spider mind

I used to be an arachnophobe. Spiders scared the hell out of me. All those legs, so foreign, so other. Then, a couple of years ago, while exploring the entheogen known as mescaline, I had a very interesting experience.

Ant and I were in our room, we had spent the day boiling copious amounts of San Pedro cactus in a large pot, and straining out all the lumpy bits, until all we had left was a thick, greenish brown, extremely foul tasting liquid. (I can quite honestly say that I have no intention of doing mescaline again as direct result of how absolutely awful it tastes...)

Anyway, we managed to drink the required cupful, and we were lounging in the main bedroom, safe space extraodonaire, enjoying the subtle feelings of mescalito as it began to course through our systems. We jammed a bit on the guitars, making music that sounded like heaven, the harmonies and riffs filling the air as naturally as our breath filled our lungs. The trip was very peaceful, and rather uneventful, until the point that Ant discovered a perfectly formed spider skin lying on our bed. It was the skin of the African Rain Spider, a large, non poisonous variety that moves indoors when the weather is wet. We had never seen such a perfectly shed exoskeleton before. The spider had managed to shed it in one go, and had done it almost as a gift, leaving it lying at the end of our bed. Rather unusual, considering that it must have happened during the course of the evening, while we came on to the trip.

It gave me the willies, but I was on the far side of the bed, and I felt the distance provided a sufficient buffer. But then Ant picked it up. He didn't know about my (rather silly) arachnophobia. He picked it up in order for me to get a better look, and I shrieked as the distance between me and the spider relic was all of a sudden reduced to a mere couple of centimetres. As he bought it into my personal space, I yelled even louder. But before I had the chance to get away, an extraodinary thing happened. I felt millions of little spiders, running up my legs, then up my torso, and down my arms. As they reached my hands, I had the strangest sensation of actually being a spider. Each hand was a spider. Each finger was a leg, and my hands curled as I merged completely. It felt like the soul of spider, the great archtype, the weaver, was inside me, and I was part of it. Patient spider, waiting quietly in the corner as the hours pass. Scuttling spider, weaver of webs and maker of silky strands. Spider as functioning consciousness.

Within seconds the whole experience was over. I was myself again. But I was no longer afraid. Spider was no longer other. Spider was now part of my intimate experience of being alive on this planet. Spider mind was one that I had managed to briefly touch, spider consciousness had been my consciouness for a fleeting moment.

I was in awe. I was wholy shaken. And I have never looked at spiders the same again. Since then I have done some research into the archtype of the weaver. In many African cultures spider is one of the gods, Ananzi, the mischevious weaver of illusions. Spider mind is a mind that can run 8 streams at the same time. Eight legs moving with conscious direction to forward spiders intentions. I have learned a lot from my brief period of oneness with spider mind. And it no longer scares me.

(The picture that I drew a few days later is the closest I can get to decribing the actual experience. Words fail terribly when discussing altered states of consciousness...)