Zen and the Art of Subration: How Mastery of the Art of Subration Activates Physical Immortality and Cultural Evolution to Usher in the Golden Age

By Ashoka Annamaya Ishaya

Zen and the Art of Subration is a three-part masterwork arising from the author’s thirty-five-year journey to overcome cultural conditioning and achieve the ultimate transformation: living on light and oxygen.

Ashoka Annamaya Ishaya shares an intimate look into how she discovered tantric and Taoist practices for cultivating immortality and integrated them into her life. She follows up this first-person account with a teaching guide distilling knowledge and practices aimed at readers on their own transformative path toward achieving your immortal jing cycle. Ishaya believes that if a critical mass of humans commit to the process of sustainable immortality, we can affect the evolution of our entire species.

Ishaya pursues an illuminating range of questions:

• Are we as a species destined to be enlightened?
• Can we apply mindfulness skills to evolve our physiology?
• How can our health-care system better support the maturation of our species?
• Can we become an immortal species?

The treatise concludes with a scholarly overview of noted prophets from varied traditions and times who have taught and fostered transformation of consciousness and sustainability of culture.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781532071188

Ashoka Annamaya Ishaya

Ashoka Annamaya Ishaya practiced and taught ascension for five years in a North Carolina monastery in the Advaita Vedanta lineage. She earned a bachelor’s degree in environmental science and a master’s in industrial hygiene from the University of Pittsburgh. She was also awarded an executive coaching certificate from Fielding Graduate University. She grows a worldwide executive coaching business through her websites (www.ishayaintegralcoaching.com and www.kundaliniinitiator.com) and blog (www.themythofmentalillness.blogspot.com).

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

What is the highest-order covenant our species has within nature? Is it a promise? This promise inspires many questions that this treatise seeks to answer, such as, What is the sacred contract of the Homo sapiens? Are we as a species destined to be enlightened? Can we apply mindfulness skills to evolve our physiology? How does our health-care system need to transform to support the maturation of our species? To conclude that mental illness is due to a chemical imbalance is false. Truly that view is incomplete; the truth is it is a vitamin and mineral deficiency and lack of knowledge and training that creates outpictured dissonance. Brain chemistry can be matured and supported to generate a most sublime chemical cocktail: the nectar of immortality. Historically known as the O soma drop, nectar of the gods, amrita of the brain, or ambrosia of the gods. One must be trained in how to achieve this most sublime achievement.

What are the internal dynamics of this nectar process that promotes physiological evolution from a vegetarian to fruitarian and finally breatharian lifestyle? Can we thrive without eating food? Yes, any organic material! Can we, as a species, apply ourselves to evolve to become breatharian, to live on light and oxygen? Are Homo sapiens destined to be or not to be an immortal species? What cultural changes do we need to make to support the conscious evolution of our species? How do we foster enlightened society? What forces govern this planetary process? Who is profiteering from quashing the growth and the consciousness of our species? Can we as a culture transform our way of thinking and doing to change how people think, how processes operate, and how our planet experiences our presence? What would an enlightened, aware culture actually be like in our postmodern culture? As a species, can we enter the arena of this process with grace and skill?

Looking at the kaleidoscope of our choices, it seems evident that in the Western consumptive, dominator society, we have been acting out of the paradigm Katharine Hepburn so eloquently stated to Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen: Nature, Mr. Allnut, is what we are put in this world to rise above. In contrast to our present consumptive, dominator society, can we create a sustainable culture such as the authors William McDonough and Michael Braungart (2013) of The Upcycle describe as nurturing and sustainable for all the children, of all species, for all time? Sounds like a worthy goal in this postmodern age, yes? Another goal of this treatise is to expound on the ways and means of creating such a society. Can we create a planetary civilization that has been prophesied in many cultures and traditions throughout millennia—the creation of the golden age, the ageless age?

Zen and the Art of Subration also outlines the process that elucidates the goals of consciousness, extends to communicate the translation skills necessary to grow through gap consciousness, and then further extends to explain how refinement into the final stages of subration into postenlightenment and ultimately breatharian status can be achieved, as I have discovered on my personal journey. This treatise is presented in three parts. The first part is written from a first-person subjective perspective. It offers a personal true-life account of one woman’s thirty-five-year healing journey and describes the obstacles and intestinal fortitude it takes to overcome cultural conditioning to achieve the ultimate transformation: living on light and oxygen. It includes key personal learning stories of how one woman discovered and integrated tantric and Taoist immortality practices into her life and how she teaches and shares her knowledge in this postmodern age. Hopefully, by reading this account of years of trials and tribulations, you will overcome them faster and easier in your own life. Don’t you find it easier to learn from laughing at someone else’s mistakes instead of crying about your own?

It is my most humble desire to aid those who desire to evolve to activate their immortal jing cycle (IJC). May my journey and my years of tears and bumblings smooth and soften the journey of those who choose to follow. It took me years to learn to find and focus on the grace and joy in the process. For those of you who would strive to run a marathon or compete in an Ironman competition, this information is written for you, those of our species who are trained up and have an adventurous constitution. This path is not for the weak of mind or faint of heart.

For those who desire to climb into activating their IJC, creating an attitude of gratitude and cultivating the skills to create happiness and wonder in even the gravest circumstances lightens the journey and eases the path to finding more grace-filled solutions. Wouldn’t you agree? The path after you activate your IJC is about revisiting and healing through all your old wounds—physical, mental, and emotional—and whatever you may have encountered along the journey after this most incredible threshold is achieved. I relay my personal healing journey as a template, so to speak, to offer a road map of possibility. If I can heal through the myriad and much-entangled pain and injuries of my journey, so can you! I sincerely doubt you will encounter all the obscurations I did along my journey.

Please, if you get bogged down in the trauma and drama, skip to part 2, Twelve Simple Steps to Immortality. This section of the book offers a condensed core of knowledge and sadhana that will transform your journey. As enough of us step into activating our immortal jing cycle, speaking of the knowledge, and committing to the process, we will create a critical mass and reach the tipping point, affecting our entire species.

The second part offers seekers a simple outline of twelve essential psychophysical skills everyone needs to master to achieve this ultimate transformation—activating and maturing your IJC. What if these twelve simple steps or skills were adopted and became cultural norms in our postmodern culture as easily as thumbing data into a cell phone? Can we create an immortal species? Can we create a culture that supports this evolutionary transformation? Can we as a conscious collective culture create a culture depicted like the one illustrated in the Liberty Mutual half-acre accountability commercials? Can we become each other’s keepers, aiding to prevent accidents and injuries to each other in this golden sphere? Could immortality become the accepted behavioral norm in our postmodern culture? Could we create a culture of everlasting life?

Thoughts are things. Did anyone think before the creation of the automobile that we as a culture would create such a complex industry around the buying, selling, and using of such wondrous machines? Did anyone foresee the environmental damage their emissions would create? Are we as a culture going to learn from our previous economic choices? Did any economic leaders foresee how the consumption of fossil fuels for these machines would create emissions that would threaten the demise of our environment? Henry Ford owned hemp plantations and designed his first vehicles to consume hemp oil as his fuel of choice. What and who shifted that consumer trend away from a sustainable fuel choice?

What about the advancement of the airplane? How wondrously and undauntedly the Wright Brothers labored against seemingly insurmountable odds to create flying machines, which created remarkable changes in our culture. In this postmodern age, we take the ability to fly around this planet from city to city in mechanical machines for granted. Flying around the world, from city to city, was unthinkable a hundred years or so ago. Those inventors were not burned at the stake or banished or imprisoned for their visionary perspective. Historically, others have been. Once I learned the simple twelve principles I outline in this book, it has taken me less than six years to step toward breatharian status. Where will our culture be in another ten years, twenty years?

The third part of this book is written from a first-person plural collective perspective—us. This collective perspective is a scholarly overview of how many noted prophets of different traditions and times have taught and fostered transformation of consciousness and various aspects of culture. I dispute some of their insights as old and outdated and laud many as true to my experience as well. Hopefully, my perspective will offer readers challenges and practices to consider incorporating into their own lives and to those adventurous souls a sincere invitation is extended to seek out my personal tutelage. It is much easier to achieve the impossible by learning from someone who has done it already. Also, hopefully my perspective will challenge and offer present-day political and business leaders a blueprint to stretch to incorporate sustainable business practices to support our cultural transformation and develop the political will to make the necessary changes to aid our species and culture in maturing. Can our culture grow to support the transformation of our species to support immortality?

I dare to whisper ever so gently to political, business, and spiritual leaders to challenge the present cultural norms to pave the way to create changes that will support our cultural advancement. Stand up and know we can create eternal life and an egalitarian culture that supports true health and shared wealth for all the children, of all species for all time, as William McDonough and Michael Braungart (2013) state in The Upcycle. In addition, this guidebook for transformation includes a number of experiential coaching processes to ease your authentic transformational moments. Please stop and invest the time to do the processes offered; do not just read through the words. Greater value and understanding can be earned by investing in the learning and not just reading the words at face value. Ease and grace are so important to offering a peace-filled and prosperous journey, for all those who choose to walk the path. A thousand-mile journey begins with the first step. May grace and goodwill forever foster your learning journey.

It has been my experience that you do what you know till you learn something different, hopefully better. As you learn, you share your knowledge, and others can grow and learn from your life lessons, shortening the learning curve. Before long, collective learning takes place, and the surrounding culture changes. Then a paradigm shift occurs, creating a leading edge of change. Hopefully, we learn before our mistakes hurt, maim, or kill ourselves or others. I have hurt myself unconsciously many times and been hurt by many folks consciously and unconsciously. I was tortured as an infant; was severely traumatized in numerous accidents and injuries as an adult, including ski wrecks and bike wrecks; and injured my lower back when I fell down a flight of stairs. I had to seek healing and had to work to not kill myself from the pain of the physical and emotional healing process. Ultimately, I stepped into activating my immortal jing cycle because I was pushing to heal from all my life injuries. I have had much grist for the mill of self-discovery and healing. I do self-reflect earnestly and question whether I would have made the journey if I’d known how tough it was going to be. There is wisdom in trusting the unfolding and creating of a more grace-filled journey. Learning to endure with grace and skill and more quickly becoming self-reliant is quite different from feeling one is suffering the journey alone. One vital axiom the intensity of my healing and learning journey has taught me is community is so very important, especially when stepping into dealing with the IJC.

Activating the IJC purifies and activates the organs of the brain to produce a refined brain cocktail that drips down the back of your throat. When activated, the purification in turn heals all the other cellular structures in the body. It is the actual physical truth of what opening the sixth seal truly means. Once consciousness is purified, the organs of the brain actually mature, purify, and grow to secrete this most refined fluid, the nectar of immortality. Communicating what this process is and how to support the maturation of the brain chemistry with the appropriate amino acids, vitamins, minerals, and mindfulness practices is a primary goal of this treatise. In my knowing, the ultimate goal of our species’ evolution is to integrate the understanding of how this most refined brain nectar is generated and cultivated. Presently, the science of how to support and integrate this knowledge into our culture is being overshadowed by much ignorance, fear, and greed. How we as a conscious, cocreating species learn to aid our DNA and subsequently the human brain to continue to mature and grow in order to emit this most refined chemical cocktail is one of this epoch’s greatest challenges. In my knowing, generating the nectar of immortality is our most divine gift. It will take skill, compassion, and patience from many helping professionals to integrate this knowledge. In turn, learning the stages of how the generation of this most refined fluid transforms the digestive processes, heals the internal organs, and activates the pulmonary processes to transform us to be able to live on light and oxygen could become a wondrous journey. Presently, there is much fear and marketing that perpetuates myths about mental illness. Old technology and poor science continue to perpetuate the myth of mental illness in the psychological community and support the continued quashing of learning higher metaphysical truths. Isn’t that incredible? It has been said that the science fiction of one age is the science and truth of the next age.

The physiological evolution of our species is vegetarian, then fruitarian/liquidarian, and finally breatharian. It took hundreds of years for our culture to evolve beyond the limited truth of the myth that the earth was flat, with people thinking that if you explored too far, you would fall off the edge of the planet! How many leaders during that cultural edge had to die, be imprisoned, or be burned at the stake before the higher truth was generally accepted in the wider population? I wonder how many people told Christopher Columbus he was crazy before he left to sail across the ocean. I wonder how many listened to his tales upon his return with wonder and acceptance. In regard to the IJC, it has been my experience that as consciousness purifies and matures the human energy field (HEF) and one learns to live on a more refined source of energy, the purified sacred vessel needs less and less organic food. The body transitions to intake and become reliant on a more refined fuel source: light and oxygen. We as a species can learn to become metaphysical solar panels able to live on light and oxygen! Isn’t that amazing?

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Healing through my physical and emotional childhood trauma put me into severe, chronic complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). During the really hard, dense years, I had a suicide pact with a dear friend. This dearest friend and I promised each other that before we did the deed, we would call each other to say our last goodbyes. We were able to be present in some deep, dark places for each other and pull each other through the darkness. Sharing such meaningful dark times, seeing and accepting each other’s shadow selves, and becoming deeply vulnerable with another soul was a great act of courage. It takes an act of courage to be vulnerable and honest in the densest times of our lives. Emotional pain is so very diminished in our culture. For my friend and me, learning to feel and embrace the emotional darkness and talk about it grew both our communication and listening skills. At times, my heart area felt like someone could pass their whole hand through the center of my body. My heart pain was over-the-top intense from grieving the levels of abuse, neglect, and torture I experienced as a child. The process did at times cause actual feelings of physical distress. Suffering hollows out the self to make room for compassion, then passion. I still find self-soothing comfort in rubbing my heart and putting a heating pad or at times ice on the physical center of my chest.

The internal dynamics of the alchemical process are basically about regulating two forces—hot and cold, yin and yang, expansion and contraction—and learning how to manage the changes and how to find your sweet spot. I consider as I write these words, if I had known of these skills back when, could I have considerably lessened the intensity of the physical pain and suffering I endured? Yes, of course, and for that reason I am devoting the time and energy to communicate this material. Too many have suffered for too long.

My dearest friend became a licensed social worker, and I am growing my coaching practice to motivate others to activate their IJC. I give great thanks for being blessed with her friendship in my life. We both made it; we pulled each other out of the depths of our physical and emotional pain. I still try to call her weekly after twenty-eight years of friendship to share my life stories and to hear hers. Thankfully, neither of us did the deed. She just celebrated her daughter’s wedding and enjoys her two grandsons’ company. Now, I am writing my story about all the pain and trauma she helped me live through and how I went on to mature into experiencing satchidananda, or bliss consciousness, and beyond. I am espousing what it takes to transform physically from a vegetarian to a fruitarian/liquidarian and then to a breatharian lifestyle. So, find a comfortable chair and a nice, hot toddy and lean in to laugh and cry about how one woman overcame some incredible odds to learn how to find the joy in living and even to learn what the bliss of satchidananda truly means. It can be done.

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Satchidananda is a known stage of achievement in the East. It is recognized and venerated, much like Christ consciousness in the West. Christ consciousness is a subtle achievement that can be validated from a learned person who has achieved the state, whereas satchidananda cannot be mistaken by someone who has achieved that stage of development for themselves. Once the nectar of immortality has begun to drip, it is physical validation that the purification has been achieved. It is unmistakable because all three bodies—the physical, the emotional, and the mental—require purification to achieve satchidananda. This stage of achievement activates and purifies all three bodies of the Homo sapiens: the nirmanakaya, the physical; the sambhogakaya, the emotional; and the dharmakaya, the mental/soul. Another way of labeling the three bodies is gross, subtle, and causal. It takes purification of the dharmakaya to produce the nectar of immortality. This brain cocktail is a complex, natural chemical effluent generated after one has stabilized satchidananda, or the three bodies in one awareness—truth, knowledge, and bliss. Therefore, purification of all three bodies—nirmanakaya, sambhogakaya, and dharmakaya—results in the production of the nectar. In the end, the three bodies—the trikaya—gain strength directly from the fire, and combined with the nectar, they induce the transformational processes in the body at the cellular and molecular levels. This most refined purification results in the healing of all three bodies into a higher energetic state and transforms the whole system to be able to exist on light and oxygen. Yes, imagine that—being able to transform the body to exist on a chemical cocktail generated by the brain that eventually transforms the whole system to be able to extract chi, oxygen, and light from one’s surroundings. The subtle energetic chakra system truly flowers energetically. Learning how to undergo the process is at the core of The Art of Subration. Literally becoming a solar panel is the end goal.

To augment this ultimate healing and transformation, a foundational process is conversation. I’ve come to understand that learning requires conversation. Have you ever considered that notion? Whether it is having a conversation with oneself or someone else, reflecting upon the ideas in a book, shouting at a television show, or reflecting on a memory of the past, the exchange of information and reflection on the exchange—that is, having a conversation—results in learning. Journaling and self-reflection are such powerful learning tools. The traditional spiritual conversation in Eastern traditions often occurs in sanghas. A sangha is created when students gather to practice inquiry with a learned prophet. During these most auspicious times, much reflection, learning, and connection can be achieved. When participants sit in close proximity to another who has done years of practices, their human energy fields (HEFs) can undergo purification and attain heightened frequency. Hopefully, the practice of sangha propagates higher learning and evolution in service of the evolution of self and humankind and not in propagation of destructive, obstructive patterns and practices. Higher learning is the main objective of evolution and why cultural evolution is so valuable. Wouldn’t you agree? Otherwise, culture would never advance.

How would you characterize a quality conversation? Is it characterized by being constantly interrupted, before you can complete a train of thought? Or do you appreciate the rich exchange of being heard and responding by asking engaging questions to further inquire into the speaker’s experience? At this level of exchange, the speaker is taking the subjective perspective—talking about some occurrence or event in his or her life. The listener is taking the objective perspective—quietly, attentively, and actively listening. A conversation, in my experience, requires a speaker and an active listener. Also, it has been my experience that good conversations take place when the role of speaker and listener can easily and effectively change and when sharing takes place. Conversation is not a lecture. Effective speaking and listening skills are essential to creating a good conversation. For me, a great conversation takes place when the participants seamlessly flow back and forth between speaker and listener.

When information is exchanged and richer elements of human experience can be expressed, a wider range of emotional material—funny, sad, or exciting, to name a few—can color the verbal exchange. Then conversations can step both participants into a greater learning. One leaves the arena of the crucible of conversation enriched, having shared some aspect of himself or herself in an authentic, caring manner. That individual leaves the exchange feeling heard, valued, and in the mood to reconnect at some future date to share another wonderful exchange. Conversation fosters learning and propagates knowledge through the culture. Subsequently, that is why relationships are so very important. You get to practice your conversation skills. That is why social media has become so popular. Of course, sadly, not all conversations are great ones. And sticks and stones can break your bones, but harsh words can break your heart.

Another foundational process that facilitates the growth of consciousness is subration. What is subration, and how does it work? Researchers have characterized the foundational process of growth of consciousness as subration. Subration is the process an individual undergoes to achieve growth of consciousness. Subration as defined by Eliot Deutsch in his treatise Advaita Vedanta: A Philosophical Reconstruction is the Mental Process whereby one re-evaluates some previously appraised level of consciousness because of its being canceled, or at least set in a different context, by the experience of a new level of consciousness (1969, 15). What does that actually mean, and how does it work in your daily awareness?

Think in terms of extending your awareness in your personal physical surroundings. As you sit gazing at these words, whether in a book or on a computer screen, you are viewing that flat surface upon which these words appear. That is your primary subject in the field you are focused upon in this moment. Now, extend your awareness, specifically your sense of sight, to include some object in your surroundings. Pick out something that is farther away from you but still in view of the primary subject, like a picture, a clock, or a chair. Now extend your awareness to include that new object in your new, expanded view. For this example, I will include a wall hanging to my immediate left in the room I am sitting in that depicts statements of how God is love. It is a very lovely picture in my opinion. Now extend your awareness to continue to include the new object of focus and the old subject, the computer screen or book page.

As you hold that widened focus, feel into your body world. Do you feel changes in your hearing? Has some new sound become known to you that you were previously unaware of nearby? Do you feel some tingling of sensual body change? That is your nervous system stretching. Do you feel something heating up? Stretching causes heat in the system. All the added symptoms are a result of widening your conscious awareness. Your awareness has now expanded to include more objects in your subjective surroundings. The objects have now become your expanded subjective perspective. You have gained ground, so to speak.

Now once again, extend your awareness to another object in your physical surroundings, something even more distant than the previous object and in the opposite direction, while holding the widened gaze. For me it is a nearby doorway. What did you choose? Now, sit and observe the widened view of all three objects—for me, the book page or computer screen, the picture, and the doorframe. Now, stretch your awareness into all three objects. This new you, the new out-pictured landscape, has expanded to include all these objects in your widened surroundings, creating a new subjective experience. Sense any phenomenon that may have occurred after you extended your eye gaze. This is how consciousness grows.

By continuing to extend your awareness to include greater numbers of objects and exploring greater unknowns farther away from your center point, you learn to expand your subjective self and awareness. Your senses extend to hear, see, and sense greater surroundings, stretching to include more. Your consciousness processes what is a doorway, what new words mean, and how they interrelate within the old established neuro-networks, ever stretching to grow and integrate into greater complexity. This experience of stretching your senses exercises your body mind and creates changes in your sensory experience, your body world. The art of subration is managing these changes and learning what they may be and how to continue to ameliorate the growth while alleviating the pain or discomfort of the growth.

The art of subration can be compared to going to the gym and doing physical exercises. You know what exercises you like, and you do them on a daily or weekly schedule. Your body mind gets used to the routine; you learn what to eat before the routine to optimize the training, and you learn to enjoy the high, the feeling of hormonal flux created by a time of purposeful stretch of the body. To grow your physical strength and endurance, you add more weight training, another yoga class, or some additional endurance training into your previous schedule. The increased exercise causes muscle pain the next day, so you take a rest day and figure out what you need to do to alleviate the discomfort—maybe by applying ice or heat. If you suffered an injury, you take additional measures to take care of the physical discomfort by taking pain medication or maybe additional R&R days to recuperate. That is a process of physical development that most people in our culture are familiar with these days. The maturing process of consciousness is a bit more complex and mysterious. The art of subration can be simple, but it is not always easy. Hopefully, reading these pages of one woman’s account of overcoming her obstacles will make your learning journey faster and easier. In this book I will also demystify the mystery of what can take place and debunk the myth that the solution is to take psychotropic drugs to quash the growth of your nervous system’s maturation.

Another foundational tool that aids growth is having a knowledgeable teacher, coach, therapist, or guide who can teach you the nuances of his or her tradition of mindfulness meditation. Different traditions have different goals. My tradition, ascension, as taught by www.ishayaintegralcoaching.com, is an immortality teaching. Luckily, through the years I have been blessed with some amazing teachers, some gifted therapists, and a few coaches who seemed to come when I needed them the most. These days, thankfully, I contract with business coaches and mentors. In my knowing, earning the reflection and connection of a caring, knowledgeable coach can aid you through your stuck behaviors, encourage you through the tough moments, and aid you to celebrate your accomplishments. Coaching is a valuable investment and an excellent stage of development.

Many of my teachers came in book form, characters that reached out to me through written words. Some came through the ages, over the mountains, and even from across the cosmic ocean to teach me their truth. One of my favorite teachers is Robert Pirsig’s alter ego, Phaedrus, in his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I first bumped into Phaedrus in my high school days when this book was first published. One of his most memorable wisdoms continues to guide my life:

Mountains should be climbed with as little effort as possible and without desire. The reality of your own nature should determine the speed. If you become restless, speed up. If you become winded, slow down. You climb the mountain in equilibrium between restlessness and exhaustion. Then, when you’re no longer thinking ahead, each footstep isn’t just a means to an end but a unique event in itself. This leaf has jagged edges. This rock looks loose. From this place the snow is less visible, even though closer. These are things you should notice anyway. To live only for some future goal is shallow. It’s the sides of the mountain which sustain life, not the top. Here’s where things grow.

But of course, without the top you can’t have any sides. It’s the top that defines the sides. So, on we go … we have a long way … no hurry … just one step after the next … with a little Chautauqua for entertainment … Mental reflection is so much more interesting than TV it’s a shame more people don’t switch over to it. They probably think what they hear is unimportant but it never is. (1976, 183)

I read Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance every few years, comparing my growth to his static literature, wondering what parcel of his truism will stand out for me in that particular year’s new reading. It’s somewhat like visiting with an old friend after years of separation and being charmed and surprised at seeing a new facet of his or her personality. It was not until I started into my own journey of healing through PTSD that I truly came to understand my affinity for his chautauqua. And now, I am writing my own chautauqua. Funny how patterns flow through our lives, coming full circle, isn’t it?

The chautauqua movement was popular at the turn of the century. The first circuit chautauqua was established in 1874 by businessman Lewis Miller and Methodist minister John Heyl Vincent. The chautauqua tents were traveling teaching times for communities to gather to enjoy lectures on a variety of subjects, including performances of classical plays and performances. According to Charlotte Canning (2000), many people saw their first movies in chautauqua tents. The goal of the chautauqua movement was to offer challenging, informational, and inspirational performances to stimulate thought and discussion on important political, social, and cultural issues of the day (www.lib.uiowa.edu/sc/tc/).

I wrote this chautauqua mostly following a historical timeline, as our lives typically unfold one year after the next. By no means did I have these memories, understandings, and meanings in any way, shape, or form as I aged through the years of my life. It was only after I divorced, ending a ten-year relationship, and stepped into my own therapeutic couch time that I gained the knowledge of the depth of trauma I endured during my childhood. Prior to my divorce, I thought I had a fairly healthy childhood. After years of therapy, healing, and living in a spiritual community for five years, I now capsulate my life lessons as a montage of Hollywood movies:

• The Miracle Worker (1962)—This movie depicts Helen Keller’s life story and how she overcame incredible physical disabilities to create a worthwhile life.

• Sybil (1976)—Sybil was initially a book and was later made into a television miniseries that was then made into a feature film. Sybil was the first notable individual that was diagnosed with multiple personality disorder (MPD). She had sixteen inner personalities. I differ from Sybil in that all my inners responded to my given name, which made the level of dissociation through chronic complex PTSD a bit less intense. The constellation of my complexes included twelve inners of both sexes—three angry boys who acted out, eight hurt little girls, and one boy who was a fighter.

• The Prince of Tides (1991)—This movie is a story about a sister and brother who survived a very brutal childhood. The sister struggles with suicide and rape issues.

• The Master (2012)—This film tells the story of how a spiritual teacher interacts with his community of followers and aids them to heal and evolve. I lived in a spiritual community with 250 people being led by one master who had gained access to the subtle realms. His teaching style was and is unconventional and powerful. These days I am learning how to lead my own flock into activating their immortal jing cycles and achieving breatharian status.

• Bliss (1997)—This movie depicts a newly married couple’s journey through marriage counseling. They encounter an alternative practitioner who teaches them how to resolve the psychodynamics of the wounds within their trikaya and how to cultivate yin for her and yang for him. I will present more in-depth tantric sexual and couples material and coaching exercises in the second book of the Eternal Life Project: The Training and Life Experiences of a Sacred Tantric Shamana. I present some sexual-intelligence material within this book because as someone who healed from sexual trauma, I know how powerful the healing process can be and how graceful depth healing can take place once this level of practice is integrated into a daily and weekly regimen. This second book also includes disciplines for women to live their most beautiful, enlightened selves. It is a lifestyle change, truly transformational!

Just recently, a male seeker who had endured an unfulfilling ten-year marriage participated in a healing ceremony and stated more than once during the session, Wow, if I had only known about these practices, these skills could have saved my marriage. This is sad and true for many couples. Working with couples is very rewarding. Teaching women how to pleasure their sacred beloved offers new avenues and opportunities for men to get their sensual and sexual needs met and for women to get their emotional and intimacy needs met. My shamana couples sessions are a paradigm reset to step both partners into experiencing the true meaning of what the ecstatic state feels like energetically. Many times this state can be nurtured and fostered into a peak multiorgasmic, ecstatic experience and even a full-blown depth experience of bliss consciousness, not just a taste for experienced longtime meditators. A paradigm shift can be achieved in one session. I’ve witnessed it take place time and again. These sessions are so wondrous and such a joy to facilitate.

• I Am Number Four (2011)—This movie depicts the fictitious story of how individuals mature their physiology to be able to perform wondrous deeds of service. There is much to do in sleep state that those who don’t know how subtle hierarchy operates have no idea how to access or serve! The body learns to sleep, and the mind awakens to deeper states. Then the soul can be taught to access paths of service. To activate the IJC, individuals need not access these pathways unless they have the body type and character to endure the training. Souls can remain grounded in the body to cocoon and mature, remaining present to a behind-the-eyes, centered awareness. Souls who choose can be taught to extend into an outbound learning path, beyond this planetary plane. Many are called; few are chosen. More in-depth material and coaching exercises will be presented in the third book of the Eternal Life Project: How Activation of the Warrior Archetype Aids in Maintaining Sacred Space and Catapults Attainment in This Golden Sphere.

• The Edge of Tomorrow (2014)—This film depicts the story of how the inner game of ascension is played. Within physical reality, the limitations of process and access are much misunderstood. Outdated dogma, greed, and ignorance hinder our species’ evolution. This planet is under siege from within and without. We are engaged in a universal arena. There are those others without ten fingers and ten toes who do not share our DNA, and they do not want our species to evolve to achieve mastery of our DNA or to create a sustainable, egalitarian economy that would support our evolution. They are actively working to create dissonance in many ways. When do we as a species wake up and grow up to honor our cradle of life and our sacred vessels? Again, more in-depth material and coaching exercises will be presented in the third book of the Eternal Life Project: How Activation of the Warrior Archetype Aids in Maintaining Sacred Space and Catapults Attainment in This Golden Sphere.

For every scene in these listed movie productions, my true-life story illustrates the facts behind the fiction and reinforces the true portrayals of others’ experiences. Most succinctly, I jokingly refer to myself as the Helen Keller of mental health. Helen Keller was not born deaf or mute. She was born fully functioning and suffered an illness, either scarlet fever or meningitis, that robbed her of her sight and hearing. She had a caring family that helped her heal from her maladies and a dedicated teacher who helped her overcome her disabilities. In contrast, my family was tortuous and cruel. I suffered beatings from a rage-filled father; neglect and cruelty from an absent, self-centered mother; and torture and abuse from an older brother who was acting out his pain and frustration.

I identify with Sybil’s healing journey because my PTSD was severe and I suffered much the same psychic woundology as she did. In contrast to me, she healed the severity of her condition without maturing to learn mindfulness skills. The Prince of Tides depicts some very harsh, brutal emotional and physical traumas. My upbringing was so very similar to the dinner table trauma in that production, especially the scene where the young girl sits with her dress inside out and no one cares or notices the dissonance.

I went on to learn from a spiritual teacher somewhat like the one depicted in The Master. The psychodynamics within the spiritual community I lived in were very similar to those portrayed in this movie. Additionally, my satguru teacher incorporated the time-honored traditional monastic skills of debate, resolution of the paradox, and inquiry into his teaching techniques, along with the study of Vedic scripture and other subtle methodologies. Once the deeper states are accessed, the more refined workings of the merkaba (mer means light, ka means spirit, and ba means body) teaching can be accessed. I grew to most fortuitously learn from my teacher what merkaba riding, or the skills of the chariot of fire, truly requires of an individual. It is not metaphorical. Biblical accounts of Ezekiel’s vision are just subtle archetypical visions of the truth. The invitation of this epoch is to step into a higher truth of how our planetary ascension could take place to attain the supreme goal of our species. More information and training will come in the third book of this series: How Activation of the Warrior Archetype Aids in Maintaining Sacred Space and Catapults Attainment in This Golden Sphere.

I mention these Hollywood movies as a montage in an effort to succinctly offer you a true-life picture of my learning journey and to create some level of commonality of feeling, thinking, and memory. We learn by associating past thoughts, memories, and feelings into our body world. If you have not viewed these artful productions, I encourage you to invest the time to experience these characters’ perspectives. Comparing and contrasting similarities in your life to those portrayed on the screen while practicing the art of subration and ascension will speed your maturation. Hopefully, the effort to extend a bridge to some commonality in your own personal life will easily and effortlessly aid your stage of development. In espousing the darkness of my personal story, sharing the deepest, darkest details of my pain, it is not my goal to traumatize readers or romanticize the pain. I emphasize the healing and diligently try not to focus on the pain and to share skills of how to heal through the pain.

Instead, it is my objective to share personal stories of key moments during the years of my life, those fulcrum learning moments that enabled fortuitous growth to shape and frame my earthly life. I also share some not-so-bright moments when learning came from approaching the shadow self and resolving those obscurations. I also highlight what I characterize as perfect moments. It has become an essential skill for me to focus on the bright, joy-filled moments of grounded living in this sacred vessel. Conditioning my consciousness to experience the joy in the midst of terror,