"Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes." – Carl Jung.
I'm not a Jungian, but I highly admire Carl Jung's branch of psychology which delves into the the spiritual symbolism of the mind. I'd highly recommend any of his works, as well as others like James Hillman's The Soul's Code, but the process of individuation and dream interpretation is found in Psychology and Alchemy. A process that I have been going through for many years, but only recently discovered for myself, needing to delve into with both feet while on my Path.
Though my own process doesn't use very many of the technical terms, I'm still learning, I can easily recognize that the Path that I walk is the one that every man needs to in order to transform in to his true self, or die in waste. In here I have learned how vastly important the stories we tell ourselves are. That we recognize our Imagination as the true driving force of our Will. That as we search for the Higher Truths, they become more and more recognizable through our imagination, not because we are able to make things up, but because it allows us to recognize the truth in all things. To be able to speak with the very heart of the universe. Every word written becomes Holy, and every piece of knowledge becomes Divine. That is because everything drives us to become more awake or delve deeper into sleep. The process of Awakening is painful but enlightening, using that pain to give us greater understanding of love. Where the process of Sleeping is comforting and sheltering, causing us to react to those things that disturb our sleep with fear.
In the Alchemical tradition, there are four stages to becoming your True Self. Nigredo, Albedo, Citrinitas, and Rubedo. They are the Dark Night of the Soul which is the putrefaction and death of the soul. The Purification of the Soul, the washing away of impurities. The Coagulation of the Soul , or the dawning of the solar light. Then finally The Completion of the Great Work also known as the Magnum Opus.
My formative years, until I joined the military, I lived a different life than most of the world. I was protected from the greater chaos but given mostly free reign to explore my surroundings. I had no father or any strong male figure to mentor me through life. I had my Great-Grandfather, he was my wise old sage full of great wisdom and displaying great love, but I was left alone to figure out the rest. My environment allowed me to do that in safety. Though my religion put the chains of sin around my ankles, it did prevent me from making most of the mistakes that young men do make early on, and though the mistakes I made when I was "free" of those chains were of greater consequence, I had been stable enough to figure my own way through them and learn the lessons that I needed to.
When I joined the military I began my Nigredo and it lasted for over a decade. My interactions with my peers and others mixed within me the darkest parts that humanity had to offer. Murder, rage, deceit, apathy, conformity, and many more. These ate away at the child that I had been, like an acid dissolving the my innocence and calcifying my entire being. Whatever core that was inside me fought, endured, and survived, finally breaking at the hammer of my physical trauma when I had thought that I had escaped that final death of my soul. But that breaking didn't destroy me, it only shattered me into a thousand thousand pieces.
My process of Albedo, purification, came at the insistence of my own Will and the guidance of the Universe. Of that I have no doubt. The dead that had appeared to me in my dreams protected me and gave me their strength, because only I could honor them in the proper manner. They formed the framework for my shattered soul as I worked on it like a puzzle whose shape changes with need of where the pieces are to be placed. The attacks against me were the forge and supplied the fire within to bind myself back together. And so a weapon had been forged, shaped by my Will like a master smith lost in a trance. The edges cut, sharp and deep, nothing could stand against it, but I had, at times, misused the weapon that I had become and blunted and dirtied it against the dull stupidity of the enemy. So I would have to go back to the forge to repair and clean. And I learned, that the sword of my spirit not only cut my enemies, but also cut myself. I sheered away that which I found of myself I no longer needed or benefited me. I added them to the forge but the weapon was still incomplete.
When I had met my Shaman Teacher for the first time, he connected me to my ancestors. I stood in front of the Great Assembly of Men in judgement. I watched as my life played out in my minds eye, and felt them watching my every reaction. They had already seen me for what I was. They were watching me for who I would become. They showed me not only my own traumas, but those that I had caused others. Then they gave me Names. I was the Red Handed. The Obsidian Heart. The Grim Dreamer. In these I felt the weight of consequence. Marks upon me that would forever identify my deeds. I accepted them as one would accept a sentence of doom.
Then I felt my Great-Grandfather's presence. There were no words, more vibrations and feelings. he conveyed to me this, "You judge yourself harsher than anyone of us could ever judge you. Forgive yourself. Remember that you are loved." And in my sorrow mixed tremendous pride. My repentance wasn't for them to give me, it was for myself to realize. They found me worthy of the weapon I was forging. The names that I had been given were added to the forge and placed into the weapon, their purpose unknown to me at the time.
The first time I had stepped fully into battle after that experience was my BBC Hardtalk interview. After that I confronted the Montana Court System with the false animal abuse charges, stepped into the Bundestag, traveled over Norway to speak, spoke at the Nobel Peace Center, did a TEDx Talk, premiered the DRONE film in Time's Square. For six months I was a whirling dervish, untouchable, filled with joy and reckless abandon. Death was at my door and I was rushing gleefully into her arms.
The secret wish of my heart wasn't to die but to find a reason not to. I had accepted the inevitable, the people in positions surrounding the drone world have fragile egos and the narcissistic tendency to eliminate anyone who is a threat to their power, and there is no greater threat than Truth.
The Universe is the Great Chemist of the Soul, and she knew the secret wish of my heart. That's why I had to meet Melissa three times before I understood the language the universe was speaking at me. Maktub.
In the process of chemistry, to purify a substance any number of techniques can be used. I had reached the point in my own Albedo process where I had let go of the past and future on my own. I was living in the moment. I might not have "loved myself" but I was satisfied with my life had it ended then. Death is simply a step in the cycle anyways.
When her Love was added to me, I felt ready to burst with radiant light! The last of the impurities, the sorrow, the grief, the disappointments were rising to the surface. Some nights I would shake almost like I was having a seizure, and my mind was bursting with what the ancients would call "Shamanic ecstasy." But Melissa was scared because she had no idea what was happening, and she attributed it to psychosis. Her fear latched on to me through the opening of love and I closed it away. Immediately I started getting physically sick again. I really had no idea what was going on other than I was experiencing an extreme release of emotional energy.
And when I had finally thought I was free, a few individuals decided to stalk me, threaten me, and slander me where they could. That fear latched on as well and drove me down into another Dark Night of the Soul. The only thing that got me through that was my Love for her.
I can't really say what went on in her mind, she never really was that communicative with me. Her harsh words drove me more and more into myself. When I brought her to Germany, my final speaking engagement there, she had told me that she had thought about cheating on me and the first night she was there I had a horrid nightmare that I had been abducted by aliens and experimented on. I did everything that I could to show her that I was dedicated to her, through all the pain and misery that I was dealing with. The German politicians that I was dealing with wanted to suck the life out of me for next to nothing, and because of her advice I decided to take care of myself. I was done anyways. I didn't need to participate in that drama any more if I wasn't going to get the support I needed. My son was conceived in Germany, the only thing good about that whole trip.
A month later I went back to the states to get my dog, check up and deal with the VA, get a handle on those jerkwads who were stalking me from a ground perspective, and then boogie back to Norway. That's when I found out that Melissa was pregnant and any reckless behavior that I had thought about pursuing vanished from my mind. And the process returned to the purification.
That summer was an interesting one to say the least. I had let a veteran buddy borrow my car and he had sold it for heroin money. I ended up reporting it to the police, and in the meantime I purchased a 10 year old ford van so that we could travel around the USA in a road trip. Even when things went wrong (our van was towed in New Orleans and it cut into my budget by $300), I like journeys that test me so that I can see where I need to improve. We had some great adventures.
I sent Melissa back home, and that was tough because I really did rely on her support and I didn't want to leave her alone and pregnant. I just hoped that everything would work out okay.. I was trying to deal with the VA and that was like pulling teeth. There is no adequate healthcare in Norway for somebody like me, and I didn't want them to think that I was using their system to get it. That took almost two months. During that time I fell into another depression. Fear and Love warring inside of me like two primordial Titans vying for dominance.
When I got back, it was with my dog, my partner, and my soon to be born son. Everything that I had ever wanted and needed. But it was like something was draining my life from me. Sucking my very soul. The blackness threatened to suffocate my light and my love. Melissa must have felt it too. Her attacks became more and more harsh, and I withdrew into myself more and more. I felt like a zombie, and I couldn't figure out why.
That's where this story begins. So I don't need to retell it. The circle has been completed. The purification process finalized. And so begins the next step. The Awakening of the Solar Light.
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