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7 Buddhist Principles to Help Transform the Human Soul

Gary Z McGee
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7 Buddhist Principles to Help Transform the Human Soul

“To conquer oneself is a greater task than conquering others.” ~ The Buddha

Buddhism has been humbling individuals for thousands of years. In Buddhism, it’s understood that conquering attachment begins with conquering the self. In this sense, Buddha was individuating before individuation was cool. He was self-actualizing before self-actualization was even a thing. 

Nonsecular, spiritual, open minded, disciplined, skeptical, curious, and courageous, Buddhism has it all.

In the spirit of conquering the self and transforming attachment into non-attachment, here are 7 Buddhist principles to help transform the human soul. 

The self is an illusion

“The self is a house on fire. Get out quickly.” ~ The Buddha

If the self is a house on fire, then non-attachment is the exalted air once you’ve escaped. 

Although the self is a necessary illusion, you must still guard against the attachment to your desire regarding the self (egoism). Mindfulness meditation is a great aid in this endeavor. It clears the mind, calms the body, and opens the spirit to receiving interconnectedness. 

When you’re able to strip away the brainwashed ego and the cultural conditioning, the world appears as it is—interconnected. This sense of interconnectedness will give you a direct conduit to the interdependent magic of the cosmos. And when you can tap into this magic, it transforms the way you see and interact with the world.

In a state of healthy non-attachment, you will realize that the self is nothing more than masks all the way down perceiving delusions all the way up. Your non-attachment frees you from the masks as well as the delusions. This creates a liberated state of fearlessness.

Be undaunted

“There are only two mistakes one can make along the road to truth; not going all the way, and not starting.” ~ The Buddha

Having liberated your mind-body-soul from the illusion of the self, you become a force of nature (cosmos/universe/infinity) first, a person second. You become unafraid, undeterred, undaunted. You become the tip of the spear, the sharpened edge of the Golden Ratio. The road to truth opens wide before you. 

You take the first step onto the path, and the lessons learned from your deep meditations and healthy non-attachment teaches you one profound truth: always keep the Truth Quest ahead of the “truth.” The delicious irony of it all compels you forward. There is no end-state. There is no final destination, no absolute truth, no shiny heaven or fiery hell, no enlightenment, no concrete answers. The only thing is the Truth Quest. 

You understand deeply, profoundly, intensely, that idleness is poison for a seeker of truth. So, undaunted, you go all the way.

Balance is the key

“To be idle is a short road to death and to be diligent is a way of life; foolish people are idle, wise people are diligent.” ~ The Buddha

Live a balanced life. This requires diligence and discipline. Understanding what the Buddha taught is an important part of that discipline.

The foundation of Buddhism is the Four Noble Truths:

1.) Dukkha: The truth of suffering: Life is suffering.

2.) Samudaya: The truth of the cause of suffering: Suffering is due to attachment.

3.) Nirhodha: The truth of the end of suffering: Attachment can be overcome.

4.) Magga: The truth of the path that frees us from suffering: Follow the Eightfold Path.

The Eightfold Path:

1.) Right View or Right Understanding: Insight into the true nature of reality.

2.) Right Intention: The unselfish desire to realize enlightenment.

3.) Right Speech: Using speech compassionately.

4.) Right Action: Using ethical conduct to manifest compassion.

5.) Right Livelihood: Making a living through ethical and nonharmful means.

6.) Right Effort: Cultivating wholesome qualities and releasing unwholesome qualities.

7.) Right Mindfulness: Whole body-and-mind awareness.

8.) Right Concentration: Meditation or some other dedicated, concentrated practice.

Then there are the four virtues. Also referred to as the brahmaviharas or the four immeasurables. They include:

1.) Metta: Loving-kindness.

2.) Karuna: Compassion.

3.) Mudita: Empathic Joy.

4.) Upekkha: Equanimity.

The effective cultivation of these disciplines will bring balance to your mind, body, and soul.

Guard against dogmatism

“If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.” ~ Linji Yixuan, ninth-century Chinese Buddhist

Cultivate the four noble truths, practice the eightfold path, embody the four virtues, but remain vigilant. Because even these can lead to dogmatism if you don’t also practice non-attachment. Never believe you have the answers. Keep humor ahead of hubris and curiosity ahead of certainty. 

So, why kill Buddha if you meet him on the path? Because any Buddha claiming to be the Buddha is false. Any Tao claiming to be the Tao is not the eternal Tao. Similarly, you should kill any notion of self-mastery in order to continue improving your mastery; so as not to get stuck, or hung-up on your expertise.

“Entertaining a thought without accepting it” is the essence of Buddhist non-attachment. Having this ability is empowering because it keeps the human mind in an open flow relationship with reality. It keeps the mind sharp and elastic regarding its relationship with cosmos.

A mind that can observe, creatively question, and then let go of the “answers,” is a mind that is less likely to get trapped in rigid constructs of thought.

Seek the middle way

“The middle path does not go from here to there. It goes from there to here.” ~ Jack Kornfield

buddhist principles

From potential to actual enlightenment there lies the Middle Way. The Middle Way is about wholeness, not enlightenment. It’s about being, not becoming. It’s recognizing that we are all a mighty pivot between attachment and aversion, between being and non-being, between form and emptiness, between free will and determinism.

The Middle Way pierces through the veil. It is absolute balance between opposites, neither leaning toward extremism nor nihilism. It’s epically centered. Proactively non-delusional. Excruciatingly whole. 

As Sogyal Rinpoche said, “You don’t actually “become” a buddha, you simply cease, slowly, to be deluded. Being a buddha is not being some omnipotent spiritual superman but becoming at last a true human being.”

Be your own authority, think for yourself

“If you adopt an idea or perception as an absolute truth, you close the door of your mind. Attachment to views, attachment to ideas, attachment to perceptions are the greatest obstacles of truth.” ~ The Buddha

No matter where you go, there you are. Therefore, authentic non-attachment begins with honoring the self as a sacred pivot of perception. Before you can properly detach from the illusion of self, you must first accept that it is a very necessary illusion.

You must become your own authority. Doing so will honor your perception as a unique individual. It will free you from the tethers of society, unbind you from your cultural conditioning, and break the spell of your ideological indoctrination. 

As Aristotle said, living in the same era as the Buddha, “Be a free thinker and don’t accept everything you hear as truth. Be critical and evaluate what you believe in.” The Buddha echoed something eerily similar from the other side of the world, “Doubt everything. Find your own light.”

Both of them were speaking toward the great importance of “entertaining a thought without accepting.”

The journey is the thing

“It is better to travel well than to arrive.” ~ The Buddha

Traveling well is being healthy, disciplined, and compassionate along the path. But it is also treating life like a glorious quest: a quest for adventure (the hero’s journey), a quest for truth (the search for knowledge and wisdom), a quest for beauty (appreciating and creating beauty).

“Arriving” will take care of itself. Focus on traveling well. The destination is overrated when the journey is the thing. And, as a bonus, the destination has a higher chance of being great the more you focus on the journey.

Make the journey the prize. When you’re focused on the journey as the prize, you’re rewarded no matter how it turns out. And you’re more likely to be doubly rewarded when it turns out well. In the game of life, the only real destination is death anyway. 

So, keep going. Never settle. Stay flexible. Keep the Truth Quest always ahead of the “truth.” 

As the Indian proverb states, “Life is a bridge, cross over it, but do not build a house on it.”

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Buddhist Principles

5 Signs you Grew up with an Emotionally Immature Parent

Bhavika
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5 Signs you Grew up with an Emotionally Immature Parent

The first seven years of our childhood are the foundational years where the child’s so-called BIOS, or the subconscious mind, or the habitual mind, takes shape. The events and occurrences, be they traumatic or joyous, that take place during these 7 years shape one’s life.

“It is very important that during these early years a child should be surrounded by noble-minded, generous-hearted and affectionate people with good thoughts, for these stamp themselves on the child’s inner life. Example, therefore, in thought and in feeling is the best means of education at this stage. It is not what we say but what we are that influences a child during his first seven years.” ~ Rudolf Steiner,  At the Gates of Spiritual Science – Lecture VI: The upbringing of children.

You can imagine the magnanimity of raising human beings. All said and done, it is a huge challenge. Being a parent doesn’t require any qualifications, but a willingness to constantly do the inner work because parents are their children’s role models, children seek guidance, love, warmth and affection from them. 

However, there are times when parents themselves need healing, to shed off unwanted layers and dysfunctional behavioral patterns that stemmed from their own childhood. Emotionally immature parents frequently parent from a place of early abuse or rejection by their own parents. Many emotionally immature parents are unable to “grow” beyond their own childish demands and self-centeredness, possibly because they were abused or neglected as children.

Perhaps they were not allowed to express their thoughts and feelings for healthy emotional development to take place. This limits their ability to regulate their own emotions in their adult life​. The vicious cycle continues and this behaviour passes on to the future generations too until something drastic is done about it.

Here are 5 signs you grew up with an emotionally immature parent 

“You may wonder why all children don’t make up wonderfully positive role-selves—why so many people are acting out roles of failure, anger, mental disturbance, emotional volatility, or other forms of misery. One answer is that not every child has the inner resources to be successful and self-controlled in interactions with others. Some children’s genetics and neurology propel them into impulsive reactivity instead of constructive action. Another reason negative role-selves arise is that it’s common for emotionally immature parents to subconsciously use different children in the family to express unresolved aspects of their own role-self and healing fantasies.” ~  Lindsay C. Gibson, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents

You struggle to regulate your emotions

Emotionally immature parents are enclosed within the cocoon of their own minds and therefore aren’t available to give the attention and affection their child needs. They are unable to process their emotions and break old patterns in order to overcome their emotional immaturity.

This behaviour makes the child question himself, and it makes him feel like he has done something wrong. The child is not capable of comprehending the reality, what he witnesses 

becomes a part of his personality. 

“Young children are not cognitively capable of sorting out the complexities of your ‘bad days’, unresolved trauma or ancestral patterns. They see your emotions and behaviours simply as a real-time reflection of how you feel about them.” ~ Missy Willis 

While the truth is that the parents have been struggling to cope with their own mental/ emotional state, and the child is at the receiving end.

You develop victim mentality

 “The parent-child connection is the most powerful mental health intervention known to mankind.” ~ Bessel van der Kolk

Grew up with an Emotionally Immature Parent

Emotionally immature parents find it challenging to raise an emotionally healthy child. The lack of attention and communication becomes a traumatic experience for the child and leads to feelings of self-doubt. 

As a result, one develops a negative mindset, where the child feels that nothing is working out for them in life. In my childhood, I have felt victimized and wallowed in self-pity, “why me,” “why does this keep happening to me (whenever things went wrong),” and all the self-doubt questions kept popping up, because I never learned how to handle different human emotions in a healthy manner.

You are forced to grow up before your time

After my father passed away when I was 17 years old and about to enter senior college, my mother was too emotionally disturbed to cater to our (my sister and I) emotional needs. The circumstances were such that we had to carve our own path, be our own guide and compelled to make our own decisions. 

In such a case we grew up before time, before we were even emotionally mature of taking big decisions in life.

Now as an adult I can say I have grown up to be capable and responsible, it has been a long arduous journey of healing, there are still several parts of me that need extra care and attention. However, it’s an ongoing process, and I am a work in-progress. 

You harbor low self-esteem

When the caregivers or parents are so busy sorting out their own emotional woes, it makes it difficult to motivate yourself to strive for more, and imagine that you deserve more when your parents don’t seem interested in how you go about things in your life.

In my case it always seemed that parents weren’t really interested in developing our skills or pushing us to achieve goals or work on a hobby. The environment was always unpleasant at home apart from the time we went out with family friends etc.  

This led to feeling unacknowledged, unimportant, and developed timidness and low self-esteem. 

You become overly dependent in relationships

When a child sees the adults in his environment not regulating their emotions in a healthy way, that often leads to chaos in a child’s mind. Trying to wrap their innocent mind around it takes a toll on their emotional well-being, making them feel insecure. A young child needs protection and security while growing up and a lack of it makes the child insecure.

In this whole scenario of protecting myself, I realised over the years that I had built a wall, restraining my unhealed emotions from coming to the surface. When I got into a serious relationship, a lot of these unhealed emotions created havoc earlier on, I had frequent meltdowns, panic attacks, was stuck in a loophole, constantly harboring a negative mindset.  

I started maintaining a journal to vent out my feelings, that gradually helped me to tackle these emotions along with other healing modalities that helped clean the mess. In retrospect, I have come a long way to become an emotionally balanced parent for our 3 children. 

The long road to healing

According to the author of The Courage to be Disliked, traumatic experiences in childhood cannot be a reason to not change to a better version of yourself.

“No experience is in itself a cause of our success or failure. We do not suffer from the shock of our experiences—the so-called trauma—but instead we make out of them whatever suits our purposes. We are not determined by our experiences, but the meaning we give them is self-determining.”  

We cannot let the past dictate our present or even our future. Childhood events are deeply rooted in our subconscious, and it manifests in strange ways in our relationships with others. If you become aware of your own patterns, triggers, then maybe, just maybe, you can slowly and gradually untie the knots in your subconscious that will allow you to flow freely in life.

Letting go and forgiveness are the anchors to help us sail through choppy waters until we find stillness deep within our being.

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The heart of a father

Do You Lack the Courage to Change?

Clyde
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Do You Lack the Courage to Change?

As you may know over the last few years I have written a few articles based on Childhood Trauma. What brought my childhood trauma to the forefront is the role reversal in the same kind of scenarios I experienced as a child. Although I’m doing my best not to repeat the generational trauma that has been passed down.

A lot of psychological principles are based on the theories of Freud and Jung, a lot of psychiatrists would actually go out and say that your current issues stemmed from your past traumas and would then just end up counselling you by saying, “So you see, it’s not your fault.”

I used a justification like this that it’s not my fault for being a little broken, a little awkward in social situations, its because of the amount of crap that I had to go through while growing up, has moulded me into what I am today.

I lived in this unknown bubble of comfort until I listened to “The Courage to be Disliked.” This book literally made me see this bubble I had built for myself and got me to poke holes to help me get out of my comfort zone. While I was listening to the book I could feel, it unravelling my triggers and cognitive dissonance kept popping up at times.

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Cultivating a Potent Gratitude Practice and it’s Benefits

Bhavika
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Cultivating a Potent Gratitude Practice and it’s Benefits

Gratitude is an essential practice in our daily life to keep us grounded, humble, and focused on life. We’re all aware of its numerous health benefits, ranging from reducing stress and anxiety to promoting calmness in our social interactions and reducing inflammation.

gratitude practice

But something of interest is that, research suggests receiving gratitude is more potent as compared to giving gratitude. According to Andrew Huberman, when you remember the time when somebody genuinely thanked you for something that you did and the way it made you feel in receiving that gratitude, shifts our body’s neural circuitry in a more effective way as compared to writing down things you are thankful for.

If you can’t think of any event when you received gratitude, then find a story that inspires you, where someone else is receiving help, and that story actually moved you in a profound way. When you think of such a story, it steers your mental and physical health in a positive direction.

“What narrative you select is based on your taste, the story you select doesn’t need to have semblance to your life experience, it’s about the story that moves you. Find a story that is particularly meaningful for you, genuinely expressing thanks, and list down on paper what the struggle was, what the help was, and something about how does that impact you emotionally.” ~ Andrew Huberman

What a story on gratitude does to our physiology?

Stories are a powerful tool in making a difference in a person’s life. Listening to a story coordinated the heart rate of certain individuals based in different places. Even when different individuals were listening from different places at different times, their heart beats in the same rhythm.

Select a story that you will return to, even if it’s not the entire story, and you note down a few points or write a summarized version of that story, and keep coming back to it regularly, even if it’s for 5 minutes a day, will create a perceptible shift in your heart beat and breathing, and will shift your physiology into a more relaxed state.

I have been personally trying to inculcate a regular gratitude practice, first thing is for anything to be effective it has to be done regularly, whether it’s doing yoga, meditation or any form of energy work, to be reaping benefits, repetition is the key here.

Obstacles on the path of a gratitude practice

Dr. Robert Emmons, author of the book Thanks! How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier, said that rather than adding a task to our existing schedule, you should integrate gratitude into your daily life.

To cultivate a gratitude practice in our daily lives, we do not need to create overwhelming goals or take any specific steps; instead, we can open up our awareness to the gifts that come into our lives daily. Once we set an intention to notice these gifts, we bring in a multitude of benefits into our lives.

He also stated that in order to achieve this, you should firstly be open to receiving gratitude, and here are three ways suggested by Emmons that can unlock the doors for gratitude to find its way to us.

You believe only in self-reliance

It is impossible to have a feeling of gratitude if you aren’t open to receiving, this could be even a helping hand or assistance in daily life. Others contribute to our success, this is how it works, in the course of our lives there’s always someone who lends us a hand, it could be as easy as someone opening the elevator door when you have your hands full of groceries.

Sometimes in office like scenarios when you work as a team, it’s human nature to take credit when things go well and prefer to put the blame on someone else when things go wrong. A situation like this works against the ability to feel gratitude.

Negative biases

It is extremely normal to focus on what’s going wrong as compared to what’s going right; this is just how our mind works. Not only that, if you try to look back in the past, it’s far easier to remember negative memories as compared to positive ones. On a personal note, when I try to recollect positive experiences as a child, I find it far easier to recollect negative experiences.

But then if you try to recollect the positive experiences and express gratitude towards them, it helps amplify the good in our lives and even helps us reduce negativity bias.

Dislike being indebted

Some of us enjoy receiving gifts, but do you ever feel that it’s better to give gifts rather than receive them? That’s probably because receiving it makes you feel like you are now in debt, and you need to return the favor as soon as possible. Again, this behavior puts you in a mode where you feel obligated to give something back, and it’s stuck there at the back of your mind.

You want to pay it back, and you feel indebted instead of actually feeling grateful that you have received a gift. You have to learn to be ok with being indebted and accept the gift with gratitude, enjoy it and be thankful, don’t get stuck in a negative pattern when there’s something good going on.

The Science of Gratitude Practice

Conclusion

All you need to do is live life from a place of gratitude, to see that there are so many givers and receivers in your life, and to know that each of them has a place. Incorporating gratitude practice is as simple as when you sit down for a meal or walk to your car, think of the same story (either personal or the story you selected) when someone was genuinely grateful to you, and how touched you were with that gesture. This simple gratitude practice, done regularly, leaves a long-lasting impact on our health as it gets you into this mode of gratitude, and neural circuits get activated more easily with repetition of this practice.

When was the last time you received gratitude?

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Gratitude by Melina

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Dr. Andrew Huberman is a neuroscientist, associate professor in the department of neurobiology and psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Jim Figora’s Ethnobotanical Visionary Art

Clyde
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Jim Figora’s Ethnobotanical Visionary Art

Ethnobotanicals have always been of interest to me, from my Ayahuasca experiences and even other plant medicines have had a major role to play in my own inner work and path corrections. Then when you combine it with Visionary art you have my undivided attention.

I recently came across this painting across this piece of artwork “The Stoned Ape Theory” and found it fascinating, for those of you who don’t know about what that is, this article on mushrooms will get you up to speed. So here’s a little interview with Jim Figora the creator of this piece of art.

the stoned ape art jim figora
The Stoned Ape Theory

When did you know that art was your calling?

I think there is a difference between being born as an artistic person, and choosing to pursue the arts as a career path. I don’t think I ever had a calling to become an artist, it was just something I had to do, a kind of compulsion to create. Some of my earliest memories involved making art as a young child, an inherent need to express my thoughts and feelings through visual representations of what was on my mind.

I was lucky enough to have a very devoted art teacher in high school, Caroline Freese, who pushed me to develop my techniques and knowledge of art, and eventually encouraged me to go to college and major in 2-dimensional design with a focus on oil painting.

Since then, making paintings has really just been a hobby of mine, a kind of meditation that keeps me sane, and a way for me to express my feelings and explore subjects that interest me. It’s really only the last couple of years that my creations have attracted a decent amount of attention and commercial success, which has allowed me to support myself and turn my passion into more of a career.

How was your relationships with your parents and siblings as a child?

I had a pretty “normal” childhood in the suburbs of Chicago, the typical middle-class American experience. I have 2 older brothers that I love dearly, who were always a source of inspiration, encouragement, and a healthy dose of competition. My parents were both blue-collar, responsible, hard-working people. They definitely pushed me and my brothers to strive for success, both academically and spiritually.

They were strict about the aspects of life that they valued, such as work ethic, honesty, integrity, and devotion. But they gave us a certain amount of freedom which allowed us to explore the things that brought us happiness, and I’m grateful for that.

What drew you to ethnobotanicals?

My interest in psychoactive plants started at a pretty early age. I think it began when I first really began listening to the Grateful Dead as a teenager, which is a body of music that absolutely spoke to my soul. It was my curiosity of the 60s counterculture that led me to start experimenting with cannabis and LSD, both of which changed my life forever. I became fascinated with altered-states of consciousness, initially because I wanted to know what influenced my favorite artists to create such unique music.

This was the early 2000s in Prohibitionist America, so it wasn’t necessarily easy to find all of the compounds I wanted to explore. But a pivotal point in my explorations of consciousness came when I discovered the website Erowid, which is an extensive online vault of information regarding plants and drugs. It is a library of knowledge, containing ethnobotanical information, pharmacology, trip reports, historical usage, cultural impacts, and preparation and dosage information.

Erowid was a game changer for me, and I soaked up as much information as I could. Many of the most interesting drugs were still legal at the time, either because of their obscurity, grey areas in the language of the laws, or novelty on the market. So thanks to Erowid and the online world-marketplace, I began ordering, collecting, and using anything that interested me. I didn’t need an Owsley manufacturing LSD when I had easy access to Hawaiian Baby Woodrose seeds, morning glories, mescaline-containing cacti, salvia divinorum, and a pharmacopeia of yet-to-be-scheduled, novel research chemicals delivered to my mailbox.

It’s only been the last 3 years that I’ve taken my love of ethnobotanicals to the next level, having travelled to the tropics of central and South America to work for organizations dedicated to the responsible use, preservation, and knowledge of psychoactive plants.

I started my journey as a naïve kid interested in altering his mind, but eventually realized the importance of respecting traditions, ceremony, and botanical knowledge. I plan on furthering my understanding in the next year, by immersing myself into some of the cultures of the Amazon who have been stewards of these plants for millennia.

What kind of influence have psychedelics and medicinal plants have on you?

Its hard to know who I would have been if I never got into psychedelics. I’ve always been an adventurous, outgoing person, so I’m not sure my personality would be much different. I think the strongest influence they’ve had on me deals with motivation issues. There have been times in my life where I’ve been lazy, complacent, content with just going through the motions of working a 9-5 job during the day and watching mindless entertainment at night.

But a heroic dose of psychedelics a couple times a year has a way of making me more driven and dedicated in many aspects of my life. They have a way of showing you your life’s purpose, explaining the importance of leaving a legacy, and give many lessons about how to maximize fun, adventure, and love.

So I think they’ve definitely made me a better, more patient artist, because my body of work is the main legacy that I will leave this planet after I die, so I need it to be the best work I can possibly do. I also doubt I would have taken so many open-ended, international trips without my mind being opened by psychedelics.

Once you take 5 grams of mushrooms, buying a one way flight to a country you’ve never been to before seems like an easy endeavour!

yopo jim figora
Exploring Ancient Knowledge

What do you believe your purpose as an artist is?

Like I said in the question above, for me it’s about leaving a legacy. It’s a gift to be alive, and I’m especially grateful to be born with the opportunities and talents that I have. I think it’s important to show your gratitude to this amazing planet by devoting yourself to something that will transcend the short amount of years you have.

Some people might achieve this by having kids, inventing new technology, writing a book, recording music, or even simply planting a tree. For me, it will be the body of artwork that I create, and I’m just getting started!

As far as the psychedelic subject matter goes, I do hope that it makes people curious and more open to experience these plants and drugs. If humans still exist in a couple hundred years, then we will have fully incorporated psychedelic sacraments into our way of life. So the more artists who help break down the stigma, the better.

I’m just a small piece in the puzzle, but if humans are going to get our shit together and learn how to live harmoniously with each other and the planet, it needs to happen soon. And psychedelics will be a major tool to help us get there. So psychedelic artists are very important in my opinion, as the world depends on us!

Do you manage to make a decent living only based on your art or would you say it’s more of a hobby, do elaborate?

For many years, it was really just a hobby. I’ve done a fair amount of commissions over the years, vended at festivals, and sold some prints online, but it was never close to enough income to support myself without a day job. I’ve always resisted the temptation to make art that I thought would be commercially successful. First and foremost, it has to be meaningful for me.

Because of my unusual interests and strange way of expressing them, I never had much of an audience until recently. The internet and social media definitely helped me out though, and the last couple years I’ve definitely “found the others” of people who understand my work, and resonate with the obscure subject matters that I find interesting.

So now I’m happy to say that my income from art has finally reached a point where I don’t need to work a dreaded day job. I’m incredibly grateful to all of the patrons who have bought originals and prints from me.

How long does it take you to create your work, describe the process in brief please!

I usually work on one painting for maybe 2 or 3 months. I take a many breaks and spend lots of time staring at the canvas to see how it wants to evolve. It always starts with a strong idea, with an emphasis on content. It has to really mean something and tell a story.

But the composition, colors, and visual elements evolve throughout the whole process. The paintings are alive and know how they want to look, it’s up to me to just kind of be the medium between the muse and the brush.

Name two of your favourite pieces that you have created and why did you choose them?

I think “The Stoned Ape Theory” and “Exploring Ancient Knowledge” are my two best so far, for a couple different reasons. First of all, my technique on these works has definitely improved compared to my earlier work. The brush work is tighter, the compositions are better, and the overall look is harmonious and visually pleasing to look at.

But these 2 also strongly focus on content. There are layers of meaning in these paintings, which has been a culmination of the years I’ve spent researching the subject matter (mushrooms influencing human evolution, and psychoactive snuffs of the Amazon, respectively.) I think there is a lot of visionary art nowadays that is visually and technically impressive, but lacks much meaning.

For me, content is always most important, as I believe the purpose of art is to give the viewer a lot to think about.

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As Above So Below

What do you think of the world we live in ?

I think we’re all a bunch of monkeys trying to evolve before we blow ourselves up, myself included. Sometimes the world can be a scary place and it can feel like there’s nothing we can do as individuals to create real change. I used to worry about the big picture a lot more, but these days I try not to focus too much on the negative aspects of humanity.

I try my best to be a good person, respect other people and the planet, and leave a light footprint. Overall, this world is an incredible place, with so much opportunity to create the life you want. I’m grateful to be alive in this exciting time and space, and I guess without the negative aspects of the world, the positive ones wouldn’t feel so good.

If you had one message that you could give people, what would it be?

Follow your bliss! You don’t want any regrets on your deathbed, so don’t waste any time with finding out what makes you happy, and pursuing that everyday.

Do you think art helps in raising or changing the consciousness/perspective of a person viewing it, do elaborate?

Of course, that’s the whole point. Art should be a catalyst for thought, emotions, and feelings in the viewer. There should be a lot of subjective meaning for the viewer, and each person will have a unique experience with any given piece. Since consciousness is essentially thoughts, then a successful work of art can certainly raise consciousness.

Even though I believe that to be true, it isn’t really my goal. To be honest, it’s a pretty selfish endeavor for me. It’s just subject matter that I find interesting and want to explore. I don’t spend much time thinking about what it will do for other people.

But I do find it incredibly flattering when someone reaches out and lets me know that my art has an impact on their life. That feels really good when something I have created has benefited someone’s life and helped change their perspective.

We do hope you enjoyed this interview if you would like to check out some more visionary artists, head over to our Artwork section.

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