Ep. 20 - Exploring Consciousness w/ Jeremy Johnson

[Music] Welcome to episode 20. It's been 20 episodes. That's uh, that's pretty crazy. Oh, I should tell you what the show is. Welcome to episode 20 of Synchronicity. Um, I guess today is Jeremy Johnson. Uh, we'll get to Jeremy in a second, don't you worry. Um, but I wanted to go... First of all, congratulations to Adam in Austin, Texas, uh, for winning the book giveaway for Mirabe Star as caravan of no despair. Um, the book is on the way, Adam. Uh, I know we already spoke, and I told you that, but now everyone knows. Um, if you're wondering what that is, um, every week, I think I'm gonna do this every week.

Give away a book related to the podcast, um, or something that I've read, if there's no book that's related to the podcast, I'm gonna give it away. So I realize that that is not tremendously useful, um, if the contest is over. So what I'm gonna do is give the date and tell you how long you have to enter the contest and how to enter the contest. Um, so today's date, the day of the release of this is either March 16th or 17th, 2016. So the book contest, the giveaway contest is good for another week, so we'll say the 23rd. Um, actually, it's a little less. I lied. We're gonna announce the winner, um, on the 21st of March.

So you got about five days to get this out, four or five days. Um, so this, uh, segue nailed it. Uh, the book that I'm gonna be giving away this week is The Supernatural, written by Whitley Stryber and Jeffrey Cripal or Cripal. I don't know how to say his name. I should probably, I don't know how to do it. We talked about that in this episode, me and Jeremy. Um, it's an excellent book. You'll hear more about it in this particular episode. Long story short, uh, David Silver actually recommended I check out this book and it is fascinating. Um, it has to do with aliens, ghosts, uh, time travel, quantum physics.

Um, it's pretty, it covers the gamut of what we would call supernatural, I don't know, phenomena. Um, but it, it really, using some comparative, uh, techniques. Um, it really, I think it presents some very interesting ways of looking at things we can't really explain. So I, I tore through that book. I think I read it in like four or five days. Really great. So if you want to win that, if you want to get a free book, brand new book, not a used book, here's how you enter. Um, there is a new website, FYI, for a synchronicity podcast. It's sync podcast.com. Uh, sync S-Y-N-C podcast.com. So all you have to do to enter or be entered into this contest is go to the website, sync podcast.com.

And yes, I'm still a part of MindPod Network. I just built a nice website for myself because I liked it. Um, but all you have to do is go to sync podcast.com and put in your email, join the synchronicity community. And no, it's not just an email list. You actually will get cool things. Um, you can expect weekly updates on the show, on the guests, if you don't want those, but you just want to get the book, you can sign up and then unsubscribe. I'm not going to take it personally. I totally get it. Not everyone wants to be on an email list, but it's so much more. I promise you, and you will see. Okay. So now that that's out of the way, book giveaway stuff, let's talk about Jeremy Johnson. Oh boy. So I, you'll hear me say in the beginning of the episode, I didn't really know Jeremy.

We're friends on Facebook. I think we have a mutual friend, um, again, via David Silver, one of David Silver's friends is his, his presence is everywhere. He is omnipresent. Um, but Jeremy, I, I've taken note of him because since we've been friends on Facebook, he posts like the most interesting stuff. And that is a typically and stark contrast to a lot of things that are posted on Facebook. Um, although I do a pretty good job of curating my friends and my feed, you know, most people aren't putting, I would say top notch caliber stuff. Maybe it's some self-promotion stuff. Who knows? But this Jeremy, oh boy, he really has been sharing stuff that every, every time I see it, I'm like, wow.

Those are really interesting article or video or whatever. Um, so here's some stuff we discussed in this episode. Uh, Jeremy does a lot of different things. He's an editor at reality sandwich. Um, he's an advocate for planetary culture. You'll find out what that means. And he's very, very interested in the evolution of consciousness. Um, and that is right, kind of nebulous, but you'll hear him explain exactly what that means in this episode. Um, he's also a huge book geek. Um, and I love book geeks because I myself am a book geek. Um, and yeah, I mean, he has some very interesting thoughts on literature and how that can affect consciousness.

Um, the book, uh, I mentioned the giveaway, the supernatural also goes into how literature and reading can affect consciousness and thereby culture. Very interesting stuff. Uh, we get into the Baha'i faith, which I didn't know anything about, but a very interesting, totally makes sense to me. Um, very aligned with what I fundamentally believe is, which is there are many paths up the mountain, but the view is the same. When talking about spiritual paths or any paths in life. Um, and Jeremy's got a new project called the theory of everybody. It's coming out soon with that is going to be a journal, an online journal. Um, you'll hear all about this.

So hopefully I in case you didn't know, um, now there are two places you can go to check out the podcast page. You can go to mine pod network.com slash Noah, and then the latest episode will be right there, or you can go to the aforementioned sync podcast.com and the first, the first the first episode will be at the top, um, which will be this one, unless you're hearing this later, then it will be another one. Um, and what else does we talk about psychedelics? Of course, um, Jeremy relays a very interesting salvia experience he has, um, or had, um, and then I kind of encourage him to take mushrooms and not, not, not really forcing him or any, anyway, but I think he's got such a knack for, um, kind of perceiving what's going on and then reporting back, which to me is like, that's one of the most valuable skills you could ever have with psychedelics to kind of go to a different place or interact with different dimensions or worlds and be able to relay that. Um, we'll look no farther than someone like Terence McKenna. I mean, you know, or Alan Watts, look at these people who can communicate very transcendental states of mind, um, and be able to relay that to the rest of us who sometimes when we go to these places just can report back very rudimentary basic stuff.

So, Jeremy has that skill. Um, he also has a book club, an online book club. It's just wrapping up right now. They, they did a, like a, how many months, Jeremy, I don't know, two, three months. They're reading a book. Lit Geeks is the name of it. I'm going to have links to all this stuff in the episode. So, no worries at all. Um, and a little bonus, a little bonus bonus for you guys, I'm going to be releasing another podcast. The second part of my podcast with Danny Goldberg that we recorded a couple weeks ago. Um, I'm going to be releasing that either in a couple of days, so that would be Friday the 18th or right before the next podcast.

I'm going to get a two for coming up. Um, let's see. Anything else I want to cover? Uh, no, I think that's it. Uh, as always, please, the reviews continue to come in, rate and review on iTunes, Stitcher, wherever else you consume podcasts really appreciate it. Um, I got an incredible review, some really incredible reviews are coming in. So I really, I appreciate that. I very much do. Um, so do I want to ramble on to anything else to cover? I'm sure. I'm sure I do. Uh, but I'm going to let you off the hook. So without further ado, here is Jeremy Johnson. I need different inputs and outputs on my interface on my computer and got confused. That happens. How you doing, man? Good. How are you? I'm good. Nice to meet you. Yeah, I don't think we actually spoke before. Nope. Uh, and truth be told. Uh, let's just jump right into it.

I'll probably just keep it from the beginning. Uh, I don't really even know you all that well. Uh, I'm only friends with you on Facebook, but I, I, I'm on Facebook a lot by nature of my work and just I'm there all the time. So I do see people and I'm very, I curate my Facebook feed. Like I don't let just anyone in. That's not to say I don't let only people who agree with me or think like me, but the people who are not I wanting in my consciousness. I don't, but, but I see you pop up all the time. Um, and you're definitely I'm like my top 10. Like, Oh, this is really like, I'm going to click on that and read that article. That's really interesting. Or this is an interesting take on something. So that, that is the reason I reached out. I was like, Hey, you want to come on? Because you seem to be interested in a lot of cool stuff. Some stuff I know about some stuff I don't. So yeah, man. Thanks for coming up. Oh, yeah. Thanks for having me on. Uh, I think you know Henrietta weeks, right? Yes. Yes. That's our mutual. That's our connecting point. That's how we exactly. I know Henrietta through David Silver.

Um, who she's good friends with him. And I met her up in the city a few months ago and she had mentioned you. And that was the first time I had ever heard your name and didn't know anything about you. And then I think we became friends on Facebook. And I've been very happy with that friendship on Facebook. So I'm glad that we get to connect like this too. I think this is going to be fun. Yeah, likewise. Yeah. So, okay, I typically I prepare a whole list of questions. I go through, I have them all out. I'm not going to do that. I recently recorded a couple of podcasts. Um, up in New York again. Where are you located by the way? I'm in Florida right now. Oh, cool. Yeah, in Florida. Orlando. Oh, cool. Cool. Cool. Yeah. Uh, go into Disney World a lot. Um, no, not so much. Disney. Disney Springs a little bit.

That's Disney World. Um, cool. So, yeah, I've just been seeing you pop up and I'm really glad. So let's just jump right in here, actually. Yeah. Um, what, what, what's your deal, man? You're an editor. I know you were at reality sandwich. You work on all these other. We both seem to be very interested in consciousness. Um, and things related to consciousness, which obviously is a huge, almost very nebulous. What does that even mean feel? But I think we kind of have an idea of what it is. What? What, what are you doing? What? What's your thing, man? What am I doing? That's a good question. That's hard. That's hard to answer. But maybe, maybe not as difficult as I'm as I'm thinking. Uh, so yeah, I did, I did reality sandwich for a while as an editor there. I still kind of am in a less formal way. But right now I'm working on a kind of multimedia project called theory of everybody.

And it's part podcast, part journal, part form. And as you've been seeing on my Facebook feed, part book club. So it's like sort of all of these things and the whole idea behind it, which is sort of reflection of what I'm really interested in as well is to basically look at consciousness studies from a kind of creative literary philosophical angle and not necessarily, you know, call it consciousness studies, but just to have that in there into the into the discussion and to look at literature from a sort of consciousness studies literature from from a literary standpoint or from a philosophical standpoint, just to kind of let that dialogue take place. So, so that's sort of what I've been just working on right now, planning and developing with two of my co workers.

So, yeah, it's, it's interesting because it's we're trying to create a community and we're trying to just sort of, I know I've been inspired by just the long history of countercultural projects and conscious culture projects like a reality sandwich, of course, as a magazine, but also it was a sort of literary hub where people were publishing and writing and discover new authors. And it just had that kind of pulse or zeitgeist for, you know, especially in the beginning years. And of course, you know, mondo 2000 and no sis magazine and those kinds of things. So I'm just really inspired by sort of the literary tradition in consciousness culture. So that's, that's sort of what I'm about. That's what I've just been dipping in and out of over the past three years trying different projects and it's all kind of coalescing around this new project. It's awesome. I mean, you know, approaching it from a literary philosophical. I mean, that's, that was my, it's different now, right? How old are you 29? Okay, so you're I'm 32. We're roughly the same age. We grew up when we still remember the dial tone on the phone, right? Like people don't now. So, yeah, I mean, my introduction to a lot of this stuff was books, right? Like, where else am I going to get this stuff from? There's no podcast. There was no immediate access to downloading things.

The internet wasn't even around until like realistically for me as like a real place like 97 and like think of the websites that were there, like not too much cars.com or something. So literary, I love the literary approach. And I also just, I am fascinated by the power of books in general, like to transport your consciousness or consciousness into different worlds and just experience different things. And I did see you mentioned you do this book club, this digital book club thing, which seems very, very awesome. Can you talk about how did you get in to kind of the study of this type of stuff, either the counterculture or consciousness stuff? Like what was the impetus behind it?

You know, I think it was probably just books. I mean, when I was really, when I was really little, when I was very young, I would just go into elementary school library and look at UFO books and that kind of stuff. So, I mean, you could take it that far back, but in terms of like actually to starting to engage with the communities, probably when I was in high school, I started reading a lot of like Eastern philosophy and spirituality books. I had to go to a Catholic school. So I was not interested in anything, you know, Christian, Western Catholic. So far away as possible. It was doing martial arts. I was learning about Taoism was learning about Zen Buddhism, which kind of, you know, it's more of a consciousness oriented, at least in the West, the way we've adapted the religion and the practice and the whole idea of Satori and Sausen and that kind of thing.

So that kind of got me on the on the on the ball with consciousness studies. But yeah, I just I've always been really interested in it in in undergraduate. My undergraduate years I found the writings of Teyr de Chardin, who is that that Jesuit mystic paleontologist, I think paleontologist yeah, and he wrote a book called the phenomenon of man, which is basically about the evolution of consciousness. And sorry that I was really into that was really into Ken Wilbur. And then from that kind of nexus point, I just started reading everybody, you know, I was absorbing, you know, academic stuff and academic philosophy, but also kind of going into sort of the consciousness culture writers so it's always been literary for me.

Yeah, I mean, it's truthfully that's like, I just finished a book that my buddy David Silver recommended the supernatural by Oh, yeah. And I was the other guy, I'm forgetting it, but that was, yes, yes, exactly. And that book was, I mean, oh my God, like I still, I am, I don't know if you follow this, but this podcast is on mine pod network. I've spoken openly, I have a guru, I do follow certain aspects of the Vedic traditions, including Buddhism, all these other things are also in addition Buddhism. But I still, I am constantly fascinated by the philosophies, the psychologists, the consciousness explores from the West, because that is where I come from, right, like it's, I don't want to, I'm very careful.

I think in the New Age movement, I've seen this happen a lot is kind of exoticizing foreign imports and being like, Oh, well, look how amazing this is not too dissimilar to what you probably did with the Catholic stuff, right? You're like, I don't want to deal with this. Oh, look at all this. This is how I mean, come on, that's how it got into it too. But taking it back to literary stuff, I mean, there's, I constantly, I'm a voracious reader, like I constantly, I'm the person who has 20 books on my nightstand and I'm reading like 50 at the same time and, Oh, I just finished this one and it was great.

So it's, to me, it's fascinating, especially with the coalescence of kind of the web and the written art form on the web and the accessibility and kind of the horizontal exploration we can get with it. I'm fascinated how it continues to open portals in people's minds. So talk, I mean, a little bit about what you're up to now and, you know, what you're hoping to do with it because this is, I mean, I'm finding out about it for the first time. I'm sure our listeners are so what's, what's kind of the, the, what was the genesis? I have an idea of that. And then also what is the idea behind it kind of.

Well, so a lot of convergence has happened around this project theory of everybody. Right now, the most immediate thing that I'm working on is the journal aspect and it's basically going to be online magazine part journal with digital media like you're saying things are kind of hybrids of other things. I mean, it's, it's kind of a journal, but it's kind of a magazine and is kind of a blog. So there's a kind of transmedia aspect to it, but it's called the journal of meta psychosis. And if you break down the words, I didn't come up with this title, but I feel like I've interpreted it enough to kind of internalize its meaning for myself.

It basically is, you know, meta is sort of the etymological roots of it is sort of going after meta means after or beyond. Or before there's a couple interesting root aspects definitions of it. And then psychosis means mind or soul, but it also kind of means transformation or like the essence of life or something like that. So, so I've just been thinking about that in terms of, you know, here we are in the 21st century and things are falling apart and things are transforming. And we've kind of done this whole thing called civilization. We don't know what we're going into next. So it's kind of like after, after the, after the transformation or after, you know, industrial civilization.

What do we do? So it's kind of looking forward to planetary culture, but it's also kind of play on sort of moving from mind to mind, meta psychosis. So it's a kind of frenetic, sort of a frenetic energy to the title, but also a kind of forward thinking planetary culture. So that's what I'm working on right now, trying to get that on set up and editors and writers and everything. So it's a big project, I'm sure. Yeah, I've dealt with creating kind of editorials in the past, and it was one of the first phrase I ever had, and it was a very big lesson in like, holy shit. This is not a small project itself, because, you know, there's things on the web now that are really one man, small organizations, and they work.

But if you're really trying to constantly be putting editorial stuff out there, I am totally aware of the work that goes beyond that. So massive respect for you to trying to get that together because it's not, I mean, like, here's the truth. I get the sense that you have something very valuable to offer to a lot of people. Like, this is again, I just get this from your Facebook, right? I'm seeing stuff that, like, are opening up little portals into things that I hadn't thought about. And that to me is invaluable, especially in this day and age, when so many of the things we see on Facebook and other places like that are just transient, try, you know, garbage.

There's like no real reason for it to be there, not knocking anyone who wants to put, you know, whatever they put on Facebook on Facebook, but it's very not meant to have an impact. It's supposed to be superficial. So, I love that you're trying to plunge deeper into that. So, talk about some of your, I guess, favorite authors or thinkers. Can you tell me, like, who really gets it going for you? Like, these are your avatars of, like, "Oh, man, those people." Who are these? Well, more recently, you mentioned the supernatural book. Not Willie Shreiber, but I like Willie. I like Willie, like his writing, but Jeffrey Criple, his co-author. I really dug into his work and he has a lot of interesting work.

Mutants and Mystics, it's one of my favorite books ever. I mean, the way he brings in religious studies and comic books and pop culture and science fiction and just, and Azoterrorism kind of mixes it all together. And the supernatural experiences, of course, that he describes. That's sort of, I mean, if there's going to be literature, that's sort of a iconographic or just reflective of what I want to do. Like, that's just close. I mean, because that, it blew my mind in that book, the comparative, I feel like I've taken a lot of the approaches that he outlines in that book just end naturally and just kind of done that, try to be open-minded, but critical.

Maybe discerning, like, you know, be comparative to different things in the past. And the way that he weaved in, for listeners who don't, exactly know what we're talking about, this book, The Supernatural, is a book. Whitley Shreiber wrote the book Communion, which was really, at this point, interpreted as one of the first alien books, abduction books. But if you read this book, The Supernatural, you'll see that he wasn't explicitly talking about aliens per se. It was a paranormal experience that he had. That involved a dead person. And then they started, after he wrote Communion, he got all of these letters, him and his wife, just like in hundreds of thousands, literally, and sharing the same experience.

So he knew he tapped into something, but didn't know exactly what it was. So what this book is, The Supernatural, it's Jeffrey Cripal, that's how you say his name? I just say Cripal, it could be Cripal. Anyway, Jeffrey, apologies if you ever hear this, but you're awesome. Yeah, he might. Yeah, he might. So he is a comparative kind of anthropologist. I don't know exactly how he'd describe himself, but he compares various mystical experiences, paranormal experiences, alien, modern cultural experiences together, and does a very, very good job of weaving a narrative that makes a tremendous amount of sense in my mind.

So anyone who's listening, pick up that book, it's excellent. To me, it touches on what I've been fascinated in is kind of the merging or coalescence of all these disparate aspects of reality or unreality, whatever you want to call them. So let me ask you this, get right to the point. What do you think this world is? Why are we here? And what is kind of the purpose of being here? Look, that's a, that's a pretty massive metaphysical question. Yeah, super small. Oh, man. And you have to get it right. You have to be right. Well, geez, I don't really know, like, why are we here? The mystical, the sort of mystical narrative that I've always interpreted is just, we are some aspect of some kind of massive Godhead thing that's imagining itself into existence, and we're just part of that.

You know, people who've had mystical experiences sort of come out of their small selfhood, and then they realize they're like God doing, doing people, they're being people. So I mean, I would say that is sort of my, my sort of on off the cuff remark, but like, well, what are we doing? Why are we here? But, you know, I, I, I prescribe personally to a kind of, you know, evolutionary spirituality in which, you know, consciousness is constantly evolving and life forms are evolving. And I do feel, I mean, I don't, I wouldn't say it's a theoretical statement, although some people have made it into theoretical statement that, you know, consciousness has evolved to intensify.

As one of my favorite philosophers, phenomenologists, John Gepser, calls concretize the spirit or spirit, the spiritual. Shira Bendo's integral yoga, I think, was really close. And also, the Baha'i faith, and I am a Baha'i. Oh, cool. Yeah, they're, their basic message is that all of humanity is evolving spiritually, and there have been series of, you know, manifestations and all world religions are part of it. The world religions are part of this kind of evolution of consciousness towards some greater world unity or what the religious founder, Baha'u'llah, called the most great peace. So, if you read it, I mean, it's just like, they're all, you know, integral yoga, the Baha'i faith, these are all kind of talking about our spiritual evolution.

So, if I were to say anything, I would say that that's what we're here to do, we're here to evolve ourselves spiritually. And part of that is really cool, weird, scientific stuff, like, you know, evolving of the brain and consciousness studies and that really complicated stuff. But I think it's also, you know, more esoteric dimensions are definitely there, too, in mystical dimensions, that's the heart of it for me. Yeah, the heart of it. I love it. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about the Baha'i faith? I admittedly don't know much about it. I've seen some people say I'm of the Baha'i faith, but I guess I didn't actually investigate it because I don't really know what it's about.

Well, I didn't know what it was about, either, until a few years ago, now my girlfriend, she is my friend at the time, Natalie, she became a Baha'i. And she just stumbled across it, too, and it's like, they believe in the unity of world religions and, like, we're evolving, and I'm like, this sounds really cool, or where is it from? Like, why have I never heard of this? But it started in Persia in the mid 19th century, 1800s. And, yeah, Baha'u'llah, and before him, there was a guy who's referred to as the Bob, and they're both, like, the sort of dual prophets of it. It's a prophetic religion. I'm kind of new to it, too, so this is like a first step.

I've got a nail in it. If I shut this up, I'm going to let them know. Well, Natalie's in the room, so she's probably listening. But, yeah, so it started with these sort of dual, basically they believe that every few thousand years, a few hundred years, depending on the time, there's some kind of, like, manifestation of God, which is a problem. So they believe they're all true, like, East and West are all part of a sort of meta thing that we don't understand is sort of mysterious. But the Bob basically was interpreting and talking about Islam, I guess, specifically, Shia Islam. But at the time, there was discussion about the Muad, I can't remember the name Muad'i, Maad'i.

Muad'i is from Dune, sorry, folks. Yeah, I was going to be like, I think that's Dune. But Dune got a lot of the inspiration from that. Makes sense. But anyway, so he's kind of announcing that this new manifestation is going to happen, and then Baha'u'llah comes around, and he has this mystical experience when he's in prison. And basically, he comes forward with, and this is the interesting thing about him, most of the writings from the Baha'i Faith is written down. So he was basically just this penned prophet mystic who's writing, just constantly writing. Basically, and I find it really interesting from a religious studies standpoint that he was writing all of this amazing literature, very beautiful, very Persian, very poetic, and deeply mystical.

And basically, you know, in the 1840s, 1850s, he's talking about world unity and like a planetary culture and spiritual evolution. Way before the new age of like the 1970s and 60s, or even the earlier, you know, 1870s and theosophy and everything. So I just found it so interesting that like, this is the earliest I've been able to kind of trace these ideas back. So, you know, I just, I really, I love the faith itself and the writings of Baha'u'llah is very deeply mystically inspiring for me. And it resonated with you, it sounds very much. I think you might take it to you. It sounds like I would. I'm a big proponent of the unity of all these things.

Like, I think there's many paths up the mountain, but the view is the same. That's kind of my general approach. One of my favorite mystics is Ramakrishna and Ramakrishna. I mean, the gospel of Ramakrishna, I was selling some of the other day, and I said it, and I was like, "Do I mean that?" And I do. It's kind of like my Bible. Like, I can open that up at any point, read a parable or two and be like, "Oh my God, I get it again." Like, I totally get it again. And he was like, it sounds like the Baha'i Faith prophets. Very much aware that there is some underlying unity and structure to all these disparate religions and philosophies.

And then I also like, you know, usually with these philosophies or religions, there's some practical tools that can help you. So, what have been kind of the practical or maybe just mindset shifting benefits of the Baha'i Faith? I'm just going to query you on this because it's totally fascinating to me. So, I mean, a lot of the teachings are moral oriented and ethics oriented. So, and a lot of it is actually, interestingly, since it was part of the inception of the Faith, is to build sort of the proto elements or structure exoskeleton of a world culture. So, like, you know, just education is important and certain, you know, basic moral values of like caring for other people and that sort of thing.

So, it's all like very much like a practice oriented day to day, like taking care of people, like practicing compassion. And there's no there's no clerical aspect to the Baha'i Faith. So, it's extremely democratic. And they literally we literally both. So, like any, yeah, so it's like a democratic mystical fellowship. Can we vote for someone from the Baha'i Faith for president? Can we do that? Can we get them as candidate? When does that happen? You know, okay, so this is interesting. Baha'is don't. And I'm still trying to understand it too. And again, this is new to me. But Baha'is don't really engage in politics. And they're encouraged to vote, but not to to debate or not to say like, well, I don't like this politician, but I like this one.

It's meant to be a kind of more private sort of thing, which is this interesting approach I've had a hard time following it. But, you know, I don't understand some logic behind that though. I mean, think of all the ranker and kind of just, you know, stuff that happens when people start a housing political view. So, I get some aspect of the logic behind it. And part of that practice, I think anyway, is something that is called consultation, which is basically, well, basically, I don't know if I could really. But it's a, it's a very mindful way of speaking with people, individuals who may have different opinions. So it's sort of like coming towards a consensus in a very kind of contemplative way, very open, receptive way, not being aggressive and trying to practice that in a social and democratic setting, which doesn't sound very what we do in politics, say, but not in politics.

But in a positive relationship, that's what we do. So, yeah, it's meant to be like a practice for everything. So, I would say that's one of the core, like day to day practices, which again is sort of like, you know, if we're building a planetary civilization, we'll have to get along. We have to really instill like certain practices and values that would be towards that sort of fellowship. So, yeah, it's really, it's really neat. It is really neat. I'm obviously going to Google it right after it's done here, for sure. So interesting because as somebody, you know, before the Baha'i Faith, I was just interested in new religious movements and just studying all of the really interesting stuff that's popped up.

I mean, you've read mistakes by Cripal, so you know that there's been a lot of really interesting movements in the 20th century talking about evolution and spirituality and really kind of interesting mutations in religion. And, you know, of course, having worked with reality sandwich, like one of the things that they talked about, especially with the grassroots movement, the Valver network, they propagate it is that, you know, they were trying to create a planetary culture. There's these kind of almost utopian aspects and religion always has, interestingly, you know, there's utopian aspects to many like counter cultural movements and religious movements.

So, so it's just sort of interesting to kind of come to the Baha'i Faith and go like, hey, like, no, nobody in like the 1960s, 1970s, pulse or wave of the new age counter culture seems to talk about this but there's here's an older thing from Persia, which seems to be sort of like, well, what happened, it seems like to me in the 60s is the, I mean, there are people, I mean, it was still at the point, there was no web, right? There was, it was direct people, like we're talking about counter culture figures, like Timothy Leary, right? Ramdas, people like that, Alan Ginsburg, right? Like the people, these were like people, vessels, channels, for people to kind of get the information through, so it was up to them to kind of like pick, so if they went to South America, well, then they got super into like the shaman stuff that was going down there in Ayahuasca, which was going on, obviously, and Terence McKenna later, and Dennis, you know, people who went to the East, they went to India and they're like, well, look, these things are 5,000, 5,000 years old.

So let me ask you this, do you believe in kind of like reincarnation? Where do you fall on that spectrum? You do. I do, I do. I don't know how it fits into like a coherent metaphysics for me personally, but I do believe it's... Get that sense. Yeah. So, so it's so interesting. I mean, it seems like you have a skill that I recognize and a lot of people who are kind of naturally gravitate to spiritual stuff, kind of like hit over the head with it in some way, can that happen to people too. You have a very powerful, intuitive kind of resonant quality. You kind of know when something is resonating with you.

Can you talk like, how has that worked in your life? Like, how do you, do you have like, let's talk about this. It's like the, the gnosis or peak experience. When someone has one of those, they know they're, they've had it, right? It's not like, whoa, I think maybe it was something. It's like, okay, direct experience. Can you talk about kind of in your life, those maybe peak experiences, what propagated them or what kind of tunes you in to this stuff? Hmm. You know, it's interesting with, with a lot of this stuff, I wouldn't say it was a specific event or a peak experience that affirmed it. You know, I have, I have practiced Zazen for a few years on and off, like as an adult, that's sort of been my main practice.

But, you know, I've had interesting peak experiences through that, sure. You know, that have sort of dissolved sort of my sense of self felt into deeper things, deeper impulses, felt into some of the writings in the Zen tradition. Um, definitely had that as an ongoing thing. Um, but in terms of like a gnosis of like the stuff I'm into, like evolution of consciousness, things like that. Haven't had that as much. It's just more of like, you know, when I'm reading, I just, I just feel like a sense of like, Oh, yeah, this is true. This is really true when I'm reading here. And I've read Shira Bendo for the first time or Baha'u'llah, or, or even John Geppster, you know, there's a sense that like what they're saying, they're tapping into it.

So I would say like as a supplement to, to the sum of the peak experiences that I've had, is certainly a kind of a subdued reading intuitive experience, you know, like intuition moves with the intellect and, in my opinion. And even in between intuition and intellect, I think there are gleanings of just even more profound insights that can take place. So I would say just, you know, meet for me reading has been, you know, a very powerful tool that shapes my, or unfold or rights me into into being and to borrow a whole way of thinking from, from Cripal. Yeah, yeah, totally. Oh, man. When Cripals a lot about that whole idea, that literature and reality are kind of synonymous with each other and that reality itself is hermeneuticals so to me language writing and reading can be extremely powerful and transformative.

Oh, man, I love that. It's so well said. I got the chills to get the little tingles when I say it. That's awesome. Cool. Let me just take a minute to process that. Oh, man. So, I mean, for me, there's been two, two big things that have kind of shaped my view of consciousness or whatever the heck is going on, right, whatever is going on. One has certainly been reading. I mean, that is where we kind of form of our vocabulary and shared language to communicate about these things, which I think is kind of a difficult thing to do. We get better and better at it as language evolves and we evolve, but it's still hard to do, but also psychedelics. Psychedelics have crystallized a lot of those kind of concepts into, like, okay, I can't exactly explain to you what happened, but it happened like, and this is what it was. And that's what these people are talking about. Psychedelics you've, you like, you do, you have done.

I've only dabbled a little bit, but I like them. I support them. They're not necessarily my own path. Sure. But psychedelics are certainly, I find them to be really important for, you know, for me in a kind of secondary way, just because I've never really felt compelled to need to take them. And whenever I have, it's been very just sort of, well, let me see what this is all about. And then it's always been really interesting. It's always kind of informed me, but I wouldn't say, for me, for me, it's not as central. But, I mean, I wrote for reality sandwich, which is kind of funny because I was always kind of like, well, you know, reality sandwiches, sort of, it's about psychedelics, but it's about consciousness, ethnicity, and there's other aspects of it too. But I surprise people a lot by that. I think it's, I'll tell you this, I had a period.

I had some very transcendental experiences on psychedelics, some that lasted far longer than the actual chemical was in my system, months at a time, and not just like, oh, well, I'm a changed person. I want a different, it's like, no, I'm still tripping for three months later. So I'm in some other dimension of world that's going on. So I stopped taking psychedelics for a good 10, 15 years, and I came to the same conclusion as you. Unless you have a specific calling or really feel compelled, like, and I know a lot of people get the calling with, like, ayahuasca, like, they get a calling and they go, and then that's what it was.

Unless you have that, you don't need them. They're not a necessary component. They can give you an experience that takes you out of yourself if you're not used to already doing that. But if you're used to kind of having your mind be somewhat malleable to begin with, they're not a necessary component. So I don't actually find it that surprising. I think it's funny, you run for reality sandwich, and you're like, just a little bit, just dabble here and there, which psychedelics have you tried, though. I have tried salvia de Venera. Oh, yeah, sure. And I feel embarrassed for not remembering, but I may have done like a light dose of mushrooms in high school at some point.

I tried salvia in high school, and it was a circle of people. I, you know, lit it with a blowtorch and hailed a ton. Nothing. I just had the most powerful visionary experience. The next guy next to me, he takes it. He loses his shit. I mean, he is in some other dimension. The next person, she takes it. She's in another place. She's like, I was in India. I was in a purple. Sorry. I was talking to this person. I was there for a little bit. Now I'm back. I don't know what the fuck is going on, because then I took just as much as them. What was your salvia experience like? Well, well, first of all, I find that really interesting people have different completely different experiences and they can be right next to each other. But also what you're saying, I've heard this before about just, you know, someone can take the same, same stuff, same night, and then nothing would happen.

And then another night, what is a strange like elusiveness to this plant that I find to be. Maybe it's sort of indicative of its spirit or characteristic. I don't know. But yeah, so I, it's difficult to explain, but I'll describe it the way it happened because it kind of came together. So I take a hit of the pipe. We put it in a pipe. Just like, you know, smoked it regularly. I didn't first try. And then I lie down on the bed. And as I'm lying down on the bed, I just suddenly become overwhelmed. But it feels like a rush of like, like when you're getting like blasted by like an ocean tide, but it's just sort of like an ongoing roar or rush. And after a few moments, I almost like completely forget that there's anything else but this is rushing energetic flow.

And then all around me, there's this kind of shimmering, partly electronic, partly organic cellular structure in which I'm suddenly a part of. And it's just oscillating in this like ocean current that's really powerful and it's just flipping me back and forth. And I was probably rolling around on the bed. But I mean, in this experience, I'm just this cellular structure flowing back and forth. And then it moves from that to just sort of now I'm suddenly this, this shimmering tree that's the sort of existing and just being. And I could feel like all of the branches and everything just sort of feels this vibrant energy of this giant tree that's just there and it's existing in a different completely different space and human beings because it, you know, it doesn't have limbs or it doesn't move.

It's just it has a completely different way of being in the world and interiority of consciousness. And I'm that thing. I'm that tree. And I just forget my personness for a while. And I'm just that tree and I don't really know how much time passes or not passes because it feels like I could have been that tree for a whole lifetime of that tree in this giant forest connected to like this plant consciousness. And then, and then I'm pulled out of it and then I'm suddenly me again and ironically, I don't know if this is just an after effect of coming out of the trip, but for a while, I just feel like my physical like my human body is actually stiffer than the tree.

I feel constrained and rigid like I'm a piece of wood as a person. And for a while, I'm like trying to shake it off like I just feel this like crunchy uncomfortable rigidness in my body. And then I eventually got used to it again. I'm like, Oh, that's just being a human. I think whatever I was that tree was way more just expansive and free and just energetically flowing. But I think, I mean, interpreting it that weird cellular thing at the beginning and then later on the tree. Maybe I was a xylem in the flow of the tree because it was this kind of back and forth back and forth in the cellular tube shimmering energy. So I just thought that was really cool. Like, I was a tree.

I got to experience a completely different way of my own consciousness is completely became tree consciousness in terms of my own interpretations of it. But that really interested me. And it also kind of for some reason got me in a funny enough a Whitley Streeber kick of rereading him just something about like, well, if you can become something so totally other. And if you can transport yourself out, maybe like, you know, abduction experiences or some kind of altered state where people are pulled out like that, like I was pulled out of my series, but I have no idea. It's just it's really interesting, interesting stuff. Well, so two thoughts. One is, that's pretty awesome. I might have three thoughts here.

The second is, is you have a really adept skill at communicating just regularly, obviously, but also you're interpreting a psychedelic experience in a very kind of concise and empirical way. You know, you may want to dabble with some other psychedelics at some point in your life because like, there's no elusiveness with mushrooms or LSD. Like, there's no elusiveness. If you take it and it's it, you're gonna get it. You know, I think there are that this is this is kind of where I'm at with psychedelics. So I said, I didn't do them for 15 years. Then I did a low doses of mushrooms, like two, two and a half grams, nothing crazy, nothing. And I used to take like nine grams at a time and call it, which was like, holy shit.

But I started this is like a couple years ago. And it was very, very, very, very, very awesome. It wasn't overwhelming. I wasn't going into it with a mindset of trying to actually glean or for some purpose. I was just going to let the experience happen, see if I could question it, prod it. And I found it to be incredibly helpful just in terms of like mindset shift. I don't know, like, I don't, I'm not advocating for you or anyone else to do psychedelics, but I find that the ability they have to kind of suck people out of their regular ordinary quote unquote states of consciousness is potentially a tool that is incredibly powerful, which is what we saw in the 60s, right? We saw people access all of these, all of these drugs, LSD, especially, and really just be like, oh my God, there's so much more.

Now it seems like I, this is my current take on where we're at in the world, and it's optional if you want to opt in. This is a pretty psychedelic experience as it is, right? Like, the world is nuts now. It is the omnipresence of whatever, like, I'm talking to someone sometimes and I'm like, it's kind of like tripping. Like, you know, like, I'm not really, and like I said, I had an experience where I trip for three months afterwards, so I fundamentally do not believe that the chemicals themselves like affect us and that I think they kind of pull out. Or sprout something as they interact with our consciousness and that how it happens.

Same thing with cannabis, same thing with most drugs. So I don't know, man, you might enjoy low doses of mushrooms or something because not for any real purpose or it's kind of spiritual evolution, but just as like a reporting bounce back experience and you sound like pretty grounded too, which is a hallmark. Like the only people I absolutely, absolutely advise don't take psychedelics are people who are just like, they're not grounded, right? They, they're already off on something else or they're set and setting, right? If they're depressed, if there's some serious life situation, like you really have to have an experience with doing them, but you may enjoy them.

I mean, you're tangentially related to, you know, with reality sandwich and these other things. Like, I'm sure you'll pop up and see the similarities. That was one thing in the supernatural that I was like, man, if he would have just weaved in psychedelics here, this would have been like amazing, the best book ever. Not taking anything away from it now. I mean, I breeze through it in like three days. Incredible. This is awesome, man. I'm having a great time. So, okay, what, what, do you want to say something? Oh, no, I'm just going to say I'm, unfortunately, I've only read a third of the book, but I love the supernatural. I have, I have it, but yeah, I need to finish it.

Oh, yeah. It's at your own pace. I found myself, because Whitley, I didn't know anything really about him before. I didn't even know about Communion at all. Didn't know anything. I was reading it at night and I was freaking out. I was getting so freaked out, man. I'm like, there's going to be little blue cobolds running around me stealing my drink. And I got to say, man, I had some really weird dreams, like, after I started reading it, like, very, very weird dreams. Next up, next subject, dreams. What do you think dreams are? I didn't want to dreams. I think there are different types of dreams. I mean, you know, there's like, you know, your brain's just sort of recycling images and playing.

But then, of course, there's other dreams that seem to be, I don't know, like, like a psychedelic, like, like a mystical experience. They suddenly, they pull you out of yourself. Or they take yourself and pull you into something more connected to everybody else or everything else. And, you know, it's interesting. Baha'u'llah wrote about dreams and Natalie and I were speaking about this recently, a passage he had about it where basically he's describing dreams as every dream that you have is another world. So, basically, God is just creating infinite worlds, infinite realities. And, like, those are real. Those are just as real as your existence is. So this is a kind of ontology to dreams that's like the world is, you know, that's a, that's real in its own way.

So, I mean, that's sort of like what I believe I just, I feel that dreams allow us to kind of just go into these other worlds, these other realms. Right. Yeah, I mean, are they literally real in the sense of like, oh, this world has matter and physical substance and laws of physics, like ours? Maybe not. But, you know, you could say that thought worlds have just as much of existence, you know, a lot of esoteric schools believe this, you know, there are thought worlds, or dream worlds, or national realms. Of course. I totally agree just to be clear that I, that is my view of what I think dreams are. And I think they're fundamentally real, just like when I think people have psychedelic experiences on drugs or whatever, those are real too.

What I've noticed in dreams, like Carl Jung, one of my favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite thinkers ever. I just thought he was one of the best bridges between East and West and just kind of these things when there was not a lot of framework for them. You know, he essentially thought that dreams could be used, unlike Freud, Freud, Freud very much subscribed to that. These are a repository for repressed parts of consciousness that would experience in waking life. That was Freud's thing. This is one of the big differences between the two. Jung thought, listen, these are maps. I don't think he ever explicitly said that he thought they had inherent existence.

I think that was a little too radical at the time he was writing, but I think the people who followed him after and his disciples, they kind of allude to that. But he said, listen, this is where the unconscious shows symbols, and this is how we can glean actual information on what's going out externally into the world, and that there's a direct correlation between internal events and external events. What I'm getting into now, what I'm noticing in myself is I'm looking for maps or blueprints of how to interact with the worlds we can't see, and then bring something back from those and kind of extend them into the world that we can see and experience with our five senses.

It's not very different from what you're doing with literature, right? There are these esoteric kind of crystal distillments and essences in these literary books and writings that you can pull out by talking about them in groups, by speaking with people, you make them more concretized, right? I love that. So yeah, that's what I think dreams are too. I'm just constantly fascinated about the process of dreaming, what it means, interpreting life as a sort of dream. My new concept I'm playing around with is what if we're dead, and what if when we die, we actually become alive again, like as a concept, like we don't know. No one can say that's not how it goes. We totally think we're alive, but we could be dead right now. We have no idea.

We don't really know what death is. So, yeah, man, I'm fascinated. Listen, we're going to break it here. I'm going to leave people wanting more because we're going to do this again. And I don't know if you feel like this, but we're friends now. So, let's stay in contact and anything you have going on related to your new projects, ongoing projects, let me know. I'm down to help. I think you're an awesome dude. Thank Natalie, who I can't see, who has been going to the behind face. This has been great, man. I really appreciate you coming on. Thanks. Likewise, Noah. I'm glad we're friends now, and I'll definitely keep you keeping the loop with stuff that's going on.

All right. Thanks for having me on. [Music] Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. [Music] Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. [Music] Well, here you are again and again and again. I love that you guys listen past the music or again are just too lazy to turn it off. Or maybe you like the song and you're like, oh, I like the song and that it ended and now you're hearing me. Oh, no.

Good episode, right? I really loved having Jeremy on. As a reminder, the book that was mentioned throughout this podcast, The Supernatural, can be yours for the low, low price of nothing. All you have to do is go to syncpodcast.com. That's S-Y-N-C, podcast.com. I'm going to assume you know how to spell podcasts. And put in your email on the right side or the bottom of every post. And you will be subscribed to the Synchronicity community and it'll be very explicit about what that is once you join and before you join. And then you're entered. And then it's a random drawing. And if you win, I'll let you know. And then I'll announce you just like I did Adam from Austin. Way to go, Adam, in this episode. So, yeah. Thank you so much. Rate and review.

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