Transcripts
The center of the universe is right between your eyes, but home is where the heart is.
Speaker:Written by Matthew J. Palamary.
Speaker:Narrated by Russell Newton.
Speaker:No matter how you choose to define yourself,
Speaker:in the end you and you alone are the one who does the defining.
Speaker:If you define yourself according to the judgment and expectations of others,
Speaker:you have lost yourself to a no-win situation,
Speaker:because no matter what you do,
Speaker:it is impossible to please everyone; yet with so many voices,
Speaker:thoughts,
Speaker:and impulses competing for your time,
Speaker:attention,
Speaker:and energy,
Speaker:how do you find a balance that brings peace?
Speaker:Where is the center?
Speaker:The true center where inner peace can be found lies in the "eye of
Speaker:the storm" that everything in your inner and outer life revolves around
Speaker:and this can only be found by practicing conscious awareness,
Speaker:which is an act of personal will.
Speaker:By paying attention and doing the challenging work that is constantly
Speaker:under assault and derailed by the spinning maelstrom of the monkey mind that is the ego,
Speaker:or more accurately egos that make up our inner lives,
Speaker:we have the ability to unify these disparate
Speaker:energies that spin through us with their own agendas.
Speaker:All of this happens in our minds where we interpret and define our experience
Speaker:of reality at the choice point where we reside between objectivity and subjectivity.
Speaker:If we focus on paying attention we will develop what can be called
Speaker:witness consciousness and discover the meaning of the expression,
Speaker:"Where your attention goes,
Speaker:there your energy goes."
Speaker:If cultivated,
Speaker:witness consciousness becomes the self-created focal point
Speaker:produced by harnessing the energy of awareness that takes responsibility
Speaker:for all of our thoughts and actions by paying attention and simply observing.
Speaker:The Zen concept of non-attachment provides a good example of what witness consciousness entails,
Speaker:which is characterized as a practice of presence and mindfulness,
Speaker:while not allowing our sense of well being to
Speaker:rely upon anything other than our own presence of awareness.
Speaker:It means to be in the world,
Speaker:but not of the world.
Speaker:This is different from detachment,
Speaker:which is distancing ourselves from the world out of disinterest with an
Speaker:aloofness that separates us from the rest of the world,
Speaker:resulting in escapism,
Speaker:another form of suffering.
Speaker:Non-attachment means that our happiness is no longer defined by anything outside of us.
Speaker:It is selfless because our sense of ‘self’ is no longer inserted into every situation.
Speaker:We are no longer self-centered and we can become single-pointed in our awareness of other people.
Speaker:If we allow our sense of self to be emotionally swayed by everything that appears to us,
Speaker:including people,
Speaker:places,
Speaker:perceptions,
Speaker:thoughts,
Speaker:sensations,
Speaker:events,
Speaker:experiences,
Speaker:and all seeming things,
Speaker:then our emotions will forever be taking us on a roller-coaster of ups and downs,
Speaker:swinging between joy and disaster.
Speaker:Our sense of well being will always be based on
Speaker:what we allow ourselves to be emotionally attached to,
Speaker:and when we become attached to something our happiness is
Speaker:based on a shifting duality that defines us by the outside world,
Speaker:rather than our true inner nature.
Speaker:Witness consciousness represents freedom that comes from a self- realization of the truth,
Speaker:that you,
Speaker:the consciousness that resides at the center of
Speaker:the universe that you are taking charge of and responsibility for,
Speaker:cannot be affected by anything.
Speaker:It is only the egoic mind(s) that make you believe otherwise.
Speaker:G.I Gurdjieff,
Speaker:an influential mystic and spiritual leader of the early
Speaker:twentieth century characterized witness consciousness in one of his lectures.
Speaker:"Instead of the discordant and often contradictory activity of different desires,
Speaker:there is one single I,
Speaker:whole,
Speaker:indivisible,
Speaker:and permanent; there is individuality,
Speaker:dominating the physical body and its desires and able to
Speaker:overcome both its reluctance and its resistance.
Speaker:Instead of the mechanical process of thinking there is consciousness.
Speaker:And there is will,
Speaker:that is,
Speaker:a power,
Speaker:not merely composed of various often contradictory desires belonging to different 'I's',
Speaker:but issuing from consciousness and governed by individuality or a single and permanent I.
Speaker:Only such a will can be called 'free',
Speaker:for it is independent of accident and cannot be altered or directed from without."
Speaker:Our five primary mechanisms of perception come from our sense receptors; taste,
Speaker:sight,
Speaker:touch,
Speaker:smell,
Speaker:and hearing.
Speaker:With the exception of our sense of touch,
Speaker:which comes to us through all parts of our bodies,
Speaker:our other four senses come through our head,
Speaker:which filters and puts them together into the unique perspective that we
Speaker:as individuals harbor whether we define the world
Speaker:through "rose colored glasses" or the dingy windows of a depressed outlook.
Speaker:Aside from the subject/object ground zero that puts the center of our
Speaker:universe between our eyes where we decide what our
Speaker:reality consists of according to our interpretation of these impressions,
Speaker:this location is the most logical place to locate it based on the
Speaker:construction of our body and the way our senses are arrayed about our head.
Speaker:This focus of awareness whether physical,
Speaker:mental,
Speaker:or metaphysical,
Speaker:points to the notion of the third eye,
Speaker:also called the mind's eye or inner eye that represents a mystical and esoteric concept that
Speaker:refers to a speculative invisible eye reputed to provide perception beyond ordinary sight.
Speaker:This third eye is considered to be the extension of what the mind perceives
Speaker:in the form of a subconscious awareness of the surroundings and interactions of the environment.
Speaker:In some spiritual traditions the third eye refers to the gate that leads to
Speaker:inner realms and spaces of higher consciousness,
Speaker:and in our present "new age" spirituality it often symbolizes
Speaker:a state of enlightenment or the evocation of mental images having deep personal,
Speaker:spiritual,
Speaker:or psychological significance.
Speaker:Some Christian teachings view the concept of the third eye
Speaker:as a metaphor for non-dualistic thinking; the way the mystics see.
Speaker:The rudiments of a biological basis for the mind's eye is found in the deeper
Speaker:portions of the brain below the neocortex where the center of perception exists.
Speaker:The neocortex is characterized as a sophisticated memory storage warehouse
Speaker:where data received as input from sensory systems is compartmentalized
Speaker:via the cerebral cortex which allows shapes to be identified.
Speaker:Given the lack of filtering input produced internally,
Speaker:we have the ability to hallucinate and see things that aren't received as external input,
Speaker:but as internal.
Speaker:Not all people have the same internal perceptual ability.
Speaker:For many,
Speaker:when their eyes are closed,
Speaker:the perception of darkness prevails,
Speaker:however some people are able to perceive colorful,
Speaker:dynamic imagery.
Speaker:In Theosophy the third eye is typically related to the pineal gland.
Speaker:According to this theory,
Speaker:humans had in far ancient times an actual third
Speaker:eye in the back of the head with a physical and spiritual function.
Speaker:Over time,
Speaker:as humans evolved,
Speaker:this eye atrophied and sank into what today is known as the pineal gland.
Speaker:Dr.
Speaker:Rick Strassman has hypothesized that the pineal gland,
Speaker:which maintains light sensitivity,
Speaker:is responsible for the production and release of DMT (dimethyltryptamine),
Speaker:an entheogen which he believes could be excreted
Speaker:in large quantities at the moments of birth and death.
Speaker:The pineal gland is a small endocrine
Speaker:gland in the vertebrate brain with a shape that resembles a pine cone,
Speaker:hence its name.
Speaker:It is located near the center of the brain,
Speaker:between the two hemispheres,
Speaker:tucked in a groove where the two halves of the thalamus join.
Speaker:From the point of view of biological evolution,
Speaker:the pineal gland represents a kind of atrophied photoreceptor,
Speaker:and in the epithalamus of some species of amphibians and reptiles
Speaker:it is linked to a light-sensing organ known as the parietal eye,
Speaker:which is also called the pineal eye or third eye.
Speaker:Philosopher René Descartes believed the pineal gland to be the "principal seat of the soul."
Speaker:Phenomenology is the Western philosophical tradition that has most forcefully called
Speaker:into question the modern assumption of a single,
Speaker:wholly determinable,
Speaker:objective reality and it has its source in
Speaker:Descartes' well-known separation of the thinking mind or subject,
Speaker:from the material world of things,
Speaker:or objects.
Speaker:This philosophy formed the basis for the divide-and-conquer western
Speaker:scientific method which has shown us many things,
Speaker:but ultimately falls short in comprehending the vastness of
Speaker:reality the way that shamans who are in touch with the natural world do.
Speaker:Instead of showing us more,
Speaker:our divide and conquer mentality has largely resulted in isolating us through technology
Speaker:and civilization in a divide that has grown by greater and greater degrees in modern times.
Speaker:In terms of this growing separation,
Speaker:French phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty stated:
Speaker:"All my knowledge of the world,
Speaker:even my scientific knowledge,
Speaker:is gained from my own particular point of view,
Speaker:or from some experience of the world without which the symbols of science would be meaningless.
Speaker:The whole universe of science is built upon the world as directly experienced,
Speaker:and if we want to subject science itself to rigorous scrutiny and arrive
Speaker:at a precise assessment of its meaning and scope,
Speaker:we must begin by reawakening the basic experience of the world,
Speaker:of which science is the second - order expression...
Speaker:To return to things themselves is to return to that world which precedes knowledge,
Speaker:of which knowledge always speaks,
Speaker:and in relation to which every scientific
Speaker:schematization is an abstract and derivative sign-language,
Speaker:as is geography in relation to the countryside in which we have learnt beforehand what a forest,
Speaker:a prairie or a river is."
Speaker:Regardless of our conception of the third eye or the mind's eye,
Speaker:whether physical,
Speaker:mental,
Speaker:or metaphysical,
Speaker:we cannot disregard the fact that the primary focus of our
Speaker:awareness and the creation of reality as we know it lies in our subjective
Speaker:interpretation of a world that exists through us and around us.
Speaker:Aside from these physical,
Speaker:mental,
Speaker:and subjective indicators of the location Descartes refers to as the seat of the soul,
Speaker:for the more scientific minded among us there are objective indicators evident in physics,
Speaker:the branch of science concerned with the nature and properties
Speaker:of matter and energy that includes mechanics,
Speaker:heat,
Speaker:light and other radiation,
Speaker:sound,
Speaker:electricity,
Speaker:magnetism,
Speaker:and the structure of atoms.
Speaker:This phenomenon is known as the observer effect,
Speaker:which is the fact that simply observing a situation necessarily changes it.
Speaker:Physicists have discovered that even passive observation
Speaker:of quantum phenomena can in fact change it.
Speaker:No matter how you characterize the subject object paradox,
Speaker:the fact of the matter is that in the end it comes down to a matter of perception;
Speaker:something that brings us all back to our primordial roots.
Speaker:Who better to teach us about the nature
Speaker:of perception than the ancient masters of perception themselves,
Speaker:shamans,
Speaker:who train to master extreme altered states of consciousness that makes
Speaker:them masters of a flexible perspective which gives them the ability to navigate
Speaker:multidimensional realms and energies that the uninitiated can scarcely imagine.
Speaker:THE WORLD'S OLDEST PROFESSION
Speaker:The World's Oldest Profession is not what we have been told by popular culture.
Speaker:The real world's oldest profession is shamanism,
Speaker:which is an amalgam of the world's oldest professions with roots that
Speaker:range well beyond our historical stereotypes of witch doctors,
Speaker:wild men,
Speaker:and demonically possessed primitives.
Speaker:Among other things,
Speaker:shamans were the first doctors,
Speaker:performing artists,
Speaker:musicians,
Speaker:storytellers,
Speaker:teachers,
Speaker:priests,
Speaker:psychologists,
Speaker:and magicians,
Speaker:who performed critical functions in their societies.
Speaker:Magicians,
Speaker:whether modern entertainers or indigenous
Speaker:tribal sorcerers work with the malleable texture of perception.
Speaker:Ecologist,
Speaker:philosopher,
Speaker:and sleight-of-hand magician David Abram,
Speaker:Ph.D.,
Speaker:tells us in his brilliant work on language and perception titled,
Speaker:The Spell of the Sensuous: "In tribal cultures
Speaker:that which we call "magic" takes its meaning from the fact that humans,
Speaker:in indigenous and oral context,
Speaker:experience their own consciousness as simply one form of awareness among many others.
Speaker:The traditional magician cultivates an ability to shift out of his or her
Speaker:common state of consciousness precisely in order to make contact with the other
Speaker:organic forms of sensitivity and awareness with which human existence is entwined.
Speaker:Only by temporarily shedding the accepted perceptual logic of his culture can the
Speaker:sorcerer hope to enter into relation with other species on their own terms;
Speaker:only by altering the common organization of his senses will he be able to enter
Speaker:into a rapport with the multiple nonhuman sensibilities that animate the local landscape.
Speaker:It is this,
Speaker:we might say,
Speaker:that defines a shaman: the ability to readily slip out of the perceptual boundaries that
Speaker:demarcate his or her particular culture — boundaries reinforced by social customs,
Speaker:taboos,
Speaker:and most importantly,
Speaker:the common speech or language — in order to make contact with,
Speaker:and learn from,
Speaker:the other powers in the land.
Speaker:His magic is precisely this heightened receptivity to the meaningful solicitations — songs,
Speaker:cries,
Speaker:gestures — of the larger,
Speaker:more than human field.
Speaker:Magic,
Speaker:then,
Speaker:and it's perhaps most primordial sense,
Speaker:is the experience of existing in the world made up of multiple intelligences,
Speaker:the intuition that every form one perceives — from
Speaker:the swallow swooping overhead to the fly on a blade of grass,
Speaker:and indeed the blade of grass itself — is an experiencing form,
Speaker:an entity with its own predilections and sensations,
Speaker:albeit sensations that are very different from our own."
Speaker:The magic of shamanism constitutes a prehistoric belief system that not
Speaker:only carries the same traditions and practices across cultures worldwide,
Speaker:it also continues to infuse our world with deeper meaning.
Speaker:Shamans were the first medical specialists in indigenous communities whose traditional
Speaker:methods have been effective in treating both physical and psychological ailments.
Speaker:The chemical components of plants used in shamanic healing rites have the potential
Speaker:to be building blocks for new drugs or cures for such scourges as cancer,
Speaker:heart disease,
Speaker:diabetes,
Speaker:Alzheimer's,
Speaker:and many others.
Speaker:The World Health Organization estimates that 80 percent of the people in developing countries
Speaker:still rely on traditional medicine for their primary health care needs.
Speaker:Without money,
Speaker:access,
Speaker:or faith in modern facilities,
Speaker:indigenous people depend on shamans and herbal healers for their survival.
Speaker:Shamans also play a crucial role in helping scientists to discover the potentials of plants.
Speaker:As one scientist has said,
Speaker:"Each time a medicine man dies,
Speaker:it is as if a library has been burned down."
Speaker:When asked about the roots of his tradition,
Speaker:an aging jungle healer stated,
Speaker:"I am a plant man.
Speaker:My father was a plant man as was his father before
Speaker:him and his father before him as far back as can be remembered."
Speaker:This simple statement is living testimony to prehistoric wisdom
Speaker:still being passed on through myths,
Speaker:practices,
Speaker:and belief systems kept alive through oral traditions the way they have for
Speaker:thousands of years from a distant past with roots that extend well
Speaker:beyond anything conceivable in our present "information age",
Speaker:and in many respects far removed from it.
Speaker:There is added depth to the uses of plants and other healing knowledge carried in the cultural
Speaker:collective that can only be accessed through direct subjective experience learned in visionary
Speaker:states engendered in a multitude of ways aside from or in combination with entheogenic plants,
Speaker:among these methods fasting,
Speaker:dancing,
Speaker:extreme diets,
Speaker:vision quests,
Speaker:ordeals,
Speaker:and many other time tested methods known to alter consciousness.
Speaker:In the Peruvian Amazon and throughout much of South America,
Speaker:the primary shamanic healing practice is centered around the Ayahuasca Vine,
Speaker:referred to as the "Mother of the Plants." In these traditions,
Speaker:"Mother Ayahuasca" works with a multitude of other teacher plants,
Speaker:each with their own unique healing properties in special
Speaker:diets and treatments referred to as dietas.
Speaker:Though it is the name of the actual vine,
Speaker:Ayahuasca refers to an entheogenic brew
Speaker:made out of the Ayahuasca vine known as Banisteriopsis caapi,
Speaker:and the Psychotria viridis leaf,
Speaker:referred to as Chacruna,
Speaker:a dimethyltryptamine (DMT)-containing plant species.
Speaker:In the Quechua languages,
Speaker:aya means "spirit,
Speaker:soul,
Speaker:corpse,
Speaker:dead body",
Speaker:and waska means "rope" and "woody vine" or "liana." The
Speaker:word Ayahuasca has been variously translated as "liana of the soul",
Speaker:"liana of the dead",
Speaker:and "spirit liana."
Speaker:This brew made from the two plants is taken in a ceremonial setting where it induces healing,
Speaker:cleansing,
Speaker:and purging as well as intense visionary states that communicate
Speaker:information in nonrational ways through alien-feeling symbols,
Speaker:concepts,
Speaker:emotions,
Speaker:thoughts,
Speaker:vistas,
Speaker:and other mixed perceptions.
Speaker:Dense information unfolds through rapidly transforming geometric colors and patterns,
Speaker:often in the form of synesthesia,
Speaker:where perceptions cross.
Speaker:While all of the senses are heightened and transformed in inexplicable ways,
Speaker:what stands out in these altered states is that sound can be seen,
Speaker:color can be heard,
Speaker:and feeling can come in hues and colors that defy description.
Speaker:Much of the traditional music of the Peruvian Amazon plays
Speaker:an integral part in Ayahuasca ceremonies.
Speaker:Songs are sung and music is performed as offerings to honor,
Speaker:flatter,
Speaker:and serenade the Mother,
Speaker:showing respect,
Speaker:as well as the healing and helping spirits of other plants and animal
Speaker:allies working with her so they will gift the petitioner with power,
Speaker:healing,
Speaker:wisdom,
Speaker:or other special gifts.
Speaker:In jungle lore,
Speaker:Mother Ayahuasca is the river that you journey upon and the
Speaker:sacred songs known as icaros are the boats that carry you on that journey.
Speaker:The multi-sensorial,
Speaker:multi-dimensional Ayahuasca journey is something that can never be fully
Speaker:articulated in any medium and can only truly be known through direct experience.
Speaker:By gaining experiential knowledge given to them by
Speaker:the plants and the patterns of Mother Nature herself,
Speaker:shamans understand on an intuitive level that nature’s designs are energy flows.
Speaker:Since prehistoric times,
Speaker:they have learned how the matrices of nature work together and with this knowledge they
Speaker:live in accord with these forces by embodying a balance of power that puts them in harmony with
Speaker:the forces of nature instead of in opposition to them the way we are in today's world.
Speaker:Aside from being a bridge between the worlds,
Speaker:the path of the shaman is to become a man or woman of power and the way to accomplish
Speaker:that is to learn how to master energy in all of its manifestations and dimensions.
Speaker:Learning how to master the energies of altered states puts the shaman in a multitude of
Speaker:unpredictable and inexplicable subjective experiences that alter their perception
Speaker:of reality by changing their experience in the same way that a radio receiver changes
Speaker:the station it is receiving by tuning in to a different carrier frequency.
Speaker:By continually "changing stations" and assimilating different realms and experiences,
Speaker:including plant and animal realms,
Speaker:the shaman breaks the station
Speaker:lock of consensual reality which brings them a greater flexibility of perception,
Speaker:freeing their perspective from the narrow way most people experience the world.
Speaker:This is especially true in indigenous groups who by breaking the perceptual
Speaker:lock that most of us live in give equal weight and validity to waking,
Speaker:dreaming,
Speaker:and visions,
Speaker:so that they all cross over each other into one big palette of experience.
Speaker:This freeing of perception brings the magic and flexibility of the non-physical realities
Speaker:of dreaming and visions into the present moment of their "waking world" of consensual reality,
Speaker:rewarding them with an expanded awareness and fuller presence in
Speaker:whatever transitory moment they happen to be experiencing at any given instant,
Speaker:regardless of the energies or realities they may be tuned in to.
Speaker:In spite of its seeming solidity and permanence,
Speaker:the physical waking world of consensual reality that we all share is in fact transitory.
Speaker:This inarguable point is driven home by the inevitability of our impending death.
Speaker:This has been The Center of the Universe is right between your eyes, but home is where the heart is.
Speaker:Written by Matthew J. Palamary. Narrated by Russell Newton.
Speaker:Copyright 2017 by Matthew J. Palamary. Production copyright by Matthew J. Palamary.
