Reflection is the thoughtful consideration or meditation of a topic.  As one reflects in a calm, quiet manner with a retrospective focus, one gains self-knowledge.  There are those people or events that have impacted each one of us.  There is the author, Ken Kesey, the ethnobotanist, Terence McKenna, and my personal loss of religion which have made great differences in my life.

                Ken Kesey, who wrote novels such as One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Sometimes a Great Notion, is one of the most influential people in my life.  His views on matters such as religion, politics, and lifestyle resonate in many of the things that I do.  Kesey, along with many other “philosophers” of the mid 20th Century, believed that society should focus more on spiritual and mental expansion than on worldly matters such as politics and economics.  After reading Tom Wolfe’s The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, which chronicles a small period of Kesey’s life, I became interested in the lifestyle that Kesey was devoted to.  It was in this way that Kesey influenced my life.

                After having been introduced to Kesey, I began researching the works of others who had similar views.  Terence McKenna soon caught my fascination.  McKenna was an ethnobotanist who introduced me to the world of metaphysics.  McKenna also felt that trifling matters are of far too great concern in modern society.  His focus was on reaching higher states of consciousness and living beyond the physical world.  He believed that through deep meditation and other means of altering states of mind, it is possible to access, “a doorway out of history and into the wiring under the board in eternity.”  Since being introduced to the works of McKenna, I have begun to focus on my own spiritual expansion to a much greater degree.

                Consequently, I found it necessary to deal with my personal “religious crisis.”  For several years, I devoutly followed the Christian religion.  I went further than regularly attending church.  I deeply and passionately studied both the Old and New Testaments with great interest and devotion.  However, I always struggled with the Christian belief in “Hell” and eternal suffering as a form of punishment. 
I feel that no transgression is great enough that one should be subject to eternal suffering.  It was this and other thoughts that slowly pulled me away from this religion.  For a period of time, I still held on to that last thread of “belief,” simply to save myself from the possibility of Hell.  I later realized, however, that this false belief was in vain, for if an almighty god does exist, he will easily see through my thin veil of “worship.”  After having come to this conclusion, I felt liberated from this struggle and free to pursue my own spiritual growth.

                In summation, even though I openly listen to any views, I have been deeply affected by the thoughts of Ken Kesey and Terence McKenna and still study their words, as well as those of others, on a daily basis.  This has led to a feeling of deep serenity and an overall sense of peace.