News outlets like CNN and FOX are featuring segments on the positive potentials of psychedelics thanks to the incredible advances in medical research over the last few years and the growing trend for municipal decriminalization of psychedelics across the United States. There is also a wave of famous celebrities opening up about their profound healing with ayahuasca and other psychedelics. For example, Mike Tyson on the JRE speaking about changing his life after smoking toad. Even Gwenyth Paltrow’s new GOOP Netflix series features psilocybin therapy (although I am not entirely sure that’s a good thing given Goop’s pseudoscience slant).
Indeed, the landscape is changing.
However, the stigma is still present, and it leads to many (not famous) people to keep the incredible benefits they have gotten from working with psychedelics a secret. They keep this from work colleagues, friends, and family for an understandable fear of negative consequences.
Keeping your psychedelic experiences and their benefits to yourself is fine, and especially if sharing them brings risk to your livelihood, relationships, or, like in some countries, your freedom or even your life! That said, being able to speak openly about your experiences with others, especially your community, has a profoundly positive and supportive influence on the integration of those experiences into your daily life.
Recognizing both the issues stigma against psychedelics creates for people, as well as the present receptivity for destigmatizing psychedelics in the modern world, our guests for this show have started a movement to create a social avenue for greater openness around sharing our stories of transformation and healing with psychedelics. It’s called #thankyouplantmedicine (TYPM).
TYPM is “a global wave of gratitude” happening February 20, 2020,”calling on people to ‘come out’ with their stories of healing and transformation on that day, using the hashtag #ThankYouPlantMedicine.” They currently have over 530 volunteers and have forged alliances with ICEERs, MAPS, Beckley Foundation, Chacruna Institute, Decriminalize Nature, The Heroic Hearts Project, 1HeartJourneys, Unlimited Science, Kosmicare, The Third Wave, High Existence, Psychedelic Society of the UK, Australia and many others. Their aim is to have 100,000 people share their stories on February 20, 2020.
David Grillot and Jonathan Glazer are the founders of ThankYouPlantMedicine, and they are on the show to both talk about the movement itself and respond to some of my criticisms. We speak about the possible risks of “coming out of the psychedelic closet”, the potentially adverse outcomes of destigmatizing psychedelics too quickly, the importance of actualizing our psychedelic learning, and the problems of politicizing the psychedelic movement.
Here you will find info about the movement and an opportunity to sign up for their newsletter.
You can also follow them on Facebook,Instagram, and YouTube.
*** Big thanks to my patrons on Patreon for helping keep this podcast alive! Especially, Thomas & Melanie H, Clea S, Steven B, James R, Dean H, Joe A, Andy D, Stephen B, Ian C, David W, Don J, Yvett FC, Ann-Madeleine, Chuck W & Dima B
TYPM is “a global wave of gratitude” happening February 20, 2020,”calling on people to ‘come out’ with their stories of healing and transformation on that day, using the hashtag #ThankYouPlantMedicine.” They currently have over 530 volunteers and have forged alliances with ICEERs, MAPS, Beckley Foundation, Chacruna Institute, Decriminalize Nature, The Heroic Hearts Project, 1HeartJourneys, Unlimited Science, Kosmicare, The Third Wave, High Existence, Psychedelic Society of the UK, Australia and many others. Their aim is to have 100,000 people share their stories on February 20, 2020.
Relevant links
