In order to use your head, you must first go out of your mind. No, I can’t take credit for that thought provoking statement. It’s actually placed in the beginning of a Mac Miller song. Mac Miller helped me through the depths of my mental breakdown, the lyrics to his songs really were the only thing that got me through for some reason. Great minds think alike maybe? Anyways, today I was curious about who says that quote in the beginning of that song, Colors and Shapes. It’s American Psycologist Timothy Leary. How interesting. I did a little more digging and what a guy. He was also pretty tight with Ram Dass, a well known spiritual leader. Both Timothy Leary and Ram Dass ultimately coined the thought process of Be Here Now, oddly enough one of the guiding principles at my last corporation – I don’t think thats what these guys had in mind when they developed the concept.
Timothy Leary was very big on looking inward, viewing yourself from the outside looking in it seems. Just from initial glances at his work. He even has a book called, Your Brain Is God. What an interesting concept. Either way, I thought back to when I first heard his quote, and I was really in the midst of accepting the fact that I had lost my mind. The truth is it was a necessary evil to get back to myself. I honestly don’t think I ever got to know who I truly was, I never had the time. I never had the chance to learn from different writers or philosophers or psychologists or dreamers. I never had time to think before. The interesting thing is that in order for me to expand my brain, my viewpoint of the world, my way of life, my spirituality, I had to go through a process of deprogramming. And when I was researching Timothy Leary he was a huge proponent of the use of psychedelics in healing, but when I went through my process it was almost as if my brain produced the effects without the drugs. It happened spontaneously, almost as if the weight became too much. My body had had enough. And I experienced what one might call a spiritual awakening, or psychosis. I refer to it on here as a mental breakdown. Maybe it could be referred to as a death of my former self. Whatever it was it was intense. And while it was happening there were signs and connections everywhere. You could say I made them up, I saw what I wanted to see, my mind was playing tricks on me. It started to make me feel crazy, and sure I went there. But I also came back. Almost like I opened a door in my mind. Something we all have.
So this morning I woke up and I saw ladybug on my ceiling. And I smiled because yesterday on my walk I noticed a house painted red with a red car that had black spots. “That’s odd”, I thought. But then I looked up what the meaning of a ladybug was. Good luck it said. I’ll take it as a sign from the universe, God, myself, whatever is out there, that I’m on the right track.
The Girl Without A Face 