​why expanded states of consciousness are perfectly normal and not apolitical

Different traditions have nuanced associations for the qualities of sun and moon (which for me, don’t benefit from being correlated with oversimplified gender stereotypes), attributes that ask to be balanced in us. This technique, the only one ever to arrive whole and complete in one meditation sit, helps me balance them in myself. I should add that this “download” is of course impacted by acculturation - influenced by Buddhist and Hindu iconography I’ve seen, yogic practices I’ve had the privilege of studying, and very cursory learning about Egyptian and Sufi maps of the body, just for starters - and all the problems of appropriative reclamation of indigenous practices by people from privileged social locations inhere in me sharing it. AND practices for working with solar and lunar energies are also part of the indigenous European cultural heritage erased by Christianity, and if we're not open to how they might be re-membered in our bodyminds we'll only ever be plundering other cultures for them. It’s been a true gift, and has proved over the last 3 or 4 years of practice to be super useful in centering me, recalibrating my own imbalances, and helping me become a clearer channel for Spirit, Quaker-style. So I’m taking the risk of sharing it. 

From this week's newsletter at Shiné: Mind/Body/Spirit:
This week in classes we roiled, we rocked and panted and just kinda "went there" a little bit. To sounds of the didgeridoo and Tibetan horns and drums and drums and drums we went down. Down into the hips and the deeper parts of the psyche with Aria Aber's chilling poem, "America," while they took down the slavery exhibit at Independence Park. Should we have been in the streets with signs, should we have been doing all.the.things? We do - AND we need time to actually feel, experience, and metabolize all that's going on all around us, so we can stay in it together. We need to resource from art, from connection with our souls and with the collective, if we're to have any resilience for the long haul. The places we went this week in classes were places in the psyche that ask to be visited. Touching in with the deeper planes is a way of maintaining right relationship with a world that is more complex than the one acknowledged by the individualist materialism that structures our society. Dropping into older ways of feeling and knowing is not in and of itself a bypass, or an exit route from the very real set of circumstances we're facing. Josh Schrei from the Emerald podcast takes issue with describing expanded states of consciousness as “altered," which implies that the perceptual state most American are living in is NORMAL. There is nothing normal about this right now in America. For most of human history, the consciousness often referred to as “altered” was normal. The world was experienced as alive, relational, full of guidance and intelligence. Forests listened. Animals and ancestors and other guides communicated. This intelligence was encountered, not extracted. Building practices for shifting our consciousness isn’t some weird, crazy, or even particularly radical thing. It’s just remembering how humans learned to listen, to belong. It's how we once knew our lives were embedded in a living, responsive world, and that we had a role in caring for it.

It seems worth mentioning here that Shiné holds space for practicing somatic techniques to help with psychedelic journeys - the next session is February 15th. It confuses folks sometimes to learn that we aren't actually taking psychedelic substances in this practice group; in fact, not everyone in the group has any interest in plant medicine. They just want to share space with other people who know something about expanded states of consciousness, and how to navigate them. I don’t like to make brazen claims about something that my culture knows very little about, but I’ve noticed that folks with some experience in psychedelic work need less and less help from external substances in expanding their perception. As the grooves imprint in our minds and bodies, it becomes easier and easier to access an older operating system of consciousness - one where perception doesn’t get boxed in by strictures of time and space, and one where meaning arises through relationship with the more-than-human realm (meaning, the world that might be natural or ancestral or what might be called spiritual). Expanded awareness might be something that folks encounter - we might say remember - through psychedelic work, but they don't in any way REQUIRE psychedelics. I find daily meditation, weekly Quaker worship, and somatic practice most days helps me access these forms of awareness more readily and smoothly.

Regardless of how we get there, if our intention is clear, entering into these modes of perception isn't about escaping reality, it’s about coming into deeper relationship with it. For thousands of years people tapped into deep mind for very practical purposes: to heal the sick, resolve conflict, receive ecological guidance, and maintain right relationship with unseen forces shaping everyday life. These were practical technologies for survival, not recreational detours. We're not looking for escape but for insight - clear insight that isn't abstract but directly channeled through the body - and it often shows up as not-always-easy and sometimes uncomfortable promptings and leadings that return us to clarity about our ethical responsibilities. So huzzah for the didgeridoo and for the roiling and panting and stretching our souls ever more expansively. Grateful for you all companioning me and one another on this journey we're on.