Journal No 21

5th May
O Captain, My Captain,

A few weeks have passed since my last letter. I shall try my best to explain, but I find it difficult to put into words.
The Lady E was kind enough to set herself to the task of preparing a tincture and perfume for my personal studies. The mind is a vast place, each one with depths and caverns unknown, not unlike the ocean. I wanted to travel the uncharted waters of the mind, to push against the boundaries until making contact with another. The tincture I requested was to aid me in this...personal challenge. I was warned of the dangers of using the various plants, knowing of their properties. What I had failed to take into account was the fact that most of these plant substances are used in various shamanic rituals for vision questing and the facing of one's self. I had thought that by not belonging to those faiths, that using these entheogenic plants I would somehow be able to skip that process in order to reach out and touch the mental waters of another. I was wrong. I had no intention of going through such an ordeal and found myself unprepared for such a task. When a dark mirror is held up to one's very being and everything is laid exposed, do you look or turn away? It is a question one must answer for oneself. I, being who I am, looked.
They say the Egyptian gods have a ritual after one is dead. Anubis weighs one's heart against the feather of Ma'at. If the heart is heavier than the feather then it is devoured by a crocodile headed goddess, cursing one's soul to eternal restlessness. Finding myself trapped in a strange state of being, there was no one to judge my actions except myself and I could imagine no harsher judge. Good, evil...dark light.. is all just a matter of perspective. I am not a Jain, nor would I ever aspire to be one. I am the sum of my actions and experiences and would have it no other way. To want to change for someone else's values is to give up ones own, I feel.
So, I would like to say that the tincture is a success, but I feel that each participant will have to face some sort of personal intense introspection before being able to attempt mental contact with another.
Achingly Yours, Angeline~