Feeling to add my two cents about some of the big shifts currently unfolding in the global psychedelic movement. Particularly the legislation of certain substances for use within the context of Psychedelic Assisted Therapy. I'll say off the bat, that I'm ultimately for full legislation within all contexts and generally prefer an atmosphere of trusting adults to make their own decisions about what they do and don't ingest for whatever reasons they choose. A healthy ecology has diversity, and a diversity of approaches feels more necessary now than ever in my opinion. However, with the exception of a handful of countries like Peru, that is not our reality at this moment. Instead, we are seeing mostly only psychiatrists and in some places, psychotherapists being given the green light to administer these medicines and only within the therapeutic context.
Having a background as a traditionally trained Ayahuasca ceremonialist within the Shipibo tradition, part of me has felt quite ambivalent about this sudden enthusiasm around psychedelic plant medicines and the ways they are now being embraced by mainstream psychology (I'm speaking specifically to plant medicines, not MDMA, Ketamine etc. which I think is fantastic!). Until very recently, these institutions have demonised and pathologized these medicines and the altered states they engender (of course there have always been certain individuals who are/were exceptions, Stan Grof being one of the many who comes to mind), so it seems a little bizarre to me that they are now the only legal keepers of these medicines.
"Because they did not know God, therefore, in their error, they worshipped every creature as divine, namely the Sun, the Moon and stars, thunder, birds, even four-legged animals, even the toad. They also had forests, fields and bodies of water, which they held so sacred that they neither chopped wood nor dared to cultivate fields or fish in them."
~ Peter of Dusburg, Chronicon Terrae Prussiae, iii, 5, 53.
THE EMBODIMENT CONFERENCE
We are delighted to be part of The Embodiment Conference. It will be a rich opportunity to come home to your body, in our chaotic world. Many of the planet’s best teachers will be there, and it costs nothing to be a part of. It’s free to all, online, and boasts keynote speakers such as Charles Eisenstein, Philip Shepherd, Judith Blackstone, David Abram, Bayo Akamolofe and many more.
Slowly emerging from the cacoon of dieta... Tender and slow...
The stillness reverberating, and me, rocked gently in its arms... Unpealing my wild mind... finding shapes hidden inside... shapes other-than-human to occupy and old tongues flapping... Long out of use, finding their voice. In me. Again.
“The crucible of making human beings is death. Every culture worth a damn knows that. It’s not success, it’s not growth, it’s not happiness. It’s death. That’s the cradle of your love of life; the fact that it ends.” — Stephen Jenkinson
In this weeks podcast episode we have Skye and Miraz joining us.
We go deep into a number of themes exploring the culture of separation that plagues the collective sphere we all find ourselves in, the re-orientation of our perception to animistic worldviews, their many years in the amazon jungle studying amazonian shamanism, the frameworks that the indigneous shipibo people passed onto them to assist in the relating with a living breathing jungle, and extrapolating from that, a living breathing planet, and how this path interrelates into the work that they’re currently doing, known as deep ecology, aka, the work that reconnects.
I can still remember the exact moment I spotted Lilikoi's tendriled, amethyst body in a sea of lush green forest... her celestial scent mingled with the heady humus of the jungle floor...
Deep Earth Dreaming 