 Transcending Drug Culture From: Jeffe <djjeffe@msn.com>
Wow, i just love your site, a friend of mine just sent me the link. My name is Jeff and I have been involved in the electronic dance scene now for over 10 years. I've seen the light and dark side of the culture and have always recognized it as a potential vehicle to enlightenment. I love your perspectives and I feel you have a genuine interest in the safety of our community as a whole. I too am a buddhist and use dance as a form of meditation and self grounding. One thing I have been doing recently is seeking out people who are on a path of transcending the drug culture aspect of the dance culture. I have posted messages on several message boards all up and down the West coast. Its probably no coincidence that I found your site. I have been in contact with some very wonderful people as a result of my posting who are feeling like I am, like we are ready to take our next step beyond the drugs. I live in Portland Oregon and have a wonderful family of dancers here who are sharing in a very beautiful vision. Id really like to stay in contact with you and invite you to a gathering I am having in Mt Shasta Ca. next year in June. I have a friend Luna who lives in Vancouver BC who will be doing a workshop that is all about transcending the drug culture through sacred movement... Anyway, let me know if that is something that would interest you. I am also a dj. If you are interested in a cd send me your mailing address. I decided to include a copy of my post below.... I'd love to hear your feedback Much love Jeffe Sharing in the vision.............. ------------- Reply from John ------------- John and Katherine will try to attend the Mt Shasta event this summer if we can. Read some more of Jeffe's very interesting perspectives below. Anyone interested in Jeffe's work can contact him directly or make additional comments to me at innerrave and I will post them. --------------------------------- Greetings again everyone reading this... My name is Jeffe, I have been a part of the electronic dance culture since early 1992. It wasn't until the early part of the year 2000 that I started becoming very disenchanted with the drug culture aspect of the dance scene. I started a collective in the latter part of 1999 called A frame with a vision of creating a family that would evolve together into a new phase of evolution for the dance scene. The other members of the collective had a much different vision than I and I found myself somewhat alone with my vision. So last Summer I posted a message on several West Coast message boards in an effort to find others who were feeling the same way I was. I expressed how the drugs had acted as a catalyst for me to see my potential, but after repeated use they only served to distort and cloud my vision. I used the analogy of the Buddhist perspective of samsara, as seeing my repeated drug use as a cycle from which I had the potential to transcend and evolve, but it took a couple of times around the wheel to fully understand this. Samsara is a word used to describe the endless cycles of birth and death, or, life experience as we know it. It can be referred to as an endless cycle of suffering, going around in circles not really getting anywhere because we are choosing not to recognize that we get caught up in cycles. Ignorance is what keeps us immersed in samsara, and this is how I began to view the drug culture in relation to the dance culture. I received many positive responses. Since last Summer I have experienced a tremendous amount of growth and moved myself out of Sacramento Ca. to the great Pacific Northwest. I now reside in Portland Oregon where I have found a wonderful family all sharing in a similar vision for the dance culture. In the early part of August I assisted in the production of a very large outdoor event called Dream Your Own Dream, or DYOD. The family of people who put this on put so much love and prayer into this event, clearly stating that our intentions were to help each other evolve and that we didn't want to see abuses going on at the event. Well, of course it is unrealistic to believe that simply by posting a sign you can keep out the parasitic energies, but they came, and in large numbers selling all kinds of stuff, blatantly and disrespectfully. Being sensitive to energy and vibration we could feel the overall vibe of the party being dragged down by their presence and we felt somewhat powerless. We wanted everyone to feel welcome but were very disappointed with their presence. First of all I want to stress that in no way do I pass any judgment on anyone immersed in the drug culture. I was once immersed in it myself and therefore it would be hypocritical of me to judge. I know that it is unrealistic to believe the entire dance culture will transcend the drug culture, meaning from my perspective that not everyone will see the drugs as a catalyst and find a completion with them. Kind of like using training wheels and then finding you don't need them anymore. I also understand that it is unrealistic to hold a large open free gathering like DYOD and expect everyone to be on their best behavior, regardless of how much love and prayer you invest into your intention. Drugs will more than likely remain an integral part of the dance culture. I am simply someone who loves the dance culture and recognizes it as a potential vehicle for heightened awareness and vibration. We have the potential to change the world and heal the planet with our movement, this I strongly believe. A few years ago I personally made a conscious choice to remove drugs from my experiences within the culture. I had reached a point where they just no longer served my experiences. I took off the training wheels so to speak. I was ready to reach states of ecstasy through simply dancing, sacred movement & just feeling the essence of the music. After the cloudiness of the effects of all the drug use cleared it was like looking with new eyes. I could really see the ill effects the abuse of drugs was having on the dance culture. I quickly became very disenchanted with the whole scene and became somewhat of a recluse. I got tired of seeing all the shady drug dealers who had no genuine interest in the well being of anyone, selling who knows what, basically preying off the scene, overdoses, ambulances, cops, parties getting busted, raids, friends getting arrested, car accidents, getting arrested myself, politicians cracking down on our scene with new laws ,the list goes on and on......... But rather than losing complete faith in the scene and shunning it, I have decided to keep the faith & reach out to find others of like mind who are carrying the same vision. I thinks its important. Its definitely a start to bringing together a whole network and potential family of dancers who are vibrating on the same frequency. We are definitely in the minority but I think there are enough of us that if we all networked and formed a collective, we could definitely make an impact. Right now I feel this vision is but a seed waiting to bloom I feel I am one of many caretakers of this seed within this garden that is our culture. I am looking for others to share in the nurturing of this vision. For all who truly resonate with my message I ask you to contact me and start a dialog. I will connect you with others who are responding . I will be setting up a gathering next year in Mt Shasta in the early part of June. One of the points of focus will be transcending the drug culture and we will be doing a workshop based on that. This gathering will be open to only those who truly feel in their hearts what I am communicating. It will be a good opportunity for us all to meet each other and begin the next stage of evolution for our culture. Namaste
Jeffe
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