042: Interview with Dr. Neal Goldsmith on Psychedelic Healing

This is Entheogen. Elevate the Conversation.

It’s March 12, 2017, and we are discussing psychedelic healing with Dr. Neal Goldsmith.

Topics:

• Neal’s book Psychedelic Healing: The Promise of Entheogens for Psychotherapy and Spiritual Development provides copious discussion points for our conversation today.

• Neal's therapy practice, and how his use of psychedelics has informed his practice of psychotherapy

• Imago therapy

• LSD is a tool: Charles Manson becomes more Charles Manson; Richard Alpert becomes Ram Dass.

• The substitution of the eucharist as a proxy for the original psychoactive sacrament. Can we please go back to the active version? What are the consequences of inactive substitutes in religious ceremonies? How have alternative spiritual practices sprung up in the absence of sanctioned Entheogenic rituals?

• George Carlin’s Modern Man.

• Are we in the midst of McKenna’s Archaic Revival? Is this another way to internalize the unfolding ecological apocalypse?

“If we’re going to be post-post-modern, if we’re going to be integral, we can’t have a fight between tribalism and modernity. We can’t have a fight between spirituality and the material world.”

• Meditation, mindfulness, yoga, breathing…

• Deep breathing to expel carbon dioxide in addition to inhaling oxygen.

• McKenna’s conjecture that it’s possible to get to the same state of consciousness that psychedelics provide access to, using meditation or chanting or drumming, but who has time for that?

• What do you recommend to listeners who might be interested in some form of psychedelic therapy, present company included?

• The dichotomy of tribalism vs. modernism: our human ancestors living naturally but for shorter time, vs. modern humans living longer but disconnected from nature. Spiraling up vs. retreating to tribalism.

• Spirituality vs. science. The concept of rational mysticism. Einstein quote via Rick Doblin: “There's no real conflict between science & religion; there's a conflict between bad science & bad religion.”

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029: Build Entheon with Alex and Allyson Grey

This is Entheogen. Talk about tools for generating the divine within.

Today is May 24 2016, and we are discussing Building Entheon with Alex and Allyson Grey.

Find the notes and links for this and other episodes at EntheogenShow.com. Sign up to receive an email when we release a new episode. Follow us @EntheogenShow on Twitter and like EntheogenShow on FaceBook. Thanks for listening.

Topics:

• Entheon is a place to discover the divine within
• Why build a psychedelic temple?
• BuildEntheon.com – Almost to the stretch goal of $200K
• Entheon is a 12,000 sq ft building, three floors including a gallery of international visionary art
• Prehistoric artifacts document early cultures who made art and had a relationship with entheogens
• “It’s important for our psychedelic sacramental culture to have evidence that in our generation there were people who valued love, unity, spirituality, and peace over commerce and war.” - Allyson Grey
• LSD is derived from ergot fungus, which shares similar characteristics with psilocybin mushrooms.
• Allyson recommends Robert Barnhart’s movie, A New Understanding: The Science of Psilocybin. (We have interviewed the producer and discussed the film on Entheogen.)
• Visit BuildEntheon.com to support the campaign! Check out the amazing original works of art and other rewards.

027: Sacred Plant Retreats with Maxwell Wieland of Munay Medicine in Peru, Part 2

This is Entheogen. Talk about tools for generating the divine within.

Today is February 21, 2016, and we are discussing Sacred Plant Retreats with our guest, Maxwell Wieland of Munay Medicine in Peru.

Find the notes and links for this and other episodes at EntheogenShow.com. Sign up to receive an email when we release a new episode. Follow us @EntheogenShow on Twitter and like EntheogenShow on FaceBook. Thanks for listening.

Topics:

• Munay Medicine – what’s the vision, how does a retreat work, what do they offer?
• The 10-day Retreat
• “La Dieta” – lifestyle more than diet.
• Yoga as adjunct therapy to plant medicine.
• Yoga class as track meet? Yoga more as philosophy than merely athleticism.
• Reconsidering “traditional” use of ayahuasca in a long historical context.
• Alchemist? E.g., extraction of alkaloids.
• The duality of the ego. “I just sleighed my ego.”
• “Avoid the dreaded underdose. Dose high. Dose healthy.”

026: Sacred Plant Retreats with Maxwell Wieland of Munay Medicine in Peru, Part 1

This is Entheogen. Talk about tools for generating the divine within.

Today is February 21, 2016, and we are discussing Sacred Plant Retreats with our guest, Maxwell Wieland of Munay Medicine in Peru.

Find the notes and links for this and other episodes at EntheogenShow.com. Sign up to receive an email when we release a new episode. Follow us @EntheogenShow on Twitter and like EntheogenShow on FaceBook. Thanks for listening.

Topics:

• Max has been in a working relationship with wachuma (san pedro), ayahuasca, changa (dmt), psilocybin mushrooms, iboga, morning glories, salvia, and other plant entheogens for a decade.
• How did Munay Medicine come to be?
• What is a typical stay like?
• Munay is in the Sacred Valley of Peru, a wonderful location with a number of retreat centers, convenient to Machu Picchu and other sacred sites.
• San Pedro vs. Peyote, the sustainability and eco-friendliness of San Pedro – can grow up to a meter per growing season. Can be propagated easily.
• The word wachuma translates to “removing the head” (wach- meaning “remove” and -uma meaning “head”) which metaphorically might mean the death of the ego. The word comes from Quechua, the language of the indigenous culture of the same name in the central Andes.
• As Maxwell told us, “The name San Pedro was an adaptation that came as a result of Catholic contact via Spanish conquistadors.” This is fascinatingly similar to the Bwiti tribe in Gabon who use ibogaine in a syncretic Christian-tribal tradition; it seems that part of the Andean adaptation to missionary influence was to rename this sacred plant after Saint Peter, implying that the entheogenic cactus holds the keys to the gates of heaven just as its new namesake, Saint Peter, is said to do.
• “Breaking open the Head”, Daniel Pinchbeck’s book about his initiation with the Bwiti (using Ibogaine).
• Max shares some of his backstory including trouble related to the illegality of plant medicine in the United States, which led to his moving to Peru.
• San Pedro “Jeff Bridges” variety: Trichocereus bridgesii

Also, please check out this link from last show's guest, Kirk Rutter: Psychedelic Science Org UK – "Psychedelics could be for psychiatry what the microscope is for biology or the telescope for astronomy."

017: Modern Shamanism

This is Entheogen. We talk about tools for generating the divine within. It's October 15, 2015. We're talking about Modern Shamanism with special guest, Micah.

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This episode we are grateful to be joined by special guest, Micah, to discuss the use of Ayahuasca in a modern context, as well as in the traditional setting.

Background:

Erowid Ayahuasca Vault: Basics

Topics:

- the traditional preparation vs. a chemical extraction

- the traditional context vs. modern comforts

- shaman vs. therapist

- jungle fauna, icaros vs. modern metaphors and music

- other psychoactive plant medicine: tobacco, chocolate/cacao, wine, sassafras, black pepper

- creating a container for deep experience

References:

Santo Daime

União do Vegetal

Controversy Brews Over Church's Hallucinogenic Tea Ritual