Pinch me, I must be dreaming

Shortly after starting work at St. Peter Hospital, I received another unexpected gift. As a 32-year-old male it never entered my mind that a 20-year-old female would give me a second thought. After all, I'd had problems getting any female to give me even a first thought most of my life. So imagine my surprise when the 20-year-old who had been cutting my hair for over a year one day asked me out on a date! Was this one of those acid flashbacks I'd heard about, or was someone playing a joke on me? OK, I'll play along. If she is serious, I'm sure 5 minutes into the date she'll see the error of her ways, admit this was a horrible mistake, and suggest I start getting my hair cut elsewhere.
Well, Christina's still cutting my hair today. Two years after that first date, we were married. This December (2010) will be our 26^th anniversary. She doesn't like when I say this, but it's true: I don't know what she sees in me, but I hope she never stops seeing it.
A little more than a year before Christina and I were married, I got what–at the time–was my dream job. Pierce College needed an assistant coordinator and full-time instructor for its Alcohol–Drug and Social Services–Mental Health programs. I had applied for the position thinking my chances of getting it were about the same as having monkeys fly out my butt (thanks Mike Meyers). A couple weeks later, I was having breakfast with Dr. Clarke St. Dennis the Coordinator of the program. After breakfast, I asked him how soon I would know if I had the job. He said if I didn't have the job, we wouldn't have had breakfast.
Teaching has always been what I like, no, LOVE doing. Whenever I'm teaching, it's hard to remember that I'm "working" and someone is actually paying me to do it. Even as a counselor, I've always taken a cognitive–educational approach in working with clients. Now I get to do it for a living full-time. Plus, I'm about to marry one of the most beautiful (inside and outside) people I've ever met. In a life of peaks and valleys–I had arrived at Mount Everest.
For two years I lived a life that–not so many years earlier–was unimaginable. For the first time in my life, I had found a job I could see staying with until I retired and was married to someone I was ready to spend the rest of my life with. What could possibly go wrong?

Time to Get Schooled

In 1982 Boeing was going through one of its periodic rounds of layoffs. Eventually my name got to the top of the list and I was unemployed. Not a problem. I had a few years left on my G.I. bill that I could use to finish college. This is just the Universe telling me it was time to move on. Since high school I’d often thought about working in human services and, after my rehab/recovery experience, I knew some things about overcoming addiction.

I enrolled as a full-time student at Fort Steilacoom Community College (now called Pierce College) in their Alcohol/Drug Studies program. I had found a minimum wage job cleaning hot tubs and that, along with my VA checks, kept my head above water. I really liked college–especially the psychology classes. I also started getting into some kind of physical shape by running. Eventually I was up to 5 miles a day.

A few weeks before graduation, one of my classmates said they were hiring at the Tacoma Detoxification Center. Well, I had to start somewhere in my new career. A county detox job is about as bad as it gets in the rehab business. You’re pretty much dealing with street alcoholics–the real skid road types. The moment you enter the building, your nose is assaulted by a combination of alcohol, vomit, urine, and gym locker. There are people sleeping on mats in the hallways because there aren’t enough beds (especially if it’s a cold night). Most of the time they’re pretty mellow, but every so often one of them thinks he’s a tough guy and takes a swing at you. Fortunately, they’re so intoxicated they can’t figure out which of the two of you they’re seeing to hit. I usually worked the overnight shift on the weekends, or as I called it–Prime Time.

I had already applied and was accepted for transfer to The Evergreen State College in Olympia to complete the two remaining years of my bachelor’s degree. A couple weeks before I was going to pack-up and move to Olympia, one of my co-workers at detox said someone he knew had called him about a job at an outpatient substance abuse treatment facility in–you guessed it–Olympia. Would I be interested? By the time I moved to Olympia, I had a half-time job as a counselor intern. Since it was outpatient, all the treatment was done in the evening. I went to college full-time during the day and worked half-time at night. This was my life for the next two years.

For those of you unfamiliar with Evergreen, they don’t have individual classes like most other colleges. They do what are called “integrated” or “coordinated” studies. Instead of taking several separate classes, you take a year-long program that integrates classes around a central core. My first year I was in a program called “Human Health and Behavior.” We were a mix of psychology and pre-med students. Half the day we were in core classes as a group, then in the afternoon the psych and pre-med students went to separate seminars to focus on their specific disciplines.

My senior year I was in a “Group Contract” class called “Psychological Counseling.” Only 16 students were selected for the group. I managed to make the cut primarily because I was already working half-time as a counselor. 16 students and one incredible instructor–Dr. Richard Jones. Dick was one of the founding faculty members of Evergreen and had been instrumental in shaping its unique learning environment. He was an elder statesman at Evergreen and this was going to be his last year of full-time teaching. A few years later, he would lose himself to Alzheimer’s and pass on.

June 1986 I became the first of my family to graduate from college. Fortunately, my maternal grandfather (the only one of my grandparents still alive) was there to see it. Later that month, I passed my test to become a Chemical Dependency Professional. Two months later I was hired as one of the staff that would open a new blended inpatient-outpatient substance abuse treatment program at St. Peter Hospital in Olympia. I didn’t think things could get any better. Then they did.

The Lost Years

One of the many things I’ve learned with age is that there are lots of peaks and valleys during one’s life. When I left San Diego, I had reached a significant peak. Little did I know I was headed for a very deep valley.

I didn’t know what I thought I would do once I returned to Washington. Things seemed to be going OK at first. I had managed to line-up some venues for teaching t’ai chi, but since this wasn’t enough to make a living, I needed to have a “real” job.

In the Navy, I’d learned how to type. That was my one marketable skill. After a relatively short time back in my home town, I knew I couldn’t go back to living there. I felt I didn’t belonged there anymore. I had changed–the town hadn’t. So I started looking for work and a place to live in Seattle. I got a job at the UW as a receptionist for the Health Sciences Department at University Hospital. Cool, I was working in the U-district! I found a little cottage to rent in West Seattle right across from Lincoln Park and the ferry terminal to Vashon Island. Another score! Seemed things were falling right into place.

Life took another good turn 6 months later when I got a job at Boeing. For someone with no real skills, a high school diploma, and one year of college they were offering what–at the time–was more money that I could imagine. Like most newbies at Boeing, I moved around a lot. It seemed like every 6 months or so I was moved to a new location with a new job and new shift. Teaching t’ai chi classes was no longer possible with all the Boeing moves, so I ended them after less than a year.

Working at Boeing was stressful. Because of all the moves, I was always the new guy and just about when I figured out how to do my job, I’d get moved to a new one. Alcohol became my very close companion. I started living for the weekends–going out to bars and taverns. I was over 21, alcohol was legal, and I was able to drink a lot of it. Problem was, more often than not, I couldn’t remember what happened when I woke-up (more like “came to”) the next morning. I later learned these are called “blackouts” and an early warning sign of impending alcoholism.

Since I liked drinking, but kept having blackouts, I came up with what–at the time–seemed a perfect solution. Cocaine was at the height of its popularity during this time (late seventies). It gave me lots of energy and kept me awake. It seemed to counteract the alcohol. Unfortunately, like coffee on steroids, cocaine doesn’t sober anyone up–it just leaves you wide-awake AND drunk. Worse yet, cocaine has a very short half-life. This means it wears off quickly–more quickly than alcohol. So the cocaine keeps you up and you drink even more because you don’t notice the effects of the alcohol because the cocaine is temporarily masking them. The cocaine runs out, the bar closes. Time to drive home. Halfway home the cocaine wears off and the full wave of alcohol hits the brain. Nighty night!

Do this long enough and, if you’re lucky, you end up in a jail cell charged with DUI. Guess what, coming out of a blackout and finding you’re in jail REALLY sucks. It also gets your attention. A few weeks later and I’m off to rehab to avoid having a DUI on my record. 26 years old and fresh out of rehab. I think this safely qualifies as a “valley” and a pretty deep one to boot. Three weeks in rehab gave me plenty of time to think. How did I get here? When did it all go so wrong? What’s next?

Well, the good news is that there’s only one direction to go when you hit bottom. Fortunately Boeing has an employee assistance program, so by telling them I had a problem and getting help they didn’t fire me. I still had a job.

I tried going out a few times after rehab. No drinking, but it was also no fun–in fact–just the opposite. Socially and emotionally I was back in Junior High when it came to dating. In my mind I was rejected before I ever even asked someone out, so why bother? It was so much easier when I had a few drinks and some lines (not the “do you come here often” kind–the coke kind). Misery and disappointment seemed to stretch out as far as I could see. Well, if that’s the case I’ve got nothing to lose. Maybe it was time for another reinvention.

Sometime between kindergarten and first grade, I developed a pretty serious stutter. It stayed with me through most of Junior High until I found something that not only got me over it, but took me to the opposite end of the spectrum. By the time I graduated, I received my high school’s drama award after acting in every school play since my sophomore year. The answer was simple–if I could be someone other than me, then I would be OK.

About this time, punk rock/new wave was taking over the music scene. A subgroup of this was the rockabilly revival (remember the Stray Cats?). My stage was set. Shy self-conscious me became a rockabilly rebel. DA haircut, white sportcoat with fake leopard skin lapels, sideburns, shades–I was a real cool daddy-O! After seeing me jitterbug to the boppin’ beat, girls we’re asking ME to dance! I had learned how to have fun with being chemically altered. All I had to do, was not be me. But, I was starting to crawl out of the valley.

California Dreamin’

After a year in Virginia Beach, I was transferred to San Diego, CA. This came at the perfect time as I now had a direction for my spiritual quest and was heading to the center of the new age spiritual universe–California. I was assigned to the administrative staff of the Rear Admiral in charge of all surface forces in the Pacific Fleet (basically everything except submarines and aircraft). I was stationed at the Naval Amphibious Base at Coronado–home of Navy Seals basic training.

San Diego was paradise for someone who spent his first 18 years of life in rainy, gloomy Western Washington. Nearly perfect weather every day. It rained in San Diego about as often as it snowed in the lowlands of Western Washington. The other 360 days it was sunny and in the 70s during the “Winter” and in the 80’s during the Summer. Next door to a warm Pacific Ocean that you could actually swim in and only a few hours drive away from the San Bernadino Mountains and miles of desert that included Joshua Tree and the Coachella Valley.

I began reading every book I could find on Buddhism and Taoism (and there were a lot of them). I also began taking yoga classes along with practicing Transcendental Meditation (something I picked-up in Virginia Beach). In my readings, it seemed that the general consensus was that spiritual experiences via psychoactive substances were not the “real” thing–they could be a catalyst for beginning a spiritual journey, but they needed to be supplanted by more traditional practices if one wanted a permanent transformation. As Houston Smith–the great scholar of world religions–said, “Having a spiritual experience is easy, living a spiritual life as a result of that experience is what’s hard.”

During this time, the one writer primarily responsible for my initial understanding of Buddhism and Taoism was a popular interpreter of Eastern philosophy–Alan Watts. I liked Watts because, like me, he was a mostly self-taught religious scholar with a strong affinity for Eastern philosophy. Born in England, he served as an Episcopal priest for 5 years before moving to the United States in 1951 to accept a teaching position at the American Academy of Asian Studies in San Francisco. During his lifetime he also had a teaching fellowship at Harvard and was a frequent speaker at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. Watts had a way of taking the most complex philosophical concepts and making them easily understandable, which was a big part of his popularity.

Alan Watts was close friends with a fellow British expatriate–Aldous Huxley. Like Huxley, Watts experimented with Mescaline, Psilocybin, and LSD in America. But unlike Huxley, Watts came to reject these substances as valid tools for a spiritual seeker. Ironic, because Watts died at age 58 due to heart failure exacerbated by his lifelong alcoholism.

Armed with a foundation of key concepts in Eastern philosophy thanks to Watts, I was able to gain a better understanding of source texts in Buddhism and Taoism. I found myself particularly drawn to Taoism. I think this was because I had not yet learned to separate the teachings of the Buddha from the religion that sprouted up around them. Later on, I would discover that the quickest way to destroy a spiritual teaching is to make it an organized religion.

Taoism led me to t’ai chi–the ancient Chinese slow-motion martial art based upon Taoist philosophy. Since learning Transcendental Meditation, I had experienced ongoing difficulties with seated meditation. For one, no matter what position I tried to sit in after about 5 minutes my lower back hijacked my attention leaving little left for meditation. Also, I seemed to have hit a wall with seated mediation and wasn’t getting much from it.

T’ai chi was often described as a “moving” form of meditation. I was ready to give it a try. All I needed to do was find a teacher. One Saturday I was strolling through Balboa Park, when I saw a group of about 10 people doing–you guessed it–t’ai chi. They were led my an elder Chinese man who simply went by “Mr. Leong.” All I needed to do to join the class was show-up on Saturdays and give Mr. Leong $5 when class was over. Sounded simple enough. I studied with Mr. Leong for about a year, learning Wu style empty hand and short staff t’ai chi forms.

The more I practiced t’ai chi, the more I wanted to learn–not only of t’ai chi, but of its sister arts. This has been a recurring theme in my life–if I decide to get into something, I jump in with both feet and don’t look back. I realized that continuing with Mr. Leong was no longer enough for me.

About this time, I met an interesting fellow from Oklahoma. He professed to not only teach t’ai chi, but many other Chinese martial arts. His name–Mike Brown. Mike had been into martial arts for quite some time before meeting a petroleum geologist from Taiwan, Her Yu Wong. Dr. Wong had studied Chinese martial arts since he was a boy in Taiwan. Since moving to the U.S. he continued his practice, but never took on any students thinking no one in this country would be interested. Mike was interested and soon became Dr. Wong’s first student.

Eventually, Mike Brown and Dr. Wong had started the Ching Yi Kung Fu Association to share Dr. Wong’s knowledge with others. In so doing, they set minimum standards for what anyone wanting to teach these arts needed to be considered proficient. So, if I wanted to teach t’ai chi as an instructor certified by the Ching Yi Kung Fu Association, I had to learn all the Ching Yi martial arts. This way, even if all I ever taught was t’ai chi, I would have a well-rounded background and understanding of the tradition from which t’ai chi emerged.

This was just what I was looking for. Now I could get a more comprehensive training in these disciplines from both the Taoist and Buddhist heritage. Through t’ai chi I had found a physical discipline that combined gentle exercise with meditative focus. Since I found the Taoist philosophical teachings so compelling, I wanted to see how the physical practices born of this philosophy could further my spiritual development.

After being discharged from the Navy, I stayed another two years in San Diego. During this time my life consisted of eating, working (just enough to pay expenses), sleeping, and practicing kung fu. I was learning everything I could from Mike and, eventually, helping him teach as an informal assistant instructor. At the time, I thought I would never return to Washington except to visit. San Diego was my new home. But shortly after passing my test to become a certified Ching Yi Kung Fu instructor, I decided it was time to head back North. My four plus years in the Golden State had come to an end. I loaded everything I owned into a VW Super Beetle and began driving North on I-5. The moment I crossed the border into Washington, it started snowing (this was in April). I should have seen that as an omen and turned around. I didn’t.

Leaving Home

Have you ever done something without really knowing why, only to find out later it was probably the best thing you could have done at the time? Before even graduating from high school, I had enlisted to enter the U.S. Navy following my graduation. At the time, I wasn't completely sure why I did it–but, in hindsight, it was probably the best choice I could have made at the time. Many of my friends were shocked. I'm sure if there had been a "Least Likely to Enter the Military" vote by my classmates, I would have finished at least in the top ten.
I could have gone to college like most of my friends, and was even accepted at The Evergreen State College. But some part of me knew going from high school straight into college would have ultimately been a waste of time (a very fun waste of time, but a waste of time nevertheless). I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and needed some time to "find myself." Having grown up in a small town where everybody not only knew me, but knew my parents and grandparents as well–I wanted to get as far away as I could. Somewhere where no one knew me and I could become whoever I wanted to be. Since I didn't have any money, I decided my best option was to spend a few years working for my Uncle Sam.
A couple weeks after my 18^th birthday, I left for boot camp in Orlando, Florida. I couldn't have gotten farther away from Washington and still remained in the continental U.S. Eight weeks in boot camp, a short visit home for Christmas, then back to Orlando for 12 weeks of Navy Personnelman school. After graduating, I went to my first duty station–Virginia Beach, VA–working in the Educational Services Office of a Naval Aircraft Squadron.
While stationed in Virginia Beach, I spent nearly every night in the base library studying the world's major religions. I had decided that I was going to see if any of them contained anything that made sense to me. I ended up focusing my attention on Buddhism and Taoism.
I liked Buddhism because it is a non-theistic religion. Although many Buddhist followers revere the Buddha in a god-like manner, the Buddha himself denied any divinity. Whenever he was asked if he was a god, he said "No, I am awake." This, in fact, is what the term "Buddha" means–awakened one. The focus of Buddhism is on the mind as the source of all existence. In his first discourse, the Buddha said "The mind is the forerunner of all things." For anyone who has delved into the world of substances such as LSD, this makes perfect sense.
Taoism, on the other hand, revered the natural world and viewed the divine as being expressed throughout the rhythms of nature. Although some try to equate the Tao with "god," there is little similarity with what most people conceive of as god. God in the Judeao-Christian tradition–as well as most other theistic traditions–is a supernatural being that exists outside of the natural world. The Tao on the other hand is a natural force that is both the source and substance of all existence. Out of it all things arise, while simultaneously it is a part of all things.
From that point on, Buddhism and Taoism became the primary focus of my study as I began in earnest my spiritual self-education. Where else to go, but California?

The Universe turned inside-out

The time was 1968-69. It was the zenith of the counter-culture movement in the United States. I was all of 14 and fancied myself a hippie (or at least as much of one as you could be in a conservative rural community). By this time, I had already discovered alcohol and was ripe for trying some of the more exotic forbidden fruit.

Now before I start my confession, you must put this in historical context. We’re talking over 40 years ago. Comedian Dana Carvey–who is the same age as me–once said the slogan for this era should have been “just say yes to drugs.” After all, Nixon didn’t sign the Controlled Substances Act into law until 1970.

This, by the way, is the other main reason for my “Adult Content” warning. I managed to survive several things I’m sure you don’t want your sons or daughter’s trying. Even if you did some of the same things, I’m sure it would keep you up at night if you thought of your offspring doing anything close to what you and I did back in the day. So, read on if you dare and Mom, please don't read any further. Nothing good can come of it.

My second encounter with things psychoactive (alcohol was first) was marijuana. This seemed to be the “bread and butter” of the counter-culture at the time. Back then, asking someone “Are you cool?” meant “Do you smoke pot?” Most people under 25 were cool. If you’ve never tried it (and I’m NOT suggesting you do), cannabis produces a very different state of consciousness than alcohol. Results may vary, but by-and-large pot tends to make one more relaxed and mellow. Sensual things–eating, listening to music, having your naked body touched, etc. taste, sound, and feel–as Tony the Tiger would say–GRRREAT! There is some loss of inhibition, but not in the same way as alcohol. It would be hard to imagine someone getting pissed off and wanting to fight while high on pot. If you decide to surrender your virginity while on pot, it would likely be because you feel a cosmic connection with the other person (besides it feeling so damn good), not because you are passed out and can’t say “no.”

Smoking pot was nice. I actually liked it more than alcohol. But alcohol was de rigueur at high school parties. No matter what the side dishes were, alcohol was always the main course. And pot does give you “cotton mouth,” so you have to drink something.

I quickly discovered that pot wasn’t the evil weed portrayed in Refer Madness. So I–like many others–figured the “other stuff” wasn’t so bad either. Before long, the list of psychoactives I had tried was longer than those I had not tried. Everything changed, however, with my first experience with LSD.

During the mid to late sixties, there was one group of chemicals that NOBODY was prepared for. They were called “Psychedelics” or “Hallucinogens” and included chemicals with names so long and complicated that they usually went by initials–LSD, MDA, DMT, etc. These are fundamentally VERY different than what everyone was used to. Drinking, smoking some pot, and maybe popping some speed every now and then does not prepare one for a full-blown experience with a substance such as LSD. This is the primary reason so many people had “bad trips.” It was not so much the drug, but the lack of appropriate preparation for taking it. In most properly structured clinical settings, LSD and similar substances showed great promise (and still do today) as therapy for mental and addictive disorders.

Well, fortunately I did not fall victim to the “bad trip,” in fact quite the opposite occurred. While those who had “bad trips” were afraid their experience would never end, I wanted it to go on forever. Initially, I was foolish enough to take this stuff at parties (definitely not recommended). But it was after the party ended and I was home laying in bed alone that the real beauty of LSD revealed itself to me. It seemed to open my mind to thoughts and ideas that led to questioning the very nature of reality. Suddenly, my existence within this infinite Universe became a prime focus of my attention. Who am I? Why am I here? What’s this all about? It was as if in one fell swoop I had gone from stoner teenager to budding philosopher.

Much later, I found out that many others have had similar experiences that left them permanently transformed. Those who weren’t scared shitless over seeing everything they ever thought that was real and true melt before their eyes had something akin to a religious conversion. In fact, an experiment conducted at the Harvard Divinity School many years earlier (more about that in future posts) had found that students could not tell the difference between a “real” spiritual experience and the experience one had on these substances.

I didn’t really experience the truly transformational power of such substances till many years later when I was able to take LSD and spend a day wandering in the desert of Southern California (there’s a reason people seeking spiritual answers often go into the wilderness alone).

The problem was, I had this transformative experience, but had nowhere to put it within my existing cognitive schema. This would lead to the next chapter of my journey.

In the beginning . . .

I thought I would start with a little background information for those of you who don’t know me (and those of you who think you do). For the sake of brevity, I will be painting this history in pretty broad strokes with more detail to follow in future posts.

I was born the first child to middle class parents. My grandparents were immigrants from Sweden (paternal) and Denmark (maternal). Only recently did I discover that my paternal grandfather was from the Sami people of Swedish Lapland. These are the indigenous people–along with the Saman of Siberia and Mongolia–from which we get the word “Shaman.” This will prove to be an interesting coincidence in my latter life.

The town I grew up in was rural with an economic base of dairy farming and the timber industry. It sits atop a plateau just to the West of the Cascade Mountain foothills and Mount Rainier. In recent years it has become primarily a suburb or the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan area–particularly for urbanites who want to play the life of a country squire–but still retains much of its rural character.

Throughout my childhood exposure to any formal religious training was mostly non-existent. I suppose we were Lutherans (in name only), as much of the town’s population, including me, was of Scandinavian heritage. I rarely, if ever, recall us going to church as a family except for occasions such as weddings. Once, my parents made a feeble attempt to send me to Sunday school with some of our neighbor’s kids, but that was very short lived. The only thing I remember about it was playing with some Jesus and friends cardboard cut-outs on a felt-covered board.

Since my parents didn’t have a strong religious conviction, they must have–at some level–seen the hypocrisy in trying to give me any kind of religious upbringing. I consider this a great advantage in my future spiritual life, as I did not have any early religious indoctrination to overcome. However, with my naturally free-thinking and rebellious nature, this would probably not have been too much of a barrier.

When I was finally old enough to intellectually grasp the concept of god–sometime in my preteens–I made the conscious choice to be atheist. At the time, I probably didn’t know the word “atheist” and if I did, I probably didn’t know what it meant. Nevertheless, having discovered Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, et al. to be “make believe,” it seemed that god–or at least the Judeao-Christian god–was make-believe as well.

A footnote: This is one reason why I have the Adult Content warning on my blog. I don’t want to be the one to shatter any child’s beliefs in Santa, etc.

The further I went in school, the more convinced I was that belief in a supernatural being was a vestigial artifact of a primitive and superstitious past. By the time I entered high school, I not only knew what atheist meant, it was a label I wore with pride. I even took the atheist position in a debate in one of my classes (back then you could talk openly about such things).

So, by the time I was in high school, I was a budding young atheist. Then something unexpected happened.