what happened to the tribes of europe

The tribes of Europe were conquered way before the indigenous people of the Americas but it was essentially the same process; the bringing of a disease which changed people’s perceptual reality.  The people became owned and lost their sense of humanness.  John Trudell also covers the Inquisition in this talk. For a long while descendants of the European tribes were owned just physically but over time this ownership went deeper.  Then the virus was taken to other parts of the globe. We're in the right place at the right time to use our intelligence to influence things for the better.

Something I love about John Trudell is that his viewpoint is so un-racist.  Rather than label the white skinned people as oppressors, he sees that they were oppressed long before the others, and this accounts for a lot.  It's part of our ancestral background that we, all of us, would be wise to look into.

hemp harvest

On arriving home, a neighbour remarked on the visibility of the large amounts of plants in the back of the car.  I am not sure he believed me when I told him it was hemp grown with a licence.  Of course it is. Our CBD rich hemp oil is here:
http://foodforconsciousness.co.uk/product/cbd-enriched-hemp-in-avocado-oil/
Here we are harvesting some hemp in Littlehempston, Devon.

the tricksters

Many humans are more interested in what they suppose to be their 'own minds" or 'inner selves' than the mind of nature...

"The way out of the trap is to discern what is genuinely human in our minds, and what is inhumane, stupid, mechanical, blind, imitative – in short, we must understand human potential in order to see how it is distorted and subverted. Imagine, for instance, that you never heard Beethoven´s 5th symphony played as it really is, but only a distorted version with the notes totally deformed. You could only know that the music was distorted if you knew the true, undistorted version. Likewise, we must realize our authentic minds, our true human potential, in order to see how we are deviated. This is the challenge of the predators.

I have a little phrase for this situation: I say, Human potential comes in a trickster package." JLL

http://www.whale.to/b/lash.html

more about global ibogaine conference

press release:

Between March 14-16th, 2016 in Tepoztlan, Mexico, the 2016 Global Ibogaine Conference will convene experts from around the world to discuss ibogaine therapy, the climate of global drug policy, and the sustainability and traditional uses of Tabernanthe iboga.

Since the 1980s ibogaine, the primary psychoactive extract of T. iboga, has increasingly been used experimentally in the detoxification from opiates and as a treatment for substance use disorders. Early clinical trials confirmed some very promising initial reports, but were later suspended because of funding and litigation. Ibogaine’s use has continued to grow, from the early peer-to-peer drug user networks, to today when ibogaine is administered under compassionate access or experimental legal frameworks in some progressive hospitals, medical centers, retreats, and private therapeutic practices around the world. The landscape of ibogaine research and practice has changed dramatically. Today clinical investigations are being re-initiated looking not only at its use in addiction treatment, but also other conditions.

The event is a partnership between The Global Ibogaine Therapy Alliance (GITA), the International Center for Ethnobotanical Education, Research & Service (ICEERS), and Espolea (Mexico City). It is the 5th international conference hosted by GITA, and the first major public conference in the series. It features influential speakers from across the fields of psychology, harm reduction, and drug policy reform, and ibogaine research, including Claudio Naranjo, Stanton Peele, Kenneth Alper, Jeffrey Kamlet, Andrew Tatarski, and many others.

The conference pre-session from March 12-13th, 2016 will be the first ever Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) Certification for Ibogaine Therapists. course, available through GITA, goes beyond the standards emergency protocols certified by the American Heart Association to discuss practical concerns for monitoring patients in a clinical setting. It will also include important changes to ACLS interventions and appropriate medications to avoid negative interaction, in order to prevent emergency situations during ibogaine administration.

Registration for the event as well as the pre- and post-conference sessions, will open on August 1st, 2015. For more information about the conference, including confirmed speakers, program outline, and to sign up for email updates, please visit: http://www.ibogaineconference.org 

global ibogaine conference

I am so excited about this event and have booked my early bird ticket already.  I am thrilled that this conference at this location too, , because this village is somewhere I am very keen to visit.  There seems to be a constellation of ibogaine activity in Mexico, although the root it comes from, iboga, actually grows in Africa.  It makes sense though because of the character of Mexico, in terms of both the people and the land.  You can read an article I recently wrote about ibogaine treatment here: http://foodforconsciousness.co.uk/ibogaine-miracles/.  I am available by phone or email to advise anyone considering this kind of experience (contact details in the article).

Regarding the conference:

http://www.ibogaineconference.org/

Ibogaine as a Contemporary Therapeutic Tool

Between March 14-16th, 2016, the Global Ibogaine Conference will convene experts from around the world to discuss ibogaine therapy, the climate of global drug policy, and the sustainability and traditional uses of Tabernanthe iboga.

Since the 1980s ibogaine has increasingly been used experimentally in the detoxification from opiates and as a treatment for substance use disorders. Early clinical trials confirmed some very promising initial reports, but were later suspended because of funding and litigation. Ibogaine’s use has continued to grow, from the early peer-to-peer drug user networks, to today when ibogaine is administered under compassionate access or experimental legal frameworks in some progressive hospitals, medical centers, retreats, and private therapeutic practices around the world. The landscape of ibogaine research and practice has changed dramatically. Today clinical investigations are being re-initiated looking not only at its use in addiction treatment, but also other conditions.

The conference will be held at the Jardin de la Abundancia hotel in Tepoztlan, Mexico.

Tepoztlan, also known locally as “Pueblo Magico,” is a beautiful small village located just more than an hour outside of Mexico City in the state of Morelos. It’s home to Tepozteco, an ancient Aztec pyramid that overlooks the valley from the surrounding mountains, as well as a large market that expands from the plaza to fill the town’s main streets during the weekend.

protect your spirit

they have entered the reality of the already dead”
"protect your spirit because you're in the place where spirits get eaten"
and a very perceptive and subtle point about 'drunken indians' which I think is highly applicable in modern society regarding addiction.. They couldn't participate in the system that was imposed on them while their natural lifestyle was ripped from them.  The growing addiction problem may turn out to be a major impetus for change.
"without them we wouldn't be here today"

cowboys and indians

 a man, a woman,
 a sort of love
 she was a beautiful woman
 but he did a lot of ugly things to turn her world around
 in his own way he loved her too
 trying to be his own man
 conquer the world when he couldn’t
 she became his last stand
 he was cowboys she was indians

 John Trudell

anosognosia and confabulation

Self-deception, delusion, anosognosia (lack of insight into own condition) and confabulation (fabrication while believing it to be true) typically follow brain injury.

the fully functioning person

"Carl Rogers believed that every person could achieve their goals wishes, and desires in life. When they did so self-actualization took place. For Rogers (1961) people who are able be self-actualize, and that is not all of us, are called fully functioning persons. This means that the person is in touch with the here and now, his or her subjective experiences and feelings, continually growing and changing.
In many ways Rogers regarded the fully functioning person as an ideal and one that people do not ultimately achieve.
It is wrong to think of this as an end or completion of life’s journey; rather it is a process of always becoming and changing.
Rogers identified five characteristics of the fully functioning person:

• 1. Open to experience: both positive and negative emotions accepted. Negative feelings are not denied, but worked through (rather than resort to ego defence mechanisms).

2. Existential living: in touch with different experiences as they occur in life, avoiding prejudging and preconceptions. Being able to live and fully appreciate the present, not always looking back to the past or forward to the future (i.e. living for the moment).


3. Trust feelings: feeling, instincts and gut-reactions are paid attention to and trusted. People’s own decisions are the right ones and we should trust ourselves to make the right choices.


4. Creativity: creative thinking and risk taking are features of a person’s life. Person does not play safe all the time. This involves the ability to adjust and change and seek new experiences.


5. Fulfilled life: person is happy and satisfied with life, and always looking for new challenges and experiences.


For Rogers, fully functioning people are well adjusted, well balanced and interesting to know. Often such people are high achievers in society. Critics claim that the fully functioning person is a product of Western culture. In other cultures, such as Eastern cultures, the achievement of the group is valued more highly than the achievement of any one person.

Carl Rogers (1902-1987) was a humanistic psychologist who agreed with the main assumptions of Abraham Maslow, but added that for a person to "grow", they need an environment that provides them with genuineness (openness and self-disclosure), acceptance (being seen with unconditional positive regard), and empathy (being listened to and understood).

Without these, relationships and healthy personalities will not develop as they should, much like a tree will not grow without sunlight and water.

Rogers believed that every person can achieve their goals, wishes and desires in life. When, or rather if they did so, self actualization took place.  This was one of Carl Rogers most important contributions to psychology and for a person to reach their potential a number of factors must be satisfied."

http://www.simplypsychology.org/carl-rogers.html

"Rogers rejected the deterministic nature of both psychoanalysis and behaviorism and maintained that we behave as we do because of the way we perceive our situation. "

smart recovery

Unfortunately unhealthy substance addiction is a worldwide epidemic.  The comforting news is that if you're in it, you are not alone. Smart recovery are  a highly recommended organisation who help with motivation, dealing with urges, thoughts, feelings and behaviours and leading a balanced life.  They do not prescribe beliefs about the nature of life, leaving these to the individual, but have a practical approach.  They are funded primarily by donation.

http://www.smartrecovery.org/

"Fortunately for me, SMART doesn’t simply say “abstain and then lean on the program” but rather offers each person a set of science-backed tools, approaches, and resources to choose from. Some of these fall into the category of mindfulness. Others derive from Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) research and themselves have additional acronyms. But don’t be scared off by the alphabet soup; most of the techniques are straightforward. A lot of them come down to what some people call “reality checking” and simply involve bringing some rational questions and ways of thinking to the unexamined assumptions and irrational conclusions that can get us into trouble. It may take some practice to implement the tools, but they are accessible and the community offers wisdom and support along the way.
Navigating an emotional and cognitive terrain landscaped across years of using drinking as an all-occasion coping mechanism was and remains crucial—not just to hanging onto my status as a nondrinker but to thriving as a happy nondrinker. And the point of changing, as well as its reward, is not abstaining for its own sake but to live a richer, better life. It’s possible I would have figured some of this out on my own—or not—but SMART made the process a lot more pleasant." Elspeth

http://blog.smartrecovery.org/2015/08/10/point-3-managing-thoughts-feelings-and-behaviors/#more-6874

This video is great introduction to Self Management And Recovery Training, highlighting the following:

• rational emotive behaviour change
• motivation
• urges - the way we deal with thoughts
• acknowledge, stop, distraction
• thoughts, feelings and behaviours, problem solving
• lifestyle balance - staying self-occupied
• dreams 

what is addiction?

"It’s always about pain. Whatever you do, don’t try to escape from your pain but be with it, because that attempt to escape from pain is what causes more pain.  That’s the reality of addiction.” Gabor Mate.



"I’d rather not speak in terms of “good” or “bad”, but if by “good” you mean positive, healthy, nourishing, then I’d say that if it’s good, it’s probably a passion and not an addiction.  Passions can be very consuming of time and energy, but they also feed your soul, your sense of being alive, your feeling of wholeness as a person.  Addictions provide fleeting pleasure or gratification, but never leave you satisfied.  And the same activity could be a passion for one person and an addiction for another.  One might be a wine enthusiast, enjoying the refined pleasures the drink has to offer, while another person’s “love” for wine masks a fear of his own mind in its sober state."

http://drgabormate.com/topic/addiction/

between worlds

Shhhh! She is traveling between worlds right now. You can see her holding the tension of not knowing ~ she is simply breathing into her unanswered questions. Sometimes she drinks her coffee with quaking hands, not knowing where her relationship or her bank account is going. But this time, she is holding onto the tension of not knowing, and is not willing to hit the panic button. She is unlearning thousands of years of conditioning. She is not being split between the opposing forces of fight and flight. She is neither naïve nor ignorant. She is a frontier woman, paving new roads & making new choices. She is willing to make a new transcendent possibility emerge. You may see her now ~ standing at thresholds, or at crossroads ~ breathing into her body ~ intently listening for inner signals. She's learning new navigation skills as she arrives at a most magical moment of her life." ~ Skhvinder Sircar.

rainbows and supplements

A beautiful double rainbow appeared in front of my eyes shortly after sunrise this morning. The rain and sun in Devon produces frequent rainbows bit this one was exceptional and filled the sky.

 On a slightly different note, a mole on my arm I have had since childhood, that was a bit raised from me fiddling with it over the years, has suddenly fallen off, my feeling is the CBD oil has something to do with it but I can't say for sure. My immune system seems to be well up right now, psychologically as well as physically; growing older is a daunting prospect that most of don't really want to have to think about, but with natural supplements and herbs it's just astounding what can be achieved. Some of my favourite herbs and supplements are: megahydrate (possibly a telomerase activator), magu's secret (Dragon Herbs), CBD oil, deer antler, Wellsprings natural progesterone serenity cream, melatonin, schizandra, reishi, cordyceps, evening primrose, complete EFAs plus DHA and EPA, ubiquinol, astragalus, ginkgo and rhodiola. Some of these are specific for my age group and women, some good all round. Personally i think we can use all the help we can get.

eye connection and altered states

"Staring into someone’s eyes for 10 minutes induces an altered state of consciousness
Volunteers ended up hallucinating and saw deformed facial traits and monsters.

http://www.sciencealert.com/staring-into-someone-s-eyes-for-10-minutes-induces-an-altered-state-of-consciousness
A psychologist in Italy has figured out how to induce a drug-free altered state of consciousness by asking 20 volunteers to sit and stare into each other’s eyes for 10 minutes straight in a dimly lit room. Not only did the deceptively simple task bring on strange ‘out of body’ experiences for the volunteers, it also caused them to see hallucinations of monsters, their relatives, and themselves in their partner’s face.
The experiment, run by Giovanni Caputo from the University of Urbino, involved having 20 young adult (15 of which were women) pair off, sit in a dimly lit room 1 metre away from each other, and stare into their partner’s eyes for 10 minutes. The lighting in the room was bright enough for the volunteers to easily make out the facial features of their partner, but low enough to diminish their overall colour perception.

A control group of 20 more volunteers were asked to sit and stare for 10 minutes in another dimly lit room in pairs, but their chairs were facing a blank wall. The volunteers were told very little about the purpose of the study, only that it had to do with a "meditative experience with eyes open".
Once the 10 minutes were up, the volunteers were asked to complete questionnaires related to what they experienced during and after the experiment. One questionnaire focussed on any dissociative symptoms that the volunteers might have experienced, and another questioned them on what they saw in their partner’s face (eye-staring group) or their own face (control group).
Dissociation is a term used in psychology to describe a whole range of psychological experiences that make a person feel detached from their immediate surroundings. Symptoms such as a loss of memory, seeing everything in distorted colours, or feeling like the world isn’t real can be brought on by abuse and trauma; drugs such as ketamine, alcohol, and LSD; and now, apparently, face-staring.
"The participants in the eye-staring group said they'd had a compelling experience unlike anything they'd felt before," Christian Jarrett writes for the British Psychological Society’s Research Digest.
Reporting in journal Psychiatry Research, Caputo says the eye-staring group out-scored the control group in all the questionnaires, signifying that something about staring into another human being’s eyes for 10 uninterrupted minutes had had a profound effect on their visual perception and mental state. "

rewilding and nomadism

Here are two interesting interviews from Daniel Vitalis's rewilding podcast.

The first one discusses the loss and rediscovery of the wild human with Arthur Haines. The second one, with Abel James, explores the idea that we are by nature semi-nomadic, in other words, by nature, we humans like to move around and then settle for a while before moving on again.

http://www.danielvitalis.com/rewild-yourself-podcast/arthur-haines-on-the-death-of-domestication-the-birth-of-the-new-aboriginal

http://www.danielvitalis.com/rewild-yourself-podcast/abel-james-on-the-wild-diet-modern-semi-nomadic-living

biophilia

"It is our biophilia that causes us to find so much beauty and satisfaction in nature. We do not love nature because it is beautiful; we find beauty in nature because we are a part of it, and it is a part of us." Christopher Marley

 “the passionate love of life and of all that is alive… the wish to further growth, whether in a person, a plant, an idea, or a social group.”  Erich Fromm

http://www.brainpickings.org/2015/07/06/biophilia-christopher-marley/

grief and the human condition

Having spent some time amongst indigenous people in southern Mexico recently I have been stunned to rediscover how shut down the human heart is in other places!  Rediscovering the traumatic situation in long time 'developed' countries has been a very valuable if shocking education.  Rather then the purpose of interaction between people being to uplift, which surely is the natural thing, conversations of a complaining or disapproving, moralising  nature have become the norm.  So removed from the natural human habitat and a natural way of life it is understandable.  When we lose somebody dear to our hearts it is an important process to grieve so we don't die in some sense with them or the relationship.  I got to the point where I felt a need to yet again grieve the whole human condition.  There is more and better for humanity, at least for the humans who really want it.

earthy experience in warm salty water

The Mediterranean Sea is very warm so evaporation occurs more rapidly than in most other bodies of water, therefore more salt is left behind. Because it is mostly enclosed by land this warm, dense, salty water stays there for a long while, up to 100 years before returning to the Atlantic Ocean.  It is gradually replaced by less salty and dense Atlantic water in the Strait of Gibraltar. 

Because it is so salty you float more in it and it is lovely to swim in.  Salt is an electrolyte and so the saltier water is the more conductive it is.  Swimming in the sea strongly connects us into the Earth’s electricity and swimming on the Mediterranean exceptionally so.  A very healing relaxing experience.

figs

Figs are one of the most popular foods amongst primates including humans in areas where they grow. They contain ample amounts of a very important class of biochemicals called mono-amine oxidase inhibitors (MAOI's) which have a very significant impact on our state of mind.

Mono-amine oxidase (MAO) is an enzyme which breaks down the monoamine neurotransmitters in our brains which include serotonin, dopamine etc. Mono-amine oxidase inhibitors slow the break down and so boost the levels of these neurotransmitters. 
Added to this, at least one of the mono-amine neurotransmitters, norepinephrine, stimulates the pineal gland. This causes the pineal gland to produce more of its hormones. These hormones have a pivotal effect on human development and our states of mind. It is possible that the presence of the powerfully influential chemicals in figs may be the underlying reason why the fig tree had significance to the ancient mystics.



Figs are one of the oldest cultivated plants, having been grown since at least 5000BC. The symbiotic relationship between humans and fruit trees is one we still sense to day.
Figs are one of the most densely mineralised of all fruits, being particularly high in calcium, also potassium, magnesium and iron. In the wild they contain a lot of insect material which is highly nutritious.

Growing tips for Britain from Helen Hurworth:

Figs are easy to grow in the UK. They do especially well in large pots in a sunny corner. The most favoured variety is 'Brown Turkey'. This is widely available, but I would advise to try and buy from organic supplier like 'Garden Organic' or support your local nursery by buying from them. Top Tip. Remove ALL buds In November, these will not grown big enough through the Winter and will exhaust the plant for the next year. Remove them All. Then the buds the next Spring have a good season to grow. This is the number one reason people don't get big or ripe enough figs on their trees and say they don't fruit.

first rule of tonic herbalism

“First Rule of Tonic Herbalism,” If you don't take the herbs, they won't work.”
Ron Teegarden

This applies to nutrtion, supplements and healthy lifestyle practices too! Doing them consistently is what makes the difference.  Consistency is the key.

how heartbreak effects the brain

"...how does losing the love of your life change the chemical composition of your brain? First of all, let's make it clear that heartbreak really does hurt. Functional MRI scans have shown that people who have recently been dumped have higher than normal activity in the region of the brain that registers physical pain.
This triggers the release of stress hormones such as cortisol and adrenalin, leading to all kinds of physical symptoms, such as nausea, difficulty breathing, and also a weakening of the heart muscle that doctors call Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, and can sometimes be fatal.
But let's get back to our brains, because those stress hormones aren't the only ones flooding our systems. Back in 2010, researchers from Rutgers University in New York asked 10 women and five men who'd recently been dumped, but were still "intensely in love", to get inside an MRI machine and look at photos of their ex. That literally sounds like the worst kind of torture you could put someone who's dealing with a breakup through, but it provided some fascinating insight into the neuroscience of being dumped (thank you, heartbroken warriors of science).
In fact, the scans showed that their brain activity was very similar to that of an addict going through cocaine withdrawals. And that's because falling in love is a lot like becoming hooked on drugs - when you're smitten with someone, it activates the 'reward' neurons in your brain, and this triggers the release of the feel-good hormone dopamine...."
http://www.sciencealert.com/this-is-what-happens-to-your-brain-when-you-get-your-heart-broken