Council of Kings

Dear Friends,

I felt good about recording this video today because I felt I was able to bring a lot of raw realness and honesty about my current process, while also sharing some medicinal wisdom that can hopefully help other folks out there.

If you prefer to read rather than watch/listen, here is a lightly edited transcript:

A Different Way of Relating to Struggle: Working With Burnout, Heaviness, and Suffering

Hey everybody. Good to see you. Sending love.

I felt like making a video about suffering, difficulty, and struggle. Oftentimes, it seems like more people could talk about their struggles while they’re in the midst of them and talk about how they work with the energy of those struggles. And so I’d like to do that today.

I’ve been going through a pretty difficult time in my life—a time of heaviness, tiredness, feeling a sense of burnout, a sense of life feeling kind of overwhelming or nonstop. Day in, day out, having a lot of obligations.

And yearning on a deep level for deeper rest.

That can show up as fantasizing about being able to pause life and go to some healing sanctuary in a forest and just rest for years on end. Wake up every day and do absolutely nothing if that’s what’s called for, or do whatever I feel like doing. That’s part of how this deep tiredness or burnout, perhaps some kind of depression, can show up for me.

I’m familiar with these kinds of feelings. It seems to be pretty cyclical for me. For whatever reason, often it is around this time of year (late summer / autumn) that I experience some of my deepest sense of tiredness or exhaustion or burnout.

So an interesting question to me is: How do I work with that energy, and how do other people work with that energy?

I’m very open to hearing from others about how you work with the energy of any kind of suffering or sorrow, difficulty, exhaustion. Perhaps especially tiredness, exhaustion, and burnout, which seem very relevant to me right now.

So feel welcome to share.

First: Allow It

When I asked myself that question—how do I work with this energy?—first and foremost, I allow it.

This is how I relate to life on a very deep, very profound level: from a place of allowing whatever is arising, allowing and welcoming whatever is arising.

Just having a sense of:

Okay, this is what’s happening now. Let’s let it flow through. Let it pass through.

Even the way I’m framing the question of “How do I work with this energy?” already reveals a lot about how I relate to life, because I’m not making this into an overly fixed condition or fixed situation that’s like, “Oh, why am I encaged in this very rigid, very fixed situation?”

I’m seeing it more as a flowing energy.

I see everything as a flowing energy.

To me, all of life is an ever-new, ever-fresh, continually refreshing flow of energy, of different flavors of energy.

Essentially, all of life is one unified continuum of many different textures and flavors of energy.

So, in a deep sense, when textures like this are arising for me, I see them as just another color on the color wheel, just another hue on the rainbow of life, just another texture in this many-textured fresco, this many-textured painting that is, again, ever new and ever fresh.

So I often remind myself to really look freshly at this moment and what is appearing in this moment, and to notice that I’ve never seen it before.

I’ve never felt these precise feelings or sensations before.

Don’t Put Your Experience in a Box

The mind wants to kind of dumb things down through a reductive averaging process and say, “Oh yeah, this is burnout. This is heaviness. This is exhaustion. This is depression.”

And then you kind of put it in a box.

And in a way, putting your experience in that box can actually over-solidify it.

You can kind of grasp onto that story and further perpetuate and create further layers of suffering by over-grasping onto the story about whatever seems to be occurring.

I think in Buddhism, they sometimes call that something like the second arrow of suffering.

The first arrow is just the raw data of whatever seems to be presenting that feels uncomfortable.

The second layer is the stories we start telling ourselves about it—grasping onto, ruminating on, and looping on.

And often that story, that second layer, is a much larger source of suffering because it can really perpetuate and extend and expand that suffering pretty much endlessly.

We can start living in this fabricated story of:

Woe is me. This is just how my life is. I suck. Life sucks. I’m perpetually depressed.

And that can become kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Whereas what Buddhism and other paths of wisdom teach us, in a way, is how to be more like the animals who, when they encounter pain or discomfort, basically just shake it off—often literally so.

Just shake it out, shake it off, and then just move on.

And it’s gone. What has passed is passed.

And they don’t create that second layer of ruminating suffering about it.

What Are These Words Actually Pointing To?

For me, it’s valuable to look at my immediate experience and say:

What are these words that I’m applying?

Words like “burnout,” “depression,” “exhaustion,” “tiredness.”

What do they really refer to in this moment, now?

And, in a sense, it can be very valuable to even negate those concepts entirely and say:

There is no burnout.There is no depression.There is no tiredness.There is no exhaustion.

These are just fictitious things—words and stories that the mind has invented and applied very reductively to an ever-shifting, ever-flowing flurry of sensation.

Let me actually go to and zoom in on and become more intimate with the microscopic detail of this ever-shifting flurry of sensation.

And when I go to that ever-shifting flurry and hurricane of sensation here and now, I find something that’s much more open and free and unpindownable.

It’s kind of like going to the level of pure being or pure awareness, turning awareness back upon itself, and just being with what is—the actual raw data of aliveness that’s showing up in this moment, beyond what the thought-based stories are saying that it is.

What is the actual textural, multisensory data of pure, raw, naked aliveness here and now?

And just simply being with that and allowing that, letting that flow through, letting that be felt nakedly, can be very, very helpful.

So I try to remind myself of that.

Total Allowing, Total Welcoming

Again, just this orientation or disposition of total allowing, total welcoming, deep surrender—it’s hard to really express how valuable that is.

Because even in the midst of quite intensely ‘negative’ experiences, or what other people would categorize as intensely ‘negative’ or uncomfortable experiences, I still often experience quite a profound sense of freedom and deep ease and peace.

Even if I’m not feeling like things are easy, even if things feel hard on a human, embodied level, there’s still this in-touchness with this deeper level of ease and freedom.

There’s just a sense of:

Okay. Just breathe through it. Everything is allowed. Everything is flowing. Everything is welcome. This too shall pass.

These are just gloppy textures that are moving through, coagulated textures.

Just let them be felt. Receive whatever messages they may have to offer.

And trust the flow—and feel that the flow is already fully trusting of the flow.

In a sense, there’s nothing to trust because there’s only one thing here.

This is what the wisdom traditions teach us, and what can be discovered in immediate experience: that there is just simply this flow of life, this ocean of life, flowing itself, totally surrendered to itself, as itself.

And therefore, the wave has no need to fear the ocean because the wave simply is the ocean.

We don’t need to fear life because we are life.

We are the essence of life simply dancing and expressing itself in whatever way it happens to be doing at any given time.

The Profound Sense in Which Life Is Not Personal

In a profound sense, it’s not personal, not serious.

It has no weight to it, in a deep way.

And it’s out of our control, too, in a deep sense.

And I would say: don’t overly grasp onto anything I’m saying here.

These are pointers to a direct experiential reality where you can discover this all-pervading dimension of your experience where everything feels deeply weightless, deeply free, deeply at peace, simply abiding, simply flowing.

Where it feels like life is not in your hands. It’s out of your hands. You can’t grasp it. You can’t control it. It’s just a pure, spontaneous flow of life living itself.

And when we get into this territory, it can be paradoxical: I’m not saying to totally negate the idea of choice or free will. It can be very important to have an experience of choice or an experience of directing one’s will in a certain direction.

So again, don’t overly grasp onto what I’m saying.

However, what I’m pointing to is a possibility of a freedom that’s always available:

A freedom for life to be just as it is.

A freedom for life to flow just how it flows.

A freedom for everything to be allowed just as it is.

And the more deeply that I allow myself to open to that freedom here and now, to open to this unpindownable flow, and to really be with this immediate aliveness as an ungraspable, unresolvable flurry and cascade of unknown sensations and openness, the more I discover something surprising and liberating.

The Vastness Is Greater Than the Problem

In a way, the openness and the vastness are much greater than the sensation.

There’s an infinite wholeness, openness, and vastness that is always right here with us.

And the more I let myself open to that and release into that, the more I almost forget what had even seemed like a problem.

There’s almost like a dissolution of any sense of contraction or identity.

It’s almost like forgetting who you even are or what a story would be.

There’s just this openness, this freedom, this joy, this peace that’s always here.

Anandamayi Ma once said something like:

“Your nature is joy. If joy seems absent, it is because attention is turned outward instead of inward.”

And similarly, Peter Brown would often say, “If something looks like a problem, just look in the other direction.”

Which some people would take as, “Oh, that’s a form of avoidance,” or something like that.

But what Peter was pointing to is something quite stunning.

The same thing I would say that Anandamayi Ma was pointing to.

And the same thing I would say that, in a profound sense, Jesus was pointing to when he said:

“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

Repent means to change direction.

Turn Inward

Instead of looking outward upon the object-level phenomena of life and what life seems to be…

Turn around and focus inward on the nature of being itself, the nature of awareness itself.

That’s what Peter and Anandamayi Ma were pointing to.

If something seems like a problem, you can be sure that you are lost in your definitions of what life is, because all problems are defined into existence.

Even if I’m feeling a lot of gloppy, heavy sensation, I don’t have to define that as a problem.

And when I don’t define it as a problem, when I just, again, go to the space of pure sensation, pure being, pure presence, pure awareness, where awareness and its apparent contents are all just being allowed as this undefined, sparkling flow—that is what it means to turn inward.

To turn truly inward.

It’s not about turning to your thoughts and emotions. Those are still outward from the perspective of what is most essential.

From the perspective of that which witnesses the thoughts and emotions, those are still outer.

The Infinite Ocean Cannot Fit in a Concept

What is inmost is, again, this space of pure being, pure presence, pure sensation, pure awareness, where nothing can be even defined as anything, because it’s really seen that as soon as you say a single word or create a single definition, you have, in a way, coagulated the flow or blocked the flow by creating a kind of artificial construction within it.

You’re trying to take the infinite super-ocean of reality and collapse it down into a jam jar, trying to fit it in the jam jar of a concept or a construct.

And you’re never going to be able to do that.

And so it creates a kind of artificial blockage of the flow.

Whereas, again, when you go to this ever-present level of pure sensation, pure presence, pure awareness — which isn’t even really a level once you’re there, because once you notice this ever-present spaciousness, the felt experience is more like: Oh, this is all that there actually is. — that pure presence is what is residing beneath all of our inaccurate stories about what this is.

And the stories are fine. They’re all included.

They can be included as beautiful poetry.

But they’re just always going to miss the mark dramatically in terms of their capacity to actually accurately reflect what this is.

Because what this is—this infinite mystery, this infinite wholeness—it is vastly beyond anything that could be conceptualized.

And it’s vastly too simple for that.

Any concept makes it far more complicated than what it actually is, which is, in its innate essence, utterly and unimaginably simple.

It is just simply:

Ocean being ocean.

Ocean being ocean is all there is.

Life being life is all there is.

Universe being universe is all there is.

God being God is all there is.

The Freedom Portal

So tuning in to this kind of noticing, this kind of ever-present freedom portal, freedom inquiry, is really, to me, the most powerful medicinal thing that one can do in the midst of any form of suffering and in the midst of really any moment of life.

Because it is the portal to the true nature of wealth, the true nature of happiness, of success, of prosperity, of joy, of well-being, of wholeness, of peace.

These are always and only here and now.

Always and only here and now.

The deepest and truest treasures that we’re looking for in life—the cosmic joke is that they are only and always discovered here and now.

They are always present.

But we’re usually overlooking them because we’re fixated on the outside.

We’re fixated on the external and we’re not directing our attention inward, which means to rest as what is most primordial, what is beyond grasp—the ungraspable wholeness, the ungraspable pure being of what this is.

Foundationally, it is beyond what words could say, beyond what the mind could ever grasp.

It’s the purest simplicity, wholeness, and freedom that is always here.

And so that is my main focus when I’m going through anything in life.

“I’m Present When I’m Not Present”

At this point, this freedom has been so deeply internalized that a deep kind of reorientation of my being has taken place where I don’t even need to consciously focus on this freedom for me to just deeply know it’s there.

In one lyric I say:

“I’m present when I’m not present.”

Even when we’re not consciously being present or ‘practicing mindfulness,’ we’re still fully present because presence is all there is.

See if you can find anything other than presence here and now in any moment of life.

I would suggest that you cannot.

The past or the future only appear as ideas or images here and now.

Presence is all that there is.

This immediate present flow is the totality of life dancing on the razor’s edge of manifestation here and now.

The super-ocean of pure being, which in its essence, you could say is changeless, is always just simply what it is.

That totality is here now.

It’s naturally emanating or emerging as this kind of light show, this kind of apparition of phenomena.

And we usually spend all our time super-fixated on the patterning, the apparent patterning within the phenomena, and all of the meaning that we’re generating and giving to all of this phenomena.

Trying to kind of ‘make it all make sense.’

Trying to find, “How do I objectively fit within all this? And what is my objective purpose within all this? And what should I do?”

And in a way, from the view of the deepest freedom, peace, and love, those are all the wrong questions and kind of the wrong focus.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with asking such questions.

It’s totally natural.

It’s what life naturally does.

So everything is okay.

Everything is welcome and included.

You Are the Picture

At the same time, if you are drawn to the deepest freedom and peace that can be available even through the travails and the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,” then you want to redirect your focus in the opposite direction—inward.

Instead of trying to make sense of what’s ‘out there’ and “How do I fit into all that?,” you just want to spend a lot of time noticing this most naked primordial fact:

Everything already simply is as it is.

Everything is already whole.

Everything is already perfect.

Everything is already living itself and flowing itself.

And you simply are that flow.

You don’t need to find how you fit in this picture because you are the picture.

You are the picture and you already perfectly fit.

Every scene is totally and wholly complete unto itself.

And you are that completion.

And what seems to be this body is perfectly, perfectly situated and appropriately fitted within that completion.

And it’s not even like it’s fitted like a puzzle piece, because that would mean it’s kind of something separate that’s fit within this tapestry.

This body is the tapestry emanating forth as all of the apparent differentiation within an underlying super-ocean of totality, completion, wholeness, grace, and freedom and love.

The Deep Knowing That Everything Is Okay

So again, that ever-present freedom is my primal focus, and a focus that has been so deeply internalized that I don’t even really need to consciously focus on it.

There’s just, there’s like a knowing in my heart, in my belly, in my bones that everything is okay.

The wave need not fear the ocean because the wave simply is the ocean.

The ocean is all there is.

There’s just this deeply internalized knowing that all is flow.

Let it flow.All is allowed.All is flowing.All is included.All is well.

In a way that has room for anything that seems unwell.

All appearances of wellness or not wellness, comfort or discomfort, pain or joy.

There’s room for all of it within this deeper wellness and wholeness, this deeper wellspring and womb of pure being.

So it’s that pure being that is the true jewel to be discovered in life.

And the discovery of that pure being brings about a profound intimacy with all that is, and the discovery that you’ve always been profoundly intimate with all there is.

And that you’ve always known pure being because pure being is all that’s actually here.

It’s all there really is.

But this reorientation is basically a noticing of what has always been the case and a deep internalizing of that noticing such that the noticing, on deeper and deeper embodied levels, keeps sinking into one’s being.

Into the marrow.

Into the cell tissues.

Into the mitochondria.

This deep message of:

Wholeness now.Home now.I’m home now.I’m whole now.This is home.This is wholeness.This is freedom.This is pure flow dancing itself.

So that has been deeply internalized here. And is ongoingly more deeply internalized.

Wholeness Even in the Midst of Burnout

And that’s immeasurably valuable when facing any kind of pain or suffering or exhaustion or burnout or what have you.

Because there’s just this deeply internalized knowingness that, in a profound sense, it doesn’t matter what textures seem to be appearing.

It doesn’t matter what scene in the movie seems to be appearing.

Because this is still inalienably, inexhaustibly wholeness, freedom, love, pure being, just being what it is, just dancing its dance.

And that’s that.

That’s all there is to it.

The Human Level Still Matters

And yeah, at the same time, I will also say that there is awareness of the human levels, too.

I encourage people to investigate the ever-present dimension of what could be called enlightenment or awakening or God-realization or the discovery of simple freedom now, wholeness now, pure flow now.

That exploration has been one of the very most fruitful—probably the most fruitful exploration—of my life that ripples into everything.

And at the same time, I would also still encourage and invite people to be open to more human-level remedies and medicines that can help with whatever’s coming up.

So for me right now, facing burnout, facing some exhaustion, there’s a clear sense of:

“Okay, I need to prioritize sleep. I need to get to bed earlier.”

Not necessarily “I need to,” because that feels kind of too much like a dictate.

It’s more like:

Okay, there’s a seed of a clear invitation within the symptoms that are presenting themselves.

So the symptoms that are presenting themselves present a clear and natural invitation of:

You are invited to get more rest.

You are invited to go to bed earlier.

You are invited to let go of forms of stimulation.

You are invited to let go of drinking beer as much.

You are invited to find spaces of self-care and sanctuary.

You are invited to move and to eat clean foods.

You are invited to find space for retreat.

You are invited to find space for meditation, for sauna, for cold shower, for nourishing, simple presence, gentle flows of activity.

You are invited to make space.

If it feels right, if you’re called, you’re invited to work with some kind of plant medicine in a wise fashion, which often is very rejuvenating for me.

Consider joining us for the Christ Fire ayahuasca retreat in December.

So I’m also aware of these invitations on a more human level, and I’m also being deeply honest with myself about what I’m feeling, about what is coming up.

And I’m allowing more human-level remedies and antidotes and medicines to make themselves known and to assist while also simultaneously having this deeper kind of totalizing awareness of this inferno of grace, of freedom, of love, of home that is ever-present, that includes everything, that fully includes everything.

The Valley and the Mountain Are Both Included

These kinds of valleys of sorrow or suffering include the invitations to climb out of the valleys through various medicinal remedies.

And from the viewless view of this ever-present grace, the mountain peak or the climb out of the valley is not greater than or more valuable than the valley itself.

It’s all seen to be, in a profound sense, an equally valuable or valueless, or neither valuable nor valueless expression of wholeness.

Another expression of pure artistry that just simply is what it is.

Another innately gorgeous and poetic, miraculous emanation of the creative intelligence of life doing whatever it’s doing moment to moment in its mysterious way that cannot be said and cannot be intellectually known, cannot be cognized, yet which is known and can be known most intimately because we are that pure flow.

We are that omnipresent source which shines and dances and emerges and emanates as all of this ever-shifting fruition, fruitfulness, all of these appearances, all of these scenes within the play of being.

So we are all of that.

We are infinity.

You are infinity.

You are perfection here and now.

You are wholeness.

You are perfection.

You are love.

You are grace.

You are unity.

You are freedom.

Compassion for the Human Experience

And you can let yourself know and feel that now while also having compassion for yourself, grace for yourself, gentleness toward yourself and whatever’s arising, and being open to the natural invitations toward the more human-level remedies and medicines that can assist with various ailments.

While also beginning to sink into the depth of clarity that sees the pure perfection even of the condition that is defined as an ailment or as something uncomfortable or awry or askew.

The perfection that sees it all as wholly included, wholly embraced, wholly allowed to be as it is.

That’s pretty much the message I wanted to share today.

A Message to Fellow Humans Going Through It

Thank you for listening and considering, and just sending a whole lot of love and peace to everybody out there, fellow sufferers, fellow humans going through it.

I feel you.

This life can get damn hard.

Everybody faces some kind of struggle.

You never know what other people are going through.

So I would love to invite us to be kind to one another, to have compassion, to be open to radical peace.

We could just melt and deconstruct all the weapons and just create world peace now.

And just make life easier on each other because it’s already hard enough.

So why do we need to kill each other and stuff like that?

Let’s just set the kids free.

Do it for the kids.

Do it all for love.

Do it all for God and grace.

Create the beautiful world our hearts know is possible while also deeply realizing the perfection that’s already here and resting in and as that perfection of now.

That would be my message and invitation.

Take what resonates, let go of what doesn’t.

Love and peace to everybody.

Thank you for listening.

Be well.

Aho.

Amen.

Namaste.

I love you.

Peace.

Love,Jordan

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

WOW FAM WOW! : )

I recorded this just now and this felt like one of my purest transmissions of joy, love, and life celebration WHOLENESS REST FREEDOM NOW Love to all beings 💚

For the full experience I recommend watching the video, as I feel an infinitude comes through in my voice and embodied expression that cannot be translated through text alone. For the fullest experience I recommend watching it on Instagram, where I added some music as well.

If you prefer to simply read the essence, here is a lightly edited transcript:

Full Permission

You Are Free

WAHOOOO!

You are free.

You are love.

You are joy.

You are wholeness now.

Wholeness now.

You are so loved.

You are free.

You are ultra-confident tsunami eruption of whatever needs and wishes to come through.

You are so confident you don’t need confidence, for you simply are the ocean of life erupting however it’s erupting, and you don’t need to apologize for your flow.

You don’t need to impede your flow. You don’t need to inhibit your flow. You are the volcanic, seismic eruption of the pelvic thrust of the universe discovering itself anew in every moment.

I’m serious.

This Is Real

This is not a put-on.

This is not some cornball gimmick.

This is f*****g real, f*****g available, infinite possibilities, full permission.

I’m literally attempting to transmit something deeply beautiful, medicinal, and powerful to whoever needs this right now.

I don’t know who needs this.

If this isn’t for you, then turn it off, you know?

I’m just sending this to whoever needs it, just pure love.

Love, pure omniversal, omnidirectional, omnidimensional joy, love.

Thanksgiving, oh, Thanksgiving, thank you.

Thank heavens, pure mercy, pure forgiveness, total forgiveness of everyone and everything.

Just let it go.

Let the grudges melt away like snow at the perfect moment as we all unfurl and unfold toward a cosmic dance of jubilation, jubilee.

Sanctuary

Sanctuary.

End all the wars.

Set the kids free.

World peace now.

Wholeness now.

Melt the weapons.

Deconstruct the nukes.

Let’s just celebrate, dance, and have jovial, joyful, playful fun.

I hereby give you full permission if you happen to be longing for it.

If you need it, full permission to BE YOU.

Full permission.

Dance your dance.

Play your game.

Celebrate your joy, your life, your love, your nectar, your juicy nectar, your frequency, your passion, your artistry.

Let it drip.

Let it drop.

Let it undulate.

Full permission.

Full permission.

If you’ve been waiting for a sign, this is it.

Full Permission to Rest

Full permission from the cosmos, the universe.

Simply celebrate.

Be you.

Rest.

Oh, we’ve forgotten how to rest, folks.

You can do a great service to this earth by simply sleeping for several months straight, like the bears do.

The bears know. Oh, time to hibernate. Going to sleep now.

Our culture has tried to bury rest beneath mountains of caffeination and endless to-do lists and go, go, go energy.

And we’re all just exhausted.

So teach us, remind us how to rest.

Discover it in your cellular tissues.

Just nap for months on end.

It’s okay.

Remind us how to rest.

Full permission.

Full jubilant jubilation.

Full permission.

This Is Not About Me

This is not about me.

I’m no one, I’m nothing.

This is just, this is pure you.

This is coming from you.

This is a tectonic earthquake of geyser-like, mountain-shattering magma, phantasmagorically and magnificently conjuring itself to ever greater degrees of miraculousness.

Here and now, every moment is an absolute hurricane, explosion, tornado of gargantuan epicness, unfathomable, legendary proportions . . .

And simultaneously totally ordinary, exquisitely, exquisitely ordinary, exquisitely ordinary, such that we can just chill.

We can just be, you know, feel into the juice, the lusciousness of ordinariness, of mundaneness, of boringness.

It’s like, oh, what a relief.

This could just be boring for a little while . . .

Even as at the same time it’s utterly phantasmaliciously effulgent in every moment!

The Unfathomable Display

If you look at it, I mean, what is color?

What is sound?

Where are we?

What is this unfathomable display, this light show that we seem to be gallivanting, sojourning through?

So, once again, my friends, full permission.

Deep, full love to your inner child at every stage and age.

Oh, your infant self, your toddler self, your small child self, your teenager self, your nine-year-old self, your 10-year-old self, the child of your parents <3

Deep love to your parents, your grandparents, your cousins, your aunts, uncles, everybody. <3

Everybody’s included in this all-encompassing embrace of now, of pure awareness, consciousness, wholeness.

Let The Genie Out Of The Bottle

Let the genie out of the lava lamp!

Let your soul sing.

We’re here for five cosmic milliseconds.

Who gives a rip?

Who gives a rat’s arse?

Peace to the rats, blessings to the rats.

Who gives a ding-dong, a diggily-doo?

Who cares what anybody thinks about any of it?

Who cares what they want to say about anything?

Who cares what they say about your one wildly green, lime-green peacock’s tail feather?

That’s you, baby.

That’s how God made you.

Who cares?

Their criticism, their concern is more about them than it’s about you.

You know, of course, be open to feedback, be open to reflections.

But just realize you’re perfect, baby.

You are perfect.

You are perfect.

Can’t say it enough times.

You’re perfect just how you are.

You are whole.

You Are Perfect

You are perfect.

You’re perfect. You’re perfect.

We’re perfect. You’re perfect.

We’re perfect.

I need to make a song, a jam out of that one. That’s a good hook, that’s a bar.

All right, everybody.

Peace infinity.

Just wanted to send love coming out of a men’s circle today, feeling charged up. Council of Kings, man. I love these guys.

I love our brotherhood. I love these brothers of the ever innocent heart. Feel welcome to hit me up if you’d like to sit in a circle with us.

Much love in all directions. Peace infinity. Namaste. Hallelujah. World peace now. Set the kids free. End all wars.

Pure love to all beings. That’s the message. That’s the movement.

Peace and love. Be well. Take care. Aho.

I love you.

Bear Hugs,Jordan

⚡🧝‍♂️🐬🐉🧙🌸

Portals of possibility: Simple Freedom / Council of Kings / Christ Fire

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

I love nonduality.

Let’s be clear about that: I love nonduality.

The exploration of nonduality has been perhaps the most liberating adventure of my life.

Nondual freedom and nondual awakening are basically my ~favorite topics at this stage of life. There’s ~nothing I am more passionate about communicating and sharing with people. I seem to be becoming more and more of a ‘nondual teacher’ all the time. This is the natural movement of life for me, it seems.

And yet…

As with any approach to wisdom…

There are (subtle) traps and shadows!

I explored this in great detail in this 9-hour course I freely gave to the world three months ago:

If you value what I create and freely give to the world, please consider sharing my work, buying my books and music, and/or contributing an occasional or ongoing donation through Wise, Stripe, PayPal, Venmo, Bitcoin, Substack, or Buy Me A Coffee. Your support is deeply appreciated, my friend. God bless you. <3

Today’s video dives deeper into this topic of the potential traps of nonduality.

These traps tend to arise from mental fixations, concretizations, or misunderstandings of what nonduality is pointing to.

What are the biggest problems with non-duality?

If you prefer to read rather than watch the video, here is a lightly edited transcript:

(I recommend also reading the diary entry after the transcript for the full experience.)

What are the biggest problems with non-duality, especially neo-advaita and radical non-duality?

Well, if I was going to be very succinct, I would say a lot of radical non-duality can end up leading into solipsism, nihilism, moral relativism, spiritual bypassing, spiritual indifference, passivity, spiritual elitism, disembodiment, no sense of moral clarity, no sense of a universal standard by which wise, skillful, good, true, loving behavior can be measured.

Further traps are: the negation of relationship, the negation of personhood, the negation of meaning and value and purpose in life, the negation of individuality and family.

These are some of the biggest shadows and traps and failure modes that are tricky to entirely avoid if you’re wading into the waters of radical non-duality and neo-advaita.

And so I would really, really put out a word of caution to be careful in those waters.

You know, for some people that space of negation can be deeply liberating, at least temporarily. It can be kind of an anesthetic against a lot of the pain of the world. You can just tell yourself, “There is no world. There is no body. There is no self. There’s no one here. This is all emptiness. This is all empty space.”

(This can be an important and legitimate stage / season / part of ongoing cycles.)

And like ~anything that you deeply tell yourself and deeply internalize, those perspectives can become experiential for you.

And I’ve gone deep into that on my own path. And I did find liberating value there.

But at the same time, I also found myself being disconnected from personhood, from groundedness, from Earth, from incarnation, from family, from fatherhood, husbandhood, family life, service to Earth, the actual callings of the Earth at this time, the way in which countless children and innocent beings, women and men, animals are being mistreated, abused, and worse—much worse—on the planet at this time.

Radical non-duality can become very solipsistic, very navel-gazy, where you’re just only endlessly focused on your own immediate experience, and you’re kind of denying the existence of God’s creation, God’s Earth, and God’s other children who are suffering and who are calling out for assistance.

Again, it can become very solipsistic, very nihilistic. You’re denying meaning and purpose, which can feel good on one level because it can feel like it’s a relinquishment of all responsibility, like, “Oh, there is no objective purpose or meaning, so I’m off the hook. I don’t have to do anything. I can just flow with whatever’s arising and let myself be free. And this is all already free and already perfection now, so there’s nothing to do and no one to be.”

You know, that’s a soothing spiritual lullaby that can feel pretty good to the mind to abdicate all responsibility.

The problem with it is that it’s not (fully) true.

It’s not true that everything is perfect. It is true on one level, yet untrue on another level.

God is perfect. There’s perfection in God, and God is with us in our heart of hearts, and that all-pervading perfection is always available to tune into, to rest as that grace and that completion.

But we are also—it’s kind of like we’re in two worlds simultaneously.

Jesus Christ said, “My kingdom is not of this world.”

Christ’s kingdom is pointing us toward that all-pervading world of God that’s always with us, and that is completion, wholeness, perfection, endless grace, and revelation.

And we are simultaneously in that world, in some sense, in our deepest spirit and essence, and we are in this world of God’s creation, of Earth, which is a world that has deviated, that has fallen significantly from aligning with the true pattern, the true way of love and grace.

We have deviated immensely.

When you really feel the gap of how far we are from true, divine, all-encompassing, universal love on this planet, it’s heartbreaking. It’s heart-shattering. It’s devastating.

And so it’s no wonder that many people will utilize any number of spiritual anesthetics to try to avoid feeling that grief. Love often feels like grief in a world like ours.

Also common nowadays are these New Age views that, “Oh, anything that feels bad is untrue, and what feels good is what is true. So just, yeah, forget any thoughts or feelings that make you feel bad and just go toward what makes you feel good.”

Or, “Oh, you’re just creating your reality anyway. This is all a projection. So just create what feels good. Just create what feels epic and ignore the rest.”

You know, again, it’s understandable why people go for that stuff. Again, it’s a spiritual anesthetic, spiritual bypassing.

The issue with it, again, is that it’s not true.

It’s not true.

This world is real. We’re here. We have bodies. We are embodied beings, and beings are suffering here.

Children are suffering. Animals are suffering. Women are suffering. Men are suffering.

There’s immense suffering here, and there’s an immensity of suffering calling out to be met by love and care and integrity and honor and honesty and dignity and truth and service.

And, yeah, attempting to spiritually bypass that or deny that or negate that is, I would say, a form of ‘devilry’ or a ‘demonic hypnosis.’

You know, not to be overly condemning, because again, I understand why people are lured into these types of snares and ways of thinking, and I myself spent a lot of time in some of these more subtle traps. And probably I still do. It all is as it is.

But, yeah, just plain and simple, I do think that there are nefarious forces that essentially want to preserve the status quo and that feed upon humanity’s fear and suffering.

And those forces want you to believe that, “Oh yeah, there’s no world, there’s no body, there’s no one here, there’s nothing to do, there’s no one to be. This is all perfection. I can just project my perfect epic reality and I don’t have to live in anyone else’s reality. I don’t know what’s going on in their reality. Oh, they shouldn’t have manifested that if they’re experiencing difficulty.”

You know, once you see it, you can’t unsee it.

You start to see how a lot of these spiritual ideas are basically narcissistic fantasies.

And so essentially, the biggest problems with non-duality relate to these ways in which it can lead to this spiritual bypassing and this dissociation, derealization.

And even though it can feel liberating or anesthetizing for many people, it also leads many people into a lot of suffering itself.

Because again, it’s not true.

People get into these solipsistic, nihilistic pigeonholes where they feel like, “I don’t even know if my own family is real. I don’t know if anything exists outside myself. Everything is meaningless. Everything is purposeless. Everything is valueless. Everything is completely relativized, so all perspectives are equal. There’s no up or down. There’s no higher or lower. There’s no more true or less true.”

And then you just end up—you know, a lot of people end up in a swampland of nihilism and solipsism and relativism that’s not really helping them, not helping anyone else, and can be quite terrifying.

You can just feel like you’re in a lonely void.

And thankfully, again, that’s not the truth. That’s not the truth of our condition. That’s not the truth of our reality as revealed through Jesus Christ and through other prophets, saints, theologians, great Fathers and Mothers of the Church, and also true saints and prophets and sages of other traditions and other streams of wisdom.

The truth is that God’s creation is real.

This is real.

We’re really here.

And perhaps in a profound sense, God is even more real than this world.

This world is real, and God is ultimate reality and is also always with us and all-pervading and is here and can be felt through the heart and can increasingly pervade this world and absorb this world and transfigure and sanctify this world.

And that is what we’re truly called to do by the true Lord of Love: to become transparent to His love, to His grace, and to allow that universal love to shine forth; to love thy enemies—to “forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do”—to show true love, grace, and mercy to all beings. And to be upright men of honor, women of honor, good people who are human, who are people, who acknowledge that we are people, we are persons, and we have honorable, sacred duties to be of service and to be loving, to be good people.

And of course, again, we’re human.

We’re going to miss the mark. We’re going to deviate.

But Christianity gives us this capacity to repent, to repeatedly return to God and say, “Have mercy on me, Father. Help me straighten my path. I offer everything up to you.”

I’m embracing that lifelong journey. I’m certainly far from perfect. I’m a sinner, and yeah, I’m just speaking honestly about my experience, and I repent regularly, and I find it very, very meaningful and very powerful to lay it all down at the feet of the Lord and say, “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

It’s when we approach God with that contrite heart, with that contrite heart and that true humility, that we can feel true grace and true mercy raining down upon us and washing us clean, washing us clean.

So, yeah, I just felt inspired to make a short video clarifying the biggest problems with a lot of radical non-duality and neo-advaita teachings.

And I hope this is a valuable invitation for you, my friend, to follow the true way of love, the way of love, of truth, of grace, of honor, of wisdom.

And to understand that there really is a true way. There is a Logos. There is a through-line in this world, a Love that we are called toward.

This life is not random. It’s not meaningless. It’s not purposeless. It’s not valueless.

It is God.

God is the ultimate value, the ultimate purpose, the ultimate meaning in an absolute sense, and we are literally invited to participate in that and to bring that forth.

And we have free will, so we’re free to deviate and explore other possibilities. But that exploration is always going to teach us that nothing truly fulfills our hearts like God’s Love, because that’s our true birthright and true home.

And that—that is the truth of reality.

So you can search. You can look for other things. But when you find the truth—from my humble perspective—you’re going to find God’s Love. You’re going to realize that’s the truth.

So thank you for listening, my friends.

Much love to you.

Amen. Peace. Hallelujah. Be well. God loves you. I love you.

Peace be with you.

Dear Diary: Getting Fresh and Real About This Video ~Months After Recording It

Thanks for reading, everybody.

This video and the one I published a couple days ago on the truth of Christianity were both recorded some ~months ago.

It was fascinating to revisit them this week to remember what I was seeing at that time.

I feel there is a lot of important truth and wisdom expressed in these videos.

And with that said, revisiting them freshly now, I’m also strongly struck by the recognition that the truth simply cannot be put into words.

Any time you feel you have put the truth into words, you can be sure you have not. You cannot capture the un-capture-able.

So with these and any words I share, hold them lightly. Don’t grasp onto the words. Don’t view the words as truth. They are symbols. View them as invitations to explore your own direct experience.

What I can feel in these two videos is the earnest heart of a good Christian man.

And simultaneously, I can also feel some of the heaviness and solemnity that can drive people away from Christianity. That heaviness, graveness, and solemnity can be a very powerful and beautiful medicine, don’t get me wrong.

Yet it can also be, well, unnecessarily heavy. I’m glad it comes through my voice sometimes though, as it probably serve as a good counterweight to a lot of my signals which are super light, weightless, playful, and free.

Upon revisiting those two videos, I’d just simply say: Find your own way. Trust your own heart. Your path is your path. And your path is perfect as it is. Perfectly imperfect. You are always on the path. You cannot be off the path. In a way, there is no path because right now is whole and complete and full and free as it is. And you are that free wholeness.

There can also be a trap of judging one season or stage of the spiraling path from the view of a different season or stage. If one is in a deeply incarnational stage, then those who are transcending and completely letting the world go may appear to be ‘irresponsibly spiritually bypassing.’ Yet from the perspective of those in the deeply transcendent stage, they may feel vast freedom and like they’re right where they need to be, and those who are in a more incarnational/immanent stage might appear boringly stuck in the swamp of ‘grounded worldly consensus reality.’

And meanwhile, people in both of those stages/seasons simply are as they are. They’re where they need to be. The conditions are always perfectly appropriate. It’s all okay.

So, yeah, let it flow.

There’s a time for grieving. A time for serving. A time for transcending. A time for being no one. A time for falling in love. A time for having kids. A time for relinquishing everything. A time for dissolving into nothingness.

It all fits. It all belongs. There’s room for all of it.

Let it flow.

I love you.

Grace be with you,Jordan

If you feel called to go deeper, feel welcome to join us for Christ Fire or reach out to me about a one-on-one Simple Freedom journey.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

Dear Family,

For me deep truth can be discovered across all world wisdom traditions.

This includes Christianity!

Many neo-spiritual westerners understandably abandoned Christianity in recent decades due to its saddening shadows as a manmade institution…

Yet the mystic (center-less) center of Christianity is truly a luminous ruby.

A jewel which beautifully evokes nondual and relational and all-inclusive truth, inviting a deeply devotional, sacred, and intimate relationship with all that is.

If this resonates, consider joining us for the Christ Fire ayahuasca retreat in Mexico at Kumankaya in December.

Today’s video explores this further.

Why is Christianity true?

If you prefer to read along rather than watching the video, here is a lightly edited transcript:

Why is Christianity true?

Well, if we were going to boil it down to its simplest form, I would say that God is Love.

God is real. God is Love. God is real beyond all hope or imagining.

This is revealed through the heart. It’s revealed most profoundly in my experience through weeping.

Through weeping. Heart revelation.

You shall know the truth when you weep before it, when your heart truly cracks open and you just weep tears of pure love and pure grace. You know this is the truth. There really is the way, the truth, and the life, and that is the way of love and the way of Christ—the way of self-giving love.

This is an objective reality, an objective through-line, an objective Logos or meta-pattern that is recurrent throughout all of human experience. When you align with the way of love, you will know that you’re coming into alignment with the truth.

You will radiate that love.

Kneeling down with a contrite heart and saying, “Lord, have mercy on me. Lord, I’m not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and I shall be healed. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

Humbly acknowledging that we have sinned, that we’ve missed the mark, that we’ve deviated from the center of the cross, from the true Logos of self-giving love—which we all do. We’re all human. We’re in a human condition where deviating from perfect loving wisdom is very common.

And so it’s absolutely essential to be able to say, “Lord, have mercy on me. Lord, forgive me. Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”

And when you do that from a true place of contrite-hearted devotion and humility, you will feel grace and mercy washing down upon you.

You will feel yourself being brought increasingly into devotion and surrender to the true Logos.

You will be invited to participate and to experience union more and more with God and with love, and to become an expression of that.

And you will see more and more clearly just how far we’ve truly deviated from Love.

So you will see your own residual sinfulness and the ways that you miss the mark more and more clearly as you’re drawn into this process. We are perfectly imperfect.

But at the same time, you’ll also feel yourself being sanctified in the light of Christ, in the love of Christ, in the love of God.

And it’s worth saying that there are many non-Christians who, in a sense, I would say, are better Christians than a lot of nominal Christians.

Many people call themselves Christians, but they are basically just going through the motions. Their religion is like a ritualistic husk of true faith.

There’s no real, deep, powerful, living, devotional connection there.

And that’s not to judge those people. They are as they are, life is as it is, it all fits. There’s still value in going through the motions of tradition and going to church.

But a lot of people are not actually endeavoring to be transformed through Christ—to truly, every day, show up and say, “How can I be further sanctified and purified to walk the path of love and to bring forth the Kingdom to this world?”

I do believe that that Kingdom Love is all-pervading. It’s with all of us already in our heart of hearts.

And if a person is sincerely calling for God, calling for the true One Creator by whatever name, with deep earnestness, then I believe that God will be with that person.

And at the same time, for me, returning to my ancestral tradition of Christianity, there’s a sense of finding something that I didn’t find anywhere else.

Some say that your ancestral tradition is your native language spiritually and religiously. So it’s something like that.

It feels so right. It fits.

And so I would generally encourage people to explore the tradition of their ancestors. I think there’s very often gold there.

And most religions do—to varying degrees—have this clarity that God is Love, that love is the center of reality, that the true reality of life is a reality of love and grace at the heart of everything, and that we are endeavoring to move closer to actually embodying and incarnating and becoming transparent to that already-present Love.

So I would look for that in your ancestral tradition.

And at the same time, I would invite people to explore Christianity because I do believe there’s tremendous wisdom there.

But everybody has to follow the path of their own heart.

I believe there are as many ways home to God as there are individuals, and so you’ve got to walk the path that’s right for you.

But I would invite you to deeply consider that love and grace really are the truth of our existence.

And we are—we are invited to participate, to embody that love, to incarnate that love.

There are so many traps on the spiritual path: traps of solipsism and nihilism and moral relativism and spiritual bypassing and disembodiment.

And Christianity offers an incredible clarifying answer to all of those traps. It avoids all of those traps.

It invites us into profound relationship, profound meaning, profound purpose, profound love, profound service, profound grace, profound freedom.

It’s really an unbelievably beautiful gift to this earth.

So thank you for listening and considering that.

That is my current sense.

God bless you. Be well. Amen.

Much love.

If you feel called to go deeper, feel welcome to join us for Christ Fire or reach out to me about a one-on-one Simple Freedom journey.

I love you.

You are free,Jordan

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

Note: Simple Free Solutions is happening tomorrow! Free and open to all. If you want to discuss any challenge with me — related to life, relationships, spirituality, career, psychedelic integration, holistic well-being, and so on — this is an awesome chance to do so.

Dear Friends,

In today’s video, I explore what success means to me. If you prefer to read rather than watch, here is a lightly-edited transcript:

What does success mean to me?

Plain and simple, success is pure being. Success is life itself. Life, to me, is already fully successful as it is. Life holds an intrinsic wholeness and intrinsic completion as it is.

If you looked at yourself as a newborn baby, you would never think to say, “Oh yeah, you’re quite unsuccessful at this stage. Maybe someday when you check a bunch of things off a to-do list, you will then be successful.”

No. It’s just very clear that the newborn baby version of you, or of anyone, is an expression of primordial purity, innocence, wholeness, completion. And we never stop being that. That’s still there for all of us.

We all are intrinsically successful beyond our wildest dreams just by existing. We are a never-before-seen artwork, each one of us, from the hand of infinite creative mystery.

So to me, success is innate, simply what we are, and we can relax into that. We can relax into the profound sense in which there is nothing to do, no one to be, nowhere to go, nothing to know. Let yourself rest. Let things be as they are.

And when you do that, surprisingly, you find that it’s not that you stagnate into a puddle of goo and don’t do anything. Rather, you come into a deeper relaxation and alignment with life, where you can learn to live from that wholeness and let that wholeness live you and breathe you in the way that is innate and natural to you.

Instead of always pushing and shoving and grasping and striving to reach this ever-receding carrot-on-a-stick of ‘success’ and enough-ness—this holy grail of “maybe someday I will achieve or accomplish enough to be successful”—you discover a different way of living and being.

A way where you relax into letting yourself feel that newborn baby-ness within—that intrinsic innocence, wholeness, purity, at-homeness, fullness, successfulness—here and now. And you just let yourself live from that.

You let that breathe you. You let life itself sing through you in the way that is natural to you—not as a means to an end, not as a means to maybe someday reach some external success—but simply as a natural overflow, a natural expression.

Like a bird’s song. Like an acorn growing into a mighty sequoia, simply out of its nature, out of the pure celebration of living, of blossoming, blooming, flowering, unfolding. It’s natural. It’s natural to us.

We sing, we dance, “we are the music makers and we are the dreamers of dreams,” as Willy Wonka put it. It’s innate.

So feel into that. If it feels good, let yourself rest in that. Let yourself feel that you are already fully successful now.

With that understood, what wants to flow naturally through you? How do you want to naturally flow through/as this precious life?

Peace, much love.

Love,Jordan

P.S. If this resonated and you’d like to go deeper, join us for Simple Free Solutions tomorrow and consider reading my book, simple freedom.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

In today’s video I explore some of the (unexpected) long-lasting shifts that took place for me in my first few ayahuasca ceremonies about 8 years ago:🌿 80-90% decrease in levels of chronic guilt/shame🌿 80% reduction of anxiety🌿 70% decrease in intake of alcohol🌿 80% decrease in intake of cannabis

🌿 90% decrease in viewing of adult films All of these shifts have been more or less permanent so far. While there may be occasional flare-ups, baseline levels have never returned to anywhere near the pre-ayahuasca levels and overall there is a much more balanced relationship to vices/indulgences, as well as a lot more inner peace.

There was also a huge release of fear/resistance to life, resulting in far more trust in the flow of life.

Deep healing, forgiveness, and love also rippled into most all of my relationships with family and friends.

As I continued sitting with ayahuasca in the years that would follow, it initiated me into profoundly deep mysteries of life and consciousness. It also taught me a great deal about humility, grounding, surrender, commitment, devotion, service, love, creativity, courage, and leadership.

Ayahuasca was also deeply connected to my journey of becoming a father and husband, as I spontaneously proposed to my wife at Kumankaya after an ayahuasca ceremony and we were married in an ayahuasca ceremony at Kumankaya.

Does your heart feel called to this medicine?

A group of soulful men and women is coming together for the Christ Fire ayahuasca retreat happening December 6th-12th of this year.

We’re about 3 months away and are aiming to finalize the group soon. So if your heart feels a spark to be there, drop us a note.

You don’t need to be a Christian to attend this retreat. The intention is for the retreat to be open and non-dogmatic, with no beliefs being pushed on anyone. Christ is related to here as a deep mystery, and is being called upon as a healer-friend and protective presence of infinite love and grace. Each person is fully encouraged to relate to the mysteries of ayahuasca, life, and Christ in the ways that feel good and native to them.

At this stage I seem to be some kind of nondual/zen Catholic who is also happy to call himself nothing at all. ‘Katholikos’ means “universal.”

I’m deeply looking forward to everything coming together for this retreat: wonderful people, ayahuasca ceremonies, rich dialogue, meditation, breathwork, dance, sound healing, bonfire nights, hammock-lounging, nature immersion, and the healing jungle oasis of Kumankaya holding all of us in a field of healing peace.

Blessings and Love,Jordan

Simple Free Solutions: Free Event This Saturday

On another note: I’m going to be hosting a free one-hour event this Saturday called Simple Free Solutions. All are welcome.

I’m excited for this.

This is an opportunity to receive precise laser guidance on your current largest challenges or questions in life.

This will be somewhat similar to ‘hot-seat coaching,’ in which one person at a time can present their challenge and I will efficiently and compassionately help them resolve it, to whatever degree is possible in the moment.

I’ve been immersed in thousands of hours of transformational work and contemplative practice for the past 15 years and I’m eager to distill all of this experience to rapidly assist you.

This session will be recorded and (portions of it) may be shared publicly, so please attend with the understanding that you are consenting to this.

If you are struggling with anything, you really have nothing to lose by attending this event. This is a great opportunity to work with me at no cost, in a highly focused way, to experience the unique ways I’m able to help people.

Spaciousness & Peace,Jordan

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

Dear friends,

I recorded this video today after having some deep intimations around the upcoming Christ Fire retreat in December.

Here’s a lightly edited transcript if you prefer to read:

Hey everybody, I’m feeling a call to share that something very deep and mysterious is about to happen in Mexico for the Christ Fire Retreat in December.

I had a couple calls today about the retreat and had chills coming, goosebumps, tears, a deep sense of some kind of collective, ancestral, karmic, or dharmic purpose being fulfilled, assisted, or brought about through this retreat.

It feels like deep mysteries of Christ and mysteries of ayahuasca converging for this. And it feels like something beyond individual healing. It feels like there’s a deep purpose of being of service to the collective and helping to heal the collective unconscious and heal deep, ancient wounds within the soul of Earth and the soul of humanity. I offer that humbly, I’m not trying to be grandiose. That’s just what feels like it’s coming through.

It feels like it’s gonna be something very deep, mysterious, profound, and sacred. If you feel the call to be there for Christ Fire at Kumankaya, December 6th to 12th, feel welcome to reach out to me.

Or fill out the form to send word to us. To be clear this retreat is open to all people: men, women, and anyone who identifies differently.

Thank you, God. Thank you, Love. May we be of service to Love and to all through this co-creation. Amen. Peace be with you. Peace be with all.

Deep mysteries here, weaving secrets of the ancient Amazon with the revelations of the Logos.

Thank you, God, for this inspiration. May we be of service to the Earth. 🙏🏼❤️‍🔥

Love,Jordan

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

Aloha familia,

I felt an inspiration to record a video version of my recent essay, Nonduality, Psychedelics, and Jesus Christ. You can read the original essay here if you like:

In the video I also elaborate quite a bit more on the essay and my current relationship to Christ, Christianity, nonduality, and entheogenic plant medicine.

If you prefer to read those elaborations rather than watch, here are most of them, lightly edited:

Note: This article is deeply relevant to this year’s Christ Fire retreat that I’m co-creating at Kumankaya, Mexico, the healing center where I got married, a place dear to my heart. If you feel the call to sit with ayahuasca in a Christ-celebrating context, this experience is handcrafted for you. Learn more and consider joining us.

Christ as Mystery

Someone might ask, “So how does Christ fit into all this? What is Jesus Christ, Christ Jesus to you?”

And I would say Christ is a mystery, a mystery of love. I feel that the mystery inherent in Christ, God, and Christianity is something that can be under-emphasized by Christians — but if you go deep into the Christian mystical tradition there is an unbelievable reverence for the unknowability of God, the inexhaustibility of God, the transcendent dimension of God who is Christ, who is Spirit.

Really the Christian story, the Christian mythopoetic emanation of the literal incarnation of the Logos — of the inherent intelligence of all that is — in and as Jesus Christ, being crucified and resurrected — the way in which these mysteries contain and point to and are suggestive of and poetically evoke unbelievably deep mysteries within the spiritual life, within the life of the spirit — is profoundly rich and mysterious.

And not as a mere metaphor, not as a mere myth. From the Christian view, creation is real. This is really God’s creation — although it is contingent upon the being of God. God is seen as the first mover, the great mystery, the great primordial mystery prior to all else. Creation is seen as a real emanation, a real song of God, and therefore Jesus Christ is seen as having really and truly walked this earth.

The Living Presence of Christ

And I’ve experienced weeping revelations, inexplicable weeping revelations — where I felt like my heart was just breaking open — of the spirit of Jesus Christ, the living presence of Jesus Christ, the profound sense that he truly did walk this earth, walked among us, and is still with us now. And in a profound and deep, mysterious, inexpressible sense that he truly did die for our sins — in a sense he died because of our ignorance, because of our tendency to miss the mark, out of our own free will, to forget the true loving Logos.

We literally greeted the living Logos with a crucifixion, with a torture device. And that illuminates the deep ignorance of humanity. But that crucifixion, his willingness to surrender on that depth, and to then be resurrected, is seen as having sent a shockwave of love through human history that altered the course of our evolution and emanated new spiritual possibilities, or made it easier for people to access the deepest spiritual revelations.

That’s one mystical way of understanding the Christ mystery, the mystery of the incarnation.

Christ as Ever-Present Mystery of Love

And again, though, I want to keep emphasizing the word mystery. For me, I experience Christ as an all-pervading mystery of love, and ever-present liberating power of love, and ever-present personal relational friend of love, as well as a suprapersonal presence of love beyond all categories, beyond all descriptions.

I experience Christ as a sense of innate wholeness and completion and perfection and harmony within this cosmic dance, this radiant creation of the mystery of divinity, the mystery of whatever the source — the waterfall from which all of this springs into being — is.

I call that God. I call that Christ.

And it feels to me like it is simple. It is ever-present. It is freedom. It is completion now. There can be a profound sense of: this is wholeness now. This is it right now. I don’t have to wait to receive God and Christ. I can receive God and Christ through my heart now, through the simple freedom of just listening to the sound of the rain and welcoming this moment as it is, as it is.

Catholicism, Universality, and Non-Dual Resonance

So Christ to me is a profoundly, profoundly deep mystery. And yeah, that’s where I currently find myself.

I find myself a lover of Christ and a Catholic. Catholikos means universal. Actually, interestingly, when you go deeper into the more mystical meaning and understanding of Christianity, you can discover this universal resonance pointing to something present in all times and places, which other traditions have also pointed to — the true light of pure wholeness.

So for me there’s not a contradiction between loving Jesus Christ, being a Catholic, and also appreciating nonduality — being some kind of nondual Christian, and also being a shamanic individual who utilizes plant medicine. I find Christ within plant medicine, within that world. His presence seems to be like that of the greatest shaman, in a sense.

When you call upon Christ in medicine ceremony, his presence seems to confer profound protection. His name seems to bind unclean spirits or demonic entities, parasitic entities, in a way that I haven’t experienced with any other name or presence.

I often visualize myself holding forth a crucifix which is shining white or golden light when I’m in those subtle shamanic realms, interfacing with those dimensions of reality. Christ is with me. Christ is who I call upon and who I relate to as my truest lineage holder in those spaces.

And in the healing work that I do, healing work is so relational, and so it’s incredibly, incredibly valuable to have that personal emanation of God, God as a personal friend to be related to, while also still realizing that the mystery is far beyond what can be encompassed or contained by any form or any living language, any real expression.

Living Myth and Ultimate Mystery

From this view, all of creation is seen as a kind of living language, a real and living mythopoetic emanation sung forth from the heart of God, where everything is both real and everything also points beyond itself toward a mystery beyond all comprehension that is beckoning us home, that is beckoning us to remember the truth that it is trustworthy, that it is inherently whole and loving and unified — and that we are that, while also being a child of that, while also being a child of that.

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever. Amen. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever. Amen.

Giving the glory unto the heavenly mother, the heavenly father, the heavenly spirit. Deep wisdom in Christianity to do that, to give the glory to God — this prevents egoic inflation of the human being, especially the Western psyche. Western man often seems really built to have that relational bhakti-devotional relationship to the greater All-Father, to use a term from J.R.R. Tolkien’s world building — the All-Father, Ilúvatar, the one who sings the world into being.

The father, the great mystery, the profound, indivisible, and relational mystery — transcendent and incarnational, immanent.

So, these are deep mysteries to contemplate. That gives a sense of where I presently find myself. So thank you for listening, and much love in all directions.

Closing Prayer

Peace everybody. May the road rise to meet you. May the wind be at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face. May the rains fall softly on your fields, and until we meet again, may you keep safe in the gentle loving arms of God.

Amen. Amen. Hallelujah. Aho. Namaste. Hallelujah. Amen.

Peace everybody. Peace and love.

With Care,JB

Council of Kings is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Related reading:

* Freedom and the Spirit by Nikolai Berdyaev

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“You can go on retreat in any moment of life by opening to now, emptying your cup, and opening to spaciousness.”

“Become no one. Become nothing. No thing.”

“The sense that I already know what the world is, I already know what life is—that’s one of the biggest blockages.”

Today’s video is another one I recorded on the Gondor retreat in Italy a couple weeks ago.

This one felt like one of my best communications on the pure joy of vastness, weightlessness, and becoming no one for a while. As well as why retreat is essential and how to go on retreat anytime.

I recommend the video for the full experience, though I’ll also include a transcript below if you prefer to read.

First: A Note on Why I Share This Type of Stuff

One might ask, “JB, why do you share so endlessly and enthusiastically about these kinds of ‘awakening’ subjects?”

“Why do you seem irresistibly drawn back into sharing about the simple freedom of the now-moment?”

I pondered on this today and I guess it’s just simply one of my very greatest passions, fascinations, and curiosities. I love exploring and celebrating the aliveness of now.

For me the subject is so omni-relevant and all-encompassing because it literally applies to every single moment of life, in every area of life.

To simply look directly and freshly at life…

To see it through a child’s eyes…

To find out what we may newly discover on this winding adventure…

This is perhaps the great and central animating impulse of my entire existence.

I simply love it! In my heart I’m some sort of poet, fool, child, hermit mystic.

It has been my experience that this whole exploration of ‘awakening’ is unbelievably fulfilling and nourishing.

It is not an exaggeration to say that it can reveal…

ever-present wholenessever-present alivenessever-present richnessever-present freedomever-present home

… and infuse all areas of life with far more lightness, flow, wonder, vibrancy, beauty, and poignancy.

That’s why I endlessly share about this stuff. It flows through me like a natural celebration of life.

For me awakening—contemplation, meditation, prayer, liberation—is the crown jewel of human life.

Everything from fatherhood and family life to vocation and wellness are greatly enriched by this ever-deepening discovery.

Discovery of what?

Openness! Spaciousness! Unity! Basking! Radiance! All-embracing-ness! Joy! Grace! Freedom! Poetry! The astounding miracle of existence!

In simple terms, awakening is the discovery of life. It is an ever-deepening opening to a living mystery beyond comprehension. It is simply life itself. Truly being life.

I hope today’s video gives you further inspiration in this respect. 💚

Video Transcript: How to Become No One & Go On Retreat Anytime

If you prefer to read instead of watch the video, here is a lightly edited transcript:

Peace and love from Italy.

What would it be like, my friends, to just become no one for a little while?

Just become no thing and no one for just a little while. Just a smidgen. Just a pinch of timeless time.

What if you just relinquished? What if you just dropped all identities, all identifications, all attachments?

You dropped the idea of your body and your name and the world of form. All your attachments. All the stories you tell yourself about what’s going on out there and what’s on the news. Your laundry list of grievances and complaints and to-dos and problems and challenges.

What if you just let all of that go?

Pop it like a bubble.

Drop it like it’s hot.

Let it blow away on the wind for even just a minute or two.

The crucial thing is that I’m not suggesting you actually burn down your life and end your relationships or anything like that. No, no.

Relationships are profound.

My dad always said family and friends are life’s greatest treasures, and he was speaking the truth.

These relationships shine like jewels in the tapestry of our lives.

So your life can stay exactly as it is.

And yet, if you can, find these moments to empty your cup, to become no one and no thing for even just a teensy little bit of time—just a teensy little bit of time.

You just go somewhere out in nature perhaps.

Nature can be very conducive to this.

You just go in nature.

You just sit still.

You just sit down.

You don’t do anything for a chunk of time.

You just go out in nature. You just sit still and you just look at the trees. You look at the rocks. You look at the dirt. You look at the sky, the clouds, the sun.

You listen to the sound of the birds, the sound of the wind.

And you let yourself start to feel like a hollow bone. Like the wind is just traveling through you. Like you’re kind of forgetting everything. You’re forgetting the world.

William Wordsworth said:

“Late and soon, getting and spending, we lay waste our powers. Little we see in nature that is ours. We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon.”

“The world is too much with us.”

That was from his poem The World Is Too Much With Us.

And that’s the thing: The ‘world’ is weighing too heavily upon us.

When we become overly embedded, overly attached, overly rigidly crystallized within the domain of formfulness, within the domain of our gorgeous, wondrous human lives that are very real in a profound sense—totally real and here and part of God’s immaculate creation, or nameless immaculate creation, however you want to language that—

When we’re too much with the formfulness and we’ve forgotten formlessness, then it can be unbelievably rejuvenating and replenishing and immensely restorative to simply be no one.

Become no one.

Become nothing.

No thing.

Become nothing and no thing.

Again, even for just five minutes.

Five hours.

Five days.

Depending on what kind of retreat you happen to be in need of on a soul-and-heart level at any given time.

You just find these pockets.

These pockets.

Even five seconds.

You find these pockets of timeless time to be no one, to be no-thing.

And oh, how rejuvenating it can be to even release the grips on your most cherished spiritual identities.

Where you’re no longer a Christian.

You’re no longer a Buddhist.

You even release the names of Buddha and Christ and Lao Tzu and God and Mary and the Mother and Father and consciousness and infinity and awareness and emptiness.

Whatever your most cherished spiritual identities, concepts, and signifiers happen to be, you let those go as well.

You just really let it all go.

And you just simply be.

You just simply exist.

You do nothing at all.

And not only do you do no thing, you be no thing and no one.

And we all have such a yearning for this on a deep level.

It’s been forgotten as an immensely rejuvenating soul technology.

You empty yourself.

You become no one and no thing.

And then you let that be filled by freshness.

By newness.

It’s a misconception that nothingness or the void is a total absence, like an empty abyss.

No.

You go to that space of emptiness, being no one and being no thing, so that you can receive a more subtle fullness.

So that the cup can then be filled with a subtlety and a richness that you were not able to apprehend in your prior clamping-down, your over-identified mode, your excessively crystallized and frozen formfulness.

You let that go.

You empty.

You become no one and no thing so that suddenly the fullness, the juiciness, the weightless, clear, invisible fire of love, of all-embracing, all-pervading love, can reveal itself.

So that pure spirit can reveal itself and breathe through you.

Pure spirit is a very subtle dynamism to apprehend.

It’s a continuous creative breath of life flowing through all things.

And we are not able to apprehend that fathomless freedom of pure spirit in our overly-fixated consensus-reality conditions and identities.

This approach is very much akin to apophatic theology in Christianity.

Many Christians are not aware of this deep and ancient monastic and mystical practice of apophatic contemplation.

It is essentially what I’m speaking to.

It is the emptying of your cup.

It is the relinquishment of all concepts of God and world and life and yourself.

It’s the letting go of everything you think you know so that God beyond all concepts of God can come in and meet you there.

Meet you there in that space of being the empty cup, the empty vessel, the hollow bone.

So that God can come in.

So that pure spirit can come in.

And you can be illumined, illuminated, enlightened in a sense by the true light—the true and subtle light that is all-pervading and always with us.

And it’s not a final event.

It’s not like:

“Poof. Now I’m enlightened. I’m now some kind of rarefied perfected Buddha to be put on a pedestal and worshipped.”

No, it’s not like that.

It’s an ever-deepening journey.

An ever-deepening journey where you discover these moments.

And really every moment of life is an ever-fresh revelation and deepening.

If we are truly paying attention to life, life can be this ongoing revelation.

But there can be moments where thresholds are crossed, where quantum leaps occur, where bountiful vistas of newness and freshness and spirit that had not been apprehended before suddenly come rushing in.

And there can be a whole fresh and new wave of understanding and knowing and seeing and feeling and directly being.

“I’m getting it now.”

“I’m feeling it.”

“I’m being it.”

“I am pure spirit.”

“This is pure spirit.”

“Pure spirit is with me.”

“Pure spirit is with us.”

“All is pervaded by pure spirit.”

“All is an emanation, a creation of pure spirit.”

“The signature of pure spirit abides within all things.”

All around us.

We are in spirit and spirit is in us.

That is the treasure that can be uncovered through emptying your cup.

Through apophatic theology, if you want to call it that.

Or apophatic contemplative practice.

You can call it whatever you like.

It’s essentially just finding those moments.

Finding those pockets of time.

Making space for retreat.

Realizing that retreat is not simply a luxury in life.

Not something only for wealthy people who can fly to Bali and go on some expensive retreat.

No shade on those people.

It’s gorgeous to go to Bali and go on retreat if that’s on your path.

But you don’t need to do that.

You can go on retreat in any moment of life by opening to now.

Emptying your cup.

Opening to spaciousness.

Opening to freshness.

It can be very helpful to design intentional containers for this.

Set aside even a half day or a full day.

Go to a local sauna.

Go to a local bathhouse.

Go to a local forest.

Go to a local church or temple.

And just exist.

Just be.

Turn off the devices.

Turn off your usual everyday consciousness—or see through it.

Ignore it for a few hours.

Let it go.

Be no one.

And make room for freshness.

Make room for the light.

Make room for revelation.

This is not optional.

This is not a luxury.

This is something that our human spirit and soul deeply, deeply needs.

A huge part of the reason why so many people are depressed and despairing and anxious is because we as a culture have become overly in the grips of a program of busyness and worldliness.

Busy, busy, busy.

Worldly, worldly, worldly.

More to do.

More to do.

More to do.

Christ Jesus said:

“My kingdom is not of this world.”

He was pointing us beyond the world as we ordinarily take it to be.

And yet that ordinary world is utterly pervaded by spirit and can be revealed as an unimaginable tapestry and artistry created and re-created continuously by pure spirit.

But we’re not able to see it that way when we’re totally identified with it and we’ve forgotten the other world of pure spirit.

Jesus was instructing us to rediscover the kingdom that abides as the vastness here and now.

The vastness that can come into the heart when we empty ourselves.

When we let all of our ordinary concepts and ideas go.

One of the biggest blockages is the sense that:

“I already know what the world is.”

“I already know what life is.”

“It’s this stubborn thing and I just have to do all this stuff and complain about it.”

Those attitudes deeply prevent an emptying of the cup and an opening to pure spirit.

So empty yourself.

Forget what you think you know.

At least temporarily.

Open to another world that is here and all around us, though it often appears invisible.

And discover that retreat is not optional.

It is essential.

I say this coming off a four-day retreat here in Italy called Gondor that I created and experienced with a group of beautiful brothers from six different countries.

We came here and remembered together the essential importance of retreat.

But again, you don’t have to travel anywhere.

You can create spaces of retreat in your day-to-day life.

Discover what it means to create a space to become no one.

Become no-thing.

Let it all go.

So that something new can come in.

This process can be confronting.

It can be destabilizing at times.

If it becomes too much, take a step back.

Go back into normal life.

Be a normal dude or dudette for a while.

Just chill.

Then give it another try when you’re feeling more grounded.

Or ask for support if that feels useful.

But the crux of the message is simple:

Retreat is always available.

Retreat is not optional.

Make space for retreat.

Make space for emptying your cup.

Becoming no one.

No-thing.

And discovering the immense rejuvenation available there.

The immense possibility of letting something new come in.

Something transformational.

Something alchemical.

A new set of eyes.

A new way of seeing everything that occurs in your life.

This is essential for discovering true freedom and true happiness and wholeness here and now.

The wisest and happiest people, whether consciously or unconsciously, make that space for themselves.

They find that space to go for long walks in nature.

To get really good rest.

Really good sleep.

To unplug.

To disconnect.

To sit.

And simply be.

So give that gift to yourself.

If this resonates, give yourself that gift.

Make that space.

And let’s enjoy life.

Let’s be love.

Radiate love.

Be the mighty sequoias rooted deep to the earth, branches to the heavens, centered in the heart.

Ending all wars within and without.

Setting the kids free.

Setting all beings free.

And bringing the kingdom to earth.

Bringing the love to earth.

What else is there to do, baby?

What else is there to do?

Spread the love.

Let’s go.

Peace.

Joy.

Grace to you.

One love.

Much love.

Familia.

Gracias.

Wholeness,Jordan

If you’re feeling the call to retreat, I’ll be attending and guest facilitating in England for Soulstice Retreat, starting in three days. Jacob Kishere and Matthew Green of The Resonant Man have brought together an epic group of men for this, and I sense it will be a healing, liberating, and empowering experience. Learn more and grab a ticket.

A few final photos of a recent woodland adventure <3

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe

“Life knows the way.”

“Home is now.”

“Love is the way, the truth, and the life.”

Hey Family,

Today’s video is another one I recorded in Italy a couple weeks ago during the Gondor retreat.

It is a reflection on love and on some of the deepest wisdom I have been fortunate to discover on my path of life.

I hope it gives you something.

Reminder that you can also watch and listen to many of my messages on Spotify and YouTube.

Here’s a lightly edited transcript if you prefer to read:

What is there to say?

Life knows the way.

Life is as it is.

Peace. Joy. Bliss. Simple kindness to all. Simple love for all. Faith. Grace. Thanksgiving. Charity. Service.

Simple principles that are pretty much all one really needs in life.

Jesus summed it up:

Love God with all your heart, mind, body, and soul.

Love your neighbor as yourself.

Love your enemies.

Love all.

Easy to summarize. Not so easy to live all the way through.

That’s why it’s an ongoing, ever-deepening journey—an ever-deepening invitation into love.

And what a gift.

It doesn’t have to be viewed as this laborious, never-ending drudge of trying to get somewhere that we’re never able to get to.

Because you can come from a place where increasingly you feel and know that you’re home now.

Home is now.

In your heart of hearts, you’re complete.

You’re whole.

You are enough as you are.

You are intrinsically worthy.

Just as if somebody looked at you as a newborn baby—or you saw yourself as a newborn baby—you would see the intrinsic wholeness and purity.

You would see the uncorruptible, ever-innocent heart of your own being.

Your childlike nature.

And that’s always here.

You can relax into and rest as that wholeness and discover the profound sense in which now is always the finish line.

This is it.

This is artistry.

This is profundity.

This is peace.

This is holiness.

This is the Holy Land.

Divinity, weightless and spaceless freedom, is all-pervading. Ever-present.

And simultaneously, we discover the necessity of humility.

For we are human.

We miss the mark all the time.

There is no end to the refinement, the cleansing, the purification, the sanctification.

I have never met a human being who embodied perfect loving wisdom at all times.

If you’ve met one, let me know.

So we remain humble about our humanity.

We remain open to the ongoing lessons that help us further integrate and embody the truth of love.

A love beyond description.

Beyond name and form.

An ever-fresh, ever-present, Tao-like wellspring of all-embracing love from the heart of hearts.

That is the truth we are invited to discover, embody, incarnate, and root into this earth.

Like mighty sequoias rooted to the earth, branches reaching toward the heavens, centered in the heart.

Ending all wars within and without.

Setting the children free.

Setting all beings free.

That’s the vision.

That’s the mission.

(At least over here.)

Nothing to do but be you.

Discover your own expression.

Discover your own North Star.

And I can tell you this:

Any North Star that is not aligned with the purest divine love—any North Star that is not some expression of the sacred—is likely to lead you astray in some way.

I offer that with humility.

That has simply been my experience.

If you want to discover truth, that’s what I would recommend.

If you want to move through this life with grace and joy, then as far as I can tell, that cannot be done outside of love.

Love is the center.

Love is the core.

Jesus said:

“I am the way, the truth, and the life.”

And Jesus was an incarnation of self-giving love.

His primary instruction was love.

So love is the way, the truth, and the life.

The mysteries of love go far deeper than we may have observed in ordinary life and consensus reality.

Love is the heart of divinity.

Love is a precious jewel of freedom.

Weightless openness.

All-embracing openness.

Here and now.

Align with love.

That would be my recommendation.

And love is not one half of a polarity.

True love transcends all polarities while simultaneously embracing them.

To truly end war within ourselves and within our world, we must learn to embrace both sides of all polarities in an unconditional love that transcends and pervades them all.

That has been my experience.

Take from it what resonates.

Carry on.

Keep rocking in the free world.

Nothing to do but be you.

Much love and peace, everybody.

Grace be with you.

Love,Jordan

Bonus Movie Recommendation

Hook is a movie I loved as a kid that may be my favorite movie of all time

Truly a heart-moving story of rediscovering child-like aliveness, joy, and freedom

And a father rediscovering his depth of love for his children

All within a brilliantly crafted world that extends the Peter Pan universe into new territories and possibilities

I recently re-watched it with Trevor West in Germany and also re-watched it last year in America with Cory Altenhofen

I love you, Robin Williams

Deeply recommended ❤️

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jordanbates.substack.com/subscribe