Sacred Cactus

What are the thoughts on this? I think it is great that they allow any race to join, no one should be discriminated for race; for Anything, in my opinion.

....Quoted from their site: "The Peyote Way Church of God is a non-sectarian, multicultural, experiential, Peyotist organization located in southeastern Arizona, in the remote Aravaipa wilderness. It is not affiliated with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the Native American Church, or any other religious organizations, though we do accept people from all faiths. Church membership is open to all races. We encourage individuals to create their own rituals as they become acquainted with the great mystery. We believe that the Holy Sacrament Peyote, when taken according to our sacramental procedure and combined with a holistic lifestyle (see Word of Wisdom), can lead an individual toward a more spiritual life.

Peyote is currently listed as a controlled substance and its religious use is protected by Federal law only for Native American members of the Native American Church. Non-Indian Peyote use is protected in five states : AZ, NM, CO, NV, and OR. We do not have access to Peyote where it grows in South Texas and Mexico. As it is an endangered species, we believe an essential and inseparable part of our religious practice is the growing and stewardship of the Holy Sacrament Peyote."

"Federal law prohibits possession of Peyote except to those who are members of the Native American Church (NAC) and can prove 25% Native American ancestry. However, the "bonafide religious use" of Peyote is exempted, regardless of race in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Oregon (by Supreme Court Judicial Consent—see Smith vs. Employment Division 1991). The American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1996 protects members of the Native American Church from harassment nationally, but not cultivation of Peyote, as the NAC currently has no doctrine concerning cultivation. The Peyote Way Church is protected in these five states because cultivation of Peyote is an Article of Faith as an essential and inseparable part of our religious practice."

i think we can all agree that no race or culture should face discrimination.  i personally believe societies could function with  interpretations of one simple law and that's never to infringe on the freedom of another person unless they infringe on the freedom of someone else.  simple.  if we all agreed to this there would be no restriction of sacramental plants, no black markets, no women being forced into prostitution, gay/lesbian people would have equal rights, prisons would close and wars would end.       

...but unfortunately that's not the world we live in.  since what, 50 years ago human beings are getting locked in cages for using plant medicines that have 1000+ years historical use.  and everyone just goes home and turns on their attention harvesting machines to get saturated with beer and pharmaceutical drug commercials monkey-seeing their way into alignment.  anyone who strays from this predetermined pathway is at the very least discriminated against.  i go as far as supporting that earnie tertelgte guy.  at least i can't out logic him.  at the very base level he is entitled to the same freedoms as all other living things.  i cannot argue with him there.  in this world freedom is given out in small doses.

under this same 'law' we could discuss religion.  everyone is entitled to their own freedom so long as they don't infringe on the freedom of another.  you can see how this applies to the recent charlie hebdo situation.  everyone must be entitled to their own freedoms but when someone starts shooting up the place we have to then address the situation as a community to protect the freedoms of all.  muslims must be free.  and cartoonists must be free.   

so i feel that persons of all ethnicities should be allowed to practice whatever religions they decide.  a white guy should be able to join the NAC just like a mormon should be allowed to become a scientologist.  who cares.  unless they are infringing on someones rights we don't have to address it as a community.  i'm pretty sure the NAC strongly supports this principle. 

speaking of which, i actually made up my own religion.  do you want to join?  it's 40 bucks a month. 

That's very interesting, your 'law'. I like it. I've come up with a similar universal creed that would be of great benefit if it were adopted fully: "Strive to be comfortable without infringing upon the comfort of others." I think that most anything can be boiled down to comfort. We all want to be comfortable; but one is doing wrong to seek comfort at the expense of another's. I'd be interested to check out your religion(if you're serious about that), but not interested in joining, really. $40 per month is a bit steep for me. I'd like to look into it, though.   :)

yeah it's pretty complicated that's why it's so expensive.  but you do get eternal life if you follow all the rules... nah really though, you can join for free.  here are the basics: just like most people i choose to believe different pieces from different sources that in the end bring me comfort.  (thanks for the concept)  basically my 'religion' believes that everything is made up of a base energy source that has yet to be clearly defined or understood.  i come from that energy source as it makes up every atom in this incredibly complicated meat machine i drive around.  when i die i will return to this source and my atoms will again swirl throughout the cosmos for an infinite amount of time as they did before my birth.  should these exact atoms come back together in the exact order and they were the day i was born, kablam, i exist again, and again and again.  throughout the multiverse.  for an infinite amount of time.  how then do i define consciousness,  well "i" is a consequence of the organization of this meat machine's molecules.  "i" was gradually carved by natural selection.  "i" have been shaped by my cumulative experience.  "i" am literally a device that helps to ensure the passage of genetic material.  i however certainly do not experience myself this way.  my experience is that of a human.  so in a sense "i" never exists and always exists at the same time.  i never exist the way the experience portrays myself to be and i always exist when my atoms are exactly as the are right now, which is always happening infinitely as we exist in infinite space and time.  would you donate 40 bucks? 

I've read about them, never attended one of their ceremonies. I can offer up my own personal opinion and that is you must follow whatever path you feel is right for you. Beliefs and the right to believe something is not tied down to an ethnicity or we would not have caucasian Christians.

Another resource I can toss at you that accepts all ethnicities. https://nativeamericanchurches.org

Inyan, it seems there is another way to use peyote that does not involve any belief.  That is, when one adopts a belief, thought, action, and perception are corralled within its framework.  So one becomes limited by adopting beliefs.  In this sense, every belief is limiting, no matter whether directed inwardly or outwardly.  Peyote has the power to disengage these limitations.  To unrestrict thought, action, and percepton.  To find fact, free from the obfuscation of belief.  Put differently, when thought action and perception are not limited by belief, one is free to find actuality, which is objective fact, love, meditation, nature, God and the rest of it. 

to me, beliefs are concerning not only because they are limiting but also because they isolate the believer from the non believer.  No matter whether the belief is political, religious,  or nationalistic, the believer isolates himself, ideologically, when he adopts a belief. 

So what happens if we see the truth of this?  That beliefs isolate the self and limit thought.  What then?  Surely then one can look past belief to objective fact, to actuality, to love. 

We all are subject to the contraints of belief, the crippling limitations of opinion, and we are all able to recieve objective fact, that is, if we understand our natural limitations.  It matters not whether we chose to identify with the left or the right, unless we can look dispassionately at the left and the right, and see how they integrate with the whole, we have not found objective fact, we are still restricted ideologically, psychologically.

Now with all the war, with all the division and conflict in the world today, surely there is a deeper need for objective reasoning then there is for the freedom to believe.  But to infringe on another ideologically is authority, and authority is too belief, and so it too is limiting. so then, without infringing on ones ideological autonomy, how do the masses become aware of the limitations of belief?  How does the left meet the right in communion to solve problems objectively?  How do we find communal love sir? 

If one believes that one is limited by adopting beliefs then that could be looked at as yet another belief. Our thoughts are filled with beliefs and thus our thoughts are limiting. Actions are guided often guided by beliefs that they will have an effect. I may believe that I will fall off a cliff if I jump off the edge of the cliff. Another may believe they can fly if they take the leap of faith that they can indeed jump and fly. If we look at it as an objective reality that we can not fly then we will most certainly die and fall to the ground. However, even more interesting that that is that there have been actual cases of people dying simply because they had a belief that if they ate a certain bird they would die. I remember reading about this in a psychology class some years ago. The man had been tricked into eating a bird that was taboo to eat by a friend. A year later when the fellow deemed it was safe to tell his friend that he had cooked and served him this bird and no ill effects came of it the fellow was told. He promptly dropped dead. Beliefs like we are all connected or part of a larger whole may be true. We are all family in not only a distant biological sense, but In the sense that we are all made up of the same atoms and these atoms will be shared with our future generations and thus... we are all connected. When does a belief cross over from being belief to being reality?
If we believe that thoughts/beliefs can isolate us... what is to keep us from believing that they can also draw us into a larger whole? Do we need to be connected to something outside of ourselves to not feel isolated?

You ask if there is a deeper need for objective reasoning then there is for the freedom to believe.  I would say that once you have lost the freedom to believe as you would like then you have lost the ability to be objective in your reasoning. If you can not entertain another belief and try to see if there is any truth to it or put yourself in another's shoes so to speak for a moment then you have lost the ability to use your imagination and in so doing any hypothesis one might come up with one would think would be extremely limited in at least some cases as you would have lost the freedom to believe or express that belief and that in itself would be very limiting.

For me, love is something you cannot truly have without being able to love oneself.  Do we pretend to love others when we are self loathing? How can we unconditionally love another if we are not unconditionally loving ourselves?

Many might have you faking it with actions till your thoughts and feelings fall in line. The desire to want to fit in and to understand might make one follow this route.

One might believe that peyote has power to change another or to influence ones being in a positive direction and that would be on par with many different people and their belief systems I've run across. Power can be used for good or bad by those that know how to wield power effectively.

I like where your thoughts go sometimes. Let me relate this part of a vision quest for you.... Some of the inner workings of the mind as I have experienced them. You spend much time in preparation giving conscious thought to the prayers/reasons for going up on a vision quest. If your prayers/reasons are not significantly strong enough you will absolutely not make it more than a day. The same is felt many times over each time I have gone up. The first time, much fear was felt as well. But, when one gets past the fears... what you are left with is the boring internal dialogue and the cravings of the body. You listen to yourself wish for ice-cream, soda, etc. You dream up all the wonderful dishes you could eat. You think about how nice it would be to simply sit as your feet begin to feel like lightning bolts are running through them there is so much pain from simply standing for so long and not being allowed to sit. So, you think of all these trivial things and your mind wanders and you hear for the first time perhaps how truly boring most of your thoughts are. It is like being in the company of a stranger and having that awkward silence that you feel you must fill with talk so the other will feel more at peace. So the other can get to know you. Eventually, your mind becomes so bored of this you simply cease to be a part of your thoughts. You are simply the observer watching nature. That is when you start to stop fighting with the experience and you truly become one with your surroundings as you begin to take it all in for the first time. You bounce back and forth between being the observer and listening to your own inner dialogue and then the visions come. Without beliefs though... I sincerely doubt many would have the will power to go through with a vision quest in the traditional Lakota manner.

With all of that said, follow what makes you content and gives you the strongest sense of being in harmony with yourself and nature if that is what makes you happy. So long as it harms no one I can see no harm in it.

that is just it iyan. we are all limited to perform within the range of what we believe will produce a desired outcome.  so in that sense, it takes belief to complete a vision quest the same way it takes belief to make any other choice.  but choice is not discernment.  and that is the distinction i am trying to make.  that fact and belief function differently in the integration.  fact is mutually discernable.  we can all arrive at fact together no matter how we are cultured.  but belief is an image.  it does not exist physically.  it is an image only of the mind and not of reality.  now that is not to say that someone should or should not believe.  we'll leave that up to the many philosophers and mystics. instead if we may discuss this matter,  for a moment, free of opinion, free of belief, and meet one another on a sequence of mutually agreeable facts.   

the first fact is that three does exist a divide between discernible fact and mental images.  that is, tangible, physical matter and mental images.  it is this distinction that i am looking to relate to the peyote experience.  specifically, a peyote experince that is free of images, free of belief, free of expectations or desire, just pure blissfull receptivity. 

now correct me if i am wrong, but there is a point during your vision quests when the self concept is no longer skewing reality.  that is, we all cultivate a self concept, a point of reference from which we define all things.  that is big, that is small.  there is pride.  there is contempt.  all relative to the point of reference that is the self concept.  and it is this constantly refurbished image that skews reality by defining it, by framing it in with opinion and desire.  but sometimes we actually are receptive to reality, to fact.  sometimes all belief and compulsion are negated and there is pure blissfull receptivity.  it is this state with you i wish to discuss.  this state with no images and only the recpetion of fact.   

I think I understand what you are getting at, but can you really separate yourself totally from ones beliefs?

Discernment is the ability to perceive or judge. I would argue that our beliefs often color our perceptions and therefore clouds our judgments. I would argue that many times you do not have a real choice as you do not realize you are making a choice based on beliefs that have been taught to you.

You believe that we can be free of belief and of opinion and you are free to have that belief if that is your opinion. I believe that our thoughts are like a web and each thought is interconnected with other thoughts much like a molecule of water is connected to other molecules of water in an ocean.

As concerns your point about self concept on a vision quest, I can tell you that from my experience that the internal dialogue that is formulated from past experiences/beliefs/etc. and is that which is taught can indeed shut down or off if you will or at least that is the experience of it as it feels as if you are simply the experience.  However, I suspect those thoughts are still running in the background. It is how you can vision of a truck wreck for example and be in the passenger side of a truck as well as on the outside of the truck looking in. Essentially experiencing an experience in a way that would not normally be possible except perhaps in a dream state. There is or can be that pure blissful state as well where upon experiencing it I felt as if I was in an ocean of unconditional acceptance as everything simply was and that was okay. There was no judgment and there was no right or wrong in that moment. There was simply being and that feeling was totally overwhelming to the point that it jump started the internal dialogue once again and the immediate thought for me was this is too good. No one should feel this good. No one, especially me, deserves to feel this freaking good. And with that simple thought the feeling was gone and that high was lost. That is the reality. We create our own highs and lows. We affect and allow ourselves to be effected by outside forces and how we have been taught to respond to them. It is our beliefs that we should not or can not that limit us in that regard and those beliefs are deep seated whether we consciously understand that fact or not. We constantly judge and sense we are being judged as that is the reality most of us live in. It is how we know what is appropriate and inappropriate... that ability to judge and be taught what is right and wrong. When our internal dialogue makes major changes then our sense of self changes. That is how I perceive it and I may be totally wrong. Having switched lenses a few times this is how I perceive it. I totally get that my reality may not be the exact same as yours. Stripping ourselves of garbage or reprogramming the garbage speak so to speak is sometimes a daunting task. The less garbage internal dialogue we have the better. Still, we are left with many moments that we must fill or at least that we think we must fill. Many are not content to exist in awkward silence with others, much less themselves.

How many of us would love to have a well muscled body or at least one that was noticeably toned? How many people would love to be able to do a single pushup or pullup and yet how many of us can do these simple things? If our desires are in conflict with our beliefs that we can do something then this can create a problem. We can let go of the idea that we would like to be able to lift or push our own body weight or we can create a whole system of beliefs about why we can't. There is not enough time in the day is an excuse I've often heard. Yet, how long does it take to try a single time each day? How much time do we waste watching television or engaged in idle chatter? Our beliefs shape our mind and thus our body and ultimately our reality. I apologize if I haven't done a good job on explaining this, but perhaps you may find a small kernel of truth that resonates with you. For me, I have a belief that a person should always be able to lift their body weight once they reach the age that they can actively work towards that. To that end, I perform just 2 exercises a day for less than 6 minutes time under tension. My goals have been met and while I may not go up as fast as some others who do more. I have my very simple goal and beliefs that have been met. Once upon a time I had a goal or belief that I could run a 5 minute mile. That goal was met. I trained many other people to run a 6 minute mile as I had the belief anyone could run a 6 minute mile provided they would give just a little effort. A 5 minute mile being the point at which you experience diminishing returns for your effort in my opinion or belief.

Peyote can affect not just what we see, but also what we hear, feel, and sense. This is one reason I love the sound of a water drum or a rattle during ceremony. Peyote can also affect changes in what we believe or understand to be true. It literally makes one more open to the power of suggestion and those affects can linger long after the effects of the medicine are gone from the body.

that's it!  that's the place!  that ocean of unconditional acceptance!  to see that ocean is to look without opinion, without the impetus to change the self or the surroundings.  that's what acceptance is.  a complete lack of psychological resistance.  when we believe something should be different, we are not receptive to it, we do not accept it.  but when there is no belief, then there is no coloring of perception.  It is this state, and its outcomes, I hope to discuss. 

now everything that can be defined, is defined relative to the self concept, to the idea of a centre.  you come upon an object and you see not the object but your relationship to it.  its uses, its value etc.  and with successive interactions there begins the cultivation of an image.  That is, the object is catalogued and labelled psychologically.  And, we create these images not only for objects, but for ideals, people, concepts etc.  and cumulatively, these labels etch out the self concept- they form the idea of 'I' relative to things.  So the self concept is always moving. Always adjusting as we cultivate labels.  The problem is, the image is of belief, and the object is of fact.  Now this is not 'me' expressing 'my' belief, this is simply a matter of mutually discerning the divide between subjective and objective awareness, for the purpose of furthering our mutual understanding, finding communion. 

Now, you have experienced the objective universe.  You have felt its acceptance. Your connection to it.  And, of course you have experienced the subjective universe.  And it is that universe in which most of us are trapped.  We are trapped within a network of our own fears and desires, our own beliefs and compulsions.  And so there is conflict.  There is conflict between the what is and the what should be, and conflict between the self and the neighbour. And so it is in this manner that there is isolation when there is belief. 

Outside of this isolation there is the integration.  That is, the integration of all things. But as long as there is the self concept, one does not experience the integration.  As long as there is the self concept, one does not experience the what is, but rather the what should be.  Do you see it? 

Now when we take peyote, when we meditate, when we love, there is a movement towards objectivity.  It is this movement the I intend to harness, and to communicate.  For it is this movement, from subjective awareness - with all its fears and compulsions - to objectivity - which is the ocean of acceptance, it is this movement that ends conflict.  From the most trivial internal duality, to the most destructive war.  So this matter seems to be of great importance. 

You mention that the effects of peyote do not recede when one exits the teepee, or in my case, walks home from the beach. The experience does not wear off because it has become part of the self concept - as all experiences that are labelled and catalogued do.  But there is a continuum of awareness, on one end, objective fact, and on the other, subjective definition.  It is our understanding of the self mechanically that moves experience along this plane.  If we don't understand ourselves, we are merely automatons of ideals.  But if we understand the nature of our compulsion, the impetus recedes and we move closer to objectivity.  Peyote shows us our nature.  It shows us the nature of things. And it is this understanding that lingers. 

Now this place of objectivity is nature.  Nature holds no opinions.  No beliefs.  Nature has no expectation or fear. No compulsion outside of its physicality.  It is from nature that we derive all invention.  So it is nature, that undefinable, constantly unfolding being that is the source of all intelligence. If we can look at it, without trying to change it, without trying to fit it into the framework of our ideals, then we tap into that intelligence, and dissolve conflict.  It is the use of peyote in this manner that the speaker is looking to share. But it must be done carefully, for the moment there is the 'me' or the 'mine' there is division, authority, conflict.  So to communicate this matter without creating conflict there mustn't be any sense of ownership, no sense of tradition, no pattern to follow.  As soon as there is a pattern there is division between the mine and the yours. And I am not looking to sell an ideal, there is quite enough of that going on, but rather to advance the collective understanding of the integration, the collective understanding of nature.  If done correctly, we will move the collective towards objectivity and away from war. 

May we discuss how this is to be achieved?  How to end conflict in the minds of man?  May we go into it? 

This state of being or not being. This state of accepting everything as it is and wanting nothing can be achieved with tools such as peyote, beliefs, ceremonies, etc. These tools done a certain way or used a certain way can often lead to this state of unconditional love/acceptance. It is then that the tools drop away for a few seconds. Reality ceases to be as we have defined it.

You seek to evade that which is structured and go straight into the chaos and while I think this may be possible for some, I do not think that the results will always be as one wants and I certainly don't think it will work for all. I see these tools as having the potential for great healing as well as great harm. It is precisely the use of tradition/ceremony that helps sets up the stage for the release in a positive manner. Albeit, there may indeed be those that will abuse that power regardless of how it is controlled or what process one uses to get there.

I think as long as we are talking about people we must realize that we are not all created equal. There are those that will abuse power regardless as some simply lack the biological capacity to love. There is nothing that can be done for these people. They are born this way. Ruling out those few, we need only concern ourselves directly with ourselves. If we achieve any lasting ability to change ourselves for the better however one wishes to define that then those positive changes will ripple out to those we are in contact with and so on and so forth so long as others are receptive. You can not make another person ready for change anymore than you can force yourself to change. You have to want the change you seek and then you have to have a plan and as they say even the best laid plans can go astray. This is where the importance of ceremony comes into play.

Now, I completely understand your desire to strip yourself of dogma. To follow a pure path as it were. All ceremonies evolved from somewhere. If we simply let the medicine teach us and stay away from the dogma... can that truly be done? While I argue against it, I will state that I think it is also possible. I simply thing that instead of using a different cultural or religious set of beliefs one will simply be inserting their own beliefs whether they want to or not. No matter how pure you try to make the experience you are always going to be bringing your own baggage and your own beliefs into the equation and thus if your own beliefs concerning the medicine help you then great. You are good to go as they say. You must understand a tool and how it works on your own mind and emotions before you can safely begin to tear it apart to reformulate how it is used. This is my biased opinion and if you are willing to take risks outside of that to keep the experience more pure and less tainted by outside cultural influences then that is also your own prerogative.  I would say study how other cultures use a particular medicine at the very least. Evolve your own ceremony based on your own understanding of these types of ceremonies while at the same time being careful not to culturally rob those other cultures of their ceremonies. If it is your own... then own it as your own. It is possible to both own something as coming from within and set it free at the same time. It is not an either or situation or at least it doesn't have to be.

A pattern is what you wish to escape from, but it is a pattern that can help you get there. In the same way when we actually change internal dialogue we experience a change not just of thought, but of perception... feeling and emotion follow and so to does reality. When you experience these shifts from one pattern to another when it is a true and deep shift that shift itself can be freeing. It shows you that first and foremost that other patterns are possible and that it is more than simply a thought or a change of thought. The ability to shift from one way of perceiving to another is something that many who can or have done this may not truly wish to continue doing depending on the cost or the perceived cost to other thoughts/emotions/ etc. that come with such a shift.

If I could some up the most important thing that can be gained... it is simply to know oneself and to accept oneself unconditionally. With that being said there are many insights that can be gained into the self and I personally get excited when I see a bit of thought or emotion that I had not noticed was tied into this other thought or emotion. Especially so when I realize that other thought was not one that was needed and may even be harmful to hold onto.

I'm going to try and meet you halfway and you might very well think this is not trying at all as I see a need for some sort of guidance and pattern.

In a nutshell, I believe that it does help many to have a guide... someone who has been there before.

I believe that music can stimulate the emotions in a positive direction or even a negative depressing direction.
Music can be the force that keeps you grounded to a specific idea or group of ideas. Whatever music it is that you listen to that brings up the best in you... that is often the best to listen to. If a particular song makes you sad, depressed, or lonely... that is the kind of music you want to steer clear of as the medicine can magnify these feelings and how we react to those songs.

Sometimes we can have specific triggers that push us in a more positive or negative direction. Try to make sure the triggers that will excite you in one direction or another are limited and more focused towards the positive.

The ability to focus ones intent on a specific goal whether it be through visualization, chanting, meditation, internal dialogue, prayer, etc. can be of help if one utilizes it. If your personal ceremony is unstructured expect that your experience may very well follow suit. That is not to say an unstructured experience can not had that lends itself to profound personal insights, it is just to say that some structure can often be of benefit and is a definite plus when it comes to harm reduction.

In life we may have many singular events over the course of our lives that transforms us to such a degree that we are changed from that moment on. We realize that more with age than we do with youth as we have lived more and have had more chances for those types of experiences. Given that this medicine can magnify the emotions and mental state many times over... is it wise to have a completely unstructured ceremony or approach if you will? For a single person by themselves who has experienced the same strength of medicine repeatedly and is familiar with it to a great degree perhaps. I'd say the same may even go for two people, but the more people you introduce into an unstructured ceremony the greater the chaos may be.

Now surely the guide is not the concern but rather the nature of his guidance.  does the guide demonstrate fact, or does he perpetuate belief?  if he perpetuates belief , does he call it his own?  does he denounce all else?  if he does these things he creates conflict.  conflict between the 'mine' and the 'yours'.  my ideology and your ideology.   the left and the right.  as soon as there is this division, this deviation from fact, there is duality/conflict.  so there cannot be the mine and the yours for the fact to be.  there is just the fact.  when you call it mine or yours it becomes an idea, which is not a fact.  and i'm not saying that an idea cannot be, in part, factual, it can.  but it cannot be a fact when it is considered.  a fact, is itself absent from ideation.  we can tap into fact, perceptually, we can recieve it, when there is not belief, opinion, want, etc.  these are the perceptual overlays that distort the reception of fact.  if the guide can point to fact, truth, nature,  god, intelligence - call it what you will -if he can demonstrate how to recieve it, regardless of his methods, his efforts will surely dissolve conflict. 

it's the mine that is really the issue here inyan.  self approximation.  the idea that one is of the left or the right.  this idea that one is mormon or catholic or buddhist or athiest.  the idea that one is fearful or acquisitive.  the idea that one is virtuous or contemptuous.  these are all ideas of self approximation and they are a misinterpretation of fact.  the fact is not the left or the right.  that is the opinion.  the fact is the whole entire matter.  the fact is both the left and the right and the conflict between them.  that is fact.  the moment one says 'i am with the left' he no longer sees fact but the skewed image of self approximation.  and so we have conflict. 

now this conflict has led to religious war for centuries.  wars of ownership.  wars of ideology.  it can stop.  because there is not the mine and the yours in fact - at least ideologically.  in fact, we posses things, no more than they possess us psychologically.  no matter whether those things be property, culture, religion, or an idea.  the moment there is the mine there is conflict due to this very minute deviation from fact.  in this regard, any deviation from fact, perceptually, produces conflict. 

so the moment i form an opinion, the moment i take a side, the moment i say i am of the left or the right, i have been misled.  i am no longer looking at the entire problem.  and i perpetuate conlifct.  i become an automaton and perpetute conflict.  i am a mere robot of ideation.  a program.  stomping my feet to my religion or my political opinion.   stomping my feet to the 'mine'.  but if i see the whole process, if i see the fact of it, that the 'mine' and the 'yours' are false, and there is only the integration, then i am free from this compulsion.  then we dissolve that thing that fuels war/conflict. 

so that is why i am suggesting that tradition is dangerous.  that is not to suggest that guidance is unnecessary.  just that inherently, tradition, or  patterns, have structure  and so are not malleable.  they are inflexible.  and we are in a world with growing numbers of overlapping, conflicting, rigid thought structures.  so to me, the matter that is of fundamental concern is dissolving self approximation, which is belief, which is tradition.   and not authoritatively, but through mutual appreciation of fact.  shared reception of fact. 

surely this doesn't sound unreasonable inyan? 

I hope you are not put off by this discussion inyan.  i see it as the most pressing matter of our time.  this matter of self approximation.  we have a man here who says he is of the left and a man there who says he is of the right.  and here we are looking at both of these men, quibbling about image and ignoring completely the problems they share. 

now i am not looking to prosthelytize any idea.  that is for the acquisitvie man, compelled by his belief.  i am looking instead to find communion with those things around me.  harmony.  symbiosis.  this is the most efficient and therefore comfortable, overall, way of communal living.  and we know this to be true, don't we?  when there is harmony between us we can acccomplish an array of feats.  but when we are conflicted, our interaction cannot progress towards communion. and so interculturally, internationally, and interpersonally, we are limited. 

and so, i cannot approach any communal problem with any particular agenda or view.  or i am just an automaton of an idea.  so i must approach the proiblem denuded of all preconception.  i must be looking at the problem and not merely looking to execute a predetermined solution. 

i am looking to discuss the communal problem of perspective, which is self approximation, and how this pertains to peyote and its healing potential.  i am not here to discuss 'my' perspective or 'your' perspective but perspective abstractly.  perspective, as it pertains to us, those men quietly observing the quibbles of the left and right, of the contradictory religious sects, and of the nationalists.  i would like to discuss with you here what makes us the same, and not how we choose to divide ourselves.  if this seems unrelated to this message board, i contest that it is not.  there can be communion between all cultures, religions, nationalities and political and ideological divides.  but to get there, we must ackowledge the position of the impartial observer, who observes and understands dispassionately the position of both the left and the right.   

we can inject this concept into the collective consicousness.  and i think i know how.  but i need your help.  i need to discuss with you this matter and find out what is true.  unfortunately, i cannot see what is true, through my own eyes alone.  so there must be communion for truth to be. 

You seek communion with those things around you.  A symbiosis and a communal way of living.
A commune is this type of existence.
You state harmony is important. The more in harmony you are with yourself the more in harmony you are with nature and those around you.
You state that when you claim ownership of a fact it becomes an idea which is not a fact. The idea of evolution or gravity are both facts which I own in my core, but then so too do many others own this shared reality. I will agree however that those that choose not to accept these factual ideas very often are in conflict with those who accept the facts as they are presented by science, but that conflict does not make those facts any less real objectively. Subjectively, those facts are less real to those that wish to ignore them or refute them with their own beliefs. Science or facts can indeed be taught and then accepted or rejected based on the correct understanding of that science or the incorrect understanding of that science. Your personal beliefs however have no bearing on the objective facts. Your personal beliefs and feelings do however influence whether you will fight those facts as they infringe upon what you hold to be true but which in fact is not necessarily true. One thing being true does not always negate another truth however. Just as evolution being a true fact does not negate the possibility of other truths being at work in the process.

You see wars of ideology/dogma etc. as being tied to ownership. Might I suggest that it is exactly because we do not own ourselves that we search for ownership outside of ourselves and this is where conflict arises? We do not own our own thoughts as those have been spoon fed to us from birth. We do not own our own emotions as we have been taught that others judge us and we must seek their approval rather than our own. We have been taught that we are self-centered if we do not consider others. But what if the reason many of us have a hard time really considering others is simply because we do not know how to genuinely consider ourselves. We do not genuinely love ourselves unconditionally and yet we want to love others unconditionally or find unconditional love in others. We want the perfect soul mate who will love all our faults unconditionally and yet we can not return this perfect love to ourselves much less another being.

You can not fight possession, but I believe you can let it go and while it might not be in every moment that you are capable of doing so... such is true of many emotions after all.

You can not fight not loving yourself unconditionally. Fear of the unknown and fear of judgment are two very real fears that interfere with knowing who we are or sharing who we are.

Traditions do change over time. Religions are given birth, die, and are reborn as a new religion all the time. Many traditions splinter off. Freedom to change is a must. Without freedom to change and be different we are no different from those you fear.

As concerns beliefs or opinions, you think you have the freedom to live without them, but I would argue that you are only fooling yourself if that is your belief. To try and rob yourself of beliefs and opinions will only result in more war and chaos within yourself and while you may see that as a noble thing to be sought after I see it as dangerous. Perhaps it is simply semantics though and I lack right understanding of what you propose.

For me, tradition or ceremony is a tool. If upon examining the tool and using the tool you come to know the tool then perhaps you can know enough to change the tool or implement another in its stead. If however you don't understand the tool how can you change it for the better with the understanding that this better tool may in fact only be better for you?

Ideally, and I will speak for myself and my own experiences. I am most at peace when I am doing what I love. For me, this changes to some degree all the time. One constant for me however is working with plants. So long as I am sitting grafting a cacti, planting a seed, watering a plant... I am content. I am truly happy and nothing else maters in those moments I am doing those activities. However, even that activity has its time and place. After sitting for several hours my back begins to ache from grafting and I must stand up. I must change activities and often times I find a nice short walk to be a great pick me up. Now, is that conducive use of my time? It is if I want to get back to grafting quickly. It allows my body a reprieve and my mind can dream of how those seedlings may look down the road. I can dream of possible crosses being made and possible advances towards a goal which I may or may not be a part of past the seedling stage. I don't own the goal as the goal is just the path that excites me. I realize that any goal I might have... many others are likely working on the same goal so in all likelihood... I will not be the first. I can not own that goal anymore than I can own the desired outcome of a particular grafted seedling or hybrid. What will be will be and I can only try to persuade the cacti or plant in the direction I would like.

Back to tradition and dogma... I have been to many ceremonies where there is much animosity of a mixed breed attends. My personal philosophy or belief is that religion or tools should not be for just one skin color, but legally it may be written that way in a nation that prides itself on equality and freedom. So, society does perpetuate intolerance and conflict when it does things like this. When we lack the back bone to stand up and say that we disagree with something we see as hateful as we don't wish to get involved or suffer repercussions then we perpetuate this hate which is often backed by fear. Fear of another appropriating ones culture is a big one. But culture is something that is shared and taught. Culture is not ones skin color no mater what the checked boxes might wish for you to think.

Another way culture and tradition remain malleable in my personal house is the holidays. Our family for instance loves Halloween. We also love Christmas. We don't however buy into many of the other elements of Christmas and we feel free to modify the holidays so we have Hallowmas. Our Hallowmas tree is fully loaded with different gods and mythical beings from many different traditions. Our tree is topped with a pumpkin rather than a star sometimes, but nothing is ever written in stone. It is just how the holidays have evolved at our house. We don't pretend to own this way of doing things and if someone else wants to do something slightly different or exactly the same that's great. Life is a celebration and no one should infringe on another person's celebration so long as they are not directly hurting another person in their celebrations. Structure can be a positive thing when it is allowed to be malleable.  Tradition need not be authoritative in nature, but there should be a clear reason behind it... even if that reason is simply because it makes you happy.

I will explain the vision quest ceremony and how pejuta was incorporated into a ceremony that traditionally for the Lakota it was not originally and how this was done during my ceremony. I will try to cut it down to the basics.

Step 1. Ask a medicine man/spiritual leader/ yuwipi man/ etc. to put you up for a vision quest. Traditionally this is done a year in advance. Often times with an offering of tobacco and or pipe being given to the leader/person putting you up on the day you ask.

This simply establishes intent in your mind. A focus if you will as the reason given must be strong enough to warrant putting you up. If the reason is weak or not heart felt... chances are you will not make it.

Step 2. Assuming the answer is yes, you generally have a year to prepare. Preparation typically includes sweat lodge ceremonies... for me it was weekly sweat lodges at a minimum, but averaged 2-3 sweats on average per week. Another part of the preparation is the making of ceremonial items such as crowns, bracelets, anklets, etc. made of sage. A skirt if your a male and a dress if you are a female all made of cotton cloth. 606 prayer ties were made 101 for each direction. Other medicine men may only have you do a different number and fewer directions or more directions.

Again, the idea here is that you are focusing your mind or your intent over the year and this focus will be brought with you in physical form on your quest.

Step 3. Ask supporters to help you. This usually entails asking a close friend or another person who has quested before to help you prepare mentally. This does not mean they will do the work for you, but that person or persons is expected to sweat and sing for you during your 4 days of not eating, drinking, or sleeping as you simply stand for your quest.

Step 4. Preparation of the vision quest site. This work can be done by your supporters, but does not excuse you from the work altogether if time is available. If you are not engaged in the work of setting up the site it is generally expected that you will be attending other ceremonies prior to your vision quest ceremony... a typical ceremony that one is expected to attend at a minimum is generally one last sweat lodge/inipi ceremony and often a pipe ceremony. The last inipi ceremony you attend will generally be one of the hottest ceremonies one has ever attended. However, this all depends on the leader of the ceremony. The idea here is that the inipi ceremony being so hot will force you to focus your intent and will all the more. If you are unable to do this the heat will be unbearable and you will ask to be let out.

Step 5. You are sealed in your vision quest altar by 4 prayer flag staffs for the 4 directions. Your prayer ties are pulled around these staffs forming a barrier between you and the outside world. You are relegated to your sacred space and not allowed to leave except to use the bathroom and you must promptly return. The prayer ties again represent all your thoughts, prayers, emotions, etc. that are giving you the strength or focus to perform this incredibly hard ceremony.

Step 6. After a few days of not eating or drinking anything you may on rare occasions be given pejuta tea. Sometimes one may even have this tea before one goes up on a vision quest. This however was not always done and is not done by all leaders putting someone up on a traditional vision quest. This is a newer adaptation... showing how tradition is fluid. Trust me when I tell you that your visions are extremely powerful without this medicine. With strong visions usually starting no later than day 2 regardless. However, as I have always heard, visions are not guaranteed. What I personally believe about that saying is that sometimes the visions are so lifelike and real that while one is visioning one simply does not realize one is visioning similar to how sometimes one does not realize one is dreaming.

Step. 7. Someone comes up and takes you back down from your vision quest. It is at this time that you reenter the world via another sweat lodge followed by a small feast. After 4 days of no food, sleep, or water where you are simply made to stand you won't eat much, but it is imperative that you have enough food for those supporters for this feast as well as the days they supported you. Another cost that reflects if only to yourself... how important this ceremony is and how much you value their help and support. You will generally gift your supporters a nice gift at this time as well as the leader of the ceremony. These gifts can be spiritual such as something traditionally looked upon as being sacred or used in a ceremony such as a fan, rattle, water drum, etc. or it may be something that you think they need such as a nice set of pots if they are a cook, or a set of paints and brushes if they are an artist.

This is the reintroduction and the thanksgiving or giveaway that you do for the gifts you have received thanks to their support and guidance while vision questing. It is acknowledging that while you have done some incredibly hard work to earn these visions, it was not something you did without help and support.

Now, if you can understand these things and how to adapt them to make them your own then who am I to stop you from creating your own tradition or your own tool? If you can truly understand the inner workings of these things even in part... I think you just might have a very successful new tradition. Just don't claim that it is anything other than your own. In short, take ownership for what you have gleaned and created and don't try to misrepresent or appropriate this as something it is not. Ownership is a very good thing when it is your own creation as I see it, but putting it off as something it is clearly not is indeed a good way to get others upset with you.

By jove sir!  Not a commune!  I am not suggesting we replace one ideology with another!  i am not suggesting we replace your beliefs with mine!  that would leave us in just the same state that i am suggesting is of primary concern.  a state of conflicting belief.  what i'm suggesting is that there is a way of observing reality that is unperverted by belief, by tradition, by impulse.  and that when this is observed conceptually, and then actually, one, in effect, opens a portal to direct, objective perception - which feel like perception orgasms.  these perception orgams, interestingly, also accompany peyote or other mescaline bearing cactus experiences.  but most importantly, what i am suggesting is that this is no accident...

now, this is something quite challenging to communicate inyan.  it is a concept so all encompassing that words cannot encapsulate it.   we can approach it with words.  we can rough it out.  but the final click into place occurs without a single word or concept.  that final click is the acceptance of what is.   i want to talk to you because you have experineced it with peyote, and during vision quests and probably other times as well.  now i am not looking to discuss your particular quests or visions.   but rather the abstract mechanism that bings one to this place of acceptance that opens the doors to the universal intelligence.     

inyan, i have seen something that i cannot unsee.  i have seen reality unimpeded by my own impulse to change it.  i have seen reality unperverted by the frame of reference that is my own self concept.  and this place of receptivity, this place of purity, this place of communion with all things, this place of intelligence, this place of meditation, of god, of nature, this place is for all of us.  and i this world of conflict and hate, i wish to share it. 

peyote can produce a state of awareness where the self concept is no longer producing reactionary impulses.  it is just recieving.  nature, or reality just flows into you.  it is perception, without the subsequent labelling that is accessible upon discernment alone.  so what i am suggesting is that the cactus experience can be recreated anytime, any place, using reasoning alone.  provided that the reasoning, is a direct reflection of fact, and not belief.  that is, as long as that reasoning is a direct reflection of reality, and not the reality i wish it would be. 

now this may sound absurd.  but it will become more clear as our conversation progresses. 

now i think it is important as well to explain that i am not saying we supress belief.  what is suppressed will surely tear.  what i am suggesitng is that there is a divide between belief and discernment.  but really we don't need to use those terms.  we just need to differentiate between what we want something to be, and what it is.  once we do that we can open this up a little bit.  otherwise we'll be stuck here arguing this same point about whether we should or should not believe.  and on that point i have no opinion.  on the matter of belief, i am completely indifferent.  now on the matter of fact, i am quite interested.  fact is the source of invention, creativity, pleasure.  it is limitless.  and we can all dip into it.  half breed.  full breed.  the chinese and the retarded.  fact is for all of us.  and, paradoxically, we need all of us to find fact.  but we will get into that as we unravel this a little more. 

wonderful story about hallowmas by the way.  this is certainly on the path of creative intelligence.  bravo.  if i may ask sir, what do you tell your children about death?  the afterlife?  do they think they have a self concept or a soul?  and, are you a medicine man? 

Discernment or the ability to perceive without judging is a tricky thing indeed. When a baby is first born and before it has been taught to be biased towards this or that or how to think a baby simply is. A baby is thus capable of discernment or perceiving without judging. However, once you have developed internal dialogue full of beliefs or thoughts about a subject your consciousness is  flooded with that internal dialogue whether it is in the background and ignored or whether one watches it unfold. One may even frequently be caught up along a train of thought upon which one has no idea one is even riding and with no way off till something or some idea startles you enough to regain a bit of control and you become alert to the fact that your thoughts or your own internal dialogue have run amuck as it were.

Now, I fully believe that you believe you are indifferent to the matter of belief and completely indifferent to it and it may even be true with you. However, I would suggest that if someone were to do something truly heinous as it sits with one of your beliefs that you would indeed not be indifferent to those beliefs.

You may indeed be traveling a road less traveled but it is a road nonetheless. A path may lead to the same destination as any other path.  Beliefs are simply the frameworks of tools which enable them to work in the way they are supposed to work.

I have seen with my own two eyes without the aide of any plant medicine things that defy the reality we as a group most often prescribe to here in the western world. I have felt what can only be described as a feeling of unconditional love so powerful it was overwhelming.  I have felt seconds that literally felt like eons and days that have slipped away as if they were seconds. I do not think any of this makes me special or different. I think at most it means I have done the same as any other person is capable of. It is the same as lifting weights or running. One does not start out lifting 100 kg on ones first lift. One very cautiously begins with learning form first. Once one learns form one begins to lift more consistently and perhaps after some time one goes back to the basics and revisits form. There is a program involved and the key to it is consistency. The program is the set of acts that are required on specific days and perhaps even times. This becomes ones ritual. The ritual of lifting weights without consistency will not yield any progress whatsoever. In fact, the one thing one gains from a ritual without consistency is the delayed onset muscle soreness the following days after ones effort. So, one in effect gains nothing but negative effects from a program/beliefs that is not consistent. Now, the program is not really the set of beliefs. The beliefs are what sets you to following the program. The belief that that program will eventually pay out. If you did not believe that the program would work then  you would not be consistent enough to reap any rewards. You might argue that one could follow the program blindly and that in doing so one might acquire the belief that the program works... but it really doesn't matter how you slice it.... Tools are used and whether they lead to beliefs or beliefs lead to the use of tools  is largely a matter of perspective that is influenced by the difficulty of the tool and the effort one must apply to use the tool.

Another way of looking at this is you could hop into an airplane/medicine and try to fly it without training/beliefs and you might even get lucky and figure out how to fly the plane without killing anyone. I would even hazard to guess that your learning to fly on your own would take a much longer time than it might have if you were taught how to fly.

Now, I will touch upon things as I see them now and as  free as I can from a belief system. I see reality as being constructed largely by our own minds. We have a shared interest in sharing a similar reality as that is what enables us to communicate most effectively with one another. Those who share a different reality no matter how subtle the difference we perceive as other than ourselves and those that share a reality most similar to us we most often feel as if we share some kind of deep kinship or closeness with that person. 

Now, if we are just the observer and we detach as much as possible we may not observe everything even within ourselves, much less everything we see or hear.
This is part of how a vision quest works. You are left with only yourself and only nature.  You can not get lost in conversation, television, the radio, etc. In ordinary life you are constantly bombarded with  information, noises, etc.  You are a slave to your desire to eat, drink, sleep, have sex, etc.. As these desires of the body creep up you frequently feed those desires and those desires distract you from truly experiencing any one thing as you are pulled every which way. You are pulled by the eyes to the color red of a dress. You are pulled by the ears to a song that has a pleasing melody. Your emotions are pulled by the words that remind you of your first kiss and so on. You are not in one place, but many.  A vision quest forces you to go against those natural desires and simply be in the moment. It reduces the source overload if you will so you can focus on genuinely connecting or more fully connecting to one thing rather than being pulled in many directions so you never fully connect with anything.

That is the key.... Forming a focused connection. What is death other than what was before life? What is a soul ? If we are atoms of mostly water... how many times have we been drank before by another entity in the 4.6 billions years this planet has existed? How many times has the oxygen that runs through our cells been in another entity? We do not own our body any more than we own our atoms. Our atoms have been shared by countless entities before us and will likely be shared by countless entities after us. We are all as immortal as life is immortal in this regard. If I perceive points of light connected by streams of light flowing over the body is that one true way of perceiving the body or is it merely self deceiving self? If I see an electrical storm surrounding the same body on another day... which is right or is neither? If I see what looks to be flowers of a sort shimmering in the light that cannot be touched but follow the body are they real? If I am so lost in another world while walking in this world that this world ceases to be which is real? What is it that blinds this mind to these other realities or are they simply the workings of a mind gone awry? Common delusions carried on in the minds and beliefs of others with a shared belief?

I am the trickster
Foolish and boasting
A rule breaker
Hell bent on causing mischief
I am offensive
I talk in circles
I have trouble following
There is no right
Just as there is no light

Resist that which is natural to become more in tune to that which is natural
An Ant battles with a moth
You must fight so that you can let go
The war rages on for what seems an eternity
There is no winning this fight
The moth is dragged away at the close of night
In fighting one may wear oneself out to the point of acceptance of defeat
In that acceptance of defeat one wins
Immortality
It is the resistance and the challenge along the path that is the true goal
A moth and an ant have both gained immortality
Do not get lost in the destination as the destination is merely the end
Never to be forgotten
Much as the beginning was when you were born
What was once yours is now another's
The illusion has been shattered

Every second an eternity
Every moment is an eternal bliss
Moments stack into years
Years which are gone in the blink of a butterfly's wings
The wolf comes to call who is no wolf at all
We must all answer the call
Silently the owl swoops down
Death is waiting for us all

As concerns your question... am I medicine man. That is a title that one can not bestow upon oneself in my eyes and one I do not care to have bestowed upon me.
I have spent much of my youth apprenticed to a Cherokee medicine man in the hopes that one day I might carry that title.  I jumped ship to the Lakota when I thought that perhaps that path might be a little faster. I'm an Army veteran, sundance veteran, and I've even sung yuwipi. Those titles however do not define me. They are merely placeholders describing where I have been and where I have come from and they are not me in my entirety.  When the curtains have been pulled back will you like what you see?

For me, I understand very well the magic behind the medicine so to speak and I have no stake in any religious/political stance whereby one tries to exert influence on another to puff up ones ego. Power corrupts and to me... it is much better to realize the only answer I need is the same answer any of us can get simply from spending time with nature. You can have a middle man or women if you wish, but for me that is not for me anymore. Sure, I would delight in watching another show by someone who has been bestowed a title, but all too often with the title comes the arrogance of which I have far too much already. Now, I will not argue that perhaps there are not some who are able to detach from those titles or that can remain unaffected by them as that is not my concern. But it has been my experience that even the worst of actors can be very believable when they buy into their own acts.

If I've confused you at all it is not surprising and if you've been able to follow along and make leaps from one to the next my hat tips to you good sir for I have no clue what I am speaking of.

if we may sir, before we move forward, first make a distinction: discernment, to the speaker, is to receive fact.  fact, is 'what is.'  actuality.  truth.  we can approach fact, but never capture it.  if we may go into this matter for a moment:

fact is unfolding.  always moving.  but we try to capture it with ideas.  we look to nature and what happens?  we begin to define it.  we create an image of it.    it becomes this or that, something to be acquired and so on.  all created relative to the impetus of the self concept, which is of belief.  but that image is not nature.  nature is moving.  never static.  never definable. 

that undefinable is discernment.  we can approach it.  but never completely reach it.  and if we become profoundly aware of this limitation, that we can never reach fact completely, that we can only approach it- then there is the birth of intelligence.  then, one navigates with earnestness and kindliness.  then they see the nature of their own compulsions and are not urged to define them.  they just look at it plainly.  dispassionately.  it is the understanding of this limitation that can bring about a fundamental change in the mind.  all other changes are merely the replacement of one set of compulsions for another.  it is this concept, this state of negation, that i have combined with the cactus to yield some astonishing results.  if one thinks of this fact sir, that these false images limit perception, if we consider the full significance of this, while on peyote, there comes a fundamental change.  one approaches discernment sir.  one approaches the undefinable.  one becomes unlimited. 

now i would like to share this.  rather, i feel it is our responsibility, as discerners, to communicate the facts we discern.  because we can only approach it, and it is much more difficult to approach it alone.  to approach truth we need more that one angle of perception.  we need your angle, my angle, his angle.  we need to consider all of these angles and then we can see the problem on all sides.  the same is true for reality.  to approach reality we must meet one another earnestly, dispassionately, without images.  and that is why, to me, this conversation is significant. 

in fact, it is our relationship here that is a window into my own impetus.  when we relate, out come the images.  and so there they are to be perceived.  so it is through relationship that we approach discernment, fact.  which is undefinable.  i wonder if have we reached communion on this distinction.

now i am not saying i am free from belief.  that is impossible.  you couldn't get through one day.  belief is necessary.  images are necessary.  so it is not that we should avoid or move away from belief.  but we should understand it.  understand that it is limiting.  because when it is understood, its impetus recedes.  and there is receptivity.  what i am suggesting is that considering this fundamental fact while on peyote advances one perceptually towards the 'what is.' 

so i am not suggesting someone go and take peyote all willy nilly with no guidance or pattern to follow.  i am suggesting that using peyote while considering the concept, the fact, that was just discussed, leads to a permanent structural change to the brain that allows for a new type of perception altogether.  and i attest to you sir, that what i am presenting here, is worthy of your deepest consideration.  i attest to you, that your very consideration of this concept will bring the collective mind closer to the undefinable intelligence, the undefinable 'what is.'  and through that, we approach the end of conflict, both in the form of violence and in the form of conflicting images.  and so we approach intelligence.  discernment.  fact. 

does this make clear the matter of what is discernment to the speaker? 

i wonder how did your poem come about? 

I will agree that there is always more to be known for those that wish to discover fact.

For the observer however, that which is observed is fact in as much as it is observed.

Discernment is the ability to judge well. The fact is that we will always judge if we do more than simply observe.

We may strive to judge well and in doing so we may attempt to  become the observer.

When one replaces one set of beliefs with another, when one truly does this
One can become aware of how thought changes being if one is for a moment the observer.

"What is" can be reached by simply "being" and that can be reached by simply "observing" and that indeed can be reached with or without medicine.

The struggle with the ordinary such as internal dialogue and the boredom that it can create when that is magnified is one such way of doing this. It is by magnifying that which we routinely pass as ordinary that we may glimpse the extraordinary. It Is often the struggle that gets us to that point the first several times, but the struggle is just one method.

My poem came about as a reflection on one of my vision quests.

I've shared that experience here and there is more to be shared in that same thread. But I will  copy and share again.

"I've done the Lakota vision quest several times. Since this is a Pejuta thread... I will entertain you with the memories of a vision quest done with Pejuta. Mind you, I have generally do not use Pejuta on a vision quest as it is not needed, but it can certainly alter the speed or onset of experiences. Let me begin with the basics of how a vision quest is supposed to work as it was relayed to me.
First, there is the reason to vision quest and then there is formed the intent to vision quest. If the reason for vision questing is sufficiently strong then the intent grows as one prepares oneself for this experience. The preparation phase can and does often take up to a year before one is ready to vision quest after declaring ones intent. Traditionally, as I was taught, one declares your intent formally by offering tobacco and or a pipe at the very beginning to a spiritual leader, medicine man, yuwipi man, etc. It is at this time that you discuss your reasons and if accepted you will begin more serious preparation. You will make prayer ties in the colors of the 6 dirctions most generally for a vision quest. Prayer ties are looked at as books that are read by the spirits that will visit you and form the boundary of your altar where you are to stand. Prayer flags are also made and are much bigger with tails that stream down the lengths of the small trees or staffs they are attached to. Both prayer ties and prayer flags are filled with tobacco and serve also as offering to the spirits. So, the making of these things must be done in a mindful way. You have to have the intent and reason filling your every movement while you are making these so they are imbued with these thoughts, emotions, etc. The serve to prepare you and to prepare the spirit world with a ready guide to what you need. Mind you, what you need may be different from what you wish. It is generally expected that you will go to as many inipi or sweatlodges as you can during this year of preparation. As a general rule, at least one sweat lodge a week is to be expected, but there are no real rules. Many may sweat multiple times in a day and some may sweat many times in a week. The sweat lodge is another ceremony in and of itself that has much symbolism surrounding it so I will not try to do it justice here.... suffice it to say that it is viewed as a means of purification at the simplest level as well as a tool to become more in harmony with the world.
I will jump to the actual experience here and describe what I have felt and seen. Day one, I am feeling a bit afraid as night is upon me and I am all alone. I hear trees breaking and falling as there is a storm. I have been told never to leave the altar under any circumstances so I stand still. I hear a rattle snake beneath my feet and I am scared to look down. This keeps me still and alert however. In the morning hours I attempt to lower my head down. I move my head at the speed of the movement of the hour hand of a clock in my mind. I am paying attention to my speed as I can hear the snake that could kill me at my feet. I have no real plan other than to bring the snake into view. At what I think is perhaps midday...I finally gaze upon the snake... that is really a moth beating its wings against my pipe as it fights with an ant for its life. I think about how powerful those two are. In a battle for their lives the entire night without stop. How weak I am in comparison with my thoughts of hunger. My thoughts of how painful my feet are beginning to feel simply standing there.... not having to fight anything other than my own weakness.  My thoughts change to thoughts of admiration and wonder and this gives me strength to continue. Time begins to slip away from me and seconds seem like days. The best I can use to describe this experience is perhaps the experience that one has Sally D... Next I see a plague of flies surrounding  me and landing on my beautiful prayer ties. I think, they must be attracted to the sweet pipe tobacco I used. How in the world I thought to use sweet tobacco is beyond me. I am now kicking myself figuratively for this mistake. I know I am not allowed to kill anything or defend myself from attack while on this journey. I can only stand and allow these flies to surround myself and land on me as they will. I try to relax and eventually over many hours I would guess... but it could be seconds.. there is no real way to know... I look at the flies and they are all turning into beautiful blue lights. I've been told that spirits often manifest as colors and take the form of various size orbs of light and these seem to appear to be about the size of small marbles lighting up the night and dancing around me. You come in and out of these types of experiences when on a vision quest. During the daylight hours in a moment of clarity one of my supporters came up and offered me some tea. I thought that this was unusual as there is generally no contact with supporters other than hearing their voices in song from a far off distant. I was deathly thirsty and as tea was being offered I assumed there must be a reason for it. Whatever the reason, I was weak and was not going to turn down any source of hydration at this stage in the game. I had been dreaming of ice cream, hot dogs, pork, you name it in the many moments of lucidity I had. These dreams tortured me rather than helped me, but still I indulged them. So, when in this weakened state I was offered tea... I took the jug and guzzled it down trying to fill every inch of my stomach before the tea could be jerked from me. My supporter and dear friend told me... hey, slow down their fellow. This is medicine. By then, it had hit me. This was peyote tea done sun tea style and as such it lacked a strong peyote taste. The visions received after this were no more spectacular than those received before the ingesting of the tea, the main difference at this point was that they were more fluid and without the interruptions that can be seen with a typical vision quest where one comes back to this world and this reality for periods of time that can seem to stretch out to an eternity. Time then for me at least and in relation to vision quest time is thus sped up and the time spent in the spirit world is more full. What I mean by this is... in a vision quest you can see spirits or elements that will seem to be a part of this world such as when the flies where a part of this world and yet spirit. Elements within this world and those of the spirit world can exist at the same time or you can be a part of either world in its totality and sometimes you don't know which is which. With the addition of tea to this experience you are more fully involved in that other world or spirit world and totally leave this world behind. I hope this helps your understanding of what was experienced, but to be completely honest these types of experiences can not be put into words. There is no way for me to be as brutally honest about how much I craved such mundane things as different types of food, companionship, etc. during these days or how such a short period of 4 days can seem like many moments of eternity shared with losses of time where moments of vision that seemed like minutes revealed that many hours had passed... so much sometimes that one wondered whether you were up there for 7 days... panic would settle in and then you might feel like... yes.... I should go down. Something has happened and I could save lives by going back now and every moment I wait things could be getting worse. These excuses are the excuses we give ourselves when we are on such a vision quest... we just need to find the right excuse to allow us to come down and stop our vision and return to normal life. Please, take this with a grain of salt as this is a reflection of one of my vision quests and as the old saying goes... your mileage may vary. What is certain is that for anyone undergoing such an experience in whatever form or tradition you will face challenges and some of those challenges will be unique to your own self... your own individual weakness or fear. Each time is different for me, and yet there always remains elements that remain the same."

http://sacredcactus.org/extractions/pejuta/

indeed.  to judge well.  so we see that discernment is something that we approach, not something we can hold conceptually.  put differently, we see that discernment or fact is not something we can capture with an idea, with a thought.  it is quite necessary for us to make this distinction if our dialog is to advance.  and we are getting to it good sir!  oh indeed!     

now, is the observer separate from the observed?  to the speaker, our communal problem, which is conflict - both internally and externally, is a direct result of this effort to separate the observer from the observed.  now, if we can unpack this a little bit, we will see that there is, in fact, no tangible separation between the thought and the thinker, the observer and the observed, and that creating this separation, with the implementation of static images, destroys and skews perception, which is too thought and action. 

so the question is: is there separation between myself and my thoughts?  that is, is there a 'my' that has the thought, or does thought itself create the idea of 'my' through static images?  if we may go into it for a moment then perhaps we will find out if there is, or is not, a 'my' separate from thought. 

so, first there comes a sensory perception.  we see a house.  then, very quickly, there is interpretation.  we begin to define the house relative to other houses, relative to our needs and wants, relative to our expectations and opinions.  the house, fact, does not become a 'relative house', until there is the point of reference which is the 'my.'  so the house becomes ugly or attractive when viewed through the impetus of the self concept.  once the house is painted with opinion, with belief, with impetus, then it becomes 'mine.'  my perception.  my opinion.  my image.

and this is how the self concept is cultivated, obviously.  first there is sensory perception, and then it is coloured relative to my impetus, relative to my beliefs and desires.  and so then it becomes the 'mine.'  it is 'my' image.  and so through this process, there is the refurbishment of the self concept.

so we see that the self concept is thought.  it is the cumulative composition of those things painted by my impetus.  so the 'my' is not fact.  the 'my' is not actuality.  the 'my' is imagery.  and fact exists outside of this.  but, naturally, we are looking to approach it, so our question then becomes, can this imagery, this concept of the 'my' ever be congruous with fact?  or is the 'my' which is a composition of my own impetus, always in conflict with fact? 

so what do you say sir, can the 'my' become congruous with fact?  or is the 'my' always in conflict with fact?   

if we can answer this question, together, you and the speaker, then perhaps the pejuta experience will itself take on a whole new meaning.  perhaps, there will come a fundamental shift in perception - and not merely the replacement of one ideology with another.   

Thought is not feeling. Feeling is not thought. Thought can give rise to feeling or emotion can give rise to thought.
Thought does not observe itself.  That which observes can observe thought or be caught up in thought in the same way one can get caught up in a movie to the point where one jumps if something scary happens.

Self-concept is indeed influenced by thought and more specifically internal dialogue as well as emotions that are trapped conjoined if you will with those thoughts. One should not confuse the idea of self-concept as it is taught with the idea of an objective observer of which there may be only fleeting moments of.

The observer simply is just as nature simply is. That is what is missing. We can move our thoughts and emotions closer to harmony or a positive direction or a negative direction. We can let them attach themselves and drag us or we can attempt to manipulate them. Thought is like a thumb in that it follows us wherever we raise our hand. Emotion may be likened to a finger that seems to follow the thumb, but can we really ever say that? The sensation of the thumb or the awareness of the thumb and the finger however is not the same as the thumb or the finger and the awareness of them both at the same time is not the awareness of the hand. The watcher watches and the clock draws toweringly near. The clock raises its hand as if to shout, but merely laughs as it holds the watchers britches high in the air. In so doing, humility draws near.

wait, who's britches are you holding in the air? 

Quote from: Seaside Chief on December 02, 2017, 01:13:11 AM
wait, who's britches are you holding in the air?

The clock raises its hand as if to shout, but merely laughs as it holds the watchers britches high in the air. In so doing, humility draws near.

apologies sir, the meaning behind your metaphor still eludes.  would you put it into laymen's terms?  terms so simple, the good speaker can discern its meaning and so reach communion with you sir? 

Quote from: Seaside Chief on December 02, 2017, 11:53:42 AM
apologies sir, the meaning behind your metaphor still eludes.  would you put it into laymen's terms?  terms so simple, the good speaker can discern its meaning and so reach communion with you sir?

The clock raises its own hand as if to shout, but merely laughs as it holds the watchers britches high in the air. In so doing, humility draws near.

A clock can symbolize time and often does. A raised hand draws attention as if it be called on. Britches being hung high alludes to the watcher being stripped. In being stripped one is often humbled if not embarrassed. That which has provided protection or shielding has been let go or perhaps stolen. And yet it is time to let these protections go. We often protect ourselves with our own internal dialogue for instance.

You have to excuse me as I sometimes think on more than one level when trying to explain certain concepts as the truth is something that I feel has many different levels of understanding. It is something best unraveled by the one that seeks to understand and yet you are absolutely right... sometimes clarification is needed. The question is often do we seek that answer from within or do we seek it from without? For me, I see merit in both.

indeed.  now sir, are you to suggest that it is time which strips man of his arrogance?  that it is time that humbles him?  is that it sir?  if that is it, then perhaps we can discuss the matter of seeking.