Who We Are is What
We Wish To Be and if we can't be who and what we wish to be, We have
the ability within in to change it.
We have the freedom within ourselves
to be unburdened by the constraints and conditioning forced upon
us by our up-bringing and the designated Cultural and Religious
dogma of the Society we are born into. The Society which then, tries
to enslave us and force us to conform to that which is “Normal”.
When we are born, we are born into
a family unit and then, as we grow older, introduced into our community,
tribe or clan. We are schooled and educated into how we are expected
to “act” according to our gender and Cultural
and Religious background. We are then, assimilated into the Society
which governs us and expected to tow the line and follow the rules
and laws of the land.
If we rebel or wander from the Social
constraints we are ostracized, victimised and criminalised and we
are branded not normal, abnormal, anti-social, malcontents, outcasts
and non-conformists.
Many of us who have been labeled
find ourselves brutalised, imprisoned or institutionalised like
McMurphy the central character from “One
Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest” and worse some of us are
murdered.
This is the Reality that we live
in. Man's inhumanity to man.
… but then, again, What is
Reality?
Reality is the conjectured state of things as they actually
exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined The more
we learn about reality, the less we understand it.
S. Michael Houdmann states- “Some
people would say that there is no true reality, only perceptions
and opinions. Others would argue that there must be some absolute
reality or truth.”
Source:
http://www.gotquestions.org/absolute-truth.html
When approaching the topic of Transformation
however, I always like to refer back to and quote Eugene Ionesco who
once said: “There is no such thing as unreality there are only
different forms of Reality.”
In his article “The
7 Steps to Alchemical Transformation” Joseph D.
Dismore; Lord Helel bin Saqar, High Priest of Ordo Sacerdotalvs
Templi presented a guide to Physical, Psychological and Spiritual
Transformation.
This article, by no means, is meant
to distracted from Joseph's well researched and written work, but
rather extend, elaborate and collaborate his findings from a personal
experience level.
Long before my friend, Joseph had
wrote and published his article, I had been seeking a means of transformation.
I had a very traumatic and unhappy childhood growing up sensing
that something was not quite right and knowing as I reached adulthood
that who I was, was not the person I wanted to be.
For but a promised that I made to
my dearly departed mother I would of taken steps to remedy the situation.
I will not go into detail here but if you wish to know more about
who I was and who I am now you can find this information on my About
Mystique Mish web page.
Way back in 2003, when Lord Helel
bin Saqar and his darling wife, High Priestess, Mistress Bloodmoon
became my friends (it was I, in passing, who played “cupid”
and brought them together), we, with our partners, owned and administered
a Yahoo Forum Group know as “The Cosmic Cauldron”, where
we discussed many interesting topics such as Transformation.
Within the forum, we discussed topics
like Reincarnation, Past Lives, Metamorphoses; Shape-Shifting and
Transformation among other notable topics of interest. In private
text conversations and emails, Joseph and I discussed my theory
that Schizophrenia, if not drug induced, was a Spiritual affliction
affecting the souls of novices and untrained Shamans who had journeyed
unprepared to another realm of existence and who had came back not
quite intact.
In the same vain we discussed, The
Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Dr. Jekyll and Mr.
Hyde, or simply Jekyll & Hyde, written by the Scottish
author Robert Louis Stevenson that was first published
in 1886.
Stevenson had long been intrigued
by the idea of how personalities can affect a human and how to incorporate
the interplay of good and evil into a story. While still
a teenager, he developed a script for a play about Deacon Brodie,
about the doctor (Jekyll) who had created a potion that divided
the two sides of a man's character--the good in him from the bad--allowing
a man to transform between the two. Hyde was the manifestation of
Jekyll's evil side.
We also, discussed one of my favourite movies of all time, Altered
States.
“I'm a man in search of his true self. How archetypically
American can you get? Everybody's looking for his true self. We're
all trying to fulfil ourselves, understand ourselves, get a hold
on ourselves, explore ourselves, expand ourselves. Ever since we've
dispensed with God, we've got nothing but ourselves. From the novel Altered
States by Paddy Chayevsky
Eddie Jessup (William Hurt) is a psycho-physiologist who in 1967
is probing his own altered states of consciousness in an isolation
tank, first in New York and then at Harvard. His assistant, Arthur
Rosenberg, wires him to EEG and EKG equipment and tape records his
accounts of what he is seeing, feeling, and experiencing. His wife
Emily, an anthropologist, and Dr. Parrish, a colleague, are concerned
about Eddie's obsessive desire to locate in his inner space-time
"the first self" and ultimate truth.
Jessup travels to Mexico where he takes part in a sacred mushroom
ceremony performed by primitive Indians. The drug intensifies his
journey backwards into time. He returns to Harvard and uses the
mushroom potion in conjunction with his tank experiments. He hallucinates
into a primitive stage of human development. Jessup then brings
his ape being into the present and goes on a rampage, killing a
security guard and escaping to the zoo grounds in Boston. Realizing
his sanity has snapped, Jessup reprograms his love for Emily and
defuses his animal self.”
Source: Frederic and Mary
Ann Brussat Film Review
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/films/films.php?id=7664
Further:
“Edward Jessup is a university
professor of abnormal psychology who, while studying schizophrenia,
begins to think that "our other states of consciousness are
as real as our waking states." Jessup begins experimenting
with sensory deprivation using a flotation tank,
aided by two like-minded researchers, Parrish and Rosenberg. At
a faculty party he meets fellow "wonder kid" Emily and
the two eventually marry.
When Edward hears of a Mexican
tribe that experiences shared illusion states, he travels to Mexico
to participate in what is apparently an AyahuascaCeremony.
During the walk into the bush his guide states that the indigenous
tribe they are meeting works with Amanita muscaria which
they are collecting for next year's ceremonies. An indigenous elder
is seen with Banisteriopsis caapi root in his hand prior
to cutting Jessup's hand, adding blood to the mixture he is preparing.
Immediately after consumption Edward experiences bizarre, intense
imagery. He returns to the U.S. with a tincture and begins
taking it orally before each session in the flotation tank where
he experiences a series of increasingly drastic psychological and
physical transformations.
Edward's mind experiments cause him to experience actual, physical biological
devolution. At one stage he emerges from the isolation tank as a
feral and curiously small-statured, light-skinned Primitive
Man. The rest of the team becomes highly concerned about the experiments,
but Edward is adamant about continuing. In a subsequent experiment
he is regressed into a mostly amorphous mass of conscious, primordial
matter.
It is only the physical intervention of his wife Emily which brings
him back from this latter, shocking transformation in which he seems
poised on the brink of becoming a non-physical form of proto-consciousness
and possibly disappearing from our version of reality altogether.
Edward begins to experience episodes of involuntary spontaneous
temporary partial devolution, outside of the isolation tank and
without the intake of additional doses of the hallucinogenic tincture.
His early reaction is more one of fascination than concern, but
as his priorities gradually change due to Emily's determination
to keep from losing him, he finally begins to act like someone who
values his humanity.”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altered_States
Unlike the modern fiction in books and movies, Metamorphoses; Shap-shifting;
Transformation, no mention of drugs in Ancient Myths or Folklore
being used except for the Norsemen/ Viking Beserkers who would chew
some kind of nut or drink some brewed potion and then, dressing
as Wolves (hence Lycanthropy) or eve Bear fur would launch
themselves into battle psychologically becoming the animal worse
skin they adorned.
In Mythology:
“In Greek mythology, shape-shifting is often a punishment
from the gods to humans who crossed them. Zeus transformed Lycaon into
a wolf (hence Lycanthropy) as a punishment for killing his
children, in some versions of the myth.
Athena transformed Arachne into
a spider for challenging her as a weaver and/or weaving a tapestry
that insulted the gods.
Artemis transformed Actaeon into a stag for spying
on her bathing, and he was later devoured by his own hunting dogs.
Io was a priestess of Hera in Argos, a nymph
who was raped by Zeus, who changed her into a heifer to escape detection.
Her mistress Hera set ever-watchful Argus Panoptes to
guard her, but Hermes was sent to distract the guardian
and slay him. Heifer Io was loosed to roam the world, stung by a
maddening gadfly sent by Hera, and wandered to Egypt, thus
placing her descendant Belus in Egypt; his sons Cadmus and Danaus would
thus "return" to mainland Greece.
Circe transformed all intruders to her island into
various beasts, including wild pigs.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne'sTanglewood
Tales, "she changes every human being into the brute, beast,
or fowl whom he happens most to resemble." There have been
numerous episodes in which the sorceress with her potions changed
men and women into wild animals. She is also said to have transformed
the nymph Scylla into a multi-headed sea monster, out
of jealousy over the merman Glaucus.
In ancient Greece there was the incident of the dog's theft of gold,
guardian of a temple of Zeus is located in Crete. In this myth,
the architect of the theft was actually Pandareus, who gave
the boy with the commitment that it hid the divine eyes. Hermes came
with the clear intent to recover the sacred animal, but Tantalus swore
falsely. The huge dog wasRhea, a female Titan, transformed by the
god Hephaestus.
In Norse mythology, Svipdagr angered Odin, who
turned him into a dragon.
In Norse mythology, however, both Odin and Loki taunt
each other with having taken the form of females in the Lokasenna.
The ultimate proof of this was that they had given birth and had
nursed their offspring. It is unknown what myths, if any, lie behind
the charges against Odin, but myths documented in the
13th century have Loki taking the form of a mare to bear
Odin's steed which was the fastest horse ever to exist, and
a she-wolf to bear Fenrir.”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shapeshifting
“The Metamorphoses, (Latin: Metamorphoseon
libri: "Books of Transformations") is a poem by
the Roman author Ovid dating from around A . D .
8, tells many of the ancient myths and legends of Greece, Rome,
and the Near East. All the stories have a common theme
of change, or metamorphosis, hence the name of the work. Characters
in each of the tales undergo some sort of transformation into other
forms, including animals, plants, and stars. The changes usually
come either as a reward for obeying or helping the gods or
as a punishment for disobeying or challenging them. Comprising fifteen
books and over 250 myths, the poem chronicles the history of
the world from its creation to the deification of Julius
Caesar within a loose mythico-historical framework.
Apart from this, the uses of
shape-shifting, transformation, and metamorphosis in fiction
... In Greek mythology, Zeus disguised himself as Artemis in
order to get close enough toCallisto; so that she could not escape
when he attempted to rape her. More innocently, Vertumnus could
not woo Pomona in his own shape. Taking the form of an
old woman, Vertumnus, was able to gain access to her orchard and
persuade her to marry him.”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamorphoses
In Folklore and Folk-Tales:
“In the Finnish tale The
Magic Bird, three young sorceresses attempt to murder a man who
keeps reviving. His revenge is to turn them into three black mares
and have them harnessed to heavy loads until he is satisfied.
In the tale of the Laidley Wyrm, an English legend from Northumbria
around the thirteenth century, Margaret of Bamburgh was
transformed into a dragon by a witch. Her brother eventually restored
her to human form with a kiss. By doing so, the curse rebounded
at the witch, who was then transformed into a frog.
In Child ballad 35, Allison Gross, the title witch
turned a man into a wyrm for refusing to be her lover.
This is a motif found in many legends and folktales.[8]
In the German tale The Frog's Bridegroom by Gustav
Jungbauer, the third of three sons of a farmer, Hansl, was forced
to marry a frog, which eventually turned out to be a beautiful nude
woman transformed by a spell.
In some variants of the fairy tales, both The Frog Prince or
more commonly The Frog Princess and Beast, of Beauty
and the Beast, were transformed as a form of punishment for some
transgression.
In the most famous Lithuanian folk tale Eagle the
Queen of Serpents, Egle irreversibly transforms her children and
herself into trees as a punishment for betrayal while her husband
is able to reversibly morph into a serpent at will.
In the Indian fable: The Dog Bride from Folklore
of the Santal Parganas by Cecil Henry Bompas a shepherd
of buffaloes fell in love with a bitch that had the power to return
a woman, when she bathed.
In East of the Sun and West of the Moon, the hero was transformed
into a bear by his wicked stepmother, who wished to force him
to marry her daughter.
In the forests of France's famous
creature half orc and half-god: Le Maître de Forêt,
was famous for having the power to change humans into animals.
In the Italian tale The Prince who married a Frog, a princess
is transformed by a magician into a frog because of her vanity and
rudeness. Only the love and compassion of a handsome prince will
restore her to her human form.
Some giants abducted humans to reduce them to slavery. In the famous
Irish legend of Prince Diarmuid, the giant of the forest of
Black Beech was holding captive three women. For a given to maintain
its appearance, but the other two, turned for fun in a dog and a
horse.
In The Marmot Queen by Italo Calvino, a Spanish queen
is turned into a rodent by the Morgan le Fay.
In a Turin Italian tale by Guido Gozzano: The Mare of
the Necromancer, the Princess of Corelandia was turned into a horse
by the baron necromancer for refusing to marry him. Only love and
intelligence of a nice guy named Candido save the princess from
the spell.
The Neapolitan tale written by Giambattista Basile: The
Deer in The Wood describes the transformation of Princess Desiderata
into a doe. Envy and jealousy of a fairy who saw his unrequited
love, because of the beauty of the noble lady, she decided to take
revenge on changing it into a deer. Here, too, will always be the
prince to save his beloved princess from the evil spell.
From a Croatian book tales Sixty Folk-Tales from Exclusively
Slavonic Sources by A. H. Wratislaw There is a fable
entitled: The she-wolf. In this tale a huge she-wolf which controlled
a mill had a habit of returning woman from time to time, taking
off the skin. One day a man saw it, and stole his fur he married
her.
Shape-shifting abilities,
founded in mythology, folklore and fantasy fiction,
is the ability of an entity to physically transform into another
being or form. This is usually achieved through an inherent faculty
of a mythological creature, divine intervention, or the use of magic spells
or talismans.
The concept has been present since antiquity, and may indeed be common
in all cultures. It is present in the oldest forms of totemism and shamanism,
as well as the oldest extant literature and epic poems, including
works such as the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Iliad,
when the shape-shifting is usually induced by the act of a deity.
The idea persisted through the Middle Ages, where the agency
causing shape-shifting is usually a sorcerer or witch; and into
the
modern period. It remains a common
trope in modern fantasy, children's literature, and works
of popular culture.
The most common form of shape-shifting myths is that of therianthropy,
which is the transformation of a human being into an animal (and,
conversely, of an animal into human form). Legends allow for transformations
into plants and objects, and the assumption of another human countenance (e.g.
fair to ugly)”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shapeshifting
“A persistent theme in Celtic
myth tales was that of metamorphosis, the ability to change from
one form to the next. There is also an element of transmigration
in the tales, and one persistent theme is the god or hero who takes
the form of one animal after another.
For example, the druid Finntan
survived for a great stretch of time by taking the form of many
animals until he was able to relate the ancient history of Ireland
to St. Patrick. This may be an allusion to reincarnation, or simply
an implication that Finntan absorbed all of the knowledge of the
natural world.”
Source: Magical Metamorphosis
by Jennifer Emick - http://www.netplaces.com/celtic-wisdom/sacred-animals/magical-metamorphosis.htm
“Mythology, fairy tales,
and legends contain many tales of humans and deities assuming the
bodies of animals temporarily. Zeus, for instance, changed himself
into a swan in order to seduce Leda. Merlin instructed the young
King Arthur in the art of shape-shifting, teaching him to take on
the forms of a badger, hawk, and bird.
Shape-shifting means changing your form into something else —
an animal or another human being — for a particular purpose.
Shamans often shape-shift in order to acquire the powers of an animal
during a journey. Witches might choose to shape-shift in order to
explore, gain knowledge, or see things from a different perspective,
or for healing purposes, or to conceal their true identities.
When you shape-shift, you don't actually turn into an animal; you
experience its energy as strongly as you can so you become like the
animal. If you wish to practice this art, begin by meeting your
power animal or totem during meditation. Ask permission to enter
it briefly, to learn what it can teach you. Envision yourself entering
into the animal's body and becoming one with it. Try to see the
world through the animal's eyes. Feel yourself existing within its
form; sense the
world as the animal does. You
may wish to actually move about in a manner that's characteristic
of the animal. When you've learned what you sought to learn, thank
the animal and return to your usual human form.
Some people like to don animal masks or costumes as part of their
shape-shifting practices. Others enjoy observing animals in their
wild habitat. As you watch birds and animals in nature, try to communicate
with them and listen to what they “say” to you. If you
keep your heart and mind open, you can learn a great deal from the
animal kingdom that will help you — and them — in the
practice of magick and the process of evolution.”
Source: Shape-shifting by Skye
Alexander - http://www.netplaces.com/wicca-witchcraft/the-animal-kingdom/shapeshifting.htm
Although there is a great deal
of Mythico-Historical documentation on the internet, there is unfortunately,
NOT any ancient transcripts of Ritual Rites or Sacred documents
to support the premises of Transformation.
It wasn't until four years ago and after I had fulfilled the promise
I had made to my mother to sire heirs and carry on the family name
and when, my darling friend and ex-partner severed the matrimonial
umbilical-cord did I find my self free to pursue in earnest my long
desire to transform myself from Male to Female.
As a Goddess Worshipper, my only
regret is that I did not do it much earlier when I was younger.
While my friend Joseph continued
his academic pursuits over the years I took a more leisurely approach
and a completely different path of research to the point of even
experimenting on myself by taking and drinking Natural plant hallucinogens
and eventually starting Hormone Replacement Therapy.
In that time also, I experimented
with self-hypnosis and researched and studied as many of the books
I could find on the ancient I-Ching.
Many modern practitioners and Westerners consider the I-Ching as
the oldest and most respected “Oracle” book, when in fact
it is more than that. Several 19th century Occultists and Metaphysists
who studied the I-Ching literally accepted the book by its English
translation: “The Book of Change”
"In its present form it
can be traced back at least 3000 years and even at that time it
was considered venerable. The Book of Change draws its basic philosophy
from the ancient Chinese faith known as Tao. The word “tao”
is most usually translated as “way” - as in the Christian
expression “I am the Way, the Truth, the Life” - but No
English word proves a really satisfactory equivalent and even in
Chinese it is susceptible of a variety of meaning. Indeed, as one
Chinese inscription puts it: “the tao that can be put into
words is not Everlasting Tao.”
To the Taoist sage the World is not made up of discrete particles
of Time and Space, everything is part of everything else and Reality
consists of ceaseless Change.”
Source: “The Occult Connection” - Orbis Publishing Limited,
London 1984.
Reading various books of Taoism and documented instruction from
Occultists of the Theosophical Society and rigorously analysing
the deeper meaning of the symbolism of the I-Ching and through self-hypnosis
and deep meditation, I am transforming myself faster than the Hormone
replacement and usual trans-gendering allows. Coupled with the inspirational
guide of Joseph's “The
7 Steps to Alchemical Transformation” I have found
that it is totally possible to transform oneself.
Cogito Ergo Sum - “I
Think therefore I am.”
The Philosophical proposition of
Rene Descartes meaning of the later phrase is that thinking about
one's existence proves in and of itself – that “I”
exist to do the thinking, or as Descartes explains: “We
cannot doubt of an existence while we doubt we cease to exist.”
Physical, Psychological and Spiritual
Change is an ability we ALL can Obtain and Utilize.
