1.1.2 The Alchemist

‘This is not your first rodeo.’

This chapter explores the unique characteristics and mindset of those drawn to the alchemical path. We examine how previous spiritual development creates the conditions for alchemical work, while investigating the fundamental nature of existence and consciousness. Through understanding the alchemist’s perspective on reality, we gain insight into both the challenges and rewards of this transformative journey.

To develop an interest deep enough to reach this point, you are standing on the shoulders of giants. We will learn much more about this later, but you only have an interest in this material because of the hard work of previous existences.

Be inspired, even when things get tough. You are the current incarnation of a long line of seekers of truth.

What is existence?

Existence is the subjective nature of being. It is the concept of a semi-permanent observer and participant in the sensory and mental process of life.

There is a sense of persistence in existence. What falls asleep at night awakens to a new day. Something, or someone is falling asleep; something or someone awakens the next day.

Yet, this sense of being extends beyond the physical. We can observe another fall asleep, and then awaken, yet when this happens to ourselves, it is more than our body that settles into rest. Subjectively, we get a sense of withdrawing into our body as our senses darken and we lose consciousness. There is a kind of extinguishing of awareness when we fall asleep as we can never quite remember the point at which we fall asleep.

Existence is therefore more than just our physical environment. We experience dreams, fantasies, thoughts and ideas. We experience feelings about both our physical well-being and our mental state of affairs. The same picture or sound can soothe one individual and instil unknown terror in another. Defining experience on a purely objective basis is nothing like actual subjective experience which includes feelings, perceptions, thoughts and consciousness.

When we ignore our subjective existence and get fully involved in an objective, but imaginary world, we can suffer. If we reduce ourselves to a thing, we then develop anxiety as we learn what might happen to us. Even the most princely of upbringings only delays the inevitable discovery that as living beings we must surely die, and before this, suffer maybe illness, poverty or both.

The aspiring alchemist must learn to pull themselves away from this objective but mutually suffered delusion and find the reality from which it springs. One only does this if one has suffered disenchantment or disappointment with the ultimate conclusion of being a living being.

The method of the alchemist is to put subjective experience into the retort of analysis and synthesis. With some difficulty at first, but then with obsessive ease, the alchemist constantly breaks down experience into its most primitive elements (analysis) and then rebuilds a mental (and therefore subjectively real) model through which to further examine existence.

The process is stepwise. One struggles, sometimes for long periods of time, with a difficult concept that once grasped, unlocks many other problems. It is regressive, in that we are learning to retrace our own evolutionary steps, trying to resist primitive drives and tendencies.

The first step is the most difficult. It is oblique, subtle and elusive. The more one seeks it, the more elusive it becomes. This is the white rabbit of Alice in Wonderland and later The Matrix fame, a tendency for consciousness to be fleeting, elusive and oddly reflective.

Our problem is that our minds are most receptive to catching hold of this elusive viewpoint when we are infants. Once we learn language and particularly once we learn to write, we reduce our capacity to grasp new concepts and have an overarching tendency to think rather than experience the raw impression of the senses. By the time we realise we are prisoners, we can no longer remember how it happened.

So, the first part of our quest involves a certain reduction or regression as we attempt to return to the experience of childhood. We must identify and heal certain mental wounds and bring our experience of being back towards a more innocent time. However, we cannot simply retrace our steps. Our past innocence was due to ignorance, but now we know. Our path back towards that simpler perspective must be a new one.

We call this simple and innocent, pre-adult viewpoint, the Garden of Eden. We will explore what we mean by this in much more depth later, but for the moment, this will do. The Garden of Eden is the name of a concept, a place of being or state of being, that we all experienced, but cannot quite remember. It was a time of development when the words or symbols of existence lacked meaning and we existed without thinking about things. At that stage we had not learned we are a separate piece of reality, this separation, which gives us the sense of individuality soon forms, but prior to this we exist in a blissful and unworried state.

As alchemists we don’t seek this blissful state for its sublime experience. In fact, it can be a trap for some seekers who can get lost for many incarnations in pursuing heavenly bliss. We seek this state for its detached tranquility. Here we can find a place of stability with which we can study reality. This state of mind is like an island on which the alchemist can observe inner and outer experience, relatively uninvolved.

For the alchemist this is only the first stage, and a preliminary one. Through a deepening understanding of consciousness one finds stability in the simpler forms, until through this stability a breakthrough occurs. With this breakthrough the aspiring alchemist’s mind experiences Nirvāṇa or unconditioned reality. This only happens for a fraction of a second but through this experience, the alchemist changes their perspective of being. Further stages refine this experience until the tendency to become is eliminated, and one learns to dwell in unconditioned reality.

Much of this may be difficult to contemplate, and we will expand on these topics as needed. At this stage I feel it’s important to impart a sense of direction, as alchemy is confusing enough.

So, the initial work of the alchemist is finding a way back to a state of being associated with a more simple view of reality. There is a sense of working with the dross that one has accumulated since childhood. This dross is not discarded or rejected, but is a substance that can be refined or purified.

This dross is the very substance of the alchemist’s being. It is a conditioned experience, and memories of it. Simplistically, it is a lifetime of meaning plus many lifetimes of cultural programming, that act like an unconscious filter over the simpler, reality of subjective experience.

The process of refining this ‘dross’ is known as Nigredo, or darkness. The aspiring alchemist must develop a passion and desire to seek out their own inner darkness and through understanding, transmute it. But this is neither pleasant nor easy. This darkness often manifests as depressive or psychotic illness, and is associated with really challenging states like despair, hopelessness and helplessness. Few alchemists realise they are on a path at this stage. Many may be severely unwell, experiencing intellectual despair and deep despondency. It can be a very dangerous time.

The only real difference between an alchemist and another suffering with mental illness is a curiosity towards their symptoms. The alchemist always has a deep, often unspoken or unthought suspicion towards experience, that can only really come from a deep level of insight associated with a previous existence.

In the next lesson we will examine the evolution of a typical human consciousness which will act like a map that we can build on as we progress.

This text is excerpted from the book Nigredo: A Course in Modern Alchemy. The complete book includes additional study guides, resources, and appendices. View the full book here.