LIFE: THE PRICE OF ADMISSION
You will emerge - bloody, broken, bruised, but alive.
They will tell you you're on a planet called Earth.
They will give you a name.
Somebody else's name.
They will teach you what they think is true.
You will speak a particular language, not of your choosing.
You will be taught your family's beliefs, values, codes of conduct.
(Don't take these as absolute truth, it's just their versio
n of truth.) They will praise you or blame you. Support you or not.
The will give you gifts or take gifts away.
They will call you wrong, bad, selfish, evil.
They will call you the best, wonderful, a genius, their saviour.
Don't buy into their names, their judgements, good or bad.
You are alive. You cannot be contained or controlled or defined by words.
You will love and lose love. Your heart will break, often.
You will touch great ecstasy, the depths of melancholy.
Those you love will die and get sick. You will question your reality.
You will sometimes feel that you cannot go on. You will go on.
You will wonder about your purpose. Find a purpose, lose it.
Inhabit a role, shed it. Trust someone, and the trust will be broken.
Or will remain unbroken. Or you will fall to your knees.
And stand. And fall. And stand again. And keep
going.
You will taste all of life, the dark and the light.
Thunder and lightning will surge through you, the joy and the sorrow, the boredom and the bliss, the certainty and the doubt,
powerful urges and longings, the behemoths in their invisible deserts, the leviathans of the abyss.
You will touch others, and be touched in return.
You will dance and sing and crumble in despair sometimes.
You will weep and laugh and tremble and fall into the Mystery.
And in the end you will cry out:
I HAVE LIVED!
I HAVE LIVED!
- Jeff Foster
Notes From Ana On Cordyceps Mushrooms
Cordyceps militaries mushrooms originally comes from the Himalayas, growing wild in the foothills of Tibet and Bhutan, where they infect and devour the caterpillars of ghost moths. From this caterpillar, it grows a grass-shaped fruiting body, which then releases spores for reproduction.
Due to the unique nature of its development, the Chinese named it “winter worm summer grass.”
Recently, people began cultivating Cordyceps in mushroom farms in a barley or rice substrate~ making it vegan.
I want to speak about mushrooms in general for a moment~ A mushroom goes through many stages during its life cycle, just like any plant or animal. Each part of a mushroom has unique attributes that support wellness and serve a different purpose for the organism, but it’s the fruiting bodies that receive the most attention and are the most familiar. Fruiting bodies emerge from the substrate on which they grow — such as trees or fallen logs — to become the part of the mushroom we recognize. They’re the above-ground part that we can see when we walk through the woods, and they’re also what have been traditionally foraged and consumed, in food and supplements.
However, there’s a network of mushrooms that are underground called the mycelium. Mycelium are so tiny that one cubic inch of soil can contain enough to stretch for 8 miles. Mycelial networks can cover as much as thousands of acres, making certain varieties of fungi the largest organisms in the world, as well as some of the oldest.
The below ground fungi connect plants and trees together, and have even been show to communicate with each other. Mycelium can transport nutrients between different plants or trees. This network has been referred to as "Earth's natural internet".
Cordyceps are so highly valued in Traditional Chinese Medicine that they used to be exclusively available to the emperor’s family in ancient China.
TCM traditionally used Cordyceps as an adaptogen and immuno-supportive or immuno-modulator. Immuno modulators regulate or normalize the immune system~ these types of herbs are much safer for those who happen to have hyper or auto-immune issues.
They are adaptogens, meaning that adapt to what your body needs, where it needs it. It also helps us adapt to stress better. This is especially important right now~ our nervous system is on the same stage as our immune system~ meaning if we’re in constant fight or flight, our immune functions will be impaired.
Cordyceps are used in TCM to support kidney and lung symptoms including bronchitis and other respiratory disorders, including lung fibrosis aka severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS.
Cordyceps Increase oxygenation of cells, improving energy and stamina.
I’m a huge fan of mushrooms of all kinds. I love Paul Stamets but his supplements tend to be really expensive. One of my favorite other brands is Real Mushrooms in capsules.
Another fun and delicious way to get a good daily dose of mushrooms is Four Sigmatic- they have different mushrooms pouches, some even with coffee, that you can just add to water and drink. They’re pretty good quality and yummy.