The Metaphysical Plane

Doubt the supernatural? Maybe you are not looking at it in the right way.

        The Metaphysical Plane

When I was just a kid, I met the greatest teacher of my life and did not even know it.

He came to our fifth grade classroom one day to talk to us about native American culture.  According to our school teachers, we were getting "cultural exposure."  He talked about peace pipes, vision quests, ritualistic dances.  He taught us a few Ojibwa words.  I must admit I found all this very fascinating.  But at the same time my eleven year old mind could not help but notice the guy wore unusually bright orange tennis shoes and a baseball cap that stated "NA" across the front of it.  He seemed weird.  And my suspicions were confirmed when he ended his talk by telling us that he had seen Timber Wolves as high as his chest, and that bigfoots were real--it's just that they exist on the metaphysical plane.  Afterword, during recess, my classmates and I joked about him.

The greatest teacher of my life...and I thought the guy was a joke.

Years passed.  I had a fairly conventional childhood and young adulthood.  Our family towed a large trailer around the country.  I was able to experience many unique settings and places.  In college, I took logic and science.  In short, I had seen places and received the best of a liberal arts education.  I thought I knew what was up.

Then, during the last semester of graduate school, I discovered the greatest teacher of my life all over again. I was working on my thesis which had to do with examining the underpinnings of world views.  Part of the field work for this was to participate in a sweat with some Ojibwa shamans to learn how the ceremony might affect their perception.

I remembered recognizing my teacher when I showed up at the sweat: the same baseball cap, I swear, and this time he was wearing bright yellow tennis shoes.  I greeted him and said I had known him from school way back in fifth grade.  He replied that his name was Ed, and that he was glad people remembered there elders.

During the sweat he described everything in precise detail.  Everything was symbolic.  The sweat lodge was shaped like a mother's womb, a womb from which we are reborn.  The door of the lodge always faces east, the direction of the rising sun, another metaphor of rebirth.  Seven rocks were heated outside the lodge and brought in.  They are the means by which steam is produced, by pouring water over them.  They also represent the seven directions, which are the four cardinal directions as well as up and down and finally the spiritual direction of looking within.  There was plenty of material for my thesis study.  Now all I had to do was see what this stuff did to the shamans.

After about twenty minutes it got pretty hot in there.  I thought about going out for some relief, but I was afraid I would destroy the atmosphere.  Presently, I looked around at the elders.  They all appeared quite ordinary, although a bit serious as they faced the glowing rocks.

Suddenly I heard a woman's voice singing in another language.  It was very faint.  It could have been in Ojibwa.  It was a beautiful, haunting song.

Somehow it sounded too beautiful to be real.  I rushed out of the sweat lodge, looking for her, but there was only the trees with a slight breeze blowing through their leaves.  Could I be hallucinating?  I stood outside the lodge a long moment, listening.  Presently, Ed came to my side. 

"You heard her, didn't you," he said.

"Yes...what was that?" I whispered in wonder.

"A grandmother spirit, of course."

"Where is she?"

"Here," he said, pointing to his head, "when you are in the right frame of mind."

"So it is a dream or something like that?"

"No, it's real. Just as real as the trees and you and me," he said with an amused look on his face.  "Come back into the lodge and relax."  I went back inside, but I could not relax.  I kept wondering if I was losing it.

At the end of the sweat, Ed explained that there had been "other realities" to experience during the sweat but that I had lost my sensitivity due to my excitement.  I replied that I did not believe him one hundred percent but was interested in somehow replicating the experience.

"Join my on a walk tomorrow," he said.  "If you are open enough maybe you will see something."

So the next day I met him at the trail head of a nearby trail system we agreed to rendezvous at.  The first thing he said was: "Just let experience flow through you, as though you are a large transparent window."  He then led me into the woods.  We walked along a trail for a few yards then we went off trail, cross county. "Ever just walk through the woods before?" he asked.

"Not really."

"Just relax and let everything go through you." 

I noticed he was walking slowly and breathing deeply.  I tried to do the same.

Presently, we came to a large clearing.  A movement caught my eye and I saw a tall black creature move out from behind some large alder bushes.  A moment later I realized it was a big foot, or at least something like it.  It had long black hair a somewhat human face and no neck.  I noticed a strong, pungent smell.

"Is that real?" I whispered.

"Ah, you see it," Ed confirmed.  "You are now on the Metaphysical Plane."

And that is how I began seeing supernatural things.  First it was with the help of my teacher Ed.  Soon it was nearly all the time, even without him.  I gave up my quest for getting a graduate degree.  I began carrying a camera around with me.  My new goal in life is to show others this fantastic reality to introduce a little awe and magic into their lives.  Welcome to the Metaphysical Plane.