What makes an initiated man?
I have chosen to capitalize Male and Female when those words are used to denote physical sex/gender. I capitalize Masculine and Feminine do denote the archetypal energy of the masculine and the feminine flowing from the Collective Unconscious (or from the Cosmos, the quantum field, the Divinity, Consciousness or other universal (or multi-versal) ground of being. In a few places, I capitalize Man, Woman, Boy, Girl, Father, Mother to denote the respective archetype, usually, but not always, when referring to someone else’s writing. However, I emphasize that I believe all those terms are ambiguous and confusing. In my view, they denote social constructions that are different from culture to culture and evolve, within a culture, over time. This is in contrast to Archetypal Masculine and Archetypal Feminine that are culturally universal, unchanging, and eternal. I capitalize Initiation or Initiated to denote the ritual that transforms the immature Male into a maturing Male.
Introduction
By all the accounts that I have read, and simply as a matter of common observation, there are stages in a Male’s life. Each stage theoretically is marked by a liminal experience in sacred space. Each involves its own separation, wounding, education, bonding and healing. A Male’s lifespan may offer him many initiations.
Robert A. Johnson speaks of the initiation of the Boy, for whom the world is unitary and all about him. Johnson’s initiation here is a transition into a more mature person who understands and can live in the dualistic world – it’s both him and other. There is then a second initiation into authentic maturity when the Male transitions into enlightenment and experiences a “conscious reconciliation of the inner and outer in harmonious wholeness.” He, Understanding Masculine Psychology. Harper Perennial: New York, Revised Edition (1989) p. 6.
A.P. Elkin, in Aboriginal Men of High Degree. Melbourne AU: Inner Traditions International, 1977, extensively studied the medicine men, Men of High Degree, of Aboriginal groups throughout Australia. Without ever being admitted to or even given knowledge of the ritual initiatory processes these males endure – and they are physically extreme – Elkin observed that becoming a Man of High Degree was seen to be the achievement of a superior position of wisdom, capability, honor and respect.
Robert L. Moore, The Archetype of Initiation, Max J. Havlick, Jr. Ed. Chicago IL: Exlibris, 2001, seems to suggest that an initiation can occur at virtually any time, and several times, in a man’s life. Id., p. 78. These initiations occur when “attainments to a location in life periodically come to an end.” Id. These upheavals happen naturally and predictably through the life cycle, and also less predictably as the result of specific events.
So, the answer to the question, “What Makes an Initiated Man,” first needs context.
The context of the following response is the New Warrior Training Adventure (NWTA) as originally created by Ron Hering, Rich Tosi and Bill Kauth and as elaborated and enhanced (in my view) by David Kaar, David Lindgren, Cliff Barry, Bill Wick, myself and others. The verbiage around the NWTA had to do with “waking up to being a man,” “becoming a better man,” “warrior energy,” etc. In my experience as a Leader and Leader Trainer, while becoming “Warrior” was the designated quest, the process and language of the NWTA itself were focused primarily on the transition of the initiates from Boy to Man, from immaturity to maturity.
Also, this answer is about what I would call the second initiation. The first would be the passage from womb through the vagina or caesarian section into the time/space we call the “world.” Although the second initiation is ideally a ritual of, or just before, adolescence, men of ages 16 through early 80s have experienced the NWTA, most “surviving” with significant positive changes in their lives.
That is context. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I believe that there are two elements without which a Male cannot be said to have been initiated. All the other characteristics of the Initiated Male are, I think, aspects of the Archetypal Masculine.
Separation from the Feminine
“Your mommy can’t save you now.”
From the moment of conception until birth, the Male in the womb is surrounded by the Archetypal Feminine body, spirit, mind and energy. Moreover, during gestation and, barring special circumstances, for a period of time after birth, the Male is dependent upon the actual Female with her Archetypal Feminine energy for physical nutrition. After birth, again barring special circumstances, the Male infant lives and survives within the orbit of the Archetypal Feminine: he receives emotional sustenance and comfort, a sense of differentiated “identity” (“There is something that is not me!”), an initial sense of “self” (Kohut: mirroring and idealizing reflected in his mother’s eyes), a sense of security, and an initial sense of agency, all of which are dependent on the presence of the Archetypal Feminine as manifest in the Mother, whatever the Mother’s gender. In addition, the young Male and the Mother develop a relationship in which he learns, among other things what behaviors elicit from Mother satisfying responses, disapproval, rejection, abandonment, punishment and physical or emotional pain.
I theorize that during gestation, a bond forms between the Archetypal Feminine and the fetus at a subatomic level. This is the result of, among other things, the quantum entanglement of subatomic particles formed during fetal growth. This bond connects the fetus, perhaps eternally, to the Archetypal Feminine at the very deepest level of their co-existence, whether that be called the Collective Unconscious, the spiritual, the subatomic, the energetic, the quantum field, or any or all of these.
This bond and the dependence of the infant/young Male on the Archetypal Feminine result in an unconscious yearning in the Male for all the comfort, nutrition, nourishment, and senses of identity, self, security and agency that are manifest in, and that he derives from, in the real Mother.
So, “ripping [the young Male] from his mother’s orbit” means much more than simple physical, emotional and social separation. Rather, it means severing the profound bond with the Archetypal Feminine and traumatically terminating the infantile dependency on the Archetypal Feminine. It means tearing a hole in the young Male’s being, dramatically and fearsomely changing his relationships not only with the Archetypal Feminine but also with the world and with himself. It means reshaping his entire gestalt, his comprehensive understanding of the world, from the Feminine to the Masculine.
This is the Essential Wound that must be inflicted as part of the initiatory process. Without this separation from the Feminine, the Masculine always will be yearning unconsciously (sometimes consciously) for everything positive manifest in the Mother and responding unconsciously (sometimes consciously) to everything negative manifest in the Mother. The failure of this separation, the lingering unconscious bond with and dependency on the Feminine, will affect the efficacy of every other aspect of the initiatory process, and, indeed, every aspect of the Male’s life.
It is correspondingly essential that the initiatory process include some healing of the Essential Wound. Some tribal initiations inflicted physical wounds, required death-defying physical tests, and forced the young Males to surpass their own physical limitations. I surmise that, whether consciously or not, tribal societies considered these experiences to be metaphors for the Essential Wound. In surviving the physical wounds, passing the tests and succeeding beyond their own beliefs, the Males also came to understand, consciously or not, that they had done so without the presence or help of the Feminine. As a result, they developed important emotional and cognitive tools for healing the Essential Wound and grieving the loss of the Mother.
Other elements of the initiatory process were also healing. Connection to Archetypal Masculine energy, especially its fierce, angry and aggressive aspects helped supplant the yearning for the Feminine. Learning the “ways of men” gave the Males social and physical skills with which they could make their ways in the world without depending on the Feminine. Bonding with their cohort and with initiating elders provided a post-initiatory network of emotional and other support that was Masculine and not Feminine. And, to the extent that the initiatory process included the spiritual world, the Male learned that he had a place as a Male, not with Mother, but in the tribe, and that the tribe had a place in the Cosmos.
A Note About Narcissistic Wounds:
The Essential Wound is quite different from the narcissistic wounds often suffered by children.
Ideally, through mirroring, idealizing and twinship (Kohut) received as part of unconditional love from parents or parental objects, a Male child develops a healthy (if not unconditional) self-love and acceptance of himself.
Conditional love, abuse, abandonment, false over-praise, undermine or even cripple a Male child’s self-love and acceptance. The result can be narcissistic wounding which leads to a sense of worthlessness, an absence of confidence, a weakness of identity – all of which may be consciously manifest or part of the subconscious. If conscious, the Male may experience depression. Often a narcissistic wound in the subconscious will lead to narcissistic grandiosity. Max McDowell, Narcissistic Injury and Healing: https://jungny.com/narcissistic-injury-and-healing/, accessed 18 Aug 2021.
To the extent that the Male Child experiences a narcissistic wound, initiation may well be an antidote, providing the appreciation and blessing of Elders as well as the test, success, challenge, survival and teaching on which self-love and acceptance can be built as the Male is mentored and grows into maturity.
Connection with the Archetypal Masculine and Archetypal Feminine
An “Initiated Man” is connected with Archetypal Masculine energy. Archetypal Masculine Energy resides in the Collective Unconscious. It is transpersonal, universal, and eternal. I believe all the characteristics of an “Initiated Man” listed below are expressions and manifestations of Archetypal Masculine energy.
It is important to remember that the Archetypal Masculine and the Archetypal Feminine reside in some measure in every human being. It is a primary characteristic of the Archetypal Masculine that it can, in its maturation, re-connect and be appropriately in balance with the Archetypal Feminine, also called the contra-sexual or, in the Male, Anima.
At the moment, I don’t know what “appropriately in balance” means outside the realm of the straight, white, cis-gendered, binary and European/American. I also don’t know how, if at all, gender fluidity fits in this model. I am open to instruction. What I think I observe is that in the past 50 years, connection with the energy of the Archetypal Masculine has decreased in Males and increased in Females.
I believe with Robert Moore’s observation, generalized from his experience with men seeking his help as a therapist. They had been, and continued to be, overwhelmed by the [F]eminine. What they were missing was an adequate connect to the deep and instinctual [M]asculine energies, the potentials of mature masculinity. They were being blocked from connection to these potentials by patriarchy [i.e., the pervasive manifestation of Boy psychology] itself, and by the feminist critique upon what little [M]asculinity they could still hold onto for themselves. And they were being blocked by the lack in their lives of any meaningful and transformative initiatory process by which they could have achieved a sense of manhood.
Robert L. Moore, Douglas Gillette, King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine. New York: Harper Collins, 1990, p. 6.
In my view, little has changed in the past two decades.
Aspects of the Archetypal Masculine that Characterize the “Initiated Man”
I have noted in parentheses the specific archetypes (ala Moore) that I believe are in play in each of these characteristics of the Initiated Man.
Self-Dependence, Initiative, Steadfastness (Warrior, Magician, King)
The Initiated Man looks first to himself and his own resources for his survival and success in the world. (This does not mean he is isolated. He knows when to be part of a team and when to ask for help.)
When he sees something that needs doing, he does it, or expends the effort to do it within the bounds of what is possible. He does what is necessary, even if that requires him to surpass his own self-prescribed limits. Initiated Man is enlisted, as a soldier, to be active, energetic and strong on his journey.
The Initiated Man needs no guarantee of success to undertake what he judges to be a task that is meant for him to do. He has courage, based in his Integrity and Authenticity, to take on challenges that may seem very risky and dangerous. These challenges may be physical, cognitive or emotional. Many involve self-examination. A New Warrior graduate once said to me “If you’ve taken a good, hard look at yourself, what’s left to be afraid of?”
Rich Tosi said, “It’s life-giving when it’s hard.” He was referring, I believe, both to the phallus and to the Warrior archetype in the Male. Steadfastness or perseverance – the ability and capacity to hold the line, to stand fast and to endure – is at once a critical part of the Archetypal Masculine and perhaps the most challenging, especially in the face of the demands of a culture that often demonizes the Masculine. At the same time, it is this very quality that provides the reliable and dependable protection that makes the partner, family, community, etc. feel safe. Behind the protection and safety, the tribe can live, procreate and thrive.
Steadfastness can be compromised when the Feminine culture or a Woman stand opposed. It is often taken as bullying and even predation, especially when the Male is actually afraid or regressed to wanting “mommy” and compensates by pounding his chest, raising his voice, and being stubborn and aggressive in defense of his position. When this happens, it takes Magician and King to manage the Warrior.
Access to a Full Range of Emotions (Lover, Warrior, Magician)
The Initiated Man is attuned to his body. He knows when his gut, his solar plexus, the site of more neurons than are in the brain, is triggered by his thoughts or by some external event. He can feel physically the responses of his body to stimuli, external or internal. He can identify by name the feelings that arise in his gut as well as anywhere else in his body, from rage to deep compassion, from terror to great joy, from shame to confidence, etc.
He can respond spontaneously with behavior appropriate to the circumstances. His access and ability to identify his emotions provide him with the opportunity to manage his behavioral response. In most circumstances, he can contain his feelings while he determines an appropriate response.
Importantly, he has the capacity to find the source of his body’s emotional activity. He knows to ask, “Where does this feeling come from? Why am I feeling like this?” And he knows to look within his own self for the answers: childhood experience, physical or prior emotional trauma, unresolved relationships, etc.
Ideally, as he matures, the Initiated Man comes to know himself well enough to be moved to address the deep sources of his emotional response set.
This is particularly important with the respect to the Essential Wound. If he is not healing the separation from the Feminine, he will likely be seeking a relationship with Mother, making any partner into Mother, throughout his life.
Authenticity and Ownership of Shadow (Warrior, Lover, Magician)
Another aspect of his relationship to his body in the Initiated Man’s authenticity. He has access to the truth about himself. “Truth” is not absolute and comes in many shades, from the deepest secrets of one’s soul to the superficial awareness that there is a “Self” somewhere in the suit of skin he wears.
The more he knows about himself, the more he can judge and choose how and with whom he wishes to share. It is said that a person has three selves. One is that which they share with the world. The second is that which they share with the most intimate others. The third is that which they share only with themselves. The point is that the Initiated Man is on a journey seeming to know what makes him who he is. This is a journey that takes courage, self-reliance and the man he discovers is the man he is meant to be.
This journey takes the Initiated Man into an exploration of his Shadow (Jung) – the parts of him that he has hidden, repressed and denied not only to others but to himself as well. As he matures, ideally the Initiated Man is more and more willing to accept that he has a dark side, that his feelings and his behavior are often motivated not by current events but by past experiences, especially by trauma. His exploration of his Shadow gives him facility in managing the feelings and behavior that often have been obstructive and destructive to himself and others. And knowing this part of himself intimately makes him a true mensch.
For some Males, it is hard to accept the dark side. For some, it is just as hard to see their “gold.”
Integrity (King, Warrior, Magician, Lover)
The Initiated Man walks his talk. He doesn’t say “Yes” and do “No.” In a sense, integrity is authenticity in action. He can be relied upon to be who he expects himself to be.
Integrity is also about being a whole man. Whole in the sense of healed (or healing) as well as in the sense of being complete, that is, having access to every realm of his being (physical, emotional, cognitive, spiritual and soul), and bringing all those realms to bear in his life.
Accountability (Warrior, King, Magician, Lover)
The Initiated Man takes responsibility for his behavior and his words as well as for the consequences, intended and unintended, of his behavior and his words on the world, including others. If he makes a mistake or has done something wrong, ideally, he does not wait to be found out. He steps up, takes ownership of the situation, and takes initiative to right the wrong he has done. At the same time, he examines the truth of why he behaved the way he did. Sometimes, but not always, sharing that truth facilitates healing.
It needs to be said that there is a paradox to be managed. For example, a man deeply but unintentionally hurts another’s feelings. On the one hand, the initiated man is responsible for owning his behavior and remediating the harm. On the other hand, the other’s feelings are their responsibility to manage. One cannot make another “feel better.” Interestingly, the Jewish tradition provides a possible solution. “T’shuva” is the Hebrew word for “return,” as in “return from transgression,” or “atonement.” A more contemporary translation is “return to at-one-ment,” connoting the repair, the return to the “one-ness” or integrity with the Divine.
- Ceasing. Immediately stop the harmful action.
- Regret. Realize the extent of the damage and authentically feel regret.
- Confession and pray for forgiveness. Own the mistake, speak that ownership and ask for forgiveness, either from the Divinity or from the wronged party. Ask what the injured party requires for restitution. Restitution. Right the wrong through compensation, in kind or otherwise.
- Resolution. When the opportunity arises, demonstrate remorse by choosing not to repeat the harmful behavior.
The Initiated Man also takes responsibility for his thoughts, examining his internal, unspoken judgments, desires, prejudices, jokes, etc. In Western culture, sexuality is glorified while objectification is abhorred. Even for some Initiated men it is culturally normal and often reflexive to have sexual feelings or thoughts about an attractive woman or man person he doesn’t know. To act out that feeling or fantasy is predatory. However, it is not the reflexive first thought that is important. It is the authenticity and integrity with which he owns the fantasy, the recognition of the possible harmful consequences of acting out, and the way he chooses to behave.
Boundary Keeping (Warrior, Magician)
The Initiated Man knows what feelings, thoughts, and behavior are authentically his – those for which he is accountable. He also has the capacity to discern what feelings, thoughts and behavior are not his responsibility. He has and maintains good boundaries. He is not codependent. His significant other might be furious at him and he can listen patiently, knowing that the rage has nothing at all to do with him, even if it was his behavior that triggered the tantrum. His good boundaries give him freedom to choose whether and how to respond.
Boundary Keeping is an essential part of authenticity, accountability and integrity.
Stewardship (King, Warrior, Lover)
The Initiated Man does not tolerate the abuse of children or of the Feminine. He does not tolerate the way the pharmaceutical industry and the drug business prey on the bodies and souls of people for a profit. He does not tolerate the corporate greed that despoils the Earth, enslaves the young, and impoverishes billions. He does not tolerate the stupidity entrenched in our educational systems that believe that a passing grade and admission to college are signs of success. He does not tolerate the bean counters who trade the lives of sentient beings for money saved in manufacturing unsafe products. He does not tolerate the fraud, deception and lies that sell unneeded and poorly make products to billions of gullible people.
In short, the Initiated Man is a steward of the well-being, health and wellness, safety, and sustainability of the life on Planet Earth.
Stewardship of his own life, the lives of his family and friends, the life of his community, the life of his nation, the life of the planet, and, ultimately, whatever the live of the Cosmos may be – the Initiated Man embodies the caring for and tending to all of it.
There are as many ways of manifesting stewardship as there are Initiated Men. I think it is this characteristic of the Initiated Man for which the Cosmos has been yearning, perhaps for centuries. Every news story cries out, “Where are the Initiated Men?”
Generativity (King, Warrior, Magician, Lover)
An integrated and authentic man has access to deep wells of creativity and productivity in his soul. I believe he also has access to the deeper wells of the life force, prana or chi, that sustain all being. When he allows that force to inhabit his body fully, I believe he manifests and models inspiration and leadership.
This characteristic of the Initiated Man is embodied in the archetype of the Sovereign, one of the four principal archetypes that comprise Archetypal Masculinity. Two of the functions of Sovereign energy are ordering and the providing of fertility and blessing. Implicit in ordering is a connection with the divine which mandates how things should be. Imbued with the channeled sense of “right order,” the Initiated Man can both generate a sense of stability his relationships, family, community, etc. and also create real stability in business, community and, if you will, the Cosmos.
In providing fertility, the Initiated Man is a source not only of offspring, but also of ideas, initiatives, and visions for those he leads and supports, whether family, community or nation.
Sustainable Relatedness (Warrior, Lover)
With the progressive healing of the Essential Wound, the Initiated Man is able to receive more and more support for his own Masculine energy and initiative from the world of the Masculine. His relationships with his cohort – whether from school, camp, college, work, religious or spiritual affiliation – can be forged deeply through authenticity, integrity and accountability. They can survive competition, long distances of space and time, absence of contact, and even betrayal. Often these relationships last a lifetime.
Ideally, when the Masculine has matured sufficiently – figuratively, when the man is standing on his own mountain – he is ready to reconnect with the Archetypal Feminine. He has a sense of who he is, and perhaps even why he is here on the planet. He is authentic. He has integrity. He is accountable. Without compromising his Self or soul, he can welcome the Feminine into his heart, mind and body. This reconnection, now manageable by the Masculine, can be the source of great generativity and enhanced creativity. Without fear of being taken over by the Mother, he can relate to actual women in interdependent relationships. This is the relatedness that the Feminine truly wants.
Mission/Purpose/Calling (King, Warrior, Magician, Lover)
Some time, in early or middle adulthood, an Initiated Man discovers that he has a purpose, a calling, a misson, in his life. This mission is transpersonal; it goes beyond anything in the man’s immediate personal round of existence. It is focused on serving the Cosmos, doing something that flows from and serves the cosmos’s benevolence. It is not something that can be accomplished during the man’s life. But it both guides an Initiated Man’s daily behavior and sets a direction, a course, for his life. It’s conception and performance are supported by a sense of “rightness” – a feeling perhaps of warmth or tingling or bubbling or energy somewhere in his body, perhaps chest, abdomen, or head.
Mission provides direction for the Initiated Man’s decisions, often a choice of career, and perhaps a set of ethical values.
Sometimes an Initiated Man will search for a mission, for example, during a vision quest or similar experience. Sometimes a mission will coalesce and inhabit an Initiated Man’s body unexpectedly. Regardless how he recognizes it, the mission will choose the man. When it does, and the Initiated Man accepts the choice, he will feel as though he’s received a simple gift and is on the path to where he is supposed to be.
How Do an Initiated Man and Mission Come Together?
A Detour into Cosmic Connection and Consciousness (King, Lover)
I believe that what I have called “mission” comes to a Initiated Man from the quantum field, the connected everything and particularly from Universal Consciousness.
The integrated and authentic man’s connectedness to prana/chi implies an even deeper – subatomic or quantum – connection with the energy that is the substance of all existence. While knowledge of the potential for connection comes from the Magician, and the fierce courage it takes to take the leap over skepticism comes from the Warrior, the recognition of this vast, inclusive kingdom resonates with the King as the yearning and passion to “become one with everything” radiates from the Lover.
Amit Goswami, among others, proposes that consciousness is the “ground of all being.” This proposition derives from quantum mechanics.
The quantum mechanical view is that the smallest bits of the universe are neither particle nor wave until they are actually observed, either by a device or by a human. Upon observation, these bits become particles in a specific location. Before observation, the bits are actually waves of probability. Goswami and others propose that it is actually consciousness, specifically an immanent, all-inclusive, all-encompassing Universal Consciousness manifested and embodied in human beings (indeed in the universe as a whole), that causes the probability wave to collapse into a specific particle.
This particle can be “entangled” with a twin particle. As a result of entanglement, what happens to one of the twins instantaneously affects the other twin, no matter how far apart they may be. Einstein called this “spooky action at a distance” and based his resistance to quantum theory in part on the fact that quantum entanglement defied the fundamental rule of relativity that nothing could travel faster than the speed of light. Einstein’s Quantum Riddle, https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MJK3GMV?autoplay=1& ref=dvm_us_api_cs_hud_pa_GWRD- singleCW&pf_rd_p=1153c4ce0143-4e64-b70a- ec14b742a85a&pf_rd_r=20FKG8FE01SFS38KDF4A.
The phenomenon of quantum entanglement leads to the possibility that entangled wave/particles of thought or feeling or consciousness might be present in more than one human at the same time. If this is so, then shared consciousness between human beings can easily be seen as a result. Moreover, it is entirely possible that the proliferation of entangled wave/particles throughout the universe may explain not only the “Butterfly Effect,” but also Universal Consciousness. Amit Goswami, The Self-Aware Universe. New York: Tarcher Penguin, 1993. See also, The Tao of Quantum Physics, https://smile.amazon.com/Tao-Quantum-Physics- iKEALLEN/dp/B00KFLAK5Y/ref=sr_1_3? dchild=1&keywords=tao+of+quantum+physics&qid=1609816587&sr=8-3. T
Religion attributes this Consciousness to a Supreme Being. Post-material and quantum scientists make a provable case that the universe itself is conscious. Achieving “higher consciousness” – as from the 1960s and 1970s – connects human beings with Universal Consciousness and allows humans access to information through intuition, insight, non-local viewing, mystic rituals and other channels not yet deemed reliable or “real” by materialist science. Post- or non-material science, largely based on quantum mechanics and statistically validated experiments, accepts the likelihood that Universal Consciousness is a real phenomenon.
For example, four practitioners of deep meditation raised the pH of a glass of water by one level only by meditating. Similarly, focused meditation increased, by a statistically significant amount the thermodynamic activity of alkaline phosphatase (ALP), a human liver enzyme. Again, meditation significantly increased the ATP to ADP ratio in developing fruit fly larva so that they would be more fit and therefore have a shorter larval development time. Conscious Acts of Creation, The Emergence of a New Physics, https://smile.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B00WJ3I7ME/ref=atv_wl_hom_c _unkc_1_18.
Another example: Meditation and visualization exercises have been found to influence the function of a random event generator. https://journalofscientificexploration.org/index.php/jse/article/view/1891 .
Masaru Emoto, The Hidden Messages in Water. Hillsboro OR: Beyond Words Publishing, Inc., 2001, reports that “resonance,” vibrations from music, words and even thought, profoundly affects formation of ice crystals. Classical music, kind words and loving thoughts formed brilliant, complex and colorful snowflake-patterned crystals. Heavy metal rock music, harsh words and cruel thoughts, on the other hand, created formed incomplete, asymmetrical patters with dull colors.
Finally, Larry Dossey poses that there is “one mind” of which the human mind is a part. One Mind: How Our Individual Mind is Part of a Greater Consciousness and Why It Matters. Carlsbad CA: Hay House, 2013. Print. Following the same path, Gary Schwartz, in Super Synchronicity. Vancouver: Param Media, 2017, sets forth a compelling case that billions of those events human beings call “coincidences” are “‘cosmic Supersynchronicities’ that potentially interconnect and semi-orchestrate billions of beings, including people, animals, and even ‘spirits.’”
While all the above may push the envelope of one’s skepticism, I suggest that the fact and the rules of quantum mechanics provide a credible scientific basis to believe there is a Universal Consciousness – or something like it – that provides human beings with information, perhaps provides guidance of some sort – hence an Initiated Man’s mission – and does, in fact, form the “ground of all being.”