We live in a world where all we see is the tip of the iceberg. How far down the rabbit hole are you willing to go? What is a hole, really, in relation to enlightenment? Isn’t everything relative? Some things, however, are literal. Particularly this aforementioned hole. In a practice called trepanation,a hole is surgically drilled into the front part of a person’s skull and then left to heal on its own. This procedure is said to bring an altered state of mind and a higher sense of awareness and enlightenment.

Trepanation is esteemed to be the oldest surgical procedure in the world being performed as far back as 10,000 B.C. This practice has actually found its way into civilizations spanning to almost every continent from South America to Europe. Coincidentally, the Hindu god of altered consciousness, Shiva, bore the mark of trepanation.

A woman by the name of Amanda Feilding actually happens to be somewhat of an authority on this practice. Ms. Feilding performed the procedure on herself in the absence of a doctor in the early 70’s and has continued to do so ever since. Being an authority on the matter, a series of questions were posed to her regarding her beliefs and outlook. According to Feilding it absolutely does have medicinal purposes. She says that ancient civilizations who practiced this simply could not formulate the exact medical verbiage for why trepanation was important to the body. Their early descriptions for it were “letting light in” or “letting devils out”. She also says that trepanation has been used to in the successful treatment of chronic headaches, epilepsy, and migraines.

A very interesting description that she gave for why trepanation is so relevant to a functioning healthy human condition was the process that a baby’s skull goes through during maturation. After birth the infant’s skull is soft and flexible. The pulse is uninhibited. As it develops and grows the soft area on top of the skull closes, then the skull closes and the once uninhibited pulse is now restricted. The full pulsation within the body and the brain is no longer there. This restriction in the pulse, she believes, results in a ratio change of the blood and cerebral spinal fluid. Trepanation creates an opening which allows full pulsation. When a scientific perspective is given to such an eccentric procedure it changes the viewpoint, somewhat, from the picture of something primal to the idea of something plausible.
[source:www.vice.com]