Blog Author.

I lived in Pretoria, South Africa until 2024. I was born in Harbeesfontein, a small town in the middle of nowhere. I entered this life in a state of oblivion where there was no time, space, focus or movement. I call this state the ‘Beyond’. We are in it whether we are alive or dead, awake or asleep. As I grew into this world, I developed a sense of time and space through focus and movement. My consciousness grew and I began to discriminate between two selves: the self that lives in 'this reality' and the self that lives in the fantasy world of make belief, magic and excitement. It was te beginning of my life long exploration of the the worlds we live in as human beings.

As we grow into this world, we are forced to forget the Beyond and adapt to time and space, the ways of this world and become Conscious. My transition was quite traumatic as you will see in the following story.

When I went to school the first day I obviously intended to take my bear with me. My father forbade it and I was very sad. I cried the whole day. That night, falling asleep in a loving embrace with my little bear, he whispered in my ear that he would tell me his plan in the morning. The morning woke us bright and shiny and my bear told me to hide him in my suitcase. At school I could not wait for the break to go out on the playfield and show him off to the other children.

The other children were not impressed and I could feel that they actually did not see who my bear really was. Two guys grabbed my bear and tossed it between them. I got hold of it and they grabbed it by the head and all of a sudden my little bears head broke off. I burst out crying. It was as if my world ended. The boy threw the head on the red soil and just before I could pick it up, the other boy kicked it through the air. It landed and rolled several times before I could grab it. It was at that moment that my real world disappeared and I was left standing, heart broken, in an illusionary world that everybody called reality.

The magic was replaced with mystery. Rhythms were replaced with time. That was the first time I experienced how it is to be god-forsaken, to be raptured out of the Beyond with its dreams and cast into a nightmare called conscious life. I smuggled the decapitated bear back home and hid it in a trunk for 50 years.

The fact that my parents locked us out of the house forced us to be creative and entertain ourselves. We held a circus charging half a cent for entrance. The excitement was tangible when the audience all sat down on blankets. The circus started. Everyone clapped as I walked up to the swing. I was a fat little round ball. I grabbed a stick that we tied to a rope that was tied to the top of the very high swing. My youngest brother started to wind me up and my middle brother, with his convincing auctioneer's voice, assured the audience that they have never seen anything like this before. When my nose was an inch away from the top bar of the swing, my brother let go of me and I started to unwind like a swirling dervish, eyes rolling ominously and the audience just stared at this banality. No one clapped and no one ever returned to the circus. We made a total of seventeen and a half cents. One day I decided to surprise my two brothers. I took our seventeen and a half cents and went to the gate at the road. We were prohibited from leaving the property. I waited at the road for someone to pass. Eventually an old lady arrived and I asked her to buy us sweets. That was 09:00 in the morning. At 1700, when my parents returned from work, I was still sitting at the road waiting. By then I have realized that something devastating had happened and I knew my brothers would not be impressed with me. That night I told everybody at the dinner table what I had done. I was in tears. Everybody was quiet. My father picked me up and put me on his lap and I cried into his heart. This was my painful encounter with the state of honesty in this consciousness. Nobody can be trusted, people pretend and play roles and are not who they say they are. Throughout the army, university, death of my father, getting married, divorcing, starting my candle business and later my theatre restaurant, I was constantly aware of the discrepancies between this reality and the Beyond.

After 15 years of studies and a few degrees, I realized that one will never understand the Beyond with the intellect as intellectual logic is too limited to explain the magic and nuances of the Beyond. For my Masters in Philosophy I worked on Heidegger and Jung and tried to find out what their thoughts were about the Beyond. Heidegger's ‘Sein’, Being, was the essence that we will never be able to grasp although we all know' it. Jung's collective archetypes were the ‘unknown’ forms that we fill with new content in every generation or culture. Forms, like the mother archetype, are known by everybody although every culture has its own unique mother that differs completely from others. This did not bring me nearer to an understanding of the Beyond, but indicated a fact that was very important: There is a ‘knowing' in us that is not intellectual and that we cannot explain in logical terms, and it is present in every human being.

During the years as a student I lived a very religious life although I was more attracted to philosophy. The early philosophers discussed the Beyond and it fascinated me so much that I studied Hellenistic Greek for three years, as I wanted to get to the depths of the original meanings. I was part of a group that translated the Medea, some Apocryphal books as well as parts from the New Testament. I was astounded by what an amazing book the Bible actually is. It describes how to live the Beyond. But I was equally appalled by the translations and misinterpretations of certain words and phrases. I realized that the Bible was forged to fit into human consciousness. In translations God were ‘humanized’, given human emotions and thoughts. The fact that the Bible is actually a book about the Beyond, was ignored. God was translated out of the Bible. It was replaced with a human, man-made god. The Beyond was translated into the afterlife. I left religion and started to delve into spiritual literature. I read many books on the New Age movement, spiritual approaches and even became a Reiki Master. I attended many workshops and conferences. But throughout, I focused on what they said about the Beyond. Again, like with religions, there was the same notion that how you live in this life determines your outcome in the after-life. Eat this, drink that, behave according to these rules, etc. and you are assured of a safe passage into heaven or nirvana. Or if you do not conform, the afterlife is eternal damnation or hell. I realized that I will have to translate the bible to find out what it really says about the Beyond.

Up until now I discovered that the Beyond is without time and space, it is a state of being which we all ‘know' but nobody can put it into words as it lies beyond consciousness and logic. The Beyond is not the afterlife, although it includes it as a state where there is no consciousness and it is not the man made god of the church. This was followed by a 10 year stagnant period where I realized that not with our intellect, nor with our spiritual views (which are actually only sugar-coated intellectual views) will we discover the nature of the Beyond. Perhaps it is hidden in everyday life.

For 10 years I did not read a book, did not write, did not think about understanding this reality, but lived it. Every day was a living in the moment, be present in the now, or, as they call it these days living mindfully. I actually discovered that living mindfully made me more conscious, obsessive about my own ego, and the more I tried to live mindfully, the less I had that knowing without knowing consciously.

One night I went to a spiritualist church where someone spoke about Ayahuasca and the journeys it takes you on. I booked my first journey on 27 April 2014. On that night I had the first glimpse through the door that sent me on a path that brought me to the discovery of the Beyond. For the first time in 45 years I was beyond consciousness in a world that had no time and space, a world that you recognize but do not remember. Through plants I discovered that consciousness, intellect and ego, living in the now were the main obstacles to living in the know. I then realized that we are always in the Beyond, in the ‘knowing’ in this life and the afterlife, in this illusion that we call reality, whether we are alive or dead, and when we are asleep or awake. In another section you can read more about how plants helped me to discover the Beyond.

I must mention that there are many books that helped me to the Beyond. You can read in one of the other sections about my book bridges. The most important thing is that all these things moved me into the state of being that I had with my yellow bear 50 years ago.

In 2015 I found a lady who could fix my bear. Two days later I fetched it from her home. I could immediately see the disapproval on his face when she handed him to me. I drove home with my bear sitting in the passenger seat with his seat belt. Slowly but surely I picked up his vibes. I knew that he saw that I have discovered the things that he told me about 50 years ago. And we both smiled.

My wish is that we are buried together.

I grew up with my two brothers on a smallholding and we had lots of time to ourselves to play in a world where time and place, physical obstructions and laws did not put a damper on our fantasies. In fact it was so hectic that my parents locked us outside the house when they went to work because we break and eat everything. On my fifth birthday my parents gave me a yellow bear. This bear became my best friend. We had long conversations and shared many secrets about animals and people, mysteries and magic. Sometimes, when he asked me to close my eyes and follow him, we would fly over the fields. I did not tell anybody about our adventures because I knew that they would not understand it. I already sensed the people had no magic, no fantasies but were locked into this consciousness with its limitations and realities. In contrast, my bear was a bundle of magic, was my advisor, confidant and I could even detect approval or disapproval on his face.

I