Psychedelics and Containers

In my last post, I talked about how psychedelic facilitators are taught to create containers based on an illusion of safety.  Structures are necessary because without them rituals devolve into chaos.  But if safety is an illusion, then what should the container be founded on? 

If we look at traditional shamanic initiations, safety is not what creates the container. Anyone who’s been to a rustic ayahuasca center in the jungle of Peru can attest to that!  

I think ritual containers should be based on the following
 

Personal transformation occurs within the context of the wider circle of relations.
 

Let’s break this down piece by piece. First, when I talk about transformation I mean ritualized death and dismemberment. The old self needs to die in order for the new self to be born. The Tantrik goddess Kali wears a necklace of human heads, symbolizing how she ritually (and eventually literally) destroys us.

Our hunger for psychedelics is based on a deep human need for ritual death, destruction and eventual rebirth. Many cultures throughout time have recognized this need and developed initiations around it. This process is an integral part of nature itself, one that has been covered up and hidden within the safe confines of modern society.

Though mostly empty now, we still have modern rituals like bar mitzvahs that mirror this death/rebirth process. I also went through this when I was baptized (and born again!) as a kid in my Christian fundamentalist church.

We take psychedelics because we yearn to experience this initiation. We want to get “unstuck”, free from the shackles of our past that bind us down. We hunger for the goddess to take us, to rip us apart and put us back together. But we live in a society that has taught us to avoid death at all costs, that has no ritualized container to experience death’s sanctity. Our loved ones die in hospitals and the only ceremony is the steady drip of morphine coursing through their body so they don’t have to consciously face death. Is it any wonder our rejection of death comes with a desire for safety?

Modern trainings around psychedelic facilitation are based on the idea that we can help others navigate that space by learning “about” it rather than directly going through it and knowing it in a deeply personal way.   So if you are guiding someone through a psychedelic journey and the dark goddess comes to devour them, you'd need to check your notes about what to do.

I recently went to a training on navigating psychedelic spaces held by a Lakota medicine woman named Dancing Crow. With pens and notebooks in hand, participants asked her about the steps they needed to take to create a ceremonial container. She proceeded to tell stories instead-- stories about how she met her spirits, about her relationships with them, and about how they've helped her do her healing work.

Instead of a step-by-step guide she told everyone (without actually telling them!) that creating a psychedelic container is based on relationship.

This gets to the second part of the structure— the context of the wider circle of relations.

Modern people are stuck on things like “my process”, “my story” and “my trauma”. But one important lesson from psychedelics is that our own trauma is a part of the wider circle of nature— of families, ancestors, the plant world, the animal world, gods and demons. The old traditions tell us that humans are but one aspect of an incredible deep, incredibly rich web of interconnectedness.  When we develop and deepen our relationships in those worlds we learn directly about the cycles of feeding and being fed, of dying and being reborn. We learn in a direct experiential way how Kali cuts off our head so that a new one can grow.
 

Deep relationship is the fundamental structure at the heart of the psychedelic container.
 

One relationship is between the facilitator and participant. For me, one important part of that means that we have triggered each other at some point. We’ve seen each others shadow and wounding. When that happens and we are able to work through it, we now have a depth in our relationship. If our wounds arise in ceremony (which is the point!) we have a history of working through it.

Relationship also exists between the facilitator and the plant world. What is the faciltator’s relationship with the substance they are using? I once had someone contact me for advice on facilitating with psilocybin. She told me she had taken psilocybin 3 times and wanted to be a guide for others. To me, that was like going on 3 dates with someone and then getting married. In the ayahuasca tradition, you have to spend months or years in isolation with the plants, getting to know them before you can assist others.

Relationship also exists between facilitator and the spirit world. Frequently people in those states encounter primal deities and ancestors that have been suppressed for generations. Does the facilitator know on a deep level who these spirits are? Have they reconnected with their own ancestors? Are they in a deep relationship with them?

Lastly, relationship exists between facilitator and friends/family.  My relationships in the spirit world, just like those in everyday life with my wife and kids, have demanded depth and commitment.  And that to me is the foundation of ceremonial structure.