Dear Friends,
You're invited to a Conversation.
If you've been tuning in to movements in the mental health field - there's a lot afoot. Psychedelic research (and investors) are mushrooming, with what many are hailing as a renaissance in the mental health field. Perhaps you've been reading? Or participating?
Recent books like How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan, quite a few articles in the New York Times and others, national Psychedelic Research conferences (like this past week in Denver with 12,000 attendees) all point to this trend and excitement.
There's a lot to like and there's a lot that needs tending in this optimistic rush to legalize psychedelics for medical use.
I've been part of the conversation for the last 20 years. Where my heart lies is with the traditional and indigenous use of these medicines. Traditional Amazonian Medicine, also known as Yaje or ayahuasca as used by the Shipibo-Conibo, Quechua-Lamista and other indigenous communities as a tool for diagnosing dis-ease, whether physical, mental, emotional, spiritual or within the collective. The Mazatec tradition of using psychoactive mushrooms called Nino Santos to support healing. The Native American Church tradition of using peyote to doctor people who need a prayer or a healing for their lives. These ways are beautiful and enriching, ancient and profound. I've had the great blessing to be invited and to attend many of these different ceremonies and rituals with respected medicine people and elders of these lineages.
In the psychedelic renaissance, these indigenous and traditional ways of using these medicines are largely being ignored. There are few organizations talking about reciprocity, though many believe this is important. There are thousands of therapists being trained to use these psychedelics without a sense of the historic or traditional use of these substances, which by and large are about connecting to spirit, to the greater web of life.
If you read, or have experienced this yourself, you may know that the most common psychedelic, or entheogenic experience is of being connected with everything. Of a sense of Oneness.
It is a profound spiritual experience.
As the indigenous and traditional medicine people have done for thousands of years, it seems important, essential even, that those who're giving these medicines, especially therapists in a clinical setting, have some spiritual training, some understanding of the fundamentals. How to orient oneself in a guided journey? How to pray for support? How to best prepare for a profound spiritual experience? How to integrate? How to ground?
All of this and more will be a part of continuing series of conversations led by myself and my husband, a person who's given his life to understanding and being immersed in indigenous medicine ways. From the Shipibo, Quechua Lamista and Aguaruna in the Peruvian Amazon, the Bwiti traditions of Gabon, the Mazatec traditions of Oaxaca, the Dinè traditions of the Native American Church, he has cultivated an incredible capacity to understand these disparate and not dissimilar cosmovisions and their respective ceremonies. He offers an incredible wealth of wisdom and information.
I invite you to join us in dialogue, a live Q&A, and information about what we're feeling excited about, what to be full of care about, and other fun topics.......
Our first call is July 7th from 4-5:30 PM EST. Join us.
Summer Series dates: July 21st, August 11th, August 25th, September 8th & September 29th See you there!
*I want to express solidarity and support of my friends and all folks sharing and celebrating an important part of their identity as I'm sharing an important and hidden part of mine. I don't claim to know what a coming out experience is for folks who identify as queer or LGBTQ+, but this moment of my own vulnerability in sharing about something private and misunderstood has made me more aware. I celebrate all peoples right to express and be who they are and acknowledge how complex this conversation is.*
We're in this together,