Under great duress was Consciousness born again and again, always with the hope He’d, one day, overthrow the evil reign of Instinct. Despite all the attempts on His life, down through the ages, Consciousness grew in strength under the nurturing care of the heart, for she knew this child alone was her only hope for salvation. Not till He came of age, with the birth of Christ, did He attempt to take on this Goliath, face to face, in a fight to death.

During the early rounds of this god-awful fight, Consciousness had gained the upper hand over Instinct. Then, in a sudden blow to the head, He suffered a right cross that sent Him reeling. Stumbling over His own words, He fell to the earth, where He died in the arms of His Mother.

Having apparently lost the fight with Instinct, was He laid to rest in a tomb within the earth. For unbeknownst to us, He had returned to the womb of His Mother so that we might understand the meaning of His words to Nicodemus—that one must be born of the Spirit to enter the Kingdom. While Wisdom labored for three dark days to give birth to a newborn Son, Consciousness finally realized His goal, the creation of the first human being ever made in His own likeness.

In spite of all the scrutiny of the history of Consciousness, that has taken place down through the ages, we have yet to see through the devilish trick Instinct played on us. Like Adam ’n’ Eve, we find it difficult to wake up from the Big Sleep—to walk through our dreams and visions, the very myths we live by, with the understanding and awareness of Consciousness. In our choice to sleepwalk through life, we remain oblivious to the myths that have driven us since time immemorial. Even when we are awakened to our dreams, we find ourselves incapable of penetrating Wisdom’s images, to free the seeds of truth, Consciousness deposited there, long ago, in safekeeping for us.

We see Consciousness as the enemy. As we enlist in the struggle to protect the life of our old mentor, turned traitor, we give up our lives for a mere shadow of what is. We seek the death of God instead of enlightenment. In our relentless persecution of the truth, we fool our selves into believing we have killed Consciousness, for in our blindness, we fail to see the death of Instinct in the crucifixion of Consciousness.

No longer free to pluck the truth from the images of Wisdom, like an apple from a tree, we’ve been cursed to toil by the sweat of our brows, to unearth the truth from the ground of our beings. From among thorns ’n’ thistles, the lies and misconceptions that surround the truth, must we now struggle to raise our level of consciousness. Like Nicodemus, must we learn to make the incestuous return to the womb of the mother of all images. So too must we learn to leave the body in spirit if, like Jesus, we want to enter the realm of the imagination to free the seeds of truth being held captive yet, by Instinct. Only, we must leave Instinct behind, to suffer and die on the cross, alone.

“With your guns & drums ’n’ drums & guns,“ bemoaned my mentor, “the enemy nearly slew ye.“

Instantly, I knew that this part of the story would push the button of everyone who read it.

“Then keep it to yourself,“ demanded an inharmonious voice from somewhere deep within my being.

“My darlin’ dear, ye look so queer,“ moaned the dead man.

“Och! Johnny,“ began the right hand, ere it was cut off by the left.

“I hardly knew ye,“ completed the left hand, its ode to the dead.

“Knew who?“ asked a tremulous right hand.

“Who are you, anyway“ entreated the left hand.

“Dammit! Who are you?“ demanded the right hand, in an effort to ascertain what was going on here, before the dead man’s spirit slipped through my fingers, taking its awful secret with it.

With that, I realized I had finally destroyed the terrible image I had of my stepfather. He was the enemy I’d shot ’n’ killed, as I peeled away the lies, which’d hidden the truth from me for so long. With each round I had, figuratively speaking, fired into the face of this dark specter, I unveiled all the pain ’n’ suffering this miserable human being had inflicted upon me. No longer cursed to live out his fate, I was free now, to make my own choices. Or was I, for while the spirit was most willing, the flesh was still very weak.

“A broken egg!“ replied my shadow in jest.

“Aw, shut up,“ I yelled out, in my anger over having received such a stupid response. “I ain’t no goddamn egg.“

“What you say is what you are,“ retorted my shadow, “cause two negatives always make a positive.“

“You’re the egghead,“ I shouted back, “not me.“

“You’re the one who penetrated her womb and sowed the seeds of consciousness,“ he enigmatically proclaimed.

“What the hell are you talkin’ about?“ I demanded to know.

“What Michael is trying to tell you, if you’d just shut up and listen,“ exclaimed my soul, “is that I am with child.“

“O, I get it now,“ I sarcastically exclaimed. “What you’re tryin’ to tell me is that I, a mere mortal, got you, a spirit, pregnant. Yeah, right! Why don’t you tell me another one of your goddamn lies.“

“I do not lie,“ she strongly asserted, “for lying ’n’ deception belong not to me, but rather to the evil magician.“

Deep down, I knew she was telling the truth.

“You’ve been penetrating my womb for some time,“ she exclaimed, “and with little regard for the outcome. Don’t you see—it was bound to happen sooner or later.“

“So what does this mean?“ I asked out of my own bewilderment.

“It means that, in three or four months,“ replied my mentor, “you’ll be giving birth to some new aspect of yourself.“

“But why must I wait so long?“ I asked.

“It takes a long time for an idea to gain flesh,“ he responded. “And as you can see, there’s a lot that needs to be done yet, in preparation for the birth of this work of art.“

“Are we all eggmen?“ I asked.

“Yes,“ replied my shadow, “just as I am you and you are me, you are Humpty Dumpty.“

“Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord’s about to pass by,“ commanded the voice of my soul.

“Now there was a great wind, so strong it split mountains and broke rocks into pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind, an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake, a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire, a sound of sheer silence.“ I Kings 19:11–12.

Overcome with fear, I broke out in a cold sweat as I lay there, struggling to awaken from a deep sleep. Unable to let go of my fear, I found little to comfort me as I rhetorically circumambulated the meaning of the dream. “Had I gone over to the exchange with Marty and the others,“ I asked my self, “only to see the hint of an encounter with God succumb to a whirlwind of Brute Force? Had I been looking for an experience of God, when I was so badly shaken by the fall of Elrie? Had not I found God in the fire that burned to reunite me with the other side of my nature?“ Into the feminine side of my nature had I lunged as I latched onto what my body had grasped. Having abandoned the foundering, one-sided, masculine point of view, to wage an unwinnable war in Vietnam, had I darted off in search of what I knew not. Lest I get swept away by a treacherous undercurrent or backlash of the feminine side of my nature, as had my real father, some twenty-odd years ago, I wanted to know what she had seen, the second the sound of sheer silence resonated with me. Having stumbled across bits ’n’ pieces of the truth, I had not yet found the whole truth, for it was nothing but the truth, so help me God, whom I sought. And so did I awaken, if only briefly, from the deep sleep that’d been imposed upon me ere I entered this world in human form to free my soul from the clutches of Instinct.

“Drawing upon this force again,“ continued my shadow, “you were shocked to see the force of truth come to life at the expense of the urge to use brute force, as if both images represented the same force, only from two very different perspectives—whether you’ve chosen heads or tails, to act consciously or unconsciously.“

“Having gotten to the heart of the matter,“ added my soul, “you not only relinquished the right to take another man’s life, but also broke the spell that’d bound you to the demon, Brute Force, when as a young child, you chased after the kid, next door, with a real butcher knife. Realizing that you could never completely rid yourself of the urge to use Brute Force, you cried out in dismay over the paradoxical nature of the force
behind this image.“

“Mobbed by your own angry thoughts,“ interjected my mentor, “for having misjudged your self, you were exonerated of all guilt when it was shown that you had, in deed, acted unconsciously. Unaware of just how much of your personality this primitive urge possessed, you were shown, in a very crude manner, exactly what Jesus meant when He told Nicodemus, ’You must be born from above’.“ (Jn. 3:7)

“When you chose to stand by the truth,“ added my shadow, “instead of giving in to the urge to use Brute Force, you finally pierced through the instinctive image which’d developed around the true nature of this urge, like the amniotic sac around an embryo. Until you realized that you’d been giving flesh to a mere shadow of the truth, you could
never have participated in the labor ’n’ delivery of the first of the three great truths to be borne by you in your lifetime.“

“Having gotten your hands bloodied, at the crowning moment of truth,“ continued my soul, “you panicked at the thought that something had gone terribly wrong. Boy, were you relieved when you saw the truth intact. As you laid claim to this new image of yourself, like any proud father, in your ecstasy were you carried aloft, that day, by many strange thoughts ’n’ feelings.“

“Prior to the birth of this new self-image,“ concluded my mentor, “you wavered for a moment, in the birth canal, where all new life hesitates before it is forced from the womb to give flesh to the good intentions it has embraced. Having brought to light more truth than you could deal with, you turned to your faculties through that tiny image of your self reflected in the eye of another, the speck you desire to remove from your neighbor’s eye. And so did you return from this near death experience to a body no longer dominated by Brute Force.“

Instantly, I found my self among the lost souls who manned the ship. As the sights and sounds of life onboard came crashing back into my awareness, I struggled, momentarily, to get my bearings. And as I made my way below, to hit the sack, I received my mentor’s blessing, “May the force of truth be with you, my son.“ With that did I collapse in a heap.

“Knowing this about you,“ added my soul, “the One Voice tried to alleviate your fears with the reassurance that you were going nowhere He had not already been and would be traversing again with you.“

“Why didn’t I see Him then?“ I asked.

“Like any voice,“ replied my mentor, “you cannot see it. Unlike the One Voice, you saw Him in the images that presented themselves to you after He spoke.“

“In response to the call for enlightenment,“ continued my shadow, “you delved into the dark pall which has hung over your head, like the Sword of Damocles, since puberty. There were you confronted by your alter ego as it flew out of control in its intoxication with the force of Nature that is released whenever the ego takes what does not belong to it. And for the first time, Dr. Jekyll, you recognized this image of Hyde as your stepfather. With the realization that you had vicariously inherited from your stepfather the same ugly tendency to usurp the sovereignty of the One Voice, you entered the theater of the absurd to seek out this tyrant, in a roundabout way, from among your own rundown and abandoned thoughts and feelings.“

“Not knowing what to expect,“ chimed in my soul, “you reluctantly inquired within, making yourself vulnerable to a confrontation with the force that had so marred your life in the past, it now appeared much more menacing than it really was. So threatened were you, by the brutish side of your nature, you tried to run away from it again, to no avail. Round ’n’ round your mind you raced, in an effort to escape having to confront your own brutality. No matter how hard you tried, you could not rationalize it away, this time.“

“As your mind expanded upon a way to get out of this pickle with your self-esteem intact,“ expounded my mentor, “you wound up on the receiving end, where your thoughts about the use of force had gathered to make sport of you. As they reiterated the chant you’d been taught in boot camp, to yell out every time you thrust your bayonet into one of them, you were overcome by the hopelessness, they had felt back then, of ever again seeing the light of day.“

“Then,“ interjected my shadow, “you spotted the narrow gate—the one seldom chosen only because the gate that leads to damnation is so much wider, the way to it, so much clearer to those who choose it. In running with the idea that the narrower choice simply consisted of putting some distance between your self and the urge to use brute force, you overlooked the limitations this choice really imposed upon you.“

“Feeling trapped,“ continued my soul, “you turned to face the urge to use brute force, as every thought ’n’ feeling in your body screamed out to kill the urge before it got hold of you and inflicted you with the wound that never heals—that endless cycle of revenge, of taking an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.“

To be continued…

“You know her all too well,“ replied my mentor, “as the only mother to have donned one of the magician’s masks when she failed to conjure up genuine love from the cauldron of life. Cut off from her feelings by the thoughtless spirit that’d overtaken your stepfather, she lashed out at you and your brother with the bitter tongue of her own unhappiness. Whenever she saw the spirit of truth rise from either one of you to challenge her, she condemned it as the thoughtless spirit that’d overtaken your stepfather, for that is how she perceived it through the eyes of the witch. By her own example did she unwittingly teach you to beat off the advances of the spirit of truth whenever the thoughtless spirit raised its ugly head to release unsettling thoughts. Once you acquired the habit of restricting the free flow of thought from your psyche, you lost the ability to think for yourself, as these damned-up thoughts began to spill over into the physical realm to find expression.“

“To free yourself from her spell,“ concluded the old Indian, “you must learn to love all your feelings, from the least to the most vile, for hidden within their ugly forms lie truths which still defy consciousness. So must you brood over these feelings, without judgment, till you have hatched the truth yet hidden in such raw form. You must learn to make the incestuous return to the womb of your imagination when the need for creating consciousness arises. And so must you follow the chain of thought, the Spirit of Pure Thought feeds you as he unravels the string of images your soul has left behind, to help you find your way through the dark spots in your life. When you have found the truth at the other end of the tunnel of vision, you will certainly know it, for a sudden swell of feeling will greet you as the tension, that has built up in you to create consciousness, is released. And lying there with her in your arms, you will say to yourself, ’Ah! So this is She Who Must Be Obeyed!’“

What could I say, for I knew he was right. “I’m sorry,“ I finally admitted, “for not having used my head when I should’ve.“

“On the other hand,“ he exclaimed, “considering what you’ve had to work with, maybe I’ve been a bit too hard on you.“

With that he embraced me.

As tears welled up in my eyes, I hugged him back.

“You must be ever vigilant, my son,“ he added as he disappeared from my grasp, “as the forces of darkness are cunning.“

Like the apostles at the transfiguration of Christ, I wanted to hold onto these precious moments, which came ’n’ went as quickly as those in reality. In other words, whenever I caught sight of the extraordinary within the ordinary, I wanted to immortalize what was already immortal, for such is the nature of truth. I wanted only to hold onto that part of my life which would not slip through my fingers, like sand, at the end of my time on earth, for such is the nature of immortality. Since I did not yet have a firm grasp of my own truth, I could not hold onto my immortality for very long, for such is the nature of a fleeting awareness.

As I turned to face the music of my own dreams, I slipped, unnoticed, through the gate she had provided at her expense. Inside, I ran smack dab into an incredibly massive and seemingly impenetrable stone wall, the likes of which I had never seen before. Standing back for a moment, to take in the full measure of the barrier I had constructed between my self and my imagination, with the help of all those who had ever passed this way, I caught sight of an invisible opening in the wall, a black hole through which only the undaunted passed. Overcoming my dismay over the shadow of a noose that hung on the wall above the opening, just beyond my reach, I stepped off into the black hole where I encountered the spirits of what had, long ago, been condemned by the Church of the Living Dead and strangled to death by the Wraiths of the State. As the spirits swarmed and slithered about me like venomous snakes, I knew the lies, which enveloped the truth of these spirits in such vile forms, could do me no harm. Allowed to pass unharmed, was I greeted by the Great Necromancer, himself, the one whom men have called the Adversary ever since he tricked them out of Paradise. While the Trickster stood there smiling at me with the conceited assurance that the likes of me would never see through the magic of an erect phallus, I watched as his form slowly gave way to the very pillar of my being, on top of which sat a pearl, the size of a softball. Immediately, I recognized it as the Pearl of Great Price, a symbol of the individual which, at birth, God had ordained me to become. And I saw it as the only way in which I could ever hope to withstand the lure of the Trickster, to act instinctively. Lacking any awareness of this individual, I lost sight of the apparition, as it slowly gave way to the illuminating light of a fire that burned brighter and brighter, the closer I got.

Just as quickly as my attention had been captured by these few stray thoughts, was it captivated by the sound of the rock ’n’ roll music that’d broken through, as this lonesome freight came screeching to a halt at Greg’s insistence.

“That sounds like the Beatles!“ exclaimed Greg, amateur musician and avid Beatles’ fan that he was. As we drew closer to the source of the music, a record shop up the street, he surmised that we were hearing, for the first time, songs from a new album they had released while we had been at sea, cut off from any news of what’d been happening around the rest of the world.

Once we were inside the shop, Greg quickly solved the mystery as he honed in on the new album, like a homing pigeon, and snatched it up in his claws. “Fancy this,“ he exclaimed, “finding the Beatles’ latest album in Japan, of all places.“ As soon as we’d all had a good laugh, he turned around and bought the darn thing.

On the way back to the ship, we made another stop, this time at my insistence, for I really wanted to buy something more than the silly little patch I’d gotten Mary, to let her know how much I loved her.

“Look!“ I exclaimed as I emerged from a small shop, to the acclaim of Greg and Harold as I held high the silk blouse I’d bought Mary.

“Say,“ I blurted out as they took off without me, “if we wanna eat supper back onboard the ship, we’d better get goin’. Besides, I can’t be late for my date with the master-at-arms; or my ass’ll be grass.“

While the work was still very menial, I noticed a slight change in my taskmasters. As they got to know me, I was no longer given the meanest and nastiest work they could muster up. When they stuck around to keep an eye on me, which was very seldom, I’d engage them in a bit of conversation. And I found that even those, who still treated me so callously, had a heart I could touch if they let me. For the most part, I was left alone, unsupervised, to do however much I felt like doing, so long as I put in two hours of my time.