End of the Road

I recently had a warrior say to me: "I have gone so far down this path till there is no path."

The truth about paths is that they do end, and there is nothing you can do about it from this point forward except to forge your own path. When I talk about "the path" it is seen on many different levels. There is essentially what might be called a "process" in the beginning - some warriors connect with it through Castaneda, others through Zen, others through various & sundry manifestations of shamanism. But there comes a time when one runs out of "road", and there is just the warrior and the worlds, with no real path left to follow. You have the Knowledge, but no clear indicator of where to take it, what to do with it, nothing at all. Just you and the end of the road – and yet, it seems that when we run out of road is when the journey really begins. And that's the part of the equation that is difficult, scary, and has caused more warriors to turn back than any encounter with allies or power plants.

When I think of the 4 enemies of a man of Knowledge, the way I see it is this: fear is obvious, and something we deal with as an ongoing enemy. Clarity comes and we revel in it - sometimes getting lost in it for years. But as we come to the end of the "path", we see with that clarity that there is no more path - just a vast, untouched universe waiting for the creator's hand. It's knowing that we ARE the creator that gives us pause and brings us face to face with Power. Usually, there is a relatively long period of time during which we simply don't know what to do with our Power, and it's at that point that a lot of warriors turn back - because they have become accustomed to being followers of a path rather than FORGERS of a path.

When we're actually following that initial path (whether Castaneda, Zen, or whatever), if we are impeccable, it could be said we're not really following, but learning from the paths of others. But then comes that day when we have learned all our teachers can teach us, and we then have to go out and push the envelope of Knowledge "where no man has gone before.” There's something to that old STAR TREK cliche - because that is the warrior's ultimate journey. Where NO man has gone before. You are the first, and so the "path" disappears from beneath your feet, leaving you only with Knowledge.

A few years back, I was playing with a concept which I called "beyond human comprehension"; and a related concept "beyond human experience." This is the territory of the nagual, which defies words almost entirely. But what it amounts to is that there is an almost physical pain/confusion/anguish which the warrior begins to experience when s/he comes up against this idea of "beyond human experience." There is much humans cannot comprehend, yet it is in the attempt to do so that we push the envelope "beyond human experience". That pushing is, in itself, part of our evolution.

Sadly - very few ever make it to the end of the path, because the sorcerer's secret is that the path itself is part of the tonal, and is comforting and alluring in so very many ways. To admit that the path HAS an end, and to find oneself facing only the vast Unknown means evolving to a new level of thinking, a new level of responsibility, a new level of awareness - and THAT is far scarier than ANYTHING on "the path" the warrior has taken to get to this point.

_____________

Copyright 2015 by Della Van Hise

All Rights Reserved