Some Initial Thoughts about James Oroc's "Tryptamine Palace: 5-MeO-DMT and the Sonoran Desert Toad"

QUOTE OF THE DAY:

"[In the Sixties] Yoga was something that was nuts -- if you did Yoga, you were totally weird."
-- Dr. Rick Doblin

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFKOB9hyJSs ]

Some Initial Thoughts about James Oroc's "Tryptamine Palace: 5-MeO-DMT and the Sonoran Desert Toad"

I have just a few initial comments to make about James Oroc's "Tryptamine Palace," particularly in regard to his first experience with smoking 5-MeO-DMT.

The things which most interest me about James' experience are: 1) He had no real faith in the existence of God prior to the experience, and after the journey he had an absolute conviction in "transcendent, formless Godhead"; 2) He notes that he began spontaneously doing "perfect yoga sun salutations" during his first experience; and 3) He speaks of meeting a Goddess (Great Mother Goddess) during some of his early 5-MeO journeys. In regard to the latter, he remarks that "we are children compared to them [the archetypal Spirit beings], and they teach us things in the slow methodical way any good teacher does: one simple lesson at a time." (p. 7)

Because I've been looking at these things through the lens of yoga, and my own personal experience with it, I can't help but want to make comparisons with what I'm aware of...

When I first got into Yoga in the Spring/Summer of '96, I was very much on the path of the Divine Mother Goddess having been deeply inspired by some of the Goddess' earthly incarnations in the form of the women saints of India (such as Ammachi and Amma Karunamayi). Having been in the presence of these women saints on numerous occasions, I can say that James' description of the "Goddess" energy very well fits these avatars, which is a Sanskrit term meaning "Divine Incarnation." It was largely due to them that I began to have a much firmer "faith" (as James puts it) that there really is such a thing as Brahman (the "transcendent, formless Godhead" of which James speaks), and a whole host of other things that I would not have otherwise felt were true were it not for the living example of these Yoga masters. That said, I can't claim that I had 100% unshakeable faith in the existence of God, and that was mainly because I had never had the direct experience of God myself. And that's a crucial point that I feel needs to be made, and it's crucial because until we directly experience something for ourself, it's not 100% true for us, which is why entheogens like 5-MeO-DMT are so profoundly important, perhaps essential, for the journey of some souls. I sense that it is essential for my personal evolution, which is why I intend to meet James and Martin Ball @ Burning Man this summer and take the journey under their guidance.

Just one more thought: About the sun salutations James was doing -- I'd have to see them myself to judge whether they were truly perfect ; )