The Spirit of The Joint

[H]owever long my lifespan, I need to live it with childlike wonder, laughing, loving, playing creating new meaning, and enjoying the time I have, rather than living a grim and somber life, waiting to die and afraid to live. I am flesh and blood. I love. I feel. I think. I am who I was before this diagnosis. Active. Alert. Alive. I vow to continue to live that way for all the remaining days of my life.

Susan Wolf Sternberg, A Year of Miracles,                   A Healing Journey From Cancer to Wholeness

needs and wants in deep consideration of my own past, present and future. Over the past 2 decades-plus, journaling has been major therapy for me. It has promoted growth in so many ways. Journaling is a major tool for self-exploration, for healing, for moving forward, for exploring all that life offers, and more. I highly recommend it to anyone who has questions and problems with life's demands, whether you consider yourself a writer or not. I highly recommend it for anyone who wishes to explore their dreams and passions.

Just as there are other ways besides writing for expressing yourself, dancing for instance, there are other vehicles for healing and growth. To my own list, in addition to writing and dancing, I've added more and more over the years the practices of both yoga and tai chi. These have become staples in my body-mind-spirit diet. Other staples include hiking and camping, exploring the great outdoors, backyard trails and the wilds, hitting the road for a little big adventure, seeing what's out there, soaking it all in, realizing as much as I can, all that I'm soaking in is exactly what I am. Thou art that, as the wise man says.

Of course, along with everything else, cannabis too has been a constant companion, or vehicle if you will, for healing, growth and exploration, and finally for connection. That for me, is the spirit of the joint...(though to be quite honest, a hit or two off the ol' pipe is my usual route of imbibement, but that's beside the point). So let's see if I can expand a bit on what I mean by the spirit of the joint.

To begin I am absolutely convinced cannabis opens channels of communication between the experiencer and that which is experienced. Cannabis somehow---along the lines of Huxley's reducing valve metaphor---allows one greater access or connection to both one's interior world as well as one's exterior world. At this point, in both experiencing and in writing about this greater access-communication, it's easy to take off on philosophic discussions concerning the nature of self and other, subject and object, and where the two intersect. Such metaphysical explorations can be highly stimulating, highly confusing, or just plain distracting depending on where you are at and where you are going. For now I'll just focus on this general tendency of cannabis to open channels and catalyze connections, especially with regard to altered states of consciousness and socialization.
Judging by the statistics, most adults are familiar with at least one altered state of consciousness called alcohol intoxication. In general, we know that an alcohol-induced altered state of consciousness significantly affects our ability to express ourselves and communicate and connect with others. That the initial effect of alcohol serves to improve socialization is a major reason why people drink. Unfortunately, as alcohol consumption increases the positive course of socialization takes a turn for the worse, often quite suddenly and unexpectedly. At this downturn, the alcohol induced altered state of consciousness is anything but productive and for many exceedingly destructive.

So if we admit that alterations in our state of consciousness can lead to positive social consequences, while at the same time realizing alcohol is not necessarily the best or only option in this regard, then we might consider cannabis an alternative. It is after all, a MUCH safer vehicle on the route to altered states of consciousness. Again, I touch upon the spirit of the joint. As with my grandfather's tavern, a locus of social connection and conviviality, sharing cannabis serves in the same way, without the ugly mess. (Just how ugly the mess of alcohol gets I'll show in a later chapter.) Now let's shift our focus on altered states from social to personal.  

Over the past 50 years or so, a number of psych-folks have utilized altered states of consciousness to facilitate therapy. In his book The Cosmic Game, Explorations of the Frontiers of Human Consciousness, explorer-healer Stanislov Grof discusses with broad insight and expertise the benefits, as well as challenges, of utilizing altered states within a therapeutic framework (including his development of holotropic breathwork, a nondrug alternative to inducing altered states). This book is a must for the cannabis psychonaut as it lays a solidly grounded foundation for inner-self-exploration. Built on a lifetime of professional experience, Grof provides a sort of roadmap for the psyche, discussing what one may expect in probing their psychic depths. Bottom line: exploring the inner psyche brings to the surface all sorts of repressed and underlying traumas and issues, and the deeper in mind-time one goes, the more these issues and traumas shift from a personal to a collective nature. In other words, we all have these underlying forces, shadows and veils buried deep within us. These prevent us from seeing and living our true nature. On the upside, as Grof says, "When we succeed in penetrating this dark veil of elemental instinctual forces, we discover that the innermost core of our being is divine rather than bestial."

Does this mean we must all do the work of the sage or mystic, or don robes and dedicate our lives to the pursuit of enlightenment? Perhaps. And perhaps not. I think there's good reason to believe that since the path to inner divinity has already been paved by others before us, our work need not be so difficult. Further, as more folks take this path, the easier it becomes for the rest. At some point we may even reach a certain critical mass of folks "on the path" such that it becomes nearly effortless for the rest. Of course I submit this as an hypothesis. Yet I think holistic science, with consciousness as reality's basis and nonlocality the rule, backs me up on this.

Hypothesis aside, no doubt each of us has our own work to do. And cannabis can help us with this. Its help can be as gentle or forceful as you wish to make it. With the assistance of cannabis we can bypass our everyday waking consciousness, create windows of different perspectives and open doors to other worldviews. Similar to dreaming, in suppressing or resting the activity of the dominant waking brain, we gain ready access to memories, needs and knowledge buried within the deepest part of our psyche. However attained---fasting, meditation, breathwork or medication---this is the basis of altered states of consciousness. It allows us expanded and deepened views of our self and our environment. It might be said this is healing and health through better vision, understanding and connection.

Mystic and spiritual teacher George Gurdjieff claimed that people normally live in a state of hypnotic waking sleep. The philosopher Heraclitus, also known as the reviler of the mob, probably would have agreed with him. For it is this seemingly innate inclination to waking sleep, or tendency to so easily get lost or entranced by typical experience, that results in so many human troubles and societal problems, including endless personal dramas, senseless political campaigns and whims of war.

While in our day and age the masses may not be as asleep as these two saw in their time, our history, both genetically and experientially, does support this almost automatic herding tendency. Perhaps moving mostly en masse is just part of being human and not in itself a bad thing. In fact I'm certain it's quite beneficial in a number of ways. And yet what happens if this waking sleep is left unchecked? Are the recurring mass problems our civilized history the result?

Mass problems of war, overpopulation and environmental destruction have not always been known to man. In fact a strong case could be made that the pre-civilized human, the hunter-gatherer and simple farmer, had in many ways a life much simpler and richer, or, without romanticizing it too much, at least a life more harmonious with their environment and each other. Did altered states of consciousness play a role in early man's survival? Shamanic traditions the world over tell us this is almost certainly the case. Otherworldly visions were often critical to healing. But beyond healing, have not altered states of consciousness been an ongoing, and perhaps even necessary part of human evolution? Here we might find the basis for the existence of naturally occurring cannabinoid compounds and receptors in own bodies.

Our perennial dependence on plants as a food source has over the ancient millennia created many ongoing alliances with mind-altering agents, with cannabis obviously playing a major role. The altered states of consciousness thus produced by such agents were helpful in many ways physically, mentally and spiritually. After all, connection and communication beyond everyday experience provides ready insight and perspective that might be beneficial to survival. No wonder why altered states of consciousness figure so prominently in indigenous cultures, often playing key roles in the context of social ritual and rites of passage.

Having said all that, in the spirit of the joint...onward.

My grandfather Johnnie Greco spent a happy fulfilling life running his business, the Coors Tavern, a place he affectionately called, the joint. A man of notable distinction and community standing, I wrote about  Johnnie the Greek upon his passing ---his beginnings as a grade school dropout and bus driver, his rumored activity as a bootlegger during prohibition, his dedicated support of youth baseball and passion for athletics, and finally his life-long endeavor as beer pourer and burger-flipper extraordinaire. So too I wrote about his top gun son, my uncle, Sonny, an ace flyer of the F-104 Super Star Fighter and one of the most successful flyers in military history with over 313 successful missions under his wing.

Over the past 8 years I've written four eulogies for close relatives and loved ones, all people I've admired very much, and each of whom in their own way was a most extraordinary person. Writing about the life of another from the perspective of their death is a humbling and inspiring experience. And each time I have done so, I've gotten the unmistakable impression that somehow, in a way I can't fully understand or describe, they are still around. Beyond faith and reason, I've felt their essence behind the matter, their spirit beyond the material realm.

I've always been a writer. Much like my grandfather, I started as a habitual list-maker. Then I began journaling, recording my thoughts and exploring my