Meditating on the Bones: Snorkeling on LSD in Culebra, Puerto Rico

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I spent a week in Puerto Rico recently—my first real vacation in several years. I’ve been to the island a few times but this was my first visit to Culebra, which is the smallest of its inhabited isles.

The place is incredible. I find it amazing more people do not visit Puerto Rico—and awful how poorly the US government treats the territory. But that is stuff for another post.

While I was there, I had the chance to do some snorkeling. And paired that with some meditation on the beach, and a low dose of LSD. One day I will post more about my use of acid, and how it can help to access deeper states of awareness. But in general, I describe the drug as pure empathy.

LSD can help people reach startling and joyous realizations and truths, and can produce benefits that persist long after the actual experience. In this instance, I took a fairly modest dose—about a third of your average “trip” amount—and paired it with a series of ideas to focus on.

The beach was not sandy, but instead was mostly rocks and shells and coral. So in essence, I sat on top of many things which at one point had been alive. There is something about dried, calcified coral that leaves no doubt it used to be a living thing.

I was struck by this beautiful realization that sometime in the future—not too long from now—I’ll be dead. And my corpse will rot away leaving only bones, just like the coral I sat on.

But even that wont be the end. With enough time, my bones will be worn away until there’s nothing but sand.

No matter what I do, no matter how much I write or what art I create or how many friends I have, it wont be long until there is zero trace I ever existed. And that comforts me.

Our bodies and egos exist for just a blink of a moment, and absolutely nothing can change that.

Nothing you can do will break that which is eternal—and nothing can truly hurt the energy which is your essence. Call it a soul; call it love; call it whatever you like. My body will fall away and leave only that.

And the snorkeling? Amazing. Acid tends to make the world sparkle, as if everything were new and unnamed.

I actually got over my fear of sharks.

Meditation: All Fear is a Fear of Death

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I recently went to a New Year ceremony with a group of friends, where the focus was on things we were ready to let go. Every person in the group expressed a variation of fear.

Really, what else is there? All fear is a fear of death. It is the only fear.

We sat there with candles in our hands, and held in our minds those things we wanted to leave behind. One by one we gave voice to those fears, and floated the candle in a pool of water where it would eventually extinguish.

For me, it's time to stop being afraid of being seen. It is a fear that has plagued me for years, impacting my writing and work and art and how I engage with community. And the fear is absurd, because death is the only thing we all have in common.

This isn't me preaching: I sure don't have all this (or anything) figured out. There is a Buddhist meditation "maraṇasati" where you visualize your own corpse in different stages of decomposition. I've tried to do this, but often forget what I look like.

But I am absolutely certain that if I--we--you--everyone--can get more comfortable with the idea of death and impermanence then a lot of other comfort will follow.

Our ideas of Past and Future are mostly wrong. Neither exists. Our ideas of Self are mostly wrong, too. It exists, but not the way we often think and it doesn’t loom nearly so large as we believe.

Yet humans spend most of their time thinking about those very things.

There is only now. This moment, stretched out for eternity. And throughout our entire lives, we’ll just catch a glimpse.

The Dreams Are Back

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The dreams have returned.

Years ago I would often have rich, striking dreams that seemed filled with symbols and meaning and could be mined for insight and stories. Sometimes there would also be nightmares--or terrors that would leave my body writhing, desperate to wake up.

And then, they were gone. Like half a magic trick, where the rabbit stays vanished. At first their absence was just an interesting phenomenon. Over several years, I accepted it as a permanent mystery. While in reality I probably did dream and just not remember, the veil was so thick it was as if not a flicker of seeing had passed during sleep.

Now they are back: Dreams of guns that don't fire--and those that do, but thankfully miss. An ear falls off. Strange air conditioners read my body with blasts of psychic energy. Michelle Obama diagnoses me as "defeated." I play pool with my grandfather, who passed years ago. Instead of a cue stick, I shoot with a can opener.

What has changed, or reverted? Is this temporary? Will the dreams vanish again? Is anything permanent? It makes me anxious, in a way. I want the dreams to stay, and wonder how I can make my subconscious more open to them.

Was I a bad host, before? Has something been fixed or found?

Sometimes the dreams feel significant; other times I suspect they are manifested brain farts. But most of all they are comforting, like a friend who was gone and has now returned.

The thing is, while almost everyone has dreams there really isn't a consensus on just what they are or mean. Many people focus on the objects in dreams as symbols, capable of yielding insight into the subconscious. Some dreams feel like premonitions. Others are altered memory.

There is a Greek word I like quite a bit: oneiranaut, which means “explorer of dreams.”

I like to write down the dreams, and then start “editing.” I delete anything that doesn’t feel deeply resonate, and after enough passes the truth tends to leap out. You can read some of those past dream-writing experiments here. An example:

In a crowded room
a woman I know
is trying to cut down a small tree

She swings an axe, but weakly;
when it strikes, it does not cut deep;
and what it does cut
is already dead and dried and brittled

Next it is my turn
and my cuts go deeper
and strike with force

The axe bites firmly, and the torn wood
is alive and soft and pulpy.
People are watching
but I do not want to do this.

Right now, I am simply enjoying the dreams’ presence. Happy they have returned, with all their surreal, inscrutable messages. Each night I go to bed curious what will bubble up. Whatever whiffs of subconscious remain in the morning keep me thinking all day.

Blogging Walden #3: Solitude; immeasurable in miles; points in space & exertion of the legs

The cabin where I live sits seven miles from town, and from the porch in summer there are no neighbors visible. In winter, when the trees between us have lost their foliage, across a large pasture a distant farm can be seen. And in mornings, when the air is still, I can here the cries of an infant coming from the farmhouse, which is a new sound and was not there the year before.

My neighbor is a farmer and we have met just twice, both times at the hedge between our properties. Once, discussing his fence, and a second time shooing away a pair of trespassing hunters.

In the years I've lived here, many people have expressed concern about my isolation and solitude. There is something about being alone which frightens many people—though I suspect at heart some of those are truly frightened of themselves.

But I am never lonely here--at least, no moreso than when I am in town--because I never consider myself alone.

Henry David Thoreau's Walden is in some ways a treatise on solitude—and so it makes a certain kind of sense that the chapter actually titled “Solitude” would be among the book's shortest. And in it, Thoreau essentially argues that the solitude so many seem to fear is in fact merely misperception.

To say Walden is a naturalist book is some kind of an understatement. But woven into it are ideas that one might broadly call “eastern” – musings on duality and existence and the thin lines between who we are and who we are, and if we are.

Thoreau essentially makes two points in this chapter. The first is that in many ways solitude does not exist--particularly in nature. And second, the society we use to subvert our solitude is in many ways a cheap salve that is only surface deep.

"There can be no very black melancholy to him who lives in the midst of nature and has his senses still."

Sometimes I wonder if Thoreau didn't eat a lot of mushrooms.

"In the midst of a gentle rain while these thoughts prevailed, I was suddenly sensible of such sweet and beneficent society in Nature, in the very pattering of the drops, and in every sound and sight around my house, an infinite and unaccountable friendliness all at once like an atmosphere sustaining me, as made the fancied advantages of human neighborhood insignificant, and I have never thought of them since."

Thoureau argues that most people see solitude as a function of distance, when it is actually about sharing the same mental space.

"This whole earth we inhabit is but a point in space ... no exertion of the legs can bring two minds much nearer to one another."

But the next section really jumps out to me because Thourea starts to get into some interesting ideas. Check this out:

"By a conscious effort of the mind we can stand aloof from actions and their consequences; and all things, good and bad, go by us like a torrent. We are not wholly involved in Nature. ...

"I only know myself as a human entity; the scene, so to speak, of thoughts and affections; and am sensible of a certain doubleness by which I can stand as remote from myself as from another. However intense my experience, I am conscious of the presence and criticism of a part of me, which, as it were, is not a part of me, but spectator, sharing no experience, but taking note of it, and that is no more I than it is you."

That's Thoreau in the mid 1800s. Here's a more recent Alan Watts in the 50s: 

"The individual is separate from his universal environment only in name. When this is not recognized, you have been fooled by your name. Confusing names with nature, you come to believe that having a separate name makes you a separate being.”

And then Walpola Rahula, from his book What the Buddha Taught:

"According to the teaching of the Buddha, the idea of a self is an imaginary, false belief which has no corresponding reality, and it produces harmful thoughts of 'me' and 'mine', selfish desire, craving, attachment, hatred, ill-will, conceit, pride, egoism,and other defilements, impurities and problems."

It's all the same energy. We are. Any separateness or distinctness is misperception. No Me, no You, Us or Them. No distance. No past or self.  And if that's true, there's no solitude. 

Was Thoreau the first eastern philosopher in America? Eh. Probably not. But he starts to get at it, in parts. Most of the book is very much rooted in the here and now and nature, but in Solitude he touches on some questions are central to other ways of considering the world.

Blogging Walden #2: Sounds -- 'a vibration of the universal lyre'

Nature is not quiet.

It's easy to forget that, since it is quieter than many things. City life is loud: The sounds of many modern lives lived on top of one another. When you live in a city, you think of nature as quiet.

And in winter, it can be. The cold twists the humidity out of the air and forces all the birds to warmer climes. It creates a silence  that hollows out space.

But once spring arrives, the woods become a cacophony. My desk sits next to a window, and though it is a cool morning I have it open to listen to the sounds. I can hear at least a half dozen different songbirds, the wind in the trees, and some cows in the distance.

In "Walden," Thoreau devotes an entire section to the sounds he hears in the woods. Though it's just 15 pages (in my copy*, anyway), it is a dense section of the book with sentences that have a winding life of their own. There is a lot of excellent writing here that I am often tempted to--and do--skip past. It's just a bit much sometimes. Take for instance how Thoreau describes the "dismal scream" of a screech owl:

" It is no honest and blunt tu-whit tu-who of the poets, but, without jesting, a most solemn graveyard ditty, the mutual consolations of suicide lovers remembering the pangs and the delights of supernal love in the infernal groves. "

It's not the sort of snappy description that moves the plot along. And there is a lot of writing like it: from the baying of dogs to the screams of a whistle, Thoreau takes his time. He is unrushed. ... it's not the type of writing I am accustomed to reading these days and it can be difficult to slow myself down. I often feel my eyes skipping past these lengthy paintings of sound. ...

Which is fine. Not every line or page or chapter of each great book will enthrall all readers.

Still, there is much in the "Sounds" section to linger over. Take this line early in the chapter, where Thoreau is setting the scene for us. He is describing how he worked outside, but how the worked flowed naturally with the days and seasons rather than taking effort:

"The day advanced as if to light some work of mine; it was morning, and lo, now it is evening, and nothing memorable is accomplished."

Here, his words echo the classic Chinese text, Tao Te Ching:

"Less and less is done
Until non-action is achieved.
When nothing is done, nothing is left undone.

The world is ruled by letting things take their course.
It cannot be ruled by interfering."

Is Thoreau a Taoist? I'm not sure his staunch individualism meshes well with Taoism, but both writings focus on the idea of co-existing with a natural way. When things unfold as they should, it's not work. 

Really, I should not be so critical of Thoreau's "Sounds" chapter. But the ideas and thoughts I enjoy most are not about the sounds he heard but his ideas of individualism and life. He advocates living a simple life, unfettered by unnecessary wants, with a focus on the daily and common.

"... my life itself was become my amusement and never ceased to be novel. It was a drama of many scenes and without an end. ... Every track but your own is the path of fate. Keep on your own track, then."

Thoreau didn't eschew other people, but he also didn't think much of society's excesses and the idea of working long hours to afford unnecessary luxuries. Which makes a lot of sense to me. Wanting less is one way to have more, so long as you're ok with with "more" meaning time, independence, security and self-determination , as opposed to more stuff.

"All sound heard at the greatest possible distance produces one and the same effect, a vibration of the universal lyre ..."

Maybe Thoreau was being cryptic or metaphorical with this last comment here, but I tend to think not. A flock of geese -- just about the noisiest form of nature around here -- flew over my head earlier this month. Their bleating squawks had announced their arrival, but just as they flew over they were silent and I could hear the beating of their wings, but just barely, which created a buzzing effect that hit me like a physical vibration.

He may take a while getting to it, but Thoreau knew what he was talking about. 

* I'm reading from a Signet Classic edition that also includes Thoreau's epic "Civil Disobedience" essay and a forward by the great poet W.S. Merwin. Read his beautiful poem "For the Anniversary of My Death."

Blogging Walden, #1: 'What's the news?' ... We need Thoreau now, more than ever

It may come as no surprise that a writer living in a small cabin in the woods likes Henry David Thoreau. Despite a lot of recent criticism heaped on the man and his work, I continue to think he was a genius who penned amazing treatises on solitude, nature, justice and self determination.

That's not to say the guy was perfect. But I feel a certain kinship to the naturalist writer who once accidentally burned 300 acres of woods when a campfire got out of control.  He also had a tendency to annoy people, didn't mind contradicting himself, and could be kind of an ass.

Much of the criticism surrounding Thoreau centers on his seminal work "Walden," where he writes about living a life of simplicity near the shores of Walden pond outside Concord, Mass. He describes building his own cabin, growing beans and aiming to live so simply that he avoided the need for basket-selling or most other forms of work. ... What drives people nuts is that Thoreau did not actually live so simply as he describes in his book. He was located a short distance outside of town, frequently went in to socialize, lived on borrowed land and in general was not so separate as a reader might think.

As a self-described part-time hermit, however, Thoreau's approach makes perfect sense to me.

The primary problem with Walden, is that it was written 1846 and in the proceeding 172 years language has evolved quite a bit. Which is to say, Walden can be difficult for modern day readers--and to boot, huge chunks of it are boring. Nobody cares what your beans cost, dude.

Recently, I've been re-reading the book. Slowly. Forcing myself to linger on pages that give me trouble, making notes to look up out-of-date phrases or words, and underlining any passage which speaks to me.  Making a study of it.

Walden has become a morning ritual. I wake up, put the kettle on, make the bed and straighten the cabin, make coffee and sit down to read. Sometimes I make it a dozen pages before the demands of the day come knocking. Other times it's just a single page, or two.

I don't understand why Thoreau has drawn such ire. The process to make a thing, and the thing itself, often are different. And the man never claimed to be a hermit. He kept three seats:  "I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society."

We need Thoreau--perhaps more than ever. 

His work is a reminder that simplicity and solitude are important. That our internal lives are vital to our ability to live in a community. He does talk about withdrawing, but he also specifies it must be done in a way that is fair and just.

"Hardly a man takes a half-hour's nap after dinner, but when he wakes he holds up his head and asks, 'What's the news?' as if the rest of mankind has stood his sentinels."

That sounds remarkably relevant to today's 24-7 news cycle. It's easy to feel you must be invested in the outrageous news du jour, that you are obligated as a member of society to be constantly outraged.  But Thoreau reminds us that this isn't true, particularly in this passage from his essay "Civil Disobedience:".

"It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even the most enormous wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it thought no longer, not to give it practically his support."

And bear in mind, that's the opinion of a staunch abolitionist. For all Thoreau's critics, few will deny he was consistently and emphatically on the side of justice when the topic of slavery was discussed.

So if Thoreau wasn't a hermit living solely off the land, what was he? He explains it all in the early (and decidedly non-boring) pages. In particular, these two passages:

“To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school, but so to love wisdom as to live according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity and trust. It is to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically.”

and then ...

"My purpose in going to Walden Pond was not to live cheaply nor to live dearly there, but to transact some private business with the fewest obstacles."

In Walden, I do not find either excessive claims or admonitions. What I see is an experiment. A struggle to balance the realities of a more advanced, modern, fast-paced society, against an internal pull towards solitude when the values of the individual and society do not align. That makes a lot of sense to me.