Pubdate: Tue, 22 Dec 2015
Source: Globe and Mail (Canada)
Copyright: 2015 The Globe and Mail Company
Contact:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/168
Author: Gabor Mate
Page: A12

THE POWER OF AYAHUASCA, AND THE RESPECT IT DEMANDS

As a Western-trained doctor, I have long been aware of modern
medicine's limitations in handling chronic conditions of mind and
body. For all our achievements, there are ailments whose ravages we
physicians can at best alleviate. In our narrow pursuit of cure, we
fail to comprehend the essence of healing.

Thus the popularity of ayahuasca, the Amazonian plant medicine that
many Westerners seek out for the healing of physical illness or mental
anguish or for a sense of meaning amid the growing alienation in our
culture.

Last week's killing by a Canadian during an ayahuasca ceremony at a
Peruvian shamanic centre brought unwelcome but perhaps necessary
attention to this mysterious brew.

A holistic understanding informs many aboriginal wisdom teachings.
Like all plant-based indigenous practices around the world, the use of
ayahuasca arises from a tradition where mind and body are seen as
inseparable.

A woman I know was completely immobilized by an often-fatal autoimmune
condition. Two years ago, she began to work with ayahuasca. She now
moves about independently and with self-reliant authority.

Another, having made more than a dozen suicide attempts, is today
animated by energy and hope.

I have witnessed people overcome addiction to substances, sexual
compulsion and other self-harming behaviours. Some have found
liberation from chronic shame or the mental fog of depression or anxiety.

The plant is not a drug in the Western sense of a compound that
attacks pathogens or obliterates pathological tissue. Nor is it a
chemical taken chronically to alter the biology of a diseased nervous
system. And it is far from being a recreational psychedelic ingested
for escapist purposes.

In its proper ceremonial setting, under compassionate and experienced
guidance, the plant - or, as tradition has it, the spirit of the plant
- - puts people in touch with their repressed pain and trauma, the very
factors that drive all dysfunctional mind states. Consciously
experiencing our primal pain loosens its hold on us. Thus ayahuasca
may achieve in a few sittings what many years of psychotherapy can
only aspire to do. People can re-experience long-lost inner qualities
such as wholeness, trust, love and a sense of possibility. They quite
literally remember themselves.

The unity of mind and body, well-documented by current scientific
research, means that such experiential transformation can powerfully
affect the hormonal apparatus, the nervous and immune systems and
organs such as the brain, the gut and the heart. Hence ayahuasca's
potential healing capacity.

It is not all good news. Ayahuasca can be exploited for financial gain
by unscrupulous practitioners or even for the sexual gratification of
healers preying on vulnerable clients, most often young women. Such
cases are notorious in the ayahuasca world.

Nor is the plant a panacea. Nothing works for everyone. Its very power
to penetrate the psyche can awaken deeply repressed hostility and
rage. Although ayahuasca-related violence is exceedingly rare - almost
unheard of - something like that may have occurred in the recent
incident in Peru.

All the more reason, then, to approach ayahuasca with caution,
profound respect and only in the right context.

Gabor Mate Retired B.C. physician who has treated some patients with 
ayahuasca, known for psychedelic healing powers. He is the author of 
When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress.
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MAP posted-by: Matt