Tea is a food, I would argue. I would argue it doesnt matter what we argue. Smoke is food, I would suggest, eating the tar and oil of multiple joints is a real meal. The shamanic rituals of the Shipibo represent a world view, a hermeneutical horizon. The food is a gateway, eating is something we do in the PHYSICAL world that can move our position METAPHYSICALLY. By consuming wisely, a landscape that is unseen can be FELT and REALIZED, and even SEEN or SENSED, but I have no experience in these matters. Food unconceals what is real in our bodies and outside of our selfs. The process of mixing tea leaves into hot water is analogous to an animal EATING anything. As above so below: the shamanic healing is a healing of the world, not some petty personal use (by being precisely a petty personal use in the literal sense, it is an end to itself, treating the individual as a means to achieve the ritual and not vice versa).
When it comes to consumption, as a teenager I have done isolated camping with minimal supplies on a diet of wild mushrooms and weed, I rarely eat wild mushrooms anymore. The sensory heightened experience of the adrenaline from being alone in a windstorm on the westcoast is itself enough to create a desire to return to that experience. Being from where you camp is different from adventuring in the wilderness. Gabore Mate has an interesting approach to using ayahuasca for therapy, but in my anecdotal knowledge this does more to validate the upper class drug addiction to ayahuasca, I have a growing suspicion that Vancouverites actually do BECOME “lifecoaches” etc in order to justify their personal use of ayahuasca and appropriation of indigenous aesthetics. I have no doubts that ayahuasca can help heal, but I have no respect for the guise of healing used to mask personal excesses. I would love to consume coca tea all day everyday, but I dont live in the Andes. I have never done ayahuasca, but if I was going to do it, I would do it in secret. Ayahuasca is a secret, just like any experience. That is the irony of seeking a guide to the mysteries of your mind. The concept of guiding is very much too settling for me to accept, I dont like the idea of guiding. I like the idea of art though:
Without asking for a guide, we could reflect on why anything has VALUE. What makes an experience valued and sought after? Its all in the MYTHIC, blowing smoke is to unconceal.
Your reflection post is full of gems. “I would argue it doesn’t matter what we argue” is one of the central ideas that I hope students walk away from the course with… that we can embrace thinking and discussing without arriving at “the answer.” (not that I’m post-truth, but in terms of questions like “Is tea food?”, the truth is that the conversation is much more interesting than the answer). Your observation that “eating is something that we do in the physical world that can move our position metaphysically” is, I think, a lovely approximation to why ayahuasca is so important to the Shipibo-Konibo culture and knowledge systems.
I’ll be sitting with this today: “Being from where you camp is different from adventuring in the wilderness.”
Hi! Thank you for your post. I have done ayahuasca on multiple occasions and I can tell you for sure that it is impossible to be addicted to. It is a mother plant that slaps you with all of your daunting dreams and the only way to get out of it is to sit with it. Then you realize there is no such thing as annihilation. You said, “as above, so below”; I say as within, so without. Personal healing is nothing but petty. The world is but your personal perception. You see the world not as it is, but as you are.
Personal healing is anything but petty.***
Interesting exchange (I look forward to what the original author responds!). The original mention of “petty personal use” made me think of the many articles written by journalists who take this “mysterious, exotic” plant as a newspaper/magazine assignment. Almost uniformly, despite their cynical approach to the experience, they take something really powerful away from their journey. Ayahuasca initiates healing that they didn’t even recognize they needed. Maybe, in this way, both observations (petty / never petty) are valid.
I trust your reflection on the experience of ayahuasca, thank you for sharing. I agree with what you have said, especially the last three sentences. I do not know about the claim that it is impossible to form an addiction to ayahuasca, maybe in the clinical sense it is impossible, but in the regular sense I dont see what would prevent an addictive personality from forming a reflexive habit with using ayahuasca. Besides that, I have nothing to defend, I always I assume that my words are short of the truth, so any criticisms or points will be greeted without an argumentative defense. Please feel encouraged to disagree or contradict my posts, though I do not think that you have contradicted my post here besides the aforementioned claim.
Accepting your words, it seems that perhaps I am ‘petty’ and projecting my truths onto the horizon (see the world not as it is, but as I am), which is an unsettling enough thought for me to accept. I dont think you meant to suggest “S-J=petty” with your words, but I like the implications leftover.
Wow I was left in awe after your reading your response. I found it well worded and left me truly looking deeper at our course material. Thank you for writing this! When you mentioned that food is a gateway I found it especially impactful. I completely agree! While I may not have experienced the same sort of mind altered realties you speak of, I find that even with no psycho-active food I notice a difference in myself depending on what I consume. Changing my diet from vegetarian to pescatarian to lactose free to gluten free over the course of several years has show me the differences that different food groups have on the body and mind. I finally now from this experience see how important it is to be cognizant of what we put into our bodies!