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Echoes from the Multiverse
- Kishan Khoday
- Aug 9
- 7 min read
My Initiation
The nexus of culture and the environment has driven the mythic imagination for millennia, shaping human civilization and its development pathways. Music in particular has been a medium to reconnect people, nature and the cosmos. Music, as well as other art forms, has allowed communities worldwide to express the mythic imagination, the changing nature of global and local ecosystems, the shifting balance between people and nature, as well as their fears, hopes and collective visions for the future.
For the past twenty-five years I have been with the United Nations, having led our work around the world on the sustainable development agenda, helping combat the planetary crisis of climate change and loss of ecosystems. We have also empowered local cultures and sustained communities' efforts to combat poverty and inequality. This has been my pollen path—the center of my life’s work. I have encountered much beauty during my global UN assignments: the planet’s diverse ecosystems and our multiverse of cultures and mythologies. My journey has also entailed many challenges which ecosystems and communities face in achieving a future of sustainability and resilience. Embracing the connection between culture and the environment is a key priority in this regard.
Mythic harmonies in the Himalayas
My career initiation started not behind a desk but on a mountain, shaped by mythic experiences, music and the power of nature. My first UN assignment, in the mid-1990s in the Garhwal region of the Indian Himalayas, involved my working with one of the world’s leading experts on mountain ecosystems to better understand the implications of rapid climate change and biodiversity loss for local cultures and communities. The Himalayas,known as the “Third Pole,” are the highest peaks on the planet. Their glaciers and rich waters are the source of some of the world’s oldest civilizations and mythic traditions. The Garhwal region of the Himalayas is a center of yogic culture and home of the ascetics since millennia, with deep reverence for the surrounding heavenly mountain systems and the mythic tales that accompany them. Garhwal is also home to the famous Chipko movement, led by women rural villagers in the 1970s. Their original “tree hugger” sustainability campaign gained global resonance, inspiring nonviolent actions for social justice and ecological protection worldwide.
Like any initiation, my experience entailed trials and tribulations, including the various development challenges faced by local communities which were the subject of extensive field work. But the most impactful part of my initial journey as a UN practitioner was connecting with communities on ways local culture shaped their relation with nature. A particularly inspirational experience was joining local traveling musical theatre groups connected with a local ashram. Their work focused on reconnecting people and nature through mythology. The traveling bands adapted ancient Vedic myths about the Himalayas, accentuating pre-existing ecological themes and integrating modern aspects of climate change and biodiversity loss. This conveyed messages on the connection between humans, nature and cosmos via musical performances and village theatre that reenacted myths. This served as a medium for conveying and preserving inherited wisdom via mythologies on both the age-old and modern dimensions of ecological crisis and community resilience in Himalayan society.
Music has allowed communities worldwide to express the mythic imagination, the changing nature of global and local ecosystems, the shifting balance between people and nature, as well as their fears, hopes and collective visions for the future.
Music and theatre conveyed, through the power of myth, both fears and challenges, as well as hopes, visions for the future and collective wisdom on the importance of balancing people and nature. The sharp sounds from the artisans’ traditional string instruments intertwined with the deep drumbeats, generated a sacred atmosphere in which the theatre performance unfolded, with actors adorned in colorful costumes depicting mythical characters. All around were the thrusting waves of sound from the sweeping mountain winds and from the rural villagers themselves, some speaking about the story being conveyed, some joining the chorus, others laughing or crying during scenes of the performance. I was inspired seeing the artisans’ commitment to sustainability and their creativity in mobilizing ancient myths to reconnect people and nature.
This was a formative experience, shaping my lifelong career focused on the role of culture in building robustness for communities and the environment. As my first UN assignment, it showed me in a real, visceral way how mythic imagination and storytelling are the roots of resilience for local and indigenous communities across critical ecosystems in the Himalayas, and indeed the world over.
Rhythms from the archipelago
After my time in the Himalayas, my next UN assignment took me to Indonesia, an archipelagic nation of over 17,000 islands. Sitting along the Ring of Fire, the archipelago is one of the world’s most ecologically and culturally diverse regions, a complex system of remote island ecosystems and communities. This complexity is reflected in Indonesian mythology, emerging over millennia, as well as in its rich forms of music, dance and art.
This stage of my initiation involved time with the communities around Mount Bromo on the eastern edge of Java, near Bali. Mount Bromo is an ancient volcano, part of a chain at the center of a massive caldera formed over 30,000 years ago, surrounded by a black mantle of sand generated by ash over time. Bromo is named after Brahma, the lord of creation in Vedic mythology—a testament to the life-giving nature of volcanoes and their role in the cosmogony, or mythic original stories, here and globally.
Beyond our work supporting local efforts to address climate impacts on communities and sustaining vital forest, mangrove and coral ecosystems, I was privileged to participate alongside a group of shamans and yogis in Kasada, an ancient cultural tradition of the local community. Starting in a temple at the base of the volcano, we sat cross-legged at the centre of the open air courtyard of the complex, adorned in traditional attire. Slowly, the sound of a music ensemble started to reverberate across the black stone structure.
This was the ancient Gamelan percussion instrument system. A group of musicians began to play, at first slowly, then at a rapid pace, with Gamelan’s classic rhythmic and cyclic structure. This features complex polyrhythms, conveying the complexity of nature and the cosmos. Gamelan’s smooth rhythmic nature, utilized in traditional Javanese and Balinese spiritual ceremonies, uses a cyclical and repetitive harmonic flow rather than a linear one, symbolizing the repeating aspect of nature and society. This initiated our experience. Then with the shaman and yogis, we entered a deep meditation, devoid of sound, immersing ourselves into self-realization. This commenced at night and lasted approximately six hours. We arose at sunrise the next day, welcoming the day with the rhythmic chanted of “aum.”
The circularity and singularity of the Gamelan rhythm aligned with the chanting of “aum.” As Campbell has noted, “aum” represents the cycle of life with three sub-dimensions of the character—representing creation, sustenance and death—and a fourth dimension being the silence underlying them, from which the cycle emerges and to which it returns (The Power of Myth, 286-87). Awakening from the meditation, I realized how the Gamelan expressed our pathway through this cycle, towards a soundless unity and singularity. Via the meditative process,we became one with the complex fabric of life on Earth and across the cosmos.
The long walk towards the volcano of Mount Bromo was a meditative experience in itself. We joined a procession up the volcano’s side, led by the shamans, and sprinkled provisions of fruits, flowers and other items into the crater as fumes rose from its depths. After the intensive ceremony, I understood first how the archipelago’s diverse cultures express a mythic balance between society and nature through its music and arts. I also witnessed how the spirit of Gamelan infuses overall culture and ways of life. This was a formative experience into the nexus of nature and culture, carried forward through my term in Indonesia for many years thereafter, advancing resilient communities and ecosystems.
Reverberations to the future
Building on my initiation and six years of UN deployments in India and Indonesia, I have continued on my pollen path over the past twenty-five years. Further UN assignments took me to places like China, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Belize and Jamaica, each for five-year terms. Additionally, through our work supporting countries and communities combating inequality and ecological decline, I experienced the multiversal ways that communities, nature, and cosmos address these challenges through myth and culture.
Myths contain the deep spiritual and ecological intelligence of local and indigenous communities, continuing to vitally contribute to global goals of reconnecting people and planet, and crafting more inclusive, nature-based futures. This is rooted in local experience. As Campbell noted, the multiverse of cultures and ecosystems across the planet show that “These are the eyes of the Earth. And this is the voice of the universe” (The Power of Myth, 40). What else?
MythBlast authored by:
Kishan Khoday is a Fellow at the Joseph Campbell Foundation, serving in a pro-bono capacity to support research and analysis of the role of mythology in advancing goals of sustainability and resilience. A planetary scientist and international lawyer, Kishan has practiced with the United Nations for over 25 years, leading local cooperation with communities, governments and change makers to combat inequality, advance nature-based solutions and develop capacities for transformation change. Kishan has been a thought leader on the nexus of nature, culture and development, having traveled to over fifty countries and serving in UN country assignments across Asia and the Pacific, the Middle East and North Africa and the Caribbean.
This MythBlast was inspired by the Initiation stage of the hero's journey and The Hero's Journey: Joseph Campbell on his Life and Work.
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"Rhythm is the instrument of art."
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