New Mexico: Land of Enchantments.

Following the trail of time, we arrived for a week's stay in the enchanted lands known as, "New Mexico" (also known as Nuevo Mexico). Our wander lust eventually led us to the ancient city of Taos Pueblo. There, we met the past; a timeless culture that defies the laws of mortals and dances near the threshold of immortality. The Taos Pueblo people have been continuously inhabiting this land since the year 1,000 CE. The energy of all those ages envelopes you upon falling under the shadow of the buildings. And, if your senses are alert, you can hear the walls speak to you of wisdom that was nearly sacrificed upon the altar of "progress."

As I curiously explored the wandering alleyways, a sense of belonging and peace washed over me; almost as if I had returned to visit family after being lost in time. There was indeed an energy that felt reassuringly familiar in that isolated but vibrant mud-walled village. Vibrant visions, dreams and shamanic interaction have often reveled to me previous lives lived as a Native American.

The sacred nature of Taos Publo was so impressively all-encompassing that I removed my hat upon entering any of the dwellings; just as I would in any religious temple or shrine. It was spiritually refreshing to have the privilege of exploring a sacred refuge built with the purity and fertility of Mother Earth's own fertile ground. Their respect for Mother Nature is such that every building in their town is a monument to her. It is a simple but powerful tradition of living in accordance with Mother Nature, rather than against her. This kind of humility toward nature is even more precious today since modern humanity has foolishly squandered and exploited our Mother's gifts.

~The Green Man has Spoken~

Marijuana: The Miracle Drug.

As some of you know, my primary spiritual belief system is that of Zen Buddhism and part of that belief involves rebirth. Awhile back, I went to see a highly respected and trusted psychic who was recommended by my equally respected and credible psychologist. Anyway, she told me that in one of my past lives I was a Native American shaman who lived into his 90s. And that before that I was a shaman/medicine man in Africa. Those are both cultures that I really identity with but especially Africa. Plus, I have always been one who has spent countless days up high in the pine forests and meadows of the high rocky mountains. I am also one who respects all living things on planet Earth. As well as someone who has been curious about and attracted to natural remedies and plant life. I use to grind up flowers with water in with other plant matter when I was a kid. I was just having fun but isn't that interesting that I was subconsciously doing something that shamans have done for eons? I even spent a couple years selling vitamins and herbs to people looking for alternative therapies. I developed an extensive library of knowledge both in my mind and piled up on one of my many book shelves. So, anyway, I certainly feel a connection to the role of shamans.

So it shouldn't come as a surprise that I, The Green Man support the legalization of marijuana and certainly believe in its medicinal use. I don't know of any other drug that has so many benefits to it and thus why I call it a miracle drug. I personally use it to be a quick acting anti-depressant when I'm feeling suicidally depressed from my mental illness. As well as an anti-inflammatory for my fibromyalgia, which eases my aches and pains quicker and more effectively than a handful of Advil. And nothing tops the stomach pain easing effects of marijuana. When I get the flu I don't reach for Pepto Bismal, which makes me gag or choking on half a bottle of those chalky Tums tablets. I go straight for the pot because it works instantly and lasts long. Plus, it relaxes the stomach muscles to help ease that tight, uncomfortable feeling that comes with stomach sickness. Also, it often flat-out shuts down nausea.

Let me be very clear up front, I do not recommend everyone with a mental illness smoke marijuana but it's long past due that the mental health community recognize it as a potentially beneficial drug for some. Especially when it comes to folks with major depression and tendencies toward chronic suicidal thinking and planning. Suicidal impulses hit me like a storm that explodes around you within minutes and before you can realize what is happening you are fighting to stay alive.

Many of you who struggle with suicidal impulses know that once it hits you, like LSD, it steadily pulls you deeper and deeper into an altered state of consciousness that you increasingly can not control. It isn't long before you are locked into what I literally refer to as a, "death spiral." Once that process starts there isn't much that can reach me let along pull me out of it without hospitalization. Except I discovered since my one and only hospitalization that smoking some pot right as that suicidal storm hits lifts me up out of that dark, powerful, destructive black hole like being plucked out of a violent sea by a coast guard helicopter. People don't take it seriously enough as a natural supplement to prescription drugs, which kill more people every year than died in the entire Vietnam War!! That's 50,000+ every year!! Plus, when I miss a prescription drug for my schizoaffective disorder it makes me vomit violently in withdrawals. Whereas if I don't do marijuana for a day or two I don't have anything like that happen. I'm not saying pot takes the place of my meds -- not at all. It simply adds to them to ease the symptoms that the prescription drugs can't hit.

There is no pill out there that I know of, which works instantaneously to pull someone out of suicidal depression how Ativan or Klonopin instantaneously can pull people out of mania (including anxiety and panic attacks). Certainly this isn't true for everyone because for some it might pull them out of suicidal thoughts but exchange it with psychosis. However, that's true for any psychological medication but that doesn't mean that just because say Lexapro doesn't work for someone that it should be banned altogether. It's clear that marijuana DOES help people with suicidal depression and that should be factored into what conditions qualify for medicinal marijuana. And for many it can also melt away anxiety and stress as well as any prescription drug but whereas the pill is made from a long list of hard to pronounce, unnatural chemicals -- Pot it all natural.

Besides, this is America and our country was founded upon personal liberties and freedoms so why is it the government's business if someone wants to smoke a joint in the privacy of their own home and laugh at cartoons? How does that hurt anyone? Sure there need to be laws preventing smoking it and driving and keeping it away from minors. However, did you know that because marijuana isn't legal and thus not regulated that it is easier for minors to get than alcohol? To buy alcohol a teen must walk into a security camera enforced store and show valid identification. Sure they can try to make a fake ID but it's difficult to do and fakes are often discovered. If a teen goes to buy illegal pot the dealer isn't going to ask for identification. He doesn't care who buys his product, thus the teens can get pot easier than alcohol. If pot was sold in a regulated store the use rates who go down.

Sure it can be abused if you smoke it all day but honestly how many people are doing that besides college kids? Another argument is that the pot today is stronger. Blah, blah, blah. Pot has NEVER, EVER led to any over-dose. You simply can't overdose on marijuana. You can smoke it all day and the worst that happens is you fall asleep and get a good night of sleep!! Wow. Soooo dangerous. The stronger pot argument is only valid if it led to overdoses but it doesn't. It simply isn't true. Sure it might cause emphysema but that's a personal decision that someone shouldn't be making for someone else. Besides you can bake marijuana into brownies and ingest it orally without running the risks of smoking. Plus now there is the vaporizing method, which is a mist that you ingest and it has been shown to be safe. That's the method I use. It's not unlike ingesting mist from those asthma pumps.

Hell, eating too much junk food leads to heart disease, diabetes and other major health problems but do we make Twinkies illegal? Alcohol leads to liver and kidney damage but we saw what prohibition of alcohol brought us in the golden age of gangsters in the 20's. And the same members of Congress that say pot should remain illegal are guzzling alcohol by the barrel full. Porn can be abused but it's legal, working can even be abused and break up marriages. Anything can be abused but does that mean we should make everything with the ability to be abused illegal? We'd have to outlaw cold medicine, mouthwash and paint solvents to name but a few things. We wouldn't be able to function as a society or leave our house!! Should we outlaw greed? Good luck. And what about the "legal drugs" that are aired non-stop on t.v. and take half the commercial time listing adverse side effects? No, I choose not to live in fear. It's time to stop demonizing marijuana and throw it in the same category as heroin, cocaine, crack and meth. Marijuana is to those other substances as B.B. guns are to AK-47's.

I find it very odd to say the least that Conservatives who are usually for personal liberties and the government butting out of a person's private life are for keeping pot illegal!! Huh?

Independent Pagan.

I have noticed a trend in American religious thought that many are leaving the cold, rigid religious boundaries of the past as we emerge from the cocoon of a puritanical society. The trend seems to be one of reclaiming one's independence and freedom to tailor one's philosophy/religion/belief system to what feels right for them. It is in that light from which I write out this declaration of what Paganism means to me. It's long but I hope you find it interesting.

It is but one branch, however, to my overall tree of beliefs, which also include Buddhism, Taoism, Hindu Mysticism, a bit of the Occult and Secular Humanism. I am writing this out mostly for my benefit as I explore what I believe as far as my Pagan side expresses. If anyone finds it useful or interesting then I'm happy to have aided you in some way:

I am of Scottish and Norwegian descent. My last name is an old Scottish one, which is also the name of a small fishing village not far off the northern, Scottish, Shetland islands on the far eastern coast of Norway. As my parents are Mormon they are very into family genealogy and figure that my Scottish ancestors were originally Norse Vikings who migrated to northern Scotland. Thus the fiery orange red beard I wear. I say all of this to say that the foundation of my Pagan philosophy is a mix of ancient Celtic, Gaelic and Norse pagan practices/beliefs. I'm also very atheistic so I am not one of those Pagans who believe in spells, praying to gods or worshiping other mythical beings. I enjoy them as aspects within myself represented in a very easy to understand and absorb fashion in visual images. That is why I connect so well to altars and images of gods as visual information is my best way of processing things. They are symbols to me of what I seek to embody, strive for and avoid.

I collect objects important to me, which I place upon my altar not because I believe they have any magical power but because they mean something meaningful to me. So to see all these personally sacred objects collected and positioned altogether, with care, is inspirational and visually very pleasing and thus calming to me. My therapist speaks of balancing my scales as I am a very pessimistic and cynical being. It's a weakness of mine I struggle with daily. So basically my scales are totally lopsided with negative stuff weighing the scale down to one side. One reason for my constant low level of depression and feelings of hopelessness come from not having enough positive things that bring my scale into more balance. So since I have realized that seeing all these images, (such as the ones on this blog, in my house and on my altar) bring me happiness, empowerment and peace I am embracing it.

Animism is another important facet to my independent Pagan philosophy as I spent two life changing years in Cote D'Ivoire, West Africa where I came into contact with the belief system. It is one that believes all things have a "life force" or "energy" within it that connects all things together in an interdependent web of existence. Rocks, plants, waterfalls, rivers, mountains, springs, trees, dirt, rain, etc. This blends nicely into my Buddhist, Taoist and general pagan beliefs. Traditional Animism believes these things such as objects or wooden statues represent spirits, which if given the right things will bless or curse you or others. However, again being atheistic I use my objects and locations as symbols of people and places that I cherish deeply.

These memories are more easily and more powerfully activated for me by visual representations, which I place on my Animist altar. The objects also represent my hopes and aspirations, which when contemplated upon bring about a feeling of peace and contentment. Some things I place upon either of my three altars without really knowing why -- just that they catch my attention and fascinate me. My altars are like moving art -- they are alive and a moving, ever evolving sacred space. I change things around based on the seasons, my mood, my intentions or just for a change. I often don't ask why I should put something where I place it but rather follow my intuition that it is meant to be there. If it's pleasing to the eye that is often enough for me to find it meaningful. Sometimes we ask too many questions and seek too much for reasons for doing things. This life is often about letting go and just following the flow of energy and see where it takes us.

The final aspect of my Pagan philosophy right now is that of Shamanism, which involves a Shaman acting as intermediary between the spirit world and the human realm. I don't believe in spirits much but I do believe that all things have an energy that could involve electromagnetic waves, which pulse throughout all objects and beings. Those waves would seem to affect and connect with the electrical behavior of our brain. It isn't the same as traditional electricity but in both cases they involved pules of energy radiating through a network of circuits. Plus, Earth has it's own magnetic field that is pulsing throughout everything that resides upon it. This would all explain why some places and people have a stronger pull to them than others such as the north and south poles, etc. However, I am severely digressing from discussing my interpretation and practice of Shamanism.

One of the other important aspects to Shamanism is connecting with, watching, learning from being guided by the animal kingdom. Animals have always been attracted to me, especially cats. Where ever we move there are always cats that seek us out. We have saved so many strays over the years. At this one place we lived there was this cat that would come and hang out with me on our porch. He would sit on the post of the railing and I would sit on the stairs and we'd just sit and absorbs the sights, sound and smells of nature together. I am very cat like with excellent reflexes, acute senses, strong spirit of independence and a creature of the night. So cat like animals are especially totem guides to me as well as hawks/eagles/owls but I find inspiration in all critters. I see them in part as omens. For example, I was about to head off to a weekend in Las Vegas (we all know what THAT means) but while we were waiting on the airplane they told us the previous flight that this plane had just landed from was being cleaned because it sucked a red-tail hawk into the engine!! I was horrorfied as the red-tail in particular is a favorite animal totem of mine as we both have red spots (it feathers and me my beard). So, well, the rest of that weekend in Vegas turned out of be one of the worst three days of my life. I should have known.

The other part of Shamanism that I have adopted is the role of healer. Since I was a young adult I've always taken an interest in plants and use to chew on mint leaves from my neighbors garden. Then one of my first and longest jobs was working at a vitamin and herb company selling it too people who would call in to place orders. I got to know what vitamins and herbs did what for a person's health. I have committed many of the herb books to heart and am that guy who is always suggesting herbs and natural remedies for common illnesses like colds, stomach ailments and the like. This includes psychoactive substances such as cannabis and magic mushrooms to explore the depths of consciousness. Well, I think that's enough for now.

~Be well~