Journeys into the bright world

Marcia. The pain is like the grain of the wood in this door that I'm looking at. It's still flowing so I know I'm somewhat under. Oh dear, I don't want to get into that pun-ishness of the subconscious. and pain rhymes with the grain of the wood. I don't want this to be just a schizophrenic flight of fancy. It has to be the real thing. And I know I'm well back. I've long since passed that portal. When I've passed the portal it means that I'm capable of prevaricating. (At this moment I was exceedingly conscious of the way in which the word "pain" rhymed with the word "grain" while at that moment my pain seemed to be an exact replica of the flowing grain in the wood. That is, it seemed as though the substance and beauty of the human soul has been formed out of pain-literally ingrained pain.)

Howard. It's 7:40. It's been exactly thirty minutes.

Marcia. Oh my God, that was incredibly deep.

Howard. (Taking blood pressure) 130 over 80. Pulse 76.

Marcia. It's strange. The drug brings out the pain flowing through my leg the same way it brings out the grain in the wood. What was the blood pressure at its maximum?

Howard. It was only up to 140. That's not bad.

Marcia. I was under thirty minutes. It didn't seem that long. It was like eternity and like nothing. There won't be much on this tape. There was just nothing to be said. I am going to tame this stuff though. But isn't that amazing? I haven't developed any tolerance for it at all. It's as though the goddess were telling me, "Look, I call the shots." (Pause) I'm going to stay with it until it's tamed. I won't tame it, really, I know. But I have to keep trying until I've done this thing I have to do.

It brought the pain in my leg right to the forefront of consciousness. An anesthetic is supposed to remove pain, but actually it was like rubbing wood with oil and seeing the grain of that pain-so very deep within. I'm aggravated with people who say that diseases like cancer are just an issue of wrong thought and that you should think better. Ramakrishna died of cancer and Ramana Maharshi died of cancer, and many of the greatest saints took it on. They were doing something high and noble for humanity. There's a mystery there. Ramakrishna could have been healed. The disciples used to plead with him to cure himself. But he wouldn't do it. There was some reason why he had to take on that load of pain and work it through. It was as though he was doing it for all humanity.

Howard. Well, it took it away while you were under.

Marcia. Yes, while I was under I felt nothing, of course. I was out of the body. But it was a very beautiful pain. When I said it was like the grain in the wood I meant it was something one should treasure-like a resource. Taurus is the sign of resources and Scorpio is the sign of pain, trial, testing and death. I hadn't thought of pain as being connected with resources, but somewhere up in the archetypal realm-that big rose window where all the opposites meet-there's a link between pain and resources. I don't understand it at all. But I know it is necessary for us to suffer. Most of this is going to have to come through my mind; I'm not going to be able to do it on tape.

By the time I was all the way back most of the pain had ebbed away and did not recur except in momentary twinges. Later, thinking about the pain/grain enigma it occured to me that the grain in the wood serves as a measure of growth, and that up to now it has been the lot of humanity to grow through suffering. Somehow the soul of the wood was reflected in the pattern of its grain. I also remembered the earlier session in which it had so forcibly struck me that pain was a forcing process whereby material objects are opened up and rendered permeable by the divine light of significance. Evidently the goddess Ketamine was patiently endeavoring, lesson by lesson, to teach me something about the purpose of this earthly school for souls, but my mind was still so dense it was hard to bring it through.

Four days passed before I had time to play the tape and hear Howard's jocular remark made when I was out of the body and totally engrossed in the deepest of deep cogitations. However, that night as we were falling asleep I suddenly laughed and said to Howard, "This must be a drag for you. You do anesthesia all day and then you come home and do it at night."

6: Let the Soul Seep Through

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Elevation of blood pressure begins shortly after injection, reaches a maximum within a few minutes, and usually returns to preanesthetic values within 15 minutes after injection. The median peak rise has ranged from 20% to 25% of preanesthetic values.

– Parke-Davis