up' when you were a kid and then all of a sudden you're 35, married with children, a dog and a mortgage - the way you never listen to that old hippie on the bus telling you when you were 17 to enjoy the ride of life and not be in a hurry - the way the sun keeps rising and setting without fail - the way we oscillate between having all the time in the world and not having enough time and how we feel as though the outcome somehow defines who we are as human beings - the way we think we know what the outcome will be or that everything in life will go as planned - the way the universe laughs when we make plans - the way an epiphany comes upon you all of a sudden after what felt like an eternity of searching. 

Because our perception of the world influences how we live in it, our consciousness sculpts reality. Our experiences influence our thinking, so our reality shapes our consciousness - our minds create what is real, while thoughts are generated from lived experience.  When you wake up each morning, know that the minutes or hours you spent hitting the snooze - are moments that will never exist again at your level of consciousness in this lifetime. With that, there is no reason not to seize the day - make the most productive use of time - after all, that's what we are here for, right? If we sit around waiting for that perfect moment, it may never come - perhaps the perfect moment does not exist, but then what's all this talk about waiting for the right time? Is there a right time?  Or is it just a matter of perspective and the sequence of events that unfold naturally? How much influence do we have on it? One thing is for sure - that everything changes and seems to do so in a linear, forward moving fashion. The idea is to remain at a constant state of departure while always arriving - The happening of a moment. It turns out that all the answers are inside of us - Doubt simply stems from not believing this fact. The best thing to do is, in the words of my mother, "always do your best and always be kind - the rest will fall into place." 

By Andre Lyons

In 1952 the English–born writer Aldous Huxley became involved in an experiment to clinically detail the physiological and psychological effects of Peyote (Mescaline), a substance used in spiritual practice by Native Americans and the Indians of Mexico. Having a profound impact and subsequently changing the course of his life, Aldous wrote The Doors of Perception, which contains his reflections on his experience with the powerful entheogen. This book is among the most valuable tributes to the psychedelic experience man has yet to produce.

Before moving forward with Huxley and his work, I think it is important to take a moment to mention some little known information about psychedelics and the positive capabilities they possess.  Psychedelics, as the general public understand them, are illegal recreational drugs that render people insane and ruin lives in addictive fashion. This is tragic in both its fallacy and legality; this misconception is a product of the hysterical and reckless use during the 1960’s and the governmental scare propaganda that followed. These substances, like alcohol or even a motor vehicle, can and have been misused; but if proper education in a factual non-biased manner was made available, along with safe and professional environments for use, we could significantly lower the cases of abuse and increase the opportunities for productive exploration of the human psyche.

Contrary to public opinion, there are a vast variety of psychoactive substances that are showing potential intellectual, therapeutic and even spiritual benefits. For example, LSD-25 and psilocybin mushrooms are showing the ability to mitigate end-of-life anxiety in patients suffering from terminal cancer. (Acid test: LSD used as drug therapy for the first time in 40 years) (Harbor - UCLA Psilocybin & Cancer) Rick Doblin Ph.D., founder of the Multi-disciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies, has been facilitating research in the potential therapeutic benefits of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) with patients suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other traumas. (Research > MDMA-Assisted Psychotherapy) Iboga, being administered at Ibogain Treatment Centers in Mexico as well as several other countries, has shown significant therapeutic benefits with recovering alcoholics and heroin addicts. (Why Choose Ibogaine for Drug Detox?) And ayahuasca, the Mother of all the entheogens, is the sacred plant medicine used for perhaps thousands of years by the native people of South America. Ayahuasca has a reputation for helping people over come a great variety of internal issues ranging from neurosis to spiritual conflicts. This very small list of benefits only contains the tangible results science has confirmed. Beyond this, these substances also have an incredible capacity to produce remarkably honest self-reflection, life changing expansion of awareness, shifts in perspective, deep appreciation for life and existence, heightened problem solving abilities, love, compassion, curiosity and the list goes on.

Now to get back to the point; Aldous Huxley was a modest, compassionate and open-minded man of formidable intelligence. It is these three qualities that allowed him to produce such an honest, well-articulated account of his experience with Mescaline. Anyone who has ever had any profound experience with the use of psychedelics can appreciate the difficulty in trying to share these experiences. There is a state of consciousness where a kind of information can be experienced and even understood, but can hardly be brought back to our ordinary state of consciousness. Trying to translate and articulate these experiences into ordinary linear thought and symbols seems to be an impossible task. But in The Doors of Perception, Huxley has done a tremendous job at bringing his readers closer to the reality of the psychedelic experience.

Unlike many people, Huxley formed his opinions on matters through personal inquiry; he was not a particularly impressionable man. It was this very method of experiencing life combined with his curiosity that led him through The Doors of Perception.

In his writing Huxley portrays a spectacular experience filled with beauty, purity and a newfound perspective that transcends anything he had ever experienced before. A world “Neither agreeable nor disagreeable,” a world he would describe as simply “Is-ness.” (The Doors of Perception)

Huxley felt, as many people who under go such an experience, at least those with a level of seriousness about it do, that he was much more intimately connected with the universe than he was previously aware of. Upon reflecting on his experience, he found himself agreeing with “the Cambridge philosopher, Dr. C.D. Broad, ‘that we should do well to consider much more seriously than we have hitherto been inclined to do the type of theory which Bergson put forward in connection with memory and sense perception. The suggestion is that the function of the brain and nervous system and sense organs is in the main eliminative and not productive.” … “The function of the brain and nervous system is to protect us from being overwhelmed and confused by this mass of largely useless and irrelevant knowledge, by shutting out what we should otherwise perceive or remember at any moment, and leaving only that very small and special selection which is likely to be practically useful.’ According to such a theory, each one of us is potentially Mind at Large. But in so far as we are animals, our business is at all cost to survive. To make biological survival possible, Mind at Large has to be funneled through the reducing valve of the brain and nervous system.” (The Doors of Perception)

As you might see, this experience opened up a significantly new view of the universe and man’s place in it for Huxley, one that, given western societies conventional approach to understanding reality, is quite easy to criticize. Such a theory, as metaphysical as it is, was surely written off by mainstream science. But considering how little we know about the nature of consciousness, I find it hard to understand why one wouldn’t find enough of an open mind to consider it. It’s not necessarily impractical, just a bit outside the traditional scope of rational consideration.

Huxley’s account of his experience is filled with beauty and profound ideas, but there comes a time during his trip when he begins to feel overwhelmed. As his journey drives him deeper and deeper into the unknowable, Huxley finds himself shaken to the core. In retrospect, he realizes that his fear was produced from the sensation of “disintegrating under a pressure of reality greater than a mind accustomed to living in a cozy world of symbols could possibly bear.” (The Doors of Perception) This is what some might call an ego-death; the sensation of ones personal identity, cultural conditioning and belief systems all dissolving into the paradoxically beautiful yet alarming mystery experience.  But Huxley wasn’t so foolish to claim that the mescaline experience or any other psychedelic experience was on the grounds of producing enlightenment. He instead suggested that the experience was what the Catholic theologians called “a gratuitous grace”.

The Doors of Perception is undoubtedly a controversial piece of writing and can be interpreted in many ways. But regardless of how one interprets the work, it’s clearly an honest, humble, thoughtful and skillfully written report that took a great deal of courage to publish considering the era in which this all was taking place. And as highly regarded as Mr. Huxley was in the world of literature and intellectuals alike, The Doors of Perception was the beginning of a widely mixed and criticized reputation.

Whether you decide Huxley’s report of his experience is rooted in a legitimate reality beyond the realm of ordinary experience or should simply be summed up as merely personal impression, The Doors of Perception is a fascinating and beautifully written piece of work, one of great importance for understanding what it is like to take the trip into the psychedelic experience. And if there’s one thing for certain, and Aldous said it best, it’s that “…the man who comes back through the Door in the Wall will never be quite the same as the man that went out.” (The Doors of Perception)

References:
1) "Harbor - UCLA Psilocybin & Cancer." Hefter Research Institute . Web. 1 Sept. 2014. <http://www.heffter.org/research-hucla.htm>.
2) Duhaime-Ross, Arielle. "Acid test: LSD used as drug therapy for the first time in 40 years." The Verge (2014). Web. 1 Sept. 2014. <http://www.theverge.com/2014/3/5/5473828/lsd-drug-therapy-first-time-in-40-years>.
3) "Research > MDMA-Assisted Psychotherapy." . Web. 1 Sept. 2014. <http://www.maps.org/research/mdma/>.
4) "Why Choose Ibogaine for Drug Detox?" Ibogaine Association . Web. 1 Sept. 2014. <http://www.ibogaine-therapy.net>.
5) Huxley, Aldous. The Doors of Perception. Seventh ed. 2011: Thinking Ink. Print.