About

My Story

As a kid, I loved playing something I called “space doctor,” which is akin to what I do now, only instead of outer space doctoring, I practice inner space doctoring. 

When I was 7 years old, I began having unusual episodes, often when I was sick with the flu, during test taking or other moments of deep quiet. My depth perception would flatten, then a breathy voice would whisper unintelligibly into my ear. My inner sight opened, and I perceived the silhouette of a man standing on a hill, wildly waving his arms at me. My tactile sense would shift so that my whole body felt like stone; touching my fingers together was like rubbing bone against bone. There was pleasure in this experience, but I was frightened, and looked to the adults around me for an explanation. My doctors did a brain scan, worried I might have a brain tumor. They coached me on how to “shut it down,” then finally suggested I ignore it, calling it Alice in Wonderland Syndrome. I call it a gift that taught me things are not as they seem. Luckily, these episodes only disappeared for some years. Sitting in meditation, gazing upon a flame, or resting my eyes for a long time upon the face of a friend will reawaken this portal to a Medicine Realm. 

When I was 19, I was an opera student in New York City. One night I went to a party, smoked a little cannabis with some friends, then walked out to get a breath of fresh air. There I found a classmate, crying on the stairs. Immediately, my heart opened to her. I engaged her in conversation, then listened deeply. My hand went to her shoulder, and the moment I made contact, an enormity of emotion rocketed through me. I began to weep. It felt as though her emotions were moving through me and I was taken to my knees. 

“I didn’t know you cared,” she said. I responded in the only way I could. “Me neither.” This was a powerful, heart-awakening moment. I had been shut down and cut off from my fellow humans. This moment awakened me to the possibility of connection and empathy that I had always dreamed of but had not experienced.

Finding Prayer

As I progressed into my 20s, I was deeply confused about the world and felt utterly alone. I had suicidal ideations, self-medicated with cannabis, and regularly engaged in self-harm. Eventually, the overwhelming pressure of my state of mind knocked the wind out of me and I dropped to my knees. On my knees, I found prayer; not dogma or allegiance to a savior God, but prayer to a Mother-Father Earth who had the power to catch me, brush me off, and point me in the direction of my Path of Service.

At 29, I lived in a tiny attic space in Brooklyn, NY, and my opera career was ending. I was engaged to a woman who was lovely, but not the right partner for me. I meditated several hours a day, trying ferociously to storm the gates of heaven. My body was dry and my soul was starving. Within five weeks of each other, my grandparents, with whom I was very close, passed. For a variety of reasons, I broke off my engagement. 

First Ceremony

During New Years weekend of 2012, I partook in my first ceremony. The plant medicine I communed with split me right down my center. I re-lived horrors from what some might call past lives, and returned to New York a changed man. The rewiring that had taken place in the ceremony made it impossible for me to return to my life as I knew it. One of my friends described me as an erupting rainbow volcano. So I did what any erupting rainbow volcano would do; I moved to California. 

A year later I found myself living on the edge of Berkeley, CA overlooking Wildcat Canyon. I had no voice (my singing voice had completely shut down), no family, friends, community or clear purpose. I worked in IT during the day, and studied the esoteric arts of indigenous cultures. I entered a “dark night of soul,” and began to melt out of my previously constructed identity. I was supported during this time by a masterful, spiritual mentor with whom I still go to for regular council. 

The Pachakuti Mesa Tradition

The first ceremony I attended with the Pachakuti Mesa Tradition (PMT) was on the equinox of 2012. I met up with a group that gathered around a stone cairn, pouring libations, cornmeal and tobacco upon it while singing and playing instruments. It was chaotic, wild and beautiful, and immediately felt like home. I squeezed into a retreat with the founder of the PMT, Don Oscar Miro-Quesada. At the closing of our first night together at Mt. Shasta, Don Oscar called out my name and asked me to stand in the North, directly across from him. I faced him, surprised, a little scared, and with an inflated ego. 

“Alexander,” he said. “I believe we’ve never been ‘in hoop’ together. So tell me, how is it that I recognize you?” Fumbling for words, I answered, “I prayed really hard to get off the waiting list and into the retreat for some time.” He brushed this off, looking for something more. 

“You also came to me in one of my meditations,” I said. His eyebrows rose. “You came to me and placed something in my mouth. You said, ‘Before you swallow, I ask you to be sure that you want to walk this path.’ I swallowed.” 

Don Oscar lept out of his chair and scurried around the altar to come face to face with me. He pulled his jaguar-tooth necklace over his head and placed it around my neck. He instructed me to wear it against my skin and place it to the left of my head when I got to my bed. Exhilarated, terrified and still full of myself, I returned to my solo campsite on the river where I followed his instructions to a T. 

Hours into the night I was awakened by the sound of something scratching on my tent. Adrenaline rocketed through my system, and I began to see the news article about the spiritual dude who was eaten by a bear. I prayed for my life like never before, and whoever had come to pay me a visit slowly walked away. 

The next morning I returned to the lodge to present the necklace back to the Maestro. With a twinkle in his eye, he asked how I slept. I had no words, only the trembling gratitude of an initiate realizing how little he knew. Years later, I would discover that he presented this necklace to those of us who were in need of dismemberment, the liberation from the confines of an unhealthy Mind.

Deepening the Prayer

I meditated for years and did all of the prescribed rituals and practices like a good boy. Then, I rediscovered prayer. I attended my first sweat lodge, my first Chanupah (Lakota prayer pipe) ceremony, my first adventure with the Wilderness Torah community celebrating Passover in the desert, all of which turned on my passion for praying. These were not the prayers written ages ago or even those composed by living masters, but the prayers of my heart in this moment.

This rediscovery of prayer felt revolutionary, like a peaceful, energized and erotic awakening through my center. I was also embarrassed about this newfound joy. Nobody in my family or childhood community prayed. In fact, the societal message I had received about prayer was that it was something for weak people who “needed” to pray to make themselves feel better. What I discovered then, and am awake to now, is that prayer is my pleasure and my compass. It is not a frivolity that I do on the weekends or once a year. It is my way of tending to my primary relationships. It is how I express my love and gratitude for what some might call God, the Universe, the All That Is. It is how I have learned to open the communication channels for my ancestors to speak with me and guide my steps. It is how I love up the many unseen allies who unfailingly show up for me and have helped me blossom into the man that I am. It is what has helped liberate me from a tight, false sense of individuality. I am my ancestors, as are you. I am the Earth, as are you. I am the Sky and the trees and my Creator. I am also an individuated spark of consciousness, in love with loving God.

Taking the Leap Towards Healing

In October 2013, I returned from another retreat with Don Oscar. It was Monday morning, and I sat down to tend to a pile of emails from my clients. I moved to put my hands on my keyboard, but no, I couldn’t do it. It was more than a sense, it was a physical experience, a field that I could not penetrate. My hands were repelled from the keyboard, and from my old life. I could not step back in. The next day, I quit my IT job. The next month, I moved out of my apartment and began to ask for and receive the generosity of my community. I spent nine nomadic months stepping out of familiar and socially prescribed support structures. I knew that I was destined to offer healing work in the world, though the term “healing” still felt mysterious and uncomfortable to me. Yet, called to the rabbit hole, I lept, and fell into the darkness of the Unknown, and the mystery of what is called the Beauty Way.

Nearing the end of my savings and my patience, I began working with a business coach to help me strategize aligning my work life with my soul’s purpose, whatever that was. She suggested I interview people in my community to find out how they perceived me. A close friend and fellow healer suggested that I offer men’s work. Why would I offer men’s work? Men are the hardest clients. I have to wrestle them into receiving any healing. That sounds terrible. And yet the idea stuck with me and I began to see how it might make sense, and even work. 

On my next birthday, I went on a solo overnight prayer-fast on Mt. Tamalpais in Marin County. As I sat awake during the cold and rainy night singing songs of my ancestors, I was introduced to three forces: the Gathering Force, the Bonding Force, and the Liberating Force. I was also shown a visual representation of these forces and used this “map” to create a curriculum for a new men’s work offering. It was unlike any men’s work I had heard of because it was primarily heart-initiation work. After creating the structures to invite men into a three month program, I realized that I was beginning to stabilize occupationally. This allowed me to continue my studies of the healing arts while I developed offerings, refining and crafting a better structure for my gifts to flow through and for the healing to be shared.

Divination from the Tradition of the Dagara People

During this time my spiritual brother and collaborator, Madhu, gifted me a divination for my birthday. He drove us to Nicasio, CA where I met my soon to be teacher, Mark Bockley. We sat down in his beautifully disheveled shrine room; ash all over the ground, bottles and jars everywhere, bowls of iron bracelets and bells, magnetising grotesque figurines, and ancient geometric healing art on the walls. A few minutes into the divination, Mark said, “Well, they’re telling me that you’re gonna do this work.” Offended for some reason, I responded, “No way. I already carry an altar from Peru and have enough unseen ones to tend to. I don’t want another lineage to carry. I have more than I can handle already.” 

“Okay,” he said. “I’m just telling you what they are saying,” referring to the unseen ones called Wedeme who enable the diviner to communicate between realms. A few months and many miraculous happenings later, I returned to Mark saying, “Okay, you win. I’m in. I’ve never experienced such powerful and effective prayer work. When can we begin my apprenticeship?” 

“We already have.”

The path that the Dagara people of Burkina Faso have mapped between the worlds of spirit and matter is unlike any I have come across. It is wild and mundane in its beauty, and profound and shockingly impactful in it’s efficacy. Over the years, I have woven this tradition of divination into my work in the healing arts and I am honored to share it all with you.