Chapter 4 — The Final Lesson
The door, it was swinging open; the light shined brightly, it was blinding. The power of the apocalypse deafened the room in three coastal waves of split-second frames, each consecutive spasm more forced and delayed than the first.
The final three clicks at the top of a roller coaster.
And then…it shattered. With a single swift motion, they barged in and I was swarmed. It was my family, my friends, and all the people that had once loved and cared for me—they had been waiting for my arrival this whole time behind that door!
They all formed a single file line and were waiting their turn to share a piece of their life with me. My father approached me and scolded me as if I were a small child. B came up from behind him and hugged me to share the gossip of last year. Helen, jabbering away on a cell phone, shot me a smile and waved before prancing away. A dealer from a club approached me in swift dance moves, before smirking cleverly right in my face to offer me pills. My high school sweetheart came up and pecked me on the cheek, and dashed away while laughing wholeheartedly. Everybody started over again at the back of the line, only to come back around again, over and over and over again, each of them to repeat yet another part of our relationship.
Some brought me joy, and others brought me pain. Some laughed at me, and others shared my tears. There were those who brought forth healing, and those who needed me for their own healing. I saw a replay of these actions, in both reverse and forward motion—everything was melting into one giant soup. All those lives, one layer after the other, all on top of each other, only to live and then come back round again, all over again—the map, almost complete, zapped with electric shocks so blindingly white… Detachment from the body. Their words had become nothing but primordial gibberish, yet I clearly understood the content behind their actions. Even when my father came up to me speaking in tongues again, I knew that he was holding that discussion we had on nihilistic philosophy with me. Oh if only he knew what I was seeing right now!
And then there was the love that I lost. He was the last one who was not standing in line. He grazed my cheek with celestial essence, and spoke the exact words that he wrote in a letter a long time ago: “The universe will always transpire in your favor.”
With that, back turned to me, he looked at me to smile one last time. “See you in the next life.”
With that instant, he was gone.… But I didn’t want him to go. B came from behind him and everybody else, and slammed the door in my face. She was the gatekeeper, and now it was time to close this chapter.
It was then my eyes were opened to many things anew. There are those that believe there is no point in love if you know you will end up losing them. I say that there is no meaning in love if it is to never evolve. But one thing is for sure:
You can’t control who you love.
Love heals all. Everything that happened, the pieces were falling in place, and it was all coming together. It was all for a reason: A miracle.
They were all here to teach me something. For to live is to love, and to immerse yourself in the joy of living is to love both the hating and the loving and the giving and the crying... The cycle was neverending.
B re-appeared again to help me off the bed. “Aww K, how did you get so dirty…” Her strong sympathy uplifted my spirits, knowing that I was being cared for.
Helen and her both lead me to the shower—I was exhilarated to find that she was real, I was awake, and I was living this all in action! I just needed to make sure.
“Who am I?” I asked the question of truth.
“Kasumi,” B dignified with thought-provoking clarity. “You are Kasumi.”
And that was it. They turned me on the water and left me in peace. It was time to cleanse myself of all the grime of the past, and complete my transformation. I was almost there.
The booming voice of the aliens rang ahead in my head. “We are going to restart again, in 3…2…”
Blinding white.
****
I was back at the scene, when JD had first said it, and John just opened the door. I saw it all frozen in time.
Everything that was to happen, it was all laid out BEFORE it actually happened… And I was there to visually witness the progress in motion. I was there to visually see where the most impressionable mark was to be made in the future. Lucid-dreaming in virtual color, visualizing my friend’s footprints on the carpet; they were aligned in sync with the blinking dots, connecting with the fragments of MY MAP. In a split second, I knew where he would place each foot before he did.
I walked closer and farther away from the objects in the room. I was surprised to find my change of perception vastly changed the shading and color of the vision. Imagine a baseball game, one team will argue that the runner is safe while the other side claims the runner is out. The runner swears on his grave he felt getting tagged AFTER touching the base, while the catcher knows it was quite the opposite. In that distinct moment of time, the same action was viewed by such a wide spectrum of perceptions that were distorted. Different angles, different manifestations, different perceptions, different mechanisms of the organs—all different, but nobody is more right or wrong from the other…
It was all relative.
Everybody was my relative.
“Undeniable proof…It’ just an overall feeling… But somehow, you…”
“Just know…” all the voices of my life chimed in, our monotone drones chorusing in a cyclone of echoes.
And thus, I learned my first lesson.
Timing. Is. EVERYTHING. Predetermination. Fate. Destiny. I entrusted that in the end, everything was working for a common goal…When the universe transpires to harmony. The future lies in our history.
“The real knowledge is free. It’s encoded in your DNA. All you need is within you. Great teachers have said that from the beginning. Find your heart, and you will find your way.” –Mr. Barrios (
http://www.futurehi.net/archives/2005_11.html)
I suppose the one question lingering in my mind is… Why? And I wish I could answer it, but the only thing I can say is that there is no reason. There is no explanation. It just is. And
the universe always will be.
To this day, I still cannot fully explain why I placed so much faith in this experience. Even when I awakened from my trip not remembering a damn thing, I could feel inside of me had drastically changed. I couldn’t explain it then; it was something I just KNEW. But surely it was something undeniable that caused me to recognize all these worldly teachings.
Months later, segments slowly started revealing, uncovering a bigger part of the truth. Bit by bit, as all the puzzle pieces fell into place, it only enforced what I had placed faith in all along. Layers of skin unshed; there was
a new light; a new beginning. All I knew is that I had to
appreciate life for what it’s worth, to
treat others with kindness and sincerity, to
do unto others, and to
accept everybody into my life.
What a crazy fucking drug, DOB. Also stands for Date of Birth. Or in my case, Date of (Re)Birth. I’d like to call it the night that changed my life.
A new light was shed, and I entrusted that I would live in immortality. ALL OF US. And suddenly, there was no reason to rush.
We have all the time in the world to get to know each other. Others might consider such a notion to be idiotic, because time is money and it cannot be wasted. But
if only everybody knew this secret, we would be able to take the time to appreciate the simplest things in life.
Deadlines cause us to lose sight of the things that are most important—other people. So many times, we place foolish value on material possessions. We judge others by the type of car they drive, their weight, their salary–but in the end, it is money, looks, and possessions that inevitably fade.
What is everlasting is what is truly genuine.
One thing I love about entheogens is how valuable they make the most basic principles to us. It inspires us to
live the way you would like to see the world one day. To live by example, in hopes that others will follow. To reach out to everybody around you, and try to spread a good message that benefits not just humans, but the environment, society, and even animals and other forms of life everywhere.
“Ignorance is a sin. Not the ignorance of not knowing, but the ignorance of knowing, and acting ignorant anyway.” –neferiousdad87 (Lycaeum Forums)
If we only promote a message of hate, it only perpetuates the vicious cycle, and simply because the results are not always immediate does not mean consequences will not be suffered. If you do not want to live in a community of thieves, stop stealing and playing like a cheat. If you don’t want to see violence on the streets, transfer your anger through art, not people.
To live physically, you must live everyday as if it were your last. To live spiritually, you must
live every day as if you will live forever. In the physical realm, energy loses momentum as it is transferred. In the spirit world, it is quite the opposite—and being in this near-death state somehow made me able to visualize the gravitation pull between the two struggling words. Everything is inevitably building up and leading to something greater. Even the smallest spiteful comment or a friendly gesture can start a spark, creating a drastic domino effect. It sweeps all around the world with increasing momentum, only to come around and go around and then come back again. And we live on through these actions, by reaching out to those around us. So to
touch others and affect those around you…to REACH OUT… THAT is the meaning of living a fulfilling life.
What’s in the darkness
Must be revealed to light
We’re not here to judge what’s good from bad
But to do the things that are right…
Live for yourself and you will live in vain;
Live for others, you will live again. –Bob Marley (Pass It On)
A natural element of life is to constantly be developing your own self—body, mind, and soul. If hardships lead to self discovery, then we as humans are in an endless plight to seek the truth; to constantly better ourselves. The people we come across, and the situations we get ourselves into are all part of a divine plan—
Everybody is here to teach YOU something. It is for the lessons you will learn in this upcoming stage of growth. It is to share the best kind of happiness, and ease the worst pain, yet at the same time be its cause and effect.
Karma—The progress of cause and effect. Evolution—Evident in physical nature. What goes up must come down. What is heated will eventually cool. When motion progresses one way, it is bound to head the other. So there must be a heaven because we’ve already done our time in hell. If we only allow the darkness to consume and destroy us, then who really wins?
All too often we justify our poor actions by reasoning that it has happened to us. We often cry about how we have fallen victims to so many bad circumstances...but how often do we sit and think about all the pain we have CAUSED in this world?
It is far too common to suffer in our own misery and believe that we have it the worst, that nobody could possibly understand us. Even when we have all the luck in the world, we are always striving for more, we always want better. The Dahli Lama says that desire stems from the root of ignorance, and is the cause of all suffering in this world. I for one, agree. We become lost in our own personal greed and forget compassion, when it is this very essence that makes us human.
The truth is, every one of us is familiar with the all too-real experience of pain, tragedy, heartbreak, loss, and death. We live through such ordeals in order to understand each other as human beings and grow. As we do, what is the trend that begins to occur?
Acceptance.
Tolerance.
Respect for others. Throughout history, humans have endured the worst of the worst endeavors, yet continue to survive. Massacres by the millions under Stalin's reign, Hitler's concentration camps, slavery in the USA, brutal and violent crime all over the world, just to name a few. Now we are witnessing society slowly evolving into a union that accepts people of different genders, races, nationalities, religions, sexual orientations, body shapes, sizes, mental deficiencies, physical handicaps, and ages. The more we repeat this cycle of suffering and healing, torment and bliss, the more we begin to lose judgment for the very things that we used to abhor.
It is such a mystery, how easy the morals we used to abide by crumble into pieces the more we intermingle and share each other’s personal stories. A father, once homophobic, discovers his son was killed for his sexual preference. A rapist in the night finds out that a close relative of his was unknowingly made his last victim. A person who ‘only’ jokes about niggers witnesses a real-life example of racial profiling in police brutality.
The more personal someone becomes to us, the more instances like these hit us too close to home. Suddenly, it is no longer fun to taunt, cheat, or torment the very same people we love. When we hurt others, we are hurting our own mothers, brothers, sisters, fathers, cousins, best friends, daughters, grandsons, and lovers. Behind the eyes of a crying soul is your own kin, flesh, and blood—they, WE, are
together as one.
When we learn to love others more than ourselves, the truth will set us free.
When we see truth for the beauty that it actually is, the world will come to know peace.
Let us never forget how precious of a quality it is to dream. (My words)
I remember the first drug I ever read about on Erowid—n,n,DMT. I was 14 years old. I can remember their words like it was yesterday, that the one proof that is undeniable is human experience. I remember reading this at such a young age and mocking such a foolish idea; now I know otherwise.
Human relations teach us something that science will never be able to. It is in our history, it is in our textbooks, it is in our blood. To ridicule such crimes against humanity depersonalizes and undermines human suffering. What would the purpose in life be if other people did not exist? For what reason would we have suffered for, if there is nobody to share your happiness with afterwards?
Humanity. It continues to touch us for life. And piecing together the last piece (or at least what I think was the last) gave me a whole new perspective.
Can you imagine…I never considered ANY of these philosophical ideas, until this single night in June changed my entire life. What they say is true—drugs cannot bring out anything inside of you that does not already exist. And to truly appreciate life, one must first lose everything. Only until I did, did I realize how precious the time we spend with others is. It was through this blessing in disguise, through these collective lessons, that I was able to transform and develop a new, valuable appreciation for spirit.
Since then, I have made an effort to change my ways. I went from being a conceited, arrogant prick to genuinely caring for my fellow neighbor. I went from only selfishly tending to my own needs to feeling the cry of others. To listen humbly, but never attack. To do unto others as I would have them do unto me. I stopped closing my mind off to possibilities and started
allowing myself to dream. It is unexplainable, but I know…it was just meant to be.
“Real enough to enjoy and savor,
Genuine enough to be significant;
But illusory in that it obscures the knowledge;
That the journey never ends.” –Hocus Pocus (Lycaeum Forums)
DOB trip.
