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Mckenna & Nicole

Terence McKenna / audio 6:23:55 ~414 MB opus 151 kb/s

This weekend workshop at the Ojai Foundation pairs Terence McKenna with ethnographer Nicole Maxwell for four talks on Amazon knowledge and indigenous consciousness. Maxwell spent over four decades in the jungle documenting shamanic practice, medicinal plants, and the carefully-guarded knowledge systems of indigenous peoples - including her breakthrough fieldwork on contraceptive medicines, wound-healing remedies that stop bleeding within minutes, and the use of psychoactive plants like ayahuasca in ordinary spiritual practice. She recounts direct encounters with the Shuar and other peoples, her early skepticism of indigenous medicine and subsequent conversion when she witnessed a severe wound heal rapidly without scarring or infection. McKenna contextualizes her work within larger questions about human evolution, our alienation from nature, and the crisis of cultural knowledge vanishing as acculturation erodes indigenous wisdom. This recording captures a rare master ethnographer at her peak, speaking authentically about decades of lived fieldwork alongside one of the twentieth century's most articulate voices on consciousness and plants.

transcriptmachine-transcribed, unedited

It seems like an annual event now when Terence comes.

It's very challenging and inspiring for our community,

and we're very happy to welcome her back again.

Thanks.

It's good to be here.

Well, this is the culmination of a dream of mine

and sort of a departure from what you may be used to from me.

I think inevitably this weekend will be a little more personal

and maybe less cosmic than some have been

because I sort of have to open my private life to you

because what I'll be doing this weekend is basically sharing a friend.

Last year I was here with Rianne Eisler,

but that was a marriage of ideological convenience.

Not that it wasn't sincere,

but we were drawn together primarily because our ideas were in congruence.

Nicole and I, on the other hand,

were drawn together primarily because our patterns of intoxication

seemed to be in congruence.

We're going this weekend to talk inevitably a lot about the Amazon,

the crisis of conservation in the warm tropics,

vegetable medicine.

Nicole is a world expert.

She's spent over 40 years in the Amazon

after a very complex and fertile time spent in the Far East before that.

She's a storyteller, an ethnographer,

and a personality of great depth, warmth, and uniqueness.

And it's a pleasure to appear here with her.

I first met Nicole in 1980 when I was part of an expedition to the Amazon

and involved Wade Davis of Serpent and Rainbow fame

and my brother and Dennis and some other people

from the University of British Columbia.

And I had read Nicole's book,

The Witch Doctor's Apprentice.

This tells you something.

This lady got in on it so early

that shaman wasn't even a word,

let alone a buzzword,

when the first edition of her book came out.

And I quickly discovered in Iquitos in 1980

that all roads seemed to lead to Nicole.

If you wanted something done,

if you wanted to meet somebody,

if you wanted an obstacle cleared away

with the Peruvian government or the university,

Nicole was the person to see.

And one of my weaknesses is for characters.

And I've collected them in all times and places.

My charm bracelet has such peculiar specimens

as Ralph Abraham, Rupert Sheldrake,

Nina Wise, Joan Halifax.

Unique types.

I mean, they threw the mold away

before they made these people.

And Nicole fell in to that category.

So, in line with that picture

of our mutual love of hell-raising,

I have to tell you that we stayed up

much too late last night.

And so we're mere shells

that sit before you this evening.

Yes, and some of you I understand

are mere shells.

When I really feel like a mere shell,

I feel like an old wasp's nest.

So, what I thought we would do this evening

is we want to meet each of you.

This is Roy Tuchman is on vacation this month,

so we have an intimate group.

Otherwise, we would have had

a financially successful group.

So, we trade one breakthrough for another.

But what I would like to do this evening,

briefly, is go around the circle

and just hear who you are

and what your interests are

and maybe a statement of your expectation

or your hope for the thing.

Make it brief.

One cannot say often enough

in these situations

that lack of brevity

is proof of psychosis.

So, please bear that in mind.

Fifty people are looking at you

and wondering how balanced you are.

So, this is an opportunity

to lead them astray.

And I'll slyly organize it

so that we come around

and then it will come to Nicole

last before me

and then I will tie it all up if I can.

So, why don't we do that just briefly.

Before we start, let me say

we will have three meetings tomorrow.

One in the evening,

the other two in the obvious slots

and one meeting on Sunday.

And all of these meetings will either be

under the teaching tree,

which is immediately outside,

or right here if the weather turns bad on us.

Tomorrow night's meeting will be here.

So, why don't we just quickly go around the circle

and introduce ourselves.

Michael, why don't you start?

Okay, hi, I'm Michael.

I spend my time living here

at the Yo-Hai Foundation

and at Omega Institute in New York.

And Terence, his material

and influences that he's been influenced by

have been important to me as well.

I love science fiction.

And I love Tai Chi.

Glad to meet you.

My name's Leon.

I also work here.

Terence changed my life, to be honest.

I'd always been rather scared of the psychedelics.

And I met him at Esalen a number of years ago.

And he was the first person

who said something sane about me

that really changed my thinking.

And ever since,

I've been greatly stirred with him by his ideas.

And they've really impacted me a lot.

So I'm very thankful to be here with you again.

Glad you're here, man.

I'm Julie Wellings.

I live down in the valley here.

And I'm anxious to hear Nicole's story.

My name's Stephen.

I heard you one day on the radio

about six months ago.

And it was the first time I ever had any validation

on what was going on in the other world for me.

And you verbalize it when you talk about it.

And it's what I experienced.

So it's just,

it's really brought some light into my life.

And I really appreciate it.

That's why I'm here.

My name's Elaine.

And I'm here because I'm feeling a draw to children's

and getting reconnected with the earth

and make a contribution where I can give you help.

I'm here at the Ohio Foundation.

And I'm especially concerned about the threat to the...

My name's John Wymore.

I'm now the curtain.

I'm a temporary part-time staff member.

I'm anxious to find out who the hell you are.

Me too.

I'm Joe Lasosky.

And I'm a painter, fine arts.

I started doing psychedelics

with Wheat Show Indians maybe 20 years ago.

And I met Terrence.

It was like a meeting with Shaman

at Esalen and the Kenya ago.

My name's Christopher.

And I have an interest in the Amazon and psychedelics.

And very often haunted by Terrence.

I'm trying to do radio.

My name is Nina and I'm a performance artist

and old friend.

And I expect the unexpected.

Yes, Nina.

A man.

I didn't know.

Nina introduced me to my wife

and it's been unexpected ever since.

And I'm really delighted to meet Nicole.

What is it?

Yes, sir.

I'm Foster and Bray.

With Brian Morris,

we composed sound photosynthesis

and a band called Intuit.

We produced Terrence and Cat

and many other folks around the town

that you have come to know and love.

And it's great to see you here again.

We were here last year with Ralph Messner

and Terrence for our first time on our ride.

Brian.

Music.

And this kind of stuff.

I'm quite happy to be with these great characters.

My name is Elizabeth.

When I was 37,

on my birthday,

I heard a voice inside my head say,

from now on,

everything will be in reverse.

And to point it up,

while I was driving

about a half a mile from my house,

forward gear went out

and I drove home.

So I feel very comfortable

with the archaic revival things.

My name is Jane

and I also live in the valley

and I'm very grateful

to be in your presence

and looking very much forward

to hearing,

especially with Colas and me.

Thank you.

I'm Pat Danish,

a blue painter

and I work here.

I'm very curious

and interested

in the other parts

of reality

that I touch upon

and working with art

and the side of the world.

My name is Ingrid.

I'm a work student here.

I'm a colleague

from Vienna, Austria.

And I'm here

in your workshop

because I have heard

many interesting things

about Nicole and you,

little crazy things

and now I will find it out

for myself

what it's true about.

My name is Anne

and I'm an artist

and I live in Ojai

in Santa Monica

and I've heard enough

that I'm fascinated

with all this information

and I'm looking forward

to hearing more.

My name is Kevin

and I came

because I got the,

somehow I got on

the mailing list

and they sent me this out

and I looked through them

and this one looked really bad.

I have no expectations.

I heard parents speak once

down in Los Angeles

and that was a nice thing

so I'm looking forward.

If I'm looking forward to it

then that's an expectation

and I'm looking forward

to it in the end.

Welcome.

My name's Gary

and I work here

at the Ohio Foundation.

One of my interests

I guess would be

what the source

of hallucinations

got out of

or where they come from

or what sort of structures

in mind

and how they got there.

My name's Ken Simonton

and I live in Los Angeles

and I like plants

and I like to grow them

and deal with them

and see them grow

and I like to hear parents

talk about plants.

My name is Jordan Alex

and I've listened

to Ken's tapes.

I've got word

and loved all the people

for thought

and loved more.

My name's Carl.

I'm a physician

from Orange County

and I'm here

out of curiosity

looking for insight.

My name's Alan

and this place

is a spiritual home

for me

and my wife.

We come here a lot

and it's good

to be here

and Terrence

is always a great pleasure

to be with.

I like to think of him

as the Abraham Lincoln

of consciousness

among other things

and it's particularly

exciting to have an opportunity

to meet Nicole

and have a chance

to spend some time

with the two

together.

I'm Marion.

I'm an old friend

of Terrence's

and I'm happy

to meet Nicole

and I'm interested

in the stories

about the forest

and the other thing.

Good.

My name's Randy

and I'm not familiar

at all with Nicole

but I'm familiar

with Terrence's

and I think

we haven't heard yet

I guess.

I think we've heard

quite a bit

on it.

My name is Diane

and I'm an artist

and I've been having

this wonderful experience

since I've seen you

for the first time

this evening.

We've been listening

to true hallucinations

and a senior photograph

and something

well some very strange

phenomena's going on

to me because

hearing you speak

I mean I've heard

you speak about

going down the path

in my head

it's sort of full

of your words

but it was coming

from a speaker

and I don't know

if I'm explaining

this right

but it is a very

strange phenomena

a true hallucination

he lives

Hi I'm Max

August

I'm a therapist

and I'm interested

in consciousness

and what time

space

and reality

and all about

and it seems like

you've got some

things to say

about that.

My name is

Daniel Siebert

and I'm a

plant grower

and

partnership

with

golf pins

and sweater

business

and

I received

an itinerary

of Terrence's

a couple of

months ago

and there was

an asterisk

next to

the Nicole

Maxwell event

and down at the

bottom

it said

should be

very interesting

my name is

Ellen

and

design

sweaters

and

Daniel

left out

parties

while he does

which is

he has a

magical plant

business

and we're

very interested

in plants

from the

Amazon

and with

psychoactive

effects

yes Daniel

and Ellen

have a

business

which is

one of the

few places

in the

United States

where some

of these

psychoactive

and medicinal

Amazonian

plants actually

find a

commercial

outlet

I'm Laurel

and I'm

from New

Hampshire

and I'm

very much

of a child

through this

whole

consciousness

thing

I'm looking

for some

new answers

to old

problems

or old

answers

to new

problems

which are

the

women

in it

my name is

Bob

I work at

the Ohio

Foundation

and

I've gotten

a lot

of different

perspectives

on your

work

from the

staff

here

and

it's

rather

intrigued

there

I am

it seems

like something

I don't

a good

morning

my name

is June

and

I'm here

because I

like being

with people

of like

mind

and

I'm very

interested

to hear

what you

speak

I write

therapists

and do

artwork

and I'm

a very

good

company

I can

artist

and artist

is my

whole

sculptor

and I

was

interested

I heard

Terrence

on TPFK

the first

time

and wrote

the Ohio

Foundation

for tapes

and that's

how I

do this

whole

program

and

what Terrence

has to say

has fascinated

because of

where I

when I'm

doing

artwork

and

what

state of

mind

that I

get in

to do

artwork

seems

to have

a great

deal

camaraderie

with

what he

speaks

about

My name

is John

I live

here at

the Foundation

I'm interested

in the nature

of the mind

especially

the mind

before it

became so

overloaded

with symbols

and at this

time

I don't think

we have

the possibility

to look

at that

mind

without

looking

through

the veil

of symbols

and

I'd like

to see

through

shamanism

which

goes back

perhaps

40 or

50 thousand

years

where

time

in the

negative

mind

much

quiet

through

that

maybe

the

time

I'm

Joe

thanks to

I met

Terrence

about

years

ago

and

continues

increasing

number

insane

I'm

anthropologist

and

I've

had a

long

relationship

with

green

vegetables

and

I'm

very

interested

examining

in many

ways

personally

and in

other ways

the

relationship

between

indigenous

peoples

and

endangered

environments

I'm

Gigi

I'm

currently

emcee

and part

the

back-up

band

for

spirit

artists

at the

Ojai

Foundation

I am

interested

I would

say

events

and

people

ideas

experiences

that

help

deepen

our

sacred

relationship

class

all

life

and

I'm

particularly

happy to

see

Nicole

here

as a

welcome

coming back

from a

women's

retreat

see such

fine

distinguished

woman

here

and

homecoming

accompany

such

fine

distinguished

woman

Mary

What an

Irish

tongue

you've

got

my name is

Jim

I'm a

part of a

small company

that develops

socially

responsible

business

ventures

for many

years

we've been

doing business

with the

Soviet Union

and recently

become involved

in Brazil

because we

believe that

part of the

answer to

the preservation

and rainforests

is the

development of

commercially

viable

businesses

that support

the culture

and

the preservation

of the

Amazon basin

rather than

its destruction

so I'm

currently learning

all I can

about the

Amazon basin

to apply

our

business

acumen

to this

whole

past

government

my name is

Laura

Jensen

I'm a

contemporary

I've

worked for

this year

to 35

years

from South

America

also

I've been

on the past

and studying

communism

for the last

few years

looking forward

to your

new insights

and for being

here

last year

I went

to the

Amazon

for the

first time

I stayed

for a couple

of months

so I went

to Brazil

to the

forest

in Arizona

I was particularly

interested in

the preservation

of the rainforest

and preserving

the plants

that got involved

with a group

of people

who were working

to save the

forest

they do

the stuff

they do

very much

in the

planted

garden

and

so I've

been working

with them

for the

last year

and particularly

interested in

the medicinal

herbs

and that

that's been

the hardest

that you've

been living

in Africa

and so

different parts

of the world

and

particularly

interested

to as much

as I can get

of what I'm

looking for

and your name

has been

ringing in my

ears

for the last

year

I'm very

curious

my name is

Janet

I'm a character

at Ohi

foundation

and I'll

probably get

to see some

of your ears

and I came here

tonight to do

some slurps

my name is

Lynn Bradfoot

I've recently

come from the

east

to join the

staff at Ohi

doing program

work

and I'm a

peace and justice

activist

from a long

time

and that includes

justice for the

environment

and I'm glad

you're both

doing the

work for

and I'm always

glad to see

gutsy avant-garde

way out

ahead

women

so I'm

very glad

to see you

there

you're a good

role model

my name is

Pat

I live in

Malibu

and I live

in Mexico

and I love

the psychedelic

room

and I love

to be

used to

my name is

Tushanka

and I was

recently

introduced

to you

via our

take

at your

presentation

at Esalen

and I

thought it

very inspiring

and I'm

glad to hear

I'm Sarah

and I'm

glad to hear

parents talk

and I'm

glad to hear

you both talk

my name is

Lily

and I live

here in the

valley

and I have

pictures

near the

Amazon

and

hallucinogenic

drugs

from way

back

I do

production

with music

festivals

because I

believe music

is magic

and I have

also interest

in magic

and the

goddess

and I love

to hear

parents speak

because it

always makes

me laugh

and I always

learn something

and I thank

you for that

and I'm

looking forward

to Nicole

my name is

Lynx

and I'm

happy to be

here

haven't heard

either of you

speak before

I'm looking forward

to it

my name is

Bob

and I

recently heard

parents

up at

Essiline

give a

weekend series

of talks

and I sent

Dusanka

the tape

I'm Eric

I'm

semi-lucid

insomniac

I'd like

information

thank you

for sharing

my name is

Sean

I'm a

registered

nurse

working in

an emergency

room

in Ventura

been listening to

parents for a

couple years

and

I'd like to

be involved

in the

additional time

and I'm

Terry

I'm also

an emergency

room nurse

and

procrastinated

with

Terence

and

Nicole

can't

call me

I'm a

psychiatric

nurse

and we

don't even

know each

other

and

I study

different forms

of healing

and there's a

crew of the

Amazon

that's

very much

love the land

and very

interesting

in ancient

areas

were you

on the

map

though

where

were you

on the

Amazon

good

I'm

Tandra

in Ohio

I'm

the mother

of two

daughters

I've

wandered

around

a bit

around

the world

I'm

interested

good

ideas

consciousness

I love

plants

in the

forest

and

looking

forward

listening

tonight

I hope

we get

to you

My name

is Lola

and I live

here

and

I'm

completely

interested

in the

unlimited

expanse

of human

consciousness

and I

love

listen

Terence

one

of the

astral

travelers

all

those

realms

I'm

happy

to be

here

and

it's

a pleasure

to meet

Nicole

as well

Nicole

why don't

you just

take a few

minutes

and say

whatever's

on your

mind

Well the

first thing

I would

say

that I

ought to

I never

really

thought

too much

about

the

out of

the ordinary

experiences

that we all

have

because

it seems

so natural

and

I've

been

with

many

cultures

now

first

went

the

Amazon

region

19...

1948, that is, as an expedition. And that was not store for the purpose of getting medicinal

plants. I wanted some excitement. I got it. But the one thing about that was I got hooked

on jungle. It's the only thing I've ever been really addicted to. But I can't stay away

too much. I get restless. And it does that to some people, because, you see, it is an

entity. It is not just a bunch of trees and rivers and mud and bugs. To me, at least, and

to most of the people who live in it, I think of the primitive people, it is a very definite

personality. And it has power. And so that is why I have to keep going back. My first

trip did it. I got into a tribe who'd never seen a white skin before. They didn't think

much of it. No, they took my hand and went this way. And then they said something and

everybody broke up, just howling. And I kept saying to my guide, what did they say, Alfredo,

what did they say? And Alfredo was laughing so hard he couldn't say. But he finally dried

his eyes and said, he says, that isn't white paint, it won't come off. She's really got skin

like a fish and eyes like a fish belly since she's hideous. So that went my chance, my ideas

of being the white queen of the jungle. And after that, I learned that these people were

very different from other people I've known, in that you could really trust them anywhere.

I was with a group of heroes. They're the ones who cut off the heads of people that they kill

in battle and then shrink them. It's quite an easy matter. It's nothing particularly magical.

They boil the head a little bit and make a slit up the back and peel the skin off, delicate

cutting around the cartilage. And sew it up again and then fill it with hot rocks and smaller

and smaller hot rocks. And then finally sand and they sort of model it and you get a nice

little shrunken head called a sansa. And so some people suggested it might be rather good

for me. But this is my first encounter with primitive, except for a very brief one in Laos, Indochina,

as it was then. And they wanted everything I had, of course. Safety pins were the greatest,

the most popular. I had fortunately somehow got the idea of taking a lot of safety pins.

And since women wear a dress that goes with a piece of cloth wrapped around and brought over

the ones that were rather chic and fastened here usually with a thorn. Safety pins, combining the

elegance of jewelry with modern technology, were a great success. And they also rather sometimes

wear a lot of cloth. They weren't so sure. I'd taken a lot of gaudy stuff in. But mostly they wear brown,

stuff they weave out of the native cotton. Cotton goes all over the place. And then dye brown and

make it into their clothes. And, but I could leave everything I owned spread out because we got,

you're always getting wet in jungle. Getting rained on all your, your raft. I was on a raft for that one

because we'd gone through some rapids you can't take a canoe through. And everything out to dry. And I

could go away all day. They wouldn't touch a thing. They're very, very honorable. In fact,

honor is all they've got, you see. Because they have anything they, any possessions,

in a short time will get mildewed or they'll be eaten by bugs or they just plain rot. And so you can't

be anybody important by owning things. You have to be it. You have to be the best hunter or the best

warrior or whatever. And it works out rather well until our people come along and teach them a lot of

other things. But that was the first trip. And I learned to respect and admire these people very much.

And I had to keep going back. Only, and so I'd been hearing about medicinal plants all the time I'd been

in South America, which was by then three years, and that the Indians had wonderful remedies. And I

didn't believe a word of it. I'd had a year and a half of medical school. And these savages couldn't know

anything that my professors didn't know. That's what I thought. And it took me three years. I seemed to be a

slow learner. Before I could accept that, they did have some remarkable things. And only then, because I fell

on my machete and got a big gash in his arm. And I have a slight tendency to be a bleeder. And I was out in the

bush, not very far from the house, and put on the tourniquet of a vine and came back. And the interpreter, who was the

administrator, that this was a property owned by the widow of a Peruvian, who happened to be a gal from Brooklyn.

And it was way out of nowhere. It took five, the record for getting there by canoe was five days.

And the borders of the property were one range of mountains and a river over here and that way. And so,

but here I was bleeding all over the place. And they brought out a bottle with some tree sap in it and

put them on. But of course, when you're bleeding like that, nothing can take. It doesn't stay there.

And so they said, you have to drink some of this. And well, I didn't want to be rude.

So I drank it. It was the most horrible, acrid, major mouth pucker. And in three minutes, about three to four,

I would say, the bleeding had quite stopped. And that was kind of interesting. So I thought, I had plenty of penicillin,

and I didn't have to worry about infection. So they told me that putting this stuff on it would stop any infection.

So I thought, I'll see. And I put a couple of pieces of, a few pieces of adhesive across it,

holding it together, but I could see in between, because it got quite dry.

And there was never any infection. There was practically no inflammation. In the morning,

there was a neat scab, a very narrow one. And it healed in a little less than half the normal time,

leaving only a very slight scar. So then I had to do a little rethinking and decide that

my nice arrogant position of our superiority in medicine would do a little reviewing.

And from then on, I went after medicinal plants, and I found they have so much. And their psychedelics are just as important.

As a matter of fact, I think there are rather more of them than is generally recognized, even tobacco.

Chewing tobacco and swallowing it is very hard on the stomach, but we will hallucinate. I don't recommend it though,

because there are far pleasanter ways. And they use those hallucinations so very routinely.

They'll tell you, well, I didn't know what to do for my son, he was so sick, so I took ayahuasca. I mean, sometimes it was just one person alone in the jungle.

Or I took any one of a dozen, and I saw a ghost tigre attack my son, that's what happened to him, or something like that.

And it is so much a part of the life, that you stop thinking of those things, or the medicines, as particularly remarkable.

They're there, and you use them as you would use soap, or any ordinary thing. But with greater respect.

There is a very definite need that is manifested to respect the things you use, especially the psychedelics.

I remember the first time I took home a piece of ayahuasca to plant in my garden,

the shaman who gave it to me. It was a very nice friend of mine, who lived quite near Akita Zubunyak,

in Pikuruyako. You've been up there, haven't you? And they have a, it's a little village,

mostly of bestiezers who being, well most of them aren't too far from a tribe themselves,

and nouveau civilisé is very much like nouveau riche. They have great contempt for the poor,

poor, and the poor in what we consider culture. And so the Indians there, there are about eight of them,

Yalwa, and ritoto most, and Bora. And they stuck together, and they took their things to the market,

and all that. And I didn't realize when I first got acquainted with them, that the three of them were

shamans. And I didn't know that until one day, one of them came to my house, and it was Vicente,

who was quite old, and he was blind. It was very hard for him to get around. And he had to cross

a river, and then get on a bus or walk from Bella Vista, is about three, four miles. And he had a

little boy guiding him, it was raining. So he, I realized this was not just a dropping in to see a

friend. And he sat down and he said, you have to save me. I said, what, what do you mean? What can I do?

He said, they will arrest me for murder. And I said, whom did you kill?

And he said, I didn't kill anybody. It's Belisario. He said, you know, I'm a witch. I hadn't known it.

And he said, Belisario is a witch too. And he's off on the trip somewhere. He had gone up to the,

up the Maragnon River. And Belisario had died.

He got sick and died on his head. And he said, you know, I know that they will say that I put a spell

on him. And I put it, sent a dart at him. And the police will come and get me and arrest me for murder.

It is that matter of fact. And so I said, no, oh, no, they won't. And finally I had to say,

all right, I'll speak to the general about it. And I'll tell him you didn't do anything.

And then he was at ease. But it's that, it's that much a part of it, the ordinary texture of everyday

life, in a great part of the population. And so you get so, that you get a little used

and you sort of accept it as, well, that's part of it. And I think it would do us all rather a lot of

good to consider the possibilities. What do you think?

Sounds good, Nicole. I'm not going to let you off the hook so easily. I want to bring a little bit

of this out. Your name is really associated with, in the public mind, I think, with the contraceptives

that are very much a woman's secret. Yeah, I remember somebody told me, if I kept this up,

I'd be called Contraceptive Connie. Contraceptive Connie. It's not a title, I think.

Well, it wasn't that, it was Carstens, who was, I think, a Swedish or German anthropologist. In 1920,

he was studying the Canelos Indian in southern Ecuador. And he wrote an article saying that the

women took some plant, which is called piri piri, and they swallowed it so that they could

cohabit, as he put it in a, in a refined way, with men, and not to have children.

And at the time he was attacked violently, in 1920, everybody said, this is, this man's out of his mindy

sillies. It invalidated quite a lot of his very good work, because everybody knew that nothing you

took by mouth could stop a woman from having a child. It's nice to know how many of our present

beliefs didn't make about that much sense. The more you see of jungles, the more you wonder about those

things. And anyway, there are, they were the hardest of all things to get. You see, all medicines,

at the beginning at least, now that the acculturation process is proceeding at such a rate,

that the old taboos have worn kind of thin in some places. But when I first started doing this,

medicine is magic. And magic is secret. You don't tell anyone. One tribe would be using a totally

different set of medicinal plants from another tribe. Their pharmacopoeias will be quite different,

they'll, they'll overlap a bit. But, but the, the wittotos will know, know a plant that will heal

infected third degree burns, I've seen this, without any scarring. And the, the okinas who were,

even in the same language group, didn't know it. Because an okina girl told me how a wittoto woman

cured her, and they hadn't, her tribe hadn't known this. And they just keep it separate, it's secret.

Even when it's a friendly tribe, and if somewhat related tribe. So it was a lot of, it made it

rather a spoiling proposition to see how much you could work out of them. And being a woman and

traveling alone made it a lot easier because there's no threat to anybody. I'd have a boatman and his wife,

but that's all. And an interpreter that picked up at the edge, edge of the language area.

And also I'd traveled in very inconspicuous and not necessarily by choice, rather ordinary and

poverty-stricken way. And so that made it better too. You go in all with fancy equipment and a fine boat and

half a dozen people. You're not going to get very far. Because they're too used to being put down.

And that in itself is a put down to go in looking very elegant.

And so I managed to get quite, quite a lot of stuff. And it was, it was, it made it rather

more fun, you know, something of a game to, so you could feel you were pretty smart. And

uh, the one thing that I, even when I had formed a very strong friendship, I could not for years get

anyone to tell me about, because they're contraceptives. I knew they had them. I knew because some

missionaries, medical missionaries had told me of cases in which a woman with malformed pelvis

had had a terrible time giving birth. And they told her she couldn't have any more children. And she,

in this particular case, the woman said, oh, that's too bad. And said, are you going to leave your

husband? Why should I do that? The woman said, he's a, he's a nice man. Why would I leave him?

But you can't have any more children. And she said, well, I'll take some medicine. But she wouldn't

tell her what it was. And she never had another child. And they, over the time they were with them,

there were about four tribes, four, four women in the tribe who did, had that same experience.

And so they were convinced that oral contraceptives did exist and were effective. But at that time,

I think it's about, when I first heard about it, it was in the, it was about 1951 and before I'd even

really started going after medicinal plants. And there were, the contraceptives, oral contraceptives,

did not get published and get on the market until 1960. So I, I believed them. And I thought it'd be

kind of interesting to get them. But you just draw a blank when you mention them. In fact, you may ruin a

good, when you're building a relation with, you've gone into some tribes that are kind of far away and

not used to white people. And maybe it hasn't seen them very often. And then you're getting along fine.

You say something about a contraceptive. Once I just said, I smell piri piri, which is,

and you, and you know, there are, I've had 20 piri piri's for all different purposes, rheumatism,

contraceptives, and some you wash your husband's pants with and it'll be impotent with another woman.

And they use it for everything. They've got one for whatever it is.

So, but every time, I even got myself practically thrown out a couple of times just by mentioning them.

And so, finally, it took a long, long time. But you will eventually, if you keep going into different

tribes and meeting different people, get a sudden understanding. It's like the leap of an

of an arc between the two electric poles. And now and then it happens. And then you're in,

you're really lucky. And so I did find the evil old woman who got them for me.

And even then, I had a very difficult time getting away with them. Because... But we managed. And, uh...

Well, it was very funny, actually, how I managed. I had been thinking about this. I was going up

the Rio Corrientes. And there's a Hebrew... You've been up there?

Not the Corrientes. And there's a Hebrew colony, uh, up about halfway up the river, on the way to the Makosari.

And they were having a great fiesta and everybody was getting very drunk when we arrived. And you don't

want to hang around when... It's, uh, after... fights are apt to happen when Indians get drunk.

And so we went home with this one woman who was taking her husband home to clean him up. I think he'd been

a little sick. And it is not considered a bad manners at all for a man to get roaring drunk and throwing up.

And so, uh, she and I sat and talked. And with me, she spoke Spanish. Very bad Spanish. Very...

Sometimes pretty hard to understand. But she did know little. She didn't like my boatman and his wife.

Neither did I by that time. And, um, and so she wouldn't speak Spanish. In fact, I found there was

three people in the tribe who spoke Spanish excellently. Or at least intelligibly. That's

excellent in the jungle. And, uh, she didn't... When they had left, she said to me in Spanish,

first thing she said, Where's your husband? And I said, Oh! I... He... I didn't know that Indians had

divorces then. I said, Well, uh, he... We are not married anymore. He is in one place. I'm in another

place. He is no more my husband. Thinking I was giving a good shocker, she said, Oh, me too.

And so she had been married to a very brutal man, she told me. And he, uh, beat her and so forth.

And finally he abandoned her to a great delight. And her stepfather was the witch doctor of that tribe.

So he told her... It was a long time before she was willing to marry again. She's had a bad

time. And her little daughter... There's no question of custody that child stays with the mother

in divorce... in jungle divorces. And, uh, she... He told her she... that she ought to marry again.

And she finally did find a man she thought was... who was very good to her. And he was quite an

important guy in the tribe. He even had a pair of shoes. And they were bright yellow. And he was the

only person on the... only Indian on that river who had a pair of shoes. And he was an awfully nice man too.

And so she married him. But she would not give him a child. And I said, Well, how did you manage that?

She said, Well, of course. I took the person. And I thought, Oh, at last. And so she... she told me she'd

give it to me when I got... And I was going up the river. I said, I said, Give it to me when I get back.

I didn't want it. For one thing, I didn't want to carry it around because I knew by then that anything

that has to do with the giving or withholding of life, things that ease birth, ease labor. And they have

some very good...

and things that, and the contraceptives, and the fortifacians, they have very good things for abortion.

All of those are so secret that you have to be awfully careful and awfully sure you're really

and intimate before you mention them.

At least you did in those days.

It's easing up now as they're losing their taboos, they're losing their culture,

they're also losing their knowledge of the violence, so it doesn't help much.

And so she gave them to me when I came back down, but they were having another fiesta,

and the men were all sitting together at one end of the house.

It was an Indian house.

It has a trunk in front to climb up because they're built so-and-stilts because of the rough floods.

And then just a platform and a roof, and nice and airy.

And they were all sitting around there.

It was raining.

And the women got me the plants, because, and I was just about to get them down to the canoe,

when some of the old men who were sitting in a little row in the back came over and looked at the plants,

and looked at me.

Then they started talking, and my friend Tessa started explaining.

It didn't work.

And they said that she was looking very distressed,

and so it was Auntie.

Her Auntie of us had helped in this deal.

And I had been thinking about this.

I'd learned the trick from a man in Shanghai

who had a hard time getting the best of his Chinese servants sometimes.

And so, through the interpreter, I said,

Tell Tessa to tell them I already knew the names of all these plants.

I knew all about them.

So Tessa did, I suppose, and she spouted it to give her up.

And the men said,

Okay, that's the case.

What's the name of this one?

So the interpreter said,

Well, tell him, of course, I don't speak his language.

So I couldn't tell him what this bench is in him.

I don't know the word for bench.

I couldn't tell him what the rain is.

But I can tell him what it is in my language.

It is a...

This one, I think, is a logarithm.

And this one is an isosceles quadrangle.

It's a wild combination.

And, you know, they do sound magical.

And they are magic to me.

I don't understand with all.

And I got by with it.

Because Tessa said,

And the old witch dog,

whom I had bribed by giving him a glass eye,

with which he could,

I figured he could sort of

pull a few fashions

if he ever got in a problem with magic.

And so it worked beautifully.

And he left rather quickly

and got them in the canoe

and off we went.

But that's how secret they are.

And now...

Now I'll let you off the hook.

Thank you.

Yes, well...

I mean, I talk a lot about

how this plant knowledge

is being lost

even more quickly

than the rainforest itself.

And I think very few

modern ethnographers

have taken the time

to learn it

the way you have.

And very few

modern ethnographers

have been able to gain

the confidence of women

the way you have.

They haven't tried.

No, they haven't tried.

But I know horror stories

of clashes

between insensitive anthropologists

and tribal groups where...

You have to keep your antennae out

all the time.

And you have to take your time

and not be in a hurry.

Appleton, I have been sometimes.

I got myself thrown out.

By being in a hurry.

Yes, Nicole is the only

white person I have ever met

who has been able to convince me

that they actually enjoyed

being in the jungle.

And Nicole does enjoy

being in the jungle.

Oh, why not?

There are 10,000 reasons

why not?

It is the most exciting,

the most beautiful,

and also...

and the most

sort of sacred,

sort of...

it has a spirit,

a very strong spirit.

And also,

it has a great pleasure

to imagine me doing this

and feeling like

somebody important.

That's right.

For yourself.

That's right.

And you know,

I don't get that chance

very often.

But I traveled

years later

to many of the same places

that Nicole describes

in her book,

The Witch Doctor's Apprentice.

And the model,

let me tell you,

for exploratory writing

is you go nowhere

and then you exaggerate

when you write about it.

And all these

hairy-chested guys

who are running around

the Amazon

with machine guns

and helicopters

inevitably

exaggerate

the difficulty.

And if you read

Nicole's book,

it sounds as though

the Amazon basin

is just dotted

with wonderful,

clean,

friendly villages

filled with happy,

fascinating people.

Oh, nuts.

I don't...

My books aren't phony.

No, that's what I mean.

You don't exaggerate.

But Sebastian Snow

and some of these

other people...

Oh, well, I knew Sebastian.

He came to my door

and said,

in Lima many years ago,

somebody banged on the door.

He was this nice

little blonde boy.

And...

And he said,

I'm Sebastian Snow,

the Royal Geographical Society.

I said,

that's nice.

I'm a fellow, too.

I said,

well, I'm not yet,

but I'm going to be.

No, well, I think the acid test

for every Amazon explorer

is how hard you find it

to stay at a Rika.

And I became...

Well, that was not...

That was a hellhole.

Well, Alfred Russell,

Alfred Russell Wallace

in 1858

described it as

absolutely unbearable.

You had a terrible time there.

I had an awful time.

Not only that,

but I lived in a double boiler.

You lived in one of those

metal buildings

that they put up.

Yes, so did I.

Yes.

Why would people put up

with this kind of stuff

unless they felt

they were in touch

with a living world?

Because the people

they sent down,

they didn't know.

It was the Colombian police.

And they sent down people

who were from Bogota,

grew up in Bogota,

didn't know a thing

about the jungle.

And they sent them

for a year and a half

so they didn't have time

to learn anything.

Very lonely boys

from Boyacá.

And that,

the thing that's bad

about that place

is that they have

the most stinging gnats

I have ever seen.

three kinds

of stinging insects

that fly in clouds,

really in clouds.

And there are

the little black gnats

that make a blister.

There are the little black gnats

that make a bloody spot.

And there are the tabanos,

you know,

the triangular black flies.

This is the one

we were trying to remember

yesterday.

Tabano.

Tabano, yeah.

And they would eat

through the heaviest jeans

or anything else

and they make a very painful

burning bite.

Of course the mosquitoes

are all on duty too.

But they're never left by evil.

Now that is the most important.

It's an awful place.

Nicole,

Nicole visited La Charrera

long before I was there.

Even before John Sullivan

was there.

That's how out in front

of the patch you were.

I was there in 59.

You were there in 59.

I didn't get there

until 71.

You're a wonderful group

of nuns and priests there.

Yes,

I wonder how they're faring

in the middle

of the Koch wars.

But I haven't heard

they're killing any capital.

No,

I think that airfield

is very important

to the Kochianeros

and probably

they strive to keep

decent relations there.

But they're all Catholics too.

Oh yes,

absolutely.

The higher horror

of the whiteness

is certainly

a Catholic trait.

Well,

let's see here.

Let me,

I'm a little off balance

because I held

a weekend

at Esalen

two weeks ago

and you know

they allow

the people

who participate

in the workshops

to evaluate people

and I got dinged

and somebody

wrote an evaluation

and said

Terence McKenna

is the William Buckley

of the psychedelic left

and he needs

to learn

to listen.

you'll see me doing

or trying

to do a lot

of listening

this weekend.

I have a kind

of obsessive need

to create

a certain kind

of closure

so excuse me

for about five minutes

and I'll do it.

It's just to satisfy

an itch

of mine.

It's the need

to try and tie

this all together

and make some kind

of sense of it.

I mean what does

a plant

that heals

wounds

have to do

with hallucinogens

and what do

these things

have to do

with a global

planetary crisis

in the ecosystem

and what does

that have to do

with each of us?

Well to create

an overarching

metaphor

that can connect

all this together

I think what

we have to do

is think

in terms

of the exhaustion

of our own

cultural forms

I mean that's

what we're living

through

is a global

dying

created by the

exhaustion

of our cultural

forms

and the vitality

of the cultural

forms

that we see

in these

so-called

primitive

I call them

pre-literate

people

as Nicole

pointed out

they have

nothing

but what they

seem to have

that we cannot

seem to get

a grip on

is a kind

of dynamic

equilibrium

with their

environment

and peace

of mind

in the

felt experience

of the moment

these are the

two things

we don't have

as a society

we cannot

seem to

make peace

with nature

as human

beings

as individuals

it's very

hard for us

to be at

peace with

ourselves

I mean

I consider

my own life

the search

for peace

of mind

forget

enlightenment

forget

shunyata

all this

stuff

you know

just a little

peace of

mind

would be

a tremendous

boon

as far

as I can

see

so I

really think

that there's

a confluence

here

of themes

and possibilities

it has

this richly

plotted

texture

that always

lets you

know

that you're

in the

presence

a higher

order

of things

it's that

the shamans

whom we

admire

who we

idealize

are

seen to

at the

center

this

environment

the warm

jungle

the tropics

the warm

tropics

that we

find it

necessary

to destroy

so it's

a perfect

image

of us

being at

war

not only

with ourselves

but with

nature

itself

and

you know

for

you've heard

all about

how the

Amazon

and the

Congo

Basin

and Eastern

Indonesia

are all

being cleared

and lumbered

and

turned into

cattle ranches

this is a

tragedy

obviously

we understand

and can

perceive

the dynamics

of that

but how

to make

sense

of a

situation

where

as the

World Bank

and the

IMF

attempt

to halt

this kind

of destruction

on the

other side

of the

coin

the

United

States

State

Department

and the

DEA

and these

agencies

propose

and are

planning to

carry out

the

defoliation

of the

Waijaga

Basin

there's a

schizophrenia

here

that is

not

academic

I mean

are we

trying to

get the

patient

well

or are we

pulling the

plugs

one by

one

we seem

to be

acting

in both

dimensions

simultaneously

and I

think it's

because

we have

not in

this

culture

awakened

to the

depth

of the

crisis

that

surrounds

you know

there's a

lot of

kind of

self

congratulatory

back slapping

going around

these days

over the

fact that

communists

everywhere

are in

hot water

and have

to admit

that they

did it

wrong

and this

gives a

lot of

satisfaction

people

feel

that

means

did

right

didn't

right

they

did

wrong

and now

admit

they

did

wrong

and have

yet

even

raise

the

possibility

turning

away

from

propaganda

and

stereotyping

neither

people

respond

ethos

self

denial

a view

of human

beings

that denies

the fact

that we

have

certain

itches

which

must be

scratched

you

know

think

that

the

collapse

marxism

only

the

collapse

the

outer

edge

the

societal

and

civilizing

assumptions

that we

have made

after all

marxism

is nothing

more than

the

millenarian

retread

christian

millenarianism

and

modern

science

yet

another

secular

retread

christian

millenarianism

our

culture

trouble

not

trouble

are

terminal

crisis

bifurcation

that is

it can

only go

one of

two

ways

horror

beyond

your

wildest

imagination

breakthrough

dignity

decency

community

and

caring

beyond

your

wildest

imagination

now

where do

you look

for models

where do

you go

the answer

is so

obvious

you go

nature

has been

playing

this game

for three

billion years

on this

planet

we have

been playing

the game

we the

apostles

christian

scientism

for about

two thousand

years

nature

has an

economy

elegance

a style

that if we

could but

emulate it

we could

rise out

of the

rubble

that we

are making

of the

planet

you know

it was the

geographer

carl

sauer

who said

man

found

the planet

a climaxed

primeval

forest

and notice

the gender

here

will

leave

the

planet

weedy

lot

a weedy

lot

well

now this

is a

metaphor

where you

change

climaxed

rainforest

for weeds

but it's

also true

by clearing

land

we promote

the kind

of plant

evolution

that stresses

very rapid

seed production

and annular

cycles of

growth

in other words

weeds

and this

tendency

to find

perfection

and then to

leave rubble

in our wake

has haunted

us for the

past three or

four thousand

years of our

history

now

with the

ozone shield

disappearing

with acid

rain falling

on the earth

that can melt

blocks of

marble

with the

co2 levels

rising

with the

levels of

strontium

and

chlorofluorocarbons

and you know

the litany

we have

now

one last chance

to fish

or cut

bait

and

the place

where nature

has provided

the models

for how to

respond to

this situation

is the

climaxed

rainforest

only the

climaxed

tropical

rainforest

has the

kind of

complexity

of signal

transfer

movement of

nutritional

materials

movement of

electromagnetic

radiation

that we

find in

the modern

city

it is a

cliche of

modernity

the city

that the city

is a jungle

the problem

is it isn't

jungle enough

and I think

it's the task

of the new

shamans

to take the

metaphor of

the jungle

which is a

metaphor of

tremendous

wealth

tremendous

variety

a tremendous

outpouring of

form

and of

energy

and of

potential

fulfillment

of various

bifurcation

patterns of

flow

to take

that

and

enrich our

own lives

with it

and the way

this is done

is by

empowering

the

presence

experience

the main

thing that

you get

with these

so called

primitive

preliterate

people

and with

people like

Nicole

who have

spent time

in this

situation

is they

are in

the moment

they know

how to

have fun

they know

how to

work

they know

how to

live

and the

reason

they understand

this

is because

they are

focused

within the

confines

of the

felt

presence

of experience

they do

not live

abstraction

and

abstraction

is the

knife

poised

at our

hearts

we are

so much

the victims

abstraction

that with

the earth

in flames

we can

barely

rouse

ourselves

to wander

across the

room

and look

at the

thermostat

that's

the

level

disimpassioning

that

abstraction

has laid

upon us

well

hopefully

this weekend

there will

passion

there will

an effort

wherever

there is

abstraction

to drag

it down

into the

felt

presence

of the

moment

I think

basically

what we

are

a kind

of green

anarchy

an effort

revivify

social

forms

that have

been

atrophied

in the

west

at least

since the

destruction

of the

lucis

probably

in most

places

thousands

of years

before that

this is

our last

chance

I have

done

the best

I could

in terms

of trying

to sift

through

all these

options

and

as a

communicator

offer

the best

way out

and

you know

I could

only do

my best

and so

that's what

you get

I can't

preach

scientism

because I

don't believe

in it

I can't

preach

buddhism

because I

can't

understand

the only

thing I

can preach

the felt

presence

of immediate

experience

which

for me

came

through

the

psychedelics

which are

not drugs

but plants

it's a

perversion

of language

to try

and derail

this thing

into talk

of drugs

there are

spirits

in the

natural world

that come

to us

in this

way

and

so far

as I can

tell

this is the

only way

that they

come to

that is

rapid

enough

for it

to have

an impact

upon us

as a

global

population

this weekend

will be

different

because we

will be

hewing

close to

the source

Nicole

is a

priceless

repository

of information

more even

than she

knows

if I could

declare her

a national

treasure

would

and the

number

who knows

what this

woman knows

who knows

how much

human

suffering

the

alleviation

of how

much

anxiety

lies in

the hands

of perhaps

half a dozen

people

of Nicole's

caliber

who have

paid their

dues

in these

jungles

this information

is flowing

through our

fingers

and disappearing

in another

thirty years

it will be

all gone

every time

I go to

the Amazon

I can

feel

the way

in which

it's

slipping

away

when my

brother

and I

go off

looking

for these

unusual

hallucinogens

often we

have the

experience

where

when we

finally

find

the

person

who

claims

they

know

what

we're

after

the

line

goes

this

well

I've

never

taken

but

child

remember

seeing

grandfather

prepare

and

think

can

weren't

for

standing

there

asking

that

done

would

never

have

even

risen

into

the

gentleman's

mind

possibility

this

the

knife

edge

upon

which

this

knowledge

poised

can

saved

gives

hope

that

can

saved

can't

save

this

kind

knowledge

cannot

save

ourselves

because

this

kind

knowledge

ourselves

culture

is a

garment

which

you

put

medical

systems

are

pieces

jewelry

which

you

wrap

around

your

throat

neck

religious

ideals

are like

objects

which

you

push

through

pierced

nostrils

and

ear

lobes

cannot

come

terms

with

that

which

allows

give

birth

with

ease

die

with

dignity

and

live

health

then

what

kind

future

have

future

all

this

not

meeting

obscurantists

enthusiasts

for

some

private

vista

transcendence

this

meeting

political

activists

people

who

are

socially

committed

themselves

each

other

the

larger

idea

community

and

who

understand

that

when

you

talk

about

Gaia

it's

only

abstraction

unless

you

talk

about

plants

the

difference

between

men

and

women

fundamentally

division

between

plants

and

animals

plants

are

the

enveloping

feminine

matrix

control

and

refurbishment

animals

are something

invented by

plants

to move

seeds

around

extremely

yang

solution

to a

peculiar

problem

which

faced

the

archaic

revival

if it

means

anything

means

reconnecting

the

Gaian

mind

which

is a

vegetable

mind

feminine

enfolding

boundary

dissolving

planetary

mind

that is

not an

abstraction

not a

stereotype

not

something

used to

create

hortatory

propaganda

but a

living

breathing

reality

a reality

which

is the only

thing

which stands

between us

and Armageddon

we will pursue

this in detail

over the next

two days

thank you very much

spectrum

spectrum of

alkaloids

working on you

from ten

different directions

in the middle

of this

the wonderful

thing about

chacruna

the

cicotria

viridis

the admixture

the normal

admixture

to ayahuasca

is when you do

an HPLC

or a mass spec

on that

it's just

DMT

it's a pure

spike

of NN

dimethyltryptamine

nothing else

hanging on to

and I think

they are

such

subtle

folk

chemists

that they

have discerned

this

not only

located

every

possible

source

of DMT

in this

ecosystem

of several

hundred thousand

species

but then

discerningly

focused in

on those

that have

the cleanest

of these

signatures

it's a

very impressive

thing

and

to what

end

you may

ask

I mean

somebody

asked me

do they

just

take

these

things

for fun

and the

answer

is not

at all

they are

regulating

their

psychic

world

they are

this

you know

when ayahuasca

was first

described

people like

Richard Spruce

and Theodore

Koch-Grenberg

and these

early people

into the

Amazon

they spoke

in terms

of a

telepathic

drug

they felt

that these

small groups

of deep

forest Indians

were actually

entering into

group states

of mind

with this

stuff

Well, then, in the sort of hard reductionist era of pharmacology, this was, of course, completely poo-pooed and dismissed.

But now, with our planet in crisis, I think we need to go back and look at this.

I have had extraordinary experiences in ayahuasca sessions.

Cat isn't here, so she can't tell the story, but some of you may recall the story in Don Fidelmo Sanvite's circle, he had a nephew.

This guy was worthless.

He was a small-time weed dealer, part-time pimp, mostly ne'er-do-well.

But because he was the shaman's sobrino, the shaman's nephew, he couldn't just be tossed out.

And he would come to these ayahuasca sessions, and the shaman, Don Fidel, Don Jose, the old guys, would sing these beautiful songs in Quechua.

And he would sing against them.

He would sing while they were singing.

He would sing a different song.

And these people, I don't know how true it is generally in Peru, but these Loretanios, the people of Loreto, are such fine people, they will never directly confront a social outrage.

So everybody in the circle was uncomfortable with this guy, didn't want him back.

It was the main topic of conversation when we all weren't loaded.

But when we were loaded, there he would be, hassling the group.

So finally, after about the third time this came, there were about 30 of us in the shed, Don Jose, this older guy, had made the ayahuasca, and he was quite proud of it.

He was showing it off, and it was god-awful strong.

And Don Jose, the sobrino, was sitting across from me, and as these waves of hallucination would come, I would see him, and he would turn into like a monkey, a howler monkey, or a monkey with a dog's face.

And just these weird animal transformations, and everybody else was staying the same.

Well, Cat, who is a little less mealy-mouthed than I am, finally had had all she was going to take of this guy.

And we were all sitting there, and she just looked across the room.

She just gave him what in English parlance is called a look that would kill.

And he physically staggered backwards.

And what I saw was these red darts come out of her eyes and go across the room.

The singing stopped.

Yes, the singing stopped instantly, and Don Fidel turned to one of the old guys and said,

She sends the z-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m.

And the other guy said, Yes!

And it was just this, it was a telepathic group experience where someone had been able to zing somebody else,

and thirty people had seen it as a real thing.

Well, I think the potential for this kind of thing, for problem-solving, is immense.

The thing I used to would be in politics, as we have them today.

Do you want to say something?

No.

Well, and you see, what they'll tell you in the Amazon, these ayahuasqueros,

is the purpose of each journey when it is not to cure.

And the shaman I spent the most time with, he did public curing sessions on Saturday nights.

And everyone was welcome.

On Wednesday nights, he took double doses, and it was a very small, intimate group,

and he said, This is for knowing.

Now we don't cure.

This is to know and to see.

And what this consisted of was the recovery out of the hallucinogenic state of what are called Icaros.

Icaros are magical songs.

And the more of them you have, they are taught to you by the plant spirit.

And the more of them you have, the more powerful a shaman you are.

Well, these Icaros, when you listen to recordings of them, they're quite beautiful, quite extraordinary.

But when you're with the people, it's made very clear that an Icaro is not something you listen to.

An Icaro is something you look at.

You look at it.

It is to be seen, even though it is made out of sound, as a composition, as a work of art,

it is offered more in the vein of a painting than a song or a poem.

What is happening is that in this group state of mind,

the intentionality of the singer is beheld as a three-dimensional modality of light and of color.

Well, this is like an ontological transformation of language itself.

Language, you see, we have eyes, ears, and tactile sensory receptors.

They break the world of incoming perception, the electromagnetic radiation and the acoustical waveforms falling on our bodies are canalized by the senses into these narrow streams of input, the visual input, the audio input, the tactile input.

In the ayahuasca state, a synesthesia comes into being.

Well, synesthesia, in our context, is a rare medical word.

But if you know anything about Romanticism and the literary movements of the 19th century, the pursuit of synesthesia is what drove the French symbolists and the Romantics.

They saw this melding of the senses as a higher transformation of the ontos of art.

And I believe it so to be.

I think that what history is for is to give us a technology that will allow us to share our hallucinations.

And they, the people of the Amazon, these Los Tribus, the tribal groups, have perfected a shamanic technology that allows them to do the same thing.

It's this ability to display to your intimates the contents of your own head that creates a larger organism than simply the ego.

And there are so many problems here with translating these concepts from language to language.

The shamans of the Amazon may not even grok fully that it is this collective state of mind that is so empowering to them and that we don't have.

How do you know what it's like to be inside the clothing of another culture?

Well, you don't know, but the modality, the benchmark that the pharmacological fact of the chemistry of consciousness gives you allows you to work out from a given a kind of map of what must be going on.

That's why the shaman's remark that it's so hard to take Ukuhei was interesting.

It meant that, you know, he was making a statement about the human condition.

He was saying, it's hard for us to do this just the way it's hard for you to do this.

I've discussed this with the mushroom shamans in Mexico and ayahuasqueros in South America.

They say it is not easy to do this.

It is not easy to plunge into this hallucinogenic maelstrom.

No culture prepares you for the modalities of the psychedelic experience.

A culture can give you personal authenticity, self-control and courage.

These things will serve you well, but in terms of preparing you for what you will experience, it's virtually inconceivable.

I think that the great gift that is going to come out of ayahuasca is the ability to open our heads to each other, to truly de-individuate, to truly create for ourselves a group mind.

And now on a global scale, you see the masculine engineering mentality is just running along behind the feminist, shamanist parade, hardwiring all the changes into technology.

The engineering mentality doesn't believe it unless it turns on with a red light when you hit the button.

But all that the engineering mentality can dream of or ever accomplish, it's in place in this vegetable matrix, this other way of doing it that doesn't give you much to show.

No Amazonian shaman can point to an edifice like the World Trade Center or an atom smasher or a moon probe and say the genius of my worldview allowed me to create these things.

But the genius of their worldview allows them to create authentic caring, reasonable transmission of gnosis from one generation to another, an ability to walk lightly on the earth, an ability to intuit the needs and feelings of other people.

And this is what we lack is any sort of emotional sensitivity, any sort of ability to call on the racial mind at its roots to authenticate us personally in moments of stress and crisis.

The ego really is a poor substitute for authentic being and it's the poor substitute for authentic being that we have each and every one of us opted for, man, woman, oldster, child.

The neurotic programming is so deep that it is very difficult to transcend it.

You see, I think, and Nicole is certainly a part of this phenomenon, that what really has happened, let's say, well, let's just say in the 20th century,

it is that anthropologists, ethnographers, botanists, geographers, linguists, have gone out to the four corners of the globe,

the wastes of the Kalahari, the Amazon jungles, the storm-beaten shores of Kergulan, all of these places, and they have come back with information.

These people copulate in this position, these people intoxicate with this kind of thing, these people treat wealthy people this way, these people treat homosexuals this way,

these people who believe identical twins are this and that, all these ideas, ideas and technologies in the form of drugs, basically.

And every jungle has consciousness transforming potential within it, not all equally.

But no jungle, no ecosystem is so poor that you can't find a consciousness transforming element in it.

Well, as we now sort through this vast smorgasbord of options, you know, should we practice the oracular systems of the Azande?

Shall we all become Mahayanists?

Shall we take up Sufi practices?

What is our relationship to the shamanism of Tierra del Fuego?

As all of this is sorted out in a kind of evolutionary fury, certain things are going to come to the fore.

And I think it's the, it's not the form, not the ritual, but the way in which these things empower being, empower the physiology, the felt experience of being, and empower the cognitive processing, and the integrative processing that goes on between people.

And in the world of paradisical Taoistic integration that I hypothesize preceded history, still exists in the Amazon, in these, basically in the ayahuasca complex,

but then in all the other complexes that are the feathering out of the edges of that.

The archaic consciousness lives.

This is why I think we are so strongly drawn to involve ourselves with these archaic people,

because we recognize that they have answers to questions that we couldn't even ask until the 1960s.

Do you want to say anything about any of this, Nicole?

Or shall we ask people for questions?

I would like to be asked questions.

I like even to be interrupted when I'm talking and ask questions.

What do you mean by that?

What is your experience with ayahuasca for people?

Mine?

What is your experience with ayahuasca?

Well, it's about the usual, I would say.

Actually, they usually don't give me a strong enough dose,

because I think I'm, you know, an old lady indelicate or something.

And so I haven't had such vivid, such vivid experiences as,

so frequently, or such enduring experiences, you see.

I just get flashes on and off usually.

It's very hard for me to convince anybody that I am really a very couple baby.

And so they give me, I have, mine have been oddly disappointing usually.

For example, one night I couldn't see anything except the temples in Thailand.

And I'd seen those already, so I wanted to see something new.

Very elaborate, Indonesian architecture.

That wasn't what I wanted.

And I kept saying,

Senorita Ayahuasca, because that's the way you must address her.

Please, turn it off and get me something else.

But, incidentally, the respect for such plants must always be shown.

Not only in your mind, but verbally, and in the handling.

When a witch doctor, Fendim, he sang a song to it when he dug it up.

And he sang,

Dear Senorita Ayahuasca,

I am very sorry to have you leave me.

But you are going to Senorita Nicole.

She will be good to you.

She is a good person.