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The Shaman’s Passage

He slowly picked up the banana peel from the earthen floor. Its color was dull and it was covered in dirt like his young face and little hands. It was too old and rotten to be eaten, but he was too hungry to resist. And before taking his first bite, a defining moment transpired in the life of this human child. Woven seamlessly by the Fates, it happened the moment he carefully looked to make sure no one could see what he was about to do. It came to him as a cold heat that stung his chest and throat and brought tears to his eyes. Shame had consumed him. It was painful and it didn’t matter that he was only six years old. It didn’t matter that he was starving. The emotion broke his heart regardless, demoralizing him and trapping him into a memory, a mood that would haunt him through out his adult years.

The currents of emotion can take us to our deepest bliss and suffering. Many become prisoners of their feelings and of their passion, and eventually victims of circumstance and the whims of karma. This happens when there is no true master to hold the reigns. In the time of pre-Spanish cultures—culturas prehispanicas—the way of Toltecs was the way of self mastery. The Toltecs understood that humans are made up of an assortment of personalities, demons and angels, all striving to take the lead. But there can only be one leader, the Sun, and the rest must serve and follow if there is to be perfect order within the solar system of our bodies.

The Toltecs and the true shamans of old were relentless warriors continuously seeking alchemical transformation and aspiring for perfected divinity within. To take on this path is to shed like a serpent, leaving behind old programming and deeply-rooted beliefs that incorporate the very basis of our existence. Everything you thought you were dissolves into the fires of the volcano. It is a grueling, arduous process; a poignant, emotive mixture of pain and joy that leaves the individual completely raw and utterly naked to the world.

Emotions and memories that were once familiar and dependable no longer give you an identity or any solace from the madness of annihilation. In these tumultuous waters, the opportunity to refine one’s self and develop into a sharp instrument of pure will and intent is great. To become steady and calm in the emotional turmoil of the dying mind is a valuable skill to hone. That Stillness reverberates throughout the body, transmitting a frequency, a silent language that is otherworldly and pertains to a space that can hold higher intelligence—a silent, celestial space between sound and the passing of time.

One who has mastered her own inner world can tap into a reservoir of higher emotions and higher intelligence, becoming a free star and no longer a prisoner of any thought, emotion or memory created by the illusion of time. But it is not an easy path to take. He who endeavors to walk it, will never really be human again or fit into the social and moral constructs of this world. The true master follows the trajectory of his own inner sun, and it all starts the moment before taking the first bite. . .

The key is in the recognition of the transition states, the spaces in between sound and light. Watch the little ones! They know how to dance to the empty spaces. They hear the rhythms of our feathered-ancestors, and in their play, in their laughter, in the darkest point of their bright, twilight eyes the Beloved can be found.

 Star Water

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