[[Note to readers; the original draft of this post was over six pages long. We decided to break it up into separate posts that we’ll publish over the coming weeks. This post, Part 1, deals with some of my past experiences and specifically Ceremonies and Rituals. Enjoy!]]
About 25 years ago (as I write this), shortly after my teachers gave me permission to teach on my own, I took part in a small, store-based spirituality fair. There were lots of psychics and psychic-like people there. I was the only one practicing shamanism.
I have several memories of that event. One that always gives me a chuckle involved a bunch of us taking a break together and going to a different part of the building to get coffees, sodas and the like. I would periodically look up, excuse myself from the discussion and return to my little presentation area (I didn’t have a booth) because I knew there was someone in my little area who wanted to talk with me.
How did I know this? I knew this because I placed a level of awareness on my area and thus knew when someone wanted to talk to me versus was just walking by. Were there times people were waiting for me and I didn’t know it? No idea, really, because no one came up to me to tell me otherwise.
The reason this tickles me is because one of the people taking part in the break was someone with quite a history as a psychic and was considered one of the best in southern NH/northern MA. She was, in fact, called “the queen of the psychics” by those who knew her.
And at one point in the break someone came to this woman and said, “There’s some people at your booth. I think they’re looking for you” and she replied (and I swear this is what she said) “There’s somebody at my booth? How am I suppose to know somebody’s at my booth? What, do you think I’m psychic?” and she picked up her things and hustled off to attend to those waiting for her. This tickles me in the same way that “Why do psychics have to ask your name?” tickles me. There’s some kind of cognitive oxymoron going on and I find such things amusing.
I’m starting this post with that anecdote because 1) I always get a kick out of it and 2) it’s an example of how I differentiate myself from others who may/may not attend such events.
Susan and I spent a recent Saturday at a “Holistic Health Expo”. It was a first time for me. Susan can (and I hope will) share her experience and observations. I’ve been to software and hardware expos, management expos, even expos on expos. I saw little difference between the holistic health expo and previous expos I’ve attended. There were guest speakers/presenters, training sessions and, of course, the vendors’ floor.
I wasn’t sure what I expected at this expo. I wanted to be pleasantly surprised, that I know. It would have been grand to find someone practicing what I practice or even something close. Perhaps I could become their student. I also went wanting to learn if there is an audience for what we’re doing here at the NextStage Expanded Awareness Society.
“My daughter’s stereo”
There’s a scene in The Hunt for Red October involving Captain Davenport and Jack Ryan. Captain Davenport determines that the Soviet fleet is actively looking for the Red October and this exchange takes place:
Captain Davenport: They’re pinging away with their active sonar like they’re looking for something, but nobody’s listening.
Jack Ryan: What do you mean?
Captain Davenport: Well, they’re moving at almost forty knots. At that speed, they could run right over my daughter’s stereo and not hear it.
The people walking the vendors’ floor pretty much impressed me as being like the Soviet fleet. There were lots of people, no question. That many people at anything will cause an amazing confusion of energies.
And like the Soviet fleet, everybody was looking for something but nobody was taking the time to learn, interact, engage…what I sensed was that everyone had insulated themselves from learning, interacting and engaging except at a superficial level. Worse, it didn’t seem any of them were aware of this. They were looking for solutions but nobody was willing to take the time to learn one, as if they’d insulated themselves from the hope of finding real, working answers to their questions.
What really amuses me about this is that most of the booths were professing/offering “ancient” systems, methodologies and mechanisms yet modern marketing was clearly behind every one (I can offer this as, in my day job, companies from Mom&Pops to F500s and from all over the globe have come to me for help with their marketing challenges).
And my sincerest hope is that their marketing works for them. I know that kind of marketing won’t work for me because my practice won’t allow it.
Rituals without Ceremonies
There were quite a few booths where people performed various kinds of rituals. I saw rituals, I never saw the ceremonies associated with the rituals. This, to me, is dangerous because ritual without ceremony is an indication that the original meaning, hence the original power, is lost. It’s like going through the motions without knowing what the motions are about. Imagine a massage therapist knowing they have to press on you but not knowing where or why, basically they saw it done, didn’t really understand it themselves but what the heck, it didn’t seem that hard, so they give it a go and hope no one gets hurt. Do you want a surgeon to just go through the motions when they operate or do you want them to have a deep understanding of exactly what they’re doing, to prepare themselves and to have their assistants and the patient prepared as well?
The concept of ceremony versus ritual, as I’ve been taught it, extends far beyond what most people think. For example, I knew several ritual versus ceremony people when I worked as a physicist, people who knew the rituals of physics but not the ceremonies. They made excellent technicians but nothing more. You could trust them to know that an experiment’s readings had gone awry because they could read the gauges but you couldn’t trust them to know how to bring the experiment back within bounds. They understood that something had happened, not why or how it happened, hence not how to stop or change it once things went sour.
I suppose I’m sensitive to such things because I’ve had people come to me for training, tell me they can spare a weekend to learn it “all” and are shocked when I explain that, for example, I’ve been studying some aspect of the practice for thirty years and still don’t know it “all”.
Whoa! They must be incredible students or have had incredible teachers, don’t you think?
Anyway, the dangers from performing rituals without knowing or understanding the underlying ceremonies is foolish at best and dangerous at worst. Imagine someone performing a cleansing ritual and not knowing any of the ceremony involved. They may know enough to open a door, not enough to guide and move the energy out and instead let more via negativa (negative life energy) in. Imagine someone performing a healing ritual, not understanding the ceremonial requirements involved and causing arthritis where they hoped to remove it.
And, of course, if the people performing the rituals without knowing or understanding the underlying ceremonies aren’t careful or trained properly, whatever via negativa they release will have to find ground somewhere and it’ll be in them or back in you, but now magnified because they managed to piss it off.
Not good!
Next up, Part 2 – Fear and Loss…
Hi Joseph, is there an aspect of the quick-fix culture in this? As an avid long-time gym goer, this reminds me of “New Years Revolutionaries” who appear at the club in early January, work out a few times, then disappear for another year. I have often found myself behaving similarly in wanting short, pain-free solutions to my problems or challenges. Are people insulating themselves because actual interaction and actual change requires commitment and work?
Howdy,
No question (for me) that this is a quick-fix culture issue. I wrote in Reading Virtual Minds Volumes II and III that technology is training us to expect immediate gratification and fulfillment, and that if things don’t come easy then move onto the next thing in the hopes that it does come easy.
The end result is that we become intolerant of waiting, are more easily frustrated, don’t learn how to deal effectively with disappointment, … Not good.
Sometimes a quick solution is necessary. Several of NextStage’s Principles deal with responding to immediate needs immediately (#21, ‘If someone is drowning don’t ask them “How wet is the water?”‘ is an example) and there’s a categorical difference (to me) between seeing to an immediate need and dealing with a long term challenge.
And I’m happy to learn otherwise.
Another great post! I have had experience with via negativa in my life; negative life energy that was passed down to me that resembles me but isn’t me is a scary thing. Even being prepared, one must approach with compassion.
Compassion, especially self-compassion, is the key (me thinks) and I’ll place self-compassion before compassion for others (an aspect of the Selfish-Selfless boundary). Without compassion for my self first in my psyche, I can not have honest, caring compassion for others because (at some point) I will want that compassion returned and if it’s not, then I add via negativa to myself, to the relationship with that other person and to life and the world in general.
However, if I have compassion for myself first and will understand and forgive myself when necessary? I am now overflowing with via positiva and will give compassion to others without ego or need or desire for return getting in the way.
Just me, perhaps, and it works for me so far.
Thank you for this. Sometimes it’s hard to be selfish.