Enroll in Vital Psychedelic Training, starting September 17!
Master the art of psychedelic practice

Learn More

Post Tag: Spiritual

Posted on

Matthew Pallamary – Exploring Ayahuasca Shamanism


Download

Introduction

In this episode of Psychedelics Today, host Joe Moore and Kyle Buller interview Matt Pallamary, and have a discussion with him about his writing, research, and ayahuasca experiences. He also shares his concerns about self-proclaimed gurus and some issues that have been emerging because of the popularity of ayahuasca.

3 Key Points:

  1. Science fiction writer Ray Bradbury was a mentor of Matt Pallamary.
  2. There are pros and cons to ayahuasca shamanism in Peru.
  3. The more in touch with the natural world you are the more balanced you are.

Show Notes

  • Matt Pallamary was part of the early psychedelics podcast scene.
  • Matt grew up in Dorchester near Boston, and he began early experiences with sniffing glue, weed, and getting acid from a chemist from M.I.T..
  • He has almost 20 years experience with ayahuasca.
  • Too many people have a couple of ayahuasca experiences and claim to be a guru.
  • Famed science fiction writer Ray Bradbury was a mentor of Matt Pallamary.
  • Everything is energy—the whole universe exists between our eyes.
  • Matt labels shamans as the first storytellers, the first musicians, the first performers, psychologists, psychiatrists, and first performers.
  • Being in touch with the natural world makes a person more balanced.
  • The boundaries between your conscious and subconscious are blurred, overlapping your visions, dreams, and waking life.
  • When going through an ayahuasca experience, you have to be in a safe place where you can be vulnerable and around people you can trust.
  • For ayahuasca experiences, be sure to get references from people that have successfully worked with a group.

Resources Mentioned:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCKedqiAQ7g]

About Author

   

Author, Editor, and Shamanic Explorer Matthew J. Pallamary is an award winning writer, musician, and sound healer who has been studying shamanism all of his life. He incorporates shamanic practices into his daily life as well as into his writing and teaching. He has over a dozen books in print that cover several genres, many of which have been translated into foreign languages.

His book on writing, Phantastic Fiction: A Shamanic Approach to Story took First Place in the International Book Awards Writing and Editing Category, and his popular Phantastic Fiction Workshop has been a staple of the Santa Barbara Writers Conference and the Southern California Writer’s Conference for over twenty five years. He has also lectured about writing and shamanism at numerous venues throughout the United States.

Matt has spent extended time in the jungles, mountains, and deserts of North, Central, and South America pursuing his studies of shamanism and ancient cultures. Through his research into both the written word and the ancient beliefs of shamanism, he has uncovered the heart of what a story really is and integrated it into core dramatic concepts that also have their basis in shamanism.

Posted on

Mike Branc – Mikeadelic, Ayahuasca and Coming Back to America

Mike Branc

Download
In this 88th episode of Psychedelics Today, host Joe Moore interviews Mike Brancatelli of the Mikeadelic podcast. After returning from a three-month Amazonian ayahuasca sojourn, Mikeadelic himself shares information about this extraordinary experience, how he has gotten involved in psychedelics and his journey.

Show Notes:
● Mike Brancatelli spent his three-month trip in Peru at the Temple of the Way of Lights with their residency program in the heart of the Amazon jungle during an ayahuasca retreat.
● Mike was previously doing stand-up comedy in New York City with his friend Dave Smith called “Part of the Problem.”
● Mikeadelic the podcast began in the spring of 2016.
● Drinking ayahuasca will produce an effect on you, especially when coupled with ceremony and healing songs.
● During an intense healing ceremony, a song cut to the core of the collection of pain that Mike was experiencing, and it felt like he was being unclogged of this negative energy, and it came out in the form of a very vocal purge.
● He feels passionate about ending the war on drugs and the prison industrial complex.
● You can remain filled with passion and compassion without being emotionally attached. Sit with your feelings without letting them control how you respond.
● The information overload of media drowns your spirit.
● A morning routine with meditation is helpful to get centered and focused for the rest of the day.
● The Netflix TV series “Wild Wild Country” is a true story about a controversial cult leader claiming to enlighten people.
● “Enlightenment Now” is a book about the enlightenment philosophy “science, reason and humanism”. It is a contemporary take on that philosophy – you could call Pinker’s take a Modern Enlightenment philosophy. Steven Pinker wrote the book. Joe Moore, suggests it and found out about it from the Bill Gates’s.
● “The Internet of Money” Volume 1 and Volume 2 by Andreas M. Antonopoulos is another interesting read suggested by Joe Moore.
● Before ayahuasca use, listen to your heart to understand why you want to try it.

3 Key Points:
1. During an intense healing ceremony, a song cut to the core of the collection of pain that Mike was experiencing, and it felt like he was being unclogged of this negative energy, and it came out in the form of a very vocal purge.
2. It is incredibly brave to be willing to confront your stress and be willing to stare into your soul and slay your demons.
3. Remain passionate, compassionate, and acknowledge the problems in the world, but don’t stay emotionally attached to them. Become mindful of how you respond.

Posted on

Daniel McQueen – DMTx and Future Psychedelic Technologies


Download

In this episode of Psychedelics Today, host Joe Moore interviews Daniel McQueen, Co-Founder of Medicinal Mindfulness and the DMT research project called DMTx. They discuss the extended-state DMT research project that they are involved in, the personal DMT trip experiences that Daniel McQueen has had, and what this research can make possible.

3 Key Points:

  1. Daniel McQueen does private retreats, groups, conscious cannabis circles, healing meditations, and community breath work.
  2. Goals for called Extended State DMT research include healing clinical concerns and advanced creative problem-solving with experts that need assistance.
  3. We are four-dimensional beings in an 11-dimensional reality.

Show Notes

  • What is DMTx?
  • Who originated the concept?
    • Dr. Rick Strassman and Dr. Andrew Gallimore.
  • Daniel’s story of a very intense and meaningful DMT experience
  • Depth Psychology is trying to bring things from the subconscious to the surface.
  • Humanist Psychology is based on what it means to be human and the human experience.
  • William James is one of the fathers of Transpersonal Psychology, which integrates the spiritual and transcendent aspects of the human experience with psychology.
  • Psychedelics Today has partnered with Daniel McQueen of Medicinal Mindfulness on a project called DMTx (Extended-State DMT research) which involves using an IV pump to keep a steady stream of DMT in the bloodstream for a long period of time.
  • Daniel McQueen does private retreats, groups, conscious cannabis circles, healing meditations, and community breath work.
  • DMT is “the most profound hallucinogen that we have access to.” It doesn’t lose its effect the more you use it.
  • Once you hit the peak of the DMT trip during Extended State DMT you stabilize.
  • People have been overwhelmed when smoking DMT because the dosages may have been too high with a lack of a sense of meaning—an overdose of stimulation.
  • A peak experience that Daniel had was slug beings showing the soul of his unborn child.
  • After his second child was born, Daniel had another trip where an authoritative being searched for the soul of his child that had now been born.
  • The risk is low but bad events not handled properly could involve: a cardiac arrest, situation even though there are no known cases and psychological crisis and mania.
  • Daniel is working towards a DMT travel exhibition with four experiences included.
  • Spiritual traditions will be integrated into the research to acknowledge the spiritual possibilities.
  • Goals for the project include healing clinical concerns and advanced creative problem-solving with experts that need assistance.
  • Daniel believes psychedelic medicines give us the potential to see things beyond three dimensions.
  • What happens when our culture is literate to the psychedelic space?
  • There is a moral case to make to prevent people using altered states to create more advanced dangerous weapons.
  • We are four-dimensional beings in an 11-dimensional reality.
  • Why can’t we use a more scientific approach to move towards spiritual awakenings?


Resources Mentioned

Daniel McQueen, MA

      

Daniel discovered meditation and spiritual practices at twelve and has been interested in exploring inner states ever since.  He apprenticed under a number of shamanic teachers and has been a practicing intentional journeyer for over 16 years.  For Daniel, working in the professional field of Cannabis and Psychedelics isn’t a career interest, but represents a core identity and life calling.  Finding a place to honor such a life calling within a world that has until recently prohibited it has been an interesting challenge.

After graduating from the University of Arkansas with a degree in Communication, Daniel traveled down a many forked and unmarked road through the wild terrain of political activism, corporate accountability research and campaign finance reform for many years in Washington, DC.  Disillusioned by the city, he moved to Florida and opened a small meditation center to explore grassroots community organizing before moving to Boulder, CO and returning to school at Naropa University.

Daniel earned a Masters Degree in Transpersonal Counseling Psychology from Naropa and received advanced training in MDMA-assisted psychotherapy through a year internship with the MAPS Boulder MDMA for PTSD Study.  It was his experience with MAPS that inspired Daniel to explore alternative visions in cannabis and psychedelic activism and entrepreneurship.

Daniel bridges transpersonal paradigms with the grounded clinical and organizational skills necessary to begin addressing the significant ecological and mental health crises facing our society today.  Although Daniel no longer practices as a clinical psychotherapist, he supports his clients as a teacher, coach, ally and event facilitator, providing individual and group transformational experiences and deeply held intentional conversations.  In his practice, Daniel quickly realized that the most important intervention he could provide to his clients, who were isolated and longed for meaningful contact with others, was a sense of community.  Medicinal Mindfulness is, in a very real way, a cultural intervention that provides a safe and transformational community container for healing and awakening… a program based on skill development and not dogma.  Since 2012, Daniel has been teaching a psychedelic harm prevention and intentional psychedelic use course called Psychedelic Sitters School.  Since the legalization of recreational cannabis in Colorado, he has been facilitating group journey experiences called Conscious Cannabis Events and guiding individual cannabis journeys.

In addition to his work with Medicinal Mindfulness, Daniel has a successful spirituality and life coaching practice with his wife, Alison, through their company, Aspenroots Counseling LLC.  Highly skilled in identifying and cultivating giftedness in young people and supporting significant life transitions, Daniel is inspired to support passionate and talented individuals striving to live into their calling.  A primary focus of his practice involves assessing and addressing the benefits and difficulties related to psychedelic and cannabis use and misuse.

Daniel co-founded the Naropa Alliance for Psychedelic Studies and helped organize the first annual Psychedelic Symposium at Naropa University in 2012.

About Medicinal Mindfulness

Medicinal Mindfulness® LLC and Medicinal Mindfulness Events LLC

Medicinal Mindfulness is a grassroots consciousness community/membership organization and education program that supports individuals and groups who choose to use cannabis and psychedelics with intention.  Founded by Daniel McQueen, MA, and his wife, Alison McQueen, MA, our community has come together to provide an enjoyable, safe, open and affirming space to share transformational cannabis and breathwork experiences.

We use clinically informed, mindfulness-based approaches within a somatically oriented, transpersonal and community paradigm to create an holistic (mind, body, spirit) process that initiates powerful transformations in healing and personal development.

Services are available for individuals, couples, families and groups.

Given the common misunderstandings and concerns that accompany the field of psychedelics and cannabis harm prevention and advocacy, we are committed to making ourselves available to public service and safety professionals to answer questions regarding psychedelic and cannabis harm reduction programs.

Posted on

Zach Leary – Trans-humanism, psychedelic use, over-use and taking a break


Download

Introduction

During this episode of Psychedelics Today, your hosts Kyle Buller and Joe Moore talk to Zach Leary host of the MAPS podcast and It’s All Happening. We have an incredible time talking to Zach and his worldview, experiences, opinions and much more. It was a very fun time recording with Zach and we hope it can happen again in the near future. 

Show Notes

  • Joe and Kyle discuss Zach’s connections with Ram Dass
  • Zach Leary calls himself a futurist and we discuss what a futurist is.
    • A natural way to continue the narrative of our physical evolution and our spiritual development.
    • Cyberspace is an invention as a result of our human condition.
      • The way and the reason we invented it is that we found a need to create another dimension.
    • Futurism and transhumanism and embracing the way technology is augmenting the human experience is a great place to be.
  • Do you see any major problems in psychedelia?
    • Overall, it’s a great time to be into psychedelics.
      • There’s so much research and data available to the end-user and the discussion is improving.
      • Many people are starting to be more open about their beneficial relationship with psychedelics.
      • It’s important to get people in the mainstream aware of their beneficial properties.
      • The Ayahuasca fad going on in the U.S. has many people calling themselves shamans, which raised a red flag to Zach.
      • It used to be that going to the medicine man was a common occurrence in any culture.
      • Mysticism didn’t go away, it just got turned into a more doctrinal practice.
  • The part of the church that bothers Zach is the authoritarian aspect, that there is only one god.
    • There’s an element of fanaticism when someone says there’s only one drug that’s worth taking.
    • April 19 is the 75th anniversary of the first intentional use of LSD (Bicycle Day).
    • We have to start re-thinking about what “natural” means.
      • The human imagination and what it creates is a by-product of nature.
  • There’s no stopping the technological march, the train has left the station.
    • A return to nature can include biodiverse rooftop gardens in New York.
    • It’s very hard to get off the grid.
  • What do we have that’s readily available and sustainable?
    • Mushrooms
    • LSD
    • Other synthetic compounds that don’t bother the rainforest, etc.
  • Drugs that may not be sustainable:
    • Ayahuasca, Peyote, 5-MeO (Sonoran Desert Toad – Bufo Alvarius toad venom)
    • Some people are playing fast and loose with 5-MeO
      • There are people who give do things to “patients” that are non-consensual while they are under the effect of the drug.
  • Psychedelics are often highly individualistic.
    • It’s nice to be able to jump in with a shaman, but to what extent?
  • There is some cultural appropriation here when you take ancient practices and move them into new environments.
    • It’s best not to ignore the roots and traditions of these practices but honor them as best as you can.
  • How do we not make mistakes in psychedelics?
    • There’s so much data, examples and role models now.
    • There are best practices based on data now.
  • Zach would like to see less consumption of MDMA.
    • People over-consume MDMA.
    • More of a concern about bodily harm.
    • 2-3 times a year is probably enough.
  • There are parallel paths going on and if the parallel path of computers and humanity are going on, what does that look like eventually?
  • What are some of your major influences in the psychedelic world?
    • Terence McKenna, Jim Fadiman, Timothy Leary, Aldous Huxley, Dennis McKenna
  • How would you like to see the future of psychedelics evolve?
    • We’re seeing the rumblings of what’s to come.
    • There’s going to be a firmly legitimate place in the psychiatric world for the psychedelic therapy.
    • Hopefully, it carries over into recreational use and cognitive therapy.

Links

About Zach Leary

     

Zach is the host of both the “It’s All Happening with Zach Leary” podcast and “The MAPS Podcast.” They have helped to cement him as one of the most thought provoking podcasters in the cultural philosophy genre of podcasting. He’s also a blogger/writer, a futurist, spiritualist, a technology consultant and socio-cultural theorist.

In all of Zach’s work he blends his roles as a spiritual aspirant and a futurist into a unique identity all his own. His spiritual background has it’s roots in being a practitioner of bhakti yoga as taught through many of the vedantic systems of Northern India, in particular Neem Karoli Baba as taught by Ram Dass. Through the practice of bhakti yoga he has found keys that unlock doorways that allow the soul to experience it’s true nature of being eternal, full of knowledge and full of bliss. In addition to bhakti yoga, Zach is influenced by many different methods and traditions of consciousness exploration ranging from trans-humanism to buddhism and clinical psychology. Zach is also a frequent pundit on the political systems that are fueling todays economic and cultural structures. At the core of all of Zach’s work is the belief that we have been fused together by the collective practice of using technology to expand our species imagination with spirituality and mysticism to define the very nature of who we are.

Check out our online store

 

Posted on

James Norwood – Madness, Spiritual Emergence, and the Gnosis Retreat Center


Download

James Norwood, MA, joins Kyle and Michelle Hobart for a talk about spiritual emergence, madness, entheogens, and the Gnosis Retreat Center.

Learn more about Gnosis: http://www.gnosisretreatcenter.org/

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4-lJWwwRc8]

A brief introduction to Gnosis

Suppose you come to the end of your tether, can no longer cope, have a break-down, fall apart, go to pieces. To whom would you turn? Where would you go?
What alternatives do you have when you desperately need help, but have little, if any, say in the kind of help available?

When a person’s suffering becomes insupportable, to him or herself and to others, and yet persists, that person is in a state of distress. Once you find yourself in distress you come to realize that you are at the mercy of other people. Which of those people are you willing to be at their mercy, for better or worse? To whom are you willing to entrust your life? If you don’t happen to know anyone who comes to mind, then how will you go about finding someone you can trust? Do such persons exist?

Gnosis Retreat Center aspires to be such a place, by providing a safe place to be, when you are alone and afraid, confused, bereft, and not sure whom to turn to for help. Gnosis is a household that is populated by others like yourself, a refuge for those who are lost, afraid, bewildered, or simply seeking a fresh start, who may, if they choose, get over their ordeal and see it through, without jeopardy.

If you want to learn more about spiritual emergence(y) check out this online webinar: Spiritual Emergence or Psychosis?

Links

Additional video link of interest to the viewers:

This is the video of the talk on Why Radical Community is Vital

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOI_qT0mDKs&t=15s

About James Norwood, MA

James Norwood, MA, is a doctoral student in the Clinical Psychology program at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, California. Norwood is presently working as a clinical intern, researching MDMA-assisted psychotherapy in concert with the Multi-Disciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies, and is on the board of directors of Free Association Inc., a nonprofit organization that provides alternatives to treatment for people with altered experiences of reality in the Bay Area.

About Michelle Anne Hobart, MA

Michelle Anne Hobart, MA: is a practitioner of energy medicine and holistic health educator. She holds a BS in Biology, and an MA in Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness. Currently, she is doing coursework in Integral Counseling Psychology at California Institute of Integral Studies. Michelle is an advocate for the Neurodiversity movement and a certified Spiritual Emergence Coach. She supports sensitive, empathic people whose gifts and experiences have been judged or oppressed and who are in the process of reclaiming and recovering their self-care, power, and personal truth. Michelle offers workshops, retreats, support groups, and one-on-one sessions.

Posted on

What is Breathwork?


Download

What is breathwork and Transpersonal Breathwork? Kyle and Joe talk about the components and mechanics of breathwork and share some personal experiences. Breathwork is a topic that is brought up often on Psychedelics Today, so here is a more in-depth discussion about what it is. The form of breathwork that Joe and Kyle are trained in is Transpersonal Breathwork. More about this practice below.

About Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork

From dreamshadow.com

Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork is an applied, practice-linked philosophy that uses the method of Stanislav Grof’s Holotropic Breathwork as a modern shamanic practice for self-discovery through cathartic re-experience of events from a person’s biographic history and the process of birth, as well as the potential apprehension of archetypes and events in the cosmos.

The experiential aspect of Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork uses a combination of group process, intense breathing, evocative music, body work, and expressive drawing.

The term “transpersonal” refers to those experiences where our sense of self-identity expands beyond our personal biography and ego boundaries and transcends the usual limitations of time and space. These experiences facilitate deeper understanding of ourselves, our relation to others and our place in the universe. They help us gain increased comfort in daily life and a spiritual intelligence that fosters calm and optimism amidst the difficulties of the world.

Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork draws on the work of William James, Carl Jung, Abraham Maslow, Stanislav Grof and others. Grof is a pioneering psychedelic researcher, investigator of exceptional human experiences and cofounder of the transpersonal psychology movement. Together with his wife Christina Grof, he developed Holotropic Breathwork, an inspiration of Dreamshadow Transpersonal Breathwork, Integrative Breathwork and other methods. In his book The Holotropic Mind, Grof describes Holotropic Breathwork as a seemingly simple process with “extraordinary potential for opening the way for exploring the entire spectrum of the inner world.”

5 Components of Breathwork

  1. Intense Breathing  – Deep circular breathing with a minimal pause in between the in and out breaths. There is no “right” technique, but to intensify and deepen one’s breathing.
  2. Evocative Music– A music setlist is created to help drive the breathing session. The music is typically all instrumental with no distinguishable language. There are often times when music with foreign languages will be used because of the lack of context. The music setlist is around two to three hours long.
  3. Focused Bodywork – Emotional energy can become stuck in the body. To help assist with stuck emotional or physical energy, bodywork is performed to help release the energy. Bodywork can also be in the form of support by offering a hand to hold.
  4. Expressive Drawing – After the breathwork session, participants are asked to create a mandala or drawing. This helps to process the experience without language or words and can be very symbolic. This process helps to integrate the experience.
  5. Group Process– We are social creatures. As Lenny Gibson states, “we are the descendants of successful tribes.” We need one another to survive in the world. The group helps to form a safe container for participants to dive deep into their psyche and being. The group holds the space for a healing process to occur.

Links & Notes

Posted on

Daniel McQueen – Extended-State DMT Research (DMTx)

Daniel McQueen - Extended State DMT - DMTx


Download
Daniel McQueen of Medicinal Mindfulness joins us to talk about extended-state DMT research, also known as DMTx. Daniel has been presenting this idea at local events in the Colorado area to help raise awareness and money to help bring this research idea to life. To learn more about this project, upcoming events, or to donate to help fund the research check out DMTx.org

Here is a quick message from Daniel:

A few years ago we started a community gathering and speaker series called Psychedelic Shine, and it was through this project that I met Dr. Rick Strassman, Dr. Dennis McKenna, and Dr. Andrew Gallimore, to name a few. The process of creating psychedelic inspired programs, meeting innovative leaders in the field, and also the inner exploration this work requires, were all factors that initiated this journey into exploring Extended-State DMT research. It has been a wild and wonderful ride ever since, and we’re excited to step into the next stage of this work.

It is our intention to create a sustainable, multi-generation DMT research program that is both congruent with scientific inquiry, as well as with the creative and spiritual interests and values of the psychedelic community. We believe Extended-State DMT research is as much an expedition as it is a scientific experiment. We believe it is both deeply inspiring and practically feasible.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_rrjBD16_0]

Show Notes/Links

About Daniel McQueen

Daniel earned a Masters Degree in Transpersonal Counseling Psychology from Naropa and received advanced training in MDMA-assisted psychotherapy through a year internship with the MAPS Boulder MDMA for PTSD Study.  It was his experience with MAPS that inspired Daniel to explore alternative visions in psychedelic activism and entrepreneurship.

Daniel bridges transpersonal paradigms with the grounded clinical and organizational skills necessary to begin addressing the significant ecological and mental health crises facing our society today.  Although Daniel no longer practices as a clinical psychotherapist, he supports his clients as a teacher, coach, ally and event facilitator, providing individual and group transformational experiences and deeply held intentional conversations.  In his practice, Daniel quickly realized that the most important intervention he could provide to his clients, who were isolated and longed for meaningful contact with others, was a sense of community.  Medicinal Mindfulness is, in a very real way, a cultural intervention that provides a safe and transformational community container for healing and awakening… a program based on skill development and not dogma.  Since 2012, Daniel has been teaching a psychedelic harm prevention and intentional psychedelic use course called Mindful Journeywork.  Since the legalization of recreational cannabis in Colorado, he has been facilitating Conscious Cannabis Circles and individual cannabis journeys.

In addition to his work with Medicinal Mindfulness, Daniel has a successful spirituality and life coaching practice with his wife, Alison, through their company, Aspenroots Counseling LLC.  Highly skilled in identifying and cultivating giftedness in young people and supporting significant life transitions, Daniel is inspired to support passionate and talented individuals striving to live into their calling.  A primary focus of his practice involves assessing and addressing the benefits and difficulties related to psychedelic and cannabis use and misuse.

Daniel co-founded the Naropa Alliance for Psychedelic Studies and helped organize the first annual Psychedelic Symposium at Naropa University in 2012.  He is currently working with Grounding Solutions, Inc. to develop a natural rescue medicinal for users of psychedelics and cannabis.

Our online course, ‘Navigating Psychedelics: Lessons on Self-Care & Integration” will keep you and your friends safer. Just say KNOW to drugs.

 

Posted on

Kyle and Joe – Contexts of Psychedelic Use

Contexts of Psychedelic Use


Download

In this episode, Joe and Kyle discuss the difference contexts of psychedelic use:

  • Therapeutic
  • Recreational
  • Psychospiritual & Self-Discovery
  • Ceremonial & Shamanic

While these categories can be flexible and sometimes merge into one another, we thought that it would be important to give context to the variety of experiences. As MAPS has just received “Breakthrough Therapy” status on the MDMA-assisted psychotherapy research, this is an exciting time for research and therapeutic use of a powerful medicine. However, there may be some confusion about how the therapeutic approach is different from some of these other contexts and ways of using psychedelics. While we believe that all contexts are valid or legitimate and each carry their own risk/benefit, we thought that it would be helpful and fun to talk about our views about this subject.

Become a Patron!

If you want to learn more about navigating the psychedelic experience or learn more about safety guidelines for these different contexts, check out our new online course, “Navigating Psychedelics: Lessons on Self-Care & Integration.”

Navigating Psychedelics

Useful Texts & Resources

Posted on

For the Use of Entheogens – Ibogaine

Ibogaine Ceremony

By David Stetson

How can we use our mind, intellect, or heart to diffuse or address the origin of our problems that arise from the same place?

Iboga, Ayahuasca, Kambo, and 5-MeO-DMT have wandered from their origins and into our western culture during an ominous time for humanity – a time that is naturally calling for healing and metamorphosis. At Oka Center, it is our privilege to work with and integrate these medicines with their traditional uses into our lives and the lives of all who come here.  Each guest brings benefits to all who are involved.

For us, the traditional use of entheogens is just as important (or more) as the recently developed ideology and protocols created by western doctors, scholars, and laypeople.  Westerners have only recently started using these medicines significantly within the last 50 – 60 years. Traditional indigenous use is centuries old – perhaps older according to many – and comprises the vast majority of experience with these powerful medicines, not to mention their original discovery. Generations of use has naturally given rise to refined protocols, beautifully disarming spirituality, sublime music, and just the right amount of humor. We include standardized western medical guidelines to ensure safety which is imperative, but not intrusive. Particularly with ibogaine, it is of utmost importance to have medical prescreening, monitoring, and supervision before, during, and after the treatment.

We are grateful for the research and empirical data that has helped to assess the risks and benefits of Ibogaine and other entheogens, particularly from Ken Alper and the late Howard Lotsof.  At the same time, the new trend in attempting to fit entheogens into the framework of the western medical schema is questionable.  

Since there are enough anecdotal reports that suggest so many applications and benefits of these entheogens, it makes sense to try and “legitimize” them in order to make them available in our healthcare system. However, we need an honest review of our healthcare industry – especially within the mental health sector – to gauge how genuine a reference point our system is for validating or practicing any medicine or modality, especially for plant-based medicine which is off limits for patenting.

The enormous profit margins of the healthcare industry would be significantly reduced if lifelong prescription medications were no longer considered final solutions to common mental “disorders.”  You need only do minimal research on the ruthless financial methods and ethics of the healthcare industry to come to some disturbing conclusions.  In our experience, many people coming to Oka Center have reached a point at which their ongoing use of prescribed medications has provided no change or only damaged their situation further.  

For those of you who want to get off hard drugs and have heard about the medicinal value of plant medicine like ibogaine, you might not see the relevance of its traditional use.  Perhaps you have come to ibogaine because of its ability to alleviate opiate withdrawal or interrupt addiction, or your friend of a friend got off dope with ibogaine and it was miraculous.

While we do not force our ceremonially based protocol on anyone, almost everyone – including those coming to get off hard drugs – respond very positively to it. In the end, it is embraced and appreciated as an important element of the healing process.

Ruptured spirituality is common to everyone that comes to Oka Center – drug use or not: We are broken, tired, angry, bored, confused, stressed, frustrated, and oftentimes infinitely sad. Reflection, prayer, song, and dance may seem frivolous at first, but these things are much needed in our lives and are important in respecting the medicine and for laying the groundwork for your experience.

Oka Center - Ibogaine Center in Mexico

In many ways, our western culture has separated itself from nature. As individuals, we have lost an innate intelligence or awareness because of it. What might have been awe and wonder has been replaced with sarcasm and cynicism.  Although our advancements in technology and industry have paved the way for practical efficiency and comfort, the downside is that it is getting increasingly easier to forget where we come from and where we are going. It is normal for us to feel alienated and unhappy in such a competitive, indifferent society built with concrete, computer chips, and suffocating ethical standards and expectations.  Hard drug use is an appropriate response as any attempt to get through each day with a smile on your face.

Whether it is drugs, alcohol, gambling, depression, anxiety, exhaustion, or whatever else we have adopted or suffered from in the attempt to get by, somewhere along the line we realize discomfort, harm, and despair. Naturally, this is when we look for a way out of these negative cycles.  

Beyond a certain point, to truly view and examine ourselves deeply and objectively in waking life can be almost impossible. The attempt at doing so most often ends up being more of the same self-deception. How can we use our mind, intellect, or heart to diffuse or address the origin of our problems that arise from the same place?  

This is one of the main reasons why we advocate for the use of entheogens. The incessant internal rapport we have with ourselves never allows us to look beneath the masks we have created which project the flawless versions of ourselves we present to the world. Entheogens have a way of blasting our masquerade into pieces. With any luck, we are left with a beautiful nightmare that shines a light on our humanness: our fallibility, our fragility, our innate goodness, and our capacity for softness and empathy toward others because at the very root, we all share the same capacity for madness and beauty.

About the Author

David Stetson‘s passion has been Bwiti since his Iboga initiation in 2007. David is extensively well-traveled in Gabon, Africa where he is known as Okukwe.  During his time in Gabon he learned Bwiti traditions, music, and ceremonial practices and is proficient on both the moungongo (musical bow) and ngombi (harp) instruments. David views Bwiti and Ibogaine as a lifeway that champions communion with others while also empowering the individual.  His approach to working and healing with others starts with the awareness of alienation and isolation as common and appropriate responses to our western culture, and is based in non-judgement. Learn more about Oka Center here and check out David’s podcast interview with us here. 

Posted on

Psychedelics, Philosophy, Transhumanism and Peter Sjöstedt-H

Psychedelic Philosophy and Peter Sjöstedt-H


Download
Peter is a psychedelic philosopher focusing on panpsychism, psychedelics, Whitehead, Nietzsche and some other heavy weights. We discuss Peter’s psychedelic philosophy and influences from psychedelic liberty cap mushrooms found in a field in England, his influence on the famous comic author Warren Ellis, his essay Neo-Nihilism, transhumanism and much more. We really look forward to having Peter on the show again in the future!

Show Notes/links

Whitehead Quotes

‘The terms morality, logic, religion, art, have each of them been claimed as exhausting the whole meaning of importance. Each of them denotes a subordinate species. But the genus stretches beyond any finite group of species.’ (MT)

‘Philosophy is an attempt to express the infinity of the universe in terms of the limitations of language.’ (Autobiog.)

‘The doctrines which best repay critical examination are those which for the longest period have remained unquestioned.’ (MT)

‘[I]n the development of intelligence there is a great principle which is often forgotten. In order to acquire learning, we must first shake ourselves free of it. We must grasp the topic in the rough, before we smooth it out and shape it.’ (MT)

More on Peter’s site here 

Peter’s Social Media

Instagram
Twitter
Facebook

Warren Ellis

The Brink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMyMbQAgiVc

About Peter

Peter Sjöstedt-H is an Anglo-Scandinavian philosopher who specialises in the thought of Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Whitehead within the fields of Philosophy of Mind and Metaphysics – especially with regard to panpsychism and altered states of sentience. Peter received a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and a Master’s degree in Continental Philosophy from the University of Warwick, where he was awarded a first-class distinction for his dissertation on Kant and Schelling in relation to ‘intellectual intuition’. He subsequently became a Philosophy Lecturer in London for six years but is now engaged in his PhD at Exeter University where he also teaches philosophy modules and writing skills. Peter is the author of Noumenautics and an inspiration behind the new inhuman philosopher Marvel Superhero, Karnak.

In the words of futurist, philosopher and pop star Alexander Bard: ‘One of our favourite contemporary philosophers, Peter Sjöstedt-H…think a psychedelic Nietzsche’.

Posted on

Kyle’s Story

Kyle Buller - Psychedelic Podcaster


Download

In this episode of Psychedelics Today, Joe interviews the co-host of the show, Kyle Buller.  As hosts of the show, we thought that it would be fun to dig a little deeper into our own personal narratives to give our listeners an idea of who we are.  This episode offers the opportunity for Kyle to share his story about how he became interested in psychedelics and other non-ordinary states of consciousness.

From Kyle of Psychedelics Today

I became interested in non-ordinary states of consciousness at an young age.  One event that sparked my interest in these topics stems from suffering a near-death experience when I was teenager.  This experience changed the trajectory of my life and also left me with asking myself many questions about life and death.

Tune into this episode as Joe asks me about my history with non-ordinary states of consciousness, the development of a psychedelic course at Burlington College, my interest in Holotropic Breathwork, and much more.

Thanks for listening!