A trance or altered state of consciousness is useful for gaining perspective that is different from one’s everyday point of view, and for breaking free from conventional ways of thinking about reality. The goal of entering trance is not to remove ourselves from what is normally considered reality, but instead to become more fully aware within the present moment of subtle clues, peripheral awareness and the multifaceted spiritual presence of unseen helpers, guides, teachers, ancestors, nature spirits, and other beings with relevant input for the soul’s journey.
For visionary contrarians, the ability to move in and out of altered states of consciousness is a profound resource, and potentially a portal to insight and creativity that can change the world. When aligned with a deep sense of personal integrity, compassion, and the wisdom borne of hard soul lessons taken to heart, trance induction can lead a visionary contrarian to discover important clues and points of entry into both personal and collective quantum leaps in consciousness.
Throughout history, trances have been induced in a bewildering variety of ways including the use of psychotropic plant medicines, meditation, hypnotherapy, aquatic bodywork, immersion in flotation chambers, sensory deprivation, vision fasting, ritual and ceremony, shamanic journeys, dreams, hypnogogic reverie, ecstatic dance, and spontaneously arising mystical experiences – to name a few.
The intentional induction of trance states will be a routine part of Yggdrasil’s curriculum, integrated as a matter of course into many aspects of our workshops, training programs, and immersion experiences – used for purposes of healing, invocation of vision and/or deep insight, communion with diverse intelligences that dwell in parallel dimensions, and entry into the mythopoetic realm. Altered states may also help to enhance the creative process – which will be encouraged at Yggdrasil to give expression to the movement of the contrarian soul guided by vision.
