Ceremony Under the Stars

[Originally Published Oct 27, 2023] Opening the heart to solutions in not-knowing

The recent Solar Eclipse in Libra marked the one-year anniversary for my experience within an all-women’s peyote ceremony. When I first published this piece, there were about 30 subscribers on my list, and now that we are well over a 100 I want to share it again. As True Nature has been evolving, I find that a lot of my personal writing has migrated to the paid subscriber portal - and I realize that new subscribers may be missing out on hearing from me in the context of my intimate, inner dimensions. A lot of what flows through me these days for public posts are wild slipstream essays, emanating from a deep place of knowing and communion. Yet, of course I am very much human, learning to navigate life just like everyone else. I am not always rooted in knowing, far from it, but my perennial quest and intentions are to resonate in that place - and I find that these intentions undergird how my life unfolds, leading me to opportunities such as the one shared below.

(The names in this story have been changed to honor privacy)

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A little over a week ago I had an extraordinary experience.

I was given the opportunity to attend an all-women’s peyote ceremony, led by a third generation Lakota medicine holder. The experience, in all of its facets, has permeated my life and left a strong, lasting impression - I think this is worth a telling.

Would you like to come sit with me here by this fire? Settle in to this cozy chair. Here, let me pour you a cup of tea. Would you like honey with that? Allow me to toss this cedar onto the fire, an offering, a prayer, that the words I share will be seeds of well-being, gilded with clarity, love, and the intimate truth of my experience - for the benefit of the deepening understanding of ourselves, each other, and this wild life we live together.

And the sparks fly

I am pressing the entirety of my weight through my arms, wrists, and hands - anchoring the ends of two, forty-foot long poles to the ground. My knees are pressed into the cool, moist field grass. I say poles, but really they are the slim, smooth, trunks of trees that have been de-branched, de-barked, and sanded. There is another set of tree poles, lying perpendicular to the ones I am stabilizing. At the corner of their meeting, they have been lashed together in a specific fashion - I know this because I saw three woman tying and retying the knot at least three times, making sure to get it tight enough. Vivian, who is guiding the process, explains that tobacco can be placed with the knot - as a blessing, I imagine.

On the count of three, I brace the poles with my body, while the friend who invited me to this experience braces the other set. Several other women stand close by at the ready, and as soon as one woman hoists the main rope from the upper lashing, the four poles rise into the air and many sets of hands reach to stabilize the towering poles, which are now reaching towards the sky.

We are erecting the tipi, a job which Vivian explains is traditionally the women’s. I imagine all of us as sisters, aunties, grannies, mothers, daughters, friends and cousins - our familiarity with the process and the materials means we dance with the poles, weave the ropes, affix the eagle feather, and dress the bare form in its canvas robe. In reality, I have never met any of these women in my life, except she who invited me, and this process which I am sure takes a skilled gathering of hands a reasonable hour or so, takes us at least four. It all seems very dreamlike, with abrupt moments of intensity - like when six of us lower the chief pole, largest and heaviest of all (with the entire weight of the canvas wrapped around it) into its slot - only to find that it doesn’t fit and we have to bring it out again, and again - using the entirety of our strength and weight to lift, reposition, and coax the poles into their perfect alignment.

Even while this is all unfamiliar to me, I recognize that we are not just erecting some kind of tent - but creating a physical container that will become a portal as the sun sets and the sacred fire is lit. I see how care is taken to ensure that the radius from where the fire will be, to the opening of the doorway is set exactly; that objects and people are washed with the fragrant smoke of burning sage; subtle mistakes in the tipi’s form are corrected - meaning that we reset and toggle the poles multiple upon multiple of times so that the canvas can be hoisted, shifted, bound together above the door, and completed only when it can be tapped like a drum - the fabric even and taut across the wooden frame.

Other things are happening while we erect the tipi - women are preparing the wood for the fire - the pile situated a few feet beyond the tipi’s doorway is massive and growing by the minute. It is not your standard face cord of stacked wood; all the logs are long - four to six feet on average, six to eight inches in diameter. Another woman is on her hands and knees inside the tipi we are still guiding into form; she is using what looks like wet, white sand to create a low, mounding semi-circle around the outer perimeter of the fire’s ring. At first I erroneously guess it is some kind of barrier between the fire and where we will be sitting - later I realize it is an altar. In the midst of all this, one of the handful of children skips up, happily complaining about how “bad it smells” in the kitchen on account of the tea the older women are brewing.

Peyote. Grandfather.

Well past dark, under the auspices of flashlights we set the last two poles - the ones that hold open the rain flaps, allowing the smoke and sparks from the fire inside to merge with the starry sky. The tipi is finally in full form. More women are arriving now, some are already dressed for the ceremony in beautiful long skirts and dresses. A few of us gather armloads of carpets and thick mats and bring them up to the tipi, covering the ground in a circle around the inside perimeter. One of the women introduces herself to me - Kerri - and as we walk with arms full, I ask her if she wouldn’t mind sharing with me how she prepares for a ceremony like this. “Well,” she says, “I consider this the same way I did hundred-mile bike rides.” Stamina. This is isn’t the first person I’ve heard speak like this about the ceremony. Stamina and commitment - staying up all night, seated, no laying down, no drinking water except that which is offered in the ritual…and then there is the medicine itself. I have experienced other entheogens (literally translated as “revealing the god within”) but never peyote. The only way I figured I would ever experience this cactus medicine was in its traditional ritual context.

Well, here I am.

Kerri says other things too, about meditating, praying, and clearing her mind of expectations. At least I am prepared in that manner. I am feeling relaxed, even with the knowledge that I am deliberately agreeing to participate in something unknown to me, described by all accounts as “not easy.” It’s not that I’m fooling myself, thinking that this will be a walk in the park; quite the opposite, I understand exactly what I am getting myself into, even without having a clue what it will actually be.

I am no stranger to ritual.

Between the ages of twenty and twenty-five, I spent a cumulative total of two years living in India, studying and practicing within the Buddhist world. I was a girl obsessed. Obsessed with consciousness, completely consumed with the idea of enlightenment - personal realization and the end of suffering for myself and all sentient beings within the entire ten-thousandfold universe. I was originally drawn to the Buddhist world after four years of seeking the answer to how I could stabilize the eye and mind-opening glimpses of reality I received thanks to cannabis. Through this plant teacher, I had directly perceived that I was not just a body, but also a consciousness as vast as space itself. In the beginning, I assumed that the counter-culture held the answers and the inner roadmaps - but I discovered that the great thinkers, artists, musicians, and writers within that sphere commonly deferred to older branches of wisdom - the ancient texts and teachers from India, China, Tibet, and Japan. In finding out for myself that there was a large, untapped dimension to who I was, I became absolutely dead-set on prioritizing my inner growth and development, and for the first time in my life - cultivating my spirituality.

I was seeking source material.

India blew me open. It turned me upside down, held me by the ankles, and shook everything out of me that wasn’t an essential part of who I was. It was a fascinating experience to see that much of how I knew myself was culturally related. And I was very willing to exchange all but my very body and soul for teachings and transmissions of wisdom. I left my tutelage with cannabis and other entheogens back in the States, and witnessed directly how prolonged meditation, mantra recitation, and ritual were powerful vehicles for inducing alterations in consciousness. Whether the rituals spanned minutes, hours, or even days in some cases, I discovered that ceremony performed with a living, present moment relationship to the meanings contained with the words and actions, has the capacity to harness focus and draw perception open in ways surpassing the limitations of three-dimensional logic; in exactly the same way a spaceship has the capacity to carry us out into the cosmere away from the normal pull of gravity. Over and over, I observed how when ritual is infused with heart rather than rote, the possibilities for transformation, illumination, and initiation into the greater mysteries of self and reality, come to life.

Back in the tipi, the air is buzzing now; activity is happening in all directions. Women are milling around, talking, hugging, meeting and greeting; some are eating a final snack in the kitchen, others are bringing their gear up to the tipi - low chairs to sit on, cushions, and blankets. I change out of my jeans, into a long skirt, wrap a shawl around my shoulders and bring my pile of wool blankets up to the tipi. The fire keepers have started their work - a tending that will not end until well into the morning - nearly twelve hours later, when the fire itself will be transported out of the tipi down to seed the fire that will heat the rocks for our sweat lodge. From a distance, the tipi is glowing, a luminosity against the clear night sky.

Regardless of what culture we come from or whose blood runs in our veins, deep within our ancestral memory we all carry the remembrance of living closer with the land, with earth, air, water, and fire, all wrapped in the vast expanse of space. There is a reason so many of us like camping, and not because of its novelty. When we abide in a structure that brings us closer to the ground, closer to the air, closer to the wild elements of the world - we rekindle a knowing primordially encoded within our cells. We were born of this. The wild is who is we are. There are other knowings tucked within our ancestral memories - knowledge of community, harmony, togetherness - and I do not just mean within the scope of our human lineage. We live a legacy paved by our much older ancestors - the plants, the fungi, the microbes. It is good medicine to remember.

I settle my things and myself into a spot along the left side of the fire. My friend already has her floor chair set up, behind which is the cozy nest of a sleeping bag, pillows, and stuffed animals for her five-year-old who will be sleeping behind us during the night. He’s not the only little one preparing to snuggle in - there are children ranging in age from a one-year-old babe in arms to a young teen who is attending her first ever ceremony with her mother. When I first discovered that there would be children at the ceremony, my mind did a double-take. Yet as the evening unfolded, I realized how similar this was to the long rituals I had attended in India with thousands of Bhutanese and Tibetans - their children wrapped onto their backs, snuggling and smiling while their mothers chanted, meditated, and circumambulated the perimeters of the holy places. I remembered more intimate ritual settings in which entire families, from the babies to the elders and everyone in-between were present - seated cross-legged, pressing up against one another in a convivial display of love and accustomed intimacy - chanting, smiling, pouring tea, and performing the ritual together. The first time I was smooshed in with a group like this, my Western sensibilities of “personal space” were constricted and I felt very tense in actual contact with the bodies of other people I didn’t know. As I learned to relax my cultural habituation to personal space (it still is a practice for me), I opened to a very warm feeling of connection and shared intent. In the context of a ritual, this natural connection with one another helps to generate power within the ceremony.

We are in this together.

Within the tipi, I notice how the presence of the children adds a heightened degree of sacred and family and nourishing to the ceremony. It is their youthful innocence and their bliss of being included in something special their mothers are doing. I sense how this inclusivity amplifies the intention of the gathering. While there are many reasons someone may choose to work with an entheogen, the clear purpose of this circle is to touch in with the sacred essence of life, to pray, intend, and receive the knowings that allow for a broader opening of the heart in gratitude and joy. While this work is intensely personal, its immediate radiating effect travels directly through one’s intimate family circle, then out into the wider world of the collective web. The presence of the children is a beautiful reminder of why we would want to do this work in the first place - we each hold the evolution of the world, our world, in our hands. How we tend for ourselves, is how we tend to our families, is how we tend to the world at large. The peace and harmony that we want in this world starts at home within our own hearts, and emanates forth from within that most personal space.

The tipi begins to fill as more and more women filter in and settle into the space. Now we are a gaggle of giggles and smiles, mirroring the baby and the giddiness of the kids. The fire keepers are fulfilling their duty in earnest, and I see why the wood was so specifically cut. The fire is not just a higgedly-piggedly pile of logs, but a well defined v-shaped structure - looking exactly like the shape our hands and fingers make if we interlace our straightened fingers, one on top of the other to form a right angle where they cross. One of the main components of tending the fire, I notice, is to ensure that this deliberate structure abides - no matter how many logs are added to the fire. Already I feel gratitude for the warmth, in contrast to the crisp night air curling under the canvas and up our backs.

Suddenly the tenor within the tipi shifts as Vivian ducks through the entrance, which has been covered with an extremely thick blanket. She has traded her jeans and long sleeve shirt for a beautiful black dress embroidered with large, colorful flowers. Draped across her left shoulder and tucked into a belt, is her shawl - turquoise, with colorful, geometric accents. Other women are wearing their shawls in a similar manner, and I am visually struck - there is an obvious similarity in what I have seen in India amongst the practicing Buddhist yogis and yoginis. Vivian encourages us to make room for last minute arrivals, and we scoot closer together, widening the field. She settles herself at the head of the circle, exactly opposite the door, and directly in front of the fire’s apex. I can feel the energy shift - the gears clicking into motion. We are about to begin.

Ceremony is an inspired act. Regardless of the type or tradition, I have observed that the presiding guide wields the primary responsibility for holding and directing the energy. Naturally, it is a cocreation between everyone involved, and no one can be forced to receive what they are not ready for or open to. Each participant brings their own sovereign ability to focus and contributes attention to the collective space. That said, how all the energy weaves together and coalesces within the ceremonial context is up to the one who is leading, and by close association those who are directly carrying out ritual actions, such as the fire keepers. The reason for this, is that the one who is directing the ceremony, by virtue of their ability to lead, understands the ritual from the inside, out. From its most superficial level within form, to its deepest essence, they know how to traverse the bridge that carries the participant between ordinary reality and the quantum field of infinite wisdom and possibility. The master of ceremony is not only guiding the form and the energy, but is simultaneously encapsulating the entire scenario within their direct perception and connection to the essence itself. Not all ceremonies bring us to the edge of who we think we are, and widen our understanding of reality and self - however the ones that do, are presided over by guides who are well versed in the broader dimensions of consciousness - regardless of whether entheogens are a part of the ritual. Not only this, but authentic guides are able to summon the energy, knowing, and presence of every point of consciousness who has ever been a part of this ceremony throughout time - from its initial emergence within the inspired mind of its primary receiver, to the present moment. Through their focus, they summon the lineage. The quality of a living lineage can be felt deeply, and its absence is palpable. This doesn’t mean a ceremony needs to be hundreds of years old - but rather directly connected to and transmitting the original intent. The reason ceremonies become empty shells is because the meaning has been lost, and the words themselves are incapable of summoning the deeper, abiding reality they are meant to convey. Have you ever tried to think happy thoughts while you didn’t really feel them or believe them? Mouthing ritual has the same effect. Flat. A ritual that is alive is transportive - regardless of what its purpose is, and the focus need not even be decidedly spiritual in order to touch in on the essence of our deeper origins. When, however, the combination of focused intent upon realization and conscious expansion, is supported by collective participation guided by someone who is tapped in to the essence, the results can be truly life changing.

Vivian addresses us all as sisters, and it is a truly a warm welcome she offers. The firelight is casting a golden glow upon all twenty or so of our faces turned towards the medicine woman about to lead us on this journey. She speaks about the energy that will be cultivated within the ceremony, and specifically about the things we can and cannot do. I am familiar with following the rules of ritual, though I have never had them explained to me so conversantly. We are to remain seated for the entirety of the ceremony, except as true need arises for going to the bathroom, or “getting well” - what I begin to understand is the term they use for throwing up. Being honest with myself, the only part of the ceremony I feel a little nervous about is the fact that peyote often brings on purging - similar to its jungle cousin Ayahuasca. Vivian states that “if we must ‘get well’” there is a pit dug outside the tipi for that purpose, however it is “best to keep the medicine inside.” I find myself agreeing. Other rules for the ritual include no drinking of any water, except that which is offered to us during the ritual - as well, there are only specific times when we may actually leave the tipi. The fire keepers are also door keepers, in charge of making sure that no one exits at an inopportune moment. We are instructed not to pass behind the fire keepers while they are tending the fire, nor should we walk in front of the medicine while it is being passed around the circle. I find myself again, slightly nervous about understanding all these rules, but I quickly discover that we are not meant to memorize or know them perfectly. We are allowed to ask, allowed to speak if need be, and can ask the fire keepers to move, or to move the medicine if we need to pass by. Just like our many hands raised the tipi itself, I am beginning to sense how much this ceremony truly is a group effort.

Gazing around the fire lit space, I see faces of all ages. Some express joy and glee, others mild contentment, some serious or focused, while a few faces reflect wary apprehension. Flowers are placed around the altar, and Vivian thanks us all for coming, with a special nod and thanks to the mothers and children. She speaks briefly about how we are gathered here as women, not to be separate from the men, but to take this time for ourselves, as a way to nourish and tend to our own needs, so that how we nourish and tend in the world is supported from within. She also speaks about the importance of relating to each other as sisters in love and appreciation, rather than the patterns of frustration, anger, and jealousy. I do not have a lot of experience gathering only with women; growing up I did not have any sisters, and often chose the company of boys my age as friends. In reflecting on her words, I see within myself a whole realm of relating that is undernourished within me. Only now am I learning to appreciate the company of other wombs for the attunement that is possible.

After this introduction, Vivian “passes the word,” inviting anyone to speak who feels called to share intentions before we begin. There are many reasons why we women have gathered. One was with her grandmother just a few days prior as she took her final breath in this realm; another is returning to ceremony after years of being away; one is here to rediscover the appreciation for her husband so that she can hold space for his “greatness,” rather than his weakness; yet another is here because her friend is performing a prominent role in the ceremony itself. Already many prayers are being spoken into the collective space, and I begin to have recurring thoughts of how beautiful and sincere everyone is. When there are no more voices to be heard, the preamble is complete. Small square corn husks and tobacco are passed around, and we are instructed to roll our tobacco into a bundle that can be smoked. The fire keeper places the official fire stick into the flames, and brings the glowing torch to the first woman so she can light her bundle.

I am unaccustomed to imbibing tobacco, like many of the women gathered. Vivian explains that we do not need to actually inhale, but puff on it and blow the smoke into the fire. This physical act is a deliberate offering of our prayers - allowing them to enter the crucible of the fire itself, to be conveyed upward into the Great Mystery.

The spirit and energy of tobacco is strong, and though I am trying to contain the smoke to just my mouth, suddenly a wave of heat and energy courses through my body; my sense of gravity tilts wildly, and with it a spike of anxiety that I’m going to lose it before the ceremony really even begins. I dig one thumb and then the other into the center of the opposite forearm, in-between the tendons, to ward off the intensity. Minutes go. My body responds well to the pressure points, but my heart is still racing. I am barely back over the edge of feeling stable when Vivian requests the medicine to be brought inside the tipi. The fire keepers go outside, and return with a large metal bucket - its handle wrapped with sage - and a shallow, circular rimmed platter about two feet in diameter. From my vantage point, I can see that the platter is full of small, fresh green peyote buttons - the color of spring grass.

Vivian receives the medicine in front of her, ceremonially offering the platter to the fire, and opens with prayers and blessings in Lakota and Spanish. She wishes us a good journey, and the ceremony begins in earnest. Now we are on ritual time, the process has begun, and we will see to its auspicious completion. A young woman several seats to my left bursts out with the question of how much we should eat. Vivian says to start with four pieces, and I hear someone whisper that we are supposed to eat everything we take. The metal bucket contains tea made from the peyote, and after drinking her portion I see Vivian raise her eyebrows conspiratorially and comment how strong it is. I’m seated almost half the circle away from Vivian, so I have opportunity to observe while the medicine is passed from person to person. The energy in the tipi has become quiet and focused. Everyone who has already taken the medicine, including Vivian, seems to immediately withdraw inward. The only people moving are the fire keepers. It is clear from the faces I see that the peyote has a strong taste. My friend has already warned me of the bitterness, which to my herbally-inclined mind means that there is quite a strong stimulation of the liver and the other organs of digestion.

The woman on my right hands me a small ceramic cup, before lifting and maneuvering the bucket of tea to sit right in front of me. The liquid is dark brown, and I have already decided to drink twice. As the first taste of tea enters my sensorial world, I wait for for my gustatory senses to shudder or recoil. The taste is actually pleasant to my mouth, albeit strong and definitely not just bitter, but also acrid and ever-so astringent. That acrid flavor denotes its affinity for the nervous system, the astringency telling me that of its tonic properties. At my second cup I am certain I have tasted this flavor before, but I cannot place it easily. I pass the tea onward, and accept the platter of green peyote. I have decided to take five, and choose them quickly. I notice that everyone has been taking their time chewing the fresh peyote, and as soon as I place the first one in my mouth I understand why. The astringent, acrid, bitter components of the tea are joined by a sour flavor that makes my mouth water. Instinctively I chew the cactus as much as I possibly can, mixing my saliva and its digestive enzymes with the fresh desert medicine. As I chew slowly, I watch as the medicine makes it way around the circle. The mother of the young teen shows her daughter how to take blessings from the cactus through her hands rather than her digestive tract, then passes the platter to her adult daughter sitting on her left. When the medicine finishes its first round, Vivian calls for the instruments.

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

The drum is a staccato infinity

Matched by the rattle

Matching my heartbeat

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

Songs are being sung in Lakota, in Spanish, and English - one after another, around the circle, each woman is given the chance sing - the beaded stick with feathers affixed, crossed with sage, rattle in hand, on her knees

Singing

Singing the medicine alive in my body

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

The rhythm of the drum is an anchor and guide, something steady to hold on to as the opening arrives

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

I am on my knees, my song The Origin is flowing out of me - louder and faster than I have ever sung it before; it is my offering. In the midst of the song I also understand how the singing potentiates the medicine

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

The medicine makes another round, but this time I only take a small sip of tea and one piece of cactus. I am beginning to feel a very strong somatic shift, and I am unsure of how deep the opening will be. In the midst of this round, a young woman several spots to my left stands up suddenly and proclaims breathlessly, “I need to get well,” and the fire keepers move the medicine, stepping back so she can pass outside the tent.

As time flows on, I notice how uncomfortable I am. I am straining to stay alert, my whole being is sliding uncomfortably into a sleep-like stupor I can hardly withstand. Yet since I cannot lay down, I am supporting my body variously with my arms wrapped around my legs, or my head in my hands, elbows propped on my knees. I am not the only one integrating. I see other pale faces and heads under scarves. I also see smiles and laughter, the medicine integrating harmoniously. I want to feel better. My mind flashes to climbing into bed, laying down on my comfortable mattress and pillow, being snuggled by Victor in a warm sleepy embrace. I want to feel better. Thoughts like “this is terrible” and “I will never do this again” are circulating like angry birds in protest to the increasing discomfort I feel in my body. I want to feel better.

Is this my body’s tension? Or something lodged in my heart?

Meanwhile, the ceremony flows onward - certain women are called upon to speak and to pray, to offer tobacco smoke, and cedar. The fire keepers are ever moving, adding more wood, or rearranging what is already there. I notice another woman getting well, not by going outside, but right in front of where they sit. One of the fire keepers returns with a shovel and earth, collecting the discarded energy into the soil, and brings it outside, laying fresh clean earth in its place. There are two different parts of me, the one present for the flow of the ceremony, listening, watching. And the other part of me within, straining in the tension. Bracing against the sensations. Wincing against the vibration.

The vibration of peyote is a deep heart opening resonance.

Anything that is discordant with that level of openness, that degree of love and understanding - will be released. By wind, fire, water, or earth.

I am suddenly certain I’m going to release it by earth. Physical expulsion. There is a break in the speaking, I can pass through the doorway.

But as soon as I step outside I feel perfectly fine. Alert. Awake.

I decide to go to the bathroom for the sake of doing something productive. It is all stars, and sparks rising from the tipi.

There are voices singing in Lakota again, and I wait until they are done before I pass back through the doorway. Stooping to enter. Humbling myself as I enter…the portal. I am beginning to surmise there is something more than just the medicine happening to me in this space.

I take my seat, and almost immediately I feel a sinking feeling that I still have that resistance to expel. I am breathing deeply and calming myself in all the ways I know how. But it is just not working. I cannot find my own soothing. That is an unusual place for me to be in.

Vivian calls for the water to be brought in, and I think it is my chance to get up and go out, but the fire keepers stop me, “you can’t go out right now” they tell me. Vivian asks me directly if I need to get well, but I tell her and everyone else the truth - I don’t know. And I hear soft, empathic laughter. I am not the only one in this state. Vivian tells me that if I need to, I can simply get well where I’m sitting. Permission granted.

The blessing of water begins - and right in the beginning I finally expel the energy that has been blocking the medicine from fully accessing my heart. One time, two times, three times.   

Naturally, I do feel significantly better. At first I feel a lightness of heart that is almost surprising after the depth of my deeply complaining thoughts and the tension permeating through all levels of my mind-body continuum. I am present enough in my relief to witness the water blessing.

During my seasons in India, I always liked wetting my head and my mouth with the ritually blessed water. I imitated the way the Tibetans would do it, and I figured there was something to be received, if only in idea. In the years since that time I have learned to work with water in the cocreation of essences - flower and other vibrational essences. Learning to make my own, profoundly helpful medicine with water’s help, has given me a much deeper appreciation for the ability of this element to hold the imprint of focus, intention, and energies both terrestrial and celestial. Thanks to the work of Gerald Pollack and other scientists boldly reopening the study of water, I am now understanding in the language of experimental data what the mystics have long affirmed - living water creates a liquid crystalline structure that holds electromagnetic energy capable of doing work and transmitting information.

I do not understand the ins and outs of this water blessing, but I do know that the water in the large copper vessel, placed directly in front of the door, in the arrow path of the fire, in a straight line with Vivian’s gaze - is receiving and holding the energy. Vivian calls upon a woman to “express herself” and to pray, after which the water blessing will come to its capitulation. The moment stretches on and on, and the lightness I felt after the purge is gradually replaced. With that tension again. Another layer. I am no longer tired, but I am definitely uncomfortable. No matter which way I move my body I cannot find a soothing position. This is not my first rodeo with an entheogen and I know, I know, that the kind of soothing and relief I am looking for is not something that a physical posture can give me.

This is a deeper kind of resistance release - unwinding knots in the mind and the heart, not just the musculoskeletal system.

I am not alone. No one can leave until the water blessing is finished, and several other women are getting well in the circle. The fire keepers are very busy. Vivian has also requested that the fire be completely restructured. It is not burning well. She makes it clear, however, it is not the wood or the airflow that is restricting the fire, but the energy. She says it will burn better later on.

Tending the fire is tending the energy. Whose energy is being tended, and by whom? Who is perceiving this ceremony in the first place? Oh right, this is my mind. I am interrelated with this fire. I am interwoven with these women. I am interconnected with this medicine. I am not just an observer. I am a cocreator. This is our creation.

Finally the water blessing is finished and the copper vessel moved around the circle. Each woman draws a cup for the woman to her left. I am surprised when half a cup seems like a lot to drink. The water is utterly glorious. A liquid crystal, deeply suffusing my cellular matrix. As the water goes around, I feel a ripple of triumph travel around the tipi. It is some kind of non-linear half-way point.

Vivian calls again for the medicine, and I decide that what I have already taken is enough. I pass over the tea and green peyote hearts, mildly wondering if I am missing an opportunity by declining to renew my dose.

I wonder less when one woman gets well almost immediately.

The drummer starts up again, the resounding

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

Each woman choosing whether to offer her song and rattle

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

I am no longer wondering. I feel the need to get well again, but I refuse to release back to the earth.

If not by earth, then by water.

The tension I am holding is streaming down my face. I am crying.

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

This is a very deep heart opening.

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap

I pass over the stick and rattle when it comes to my turn.

I pass over the medicine when it comes around again.

When the platter and tea end their round at Vivian’s feet, she address us in the familiar way, “My sisters…” she speaks.

The night is deep.

The energy is heavy.

The woman directly across from me looks like she could give me the warmest, most loving hug. Since I am not supposed to get up, I imagine it. I feel so thankful for her presence. I am looking for anything that feels better than my inner world.

I am struggling between long periods of tension and allowing myself to release it through crying silently. This is without a shadow of a doubt one of the hardest things I have ever done. I hear Vivian through eyes closed as the speaks of how our thoughts inform our thinking. Boy am I aware of this! Her wisdom and clarity pierce through the veil of my inner struggle, and I surface peacefully listening to her teaching. She shares about her life, the teachings of her own example - encouraging us to give up the mind of drama. “I set my timer for five minutes. That’s it,” she says laughing. “Five minutes of drama and then I’m done.” What she is sharing resonates in my heart of hearts. She understands the quantum mysteries. She explains how if we do not change our thinking, our external circumstances may change but our deeper patterns remain the same.

The only soothing I can find, besides crying, is knowing that I know the truth of her words. The perennial wisdom of the ages reflected clearly. But for some reason, my knowing does not seem to be enough right now. Grandfather peyote is calling me to something deeper than even knowing.

Full heart-centered embodiment

This is what it means to be the medicine

I cannot seem to shake off the need to either cry or writhe in my seat. I cannot decide which option is preferable, so I choose one and then the other. I notice that I am not crying out of any specific grief or labeled sadness, but I am obviously releasing something from my system. From my mind-body continuum.

Suddenly, the babe in arms is awake, crying inconsolably. “Let’s shift the energy, it has gotten too intense,” I hear Vivian saying, next asking the fire tender to do certain things to adjust the flames. In a short while, the little one is happily sitting on his mother’s lap, all smiles and entranced by the fire.

Vivian’s teachings continue. Through her words I receive an unexpected jewel. She is speaking about what it means “to know something.” For instance, if money is going well in our lives - we “know” money. If certain relationships are going well - we “know” those relationships. However, when things are not going well in our life - it means that “we think we know” when really, we do not. And in thinking that we know, we block our ability to think differently; we block our ability to see and understand the situation differently. My focus has taken a sharp turn away from my inner sensations and outwards to receive her words clearly. I did not come to this ceremony empty of intention. I came seeking understanding about something currently happening in my life. Something that I would like to be going better. All of my prayers for this ceremony were so that I would come away with clarity for how to fix this thing.

“When we don’t know,” Vivian says, “the first thing we need to do is to actually admit that we do not know. THAT is when we open ourselves to receive the guidance, the wisdom, the love, the information that is all around us, here for us.”

I do not know.

I do not know how to fix this thing.

I do not know how to make this thing better.

I am still crying. Every time I stop there is a small gap of relief, and then the feeling of needing to get well returns. I decline to expel this back to the earth. So it is still purification by water. And a small seed of understanding beginning to grow.

I have been pushing. Trying to fix this. It’s not getting any better. What if I just admit it? What if I admit I am at a loss for what to do? 

We are moving through the darkest portion of the night. My sense of time is extremely dilated - I have no feeling for its passage.

With my eyes closed, the flames of the fire fill my inner world. It is incredibly soothing, and I feel a keen sense of alignment with the element. The moment is brief, but within it my awareness stretches across the multidimensional strata of my life-experience, reaching forward and backwards in time. Suddenly I can clearly sense the movement of energy in the tipi, and I comprehend vividly and tangibly why we have been going through such effort to curate our movements. I also see how as the ceremony’s master, Vivian is consciously working with that energy, weaving each woman’s prayers and intentions into her own inner process with the medicine, the fire, and the greater context of the ritual. The manner in which things make sense to me is beyond my normal mental cognition; I am experiencing an expanded state of perception.

Full heart-centered embodiment

My moment with the fire dissolves. And I am still sitting with this resistance that will not fully release. I am recognizing that I am not letting myself fully release it. As if in doing so I might create a scene, or be indulging in the mind of drama. Now I am complicating things. It is not simply resistance to be released. Now it is my judgement about how I am releasing it.

Let me cry about that now.

I am observing myself having this experience. I am loving myself for what I am putting myself through. As uncomfortable as this is, some calm, clear part of me knows that this is big medicine. Removing what is in the way of

Full heart-centered embodiment

With my big epiphany being that I don’t know.

What kind of epiphany is that?

I am shocked when Vivian asks what time it is, and the response is 5:50 am. It is morning, almost eight hours since we started. I made it through the night! The fact of the time is cause for general celebration, and Vivian says we can all take a break outside. Wrapped in my blanket, I make my way into the pre-dawn. Most of the women seem giddy and thrilled. I feel awkward, observing myself still mid-process of this resistance I still cannot seem to release. The stars and planets are exquisite. I watch myself simultaneously cry and stand mesmerized by the beauty. The woman who I imagined hugging is standing so near to me I want to reach out and tell her, but I cannot think of anything to say, so I turn away and wrap my blanket around me more closely.

Back in the tipi, my friend turns to me asking how I am doing. “Well.” I say truthfully, “I just can’t stop crying.” With a knowing nod she says, “Same.” And I see there are tears on her face too. To my surprise, after that exchange I am much more relaxed.

Vivian calls again for the water - the final blessing before the ceremonial food offering, and the closing of the medicine circle. The dawn breaks, and a rosy hued light fills the tipi with morning. I welcome the cup of water, its blessing permeating my cells once again. After the ritual food has been blessed and offered, both to the fire and the guiding spirits, bowls of meat, corn, and fruit are passed around the circle. All the children are awake and snuggled in with their mothers. Many of the women have smiles on their faces, though a few I notice have deep far-away looks. In the midst of our munching, Vivian invites us to express ourselves. One woman after the next shares the deeply intimate thoughts, realizations, challenges, and gratitudes arising from the ceremony. I am amazed and touched by what is shared. Tears are flowing freely down many faces. Some place inside me I can feel my own expression welling forth - but I do not feel comfortable with the idea of speaking. Mysteriously, Vivian gets the message that I am the one who is going to speak next, and she continues to say “someone says they want to speak over there” and “I heard someone there.” No one else speaks up, and Vivian continues to ask until I admit that it is me.

With the entirety of the circle’s attention upon me, I am actually at a loss for words because the sensation of the resistance has become waves of powerful emotion. It takes everything I have to breathe into these feelings and not break down completely. And I can hear the other women audibly breathing, sighing, and mmmm-ing with me, feeling the waves as well. When I can finally speak, I already feel heard. I have been seen in a state of radical self-honesty. Heart-felt vulnerability. Sometimes that is all we truly need. I introduce myself, and explain that I came to the ceremony praying to understand something happening in my life, and I realized through the experience and Vivian’s teachings - that I do not know. It is a profound turning point for me. The women ahhh and ohhhh; some nod their head in empathy, some in understanding. Vivian thanks me for sharing. I realize I no longer feel the need the cry.

With our expressing and sharing complete, Vivian closes the circle - and we all shake hands in a line that folds back on itself, before exiting the tipi in to the morning sun. Out in the light we are hugging and laughing. Now I am all smiles, taking in the beauty of the day. My sensory gates are wide open thanks to the peyote’s influence, and I see the harmonious, coherent, wild patterns of Nature in vivid technicolor and detail. My thoughts of I will never do this again have been replaced by This has been utterly amazing.

We are summoned to gather our things from within the tipi, and the process of taking it down begins. Within twenty-minutes, the canvas is lowered, the poles are removed, the fire keepers bring the hot coals to the sweat lodge fire - and the entire portal collapses back into the quantum void space of possibility. It is difficult for me to grok that this experience started the night before. It seems like a lifetime ago, or something that happened within a different dimension, loosely tethered to this one.

As I make my way across the driveway, I notice the woman who had been seated across from me in the circle. The one who I hugged in my imagination. My feeling of appreciation for her is so strong, and I really want to express that to her. She has such a warm smile, and her eyes twinkle. She seems like an auntie, someone who holds the tone of love very strong in her heart. I walk up to her, and she acknowledges my presence with a smile, so I tell her about how much I appreciated her presence in the circle. I tell her how much she helped me during the night. Her eyes are teary, and she responds by telling me how grateful she is I shared these words. “I was afraid that all my negativity was infecting everyone,” she says. I say again with more emphasis, how much her presence was a shining light to me. Then we hug.

…

In all my experiences working within ceremony or with an entheogen, I have found consistently that the integration process may take weeks, months, or even years - depending on the depth to which the medicine of the experience penetrates. My time with peyote rings a different tone than any other past experiences of mine - an effect I know is cocreative: my personal state of being and receptivity, the medicine itself, and the collective container of the ceremony each play their part. While I have had extremely expansive experiences with meditation, ritual, and other enthogens - the degree to which I have received and been able to stabilize this heart opening, is something new to me.

Against the backdrop of my open heart, the thing I felt I needed to fix dissolved in importance. I still care deeply about it, but I care less about it being a problem, and more about maintaining the increased flow of love and understanding that has become my new set point. Stepping into the open-hearted space of I don’t know - and trusting that honesty to bring me true solutions - has enabled me to cast away the old habitual spinning thoughts that were at the root of me getting out of wack in the first place. When I bring the subject to mind, the old thoughts do not carry the same charge. I have lost the interest in entertaining something that narrows the field of my compassion. This includes the compassion I have for myself.

What I gather from all this, is not that everyone should have a peyote ceremony - but that our full, heart-centered embodiment is essential to our ability to receive solutions, understanding, and new perspectives. It is also essential to feeling better. Enjoying stability in our natural state of well-being is our birthright. I think it is also the key to moving our experience of life beyond the day to day suffering of ourselves, each other, and the world. We have the ability to somatically sense what feels best - if we use our feelings as a guide and tool, we can consciously and tangibly release resistance from our mind-body continuum. This is not necessarily easy work, because the requirement is that we feel, and feel deeply - acknowledging where we are, and where we want to be - with the underlying comprehension that how we feel is directly related to our evaluation of what we are observing. When we land in our heart-space, there is no question. We can feel it. It is our center, our alignment - not just our ideas or logic - but a radiant, embodied understanding that permeates all levels of who we are.

I think this is how we find true clarity, within our body and mind - not strictly through mental assessment. Just like ritual devoid of meaning, logic devoid of our wisdom heart is no clarity at all.

Coming to the realization that I do not know and a subsequent I do not need to know, has profoundly altered how I navigate what appear to be problems arising in my life experience. For a while now, I have felt certain that everything can be fixed - if not in the external world, at least in my inner feelings and perspective on the matter. Yet sometimes, as Abraham-Hicks says, a bowl of worms is just a bowl of worms. We are not here to convince ourselves that we like that and want to eat it.

There are things in each of our lives, some things very loud in our collective right now, that are a big bowl of worms. And being reasonable about what living really entails - we will likely be coming across things we do not like for the rest of our lives. I used to think that if I stretched my mind this way or that, I could find a way to make certain things seem better and feel better. My take-away from the ceremony is that we do not need to figure things out from the standpoint of the problem. We do not need to manipulate our thoughts to find something good in what seems bad. Sometimes it works, but it is the hard way around.

When we focus more on what is wrong, we end up feeling that wrongness somatically, within our mind-body. A little bit of feeling off is part of how we know where our center is, but chronically feeling off is at the root of all dis-ease and diminished life experience - this solves nothing. There is a different way. We can use the power of our focus to amplify what we do wish to create, what we do really know to be true - effectively withdrawing our creative attention from feeding the problems in our lives and the world. Instead, we can focus and nourish our full, heart-centered embodiment of well-being - not in idea, but in felt, somatic beingness.

In the Buddhist world, they say that there are 84,000 teachings of the Buddha - as a metaphor to describe how many different ways there are to access the knowledge that leads to liberation. It does not matter which of the infinite routes we take to the mountain peak of our direct experience, it only matters that we follow the paths that call to us more deeply into the center of who we really are. Whether those paths look like ceremony, or walking the dog - it is important that we follow them.

While the physical elements of our world continue to evolve, I think it is the expansion of our heart that is the collective transformation we are seeking. It’s nice to know, and more important to feel, that we do not need to first change the world in order to find our center - but in finding our center we become as Mahatma Gandhi encouraged, the change we wish to see in the world.