The Skull on the Philosopher’s Desk
Disintegration of the Ego-Mind
Back in 2017 I wrote about how ayahuasca and other entheogens were helping prepare me for my own death.
After a lifetime of minimal contemplation, I was forced over and over again to stare at my own mortality down the barrel of the medicine cup.
If you’ve yet to experience any form of entheogenic medicine or psychedelic substance, the whole situation can get intense.
Very intense.
I think there’ll always be an amount of healthy trepidation and consideration before undertaking deep medicine journeys, precisely because of the ineffable intensity I experienced from the beginning.
As someone who suffered with asthma from childhood, my respiratory system was almost always a point of focus.
Sometimes I’d be neck-deep in these intense experiences, resisting the need to surrender deeper due to the extreme discomfort I felt in my chest; wheezing, coughing, and struggling to breathe clearly.
It took a long while to untangle those threads, from poor dietary choices, stagnation of emotion and energy, learning to breathe differently, psycho-somatic trauma, overall changes in lifestyle…
And as long as I chose to answer the call to keep exploring this path, there was no immediate escape.
Instead I was offered the practice of surrender, into greater levels of intensification through the disintegration of the ego-mind, and the discomforts of the body.
If you haven’t already checked it out, I recently spoke about two of my earliest ayahuasca experiences on the most recent episode of “Birdsong with Caiyuda”.
Ignoring, Obsessive Rumination & The Middle Way
As I continued to develop a relationship, and a reverence, toward these shamanic medicines and sacred psychedelics, I started to ponder dying and death with more curiosity.
I consumed and contemplated a wealth of new-found philosophical ideas regarding consciousness, the afterlife, and reincarnation.
An article by Jeff Mason, a lecturer of philosophy in London, came my way, who wrote this about death (right before he was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer):
“Ignoring death leaves us with a false sense of life's permanence and perhaps encourages us to lose ourselves in the minutiae of daily of life. Obsessive rumination on death, on the other hand, can lead us away from life.
Honestly coming to terms with one's death involves reflection on its significance in one's life, and thinking about the larger values that give life its meaning.”
Can you resonate?
Contemplating the process of dying and death doesn’t have to be a depressing morbid concept, but an important reminder of the reality of existence.
Reflecting on my own impermanence, and the mortality of those around me, allows me to better put things into perspective.
To acknowledge the fact that it may be my time to go, any time.
It reminds me to not get caught up in the anxiety and stress of the insignificant happenings in daily life.
To deepen my presence and experience more of the richness that life has to offer.
To better my relationships with those around me.
To define my priorities, values, virtues, and what’s truly important to me.
To find fulfilment and meaning in how I choose to spend my time.
Chewing on The Bigger Questions
Almost a decade later, and this process of contemplating dying and death is still present, in different forms.
What is my relationship with the idea of my own mortality?
What would I regret not having done if I were to die tomorrow?
How do I want to be remembered, and what legacy do I wish to leave behind?
What needs to die within me for something new to be born?
Am I resisting a necessary ending in my life, and if so, why?
What new beginning am I longing for, and what must I let go of to achieve it?
Like an ever-flowing current in the backdrop of life, the skull that sits atop the philosophers desk, or perhaps even the bone-pile, as Dr Martin Shaw speaks to, that we awaken during our time in solitude out in the wilderness…
The bigger themes and questions in life are always available to chew on.
And chew on them we must as part of deepening into the richness of life.
Many live on the surface, stuck in the superficialities of what others think, contorting themselves to fit others expectations and values; people pleasing, pandering to others needs.
But there’s truth in these words:
You can’t control what other people think of you.
No matter how hard you try, people will continue to project their own stories -and delusions- onto you, sometimes turning God into the Devil in their own minds.
It’s been my experience countless times.
One moment you’re placed on a throne of grandeur, yet in a change of circumstance, they experience an aspect of self outside of their own attachments and expectations, and their projections and stories shift from God to Devil.
We might be able to influence what others think of us, but trying to control is a fruitless journey.
The more we people-please, the more we lose ourselves in someone else’s story.
The more we get sucked into the distractions of someone else’s values, the more we feel the irritation, dissatisfaction, depression, disempowerment, and all those other undesirable qualities creep in; gnawing at us constantly from the inside-out.
Why do we give our power away like that?
Why do we live by values that aren’t even our own?
Stop living a life that isn’t aligned with who you truly are.
Instead, start creating your own reality—a reality that reflects your inner truth and purposeful actions.
The path to Know Thyself requires old versions of self to die in order to be reborn into something new. The caterpillar, chrysalis, to gooey mush, to butterfly.
Walking the medicine path, and exploring the initiatory wisdom rites offered here, are certainly pathways of self discovery, healing, awakening, spiritual expansion, soul illumination, reclaiming our power, and ultimately knowing thyself more intimately.
If you’re curious, The Pilgrimage: Shamanic Wilderness Expeditions and Vision Quest: The Wilderness Vigil are two options you might wish to explore.
Let the metaphorical skull on your desk guide your way.
Life is short, create your own reality, dream the dream into existence, make it happen.
I’ll see you in the mountains…
