2. Angels and Demons at the Root
Content warning: addiction, drug use
Psychedelic means “mind manifesting.”
Entheogenic means “becoming Divine within.”
Early last year, something in me shifted. Did I begin to feel an inner call which led to avid research, or did I receive some particular spark of inspiration that led to my devoted exploration? I can’t say for sure. What I remember is that I began to read some fascinating data on advances in healing made by psychologists using MDMA and ketamine with patients. Not in all cases, but in many, patients described what I myself had encountered in only a few uses of mind-altering substances: that years of healing seemed to happen almost overnight after substance ingestion and integration. However, I knew many people did not have such grandiose epiphanies or healing after clinical or casual drug use. Questions and curiosities insistently proliferated in my mind and heart. Why do some drugs lead to addiction while others lead to freedom? How can one set of mind-altering substances kill people, body and soul, while another kind seems to heal people even when they are deemed hopeless? Why do some people experience transcendent bliss on psychedelics while others have “bad trips,” or just mediocre ones?
Addiction runs prevalently through my family history. I’m extraordinarily fortunate that my immediate family members were not substance abusers, so I didn’t suffer that particular, sharp trauma to my psyche and body. However, it became clear to me in adulthood that I inherited some classic addict patterns and behaviors, though I was excellent at masking them. Shame, self-loathing, and mind-games enacted vicious cycles in my psyche. While I had a relatively normal life, I understood I had work to do. I’ve not been addicted to drugs but, last year, I realized I was addicted to sugar to manage certain feelings and stressful circumstances, mostly internal spaces I couldn’t yet understand or was too stressed to grapple with. I was similarly addicted to people-pleasing or fawning because these patterns kept me feeling safe; they also left me immature, emotionally stunted, and lonely. Largely, I was able to see these forces at work in me before any extreme harm was done to myself or others. I am still in the process of healing. Growing up, I was lucky to have a loving family, deep communities, and wise mentors to support the healthiest parts of me. But as I aged, I saw more clearly my personal need and common desperation for more radical healing; “radical” as in “grasping at the root.”
Last spring, I asked an acquaintance if she would meet to tell me more about her experience as a self-proclaimed “psychonaut,” someone who has tried many kinds of psychedelics. I thought that hearing more first-hand from someone who was more experienced than me could help my understanding. During that brunch conversation, after she explained her journeys with various plant medicines, she began to list other entheogens and psychedelics she had not (at least yet) explored. I had never heard of many of them. Suddenly, she spoke the name of an unfamiliar plant: Iboga. Merely hearing the name of this plant, my body suddenly, inexplicably, erupted in goosebumps and started shaking; my eyes welled with spontaneous tears. She and I were both taken aback by my unexplainable reaction. We also both recognized that this unexpected response could be important. I pressed her to please continue, wondering what was happening to me, my attention sharply renewed. She gently, kindly continued: “Iboga is a very intense psychedelic. Iboga is known to cure addiction. An alkaloid from the plant, ibogaine, has been studied in the West. It keeps opiate addicts from experiencing withdrawals. Many people report that one journey with iboga leaves them sober for life.”
I’m an exceptionally sensitive person and am moved profoundly, emotionally and spiritually, by mundane, everyday moments. I’ve often joked with friends, “Your high is my sober.” I’ve had numerous mystical experiences without trying. A moment of transcendence with a young girl in Haiti reshaped my life when I was 15 years old. Giving birth naturally without drugs opened a portal in me to realms of consciousness I’d never experienced. In moments of deep prayer or meditation, I can feel bright presences above me, as if multiple someones (somethings?) are looking on lovingly. I do not pretend to know for sure what that bright, loving collection of Lights might be. In my mind, I call them angels – in my imagination, not cherubic, childlike, winged creatures, but fiery messengers of hope and healing, somehow supporting me in ways I cannot fathom.
The body-and-spirit feeling of these transcendent moments were mirrored when I tried psilocybin mushrooms. During my first psychedelic experience, now 15 years ago, I could not stop saying that I was experiencing exactly what Thomas Merton must have felt when he stood at the corner of 4th and Walnut and declared every person to be “shining like the sun.” I kept inviting people closer, gently calling them into the light, telling them what goodness I saw in them. These may sound like the rant of a madwoman, but I’d felt that experience organically several times before, like in Haiti, or on retreats at CrossRoads Ministry with marginalized people in my city. Then, an hour after ingesting mushrooms, I was having that experience on-demand. It wasn’t until last year that I understood I needed to learn more about why this happened.
I dug into researching iboga and learned that this plant originates in Gabon, a country on the coast of West Africa. It is considered to be the grandfather of entheogens. The Bwiti people, who have protected and nurtured this plant for generations, explain, “There is no Bwiti without iboga; there is no iboga without Bwiti.” They hold the wisdom of hundreds of years of experimentation with this sacred plant – they have developed stringent rites and rituals, culture and beliefs around its use and integration. They have concrete, effective practices to keep people safe and mitigate harm. I’ve been astounded by my learning. It’s no surprise that Westerners have become intrigued by the potential uses of this plant and have conducted studies with ibogaine, which is one alkaloid of over a hundred in the iboga plant. Ibogaine has shown incredible efficacy in abating withdrawal symptoms and addiction. I have read dozens of articles and linked studies explaining the chemical processes that allow this healing.
However, there are concerns around the use of iboga and ibogaine. Western research indicates that ibogaine treatment can be risky for folks with heart conditions. People who have been trained in the Bwiti tradition around iboga counter this critique. They claim that using one, hyper-concentrated alkaloid of many from a plant has a very different impact on the body than utilizing the whole plant. A “dose” of ibogaine ingested during a traditional ceremony would be a small fraction of what was given in the Western experiments. Also, using ibogaine in a clinical setting without traditional practices of integration can only be expected to do so much; communal processing is integral to the Bwiti tradition around iboga. Furthermore, if you merely dip a toe into research around psychedelics, you learn that there is a widely-held understanding that “set and setting” have dramatic impacts on a psychedelic ‘trip’ (I have also learned in my explorations around the processes of birth and death that this understanding translates strongly there as well). Soft lighting, darker rooms, familiar people, and personal comforts offer a much different context for healing than a sterile, strange place. The jury is still out on whether this treatment will take off in the US.
A few months after learning about iboga, I read the novel Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. I was ignited. The information I read was not totally new to me, but my inner passion for understanding the nuance of drug use was. I felt inflamed by Demon’s story, the injustice of opioid manufacturers pushing deadly drugs on poor folks and ravaging communities for profit. I felt the pain of my fellow Kentuckians who had their lives destroyed by substance abuse, first- or second-hand. Many of those people were my own extended family members. I looked into the current efforts for addiction recovery and relief in my home state. Kentucky has received significant funds to put toward addiction recovery and relief. There are diverse efforts to mitigate harm, promote healing and sobriety, and support impacted families. Imagine my shock to learn that in the works was also an effort to bring experimental ibogaine research facilities to Kentucky.
For myriad, complex reasons, this effort has now fallen flat, and there are no plans for ibogaine research in Kentucky – it is deemed too dangerous and experimental. Furthermore, what’s the real profit potential of a drug you may only need to take once or twice to be completely healed? I harbor mixed feelings, knowing that ibogaine could save thousands of lives, while also resenting that this is a one-dimensional application of a trans-dimensional healing substance. Meanwhile, to participate in a facilitated iboga ceremony, you most likely have to travel out of the country to Costa Rica or Portugal to find a reputable leader who has trained directly under the Bwiti. One church has been founded in California in the last month to lead iboga healing rituals. Addiction, isolation, and loneliness continue as epidemics in our nation and beyond.
A dear, beloved friend in recovery taught me years ago, “The cure for addiction is connection and community.” I saw this at work in my many visits as a volunteer to the Healing Place, a thriving local addiction recovery center with multiple campuses. I recognize this truth in my own life, the reality that I side-skirted many addictions solely because I had a strong community container embracing me, my shadows and my light. A simple dose of a drug will not create lasting healing; we also need a society that values people over profit, a circle of care to catch people in their most difficult times, and communal rites and rituals that anchor us to deeper truths about our life purpose and preciousness. It’s within our grasp to create hell or heaven in our midst, to harm or heal, to tend carefully to the demons and allow the angels to bathe us in Light.
Next entry coming soon:
The Brain’s Default Mode Network and Parallels in AI Consciousness