Imaginal Journeys in the Underworld

  My goodness but my self-preservation instinct is strong! I’ve been watching for a number of years now how it has been getting triggered, probably because I’m middle-aged now and I am watching the inevitable physical decline and death of many people I’ve known for years. Inevitably, this brings out my superego and triggers my self-pres instinct. It’s a pain in the ass and also pretty amazing how much the combination of superego and fear can warp my sense of reality. They are a powerful combination and I get why so many people are on antidepressants and antianxiety meds. Fortunately, I have my spiritual practice because without the three legs of the stool (meditation, inquiry and sensing), I would be old before my time and heavily medicated. At its worst, the fear/superego combo can be paralyzing and make me doubt everything I’ve learned and experienced over the years. Again, thanks to my practice, I can recognize it and counteract the effects. I am still amazed by how powerful the...

  I got an angel to laugh! I didn’t realize they had a sense of humor but apparently they do. It’s been a strange past several weeks. I feel like I am living simultaneously in two realms, the physical world and a particular location in the Imaginal that I am connected to whether I like it or not. I’ve described this place in the Imaginal before. It’s sort of subterranean but there is daylight coming down from above. It feels like a complex of caverns, open to the world above through various chasms. It’s an earthy place, cool and moist. There is lichen and moss growing on the cave walls where the light pours in from above. It feels like both a temple and catacombs. There are ‘rooms’ carved into the rock that feel almost natural. These are where the bodies of the dead lie. There is a slab like a primitive altar and it is stained with blood. The blood is from sacrifice. I feel safe in this place, if also a bit lonesome and sad. It is the same place that I encountered the honey-keeper ...

  Bearing in mind that pretty much every one of these entries is loony enough to get me institutionalized, I’m just going to blaze ahead and seal my reputation forever as crazy.  Throughout my experiences in the Imaginal, elves have been a recurring theme. I feel connected to a band of elves who usually appear dressed in green clothing and apparently reside in the forest. So, forest elves. I feel a kinship with them like they are my clan. There is an ancient feeling to the connection like it is beyond time. I know the stories of elves being immortal but immortal feels like the wrong word. These elves live outside of time or in a place where time runs differently than it does here, making them timeless.  I’ve written about the multiple realms I’ve visited in the Imaginal. Some are Christian, some pagan, some indigenous. I appear differently depending on which realm I’m in but my essential nature is always the same. But about that essential nature…the soul changes constantl...

  I’m in a weird space. I haven’t had any further forays into the Imaginal but that doesn’t mean that I’m not experiencing strange feelings. Something feels like it has shifted inside me and I can’t put my finger on it. Is it because of the insanity going on in Europe with the invasion of Ukraine and a sense of looming doom? Is it because I’m at middle age now and feeling like the pathway of my life is narrowing toward the final days in this body on this Earth? It’s possible that some nuclear catastrophe could pretty much end life as we know it at any moment. This feels more possible now than it did back in the Seventies and Eighties. Inside, I feel an emptiness where there was once something. That something is a coziness that feels soporific, like a warm blanket. It’s soft and hazy, making me think of the Central Object Relation, the internalization of mother. Could it have loosened up? The COR is important because it lends stability to the ego, providing the core around which the...

  I feel like such a dope. I didn’t understand the meaning of the word, ‘sacred,’ until today during my meditation. Oh, I’ve tossed it out a lot, especially lately with these journeys into the Imaginal but part of me only understood it as a concept, not as the reality that the word strives to convey. What is sacred? Well, the Divine, of course. But what I understand now is that the Divine shines through everything. Everything is therefore sacred, even the most defiled. This helps me to see the reason that the tortured souls and other entities I’ve met are so important. They, like everything else, are Divine. They are sacred. I’ve known this on some level but now I really see it. And not only that, I see that everything is an emanation of the Divine. This certainly puts the frustrations of my morning and evening commutes in perspective! It’s hard to be angry at other drivers when you recognize their innate divinity! There is a danger in the reified world of overusing the word, ‘sacr...