Hey friends,

I recently had the honor of contributing some healing musical mediation vibrations to a live channeling of Yeshua and Miriam. I’m such a skeptic, still, even after all I’ve seen and felt and witnessed. I was nervous to be a part of this. Afraid even. I don’t know. What do I know. As soon as it began I felt that flood of warmth and peace that sometimes comes when you pray to Jesus (despite what’s been done in his name). I’ve listened back three times and the words feel true, poignant, helpful. Fenix is one of Ella’s best friends in the world and is a powerful psychic, clairvoyant healer who I admire as a clear channel of divine wisdom. She is also humble, deeply human, and trauma-informed as a spiritual leader. Take all she says with a grain of salt, better yet, be the grain of salt yourself. You are the salt. Of the earth. OF. Turtles all the way down babe. Ella just said that to me while counting our cash as we sit by the lake. “Let life take you to amazing places beyond your dreams” is the fortune cookie she pulled from her wallet. We’ve got more hope than cash that’s for sure. That said. The channeling is $10 right now and that’s groovy to me. I’ve been programmed to believe any recorded offering must be free. I’m trying to unlearn that too. Money is water and oh yes it’s dirty at the source but perhaps we can purify it with our intentions and our love. Flip the tables, flip the script, be free and be light and wear it all with ease. Love ya, if you dig into this please let me know how it lands with you. The audio is far from perfect, but isn’t that the whole message from Jesus? G*d is here in the imperfect. But also I’m working on being better at the digital stuff. Peace and love to you and all creatures.

Corey

P.S.

I typed all this early today because Fenix told me there was some groovy astrology going on to share at 11:10am. I missed the mark though because my beloved George was missing and I feared he’d been munched by coyotes. I moved to Colorado this month and let him out at night and he failed to return. His AirTag didn’t update all day. I kept having visuals of him being eaten. Fenix lovingly did a psychic reading and called me a few hours ago to say that he was ok but scared, and to be honest I had literally already wept by the river and sprinkled some Tobacco and given up hope because I’m really freaking good at that. So I didn’t believe her right away. I was kinda just like ok suuuuuure and then I checked his location and it had updated!!!! It said he was down by the lake so we power-walked through all the tourists, (I ringing my little bell I use to summon my cats like a crazy person) and we found him. So sorry this is late but hopefully there’s at least one person who believes this tall tale, has an extra ten dollars, and decides to spend this eclipse (happening right meow) tuning into Yeshua & Miriam who continue to guide, teach, heal, and soothe the world. Hey perhaps they (we) are just getting started.

This isn’t a poem,

It’s prose chopped into stanzas

I saw someone on substack complain

About this modern hacking

My autocorrect keeps filling in words

Someone spoke straight to me

Yesterday, after she lead us to the cave

And we washed our hands

They said I like what you share

I was joking when I sang

That my view is the right one

I joke to protect myself

My only view is non-violence

Benevolence towards all creatures

Why not? Why not? Why not?

I ask, but honestly doubt

That I could handle the answer

hey loves!

Today is my bday and I’ve got lots of sweet shenanigans going on at home. I Don’t have time to say many words, but I am happy to share a new YouTube channel with you. I am inspired to share the medicine of my songs and stories under a new name, Burning Heart. I’ve been Corey Kilgannon for so long, 32 years in fact, and I’m sure I will continue to be for a while! Hahah but the things I want to share about spirit, Christ, plant medicines, etc…. Feel like a new life… something far (and yet so near) to my long journey as a songwriter. It’s all one thing too I suppose. I am who I am becoming. Ya know that’s a better translation of the burning bush dialogue than “I am who I am”. Feels so final and finished. But…. G*d is still speaking and still creating and still becoming. We’re a part of it. Groovy. Amazing grace. Saves a space for me. Space. Out of constriction. Out of the concrete jungle. Into the weeds. Into the wild. Ommmmmm.

Thanks for tuning in, I hope you have a blessed day today and that something I’ve shared already on this page might bless you. Much more to come and I’m sure I’ll eventually grow tired of this trippy video editing app I have. It’s really just videos layered over one another. Layers. That’s all it is. Peel it back. You’ll find the man. Beneath the man…. The nucleus….

They think I don’t know a buttload of crap about the gospel…. But I DO!

I first rode a onewheel behind Pete’s Bar around 2am, Fall 2020. It was a new friend of mine’s primary mode of transportation and he insisted I give it a try. I popped up, found it a pretty intuitive transition from surfing, and after just a few minutes wiped out super hard. These things are heavy, I busted my big toe and it bled heavily. I was humbled, and totally hooked. He had a second wheel, or maybe it was his girlfriend’s, and we’d meet up every week or so to have a cruise and talk about the future. I wouldn’t listen well as he would enthusiastically try to teach me about Bitcoin (oops) and other futuristic developments. At the time I had a flip phone, a job I could walk to, and was making every effort to rewind to the 90s. You can’t live in nostalgic lalaland forever, but honestly if you can pull it off for a year or two it’s not a bad strategy. A few months later my big brother bought a wheel for us to share, but I think after he tried it a few times it sort of just became mine. I stopped riding my scooter and for the next few years one-wheeled practically everywhere I went. I traveled thousands of miles on that thing (all without leaving the beaches of course).

I remember one of my first “enlightening” moments on my futuristic uni-chariot. I had nibbled some sacred mushroom and took off for a cruise. While I certainly do not recommend operating any motorized vehicle while in communion with plant teachers, the truth is, I haven’t fallen down in several years. I think once you get comfortable riding these wonderful machines you have just about as much chance falling down walking. I’m a chill cruiser interested in slow, smooth turns and don’t do too much mountain descending. I digress. Early on I felt some shame about riding the one-wheel. I mean, I felt shame about almost everything because I grew up in a fundamentalist religious environment that uses shame as the primary motivator for behavior change. My whole last decade has been primarily about rewiring my brain to enjoy life and to love myself as I am. This was one of those moments. People, at least five years ago, would often holler things at you when riding. “Do a kick flip!” one of the most common which is apparently some kind of inside skater joke. Maybe it was well-meant but almost every time someone would shout at me I’d collapse inward and feel embarrassed. So I’d cruise north of town where it’s a little quieter. This particular trip it was hot so I unbuttoned my shirt all the way. The fungus brought flow to my hips and I felt this little breaking in the shame, an enormous smile took over my face and I had the thought that I’d never care about what anyone thought about me ever again. The point of life is having fun. Somehow, I knew this again deep in my heart. Of course I still forget, I still return to the patterns I was raised in, but I’ll always remember that moment, how free I felt.

That’s probably the grooviest thing about the one wheel. It being only a single tire, your ability to move in different directions is so unlike any other board. I love how each moment has so many choices, do I slip off the street into this patch of dirt? Do I try this little alley? Or, as I travel for one of the first times since I’ve been riding, do I try to go up a mountain road? The power of the motor is truly mind boggling, in Colorado this month I’ve made it up some paths with relative ease that proved to me again how unique the one-wheel is. It’s been marketed as the cure to boredom, and it honestly reliably is. I’d add for me that it’s been a major cure for depression, anxiety, and even hopelessness. I can be, as I alluded to earlier, nostalgic for simple, less technological times. It’s easy to get overwhelmed by all the change and advancement and think that we are heading to our computerized doom. Well, maybe it’s true but there’s moments when I’m one-wheeling that I think even if so… it’s worth it for this experience. Ha! But actually, usually the single pointed, joyful meditative focus of a one-wheel cruise reminds me that from a lot of angles things are getting better. There are types of freedom that are increasingly accessible to more and more people.

I am finding my way into a line of work interested in teaching people deeper spiritual/religious freedom. It’s been a zig-zag, spiraling journey with lots of confusion and failure. For sure. For a long while, and still sometimes, I devoured dense Buddhist books with all kinds of super specific ways that one must meditate to reach enlightenment. When I started this substack I converted my emailing list from years of touring, hoping not too many of my old fans would be upset by the shift in tone and intention. One person did respond with some frustration but said something like, “I’d report this to the whoever or whatever but since you are pursuing enlightenment I guess I’ll let it go.” It’s funny, it feels like an ego move to admit that you want that right? I see the same traps in Buddhism and Yoga that are glaringly obvious in Christianity… yeah I love this stuff but I’ll never reach enlightenment in this life! I could never be a Saint, or a Holy Man, or something like that. I’ve done too many bad things and my mind is too crazy a place. The book I just started reading yesterday on Tantra and Inner Fire meditation began with a praise of the author’s Buddha nature and how we mere mortals could never attain that level of peace and tranquility. I don’t know if it’s my religious trauma, or the wisdom of my burning heart that calls Bull-Shit! My belief, is that Buddha, Jesus, and all those other dudes who are now eternally enshrined in religious garb were simply dudes (who devoted a great deal of heart and effort to freeing themselves and others from suffering). We have such a tendency to want to worship others who figured it out, rather than figure it out for ourselves. Or better than “figure it out”, FEEL it! Hey, the spirit is like that though. Going inward can feel like a maze, but it’s a labyrinth. You just keep following the next little clue and this next little nudge. One day you’ll find yourself one-wheeling up the road to the stupa of Enlightenment. As I did yesterday.

I’m in Crestone, Colorado, a little mountain town nestled in the bottom of the Sangre De Cristo mountain range. It’s an interfaith Mecca of the U.S. with over 30 spiritual centers, juxtaposed against a town with a population of 150. There are prayer flags and buddhas everywhere and the vibe is awesome. Even reading about the stupa started triggering my little cynical sensibilities. There’s pieces of hair and bone from holy men, gold and jewels and even water from sacred places all around the world trapped inside. Interesting, the more I’ve learned about water it seems to me one of the least spiritual things we could do, to trap and bottle it and force it to dwell stagnant in a shrine. I learned that lesson because I was doing the same thing for my paintings, collecting water samples from places of significance to me. I took an online course from a Native Wisdom Grandmother who encouraged us to have deeper connection with the water, to really listen. One night I could actually hear the waters on my shelf crying out to be released back into the cycle. Gaia (earth) does not like to be bottled and damned, she wants to flow. Anywhosie. I still wanted to see it so I set my map on my phone and cruised the two and a half miles to the road-side religious artifact. I arrived, genuinely inspired by the beauty of the monument, the prayer flags (which I do love) and the snowy peaks just behind. I circled the monument a few times, considered stealing a crystal or two from the offering altar, and then remembered (as I always do) that I probably should not do that for about a dozen good reasons. I sat down to read my new Tibetan Buddhist Book and immediately began to be eaten alive by gnats. It was so bad that I stood up and read my book pacing in a circle around the stupa. Classic crazy religious guy stuff. The best rituals are rooted in the practical. This book caught my eye because it is based in Tantra, or the idea that pleasure is one of the most reliable pathways to enlightenment. Christianity, but also a lot of the Buddhism I studied, taught that desire is a distraction from the real goal of being here. I’m trying to unlearn that, to find balance, to find that spot where everything (the pain and the pleasure) keeps turning me on and turning me in. First enlightenment, and then the dishes… or something like that. It’s easy to be so hell-bent on reaching Shambala that you don’t fully realize you are already standing there (and in my current situation I kind of literally am).

On the onewheel ride home I took an alternate path, it said no motorized vehicles but I do like breaking some rules and I wanted to get off the road. Cars are my main concern, two cars came and parked by the stupa while I was there. They got out quickly, took a few pictures, and raced away before the bugs had gotten all the flesh from their bones. Cars are synonymous with hurry. The one-wheel is about getting from point A to point B with maximum pleasure. The path was white, in the sunset it seemed to glow, and it weaved through the high desert like a snake. I couldn’t really dream a more pleasant place to cruise, I remembered that time years before when I thought that I’d never feel judged again. “Judge not, lest you be judged,” said the ancient sage…the hard part is not judging the people in their cars coming to take a quick picture. You do not have to be good, you do not have to walk on your knees through the desert repenting. I’ve been shifting my internal monologue lately, after failing out of being a Pastor and feeling so much confusion about spiritual leadership. On the one hand, I get it and have many people I consider to be wise and safe leaders. The nit-picky part of me that really cares about what each word means thinks there’s actually no such thing as a spiritual leader. Being a leader implies that you are ahead of someone doesn’t it? Kind of? The big fat joke of spirituality, the hilarious thing about all the priestly robes and the cathedrals and the enormous amounts of effort people make to be pious, is that we are all ONE! How could anyone be more or less spiritual than anyone else? Sure, rituals and religions and practices and books may help you tune in deeper to your nature (spirit living in a body) but it doesn’t put you in a different metaphysical tax bracket. We are born, we learn, we forget, we dance, we cry, we get a little englightened, we screw it up some more, and then we die. Maybe we reincarnate. Maybe we go to heaven. Maybe it’s infinite nothingness. Anyone who tells you for sure how it works is about to sell you something. Oops, that might be my wound speaking again.

One of my favorite Buddhist one-liners (they have a real knack for those) is from the top of the mountain you see the mountain. I take it to mean that enlightenment is just seeing what’s really going on here. You can see it in what is right in front of you. What’s really import is your unique way of getting up the mountain. I’m still kind of a crazy religious nut because for whatever reason I find a lot of it fun. I’m one-wheeling up the path with my shirt flying behind me, micro-dosing cannabis in a prayerful way, and finding increasingly deeper harmony with myself and with the world. I don’t know. I jut want to continue to be really honest. That’s what I thought my job was as a Pastor, to be brutally honest… but I was often too scared. Honestly one of my favorite parts about my tenure as Music Minister in an old movie-theatre turned contemplative church was riding my one wheel to work each day. It’s all in the hips, it’s all in how you dance, it’s about being your weird (to see the hand of G*d upon) and wonderful self. One of my other favorite parts was when I’d lead people down the old projector hallway to the fire escape, offer some ganja, and then listen to them share about their religious trauma. I’d do my best to say very little, to be empathetic, and to validate that the pain they were describing makes a lot of sense. That’s what set me free, Pastor Bobby Bubbles (and if you are confused about Jesus and the Bible/wanting to learn more I can’t recommend anyone more highly) listened to me and offered critical reframes that helped me forgive the church for screwing it up so often and so thoroughly. I may change my mind someday, but I think I’m a little too burnt to be a Pastor. The group dynamic really unnerves me and like Jesus, if I were to fully be myself in the church setting long enough I imagine someone would kill me. I’m not joking about that, Jesus often fled from the crowds.

I am almost finished with my Cannabis Coaching certification program, and inching towards really launching my offering. Cannabis is of course, always a possibility for healing not the only way I’m willing to work with humans. If you’ve read this far, I imagine that something in the way I share resonates with you. That’s groovy as all get out. The Gospel of Thomas has a pesky little stanza attributed to Yeshua that says “Businessmen will not enter the kingdom of Heaven”. Obviously that’s been translated with a bit of a harsh tone but I think for me the idea is that when spirituality becomes transactional it looses the heart of the matter. I’ve been a little stuck there for years and not really offering anything. But I’ve done a ton of digging and self-development, can really be of service to people’s growth, and quite frankly have got some debts to pay and a family to raise and all that jazz. I need to find the balance. I have been liking the rate of $108 an hour for years. It’s all donation based. This is a bonkers time financially, but maybe you’ve got a steady gig and now you’re looking to get more in touch with the untouchable. I’m looking for friends (clients) who want to talk, share, listen, commune with cannabis, etc. I’m an artist, I relate to everyone with creativity, I’m resistant to developing much programming and finally listening to spirit’s nudge that if I share more, more will be returned. I believe in psychotherapy and counseling and all the more clinical steps toward healing and I also sort of believe at the end of the day that it’s only love and friendship that really reach the deep places. That makes an awkward predicament. Am I looking for people to pay me to be friends with them? I guess kind of? Isn’t that basically what church is? My last name in Irish literally means “Church of Light”. We don’t need a building. We are church together. So let me just make it abundantly clear. You’ve already got everything you need inside of you. I’m just a thrift store shaman who’s read a lot of books and gone on a lot of spiritual side-quests and I’m ambling toward being some kind of spiritual teacher. We teach what we want to learn. I’m so freaking human hahahaha. I’ve got a lot of struggles and shadows, but I am seeing more and more light (even in the shadows, behold the yin yang). How can I help you? How can I be of service? How can we heal together? Curious if this will spark a connection. Well, it already has in my own heart. I am loving these moments, the sun warming the valley, the hands flowing over the Bluetooth keyboard. The technology that allows us to connect over such great distance. The lingering realization that we are all one, we are all one, Christ and Krishna are one, you are the Buddha! Be careful! They will kill you. We will. I will. I won’t. Non-violence is the core of my commitment. I tried to brush a little bug off the keyboard a moment ago and smeared her. I am so sorry. Please forgive me. My son, says the holy Mother,

YOU ARE ALREADY FORGIVEN. THAT’S THE WHOLE POINT (of the circle)

I attached an off the cuff heartfelt video about my recent graduation from Cannabis Coaching school. I’ll keep my words brief here for now, I have so much more to share about my journey and some helpful wisdom for yours. I’m really proud of the relationship I’ve built with Mama Ganja. I believe our relationship with her is a direct reflection of our relationship with the earth, with the feminine, with our own inner sensitivity. It’s a potent mirror, and amplifier, and can really spin us out in some crazy circles. If you’ve got shame in your system, addiction in your patterning, or anything like that and you could use a little help…. Please reach out. I’ve needed lots and lots of help and I’m really grateful to be in a space where I can now be of service to others. Peace and love. Talk to you soon. ❤️‍🔥🌿

I was visiting Florida from Seattle, and as you know it was smack in the middle of the Covid craziness.  My life was a mess, everything was falling apart,  so when my Dad called and asked if I wanted to go spearfishing with some of his buddies I figured why not.  I knew this would be probably pretty terrifying, but at 25 years old I felt invincible and if not, Indifferent to my mortality.  We met at the dock, dad’s friends are rednecks (his words not mine) and I’m run through the briefest possible refresher course on scuba diving.  This button puts air in the vest; this button deflates the vest. We’ve got to come up slow and don’t leave your partner. That’s pretty much it, it’ll come right back to you.  In a sense that’s true.  I strapped on all the bells and whistles, and rolled backwards off the boat into the open ocean.

The reef we were hunting was one hundred feet down.  In scuba every 30 feet or so is considered an “atmosphere” of pressure.  I think in our training we went down 60 feet in a big hole in the earth but this was a whole new experience.  100 feet makes the surface feel very, very far away.  If something goes wrong you can’t just shoot back up, or you will die because bubbles in your blood explode (or something like that).  We gave each other an “ok” hand gesture and started descending for the sea floor.  The visibility was amazing. Less than ten seconds later, looking down, I saw the biggest shark I’ve ever seen in my life.

I think twelve feet long is a genuinely fair interpretation. Obviously fish stories wiggle around the truth and everything is magnified under water but all I can say is it was immediately obvious that this was not one of those little reef sharks that just want to go do their own thing. I saw the shark, the shark saw us, and my assumption was…. Well, this must be normal!? These dudes dive out here all the time, it’s the middle of the ocean, I guess the big sharks hang around and don’t mind us being there with our funny little spears.  Wrong. As we floated down I watched the shark begin to make a wide circle around the area. I tapped my father, pointed to where the shark was, his eyes widened.  We began the clumsy process of switching spear guns, mine had an attachment that could be screwed on, turning the spear into a shot gun somehow.  Dad fumbled with the machine and I watched the shark circle closer.  At this point you’d think i was crapping my wetsuit but honestly the whole thing was so surreal, I was so helpless, that a tranquility washed over my body.  Dad got the gun ready, brought it up to chest level, and fired almost point blank at the Shark as it came in towards us, mouth wide open.

It was a quiet shot. Just a pop.  The shark reeled backwards, rolled over, and began to flop violently into the sea floor.  My nervous system caught up to me, what if it wasn’t dead from this? We watched in awe as the huge beast wrestled death, and eventually drifted away into the “desert”.  Mind you, this all took place within 5 minutes of flopping over the back of the boat.  We turned to face each other, dad flashed the “are you ok” hand gesture and I flashed it back.  We continued our dive around this beautiful reef, neither of us compelled to shoot anything else.

We reached the surface twenty minutes later. I think my first question was “so…. Is that normal?” Definitely not.  A few other big sharks showing their presence, but one circling and coming in to attack that way was a first for my Dad, and the other two men.  Ya  know, I’m not a big hunter/fisher, this was one of the last times I entered nature with anything like an intention to kill.  It’s a vast landscape of debate, whether we should or shouldn’t and all that.  I doubt there’s a true north of what is correct.  I don’t choose to eat animals,  save but once in a while.  I made contact with one of our most primal fears though, of being eaten by another animal.  That shark wasn’t having an ethical debate with itself. It was simply hungry and following instincts.  Protect your territory.  I’m on a gym elliptical right now and Fox News is on.  I see the sharks in their suits.  They are a part of nature.  I think, in a weird way, I could forgive a shark as it chomped me to death for breakfast.  Maybe not, hopefully I’ll never have to test that.  I certainly won’t quit surfing, but I won’t be giving any other leviathans an up-close opportunity for that meal.  The surface of the sea is a fine place to hang out.  And men, fathers, as confusing as a time as this is for masculinity, have a deep, ancient protective instinct for their children. That’s what arrived for me in the poem a year later.  Dad sprung into action, as he had 10,000 times before, willing to be between me and the shark.

Believe it or not, we dove again that day. This time on a sunken barge. There were openings I could squeeze through but my Dad couldn’t (or wouldn’t… being the more seasoned diver). I found myself alone in a sunken ship surrounded by more silver fish than I can poetically describe.  It took my breath away.  I marveled for a few minutes and then realized I shouldn’t be alone and went to find my Dad.  The second I swam up to him, my breath was taken away.  Not metaphorically this time, I breathed and nothing came out of the tube.  Now, real panic. In a proper scuba refresher course you’d be reminded that you have another tube, to just stay calm and reach for the back up.  I did not remember this.  Dad gave me his, we passed back and forth, as he helped me free my back up regulator. Twice in one day I nearly died at the bottom of the sea.  I guess there should be a powerful lesson, a kind of waking up.  And there was, there is, I’m sure.  Death is always close. It’s simple and we all know it on some level.  I felt it acutely last night driving in a heavy rain, so heavy we pulled over and found this hotel.  Having a relationship with Death, a healthy reverence, is, as I age, leading to safer decisions.  People have some very invincible ideas of fun.  In our minds we can confront death, I can stand in front of that shark again, simply laying on the ground and breathing.  I can take a tiny toke of ganja and whisper to the world “I am not afraid to die” 7 times and usually death herself will arrive quickly to show me places I’m still afraid of her. Recently I couldn’t sleep at all one night, imagining myself getting mauled by a bear.  This fear is primal.  It used to be a lot more real than the fears we face in the modern world.  I don’t really know how to face those fears yet, as small a creature as I am.  But I guess I do know that even the shark is animated by love herself, I guess what sets me free is a willingness (within an aversion) to be eaten. Hahahahahahahahahahahaha

Hare Rama Hare Krishna

Hahahahahaha!

Duh duh.

Duh duh.

Duh duh duh duh

Duh duh duh duh duh duh DUH

DUH DUH DUB DUHDU WSJ

IWBOC WOF WLHAJSLWNDKMAMS

NAPCBMWOEHOWNSOWWIOAKWJWO!!!

Happy Fathers Day everyone.  May we live into a world of less violence, while honoring the protective instinct hard wired into most humans from millions of years of running away from hungry beasties.  Running away is a great strategy. 😊👍🏼

G*d ain’t sh*t and there ain’t sh*t you can do about it.

I am! You are! We is!

This is all just archival.

I’ll die some day and folks will appreciate a peek into my bathroom. I don’t mind. Privacy is an illusion. G*d sees it all. Hears all. She is good.

This website has so many words. My feed is full of beautiful opinions. I’m struggling to feel it. Or it all feels irritated with each other or something. I’m scared to share because I don’t really want to be right. I’m trying to love everyone on both sides. I’m failing a lot. Maybe we fail our way into freedom.

i was asked 6 years ago or so to write a song for an album of hope for lgbtqia+ youth of faith. I didn’t consider myself of faith really, or I’d misplaced it for a while. Most of us are probably more gay than we give ourselves credit for, or permission to feel… but still I’m pretty straight tbh. Kinda a buzz kill but it seems true. So I did not feel qualified at all to be a part of it. Who cares. Wah wah wah. The song still came and it is still teaching me and challenging me. Confront gender roles and identities within myself, see where I’m not in flow. Forgive everyone. Love everyone who needs help. It seems like everyone does. This might be unpopular but I actually was feeling so sad for Trump the other night. I was really feeling how scared he must be to die, and that the function of these pesky egos we all have is to protect the wound. With an ego that big, can you imagine the pain…. I’m sad that we can’t all drop the proud act. I dream of a world where we aren’t violent with each other. It starts in the mind and it starts with me. I’m still angry so often. It doesn’t help. Can’t fight fire with fire. We need water. We need the Tao. We need the low places.

Sorry about the airplane flying over. I’m intending to share more long format. I don’t care if it’s for five people. I have this mechanism where I’m silencing myself and not sharing my art and my presence. I’m a coward I guess. Too often. I’m afraid of the powerful angry men. I don’t want to be around them. I am them. It’s my judgement generating the anger. And the planes. We’re so sensitive to sounds. So also it is that I’m just a vibrational sponge living in the jungle of noise.

cannabis, in small prayerful doses, helps me return to the inner silence. It has for years (centuries perhaps). I’m at the end of a six month coaching with cannabis certificate and in our last business meeting yesterday (which was very businessy….. ) he encouraged me to just give everything I do away free with reckless abandon. He said that would create value. I don’t know if I get it but I’ve been dreaming about it for years. Finally permission. If you want to, if it would be useful to you, for us to hang out on zoom and talk about religion, music, song writing? Nature, etc whatever. Maybe, reverently incorporate cannabis in a low dose, listen… become willing to enter the temple of inner space…. I’m here for it. For free! The gospel is good news, and it’s totally and it’s literally free. That means, you don’t have to worry about anything!

I’m still worrying though. I’m not selling a solution. Im scared and I don’t want to be a guru. I don’t want the fame carrot that they (I/we) always dangle. Just a guide through some familiar territory. Just a compassionate listener. Just a creative weirdo who’s fallen in and out of love a million times. At least. Every day. Ride the wave, it’s not a roller coaster… slow it down. Speed is literally the issue.

i tune down to 432 hz. I won’t present you the convincing science and mathematics here. Just Google it please. Or better yet try it. 440 hz is just a little faster than 432. Everything’s a little too fast. If you slow down the mind, it became a a wave. The sound waves help. I’m not a stoner. You can’t escape your problems by using ganja as a crutch. You can, however, commune with her and receive help and healing to stay here. To slow down and be here. With whatever. The anger I guess. Denying it doesn’t do anything. Do you still want to be my friend? I’d like to be yours. I’m proud of you. Just for being you. Been watching a lot of Mister Rogers. One of the only sane, famous Christians to ever live. Hahahahahahahahahaahare Rama Hare Krishna

gotta run,

love,

Corey

GO SEE A STAR WAR

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I recorded this song in September after attending an “out of the darkness” walk for suicide prevention.  I invited friends and even my larger local community to come and walk with me.  It was sweet, and sad, and honestly really weird (as most big events are). There were booths and one of them had different color beads to wear representing different orientations to the cause (red if you lost someone to suicide, yellow for loss of a military veteran etc.). Green beads were for if you yourself struggled.  There were probably close to 1500 people there in the pavilion and someone got on the microphone (with that whole pumped up MC WHAT UP JACKSONVILLE) tone… ok maybe not that bad but still, calm isn’t popular.  One color at a time we were asked to hold up our beads for why we were there.  I sheepishly help up my green beads, trying to feel something like proud of being willing to stand there. I looked through the crowd and I guess shouldn’t have been too surprised to see only a handful of other fellow ideators with the confidence to say so.  Oh well, I get it, the world is noisy and most days I try not to interface with big crowds too.

The walk itself was supremely healing, I brought a guitar and sang songs that have comforted me over the years. I particularly remember enjoying “somewhere along the way” by Dawes with my sister singing her perfect harmonies.  There wasn’t a clearly marked turn around spot and our group kind of dissolved into a bunch of smaller groups.  I guess maybe I was hoping this walk would feel “final” in some way like… ok I held up my beads and did this thing so I won’t struggle anymore…. Womp.

I got home and crashed on the floor of my little music room, if I remember correctly, for a few hours.  Every album worth its salt has its long hours of laying there looking at the gear and the guitars and thinking what the heck am I supposed to do with all these songs and feelings. It’s all way too much. That’s why, even though I am deeply desiring to collaborate more and jam (we jammin’ ooooo yahhhhh) much of this project was also done alone in my room.  Every once in a a while I got in something like an efficient rhythm but most of this project was wandering with no clear signs. Kind of relearning how to walk.  This song was the first I recorded, I set up a simple drum loop on garage band, propped up my mics in front of the window, and tried a few live passes standing up.  I felt the energy of the friends who had supported me, and though I still couldn’t fully feel the hope in my bones,  I decided to just keep going.  After years of tinkering with tape machines and forcing myself to find “perfect” takes, I really learned to love recording with more options (computers are ultimately pretty freaking awesome right?).

The main gig I’ve had the last year is playing in the corner of a groovy little Kava bar.  Through this gig I became great pals with John Jones who drums on this song (and many more on the album).  Finding someone to have easy musical conversations with has been one of the most hopeful things of my life.  Words (even though I’m spilling so many right now) pale in comparison to the way music can communicate what really matters (feelings).   Thanks John Donkey Kong jam juice Jonesin’ for that easy breezy rhythm. I played pretty much everything else but the saxophone, I also reconnected with a friend from highschool named Josh Guadino who came over and laid down those incredible parts.  This album has a deep vein of grief on it,  it’s been ten years now since my cousin passed away and every time I get to work with the saxophone I am given a great opportunity to feel the immensity of his absence. It’s a kind of presence too.  Patrick Taylor mixed and mastered what I was able to put together on garage band (oh and I think he added a shamanic shaker vibe to one of those little psychedelic interludes) the group vocals is a bunch of the folks from that day of walking, and a stranger or two from the internet (if you’re reading this and you’d like to be named hmu but I’m assuming otherwise for some reason right now?).

It’s ok to feel like dying, it’s ok to wonder Y?

But just because it’s ok (and you have to start there, that it is ok to feel anything) doesn’t really make it useful to dwell on.  Why not is maybe a better question and equally hard to answer, so as the great poet Rilke says why don’t we just love the questions themselves.  “Why not” feels like it has some levity to it,  resilience and at least enough understanding to know that the challenges deepen the roots.  I’ve felt for the last year like a tiny sprout that’s just poked through the ground after a long hard winter.  I’ve felt fragile, and afraid, but I’m finding faith that things are going to… well maybe not get better right away but they will carry on? Life is resilient and I’m learning to be too. I hope this share, and this song, bring you some comfort.  I’m learning to measure success by very different metrics, I already know one story of this recording helping someone down from the ledge (metaphorically but also kind of literally) and I pray that it’s able to maybe help a few more people.  Suicide is the second leading cause of death age 10-34 and particularly in men.  I don’t know how we solve so many of our worlds problems, I don’t know how we release our anger, I don’t know how we even pay our freaking bills in this late stage capitalism fall out. Maybe we can’t, maybe we won’t.  For some reason, for no reason (why not?) I’m starting to really retrain my brain into dwelling on how worth it this all is. I’m hearing the spring birds sing their song as I sit by a smoldering camp fire, for just right now… I don’t need to know why.

If ur reading this and u have them kinda thoughts and don’t know where to start, or who to talk to, I can’t promise much of anything helpful but sometimes it’s really nice just to share with someone who also gets it. I’ll listen/read etc.

I read that in a book a few years ago, though which I can’t remember. I love feeling connected to the land and lineage (and grief and magic) of Ireland. I imagine in a past life or two I was a wandering folk singer of some sorts. Well, I was in this life time too so it makes sense. My dear old nanny used to love this song, and I had the great privilege of sining it at her funeral. I was extremely uncomfortable as it was in a big Catholic Church and the priests had already made some kind of fuss as to wether or not that type of song would be allowed to be played in the “holy halls”. One thing a lot of Celts got right in their spirituality was a deep friendship with Nature and a double dose of distrust for authority (dang those empirical christianizing Brits!) hahaharerama.

Nanny bought me this ukulele ya hear on my sixteenth birthday at George’s music down the block from here. I’ve never, not once changed the strings and I love its mellow mood. So many Irish songs of beer and whackin’ each other with our trusty shillelaghs (pronounced she-lay-lee). Time for more Irishmen to settle their disputes with Ukuleles instead. Anywhooooo, it’s late and my lovin’ wife has settled in for sleep, I’d better do the same. If you’re still up, hope this finds ya somewhere safe and this song eases you into the dream world. Happy day of being happy to be Irish (apparently St. Patrick is kinda cancelled…. I mean probably all those dang “saints” should be…there just human after all…..)

Much love thanks for tuning in, for supporting, as always Ella and I appreciate a few pence in the digital tip jar (by subscribing here or sending some Venmo 904-206-1118). We’re a bit around the bend on our bills (for now) which is a good feeling. May we all one day be resourced the way the field we married each other in (where I stopped earlier to play my flute for the birds) was abundant with white clover. Gah, I’m flappin’ my beak. G’Night sweet children.

Corey

HOLLOW III COMING IN HOT (but cool and calm I’m just excited)

Peace & Love!

Corey

y

I’m just a layman man. I buried my priest robes at the beach. They weren’t even mine. I stole them and I was on the run. I was wearing a mask so they wouldn’t kill me. I was a sheep in wolves clothing. Please, forgive me for trying to teach you something. I’m listening now, and slower to speak. I’m sure that I know nothing, I’m certain I can’t save anyone.

Still, some gentle sweet thing that I like to call a soul, wants someone to hear this and find a little more permission to feel, to wonder, to fail.

Hello human!

Let’s see how do I set this up right…ummmmmmmm…… could I please have some of your money? I don’t know that’s probably too direct. Maybe I should try to prove why I deserve it first or promise a shiny reward. I don’t know, I think I’m just getting old and tired. I often feel like I’m never working hard enough or giving enough of my self away to thrive. I’ve felt guilty when I have enough to breathe and if you looked through my financial records you’d see the three or four times in my adult life where I was beginning to have a humble savings…I got rid of it as fast as possible. Though there’s some subtle part of me that perhaps perceived the dirtiness of our money I can’t go on living in this guilt trap and what I really need right now in this moment of life is enough bread to take a deep breath (we all do, and we all deserve this).

Over ten years ago now I woke up one morning and wrote a song called “The Hollow”. I had been writing songs for a few years, but this one felt different, like a new dimension of my soul was involved. I had begun to really experience emptiness and depression, to see and feel my own deep sadness and channel it through song. I had so much inner turmoil, such a desire to be heard and loved, and underneath this push-pull some flickering of an inner peace I knew I wanted to share by singing for people. And boy! Did I. My recent instagram post asking for some encouragement was met with a flood of kindness and memories that I had not anticipated and struggle to feel proud of. But I did quit school, make a bunch of soul-music, and drive all around this big country sharing in all kinds of intimate spaces. I miss it, I really do. Somewhere in all that, I wrote and made The Hollow II which was when things began to spiral out of control. My depression and dependency on booze and drugs got really bad…I kept seeking the light and finding ways to bandage over the wounds…determined to keep going. Covid, blessedly, canceled all my plans and it’s really been since then that I’ve had any sense of direction whatsoever (though I have released some amazing scrappy tunes and done a lot of healing). Last year, a month after moving in with my now wife Ella Marie, the “Hollow” portal reopened and I rewrote many of the songs from the first two projects. The slowness I’ve cultivated, the sobriety I’ve maintained, the deep and difficult work I’ve done to get back in touch with my heart all crystallized into what I truly believe is my best writing yet. These songs of despair and brokenness found their full circle into anthems of hope and healing, and songs with the deeper wisdom of what grief gives to us (presence). They are often set to very similar chord progressions and play with the original language of the tunes. Recently in a cannabis assisted therapy session (which I am training right now to facilitate…rad!) I was shown how when we change just a few words of our story we can radically shift our mindset. For example instead of saying “this situation isn’t killing me anymore, but it isn’t letting me live”… I was asked to say out loud “I am not killing myself anymore, but I am not letting myself live”.

Longing for death via suicide is one of the themes of this work, and I am happy to say I have finally found freedom from this long and bitter struggle. Six months ago I walked into a mental health clinic called “Here Tomorrow” because I was having a really intense episode of sanity collapse. I’ve tried to be honest that I’ve struggled in this way (for a long time, probably before I can even remember) and it took that total surrender to begin actually seeing my situation with any clarity. There’s a dozen threads I can tug on…religious trauma, sensitivity in scary times, etc… but they are all simply stories. I’ve learned to rest in the beautiful okayness of the present moment, even when things inside (or outside) seem REALLY not ok. I really, truly want to make this album with great care and patience. I don’t know if anyone will resonate with it, I don’t know if it will will help anyone else in their healing journey (though there’s some beautiful evidence that it might). All I know for sure is that I need to make it, and I really need help. I asked for encouragement for recording because it has been truly one of the most challenging tasks of my life. I dream that someday it will simply be easy and fun, and I’m consciously choosing to practice approaching the process with levity and ease. I remember so long ago in Nashville listening to a Derek Webb (founder of Noisetrade) talk about how as songwriters we should also be developing good businesses and if you have to keep doing kickstarters for every album then you aren’t a true musician. I may be remembering that more harshly than he said it, but for over ten years I’ve flailed and struggled to ever find equilibrium in the “music business”. I had a Patreon for some time but always felt really strange about it. I signed a record deal and that turned out to be huge mistake, thankfully not financially or logistically but the turkey who runs the joint was noooooooot very kind to me hahahahahahahaharerama . I traded the rights to my entire catalogue to a different distributor who promised to make the streaming double (by pressing all the secret buttons and levers) and instead it has shrunk further and further. The industry is so confusing and discouraging and I don’t really care to figure it out anymore. I’m just trying to ask, without caveat or proof that it’s a “sound investment” for some support. What I’d really like is to be able to just sit back and breathe for the next few months, to spend long hours tinkering with sounds and microphones (maybe even be more resourced to hire some help) and to make an album that celebrates my recovery.

I learned on tour many years ago that the word “Corey” actually means “Hollow”. I know now, that my darkness is the perfect canvas for the light to paint, that my emptiness is the perfect space for the song to reverberate. I can’t promise any fancy merch, I can’t in good faith really promise anything except that I am sincerely trying to be a true, humble artist without political or spiritual agendas. I have a few gigs, I’m making rent (barely), I’m surviving…this isn’t an ask for charity. I’m wondering if those who have been really moved by my songs will help move some energy into my corner, that I might get up and really dance. Not for you, not to entertain you, for me… For G*d (if you don’t mind me saying so)….for us. What’s the difference, really? It’s all one song and I’ll keep humming along no matter how this shakes out. Thanks for considering. Peace be with you, forevermore!

Corey Kilgannon :)

Venmo @Corey-Kilgannon Cashapp $Coreykilgannon

“Though WE may be parted, there is still a Way that we can see”.

No us vs. them, and yes a chance but also a path, a walkable path to the heart called non-violence. The golden thread of all religions.

(I am really struggling to make ends meet right now! If this tune blessed you and you’d like to put a dollar in the digital tip jar my Venmo is @Corey-Kilgannon thank you!)

I am awake thanks to my beloved cats arguing through my bedroom window. They are quite friendly to each other when both inside, but for some reason through the glass they get feisty. Maybe that’s a great metaphor, maybe we all really love each other there’s just these panes blurring our vision.

I am restless now with thoughts, and hoping putting some to the page will help me settle back down. I had a funny realization yesterday, that there’s this mechanism inside of me that in a sort of strict voice constantly demands that I share less. My zen Buddhist sensibilities sometimes convince me that the best use of my life would be to live on only water and air; that I’d be happiest if I was a silent monk. While there’s a sliver of truth in the sentiment, I am nourished by these things, I use what could be a gentle practice as a weapon to bludgeon my creativity and my voice. I am also quite happy when I share my stories, my songs, my paintings, my thoughts, and for really my own sake I’m going to try and find a little more courage to do so. Besides, I am a white-male Christian pastor after all, there’s clearly something in our kind that simply can not shut the hell up! (thankfully some of us are going on and on about how hell isn’t literal!)

I want to share a bit about my relationship with marijuana. I, like most who were raised Christian in America, was taught to be terrified of her. I didn’t try, I don’t even think I had an opportunity to try some until I was like 19 or 20 years old. My parents didn’t drink, which I’m tremendously grateful for, and I lived a sheltered, straight-edge adolescence. I don’t really believe in the trope “all things in moderation”. There’s plenty of things that we should not do even in moderation. I’d even argue personally that alcohol is probably one of those things (if you want to keep drinking definitely do not read the book This Naked Mind). Though it can be severely habit forming, and I’ve wandered through a few deserts of “addiction”, I have to say that I do think a healthy relationship with Ganja is possible and beautiful (and it does involve restraint).

What it is that I’m looking for when I go to my beloved plant teacher is a gentle hug from the divine feminine. The Christianity I was raised in, when not outright cruel, was at least hyper-critical and completely distrusting of the softer sex, nature, and anything perceived as “weak”. Militaristic language dominated my inner-world under the guise of salvation, and it was only when I rejected that kind of faith that I found the freedom to experiment with practices that widened the frame. See, my commitment to the Church (I was a worship leader, missionary, etc.) had (has) left an incredibly deep wound and a mental loop of suicidal ideation. Really the logical conclusion of fundamental Christianity in our country is a confused desire to kill your “self” (ego, sinful nature etc) instead of to walk a humble path where you get more in touch with your true self (which is light and love). It wasn’t just weed (which I don’t even like to call this plant), it was yoga, meditation, Rumi, therapy, and the oh so many other peace allies that have been exiled from the Church.

Fast forward a few years (2022): I’m an artist struggling to gain equilibrium after the pandemic up-ended my career. I live in an epic little apartment on the beach with a few other stoner musician friends and I’m growing tired of the haze and searching for clarity. Every time I try to quit ganja I do it like a soldier for consciousness, and every time I fail. I remember once I walked out my front door and a buddy was drifting down the alley with a lit joint in hand and offered me a hit. Take a hit to slow it down, times like these don’t come around, quite as often as they should, times when everything is good… I obliged. But what had worked as a medicine in excess began to fail. A therapist helped me become aware for the first time that I was not only depressed, I struggled with anxiety. I’d adopted, and gotten rather good at, this laid-back beach-mystic persona by listening to the Beatles and Bob Marley for years but underneath the mask I was constantly running from a lot of fear and unworthiness. I had a few major panic attacks, cancelled my last ever tour, and moved back in with family. One of my rock bottoms (I’ve bounced along for a few years…it’s not so bad down here).

Shortly after I go camping with a new pastor friend of mine out at peacock springs. Long-story short I get baptized while super high and have a mystical encounter under the water. Something shifted. For years I’d been reading Richard Rohr, Rob Bell, and other voices in the faith that had helped me start to repair the cracked foundation of my understanding. There are some shifts in knowledge that were so fundamental to my being able to keep existing, and I am eternally grateful to those scholars for showing the true way. The baptism lead to “conversion” which lead to Pastor school (which was so weird and awesome and I could probably write a book about it…maybe that’s what this is?) and for the last year and some change I’ve been an ordained minister of the Gospel of our Lord (please read that sentence in a Nacho Libre voice). I had a hard time with that word “Lord” for a long while. Like Land-Lord or King it just gives authoritarian vibes. I learned that, at least when Mary Magdalene used it, it was more of an endearing term like something a wife might use of a loving husband. That’s not the rabbit hole we are in right now though.

As a Pastor, I try (without force) to help other people off the hook of their misunderstandings and to offer a salve for the wounds the Christian militia (I mean church) inflicted on them. I have tried, relentlessly, to cease using cannabis completely for many reasons, some of them sound, but ultimately because I was judging the crap out of my self for still wanting to. Recently, when working on my first art show, I took one small ceremonial hit from my pipe and did a little breath work. I do want to say that responsible use (for me) looks like only taking tiny amounts at a time and always spending at least the fist few minutes in some kind of meditation/prayer practice. I was flooded with love and compassion, and began to weep when this thought flooded down from my mind to my heart and finally felt true, “G*D IS NOT MAT AT ME”. Though I had been trying to really allow it to sink in for years, it was really only a few weeks ago that I let it resonate all the way to the center, and it feels so good and right. I can’t prove it theologically, but I can share my story and say that it feels like life has only just begun. Life through the lens that we are sinners in need of a sacrifice, at least for me, never made enough sense to be worth living. Reframe Yeshua’s death as the ultimate surrender to passivity and non-violence, tell me that G*d’s love is so universally encompassing that I don’t need to hate or resist anyone even as they drive nails into my hands… that kind of compassion makes every breath a miracle.

I do have some hilarious stoner stories. In the first week or two of being a pastor a buddy and I smoked half a joint in the closet of my office while a school play took place downstairs. Smoke rises right? No problem. I failed to consider that the main air-conditioning unit for the building was also in that closet, so I basically sent the sweet smell of one of G*d’s most interesting flowers wafting down to all hundred or so children and their parents. If I didn’t get fired for that I suppose my “job” security is pretty solid. I don’t really think of being a pastor as my job, for a litany of reasons. Being an artist is my job, and holding this strange role is sort of side-quest or a hobby. That helps me not take it too seriously, Jesus didn’t seem to take religious guys too seriously himself. He saw through all their posturing and pandering, he taught that it’s what in the heart that matters not what’s in the dogmas and traditions. But, for some of us weirdos, religious tradition is enjoyable and that’s why it’s important for me as a religious leader to proclaim, “NO FRUIT IS FORBIDDEN.”

“Forbidden Fruit” was always my favorite strain of flower. A deep purple heavy indica, I’ve been drawn to it many times over the years. I think often the spirals of dependency were fueled by this sort of punk attitude that by smoking pot I was doing something wrong. Underneath the “I don’t care” act, despite how long I’ve been enjoying herb, there’s still been vestiges of shame. I’m over it, and I’m writing this confession so I can stand tall, as a healed and happy man who occasionally uses a little plant medicine to get HERE. That’s the best guiding principal I have to stay in the flow of moderate, healthy use. I’m not trying to get high. I’m trying to stay here, and sometimes because of my religious trauma I tend to dip down low. The answer isn’t always ganja, often it’s a run or a cold shower, or a good conversation, or a few episodes of the office.

I carved “WWJD” into one of my little wooden smoking apparatuses, as cheesy as it is it’s really a great question to ask. What I know from the stories, and from my personal encounters with the Cosmic Christ, is that he does not judge us. I know he brought more wine to the wedding (which I think was psychedelic but that’s another rabbit hole). I know that he deeply loved the feminine, honored his mother, and held his beloved Mary in such a way that it set her free. I try to do the same, I am grateful to live in a time where the persecution of this plant is coming to an end. In fact, I bought my favorite strain from my friend’s shop the other day and learned more about Delta 9 and the hemp bill of 2018. Worth looking into, I was confused about what it is but basically the fed accidentally made Marijuana legal so long as its still considered hemp. A versatile plant with incredible benefits, a gift from G*d to man. Let us be clear-headed, and open-hearted, and use without shame or fear the allies our beautiful planet has for us to get, and stay HERE.

Ok, I’m sleepy now. Thanks for listening,

Pastor Corey Ras Kilgannon

It’s all prop money. I’m a rich man today, in the currencies that count in the long run: gratitude, joy, love, simplicity. Each year I’m amazed again by the November light. Oh and I’m glad I lived to see it. Hope you’re finding some cool treasures today (I’ve got a few books in amazon cart…we will see if I get any tips down at the brunch joint I play piano at on Fridays). They are all lying to you, and once you know the truth you are free. There is no scarcity on this planet. There’s plenty of food, plenty of water, plenty of warmth, and there is plenty of money. Actually, there’s too much money! That’s a whole different rabbit hole and one I’m not so qualified to speak on. What I’m qualified to say is this: IT IS ALL LOVE.

May you feel today, even if only for a moment, that you have…that you ARE: more than enough.

In peace,

CK

I can’t remember exactly why I was having an emotional/psychological meltdown (which is good I guess?). It may have been as simple as the fact that the studio was right on third street, which is the beach highway, and for hours I’d hear all the cars roaring past.  Sound is so powerful. Anyway, I bailed frantically to a nearby park to meditate in the bushes against this wonderful palm tree.  You can’t make this up… as soon as I settled in for a few minutes I started to hear tapping and feel plant debris raining down on my head.  I laughed, and without opening my eyes decided I could still meditate beneath a busy wood-pecker.  A few minutes later I did slowly blink open only to see an enormous spider coming in hot hungry for blood.  This I could not sit calmly and endure, I shot to my feet (twice as manic as I was when I arrived) and raced back to the studio.  I burst in the door, sloppily mixed the ink into the water, and intended to paint a horrible looking spider to extricate all the negativity.  The circle of its body was as far as I got.  The shape stopped me in my tracks, my breath slowed, I stared at it for who knows how long. I returned to equilibrium.  Later, in a serene state of mind I filled the circle with prayer.  I don’t think I’ll ever sell this one.  It reminds me, whenever I look at it, that the chaos gives way to calm when we are patient

All the good stuff is in the subtle details,