Feast or Die?

Are you aware that unless you, at least quarterly, wake up with a communal hangover (and suffer some measure of indigestion) you will significantly reduce your longevity?

As a spiritual healer for the past 30 years I've noticed a common appetite in my clients: the hunger for the feast. But before I can discuss the feast I must first explain the tribe. Within you is the desire to belong to something that is much more than you, but also something that would be much less without you: the tribe.

It goes without saying that industrialization and Western mentality has all but shattered our tribes in their insatiable desire to capture independence. Who do you know that lives within five miles of where they were born? In response to our scattering, we now attempt to gather in massive, but anonymous, gatherings. MySpace, Facebook and YouTube are nothing more than imitations of what we have lost. Can you truly meet soul to soul in these virtual places? God bless technological advancement, but God also save what makes us human.

My wife and I, and those who first moved into our neighborhood nearly ten years ago, have grown a tribe. (A tribe is an organic; it is grown, not built.) It's impossible to tell which child goes with what parent on our street. On a Friday night it is quite possible that I will walk into four or five homes without knocking. Nearly every week we arrange to bring someone meals because they've been knocked off their pony and we all want to help them get back in the saddle. We are bound to each other. We are, by some large portion of our beingness, one.

Are you aware that most indigenous people believe that their communal intent and ceremonies actually turn the seasons? Returning to my opening line, I literally do not mean that you must drink and eat to excess; I'm saying that you must wholly let go. (This usually results in drinking and eating to some measure of excess.) You must be swept away by the power of the tribe to a place where only the joyous present moment exists and troubles recede. A tribe means one. At the center of a feast is the fire of gratitude. The Feast is the means by which a tribe becomes one.

On our street, within our tribe, a night of feasting is when our social boundaries blur. It's when the kids can trample down and tickle the crabbiest adult in attendance. It's when hugs last longer. It's when all forms of venting are allowed . . . as long as you vent expeditiously. It's when we all become equal. It's when we become spiritually human. It's when homecoming and exploration coexist.

I hear you. . . . This is your third move to a new city in six years and you don't even try to make friends anymore. I'm here to lovingly explain that your desire to belong to a tribe cannot be ignored. Indeed, that's why you've been having those feelings that some compare to starvation or strangulation. I offer two suggestions.

The first is pragmatic: you must go to them. You must find people you'd like as friends. You must leap into their arms, and yes, some won't catch you. The second is that you must create a bonfire to attract these same people. For over 30 years I've aided my clients in building bonfires for soul mates, tribes and every other form of human bonding.

The bonfire is something that is within you that can be seen on the spiritual plane. In other words, it's something that is really there. It is a form of prayer that literally attracts certain people to you. Is this the Law Of Attraction? Kinda sorta. But, it's more like a prayer formed by faith into action. It's an utterly congruent broadcast to the entire angelic realm.

The foundation of growing or joining a tribe must be your complete surrender to the truth that you are a social creature. But can a tribe be virtual, knitted by cell phone calls and social networking tools? Again, kinda sorta, but where is the touch? Where is the power of not needing words because you are holding a hand and looking deeply into someone's eyes? Where is the bond? Where is the oneness?

Can you grow a tribe in six months, recruiting just two other members, that will aid in turning the seasons? Yes. And, you must. You successfully satisfy your craving for food and drink, don't you? The craving for the tribe and the feast are no different and no less important.

I know you and you are made of some damn amazing divine stuff. My prayer is that I stirred a hunger that must be satisfied and awoken the magic designed to satisfy it. Feast or die? I'd rather feast too much than die too much.