The Goddess Quest (click here to join my group on Facebook)

(Important note: I am now seeking writing submissions from men for this book as well as women. I have finished writing Part 1. Part 2 will then feature writings from many different women. And Part 3 will feature writings from men. As in the writings by women, the men should keep men in mind that other men are the intended audience, writing to them with a story/message/lesson as to how they can deepen their relationships with women, and/or with the Goddess energy within.)

Update: I am still accepting submissions until at least March 1st, 2011, and possibly beyond that. Please join my group on Facebook (click the subject line above) to receive further updates and developments regarding the book.

Greetings and namaste...

My first book, "Kundalini and the Art of Being" chronicled the story of my unanticipated and very challenging kundalini awakening at the age of 22, as well as my semi-homeless travels at the time around the western United States.

My next book, "The Goddess Quest: A Guide for Men Seeking the Divine, Ecstatic Feminine" will delve deeply into the realm of the Goddess, and of the essence of women in general. However, the book is actually written primarily for men (though I'm sure women will end up finding it very informative as well). The purpose of this book is to help improve and greatly deepen relations between men and women. The underlying theme of the book is that the responsibility lies to a great deal on men to decide it's a priority for them to engage in a more loving relationship with women. The reason for this is that women have already been there from the beginning, ready and yearning for a relationship with men that goes into the realms of true love and intimacy, exploring the full potential of a cooperative, intertwined human relationship. It takes two to tango, and until men decide that's something they are genuinely interested in, then it won't happen. So I hope for this to be a helpful guide for men to figure out how to create the space and the trust for such relating with women.

I am seeking writing submissions from both women and men for the book, because though I've written 7 (fairly short) chapters myself for Part 1 of the book, Part 2 will feature writings from different women, and Part 3 will feature writings from men. See the bottom of this page for more info on that. But I don't expect it to be a collection of pieces that all mirror the same thoughts and ideas. I hope, and I'm sure it will be the case, that there will be a range of different, sometimes opposing views on relations between the sexes, what women's roles are, what men's roles are, what the true balance is, what women really want and what makes a woman happy, how to truly embody the Goddess, or in the case of the men writing, how to deeply connect with the Goddess, within or with women, etc. I hope for it to be a really fun, revealing, engaging, juicy, revolutionary, as well as challenging book that says something new and different, that wakes men up to the real potential of women as well as their own true potential, and shows men how to help create an amazing relationship with their woman that leaves both genuinely fulfilled, happy and deep in love.

So without further ado, here's a peek at some of what I've written so far, the first two chapters of the book...(Despite how it starts, this book isn't at all about male-bashing. But I think it's important to start off with some responsibility-taking given how men have often mistreated women throughout the centuries. I envision the book being a mix of both pushing the boundaries and the comfort zone, as well as a lot of fun. Ultimately, I hope for it to be inspiring for men, not depressing and guilt-ridden)...


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Chapter 1. Make Love not War

At first glance this might seem a silly expression, as nonsensical as “Make Forks, Not Umbrellas“. What does one necessarily have to do with the other? And yet on a deeper level (beyond it being an excuse simply to have lots of sex) it actually captures perfectly the solution to many of the world’s chronic problems.

Men have been warring with one another for thousands of years. To some extent, women have joined in the fight and fought along with them, or at the least supported their efforts. But the wars are almost always of men’s making. Because the choice to go to war as a solution is part of the imbalanced, dominant male construct that has reigned for thousands of years and continue to permeate our modern societies. There are many different, seemingly practical reasons for waging war: territorial disputes, lack of food, water or other resources, lingering feuds, money, expanding power, disarming perceived threats, political rivalries and the list goes on.

But at the core of the male thirst for war, whether between nations, businesses, individuals or in a myriad of other forms, is a lack of connection with feminine love. People—men or women—don’t inflict harm needlessly on others when they’re connected to their own hearts, souls and feeling centers, because they feel the pain that this causes. And they don’t need to continually stir up conflict, aggression and dissonance in order to feel empowered, or else endlessly seek greater influence, money, fame and extravagance in order to find some sense of fulfillment, when they are fulfilled within themselves by a true connection to the divine web of life.

The answer to this enduring discord that has embedded itself in the hearts of many men and plagued humanity for eons lies in the love, wisdom and power of women. Because coinciding with this tendency towards aggression and dominance of the stronger over the weaker within our societies, has also been a denial and subjugation of the feminine principle. It is not the feminine nature to war, to battle, to fight, to seek to destroy that which is perceived as the enemy, to resolve differences through confrontation, to seek lives of excess while the poor and the planet as a whole suffer under a way of living that’s severely out of balance with the natural order.

There is more than enough of everything humans need on our abundant Earth to go around, especially given remarkable advancements in modern technology that have revealed vast alternative sources of energy. For example, water-powered vehicles were on the verge of production twenty years ago, which could have completely transformed the foundations of our societies, including geopolitical changes that might have altered the course of recent wars. But this technology and many others have been repressed by the oil companies. As such, unrelenting greed on the part of some, fueled by a lack of internal fulfillment somewhere deep in their souls, keeps Earth’s resources skewed in favor of a few insatiable elite, while billions around the world struggle to eke out a meager existence. Another example: the recent economic crisis precipitated by a relatively small number of individuals, mostly men, in the banking and mortgage industries in the United States, that ultimately threatened the entire world economy and still leaves many millions unemployed and destitute, years later.

Of course, women are subject to all the frailties and imperfections mentioned here, and a long list could be made of women throughout history who have abused power and manipulated others. The point isn’t that men are all to blame and women are exempt from any responsibility for humanity’s and the planet’s problems. But it is the overarching masculine paradigm that has held sway throughout recorded human history—ignorant and blind for the most part to the complexity, sensitivity and deep-rooted power of the divine feminine nature—that has brought our world to where it stands today, at the brink of collapse on multiple levels. And it is when men begin awakening to the feminine principle both within and without, and sincerely listening to, honoring and aligning with their women and with the wise, ecstatic, loving goddess that resides within each woman, that the world will finally change in some fundamental way and not until then.


Chapter 2. The Game of Love

What men need to understand first and foremost is that women are for the most part ready and in fact intensely longing for a deeply loving, dynamic relationship with men. And they’ve been yearning for this for a very long time. It takes two to tango as they say. But while women have been ready to dance, throwing out hints and sending alluring looks left and right, men have been lost in a game of poker, oblivious to the deeper nature of women, more transfixed by the thrilling prospects of winning or losing their life savings than exploring the true potential that lies within the dreams, feelings and longings of women.

Because in the typical unbalanced male point of view, life and love are games to be won or lost. Women are to be conquered, along with everything else they either desire or feel threatened by. Think of Tiger Woods and his mistresses, which apparently numbered more than a hundred. Being the greatest golfer in the world wasn’t enough. Being rich and famous wasn’t enough. Having a beautiful wife and a child wasn’t enough. Even having an affair didn’t satisfy him. So he had another, and another, and another, to absurdly self-indulgent extremes.

This exemplifies the big distraction that keeps many men from going deeper into themselves. There’s always something more waiting somewhere just beyond reach. If they make a million dollars, then they want a million more. If they win the horse race, then they spend all the winnings hoping to win even bigger. If they win the game, the business deal, the war, the woman, then it’s on to the next battle to be fought, to prove they‘re even more of a force to be reckoned with. And if they lose then they are no longer men, until they can regain their pride and their manhood by somehow getting back on top.

Men have been ever searching for something that remains just beyond their grasp. It’s the buried treasure, the Holy Grail, the Fountain of Youth, El Dorado, Shangri-La. That something that will finally meet all of their expectations and desires and make them finally and truly happy and content and at peace in the world. But El Dorado or some version of it never existed, or was never found or else was nothing like the vision conceived of it once they got there. What men have failed to realize in the endless quest for something precious yet elusive out there in the world, is that the Holy Grail and the Fountain of Youth were both simply metaphors for something far more valuable than any material thing, which lies within.

At the center of this constant hunger for some hidden treasure buried at the bottom of the ocean or deep in a cave guarded by menacing dragons, is a disconnection with some long lost part of themselves. That something is feeling. That something is love. Women know this because they are the embodiment of love, feeling and emotion. They’ve felt the disconnect all along, and they know that the solution needed is quite plainly and simply a deeper connection between men and women on a heart and soul level. And they know that it requires men contacting some spark of the feminine within, in order to be able to make that heartfelt connection with women.

But the masculine psyche generally doesn’t feel the disconnect because it is mostly disconnected from feeling itself. And yet, something is clearly missing; there’s a restlessness that keeps men wanting something more, something else, something greater. And so they continue on their quest for that tantalizing vision of something out there in the world around them, searching everywhere but where it actually lies, hidden in the deepest recesses of their own consciousness. And the women, ready to dance, to engage, to make some real love, to explore the depths of human passion and potential, sit idly by, twiddling their thumbs, busying themselves with assorted tasks that help pass the time, feeling the void gnawing within them as they wait for the endless game to end.

The man folds, slams down his lousy hand of cards, goes to take a piss, grabs another beer and then heads back to the dim light of the silent table of brooding, sullen men, hoping this time he’ll win big. The woman finishes the dishes, wipes her hands, glances in his direction; and knows in her heart that he’s still a long ways away.
Maybe they have sex later that night. But it’s just a chance for him to relieve some of the tension from his frustrating losses, before he turns the other way and soon enough is snoring away loudly. They may have screwed and stoked up some momentary passion. But he never actually touched her in the slightest, not the truth of who she is.

This scenario is an oversimplification of male-female relations of course, and may seem like an exaggerated one, especially to those men who have experienced fairly healthy relationships with the women in their lives. But in reality, it’s probably somewhere around average. There are certainly countless examples of loving, cooperative, balanced relationships between men and women all around the world. And yet, there are also many, many abusive ones, as we all know from the news stories and statistics. But you don’t hear too often about the woman who beat up her husband, because it‘s almost always the other way around.

It’s hardly debatable that men have a much greater record of violence and mistreatment against women than vice versa, both in modern times and throughout human history. From the burning of witches to designating women as property, not allowing women to vote, keeping them veiled and hidden away in the home, not allowing them to divorce an abusive husband or even to drive a car in some countries today, to laws stating that forcible sex by a man of his wife isn’t rape, or that women can’t associate with men outside of their immediate family, punishable by death, human society is riddled with instances of male discrimination, domination and much worse against women. And yet it’s hard to think of a single account of an organized campaign of prejudice by women against men. If you search hard enough through the history books then perhaps you’ll find one buried away somewhere. But it will take some serious digging.

Now, in saying all this, the point isn’t to engage in male-bashing and induce a guilt trip in men. That isn’t at all what this book is about. The point is simply that what men need to understand and acknowledge and accept, before anything can truly change, is that women have every reason to distrust men. This is an essential realization when it comes to moving forward into a new and completely different mode of relating between the sexes. Women need to sense and feel that men have acknowledged and taken responsibility for their past mistakes, before they can trust them to move into that deeper level of relating, the one they’ve been yearning and waiting for.

And this is also important to realize because this distrust and wariness has kept women hiding much of themselves from men, so that they are a mere shadow of who and what they can truly be. Women have within them infinite reservoirs of radiant, creative, wise, passionate, ecstatic, orgasmic, loving energy, just waiting to be awakened, explored, honored and reveled in. And they desire a man’s sensitive, attuned touch and attention and love to bring that part of themselves fully alive (or another woman‘s, as the case may be). Because bringing this vibrant, pulsating, juicy energy to life requires interaction, uniting, a relationship with another.

And yet in a sense, ironically, sadly, this is precisely what keeps men away from the deeper core of women. Because on some subconscious level men sense that women are a Pandora’s box of swirling, unfamiliar energy that they aren’t quite sure they want to open up and let loose. Whatever is inside there, it seems highly volatile and unpredictable, to say the least. Better to keep a lid on it all, keep things under control and not take any chances. And besides, there’s a poker game to play.

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If you would like to submit a piece for this project, I very much welcome it. I am requesting that people write from around 1,000-3,000 words, so that you can go fairly in-depth with your piece and give the reader some very transformative, helpful, inspiring information and stories. You can go in pretty much any direction you want to take it. Just write from the heart. And after finishing it, consider setting it down and then coming back to it a little later to rework it so that it's the best piece of writing you can muster. Feel free to write on any topics relating to relationships between men and women. Just keep in mind that the book will be designed with men as the audience, that it's about teaching and informing men how they can better relate with women.

Some ideas of what to write about are: communication, romance, what love really is, sex, orgasm, trust, intimacy, tantra, women's bodies, the essentials of a good relationship, what men tend to overlook about women, the role of emotions, what really turns women on (on all levels), spirituality as it relates to relationships, yin and yang, finding balance between masculine and feminine energies, etc. Feel free to work in some personal stories about your own experiences regarding relationships with the opposite sex. You can't really go off topic as long as it's about love and relationships. Feel free to push the comfort zone a little, since the point is to give men the chance to not just change their thinking, but propel them to change something deeper in their heart and soul; and to give them the necessary information that through their own personal relationship with a woman, they can allow the woman to teach them and help them evolve and change. Women have done plenty of conforming to men's views of who and what they should be. Now is the time time for men to listen to women and hear their heartfelt point of view.

After you've finished your piece, you can email it to me at:

tantricquest@hotmail.com

As for compensation for writing your piece, everyone who simply submits a piece, regardless of whether I actually use it in the end, will get a free e-copy of the finished book. For everyone who is selected to be included in the book, they will both receive a free e-copy of this book, and they will also get free e-copies of my other four books, including my one published work, "Kundalini and the Art of Being", another book that I just signed a book contract for, "Following My Thumb: A Decade of Unabashed Wanderlust" about my travels, and two others. Also, they will be able to write a short bio about themselves and promote their business or website, which will be included in the back of the book. Beyond that, it will depend on which publisher I ultimately end up with. I haven't started searching for one yet because I want to have other people's pieces already finished and edited, since that is the bulk of the book. The publishing process takes some time, but long before that happens I will be offering the book online as an e-book and everyone involved in the project will receive their free e-copy at that time (probably sometime in March, 2011, shortly after I've put the book together).

Looking forward to hearing from you on this important and very fun, interesting and important topic. I have no doubt this will turn into a very engaging, informative and helpful read!
Take care, Gabriel Morris

(If you have any further questions, feel free to email me at: tantricquest@hotmail.com)

Ancient mysteries and the precession of the equinoxes (click here to watch his lecture)

This is a letter I recently wrote to Graham Hancock, which I wanted to put out there for anyone else interested in his work to read and consider...


Hello Graham,
I've just finished watching your presentation on You Tube at the 2012 Conference, tying together many of the mysteries of ancient civilizations. I thought that it was brilliant and very eye-opening, informative and inspiring.

BUT, I want to challenge you on two main points. Or rather, I want to pass on the possibility of a couple of different theories...not that I came up with them in the slightest, I've just read about and studied them both over the past year or so and think they make a lot more sense than the prevailing theories on these two very important topics.

First is the theory of the ice ages. I realize that the ice ages are so presumed to have occurred, and there is so much evidence supporting them, that it might seem ridiculous to challenge the notion that they actually existed. Because, the evidence that they did exist, and marked and scarred our Earth's surface so visibly and profoundly is proof enough, right?

About a year ago I read a book by Barbara Hand Clow, "Catastrophobia" talking about something you also mentioned in your lecture, humanity's amnesia. She says that humanity is basically gripped in a terrible fear that we've been living out generation after generation, because of a massive event that occurred on Earth many thousands of years ago. This also ties into all of the so-called myths that you talked about in cultures throughout the world, of floods and other terrible natural disasters that occurred in our distant past. In that book, Clow references repeatedly another book which she says supports the notion of this major catastrophe that struck the Earth and ancient humans, titled "Catcalysm! Compelling Evidence of a Cosmic Catastrophe in 9,500 B.C." by D.S. Allan and J.B. Delair.

I was curious to see what the scientific basis supporting this supposed catastrophe might consist of, so I ordered a copy of that book and read it. I can't even begin to summarize the contents of it, because the evidence they present is so monumental and overwhelming. They look at the evidence worldwide across many different scientific disciplines, and through mountains of evidence that all point in the same direction, they build an amazing case that, in short, this massive, sudden event that struck the Earth in our distant past, and scarred the Earth's surface, its inhabitants and humanity as a whole, has been misinterpreted by the scientific community for the past few hundred years, as being the result of ice ages.

http://www.amazon.com/Cataclysm-Compelling-Evidence-Cosmic-Catastrophe/dp/1879181428/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1283416500&sr=1-2

If you get the chance I highly recommend giving it a read. Although it is a thick book and the evidence they present can get tedious at times, and some of the ideas veer off a little from the central idea (such as attempting to explain what actually caused this disaster, in which they get a bit overly-speculative) it's really fascinating and informative, and the case they build is staggering.

And another important point should be made on this. The date they cite as for when this occurred (which is actually based on the average date found from thousands of different examples of carbon dating) is quite close to the date cited by Plato which you also mentioned, roughly 9,500 BC. And it is also fairly close to the time frame you mentioned repeatedly of about 12,000 years ago, being when the Giza Pyramids complex and Angkor Wat seemed to be hearkening back to. Could it be that these monuments are actually referencing this event when Earth and humanity was completely altered by this global disaster? That is simply my own notion I came up with while watching your presentation, and wondering why these ancient monuments could possibly be so obsessed with that time frame.

So, onto the second major theory I'd like to address, the precession of the equinoxes. You cited the prevailing theory, which even now is simply a theory and unproven, that the precession of the equinoxes is a result of a slight wobble of sorts of the Earth on its axis, causing the Earth's viewpoint in relation to the cosmos to shift ever so slightly through the ages over a period of roughly 26,000 years.

An astrophysicist, Walter Cruttenden, has an entirely different theory, which he has been studying for the past decade or so. He thinks that the precession of the equinoxes is a much more monumental event. Instead, he is exploring the possibility that this 26,000 year cycle is the result of our solar-system's orbit around another star. In other words, we are a binary star system, but our other sun is so far away that it isn't even apparent to us that we're revolving around it. This would mean that we are actually moving through space much faster than physicists currently believe.

Interestingly, on his website he cites a recent experiment by NASA in which they attempted to calculate the movement of our solar system through space. After much consideration and calculations, etc. of how to do it, they sent some extremely sensitive gyros up into space. The results they received back were so perplexing, that they scrapped the program because they assumed the gyros must have malfunctioned. The results they got back were that our solar system was actually moving much, much faster than they could have imagined.

And, guess which star Cruttenden believes is a serious candidate for our second sun? Sirius. Hmmmm, weren't the ancient Egyptians rather obsessed with Sirius? To the point that the Great Pyramid of Khufu, as you said in your lecture, is situated in relation to it, or at least one of the two tunnels within the pyramid points directly to it? Here's Cruttenden's website with more info about that:

http://www.binaryresearchinstitute.org/

So take care and if you find the time, I truly look forward to any thoughts you might have to share on all of this.
Sincerely, Gabriel Morris

PS. I would also love to hear anyone else's thoughts on these subjects, so feel free to add to the discussion below.

PPS. If I actually get a response from Graham, then I'll post it here as well. I sent it to his Facebook account, and I'm sure he's super busy and swamped with messages so I won't be surprised if I never hear back from him. But if I do it will be an exciting letter to read I'm sure...

Going to Asia for the winter (click here to follow my travels on Facebook)

I will be traveling to Asia for the winter. In October, 2010 I fly to the Philippines for 3 weeks, and will be spending most of my time there in the stunning Palawan region. From there I will fly to the small city of Kota Kinabalu on the island of Borneo, Malaysia for a week. Then I fly to Bali and will be there (and other islands in that area) for 3 weeks. After that I fly to Kuala Lumpur, the largest city in Malaysia for a week. And then I'll fly to New Delhi, India. At this point I'm planning to spend the whole winter in India, staying mostly in one little village on the Ganges River, practicing yoga and meditation, writing and all-around relaxing and chilling out. I will be documenting my travels with photos, videos, travel stories, etc. on Facebook. Click the subject line above to join my group devoted to my trip, and follow the adventures.

The Man Who Stood Alone in the Crowd (click here for more info)

This is one of the short fiction stories from my book "I Leapt Into the Night, and Ten Other Stories"...



"The Man Who Stood Alone In the Crowd"


There was once a man who stood by himself within a large throng of people. He was a little off to the side of the crowd, so as not to be too conspicuous—but near enough to the center that it was obvious he was in the crowd, and not at all separate from it. The crowd was nestled all around him, its gentle hum buzzing in his ears.

The crowd was all the man had ever known, and he thrived on its familiarity. Ironically, however, he was not much the talking type. He chose, as much as he could help it, not to contribute to the buzzing of the crowd he so enjoyed. He preferred simply to experience the crowd, and yet remain detached to some extent, an observer from within.

Since he could remember nothing else, he could scarcely imagine life outside of the crowd. The crowd was everything to him. It was the only world he could conceive of, and whenever he was reminded of how much he enjoyed the crowd—which was often—he would revel in its comforting embrace like a bird curling up in a warm nest, or a baby hidden deep inside the womb.

Since this man chose to stand alone within the crowd, he had plenty of time in which to ponder. Sometimes he thought about how nice it was to be in the crowd. Sometimes he thought about moving to another part of the crowd, just for a change—in which case he would generally do so, with an occasional “pardon me, ma’am” and “excuse me, sir, mind your drink!” Although he didn’t talk much, he had well-refined manners from so much listening to the people crowded around him.

Sometimes he even pondered, or at least imagined, life outside of the crowd. On one particular day, he was thinking about the time when he had actually had the urge to leave the crowd. Out of a clear blue sky, a sudden faltering within his mind made him wonder if he should flee from all these people gathered together in the crowd. He had been there in the crowd for so long, it occurred to him, for some reason, that he might be missing something interesting or important outside of the crowd.

But then, he had thought about where he might go if he left the crowd, and this disturbing possibility perplexed and confused him so much that he’d decided rather abruptly just to stay put. He didn’t much like perplexion or confusion. He didn’t see the point in it, and didn’t need any more complications in his life. The time a friend of his had asked if he would care to join him for a game of backgammon at his house had been enough to remind him of all the unpleasantness of the outside world. Leave the crowd? Of course not! What would he find out there? Probably more friends, who would ask him over for tennis, ask him to listen to their music, invite him to go swimming or go for a drive into the country. Soon enough he would be in some foreign land, where even the crowds themselves were unrecognizable.

No. It was too much. Too frightening even to consider. He must stop these nonsensical notions of leaving the crowd. It was much safer simply to remain there. He had everything he needed right there in the crowd—so why leave?

With that conclusion, he thought long and hard then about how nice it was just to be there inside the crowd. It made him so happy being amongst all those friendly people, that the man huddled up against the person next to him, who was trying to make a very important business deal, and he stepped on his foot, which surprised the businessman, causing him to spill his drink down the front of the man he was talking to, insulting him greatly so that he refused to close the deal, which put the businessman into a deep depression that left him incapable to work, so that his wife and kids finally left him for a plumber from Chicago whom she had secretly been seeing the last two years, which of course resulted in the businessman’s eventual suicide.

“Sorry,” said the man standing alone in the crowd.

Eventually, the crowd began to thin out. This did happen occasionally, although fortunately it never disappeared entirely. The crowd merely fluctuated between sparse and dense. The man who stood alone was always a little more nervous when the crowd was smaller, than after a big event when the entire town it seemed was there to join him. But he never really worried too much, because if it came down to only him left in the crowd—well, then he would be a one man-crowd. He’d heard of a one-man-band before. What was the difference? Nothing, really. As long as he was part of a crowd of some sort, then he was safe and secure. And besides, the people would always return eventually, and then he would be even more thankful for the comfort of the crowd.

It was early one May, as the sun was shining majestically overhead and the birds were fluttering from tree to tree, chirping their melodies to the people of the crowd, that the man had a sudden, unexpected desire. He had never experienced it before. He’d heard about it, of course. But he had assumed, out of ignorance perhaps or just innocence, that he was an exception to the rule. He would often hear in the middle of a nearby conversation, “Hey, Ralph, I’m a bit famished—shall we get a bite?” Or something of the sort. And then, they would be gone—only to return sometime later, revived and relaxed, as if nothing really had happened.

He thought it so curious, even a bit disrespectful for these people to simply leave the crowd like that and then return so nonchalantly, as if they knew the crowd would be there when they returned and they could just come and go as they pleased. Didn’t they feel such a devotion to the crowd as himself? What if everyone chose to leave the crowd—even him—and then there was no crowd at all? What then?

But all of a sudden, in the midst of an otherwise contented and satisfying life, he found himself experiencing this inner need, this growling within his bowels that he had only heard about before, but which he had, in fact, dreaded unconsciously for a long time. He’d known it might happen to him. But he’d hoped simply to ignore it when it did. Like the waxing and waning of the crowd itself, this feeling, too, would come and then go. But no—it wouldn’t. And he knew then that it wouldn’t and that he must satisfy it, for it was gnawing inside him and seemed only to be growing stronger.

He was filled with fear at the prospect of solving the dilemma before him. He didn’t know what to do. He knew that people always left the crowd when this happened. But he didn’t know where they went or what they did out there. He knew only that he must take action. The rest he would discover soon enough.

He lifted his right foot, which had been planted in the same position for a long while by then, and moved it forwards. His brow was sweating. His hands were shaking. “My God, I never thought it would be so hard,” he thought. He hadn’t. He had thought it would be easy, that he could have left the crowd anytime he wanted, that it was only by choice he had stayed.

He paused for a moment and fixed his tie, as he readied himself for the next step. Finally, strategically, he lifted his left foot to place it in front of the right. He repeated this action, and then repeated it again. It took every ounce of courage and concentration he could muster for him to walk, slowly, to the edge of the crowd. But he kept his head up and his feet moving, and with an “excuse me” here and a “pardon me” there, soon enough he was standing on the edge of the crowd.

He thought long and hard then about the decision at hand. It was a whole new world from here, past the edge of the crowd. It was that foreign land he had feared he might someday find himself in. But he had to face it. The crowd would always be there upon his return—at least so he hoped. But he would have to take that risk, and brave the consequences.

Just then his stomach rumbled, and he knew it was time to venture forth into that great unknown. The longer he waited, the harder it would be. If he turned around now, he knew he would never try again, and then the crowd would swallow him in his hunger, and he would never know if he could have lived to tell the tale of his adventure beyond the crowd. He lifted his right foot and raised it upwards, moved it forwards, set it down, took another difficult step, and then another—and in so doing, took a giant leap off the edge of the world he had known for too long.

Excerpts from Gabriel's 4 books of adventure (click here for more info)

Following are a number of assorted excerpts from my four books, "Following My Thumb", "Kundalini and the Art of Being", "I Leapt Into the Night" and "Don't Push the Road":


"Rather than hide from that which we fear and pretend it’s not there, jump headlong into it. Get a feel for what exists out beyond the familiar paved roads, in that unsettling foreign land where the moose, grizzly and eagle roam free. There’s another very real and deeply meaningful world out beyond the realm of human perception, which we can glimpse and perhaps even get acquainted with, if we so desire. For the unknown is truly unknown only as long as we choose to ignore it. There’s really only one way to get to know anything—and that’s to experience it. Ultimately life is an adventure, whether we like it or not. Better for the soul to accept this, it seems, and then live accordingly." (Excerpt from "Following My Thumb", Chapter 9.)


"I lay there on my back wide-eyed for a good long while, nerves frayed from an overabundance of caffeine and another experience of strangeness, peering up at the clear night sky and the faintly twinkling stars, contemplating the odd behavior of humans, listening to the cars going around and around and around me." (Excerpt from "Following My Thumb", Chapter 7.)


"Somehow that loneliness was heightened more during the light of day, without the comforting blanket of myriad twinkling stars to ponder overhead. It was just my lone soul, the great expanse of wide-open starkness and a thin sliver of road leading me onwards. And, based on the previous day, a car roughly every half hour that brought only a glimmer of hope as it approached from across the expanse, for what seemed an eternity of longing before it finally flew by at a mile a minute, with nary a smile nor faintest teardrop of humanity to spare a bedraggled, sullen traveler; and I was thrown back into the despair of the lonely road." (Excerpt from "Don't Push the Road".)


"As my beer buzz thickened and reality began to seep slowly into my tired, travel-worn mind, I found myself in one of those peculiar states in which you start to feel more as if you’re looking out at a panoramic movie screen before you, rather than actually living the scene around you. The woman sitting before me was a vision of beauty, as if she’d just stepped out of a fantasy film in which she reigned over a kingdom of unicorns and fairies. She had long, wavy, sandy-blond hair, a soft, vibrant face with deep, thoughtful brown eyes and was wearing tight shorts over a faded red swimsuit that concealed firm and ample breasts. She was strong, independent and intelligent, yet totally feminine and infinitely alluring. She was pretty much everything I desired in my wildest of romantic juvenile dreams. I’m sure that she would have made an excellent queen of the fairies. I just wasn’t certain in that moment that I was prepared to be her knight in shining armor, should that be her expectation. Come to think of it, I wasn’t quite sure how I’d ended up sitting there with her at all." (Excerpt from "Following My Thumb", Chapter 5.)


"The air was cold and brisk on that starry night, and my breath spewed from my mouth like a dragon, a comforting reminder that I was still alive and breathing. The snow-covered trees and wide-open meadow were cast in that eerie black-and-white light, the awesome presence of the full moon hanging high overhead. I could see the warm lights of my father's humble cabin in the distance behind me on the edge of the meadow. The trees behind it loomed darkly, as if to pounce at any moment. The dull lantern on the front porch swung creakily in the slight chill wind. All I could see of it was the faint point of flickering light swinging back and forth, back and forth." (Excerpt from "I Leapt Into the Night".)


"In the fall of 1994, I was twenty-two and leading a relatively stable life in rainy western Oregon, when I rather impulsively quit my job, sold my old Datsun pickup, moved out of my house, and hit the road with just my backpack on my back, thumb leading the way. I had only a vague notion of where I was going and what I was getting myself into. I simply had an undeniable yearning for adventure and the unknown, which I chose to follow. I was the type who tended to act on these sorts of impulses. Little did I know the real adventure that I was embarking on this time." (Excerpt from the Introduction of "Kundalini and the Art of Being", published by Station Hill Press, 2008.)


"Over the next few days I happened to talk with a few other folks who had been involved with the community. I discovered that some of the leader’s many outrageous claims about himself and his cult were: that he considered his group to embody the highest spiritual truth on the planet (hey, that’s a new one); himself to be a reincarnation of the apostle Paul (perhaps so—but I’m not washing that one down with Kool-Aid); that he was the doorway to the fourth dimension (come on, everyone knows it was the Beatles); that the energy vortexes around Sedona were of his own making (how old was this guy—4.6 billion years?); and that crop circles were his own creations from past life-times (let me guess—and he also built the Sphinx single-handedly?). As my old college physics teacher would have put it, this guy had an ego roughly the size of the observable universe." (Excerpt from "Following My Thumb", Chapter 10.)


"I hiked on and on through the rain. I had no idea of the time of day, with the thick, gray clouds ever-present overhead. After several more hours, it seemed that it would soon be getting dark. I had no idea how much farther I had to go. I decided that I needed to find somewhere to set up my tent before nightfall rather than be caught hiking in the dark. I set my pack down on the gravel jeep-trail—streaked with
countless tiny streams, a rather uninviting environment for making camp—to take a look around. But I could find nowhere. The jeep trail was on a steep slope covered with trees, and the trail itself, though wide, was far too wet and rocky to lie down on all night. Besides, I didn’t know what condition my tent and sleeping bag would be in at this point. I had to keep going." (Excerpt from "Kundalini and the Art of Being", Chapter 17.)



Following is the Introduction and all of Chapter 1 from "Following My Thumb: A Decade of Unabashed Wanderlust"...

Introduction.

Why travel? Good question. Like most things in life it depends on what you want to get out of it. A two-week vacation of tranquil boredom on a tropical beach can be the perfect antidote to the hectic 9-5 work schedule and all the other pressures and stresses associated with modern-day life. I’ve enjoyed more than a few weeks of tropical bliss myself in the course of my travels, and hope to again in the future.

But as for myself, it’s not a vacation from 9-5 I’ve looked forward to but, because I think modernity is for the most part an unnatural and incongruous way of living to begin with, I’ve done my best to skip the daily grind entirely. My travels could certainly be described as bumbling at times, lacking a clear direction or purpose. The whole not-having-a-regular-job thing meant that I was generally traveling on the cheap, sometimes to the extreme. My travels in Europe when I was 18, and the corresponding creative lengths I went to in finding a place to sleep for the night, led to my mantra of “benches, beaches, barns and bridges” (all being suitable places to rest one’s head, in a pinch). It seemed that whatever fix I managed to get myself into due to a lack of cash on hand, there was always a way out of it—as long as I kept my options very wide open and expectations to a minimum.

But as hopefully the following 26 stories will illustrate, with a certain degree of flexibility, open-mindedness and flagrant disregard for following the societal rules (as well as a little luck thrown in to help compensate) one can travel on a budget without compromising the experience in the slightest. In fact, it’s more than likely to be a hell of a lot more interesting (or harrowing, as the case may be).

A vacation is one thing. An adventure is something else entirely. My quest has been one of seeking out experiences that were catalysts for expanding my mind, learning and evolving—situations that suddenly showed me the world and myself from a completely different perspective, or challenged me to reach for a new way of being. The most rewarding experiences were almost inevitably the ones that I didn’t plan, didn’t expect and sometimes couldn’t have even imagined. And underneath it all, from the joyous moments to the terrifying ones, has been a silent, steady lesson of trusting the universe to provide what I needed, one way or another.

This book chronicles my first decade of being an unrepentant travel addict, from 1990-2000. Part 1 tells the stories of my first introduction to hitchhiking as a young boy and my first trip abroad when I was eighteen, as well as my escapades rambling around Alaska as a college kid—including unknowingly following on the heels of Chris McCandless, subject of Into the Wild. I hitchhiked part of the same stretch of highway through Canada and Alaska just a few months after him, and spent that summer working in Denali National Park, just a short ways away from where he was living in an abandoned bus, before dying of starvation.

Part 2 takes things to another level after I drop out of college and commence six years of semi-homeless traveling around the United States on a spiritual quest; which resulted in everything from falling in love on the road to getting mixed up with a strange cult, to attending Rainbow Gatherings and sweat lodges and living in the Hawaiian rainforest for several months.

And in Part 3 I explore a whole new dimension of cultural immersion and reality-bending as I spend five months traveling throughout the vast sea of rich culture and humanity that is India. I attend a massive spiritual gathering on the Ganges River, visit the erotic temple ruins of Khajuraho, tangle with an assortment of crooked businessmen and end up hiding from tigers in the jungle while awaiting the much-hyped potential effects of Y2K.

Although the book isn’t all about hitchhiking by any means, the theme of “following my thumb” prevails throughout (not unlike following one’s heart or gut…except that the thumb has the practical element of being able to actually get you there, i.e. hitchhiking). Put another way, it’s the journey, not the destination. Life is indeed short, and I’ve just tried to make the most of it. But hey, I’ll let the stories tell themselves and stop wasting your time with a lengthy introduction. Enjoy, and happy trails.


PART 1. Young at Heart, Loose at Foot…

Chapter 1. Hitchhiking may be hazardous to your sanity
(May 1991)

…Standing on the side of the road outside of Valdez, Alaska, waiting for a ride. We could see our breath as we stood there in zipped jackets, our hands in our pockets. Although it was deep into spring it was a typical Alaskan spring—cold, overcast, damp. The birds were not yet chirping in ecstatic delight to welcome the new season. They must have been huddled in their nests, same as all the people.

We were about ten miles out of town and the silence was deafening. Pure wilderness rolled away from the road and for hundreds of miles east and west. Cars were scarce—we had seen less than a dozen in two hours. And they weren’t compassionate faces that stared out from behind the windshields. It seemed the people around here didn’t have much time or care for hitchhikers. Our plight wasn’t their concern. It was Alaska. If they knew you, or simply knew of you, I’m sure they’d go well out of their way to save your hide. But otherwise, you might as well be a moose.

Okay, so perhaps we weren’t yet in a plight. It was May, not the dead of winter. But it could become desperate soon enough, if we didn’t get a ride the heck out of there. We might die of boredom and impatience, or even worse: Delusional Hitchhiker’s Syndrome. It’s not pretty, believe me. Frustration and annoyance turn rapidly to delirium as warm cars continue to speed by, the occupants staring out at you as if you’re an escapee from the local psychiatric ward. After a while you start to play the part, acting in strange, impulsive, socially deviant ways—yelling and singing into the air, hopping around in circles to entertain yourself, telling dumb jokes aloud to the wind and any animals that might be listening. And of course, the more advanced the condition gets, the less chance you have of actually getting a ride.

But my friend Josh and I weren’t the transient outcasts we may have appeared, despite our forlorn predicament. We were just a couple of college kids out exploring the world, on a spontaneous hitchhiking road trip after finishing up the school year at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. The few paved highways of interior Alaska make a huge loop that covers about a quarter of the state. We wanted to explore as much paved ground as we could in the week we both had free.

So far we had been east from Fairbanks almost to the Canadian border, then south down to Valdez on Prince William Sound. Now we were headed back north and then west across the Chugach Range towards Anchorage, further north from there up to Denali National Park and then full circle back to Fairbanks, at the center of the state.
We’d spent the previous night at a campground on the outskirts of Valdez. That morning we got a short ride about ten miles out of town from a local going home—to smack in the middle of nowhere. We were both wishing we’d stayed near town and waited for a better ride, so we could get a hot cup of coffee about now and break up the monotony.

Finally, we saw another car in the distance coming towards us down the long, straight stretch of highway. We each pulled a hand from our pockets, thumbs extended, ready for action. As the vehicle approached we could see that it was a large Suburban wagon. Our expectations rose as it neared.

“Gabe, man, this is our ride—I can feel it,” Josh said to me.

We held our outstretched arms high. As the vehicle came closer, we could see that the two occupants were both young women—gloriously beautiful women too, or at least so our chilled brains imagined. They seemed to slow as they approached. We both had sudden visions of rescue, warmth and romance swirling in our heads.

It was perfect: They would pull over with radiant smiles on their lovely faces and offer us a ride in their roomy wagon. We’d stretch out in the back seat and have engaging conversation along the way, connecting with the two beauties like old friends, enjoying the pristine Alaskan scenery so much more now that we were moving down the road in comfort. We’d all go out for lunch at a pizza parlor in the next small town, and then continue down the road. That night, the four of us would decide to split a hotel room between us to economize. The next day we would all go backpacking together, and end up falling in love in the wilderness.

It was a classic hitchhiker’s dream. But it passed us by. They smiled slightly and waved half-heartedly as they flew past. They hadn’t slowed down a bit. It was the Hitchhiker’s Syndrome already beginning to set in, a mirage of our distorted imaginations. For a brief moment it had seemed so real, just a few feet away. But then it was all rushing away from us at a mile a minute.

I stood in the middle of the road after they’d passed, my arms raised in protest.
“How could you pass us by?” I yelled after them. “Do you have no respect for destiny?!?”

I lay down in the middle of the road on my back and started laughing uncontrollably. It was definitely setting in…


Here's the Table of Contents for "Following My Thumb" to give you a hint of what's in the rest of the book...


Introduction.

PART 1. Young at Heart and Loose at Foot…

Chapter 1. Hitchhiking may be hazardous to your sanity
Chapter 2. The beginnings of a hitchhiker
Chapter 3. When in doubt, act like you know what you’re doing
Chapter 4. Never turn down a free meal
Chapter 5. Those beautiful Swedish women
Chapter 6. Uniting body and mind
Chapter 7. Sleep under the bridge, not on it
Chapter 8. To travel is to be mystified
Chapter 9. The idiot’s guide to Denali

PART 2. Rambling Around the West…

Chapter 10. Always double-check the directions
Chapter 11. The continuing quest for a good night’s sleep
Chapter 12. Love between hitchhikers
Chapter 13. An adventure in peaceful protest
Chapter 14. Small world
Chapter 15. Sweating it out
Chapter 16. Adversity builds character—and hopefully wisdom
Chapter 17. Close call
Chapter 18. When dealing with the authorities, try to keep your clothes on

PART 3. Another World…

Chapter 19. A rupee is only worth a rupee
Chapter 20. Hold onto your chai
Chapter 21. Get good directions on the way to the rainbow
Chapter 22. A fahking adventure
Chapter 23. Always double-check the return policy
Chapter 24. Don’t fool around with the locals’ women
Chapter 25. Immersed in the crowd
Chapter 26. Watch and listen

I Leapt Into the Night (click here for more info)

The title story from my book of creative fiction short stories, "I Leapt Into the Night, and Ten Other Stories"...



"I Leapt Into the Night"

The air was cold and brisk on that starry night, and my breath spewed from my mouth like a dragon, a comforting reminder that I was still alive and breathing. The snow-covered trees and wide-open meadow were cast in that eerie black-and-white light, the awesome presence of the full moon hanging high overhead. I could see the warm lights of my father's humble cabin in the distance behind me on the edge of the meadow. The trees behind it loomed darkly, as if to pounce at any moment. The dull lantern on the front porch swung creakily in the slight chill wind. All I could see of it was the faint point of flickering light swinging back and forth, back and forth.

I hadn't yet devised a practical way to carry my telescope, especially while tromping through the deep snow in my awkward furry winter boots, such as I was. Since the day it had been gifted to me in the sixth grade (I was now in ninth) I had tried, with moderate success, to make my passion as convenient as possible. Fortunately, my father was supportive of my unusual hobby—he trusted me alone out in the arctic cold, as I'd lived here in Alaska all of my young life. I couldn't even imagine living somewhere that the ground wasn't white for half the year, and the skies dark for much of that time.

My telescope wasn't one of these rinky-dink little things. It was a pretty big one, especially in comparison to little old me. I'd sewn straps around the legs of the tripod, so that I could swing it over my shoulder and across my back—like an archer’s quiver, sort of, but not quite as dexterous. And then I carried the lens case in my arms, just like when hauling firewood. Good thing that I had practice already, because you have to walk without seeing where the heck your next step will be—and besides, the arms get tired pretty quick sticking straight out like that.

At least I grew in the three years between sixth and ninth grade, which helped in some ways, though not in all. I must admit, budding breasts just get in the way for a young girl astronomer, at least in my case. Boys were starting to pester me for dates, but all I wanted to do was gaze up into the night sky, lost in my cosmic little world. Cheap, yes, but not much of a date. And besides, most boys just didn't understand the beauty of the night sky. It was too much trouble, too mysterious, and just plain weird for a girl.

Sometimes, I admit, I wished that I'd just taken up the harmonica or something for a hobby—I mean, you just slip it in your pocket and anytime, anywhere, you can pull it out and make your music, and you're happy. You don't have to worry about the clouds or waiting until dark, or it's too cold outside, or it's a pain in the butt to set everything up—or who knows if there's anything interesting up there tonight anyhow?

Despite all these random thoughts, I struggled on through the cold with my precious telescope that night, taking each step carefully, occasionally looking up at the deep, darkened sky that filled me with such warmth, even in the dead of winter. It was one of those nights when it was so clear, you could tell that the Man in the Moon was an adolescent, because he had the worst case of acne you'd ever seen. And yet he was still infinitely more handsome than most of the idiots at my school. I'd toss their silly cars, beer and sports out the window any day for that calm, cool, reflective persona of the Man in the Moon, and his infinite array of celestial relatives.

When I was young (well, younger) I wanted to be the first person to walk on the moon. When I found out it was too late, I decided that I would be the first person to walk on the sun. For some reason I thought that would be even more heroic. Never mind that the sun has no ground on which to walk—I'd just float there amongst the burning gasses, taking in its warming rays and looking back at the Earth with a certain pride and longing for whence I’d come. Oh, the innocence of youth! Fortunately, my dad had set me straight with some basic scientific principles—and soon enough provided me with a way to merge with the stars, and yet still stay connected to the ground.

If you happened to be looking down at my viewing spot from high above, you would see mountains all around—white-capped, snowy, beautiful awesome mountains, that make you want to leap right into them they're so shiny and wonderful in the moonlight. And within these mountains—in between them, that is—you would see a huge valley, probably five miles across, with lots of trees all over the place. In the middle of this forest was a clearing, and on one side would be our wonderful wooden cabin, that my mother and father built all by themselves (with a little help from me, of course, though I was only five at the time). Right in the middle of the meadow would be a small mound of a hill, only about ten feet across on top, which is where I always set up my telescope. And then waaaaay off in the distance, on the other side of the forest—with a skinny little dirt road running down through the valley—would be town, with its lights twinkling and smoke coming out of the smokestacks, and maybe a few dogs barking if you listened closely enough.

But anyhow, the important thing here is the little hill, because that was my mound of inspiration. You see, when I was really young, I used to go out there and lie on that hill and just watch the stars with my cat Vaughn (pronounced "Von"). This would be around late spring or early fall, when it wasn’t quite so crazy cold yet, but the nights were still plenty dark. Sometimes, if I heard there was going to be a meteor shower or a lunar eclipse, or maybe it was just an extra special night for some reason, I would bring my heavy-duty sleeping bag and a pillow and a thermos of hot chocolate. Then Vaughn and I would curl up nice and warm in my sleeping bag and just lay there watching the stars and the moon, until we got too cold to open our eyes anymore or even think. Eventually, we'd rush back inside and warm up by the wood stove.

So finally, like I said, in sixth grade my father decided that I needed a little better view of all that stuff up there, since I was spending my time out there watching it anyhow. He surprised me Christmas morning with the best present I ever got in my whole life. I was so ecstatic that I went out that very night and watched the sky do things that I hadn't even realized it was doing all along—though of course I'd imagined.

Since then I've seen the rings of Saturn; the moons of Jupiter; several comets that flew by, I forget their names; craters of the moon that would just blow your mind if you were me (which they did); the asteroid belt; double-star systems; quasars: a little meteor that exploded when it hit the atmosphere, which made me feel a little sad, in a happy sort of way; plus all sorts of other stuff that probably wouldn't sound very interesting or make much sense to a normal person.

On a night like tonight, however, I was hoping for something extra special, it being so exquisitely beautiful and cold and crystal clear and all.

When I got to the top of the plateau, I set down the lens veeeeery carefully. Then, I swung the tripod off my back with a great sigh of relief; the air blowing out of my mouth like a steam engine in the crisp cold.

I just stood there for a few minutes blowing into the air, taking in the night sky to see what it might have to offer this time. My arms hung stiffly from my sides from all the clothes I was wearing, including a scarf wrapped around my neck, that my mother had given me the Christmas before she'd died, when I was six. It had been much too big for me then. But the scarf had grown smaller as I got bigger (or something like that) so that it kept my neck nice and cozy now without choking me, even in forty below zero—which was about how cold it felt that night.

I was thinking that maybe it was a little too cold to stay out for long—which in my case could be for an hour or three. But it was just too perfect. There was electricity in the air, like a thunderstorm approaching on a clear day. The stars were so bright against the dark sky, the mountains gleaming white in the moonlight, that I couldn't waste this night inside doing homework or the dishes or anything. It was just right for becoming one with nature, as they say. This is what I most wanted, really—to feel no separation between the vastness of the cosmos and myself.

I was just finishing screwing the lens into place, when I heard my dad yell from the cabin,

"Aurora!"

That's my name, obviously.

"What, Dad?" I yelled back. Sound carried easily across the meadow in the cold night air.

"I'm letting Vaughn out—she's been meowing at me. Come back soon. The radio said it's minus thirty-three in town, so it must be almost forty-below out there tonight. I don't want you freezing to death. Would you like me to bring you some hot chocolate in a little while?"

"No, thanks!" I yelled back. "I'm okay. I won't be here for too long, I don't think, maybe just an hour or so. It's nice out here. It's pretty! You should see the mountains from here."

"No thanks, sweetie. I'm gonna stay inside where it's warm. It feels like an ice-rink out on the porch. I'm going back in. You be careful!"

"Okay, Dad!"

I could here Vaughn's faint meow, as she picked her way across the meadow through the snow.

"C'mon, Vaughn! Here, kitty! Come on!"

"Meow!"

She rubbed herself against my leg, as I finished adjusting the telescope. Then I put her in my lap, as I sat down on the chair that I always leave there. I covered her up with my jacket, since she was already beginning to shiver from the cold.

The sky was, of course, even more awesome seen through the God of Telescopic Insight. Everything was so clear, so real. It was as if a barrier that had always existed between myself and the sky was lifted, and I felt closer to the infinity of space than ever. The cold didn't seem to bother me at all. I just sat there, transfixed, my one open eye glued to the end of the telescope as I drifted off into the nether reaches of the universe. The glowing warmth of the moon and stars comforted me simply by their presence.

Soon, without realizing it, I guess, I lost all awareness of my surroundings. I even forgot about poor old Vaughn in my lap, who was probably asleep by then, but hopefully warm inside my jacket. I couldn't say. I had completely forgotten about the reality of the meadow and the trees, and the cabin nearby with my father resting quietly beside the fire. The stars were magnificent. They became everything to me in that moment. I could feel their brilliant light filtering down through the telescope, filling me with life.

The Man in the Moon seemed to be smiling at me. And once, he winked—a long, drawn out wink, that left me surprised, but delighted.

"Come on up," he seemed to be saying.

"But how can I?" I asked. "I don't know how."

"Just let yourself go," he said. "Let yourself go—give yourself to the sky, and it will happen."

I didn't know what he meant, at first. I thought, "'Give myself to the sky?' What's that supposed to mean?"

But as the warmth and comfort of the sky above filled me with assurance and strength, and helped to release me from the familiar physical world around me, I began to feel the truth of what he meant. The weight of my body slowly became less of a burden. I no longer knew or cared that I had arms or legs or breasts or a brain, or even an eye that perceived all of this through the telescope. I only cared for the beautiful sky above. As I came to realize this, I became more a part of the sky with every precious moment.

Soon I felt the tunnel walls of the telescope completely fall away. And I gave myself to the sky—just like he'd said—leaping straight into the night like a rocket leaving its launch, the force propelling me upwards, higher and higher. My spirit rose above everything, far above the meadows and the trees and the mountains and the town, and even sweet little Vaughn and my father's beautiful cabin.

Pretty soon I was looking down at the Earth like it was a speck of dust on the ground, far from my sight, but still at my feet. I could even see my body sitting there in the meadow, my eye still attached to the telescope. I admit that it made me a little sad—especially when I saw my father come rushing out of the cabin in panic and run to my lifeless body, screaming,

"Aurora! Aurora! What has happened to you?" (Though I could only imagine what he was saying.)

But I soon recovered from the sorrow of leaving behind the sweet Earth and my beloved friends and family, and became quite content hovering there above everything in the eternal night. For of course, it is always night in space, just as I had always wished. And if you look closely enough as you stroll along beneath the night sky, you may notice a little sparkle in the darkness of the night that wasn't there at one time. And if you smile, I'll smile back, I promise.

Chapter 15 of "Following My Thumb" (click here for more info)

This is Chapter 15 from my book of travel stories, "Following My Thumb":


"Sweating It Out"

As things turned out, I ended up living for five weeks in the lush rainforests of the Na Pali Coast. I didn’t hike in with my friend Natty, however. Somehow we managed to miss meeting up that day at the convenience store. Instead I hitched to the trailhead and started the hike on my own; only to meet up way with another acquaintance from the meditation ceremony along the way.

It started raining not long after I’d headed up the narrow, muddy trail. The scattered showers steadily accelerated into a constant, unrelenting downpour, which persisted for seemingly unending hours. But at least it was a warm rain. I was hiking along in shorts, rain jacket over a tank top and a pair of sport sandals, and stayed warm enough. After trudging along the muddy trail through the timeless rainstorm, I stopped to rest at a run-down structure alongside the trail, near a small stream that rushed down one of the many green valleys.

I’d completely lost track of time due to the stormy skies. All I knew was that I’d been hiking for hours and was getting weary. The ramshackle wooden structure was missing two walls and most of its floorboards—an abandoned ranger shed, I later found out. But it kept out the worst of the rain, and was much better than sitting in the mud by the trail while I took a break. I set my pack against one of the inside walls and sat down where a few of the remaining floorboards were joined together. While I was munching on some cheese and crackers, someone came hiking up the trail through the deluge, and then walked decisively over to the little shack to join me.

“Hey man, what’s up? Gabriel, right? Remember me? Caleb, from the little gathering yesterday.”

“Oh, yeah—how’s it going?” I said, recognizing him once he pulled down the hood of his rain jacket.

“I’m doing great,” he said. “Lovin’ this storm, keeps you cool while hiking. I hope it clears up tomorrow though, and dries things out. Gets old camping in the rain…So are you sleeping here tonight, too? We could make a fire together. I’ve got a big pot for cooking up some grub.”

“Well, I was hoping to make it all the way out to the Kalapani Valley today,” I said, as he threw down his pack and sat down beside me. “You’re going to sleep here? I was just taking a quick snack break.”

“This is only about the halfway point. We’ve come six miles from the trailhead. It’s another five out to the Kalapani Valley, and it doesn‘t get any easier. It’s already evening, it‘ll be dark in another hour. There’s only one another place to camp along the way, and it’s tough to find unless you know where it‘s at. So I’d say plan to sleep here, unless you feel like hiking in the dark and the rain.”

“Not really…Damn, I didn’t realize it was that late. Oh well, no big hurry of course. I’m just excited to see what it‘s like out there. Thought it would be pretty spectacular to wake up in the morning to the sight of the valley. But I guess I’ll go ahead and crash here with you then, if you don’t mind.”

“Hey, not at all—love the company.”

There was barely enough room for the both of us to lay out our sleeping bags on the few dry planks of wood that were left of the structure’s floor. We made a small fire on the ground nearby from some dry timber lying around inside the shack, and cooked up rice and soup for dinner. We stayed awake for a while, listening to the constant drumming of the rain, staring into the fire and sharing our various wanderings. Eventually we crawled into our warm sleeping bags on the hard wooden planks, as the rain continued pouring down and dripping all around us.

The following day, the rain had given way to clear blue skies. The two of us ate a quick granola breakfast, stuffed our backpacks and continued on our hike through the rainforest. The trail went up and down a series of valleys as it meandered along the Na Pali coastline. Most of these valleys were narrow, steep, crowded thick with jungle and lacking anything resembling a beach. But at the end of the eleven-mile trail, at which point the rugged cliffs became too steep even for the hiking trail to continue, there was a wide, sandy beach and a campground nestled between the ocean and the steep cliffs. Just past the camping area was a pristine waterfall, which made a perfect natural shower. It fell down a sheer rock face that dropped right onto the beach, the official end of the road for us bipeds. Only a few goats (most of them set free from domesticity by the hurricane that hit Kauai in 1992) were brave and agile enough to make it past that point.

Another trail also led inland, away from the beach and the main trail, two miles up into the wide, lush Kalapani Valley. Scattered throughout the valley grew papaya, mango, orange, guava, passion fruit, ginger and a variety of other exotic fruits and vegetables. Apparently there had also been coconut palm trees growing out there at one time. But the rangers had cut them all down to try and keep the likes of us from living in the jungle, since they were a reliable food source. Not that it had worked—as I was soon to find out.

Caleb and I stumbled wearily into the beachside campground later that afternoon, exhausted from two days of hiking one of the most difficult trails in the U.S. We soon found ourselves reenergized however, upon finding others from the meditation ceremony already gathering together for our full moon celebration. They had set up camp at the base of a cliff near the campground, where a large rock overhang provided natural shelter from the rain and wind. There was enough room there for a dozen or so folks to hang out during the day, or else stretch out for the night. And there was a large stone fire pit for cooking meals, complete with a bench made from a broken surfboard and driftwood.

We both gave a hearty “Aloha!” as we strolled up to the camp—and received a round of welcoming hellos and alohas back from the familiar people sitting around the sandy clearing. We quickly unbuckled our heavy backpacks, and with groans of relief and gratitude tossed them into the reddish dirt.

We sprawled out on our packs to relax from our hike and catch up with everyone as to their own adventures getting out to the valley, as well as take in the remarkable beauty of our surroundings. Swaying palm trees were scattered throughout the nearby camping area, and we could easily see and hear the ocean waves crashing nearby. Given our grimy state, the sounds of those waves were soon calling us seductively. Once Caleb and I were feeling rested enough to momentarily get off our asses, we mustered up the gumption to take a swim, both to wash off the dirt and sweat from our disgruntled bodies as well as shift our minds into an entirely different frame of being. We grabbed our towels from the bowels of our backpacks, and limped towards the beckoning water.

We immersed ourselves in the waves with yelps of splendid delight, and then lay placidly on our backs as the gentle waves massaged our aching bodies. The view from the ocean, looking back at the coastline, was staggering. Craggy cliffs towered hundreds of feet above the beachside camping area. We could see our group of friends through the palm trees, hanging out at the base of the cliff overhang. Up the coast a little ways from where we’d just hiked, the gently sloping Kalapani Valley itself rose steadily away from the ocean. And the stunningly rugged, burnt red and deep green cliffs of the Na Pali Coast stretched away from us in both directions, with no signs of roads, houses, antennas, beach umbrellas or other necessities of the modern world. It was as if the rest of civilization were an ocean away. And for all we cared at that point, it could have been and we wouldn’t have minded in the slightest.

I hadn’t planned on spending so long camping in the Kalapani Valley. My flight back to San Francisco left in mid-March, leaving me six more weeks on the Hawaiian Islands. I’d figured I would probably spend a week or so there on the Na Pali Coast, a few days at other spots on Kauai, and then hop over and explore some of the other islands. But out at Kalapani, one day flowed so effortlessly into the next that it was hard just to pack up and leave, without a heck of a good reason for doing so. I figured that if I were enjoying myself right where I was, I might as well just stay there.

And besides, I seemed to have lucked out with the weather. Winter was the rainy season on the Hawaiian Islands, and it generally rained a little every day, often for days or weeks without end. But during my first three weeks in the Kalapani Valley, it was clear, sunny and warm almost every day, with hardly a cloud in the sky. And yet, because it was winter and this wasn’t such an easy place to get to, there were few other people out there other than our rag-tag group of assorted wandering travelers.

In the course of the next few days more people showed up for the full moon get-together—including my friend Natty, who had been delayed by some personal business. Soon there was a group of about fifteen of us all camped out at the base of the cliff. A few more also set up their tents in the official campsites nearby. We cooked up dinner together at the fire pit each night and made music with a few drums, guitars and even a mandolin that someone had hiked in. We spent the days hanging out on the beach in the sun and swimming in the ocean, or else hiking up into the valley to search for fruit or swim in the creek that flowed down through the valley.

As we explored the surrounding area, we all kept our eyes open for a good place to hold our ceremony. Eventually someone found the perfect spot—near where the creek entered the ocean, and a little ways off the main hiking path. Amidst a ring of boulders was a flat, grassy area, which seemed almost to have been designed for such sacred ceremonies. There was plenty of room to build the sweat lodge and a fire pit, and still have room for us to gather around. The creek was close enough to bathe in after sweating and the area was clear of trees or branches overhead, so that we could see the whole of the night sky and the full moon, once it came out.
Some of us had built sweat lodges before and knew the basics of how to do it. We’d come across some green bamboo once while hiking up in the valley, which we figured would work well for building the basic structure. On the day of the full moon we harvested about twenty thin, flexible bamboo branches and took them down to the ceremony site.

It took a handful of us about half a day to construct the sweat lodge. It only needed to be strong enough to hold up a few blankets draped over it, so didn’t have to be a work of engineering perfection. The flexible branches were simply impaled into the ground and then bent over to connect with a stick from the opposite side. These were then tied together in the center, about five feet off the ground. A series of eight pairs of bamboo sticks were each bent over in a circle and tied together in such a fashion. More sticks were then bent and tied around the sides to provide further support.

When finished after just a few hours, it was a small dome about seven or eight feet across—just large enough for a small group to sit huddled inside. The framework was then covered with all of our available blankets, sleeping bags and tarps, to make it as insulated as possible and thus as hot and humid as possible. Like a makeshift sauna, the main purpose of the sweat lodge was simply to get inside, get overheated and sweat. The marked difference between a sauna and a sweat lodge however, is that more than just getting inside and sweating, there is a ceremonial and spiritual aspect to the experience.

While a group of us were busy building the structure, others were collecting armfuls of firewood as well as large lava rocks, which would serve to bring the heat inside the lodge. Later that afternoon, we started a roaring fire in a fire pit, five or six feet away from the entrance to the lodge. Thirty or so of the volcanic rocks were then placed into the raging fire and more wood was laid on top of them. We heated the rocks steadily over the next two hours, as people gathered around the flames both to be warmed and mesmerized by it, as well as watch the sun begin its descent into the ocean.

Once the rocks were good and hot, glowing as red as the setting sun, we began moving them one at a time inside the sweat lodge using a sturdy forked stick. They were placed down in a small hole that was dug into the center of the structure, to keep them away from the bare skin of those inside the lodge. After six or seven hot rocks had been brought inside the sweat lodge, all who wished to participate in the first round proceeded to strip naked, get down on their hands and knees and crawl through the small entrance hole into the darkened lodge. A few people stayed outside to watch the fire, attend to the blankets covering the structure and await the next round.

Once all were huddled inside, the blankets were pulled down to cover the entrance, leaving us in stuffy yet blessed darkness. We could feel the heat emanating from the glowing rocks as we sat blindly in the center of our little circle of friends. Once everyone was sitting cross-legged, facing the hot rocks, a handful of water was poured onto the pile of rocks—and a cloud of hot steam rose upwards to greet our faces and naked bodies. This was when things really started to heat up, and the actual sweating began.

As water was poured, handful by handful onto the rocks, the small lodge became hotter and hotter. It took a good while, perhaps twenty or more minutes, for the heated rocks to lose their heat, even when pouring cold water over them. The small space seemed to get smaller and smaller as the steam enveloped us, and some huddled towards the coolness of the ground. The point of the sweat lodge wasn’t just to warm up and sweat a little, but to be challenged beyond one’s comfort level, and even beyond what a person might think they could endure. Anyone could leave at any time if they felt they needed to. But we all wanted to go deep within ourselves and find the strength to endure and to learn from the challenging environment.

We went around the circle and made prayers, or else gave thanks for whatever we felt grateful for in our lives. A bottle of water was passed around, for those who needed to cool their throats or faces. If it got to the point where it seemed too hot to bear any longer, there was always the option of putting one’s face down in the cool grass, and perhaps finding a little air leaking through from the outside. Or else one could simply pray to Great Spirit or whatever higher power a person might recognize, for additional strength to endure the intense heat through to the very end. Sometimes humility and surrender to the moment at hand can give the necessary endurance to make it through what may seem an unbearable situation. This was one of the important aspects of the sweat lodge ceremony—to be reminded of both our potential inner strength and power, as well as how small we really are in the face of the natural elements.

We all made it through the first round, though not without plenty of moaning and praying. As the rocks eventually began to cool, the last of the water was poured onto them for a final burst of steam on our hot, dripping bodies. At last, we yelled to the people outside that we were done, and someone came to lift the blankets away from the entrance. A flood of cool air blew in on us as the blankets were lifted, and at the same time we were all dazzled by the sparkling light of the campfire. We proceeded to crawl out of the lodge one at a time, grateful for the refreshing night air and light of the fire. Stumbling a little with lightheadedness, we filed down to the nearby creek to dunk our bodies in the cool water, and rinse off the sweat and dirt.

Meanwhile, the lodge was being prepared for the second round, as more hot rocks were brought inside by those who had been attending the fire. Anyone who hadn’t participated in the first round then crawled into the lodge. Then someone yelled down to those of us at the creek that there was still some room left inside. A few went back for another round, while others warmed up beside the fire. This process was repeated throughout the evening as the full moon crested the cliffs to rise above us; and finally the last of the hot, glowing rocks was taken from the dark red coals of the fire, hours later.


"Following My Thumb: A Decade of Unabashed Wanderlust" tells of my travels throughout the 1990s to Europe, the western U.S., Alaska, Hawaii and India. Click the subject line at the top of this page for more info.