Inner Alchemy
by Neil
Rhoads
Created
From having known many, many spirituality/ascension/self-realization/alchemy
explorers over several years, I've seen countless times how we typically will
experience a wonderfully fulfilling series of awakenings and Aha! moments and meaningful readjustments that buoy us and carry
us along for a lovely, joyful while; but eventually..... we
look around and see that the world is still veering into the friggin' ditch all around us, and we begin to wonder where
the hell is the disconnect? What went wrong? What didn't I understand? Then we
get an apparent course correction and are delighted to arrive on the next
satisfying plateau, only to find ourselves tumbling down on the other side once
again. That's the nature of the journey; we ascend the mountain along a spiral
path that seems to keep circling back to places we thought we were done with. But,
really, we're on an ascending trajectory.
I had this very arc of discovery myself. But I managed, by
fits and starts, to stay committed to the path, and to allowing my deep
cauldron to cook without my needing to stand over it, and fret and stir, and
dictate the finished brew, and I remained open to being steadily led by my deep
inner Momentum. And it did lead me, as it will anyone, to a larger, much more
mysterious and encompassing practice: A practice that I call, for myself, Inner
Alchemy. That is, I eventually settled into the stream of learning how
everything I experience in the world around me, and touching me, and appearing
to be separate from me, is generated in my unconscious, arising from the
seminal creative thrust in my Core. I now know that my reality is a movie made
for an audience of one (myself) and that I'm the
writer and producer and casting director, and all of it. Essentially I'm the
only one inhabiting this reality I'm experiencing, which, curiously, is a very
comforting thought. In addition, all the realities that all the other points of
consciousness in this world are creating for themselves are intersecting with
the one I'm projecting for myself.
On the countless levels of collective unconscious we co-inhabit,
and often with unconscious agreements with significant others, together we co-produce
all kinds of worlds that appear to agree at various intersections and thereby
make for a comforting group reality. But the salient point is, the only place I
have any real power at all (and it is the only kind of power that's mine) is
right here, radiating in my Self, over myself and my experience of reality.
From that point of view, the parasitic realities and
overwhelming forces that so many of us experience as stealing their lives and
dreams are no longer empowered by me to make my reality for me. And most
importantly, they can't dictate my reactions to and emotional investments in
anything I observe as it shows up "out there." Not even is Ormus
imbued with something mysteriously "more-than" that can provide the
enlightenment for me; nor can it accomplish the healing for me, nor supply the
alchemy I seek in myself. I may invest Ormus with certain fascinating and
exciting possible effects on my growth and perceptions, for a while, and
experiment in those alchemical material constructs and very much enjoy what I'm
learning and seeing, especially enjoying the sparkling community we're creating
around it. But I'm increasingly remembering to come from a place of ultimate
joyful sovereignty, in myself and for myself, having experienced the certainty
that the outer alchemy we're calling Ormus is, in actuality, a wonderfully
rich, bottomless, infinity/8 metaphor and crystaline
mirror for the more potent, personal alchemy that is cooking in my Inner
cauldron. That's the precipitate I'm excited about, the one that is subliming
In Here and precipitating out my own unique but universal medicine.
Blessedly, I've come to know that if there is any culturally
generated mind-slavery - such as that by which so many people are feeling
burdened these days - going on in relation to me personally, it's a projection
of my own creation and agreement, my having put it in place for the purpose of
rediscovering the freedom that has really been present, but hidden from myself,
all along; and for the purpose of knowing the joy of truly Owning that
freedom's power and indestructibility, by having projected and sincerely
experienced for myself its apparent opposite. I've come to know that the "delusions
of grandeur" nearly all of us seekers ascribe to ourselves at some point,
when we eventually are compelled to assess the friction between our spiritual
aspirations and convictions and the sorry state of reality pressing in on us,
is really a gem of guidance from the Core, stimulating us to turn back inward
and notice an opening door; a door that is beckoning us to go deeper. Although
I've sometimes felt discouraged upon concluding that too little of the reality
I'm moving around in seems to be noticeably evolving to reflect my deepening
sense of my personal evolution, I've seized on repeating opportunities to go
deeper and acquaint myself with the characters and landscapes in my psyche, and
do what I can to take ownership of, and transform and integrate the sources of
my experience of being alive. Its an amazingly
rewarding practice, and to my joy I've discovered my inate
vision of a more harmonious world was only a delusion while it was still being
viewed with the former, out-of-date, duality-based view of the world as Other. But
the liberating truth is... the reality "out there" isn't Other at all. And the great thing is that the grandeur I
yearn for isn't a delusion at all, as it turns out, because its momentum can be
truly uncovered and celebrated, by its having been poised right here, right
now, all along, in the core of Oneness that each of us Is.... in Truth. My
accruing conviction is that this life-changing alchemical Path I'm finding for
myself, this process of merging in consciousness with Oneness through the
journey into Self, is the true alchemy, with the
alchemy we call Ormus as a compelling mirror that I, among many of us, am
enjoying tremendously.
So I guess what I'm trying to say is that... your next
understanding, your next step and process, are poised right there inside, eager
for you to turn inward and greet it and claim it and live it, trusting that its
Momentum is unquenchable. The passionate questions you've posed, to yourself
and to us, are the unmistakable evidence that the next door is already opening
for you and inviting you in.