Ian & Stuart's Australian Mac: Not for Sale/Another.not.for.sale (Australia).iso/hold me in your arms/nanomius/etc/drugs

Internet Message Format | 1994-09-24 | 10KB

Date: Tue, 6 Sep 94 14:51:05 +0100
From: [e-mail] (Matthew Watkins)
To: [e-mail]
Subject: McKenna


Has everyone ascended, or something? Haven't heard anything from this list
in a couple of days.  Anyway...

Has anyone read Terence McKenna's "Invisible Landscape" or "Trialogues at
the Edge of the West" (?) -the latter written with Rupert Sheldrake &
someone else?  Or seen the recent film "LZ-37" (i think) in which he
appears with Robert Anton Wilson and Rudy Rucker?  i'm wondering if it's
worth the effort to try and track these down.
i posted a question about T.M.'s latest book "True Hallucinations" and got
almost no response.  His unrelenting insistence that the use of psychoactive
plants is the only real hope for humanity in its quest for hyperspatial
transcendence hasn't gone down too well with the new-age community, i
think.  i don't recall having seen *any* discussion on the intelligent use
of natural psychedelics, or the role they may have played in the evolution
of human consciousness on this list.  Is this some sort of unspoken taboo,
or have i just not been here long enough?

matthew

Date: Tue, 6 Sep 1994 15:07:48 -0400
To: [e-mail]
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: McKenna

Dear Matthew,

Back in the late 70's, I brought that very question up to a Spiritual
Teacher of mine. She was an incredible person who had the uncanny ability
of reading you like a book; very unsettling if you had deluded yourself
into believing that secrets or private thoughts even exist.

She told me that the answer was spoken of in the Bible concerning the
wedding feast. You can find that in Matthew 22, 1-14. In that story, one of
the men who showed up for the marriage feast wasn't wearing a wedding
garmet. When the King asked him about it, the man was speechless. The King
then turned to his servants and told them to bind the man and to throw him
out into the darkness. The whole story is very symbolic.

You see, the man without the garment _did_ make it to the wedding feast. As
a corollary, LSD, peyote, etc., _will_ take you into other rhelms. But,
that does not earn you the right to be or stay there. Drugs, natural or
synthetic, are _not_ a natural or healthy way to open the energy centers,
or what is know as chakras. Drugs do violence to those centers. They
disrupt them and rip them open. A host of negativity can follow from lower
astral contact. A perfect example would be to look into the life of Timothy
Leary, today. As a suggestion, read the early books of Dr. Richard Alpert -
Ram Dass; "Grist for the Mill", is a good choice.

The mistake of the 60's and 70's was that Spiritual Awareness could be
reached by the fast track, with instant Illumination and complete
gratification of the senses. Ha!  8^)

Bill


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Date: Wed, 7 Sep 94 15:08:10 +0100
From: [e-mail] (Matthew Watkins)
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To: [e-mail]
Subject: re: McKenna
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Hmmm...

i appreciate your comments, and think that you're very possibly right,
but there are still a lot of unanswered questions.  i've heard a lot of
variations on the same arguments, and they always involve what someone
else (a guru or spiritual teacher of some sort) said.  i think it's
important to trust fully in the immediacy of one's own experience -
this is one significant point which distinguishes insights gained
through the use of naturally occuring psychedelics and those passed on
by a teacher (however sincere they may be).  It might seem a bit cynical,
but it's quite natural that `spiritual teachers' discourage the use of
these substances, as they represent a threat to their authority and
livelihood.

i think it's very important to distinguish the naturally occuring psychoactive
plants from synthetics like LSD.  Virtually every culture to have existed
on this planet has had some sacred plant at the root of its spiritual life -
except our own - see the essay on "Mushrooms and Religion" in Robert Graves'
book "Difficult Questions, Easy Answers" (don't take the title too seriously,
tho').  This fact has nothing to do with the recent Western desire for instant
Illumination and sensory gratification - you're confusing two different
issues.  It's interesting to note that large numbers of
Western people are now aware of Eastern mysticism, concepts like karma and
chakras, etc. and that this can be traced back to the youth culture which
exploded out of mid-60's USA which was unlike anything that had been seen before.
i'm quite sure that whatever `it' was that happened back then was due to the
widescale use of LSD, DMT, etc. There was almost *no* interest in these things
before.  As far as i can tell, LSD is a crude molecular approximation of
psilocybin and can awaken aspects of consciousness which could otherwise lay
dormant - i don't buy into everything McKenna writes, but his idea of symbiotic
relationships between the human and various plant species, the evidence of
significant mushroom use in the verdant Sahara and it's role in the sudden
rapid development of the cerebral cortex - all of these matters have to be
given serious consideration.  i take your point about Leary - i wouldn't
want to end up like that :)


i think it's misleading to label psilocybin as a `drug', and i've not yet
been convinced that its careful use will `do violence' to ones chakras.
Sudden widescale ingestion of such substances is not going to instantly
remove all of the world's problems.  Such behaviour would be entirely out
of cultural-context.  We've been out of touch with the realms of
consciousness available through psychoactive plants for so long that it
could only make things worse.  But i wouldn't dismiss the possibility that
at some point in the future, these plants may play some role in the
resolution of our current dilemna.  Check out McKenna's books - they're
very thought provoking even if you don't believe a word of them.

Om Namah Shivaya
m a  t    t       h           e                 w


Date: Wed, 7 Sep 1994 10:28:58 -0400
To: [e-mail]
From: [e-mail]
Subject: re: McKenna

Dear Matthew ...

No attempt at being trite, _all_ roads lead somewhere. Only now that I am
older, and hopefully a bit wiser, do I recognize how truly difficult it is
to convey information; parents, teachers, advisors, counselors and guides
all face the same dilemma in their transmissions. The fact is that anything
can be argued for or against, but only you convince you. You state in your
correspondence :

 i think it's
>important to trust fully in the immediacy of one's own experience -
>this is one significant point which distinguishes insights gained
>through the use of naturally occuring psychedelics and those passed on
>by a teacher (however sincere they may be).  It might seem a bit cynical,
>but it's quite natural that `spiritual teachers' discourage the use of
>these substances, as they represent a threat to their authority and
>livelihood.

I experienced some forms of psychedelics in the 60's and 70's. But, I also
came to realize for myself that any necessity for outside forms of stimulus
means that I am incomplete, in and of myself. To get around that fact,
people labled them as enhancements. Yet, enhancements can only ever be
artificial or you return to the same point of incompleteness.

As to your statement on Spiritual teachers; for anyone, like myself, who
has transcended the Roman Catholic paradigm, one becomes acutely aware of
hidden agendas. Exploitation and domination dissolve in the light of
observation. A teacher who is in anyway threatened by loss of authority or
livelyhood is certainly not Spiritual. You go on to say :

 Virtually every culture to have existed
>on this planet has had some sacred plant at the root of its spiritual life -
>except our own - see the essay on "Mushrooms and Religion" in Robert Graves'
>book "Difficult Questions, Easy Answers" (don't take the title too seriously,
>tho').  This fact has nothing to do with the recent Western desire for instant
>Illumination and sensory gratification - you're confusing two different
>issues.

Who's kidding who? Whether it's striving for the latest clothes, car, hair
style, body, sex toy - or striving for the latest personal insight, vision,
illumination or wisdom, it's still the same _striving_, originating from
the same source. Any movement to or away from leads to the same maya,
illusion, quest for personal self-gratification. It matters not how humbly
you or those of centuries ago may word it. It's still the same ol'story -
you are incomplete. Then you go on to say :

 We've been out of touch with the realms of
>consciousness available through psychoactive plants for so long that it
>could only make things worse.  But i wouldn't dismiss the possibility that
>at some point in the future, these plants may play some role in the
>resolution of our current dilemna.

The most ludicrous of all attempts that anyone can make is that of changing
anothers mind. I am firmly convinced that modification does not represent
_real_ change. It is obvious, though, that you are attracted to this flame,
so, whatever, check it out or not if that's what you want to do. I still
smile in my memory of those who have gone on that road before you. All that
was ever brought back (if they came back) were the fleeting shadows of
memories recalled in words that failed to convey.

Bill