Journeys into the bright world

It was becoming increasingly apparent that this was not a book we were writing as much as a book we were living. In the samadhi state we had seen how the entire universe is controlled by thought. That is, the outer crust of phenomenal appearances is simply the defining limit of the life-energies which ray forth from an omnipresent cosmic vortex. These originating emanations percolate down through a formative gridwork of archetypes from the God-made to the angel-made to the man-made until all at once they freeze into the congealed contours of matter. In the end, as in the beginning, there is nothing but consciousness; we change the world only to the extent that we can modify our awareness of what is going on "out there." Now that we were starting to understand these rules of the game it was up to us to try to direct these conditioning energies on higher causal levels where they were still fluid.

As I saw it now, our work was that of "weavers in the light." The downward extending strands of energy were strung from top to bottom on the multi-dimensional loom of the universe. There is a part of each one of us that remains securely attached to both the uppermost and the lowermost shafts of the encompassing framework. Now, by making the horizontal connections we were gradually working our way back up again. The purpose of this effort was not so much to reach the top (in essence we were there already) but to create the design.

To a large extent these crosswise shuttlings back and forth manifest as synchronicity, since they exist in the same present tense. Such synchronous happenings are agents of karma, hence our fate is sealed by conglomerates of apparently chance circumstances. Accidents are only events seen out of context; in their totality they become divested with the variegated hues of meaning which comprise the patterns of destiny.

In our own lives the coincidences were accumulating to an astonishing degree. If I needed a word it was apt to jump out at me from a random perusal of the dictionary. When it was important to contact a friend that person would call for no particular reason. If I fancied that it would be helpful to have a certain object it would soon appear. Often these coincidences involved Howard. For example, on Washington's birthday I was shopping when, as I had done a dozen times before, I passed a place where one could have words or emblems stamped on T-shirts. On impulse I picked out a light blue shirt for Howard and had it emblazoned with silvery letters saying "Dr. Neptune." Arriving home with my prize I was chagrined to discover that he had gone out. When he returned half an hour later he had a gift for me. It was a pink T-shirt stamped "Samadhi." Neither of us had ever mentioned the T-shirt idea to the other, yet we had stood at the same counter within the same hour.

However, the big needs took longer to fulfill. By late February our deeper desires could be boiled down to three wishes. In the order of their ascending importance these were the wish to find a house in the country, the wish to release Howard from the burdensome financial responsibilities which held him locked into an uncongenial job, and the wish to make our samadhi therapy available to large numbers of people. It seemed to us that if captains of industry, leaders of nations and molders of public opinion could partake of this love medicine the whole planet might be converted into the garden of Eden it is potentially capable of becoming. In the meantime, we continued our private experimentations.

It was becoming an intriguing challenge to take off into the bright world from different launching pads and thereby assess the extent to which the ketamine experience is affected by the immediate sensory setting. Since I had now learned to remain seated in the lotus posture up to the thirty-five-milligram point I decided to stage a private session in which I would gaze at my own face in the bathroom mirror. Perching atop the laundry hamper which doubled as a seat I positioned myself about three feet from the washbasin mirror and took a thirty-milligram injection.

Observing the changes that were modifying the image staring back at me I decided that this had to be the most flattering thing that had happened since the age of fourteen when, one day I looked at myself in the mirror in a new way and realized that I was going to grow up to be pretty. Regrettably that youthful bloom had long since passed. My next birthday would be the fiftieth and the creases in my face made it evident that efforts to beat the clock had been only minimally successful. Now, however, my Egyptian queen countenance was coming back into view and I was immensely pleased with it. In the wavering light the eyes were growing enormous.