Seeking and hanging out in the higher realms is not fundamentally wrong. It has been practiced for aeons by human kind. Tribes have used hallucinogenic herbs to visit other realms almost as casually as we use alcohol in our culture. Yet they were close to nature. They lived a life of intense physicality, and were much more aware of their bodies as they lived and died by being in such close proximity to the earth and the elements and their ability to be in harmony with it. Our ancestors also ate only natural foods from their surrounding environments and drank water from natural sources unpolluted by industry.
A spirituality was born from this close connection to nature and surviving it’s unpredictable and often hostile changeability. Spirituality was intimately threaded through the chores of daily life, such as hunting, growing crops, keeping livestock and preparing food.
Communing with the spirit world, higher beings, underworlds, became a natural extension of this survival. Being attuned to messages from other dimensions and blessings from other beings could sometimes mean the difference between life and death. Perhaps knowing when to plant seeds after a frost or understanding the cause of an illness, could be aided by a practice of following moon cycles, or from divination or indeed an attunement through journeying or visiting the local medicine man/woman.
There was no modern medicine or weather apps on the I Phone or excel spreadhseets.
Now, we live in an age where the beauty of this connection to our original innocence is but a faint memory to most and has been all but trashed by a system that is now out of control. Its unfettered growth is destroying our planet. Many important eco systems are teetering on the edge, with industrial, economic and consumer growth celebrated, whilst oceans polluted, forests burnt and land poisoned with chemicals to make way for our throw away, fast food culture. Human kind is hurtling towards the edge of a cliff.
Yet in these complex and modern times, the carefully fabricated lies of the media, education, religions, politicians keeps us hooked into this world of falsity and lack consciousness. It preys upon our core wounds, and keeps us in a straight-jacket of false beliefs which imprison us from truly seeing the innate value of our imperfections. This avoidance of what is, and papering over with delusions literally poisons our minds.
It’s no wonder our egos, then take over this role so it becomes internalized, and anchored in to our sense of self and being.
I guess this process starts even before birth. We take on our parents and ancestors foibles, thoughts and beliefs. Then we are inundated by both school and religious conditioning to be good and pure, to take on a mask of social propriety, while all the natural impulses and pure connections to Source are layered over further. As we progress through the education system we graduate and soon find ourselves keeping up with the Jones’, under further subtle and invisible pressure to maintain these lies.
It’s absolutely no wonder that the majority of spiritual practices would be reflected in this social, mental and emotional fragmentation. It’s completely unsurprising that our spirituality is not an embodied reconnection to our true Source, to our original nature. It is completely unsurprising that it tends to be an escape route, an emotional spiritual bypass of cosmic proportions to avoid the pain of all this.