Your description of belonging, as a child, to a place and time and community reminds me of how I feel/felt moving to Montana this year. I was born and raised in California and never knew what "home" felt like until now. Didn't know it was possible to have such a connection to a landscape.
It's really amazing to me how we all conjure that feeling in different ways and from different places, sometimes so unexpectedly! Can't wait to read about how that manifested during your trip back to AK.
Ha! We actually moved from AK to suburbs in SoCal when I was in high school, and I can't say I ever learned to really love that environment (more about that in an upcoming post). I've never been to Montana, but the pictures I've seen of your mountains there are truly stunning. I'm so glad you feel that you've found a place that really feels like home. I really believe that the lack of that feeling in people's lives is a more widespread and serious problem for our collective wellbeing than is commonly acknowledged. It's one of my main obsessions outside of integration (though obviously I find that they overlap a great deal). Will get that post about my trip up as soon as I have the chance to process it a bit, and I'm very glad you'll be along for the ride.
That smile says it all!!! Oh I’m so glad a clear directive came from your ceremony and got you to make the dream happen! Such a joy to see you there! And what a beautiful intention setting experience. It’s such a fine line with cultural appropriation, that does sound like a conundrum. I’m glad it was fruitful.
Side note, it’s incredibly refreshing to be able to read the unpacking of your experience so clearly. It feels like a gift to help others more deeply unpack theirs.
Thank you so much! I do aim to share this stuff in a way that is useful to others, and it's always a little tricky trying to figure out what level of detail to go into (especially in psychedelic or other not fully logical states). So I'm very glad you think it works.
I saw this lengthy D. H. Lawrence quote shortly after reading your post. It seems to speak eloquently to the medicine wheel experience. Maybe to the mushroom experience, too:
"Birds fly portentously on the walls of the tombs. The artist must often have seen these priests, the augurs, with their crooked, bird-headed staffs in their hand, out on a high place watching the flight of larks or pigeons across the quarters of the sky. They were reading the signs and the portents, looking for an indication, how they should direct the course of some serious affair. To us it may seem foolish. To them, hot-blooded birds flew through the living universe as feelings and premonitions fly through the breast of a man, or as thoughts fly through the mind. ...If the augur could see the birds flying in his heart, then he would know which way destiny too was flying for him.
...And if you live by the cosmos, you look in the cosmos for your clue. If you live by a personal god, you pray to him. If you are rational, you think things over. But it all amounts to the same thing in the end. Prayer, or thought, or studying the stars, or watching the flight of birds, or studying the entrails of the sacrifice, it is all the same process, ultimately: of divination. All it depends on is the amount of true, sincere, religious concentration you can bring to bear on your object. An act of pure attention, if you are capable of it, will bring its own answer. And you choose that object to concentrate upon which will best focus your consciousness. Every real discovery made, every serious and significant decision ever reached, was reached and made by divination. The soul stirs, and makes an act of pure attention, and that is a discovery.
...Whatever object will bring the consciousness into a state of pure attention, in a time of perplexity, will also give back an answer to the perplexity. But it is truly a question of divination."
--Excerpt from "The Painted Tombs of Tarquinia 1", in Sketches of Etruscan Places, by D.H. Lawrence
I used to subscribe to weekly highlights from The Marginalian (formerly Bran Pickings), and I'd saved a bunch of them in an email folder. A day or so after reading your post, I did a totally unrelated email search and this one showed up at the top of my search results:
Thanks for continuing to share your words. This was my first encounter with them; they're lovely.
I remember reading years ago that the Radiohead chaps all stayed put in their hometown (at least for some period of time), because it's what gave them their mojo.
I come from small town brain drain rural decay in central Pennsylvania, and yet even for me, spending time walking there wakes things in me.
Thank you for this. I'm so glad you found your way here. :)
I think that's so interesting, that even though you don't describe your hometown glowingly, you appreciate the effect it has on you just to be there. Do you mind my asking what sort of things you feel it wakes in you?
I was recently there working in a coffee shop on a new writing project and paused to go walk around the block. I went slow and treated the walk almost as forest bathing, lack of forest be damned. Noticed things I'd never noticed. When I came to a bridge, rather than cross, I climbed below. Because I did that so much as a teen; sat under bridges with friends. Bridges weren't just for crossing. And as I sat and watched the water, I thought hey, why not put my feet in this filthy holy water, too. It's a hot day; my sandals will dry. And as I climbed out, I took the time to notice things I never notice. The texture of the dead and dried plants. The hardness of them. When done with those, I stuck their stems down between the rocks, as a small marker that I was there. It was all silly, and beautiful, and only happened because I felt invited to a certain way of experiencing the world that adulthood doesn't encourage.
As I finished my walk around the block, admiring the dilapidated signs and misspelled graffiti, even those things felt cozy and familiar and playful. I felt creative and free, in a way I don't often feel elsewhere.
I like what you are describing here - like a more child-like mindset is triggered by being in the place that you were a child. I had a similar experience visiting my hometown (also involving a bridge, as you can see in the photos). I have been thinking about this in the weeks since. Also, the way that just being around people who knew you as a child can be a way to reclaim aspects of yourself that get lost when you move around.
Nice! I hope you keep sharing your journey.
Thanks! And yes, I surely will.
Your description of belonging, as a child, to a place and time and community reminds me of how I feel/felt moving to Montana this year. I was born and raised in California and never knew what "home" felt like until now. Didn't know it was possible to have such a connection to a landscape.
It's really amazing to me how we all conjure that feeling in different ways and from different places, sometimes so unexpectedly! Can't wait to read about how that manifested during your trip back to AK.
Ha! We actually moved from AK to suburbs in SoCal when I was in high school, and I can't say I ever learned to really love that environment (more about that in an upcoming post). I've never been to Montana, but the pictures I've seen of your mountains there are truly stunning. I'm so glad you feel that you've found a place that really feels like home. I really believe that the lack of that feeling in people's lives is a more widespread and serious problem for our collective wellbeing than is commonly acknowledged. It's one of my main obsessions outside of integration (though obviously I find that they overlap a great deal). Will get that post about my trip up as soon as I have the chance to process it a bit, and I'm very glad you'll be along for the ride.
That smile says it all!!! Oh I’m so glad a clear directive came from your ceremony and got you to make the dream happen! Such a joy to see you there! And what a beautiful intention setting experience. It’s such a fine line with cultural appropriation, that does sound like a conundrum. I’m glad it was fruitful.
Side note, it’s incredibly refreshing to be able to read the unpacking of your experience so clearly. It feels like a gift to help others more deeply unpack theirs.
Thank you so much! I do aim to share this stuff in a way that is useful to others, and it's always a little tricky trying to figure out what level of detail to go into (especially in psychedelic or other not fully logical states). So I'm very glad you think it works.
I saw this lengthy D. H. Lawrence quote shortly after reading your post. It seems to speak eloquently to the medicine wheel experience. Maybe to the mushroom experience, too:
"Birds fly portentously on the walls of the tombs. The artist must often have seen these priests, the augurs, with their crooked, bird-headed staffs in their hand, out on a high place watching the flight of larks or pigeons across the quarters of the sky. They were reading the signs and the portents, looking for an indication, how they should direct the course of some serious affair. To us it may seem foolish. To them, hot-blooded birds flew through the living universe as feelings and premonitions fly through the breast of a man, or as thoughts fly through the mind. ...If the augur could see the birds flying in his heart, then he would know which way destiny too was flying for him.
...And if you live by the cosmos, you look in the cosmos for your clue. If you live by a personal god, you pray to him. If you are rational, you think things over. But it all amounts to the same thing in the end. Prayer, or thought, or studying the stars, or watching the flight of birds, or studying the entrails of the sacrifice, it is all the same process, ultimately: of divination. All it depends on is the amount of true, sincere, religious concentration you can bring to bear on your object. An act of pure attention, if you are capable of it, will bring its own answer. And you choose that object to concentrate upon which will best focus your consciousness. Every real discovery made, every serious and significant decision ever reached, was reached and made by divination. The soul stirs, and makes an act of pure attention, and that is a discovery.
...Whatever object will bring the consciousness into a state of pure attention, in a time of perplexity, will also give back an answer to the perplexity. But it is truly a question of divination."
--Excerpt from "The Painted Tombs of Tarquinia 1", in Sketches of Etruscan Places, by D.H. Lawrence
Holy smokes, this is incredible! How did you come across it?
I used to subscribe to weekly highlights from The Marginalian (formerly Bran Pickings), and I'd saved a bunch of them in an email folder. A day or so after reading your post, I did a totally unrelated email search and this one showed up at the top of my search results:
https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/12/01/d-h-lawrence-divination-attention/?mc_cid=78a84f3611&mc_eid=6fef520a17
Not at all what I was looking for at the time, but perfect for your post.
I love when that happens!
--D.G., Portland, Maine
Thanks for continuing to share your words. This was my first encounter with them; they're lovely.
I remember reading years ago that the Radiohead chaps all stayed put in their hometown (at least for some period of time), because it's what gave them their mojo.
I come from small town brain drain rural decay in central Pennsylvania, and yet even for me, spending time walking there wakes things in me.
Thank you for this. I'm so glad you found your way here. :)
I think that's so interesting, that even though you don't describe your hometown glowingly, you appreciate the effect it has on you just to be there. Do you mind my asking what sort of things you feel it wakes in you?
I was recently there working in a coffee shop on a new writing project and paused to go walk around the block. I went slow and treated the walk almost as forest bathing, lack of forest be damned. Noticed things I'd never noticed. When I came to a bridge, rather than cross, I climbed below. Because I did that so much as a teen; sat under bridges with friends. Bridges weren't just for crossing. And as I sat and watched the water, I thought hey, why not put my feet in this filthy holy water, too. It's a hot day; my sandals will dry. And as I climbed out, I took the time to notice things I never notice. The texture of the dead and dried plants. The hardness of them. When done with those, I stuck their stems down between the rocks, as a small marker that I was there. It was all silly, and beautiful, and only happened because I felt invited to a certain way of experiencing the world that adulthood doesn't encourage.
As I finished my walk around the block, admiring the dilapidated signs and misspelled graffiti, even those things felt cozy and familiar and playful. I felt creative and free, in a way I don't often feel elsewhere.
I finally got my first post into good enough shape to publish it! This is what I was working on in my home town that day; it was also part of why I felt so free https://scientificanimism.substack.com/p/scientific-animism-lets-invent-a
Seems like we are thinking about some similar ideas
Congrats on launching! It's a huge project to be taking on, and I look forward to seeing where you take it/ it takes you.
I like what you are describing here - like a more child-like mindset is triggered by being in the place that you were a child. I had a similar experience visiting my hometown (also involving a bridge, as you can see in the photos). I have been thinking about this in the weeks since. Also, the way that just being around people who knew you as a child can be a way to reclaim aspects of yourself that get lost when you move around.