In search of…
Every episode of “In Search Of” ended with a disclaimer:
“This series presents information based in part on theory and conjecture. The producer’s purpose is to suggest some possible explanations, but not necessarily the only ones.”
I did not know that as a kid. I just knew that from 1977 to 1982, every week, Leonard Nimoy’s voice would come out of our television and explore fascinating mysteries that captivated me…Amelia Earhart. ESP. Atlantis. The Bermuda Triangle. Whether the pyramids were built by a civilization more advanced than we had been told.
I was about seven when it started. I would sit too close to the screen, the eerie synth music building, and feel something I could not name. Not fear. Recognition. Like these questions mattered even if I could not say why. But these topics resonated more than the rote memorization of school.
As I approached my teen years, the need for belonging and “success” surpassed my curiosity. So I learned what serious people believed. And the deeper curiosity went into a drawer for a long time.
That drawer has never been fully closed. And over the past ten years I have fully reopened it and dumped out all the contents for deeper exploration partly out of curiosity and partly out of necessity. My multi-year struggle with severe anxiety and the failure of traditional treatment was a huge catalyst for diving deeper.
I greatly benefited from psychedelic therapy. I studied myth and Jung’s imaginal realm during my purpose discovery process. I’ve read dozens of books, listened to hours of podcasts following my curiosity and more recently attending events and journeys.
What I was reminded again last week at an extraordinary three-day event called the Fivth Experience was the power of exploring these topics in community. Mostly I have been exploring alone, online, because it can be challenging to bring up these questions without inviting dismissal.
And yet something keeps pulling me to share this more openly. Something about the moment we are in.