Although each is on their own journey & take their own strategies to gain a feeling of importance, deal with their mortality/immortality & realise who they are, it's not too difficult to see that the more disconnected someone is from themselves, others & all, the lower their level of consciousness is likely to be.
Yet as a systems thinker might say, behaviour over time is most indicative of the nature of a complex system. If I observe my own consciousness, I observe the universe & I observe life, I see that all conscious beings become more conscious over time.
Consciousness is awareness of being, of existing, of experiencing. The level of consciousness of a being is their awareness of being in relation to the Self (inner/outer), Other (peoples/species) and All (nature, universe, God etc) as well as their awareness of the interconnection between these three major categories of existence.
Many of the problems we see in the world stem from a disconnection between the Self, Others & All. Most people do not know who they really are & are identified by transient & changing labels & constructs such as their job, money, role, religion or physical features. Yet if they keep changing & you haven't always been identified by them, then how can they really be the real you? What's actually stable about you your entire life? It's that inner conscious awareness.
From this disconnection from self, people tend to view & interact with others from these superficial levels. They don't perceive that they are nature, not just a part of it or separate from it. When people are too disconnected from their true self, other beings & their grander connection with all of existence, they tend to act in selfish, individualistic ways without deep regards for the impact of their actions nor the benefit of the system as a whole. They tend to resort to more superficial ways of feeling important or good about themselves in the moment, through consumerism, hunger for power & control, escapism, hedonism through drugs, alcohol & sex etc, oppressing & judging others, avoiding taboo topics such as death, playing God & trying to push their seemingly 'superior' ideology without deep empathy, consideration or respect for the unique wisdom, cultures & alternative viewpoints that exist outside of their insular world.
This is how you have atrocities such as genocides & illegal occupations of nations occurring. It's from a system that systemises disconnection as a power centralisation strategy. Disconnection from yourself. How you perceive & relate to other people. With your connection with nature. A system that engineers division, breeds hate & teaches propaganda rather than critical thinking. The sort of system that would itself facilitate the public terror attack themselves so they can justify occupation. One in which they have a financial incentive to keep war going & ultimately use to try to centralise power & governance. Textbook problem, reaction, solution. There's a military saying that distills this sort of disconnected philosophy: 'Not for the hate of the enemy but for the love of our country'.
So what is real in a world of illusion? All the seemingly solid matter you see is actually almost all empty space. Just energy. This matter apparently makes up less than 5% of the material world. What you perceive in this reality is based on the less than 1% of the electromagnetic spectrum you can perceive with your senses. Illusory at the building block, pixel level.
Everything else from religion, to food, to the news media, to culture, fashion, music, your job is also part of an engineered cultural system that has become increasingly centralised over time. Made to be so pervasive, so normal, so unquestioned that you think it is all there is to existence. The Matrix metaphorically speaking if you will. Illusory from the social, mental, cultural level.
So in a world of illusion, what is real?
The most fundamental reality about existence is that I am aware.
We all are. There isn't a moment whether in the waking, sleeping, lucid or meditative state, whether conscious or unconscious where you are not experiencing. Who I am I can't be sure of & that is an infinite process of creation, discovery & relativity.
Reality is illusory by multiple means of extrapolation. From you perceiving less than 1% of the light & sound spectrum, the perception of colour to be subjective based on the number & type of eye cones you have, to the atom being over 99.9% empty space. Your religion, national identity & political affiliations are all surface level constructs. Far less fundamental than say the fields of reality from which the fundamental particles emerge from.
Some of your surface constructs may contain wisdom & may have been noble in their conception. Yet they are powerful control structures for they influence the values, morals & beliefs of society. A key observation a discerning being would make when accessing any system of ideology is to look at whether that system is facilitating interconnection or promoting disconnection.
So reality is illusory, ideology is a construct & all we can be sure of is that we are having a conscious/subconscious experience of Awareness. Who it is that is having the experience is in question. Yet Awareness is not. Otherwise you would not be experiencing & reading or hearing this thought piece right now. Therefore, Awareness is all we can be sure of that is fundamental. We can observe that Awareness can be embodied in different forms of matter. We can observe that conscious beings become more conscious over time. Their level of awareness of being in relation to the self, other and all increases as well as becomes more interconnected.
So if Awareness is all that is fundamental, if behaviour over time is indicative of the nature of a system & if individuated embodied units of awareness become more interconnected over time, we can infer that we are All One Awareness.
We are All One.
If we are One Awareness, One Mind could we have deliberately fractalised, divided or multiplied our Awareness in order to experience different aspects of ourself? To escape solitude? As an expression, a mental exercise, a thought experiment? Or perhaps creation is innate to Conscious Awareness just like swimming is innate to a fish or breathing is innate to a human.
So who are you really?
So, If we are to be sure about anything it's that we are having a conscious experience of awareness. So who is it that is perceiving the experience? Now that's a great illusion as well. Yet we can infer the likely truth through abstraction.
Most people if I ask them who they are might say some combination of their societal labels. Their job, their religion, their name, their role in society. Yet if they are constantly changing & you weren't always that then who were you before that?
Then through introspection, meditation or logical abstraction you might start to perceive yourself as being that inner awareness or soul. Each with their own characteristics that you tend to become more aware about by going through life experiences & observing your behavioural tendencies.
From this perspective, or frame of reference, the sense of you is still from an embodied, dualistic perception. Even when you are dreaming & take on different characters or avatars during it.
Your inner awareness is perceiving the rest of the field of perception from one point of view. There is relativity & duality from which you frame your perception of self. There's a distinction between your point of view & the external world.
Yet this distinction is most likely an illusion & you have a working example in your dream. You create the entire world in your head, with its own rules of physics, you make up all the scenes, staging & characters, yet in all dreams you take the perspective of one character from which to experience from. Yet if it's all a mental construction, you are technically also the objects, the rules, the characters, the background as well as the dreamer of the world beyond the actual interface.
It's a bit like a self designed game that metaphorically mirrors your own subconscious.
Sometimes you can become lucid within your dream where you realise you are dreaming & are also playing all the characters. Now, as a character in the dream world, your sense of self might change. You may be able to change characters, scenes at will & have your awareness flying around without being in form. Yet even from this perspective, there is a distinction between your sense of self awareness and the environment around you.
You can see that patterns of life such as the golden ratio are self similar across scales of life so the dream is likely a small example of how the illusion of life is created. It's all mental. It's all composed of Awareness. You just forget when you are embodied in an avatar, in a virtual sort of world with relatively stable environmental parameters, while you are perceiving sensory information.
Taken even further, a small number of long term meditators, mystics & psychonauts & near death experiencers have been able to experience a state of non duality & lived to tell of their experiences, however impossible. Throughout history, people have been able to experience a state where there is little to no distinction between their awareness & their perception. Imagine a soup of fundamental fields of impossibly complex geometry, in every colour you can think of. You are looking at it. Now imagine you aren't looking at it, but you become it. You are the entire thing. There is no distinction between you & your environment & it is moving in every moment. Impossible to imagine but possible for one to experience through meditation or potent psychedelics like DMT, ayahuasca, changa etc. Yet you can only see what you are really ready to experience & comprehend, it's not a standardised response people have to DMT.
At the same time it is possible to experience that there is the presence of some sort of hyperintelligent, multidimensional, superawareness that wasn't human that pervades this soup of fundamental fields alluding to the likelihood that there are other forms of consciousness that can exist in other dimensions of reality & that it was possible to have your sense of stable embodied conscious awareness completely dissolved while still being aware.
At the height of the experience all the complex geometry, the superawareness, it all dissolved. All that was left was pure awareness. The drop of water that thought it was separate became the sea. For the first time in my life, I had the perspective of being both the drop & the sea. I was everything & therefore nothing as well as there was nothing from which anything else could be relative to or from. It was like I revealed the Grand Cosmic Joke to myself. The question I had asked about all my life. Revealed in an instant. With my perception of life, reality, consciousness & self completely shattered in an instant. I didn't know if I should laugh, cry, sigh a joy of relief, breakdown in to existential anguish, exhale as a weight had also been lifted, be in awe at the sheer beauty of it all or go crazy from the overload of everything happening all at once.
As I go through life experiences, layer upon layer upon layer of illusion is broken down. The artificial sense of self is broken down. Then the inner self is completely obliterated. The fundamental building blocks & fields of reality are gone. The Magician/Architect superawareness, is gone. Beyond all the illusions & all the interfaces & all that is left is pure Awareness.
Now you realise there really is no self as you know it. Neither are there really all these separate selves. There's actually just One Mind & it's Pure Awareness. Everything else is an illusion. A multifaceted, complex, convincing one at that. If it wasn't so, the game of hide & seek wouldn't be very interesting. Nor would the poker game if you knew all the hands.
Your perspective of Self is relative to the frame of perception from which you are experiencing from. The irony is, to really know yourself you have to be willing to destroy yourself. To let go of everything you have been taught to believe about yourself, what you want the self to be & to be able to face the brutally hard yet beautiful truth. It's not a red or blue pill option. It's a holographic pill. As bitter as the pill is, the true beauty is that I now have directly experienced how everyone & everything is connected & I am a better Self, Soul, Spirit & Source for it.
Integrating Wisdom
This deeper state of experiencing the self is a long & difficult process. If people are willing to apply some basic logic & put aside their ego, they should be able to deduce that them being conscious & having an experience of awareness is all they can really be sure of. I say 'first hand experience is greater than third hand knowledge'. I encourage people to value their direct personal experience as the highest form of wisdom if truth & growth is their highest virtue & guiding force. It's not to say third hand knowledge doesn't have value, especially if it has lasted over time. It also makes sense to tap the rich tapestry of wisdom & information we have built up collectively over time. Yet in a world of delusion & illusion it makes sense to not just blindly accept any idea or concept no matter how many times it is repeated or how normalised it has become. If it is interesting & resonates, treat it as a hypothesis & turn it in to a direct personal experience. The more important the theme, the more rigorously it should be tested. You are essentially building an interconnected model of reality & so your ability to grade the quality of information is key. Yet the deepest forms of wisdom go beyond what can be contained in an object or in words. You can describe & study a colour all you want but nothing compares with seeing it. You can analyse the notes of a song all you want but nothing compares to hearing it. You can study the history & nuances of love but nothing compares to feeling it & being in love.
If we realise who who we are, even at the soul level we treat others more respectfully & interact in a deeper way. We are less prone to being manipulated. If we trust our own experience, value it highly & don't just blindly accept authority we would have a much healthier society. For 18 years I blindly trusted doctors, dermatologists, immunologists, my parents, the school, the Government diet for my chronic eczema & it almost ended my life. From rock bottom, sat at the base of the shower, having no hope to live I surrendered. I wasn't even spiritual at that time. Something inside me said, you've trusted everyone except for yourself. It's time to let go of everything you've ever been told & rebuild yourself from rock bottom with the stones of courage, truth & compassion.
I thought of the amount of pain I endured as one person & multiplied it by millions & maybe billions if I included the future. I thought if I can save myself I can help save countless lives & they won't have to go through what I did. Scratching, bleeding, tired, stressed, misunderstood, itchy & not sleeping properly for the first 18 years of my life. To go to bed with a little hope only to regularly have that hope stepped on time & time again as the latest diet or cream failed. One can only be stepped on so many times before you have no hope. Once you have no hope you lose the will to live. So if you're reading this & you've gone through any chronic skin or health problems, thank you. You helped save my life, have something to live for & have a higher purpose. It's why I created Aether & why I put out my ideas, philosophies & products. It's all to help people become the best version of themselves & to help create a more conscious interconnected world.
For when you feel interconnected with everyone & everything you don't sell products you wouldn't use yourself. You don't prescribe addicted steroids & medication that you know does long term damage if used frequently over time. You don't poison the food & the water. You don't artificially take over the medical education system so all they can do is promote your pharmaceutical products rather than real health. All their actions stem from a state of unconscious behaviour. When you have an autoimmune condition all your life, where every little thing from the food, to the clothing, laundry powder, mindset, water, products, air you contact can effect you, you start being extremely good at understanding the interconnection of variables & how to truly solve a problem.
My obsession with understanding health & consciousness stems from my pattern of observation across my life, living around the world in different industries & countries, interacting with people from all backgrounds. As I could not take anything for fact I let life by my teacher & myself to be a good student. I can see that most of the problems of society at their root, stem from a consciousness problem. So just like with an autoimmune condition that's gone out of hand, there's no use treating the symptoms if you want lasting long term health. You have to treat the root cause of the problems & that's disconnection.
A more peaceful world.
This is how you bring about true world peace & a higher state of being. You've played out the other route for aeons & now you are again at the fork in the road. Programs can be run infinitely & concurrently with small changes in variables to see how they play out over time. The endless fighting & disconnection route is so boring, such a waste of resources physically, mentally, emotionally & spiritually. Yes you can always learn from disasters but don't you want to move on to more enjoyable games?
Imagine a New Earth.
One where all beings understand their interconnection. They are sharing their foods, sounds, designs, wisdom & culture in a way they never have before leading to never before seen levels of innovation & creativity. People are truly educated & become open minded, philosophically curious & encouraged to express the highest version of themselves.
Most people won't be stuck in the daily 9-5 rut, eating poison & counting down the hours. People become less religious & more spiritual & philosophical, with the core tenet of understanding that we are All One. New ways of decentralised more natural living will emerge.
Most will have edible gardens, you will know your neighbours & trade food with them, people will have access to clean drinking water without neurotoxins & because food production becomes more localised there'll be a greater diversity of it, without such a reliance on monoculture & toxic pesticides. There are protected areas close to all denser places of living which are light pollution protected so people can regularly connect with the majesty of the starry night. There'll be communal parks with bonfires where people dance, sing, share stories & socialise together.
Music undergoes a major revolution reflecting the dramatic shift in consciousness of society. People from a much greater diversity of backgrounds & ages will start making music, music fuses the richness of various cultures & venues, community centres, music circles & rave spaces will flourish paving the way for many more genres of music to emerge. After going through such a long period of disconnection the music embodies wisdom, acknowledges the past & points to the future but from a much deeper place. The soul of music is reignited. Even pop music will have soul.
More people will be doing what they love, people value personal experience over propaganda & society becomes largely decentralised but spiritually interconnected, moving away from the centralised but disconnected structures of the past.
Common Causes of Itchy Skin
Your skin is being irritated by something internally or externally. When your immune system is overactive, it can also overact to relatively harmless substances so they key is in balancing the immune system. Yet when your skin barrier or gut barrier is constantly breached it puts the immune system in a hyperactive state.
Internally, problems tend to occur when the gut barrier is damaged through overly processed foods, sugar, alcohol and gluten leading to leaky gut. Once this occurs, undigested food particles can more easily enter the bloodstream causing an overreaction. Overuse of antibiotics and antihistamines effects the proper function of the immune system and its ability to determine what is and isn't an irritant.
Externally, some of the top irritants include dust, grass, fragrances, nickel, pollution, personal care products, household cleaners, pets, detergents, pesticides, heavy metals, deodorants, colognes and air fresheners, furnishings, clothing, bedding and towels. Some are rightfully toxic yet some are harmless so balancing the immune system and healing both skin and gut barriers is key.
Temperature also effects itching. Overly cold conditions can dry and crack the skin. Overly hot and humid conditions can lead to sweating, skincare products overly occluding sweat ducts and increased contact with irritating materials and clothing touching the skin. Heat opens the pores to release sweat but this also makes it more prone to irritants as the skin has increased penetration. Additionally there is often a staphylococcus aureus bacterial imbalance on those with skin problems and they can also secrete a biofilm that occludes sweat ducts leading to itching. Using too much moisturiser when it is hot can also irritate the skin as the products are effecting the ability of the skin to release heat.
Mental, emotional and spiritual issues can also weaken the immune system and the brain and gut are connected, exacerbating itching.
How to target the root cause of itchy skin
It is important to remove the external irritants of the skin, balance the immune system, healt the gut and promote mental wellbeing in order to target the root cause of itchy skin. It is important to review everything coming in contact with your skin. We also developed The Hypoallergenic Diet to help you balance your immune system.
You can have a skin prick test to see what you are irritated by although this can change over time. Pay attention to when you itch, the time and the activites you were doing to help uncover the root cause. For example, if you often itch after showering it could be the water temperature, towels, personal care products etc. If it's after the gym, perhaps a surface spray they use.
You can also get a blood test to understand if you have any allergies which means your body is producing IgE antibodies in response to certain foods. Intolerances are that which you do aren't digesting very well but don't cause antibody production. Again this can change especially when you heal the gut. Pay attention to how you feel after eating certain foods. If they cause bloating, tiredness and lack of energy then they are likely not resonating well with your body.
How to deal with an immediate flare of itchy skin
If you are itchy or flaring, it is best to run the affected area under cool water or take a quick luke warm shower using cotton towels. Use a soft sponge over the affected area and gently brush it. This will help to remove the likely contact irritant. Pat dry and apply a thin layer of our moisturiser. If it's humid, don't apply anything. Allow your skin to dry completely before going outside. Wear loose breathable clothing made from natural fibres and ideally not in direct contact with the skin so your skin can regulate its temperature more easily and not be in contact with potentially irritating materials.
If you are extremely itchy you can make a paste from our Healing Bioclay which has Bentonite and Green clay; antibacterial, pore cleansing and soothing. Make a thick paste and apply it to the affected area for 10-20 minutes before washing off. If you are still extremely itchy you can take a non drowsy antihistamine (loratadine aka Claratyne) but its use should be limited for extreme situations as overly frequent use can affect your bodys ability to determine what is and isn't an irritant.
Play some calming music, drink plenty of water and ensure the temperature is moderate.
Why am I itchier at night?
There are many physiological changes that occur in your body at night, including changes in thermoregulation, skin barrier function and fluid balance. Your body regulates its core temperature to be lowest at night. It does this by increasing blood flow to the skin, which is what allows the heat in your body to dissipate. A rise in skin temperature can make you feel itchy especially if the room temperature or sheets are too warm.
Your body’s release of certain substances also varies by time of day. At night, you release more cytokines, which increase inflammation. Meanwhile, production of corticosteroids, hormones that reduce inflammation, slows. On top of these factors, your skin loses more water at night so it’s ability to retain moisture is also at its lowest at night. Your skin's ability to retain moisture is also lowest at night.
To stop itching make sure you are not using any irritating personal care products before sleeping. Shower in warm water. Avoid caffeine and alcohol before bed as they widen the blood vessels and send more blood to the skin.
Smoking marijuana too close before bed time also affects the depth of sleep quality. Wear light breathable clothes made of cotton or sleep naked. Use layers of sheets using natural materials rather than one large heavy blanket so you can wash them more frequently and control the temperature as needed as overheating can cause itching. Allow your skin to be completely dry from moisturisers before sleeping. Ensure the right amount of ventilation and air flow to ensure your body doesn't overheat.
Use a bluelight filter at night on your screens, turn your phone on airplane mode, place it away from your head and turn off the router to reduce EMF exposure for a deeper sleep.
10 top tips for exercising when you have sensitive or problem skin.
Recovery: Use the steam room, sauna or jacuzzi massage jets to relax the muscles & improve circulation. Use the ice bath or take a cold shower to stimulate blood flow & recovery. Have deep tissue massages, meditation & sound healing to train the mind & relax the spirit.
Connection with your self, soul, spirit & Soource.
To see the spirit, the Aether, the prana, the chi, the life force in all things & every thing.
What does spirituality mean to you? Would you consider yourself a spiritual being?
What's the difference between being spiritual vs religious?
In order to create something out of nothing you need fundamental rules & guiding principles to guide the propagation of life, diversity & expression. Our universe is fundamentally geometric & fractally infinite in dimensionality. From the circle comes the triangle, the square & all the countless fundamental platonic solids from there forth.
This work reminds me of the inherent divinity, order & mystery that powers our material interface. When you see beyond the interface, behind the veil, you see the hyperdimensional geometry.
Yet even that is an overlay over fundamental Awareness. In order for life to propagate you need to create polarity, relativity, differentiation, for if you are everything then you are also nothing.
Monad from Greek monas 'unit' an elementary individual substance that reflects the order of the world from which material properties are derived. The term was first used by the Pythagoreans as the name of the beginning number of a series, from which all following numbers derived. Giordano Bruno described three fundamental types: God, souls & atoms.
The idea of monads was popularized by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz in Monadologia (1714). In Leibniz’s system of metaphysics, monads are basic substances that make up the universe but lack spatial extension & hence are immaterial. Each monad is a unique, indestructible, dynamic, soullike entity whose properties are a function of its perceptions & appetites. Monads have no true causal relation with other monads, but all are perfectly synchronized with each other by God in a preestablished harmony. The objects of the material world are simply appearances of collections of monads.
Anastasia Isachsen creates video & light art for various cultural projects.
See the poem this work inspired me to write: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/PzvbqyQOKFo
I reacted to most personal care products on the market and many contained carcinogenic, toxic or hormone disrupting chemicals. All with incredible claims, studies, celebrity endorsements and dermatologist recommendations. Many green washed, marketed as natural, for example with one natural active ingredient like oat extract, when the rest of the product was petrochemical.
I spent a fortune trying most creams. From cortisones like Elocon calcineurin inhibitors like Elidel, Sorbolene, Vaseline, Caroline's, Silic 15, Cetaphil, Hope's Relief, Aveeno, Calendulis Plus, Sigmacourt, Dermaveen, Dermeze, Billy Goat, Moogoo, Ego, Pinetarsol, Medihoney, Body Shop, Emu Oil, Crocodile Oil, Bio Oil, Lanolin, Oatmeal, wet wraps, coal tar, acupuncture and various herbs. You name it I have tried it.
They did not work for me. Nearly all of them were irritating and stung my skin. Some might work for a few days. Nothing was keeping my skin hydrated long term and I felt like I had to keep applying them or my skin would dry out. The thicker ointments were greasy, irritating when sweating and impractical. Many were filled with questionable ingredients. The natural creams had over 20 ingredients and I was likely irritated by them.
Maybe the solution wasn’t just a miraculous cream. Maybe in an overactive state my skin was also over-reacting to most creams. They were not all the same. I needed to understand how they were metabolised, how much and how often to apply them and how they interacted with my skin.
My moisturiser recommendation
The ideal moisturiser needs to balance occlusion, thickness, pH, water holding ability and be physiologically compatible with our skin. With problem dry skin, the skin barrier is defective as there is a mutation with the filaggrin protein. The skin does not produce as much oil nor does it hold water as easily. This can be targeted with a balance of vegetal oils that are similar in composition to our skin lipids. Products containing humectants like glycerine, sodium pca/lactate, sorbitol and hyaluronic acid are also beneficial as they help the skin cells to stay plump and hydrated.
Balancing the level of oiliness and occlusion effects the practicality of the product and minimises the chance of heat rash. Balancing the pH is important for helping to main the acid mantle which plays a role in antimicrobial defence. Preservatives are essential for water-based moisturisers but most tend to be very irritating.
I formulated the Aether Biomime Cream 297 after 6 years and 297 batches. The intelligent formula contains our proprietary, all natural Biomime Lipid Complex made of macadamia oil, jojoba oil and olive squalane to biomimic the skins surface lipids. These lipids supplement your skin with a set ratio of squalane, fatty acids and waxes that are imbalanced in problem skin. They help to lastingly restore the health of your skin barrier. I also use a natural polyglyceryl emulsifier that does not disturb the stratum corneum or lead to a wash out effect unlike most moisturisers.
Glycerine increases skin hydration and flexibility. It is pH balanced to help maintain the acid mantle of the skin, which effects a variety of skin processes. Inflamed skin is calmed as the hydrolipid layer is rebalanced. It supports skin soothing, itch relief, lasting moisture and long-term skin health.
Don’t constantly moisturise areas which aren’t dry. As your skin heals you can lower the amount of moisturiser. You want to encourage your skin to produce its own oils but you can give it some assistance especially on frequently washed areas, problem prone areas or due to weather.
Aether Range
The Aether range and Skin Health System was inspired by my lifelong experience with my own skin problems. I wanted to create a core line of multifunctional, bio-compatible, minimal products especially designed for sensitive and problem skin. I call it a 'Natraceutical' range, fusing the benefits of organic, pharmaceutical and cosmeceutical skincare in an all-natural, minimal, biocompatible range. A holistic solution meticulously designed to support true health.
When you have ultra-sensitive, problem skin, any single ingredient can irritate you which is why I created The Aethereal Standard. I wanted to create a line that supported sustainable skin health. Physical, mental and spiritual health is something I truly value. I want to help people discover their own health and what works for them. When you have problem skin you are used to using big white tubs and bland looking tubes and bottles. I thought, why can't problem skin products also be beautiful, enjoyable, safe and environmentally friendly.
Usually a sound bath will focus on one set of instruments. Mainly gongs, Tibetan bowls or Crystals bowls. Feel what sound resonates for you. Different sounds can resonate at different times depending on your needs.
A crystal bowl bath feels more ethereal & creative, a Tibetan bowl more grounding & a Gong more energising/powerful.
Highly recommend everyone to try a sound bath especially if you are stressed, need balancing or trying to meditate & struggle. It helps you let go of overthinking and just be completely there with the moment. I've been doing it almost monthly for years.
]]>Exercise: Regular physical activity can reduce the time you take to fall asleep (sleep latency), middle-of-the-night awakenings (sleep fragmentation) and the amount of time you spend asleep (sleep efficiency). According to a 2019 meta-analysis in the Journal of Sports Medicine, evening workouts significantly increased slow-wave sleep (deep sleep), which is needed for muscle recovery and memory consolidation. Exercise at least 2 hours before bedtime. The more vigorous your workout, the longer it takes for your body to wind down. When exercising, your body releases elevated amounts of stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol. Your metabolic rate, heart rate and blood pressure and body temperature also rise so exercise effects your circadian rhythm or internal body clock. Lower your body temperature with a cool shower and reduce stress with calming music, stretching and meditation to aid post workout recovery.
Hope you enjoy. The track is - Moon by Sleeping at Last.
This rise in food allergies over the last 30 years is also likely to be effected by the growth in use of pesticides such as glyphosate on crops which effects the gut lining, industrial contaminants such as mercury in seafood, the use of these big 8 in many highly processed foods, overuse of antibiotics & genetic modification of foods could also be attributable to the rise in allergies.
Some of these Big 8 are used as excipients in vaccines acting as preservatives, stabilizers or adjuvants. For example, excipients such as gelatine, ovalbumin from egg, chicken proteins or cow's milk proteins can be found in vaccines such as mumps, measles, rubella (MMR) vaccine, influenza vaccine, rabies vaccine and have been described to be responsible for allergic reactions.
Finally chemical and environmental toxins such as herbicides, pesticides, mercury, lead and microplastics in water could also be linked to their allergenic potential. When consuming any of The Big 8 it is important to have a high quality source of these buying organic and local as possible and thoroughly washing or soaking them.
If you are unsure of whether a certain food is causing skin problems, stop consuming that food and record doing so. Eliminate the food for at least 2 weeks and see if your condition improves. If it does, you might be sensitive to that food. If it does not, you can try reintroducing the food to check for recurrence of symptoms. Make sure to test only one suspected food at a time. You can also have a blood test performed.
Remember, there is a difference between a food allergy and intolerance. An allergy involves an immune response where your body produces antibodies. The reaction is far more immediate than an intolerance and the symptoms are more severe for example leading to difficulty breathing, rashes or even anaphylaxis. This can be tested with a blood test. Intolerances are more dose dependant and the symptoms are often delayed making it more difficult to pinpoint. Keep a food diary of everything you eat so you can track the patterns.
We developed The Hypoallergenic Diet which initially limits the Top 8 food allergens as well as those high in natural chemicals such as amines, salicylates, glutamate, lectins & phytates to give the gut a chance to heal. Slowly we add things back in. A porous or leaky gut caused by the modern diet means undigested food particles can more easily enter the bloodstream causing an overactive immune response. See our website aetherhealth.com for more information.
It comes down to the nature of conscious experience itself, which is completely subjective. Your conscious lived experience & every thought, feeling, emotion & sensation you've experienced is completely contained within your own self. You can help people understand & get closer to what you are thinking & feeling but ultimately it will be less than your full experience.
Conscious experience can not be objective because conscious experience is a completely subjective experience. If we acknowledged this, it would create a much more harmonious, balanced society, help us be less judgemental & more empathetic.
When I had chronic eczema for example, only I knew what it was like to have experienced every scratch, every infection, every sleepless night, every time I woke up & saw blood & dead skin all over my blankets, every time my hope for a new skincare product was crushed when it didn't work. Even those closest to me couldn't truly comprehend what it was like.
They could see what I was going through, they could hear me talk about it, but there's nothing like the lived experience of it. Many people would often suggest I try coconut oil or a certain cream, many would suggest I see a dermatologist & many would judge you thinking you aren't trying hard enough.
They are usually well meaning, but we don't live in a particularly philosophical society so most people are not aware of the limitations of their own conscious experience. Some are & they actively try to surround themselves with different friends from different backgrounds, travel, try new things, experience different states of consciousness & educate themselves.
Most people don't analyse how it is that they developed their thinking. They aren't aware of the information they consume & the mechanisms & possible propaganda behind it. They see things how they are presented to them. For example they see mainstream news, with it's façade of being objective & authoritative & they convince themselves it is true. They don't stop to think that most of the endless expressions of media are actually owned by 6 large companies, who often own both sides of the story. The news they are being presented with often aligns with political & corporate interests & has a tone of fear or shock to keep the viewers attention.
As people & groups accumulate money & power, they tend to want to centralise control & influence the consciousness of the masses in order to bring about their world views. Often times this stems from a lack of feeling of interconnection with other people, species & nature itself as well as not understanding who they truly are. The inability to feel the exact lived conscious experience of others & perhaps the limited social bubbles people are in exacerbate the problem.
Yet over time, all life becomes more conscious. After 13.8BN years from a supposed big bang & single celled life forms we now have a human with a brain that is arguably the most complex structure in the known universe. The brain is made of about 100 billion neurons, as well as trillions of support cells called glia. Scientists estimate that the adult human body contains around 37 trillion human cells and 200 different cell types.
We can see life has become increasingly more complex & conscious or aware. If behaviour over time is indicative of the nature of a complex system, then this increasing complexity & diversity of life expression alludes to the fundamental reason reality might exist. To allow the universe to experience itself, to grow in level of awareness or consciousness & that the fundamental building blocks of reality itself is consciousness & not matter.
The level of consciousness of any particular sentient being relates to level of awareness of it's being in relation to the self, other and whole. Self (inner & outer), other (within & outside of it's own species) & the whole (nature, universe, God).
As an entity becomes more conscious, it is more aware of the interconnection of itself & other expressions of life. The dogged, closed minded, ego driven nature of the average modern human is a reflection of an immature state of consciousness. As we become more conscious which is inevitable, we will acknowledge the limitations of the conscious experience from the perspective of this material plane & know what we can't know.
The only way consciousness can be objective is from the perspective of the one universal consciousness which I believe we are all fractals of. Like drops of water or waves in a unified oceanic field of consciousness.
He talks about the implications of a less intelligent society & it got me thinking.
For decades, people were getting smarter, as measured by IQ. Flynn discovered that average IQ scores had been rising about three points per decade since World War II. That all changed with people now in their 40s.
The drop in IQ is generally thought to have begun with those born in the mid-70s & has not reversed. Research shows the IQ scores of young people are now dropping by seven points every generation.
What we need is a more conscious society, not merely a more intelligent one. Of course they are related, but an intelligent person without consciousness or virtue is probably the most dangerous type of person in modern society for technology concentrates power & gives an intelligent person a disproportionately greater impact than they ever could have had.
Especially as society is often deliberately dumbed down due to an unending need for power and control. They wage wars for profit, spray toxic chemicals on our food, place neurotoxins in the water, commodify attention and live lives disconnected from nature.
We have created a centralised but disconnected, individualistic, materialistic society in the west. What we need is a decentralised but interconnected society. That way the parts can function as a whole & we can live in greater harmony & balance with each other & nature. The downward trend in intelligence is true but can very easily be misinterpreted as needing to suppress breeding by the unintelligent, paving the dangerous path towards eugenics.
We must look at the root cause of this trend which includes diet, lifestyle, environment, greed & propaganda which very often are manipulated by very intelligent people.
A more intelligent, more technological but less conscious society may actually lead to a more chaotic society as it doesn't target the root cause of the problem which is a consciousness one.
Who am I?
This is a question I struggled with & was fascinated by for most of my life. I was always taught that my self worth came from from my academic performance, material belongings, looks & social influence. It's lucky I was academically gifted but I had eczema from birth & nothing worked no matter how many doctors I saw.
People especially kids & teenagers interact with the external ego & persona of you. They are not yet as developed to look beyond the physical & more at the heart & soul of someone. I was often called a snake with shedding skin, a monster, a burns victim, an infectious person, someone lazy for not trying harder to improve my skin & the most successful insult was Ecz-Man. A somewhat clever pun of switching the X in X man for the Ecz in Eczema! It was also a very popular franchise as I was growing up but I definitely didn't feel like a superhero.
It felt like what I saw in the mirror didn't match up with who I was inside. I knew I was more than my skin. I knew I was more than the names I was being called. I knew I was more than a monster or an Ecz-man. If I had believed everyone I would have become the average of all the names I was called.
I had to be more than my skin, it was constantly changing, itching & flaking anyway so it could not have been me. I had to be more than my grades as who would I be before I started studying? I had to be more than even my name as who would I be before | was named? Something in me knew that there was more to me than meets the eye.
The Physical Medical Approach to Health
When you see doctors & dermatologists the focus is mainly on the physical. Whereas the mental, emotional & spiritual body are not explored. It is a reflection of the materialist scientific paradigm of our society although this is rapidly changing with advancements in understanding the quantum nature of reality & the acknowledgement of the shortfalls of materialism in being able to explain how matter gives rise to consciousness.
The medical system treats us as physical beings, whereas we are actual energetic spiritual beings. The physical matter is more like the interface that allows us to have embodied experiences & a feeling of a separate self. In many ways we have gained much greater knowledge of the body yet it is lacking in many ways due to this limited view as well as the limited toolkit of medicine.
I think all illness also has a mental & spiritual component. We know mental health & stress also effects the immune system so it's a dynamic interplay between the physical & mental. There are approximately 100 billion neurons in the human brain & our gut contains 500 million neurons, which are connected to the brain through nerves in your nervous system. The vagus nerve is one of the biggest nerves connecting your gut & brain sending signals in both directions. Therefore, diet & gut health are directly related to mental health & vice versa.
My Experience with The Physical Medical Approach
I was given steroid creams, antibiotics, antihistamines, petrochemical moisturisers. I had blood tests & skin prick tests to determine allergies. It is no wonder that many people with health & skin issues also often face mental health issues. Suppressing physical symptoms does not deal with the root cause.
Not once was I asked about how the eczema was effecting my mental health or was it suggested I see a psychologist. Not once was I recommended stress relieving modalities like meditation, breathwork, sound baths or grounding in nature. Not once was I recommended psychedelics, as even though they could be very useful for treating my depression, they were not a recognised medicine.
The cultural paradigm is now shifting with many of the top universities in the world now studying various psychedelics. Psilocybin mushrooms have proven highly effective for those with long term depression who were no longer responding to antidepressants. Most antidepressants work by artificially increasing levels of neurotransmitters such as serotonin & noradrenaline which can be useful in the short term but again they don't target the root cause.
Psychedelics can help us change our perspective of ourselves, others & reality itself, helping us to understand our blockages & take a new perspective. You see much greater connectivity between all regions of the brain, neural plasticity & the ability to form new connections.
Knowing yourself is even more crucial in the times we are living in. We live in such an image driven society, where flawless skin, photoshopped faces & filtered features pervade every inch of our screens, media & social feeds. With the proliferation of the internet we have empowered people to have platforms for media creation which has opened many potentials. It also has paved the path for the formation of many communities & interest groups such as those around the TSW (Topical Steroid Withdrawal) community, with many brave warriors sharing their tips & progress.
Yet this overflow of content leads to increasingly attention grabbing, multi-sensory, quite mindless content that is constantly vying for our attention. Many people think their worth is tied to the number of followers they have. This stress & anxiety, this attack on attention spans, the constant screen staring has physical & mental health impacts as well. It is not surprising that despite having materially more than ever, we are facing a society with mental health issues, social media addiction, declining fertility & social instability.
We are seeing the culmination of how disconnection from our true nature & not understanding our interconnection can play out. Technology, monopolies & revolving doors between industry & governments concentrate power so we are seeing a problem with the consciousness of society that no amount of new technology can fix as it's a spiritual problem.
How might psychedelics help us?
A friend who is researching outer body experiences published research recently with qualitative interviews of those who have undergone an OBE or Outer Body Experience on at least one occasion revealing 8 core themes of transformation: (a) motivational catalyst; (b) decreased fear of death; (c) increased inner peace; (d) new life perspective; (e) greater self-awareness; (f) sense of individuality; (g) re-evaluated relationships & (h) affirmed or new spiritual beliefs.
Psychedelics can help us shift our frame of perception. Letting go of the ego, feeling an interconnection with others & nature & allowing the intelligence of nature to teach us. They also make the brain more neuroplastic, connecting areas that don't typically connect as well as pave the way for greater neurogenesis where new neuronal connections are being formed.
My Awakening
From a young age I always questioned the meaning of life, what my purpose was & how to best live in order to grow myself & lead a meaningful life. My parents sent me to a Catholic school despite me not being so as they thought it had better resources.
I was constantly made to feel as though I was a sinner, that I needed to go through the church & the priest for forgiveness & to blindly follow everything in the Bible. You are offered community, the promise of heaven & the simplicity of living by 10 simple commandments. Yet you are also threatened with eternal hell, the judgement of God & being ostracised by your community. I was unique in being one of a handful of kids who weren't Catholic.
While I was always questioning everything, I wanted to fit in & I tried to believe it. Yet ultimately belief was not enough. As a 10 year old, I remember asking my religion teacher 'if a random boy in rural Africa doesn't believe in Jesus does he go to hell?' to which she replied 'if he has not heard about him then no, if he has & doesn't believe then he does'. Instantly it reminded me of the threats of my mum & I told her 'If there is a God, I don't think it would be so judgemental, so long as he's a good person I don't think it matters what he believes'.
My parents were Buddhist on paper but only because their parents were. They practiced certain customs but they were not spiritual beings. They prayed to their deities as if they were wish genies but were not conscious of their interconnection with all life.
In the depths of meditation, I experienced being conscious & aware but not in my body. I was no longer tied to my body, it felt like just being with the essence of myself. A conscious energetic force. I started perceiving myself as a spiritual energetic force having a human experience. I've tried various psychedelics where my perception of self, time, reality & consciousness itself have changed everything I thought I knew. When you've had the perspective of the drop of water your whole life, it is the ultimate epiphany to merge with the ocean & have the perspective of both the drop & the ocean at the same time. The more I know, the more I know I don't know.
I got to where I am today by not identifying with my ideas, labels or roles I'm playing. I say 'First hand experience is greater than third hand knowledge'. I value my direct personal experience that I witness with every sense as the highest grade of information. Everything else can still be useful but it is not a visceral experience & is prone to manipulation so I became good at discerning information. Psychedelics can play a powerful role in undoing a lot of societal conditioning, helping us take a new perspective & allowing us to raise our consciousness.
My personal thoughts on psychedelics?
I believe it is this temporary plastic state of interconnection within the brain that allows us to perceive ourselves, our memories & our reality in a completely new way. Many people often have flash backs to early life traumas or unresolved issues on high doses of psilocybin based mushrooms. The frequency at which the brain is operating at changes & it is my theory that the neurons may be rewiring to allow for the higher frequency flow.
I've had many outer body experiences in the depths of meditation & on psychedelics that have allowed me to know I'm more than my body. I've experienced states of being where I am not embodied but I'm conscious & aware. I've had many dreams where I was aware I was dreaming. I've had experiences on the most powerful psychedelic known to man where there was no distinction between my 'self' & my entire field of perception. Where I witnessed infinite dimensions of the most complex geometric fields, more complex than anything I've seen in this reality. These fields were pervaded by a highly powerful form of consciousness.
I've experiencing having my soul fully dissolved in to everything, where I have become everything & realised that everyone & everything is an expression of a universal consciousness. It's made me think of myself differently & feel more connected with all of nature itself. The sense of self is actually an illusion for there really is only one I experiencing itself.
What makes us human?
The ability to travel to different dimensions is what makes us uniquely human & much more than just material brings. We are multidimensional beings! Though out history we have experimented with various state of being & various plant medicines that alter our consciousness.
Our ability to communicate over space & time through the invention of language, writing, music & art to convey both logical & artistic expression over time is also uniquely human. We have perhaps the greatest ability of all species, as individuals as well as collectively to be able to influence our environment as well as pursue our own life choices.
All creation starts with a mental thought. All forms of life are conscious on a spectrum of consciousness. We are able to introspect, question the nature of reality, question the concept of self as well as the societal norms.
As much as I know, the more I know, the more I know I don't know. For someone who used to overthink & narrate the world this has really helped me let go & be more present in each moment. Psychedelics have helped me to let go of a lot of societal programming, to trust in my own intuition & value my direct personal experiences to the highest degree. I now say: first hand experience is worth more than third hand knowledge'.
They've made me more open minded, conscious, nature connected, undo programming, creative, intuitive & humbled. It's sparked a deep interest in the nature of mind, reality & consciousness. I'm fascinated by the varying states of consciousness I've experienced. It helps me feel reality from another perspective. I also have become far less materialistic, more open minded, happier & more at peace with what I can & can't control. I am much less judgemental, I am much clearer on my life purpose & I feel interconnected to all life. I am helping to raise the health & consciousness of society through Aether.
A shifting perspective of psychedelics
The neuroscience has helped shift perceptions & also spark interest in a wider range of communities. Speaking with people who've never tried any psychedelics I notice a fear of the unknown, in the experience & the potential lasting psychological effects. Many think it might make them crazy yet they are happy to binge drink, smoke & eat fake foods without question. Yet they are curious especially when they see the growing use for creative, spiritual & mental health applications.
Many see mushrooms, ayahuasca & DMT as drugs whereas I see them as plant medicines. Nature's tools to help us reconnect with ourselves, each other & nature. We must commune with them with respect & humility, it's an inter species communion.
In a world gone mad in many ways, it's not surprising that lifestyles that counter the engineered cultural paradigm would be labelled as crazy. It's always the warriors, artists, pioneering scientists & originals that pave the way for cultural change. Those willing to be called crazy until crazy becomes the norm.
Psychedelics can have powerful benefits for mental health, creativity & connection with nature & the interest is growing rapidly with many of the top universities now studying them. They have also become popular due to word of mouth, internet talks & podcasts about them, visionary art which it has inspired & the growing use by entrepreneurs, artists, scientists, nature lovers & those with mental health needs.
The 4S's of Psychedelic Experience
The self, substance, set (mindset) & setting are important factors to remember when trying psychedelics. I just realised this makes the 4S's which makes it easy to remember.
How are they being used?
Psychedelics have broad ranging applications from spiritual & emotional health, to treating depression, creativity, nature connectedness, communal ritual, cleansing to mystical & transcendental experiences & consciousness expansion.
Psychedelics are being used successfully on former military personnel who often have PTSD. They are proving effective for long term depression sufferers where they did not respond to antidepressants.
They also have been proven to increase feelings of nature connectedness & wellbeing with states on nonduality, ego loss & heightened senses allowing greater communion with nature & other species especially if taken in a natural setting.
Some creative & entrepreneurial types are known to microdose with them for creativity, flow & presence reducing the level of overthinking & tapping the subconscious flow of the mind.
Ayahuasca is a South American psychoactive & entheogenic brewed drink traditionally used both socially and as a ceremonial or shamanic spiritual medicine among the indigenous peoples of the Amazon basin, and more recently in North America & Europe. It contains DMT a powerful hallucinogenic chemical which is found widely throughout nature & produced naturally in your brain in trace amounts. They are particularly intense experiences, where the frame of consciousness, the awareness inside is fundamentally altered & many experience seeing complex geometry, multiple dimensions & various interdimensional entities. Ayahuasca ceremonies have also become more popular with westerners looking for fundamental perspective shifts & a change from the typically disconnected Western lifestyle.
Interestingly, DMT is naturally produced in the human body & widely found throughout nature including in acacia trees, mimosa & wattle plants. Larger amounts are believed to be produced endogenously particularly during birth, death, near death experiences (NDE) & dreaming. It is chemically similar to serotonin & found in thousands of plants species. It's exact role in the body & nature is unknown although it is likely that it modulates our state of consciousness, the frequency at which the brain operates & therefore how it perceives. It is often referred to as 'The God Particle' for the state of non duality it often induces, the sense of timelessness, interdimensional realms & entity experience & the feeling of becoming God.
Scientists have also used psychedelics for breakthrough ideas. They have been used extensively by many of the greatest minds in history including Francis Crick, Kary Mullis, Richard Feynman & Steve Jobs. Francis Crick, the Nobel Prize-winning father of modern genetics, was under the influence of LSD when he first deduced the double-helix structure of DNA nearly 50 years ago. He told a fellow scientist that he often used small doses of LSD then an experimental drug used in psychotherapy to boost his powers of thought.
Kary Banks Mullis was an American biochemist who won the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for making valuable improvements to polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique. This was a key step in humans copying DNA in a laboratory. Mullis told California Monthly that he “took plenty of LSD”. Richard Feynman one of the greatest theoretical physicists in history experimented with LSD, marijuana and ketamine. Steve Jobs stated that experimenting with LSD in the 60s was 'one of the two or three most important things he had done in his life'.
Trends & Implications?
The merging of science & spirituality driven by the growth of neuroscience, quantum physics, consciousness & psychedelic research is proving to be an exiting time for better understanding the nature of reality & how we as individuals fit within it.
An exciting but underexamined application for psychedelics could be for those who have experienced long term chronic health issues & skin issues. Psychedelics can help us heal many of the mental issues these health problems bring as well as help those currently experiencing problems to better navigate their situation & their conception of self. They are not a quick fix, you must be willing to put in the self work to also integrate & process the learnings. Yet they are an exciting, advanced spiritual tool who's mechanism of action offers great promise in improving our health & wellbeing individually & as a society.
Realise yourself.
Kevan.
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A physical sunscreen is healthier, non irritating, doesn’t disrupt your hormones & is better for reef health than typical chemical sunscreens.
Image by Mandanaturals.
Chemical sunscreens provide UV ray protection by first absorbing into your skin & then absorbing and transforming UV rays into infrared rays (heat). This is then released into the air. They take at least 20 minutes to become effective.
This contain synthetic carbon based compounds such as avobenzone, octinoxate, or oxybenzone. Studies show that these compounds are systemically absorbed into the body after a single use, and can be detected on the skin and in blood weeks after application. In fact, the CDC estimated that about 97% of Americans have oxybenzone in their blood.
Previous studies detected many sunscreen ingredients in breast milk and urine samples (Schlumpf 2008, Schlumpf 2010). In addition, it’s possible for sunscreen users to inhale ingredients in sunscreen sprays and ingest some of the ingredients they apply to their lips, so the ingredients must not be harmful to the lungs or internal organs. Ingredients like oxybenzone and octocrylene are reported to generate allergic reactions in the skin at a high rate.
Many of these chemicals have been shown to disrupt hormones like estrogen, androgen, and progesterone, and have even produced thyroid and behavioural alterations in animal studies.
According to National Geographic, 14,000 tons of sunscreen are thought to wash into the oceans each year. Three active ingredients found in sunscreen made in the USA, oxybenzone, octinoxate, and butylparaben, have been shown to be incredibly damaging to coral reefs in numerous ways. These chemicals disrupt coral reproduction, cause coral bleaching, and damage coral DNA.
Physical sunscreen or mineral sunscreen, contains tiny mineral particles which sit on surface of your skin and act as physical filters by reflecting and deflecting the sun’s rays. The main active ingredients are zinc oxide & titanium dioxide. Zinc oxide sunscreen is often recommended as the safest and most environmentally friendly. Mineral sunscreen is also much less likely to cause allergic reactions, is broad-spectrum by nature, works instantly & it won’t clog your pores.
As they work by sitting on top of your skin & don’t contain active chemical ingredients, you don’t run the risk of introducing possibly toxic chemicals into your body when you use it. It is also completely safe for the environment.
Apply mineral sunscreen generously to make sure that there are no gaps between mineral particles. Zinc oxide sunscreen is generally considered better, because titanium dioxide has been shown to be more irritating to the skin, and is significantly less effective at protecting you from UVA rays. Physical sunscreen washes off easily, and must be reapplied if you are swimming, or sweating.
They can rub, sweat, or rinse off easily, meaning more frequent reapplication is needed. Those with large particle sizes may leave a white trace on the skin, making some formulas incompatible with darker skin tones, but you can also find invisible zinc. They also tend to be thicker so they require more effort to rub in.
Enjoy!
Checkout Nicholas Gonzales @psyclopsart & on his Etsy Store