I know that psychedelic experiences are ineffable by their very nature, so I won’t mince words: My fourth ayahuasca ceremony was the single-most healing moment of my life... forcing me to confront, the darkest depths of my psyche: the root of my suicidal ideations and depression.

I was there for one reason only: to pray to the Earth for a vision, a glimpse of my soul purpose, the truth at the core of my being… I am not, and may never be, ready to share the visions I received on my Quest. However I do feel called to share the sequence of events that led me here, to where I sit typing this blog post, in the Sacred Valley of Perú. 

Today, glyphosate can be found in everything from a box of “heart healthy” Cheerios, to Quaker Oats, to Sabra Hummus, and virtually all samples of conventional (non-organic) wheat and flour found on grocery store shelves today. Glyphosate is so pervasive that it is now in almost every bite of food in the U.S. food supply.

Picarones (peek-uh-roe-nays) are nothing less than a culinary wonder of the world. Hailing from Peru, these golden-fried treats… come drizzled with a “miel de higo” or “fig honey.” But it isn’t honey at all—adding to this sweet treat’s mystique…

The settings and culture of the ayahuasca tourism industry are very different, nigh unrecognizable, from Indigenous ayahuasca traditions… The modern ayahuasca scene in Peru and elsewhere around the globe, is but a puppet, dressed in ceremonial garb to give the impression of authenticity…

While ayahuasca has become quite popular in the U.S. and the rest of the industrialized West, I realize many people don’t actually know what it is or what it does. So today, I want to elucidate some of the mystique surrounding this powerful medicine from the Amazon jungle.

As I pray, I can feel the acidic sludge churning in my stomach, like a snake, writhing it’s way down, deeper and deeper into my intestines… Unexpectedly, and without the consultation of my rational mind, my prayer morphs into a new intention:

Please Mother Ayahuasca, help me heal my gut.

Later in the evening, I would learn exactly why this shift occurred.

I stare down into the dark brown brew, but see no reflection in the glinting sludge. I grasp it with both hands and hold it next to my heart, silently praying my intention…

Integration is the single-most important—and most frequently bypassed—aspect of psychedelic therapy. It is most often thought of as a period of processing after a psychedelic journey… And it is. But I believe integration begins before the psychedelic experience itself.

The stories of “healthy” young people suffering greatly, or even perishing from this Coronavirus are presented as both heartbreaking and terrifying. But to me, even as one of these “healthy” high-risk young people, this is not the time for sorrow, worry, or fear—all emotions which serve to suppress the immune system. This is the time for introspection, compassion, and community—human and microbial alike.

Until this moment, I had always considered myself to be a relatively healthy individual, with a robust immune system… I was dead wrong. Suddenly I was “high risk” for a severe coronavirus infection.

In the following post I will take a look ‘under the hood’ of my own biology, and demonstrate how a complex web of interactions began undermining my mental and physical wellbeing.

This is especially important to remember as we step into this moment of global transformation. “Sorry” represents the past, the events that got us here, to a global pandemic, systemic racism, police brutality, oceans full of plastic, the loss of a species every twenty minutes, and utterly ineffectual leadership. Now is not the time for sorry. Now is the time for action and change.

The truth is, nothing “died inside of me.” No, on the contrary, something was very, very alive. A thriving colony of dysbiotic bacteria, feasting on and mis-digesting my food intake, themselves belching sulphorous, malodorous gases that caused intense discomfort inside me.

In my efforts to heal from depression, suicidal ideations, and IBS, I no longer feel I am in a battle against these afflictions, but rather on a path away from them, and toward something else entirely: wholeness... My inward journey, and specifically the experience of ego dissolution, completely changed my relationship to the world...

In this moment, fully immersed in its presence, I wanted nothing. For the first time in my life, I felt completely accepted for who I was… All of my worries, anxieties, ambitions, needs simply melted away, and I became one with the light.

As I later learned, I was sacrificing my authentic self in order to receive love from my caretakers, and acceptance from my community — a damaging form of emotional repression and trauma.

Unresolved trauma runs us, on a subconscious level — like malware running in the background of our central processing unit — subtly (or not so subtly) influencing every decision we make, every reaction to stimuli, and yes, even our thoughts, beliefs, and actions.

I started doing Transcendental Meditation (TM for short) a year ago, and it’s the only meditation practice I’ve been able to implement and stick with on a regular basis. In this video, I show you some techniques I used to get started with, and then build upon, my TM practice.

Purging is a hallmark of Ayahuasca — a reality of the plant medicine‘s physiological effects, and an avenue by which an individual begins to rid his or herself of demons, or “that which no longer serves”