The Use of Psychedelics as Medicine

[AyahuascaJourney]

Our society has spent decades teaching us that drugs are bad. Many of the children of the 80's and 90's can vividly remember Nancy Regan telling us all to "Just Say No". But recently there has been an increased interest by the scientific community in the use of psychedelics for use as treatment from everything from mental illness to helping cancer patients deal with end of life anxiety. Perhaps we are coming to a crossroad of science and spirituality with this new research.

In the book Psychological Aspects of Cancer, co-written by Anthony P. Bossis, PhD, Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology, Radiology, and Medicine at the New York University College of Dentistry (NYUCD) and Langone Medical Center, there is chapter called Use of the Classic Hallucinogen Psilocybin for Treatment of Existential Distress Associated with Cancer that explores the use of psilocybin to improve the mood and lessen the anxiety of cancer patients facing the end of their lives. The study shows that patients moods improved and their anxiety lessened giving them a very positive experience and "allowing them to improve their quality of life and augmenting their capacity to withstand the psychological stressors of their medical condition."

The society we live in is sick, the number of people being diagnosed with anxiety, depression, and other mental illnesses increases every day. Unfortunately pharmaceutical companies see the sickness in our society as a means to make money and increase profits. People who are diagnosed with a mental illness are usually told that they will need to continue to take medication for the rest of their lives. The pharmaceutical companies benefit, as they now have a life-long customer that needs to purchase their product. When you look at the number of people in America diagnosed with anxiety and depression, the numbers are staggering:

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When used as a medicine, as opposed to a form of recreation, psychedelics provide us with the opportunity to heal ourselves mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. The use of psychedelics gives us the opportunity to looks at our whole self and address any issue that we may have. They also give us insight by opening us up to experience the world without self-imposed barriers. They teach us just into how simple life can be, and that we would be better off spending our energy taking care of each other instead of being afraid of each other. Only by addressing the whole person can true healing take place.

As science begins to develop a greater understanding of the healing properties of psychedelics, perhaps it is possible that our society will begin to realize that what we need to "Just Say No" to is the idea that a manufactured chemical is better for us than a natural method of healing.

Ayahuasca Journey: Psychedelics as Medicine

 

[zezt]

ooops #edit double post. There should be something in the software here that stops this like they have at The Shroomery

 

[zezt]

Yes you put it very well and clearly. This is something I am very interested in. It amazes me the fear this culture has had of psychedelics, and there is also the conspiracy stuff also of how psychedelics were introduced to manipulate as a form of mind-control.
Psychedelics alone though is not enough, there has to be a deep exploration of the myths which have created an ongoing matrix which divide and control us from our bodies, natures, and the natural world and universe. If we don't explore this there is a danger of the current materialistic myth via the medical model apprporiating the psychedelic experience towards its own worldview. This article explains this very well:

Psychiatric Power and Taboo in Modern Psychedelia

In the April 20 edition of the New York Times Magazine, a front-page article appeared outlining the current state of scientific research in the field of psychedelic medicine. The article—entitled “How Psychedelic Drugs Can Help Patients Face Death”—described clinical trials in which substances such as psilocybin, LSD, and MDMA have been administered to adult volunteers suffering from a variety of medical conditions, ranging from cluster headaches to life-threatening forms of cancer. Such research has become increasingly common during the last two decades, with numerous studies gaining F.D.A. approval and receiving the support of prominent institutions such as Harvard and Johns Hopkins. The result of this trend has been the formation of a new paradigm of psychedelic practice—one defined by a thoroughgoing medicalization of psychedelic discourse; a scientific professionalization of access to, and control over, psychedelic experiences; and an incorporation of psychedelic chemicals into the pharmacopeia of modern industrial medicine.

In the April 20 edition of the New York Times Magazine, a front-page article appeared outlining the current state of scientific research in the field of psychedelic medicine. The article—entitled “How Psychedelic Drugs Can Help Patients Face Death”—described clinical trials in which substances such as psilocybin, LSD, and MDMA have been administered to adult volunteers suffering from a variety of medical conditions, ranging from cluster headaches to life-threatening forms of cancer. Such research has become increasingly common during the last two decades, with numerous studies gaining F.D.A. approval and receiving the support of prominent institutions such as Harvard and Johns Hopkins. The result of this trend has been the formation of a new paradigm of psychedelic practice—one defined by a thoroughgoing medicalization of psychedelic discourse; a scientific professionalization of access to, and control over, psychedelic experiences; and an incorporation of psychedelic chemicals into the pharmacopeia of modern industrial medicine. - See more at: MAPS Media Archive: Psychiatric Power and Taboo in Modern Psychedelia

In the April 20 edition of the New York Times Magazine, a front-page article appeared outlining the current state of scientific research in the field of psychedelic medicine. The article—entitled “How Psychedelic Drugs Can Help Patients Face Death”—described clinical trials in which substances such as psilocybin, LSD, and MDMA have been administered to adult volunteers suffering from a variety of medical conditions, ranging from cluster headaches to life-threatening forms of cancer. Such research has become increasingly common during the last two decades, with numerous studies gaining F.D.A. approval and receiving the support of prominent institutions such as Harvard and Johns Hopkins. The result of this trend has been the formation of a new paradigm of psychedelic practice—one defined by a thoroughgoing medicalization of psychedelic discourse; a scientific professionalization of access to, and control over, psychedelic experiences; and an incorporation of psychedelic chemicals into the pharmacopeia of modern industrial medicine. - See more at: MAPS Media Archive: Psychiatric Power and Taboo in Modern Psychedelia

Even as the terms of the public discourse on psychedelics move further in this clinicalized, regulatory direction, cultures of independent psychedelic exploration continue to grow in both influence and complexity. Indeed, without trivializing the efforts of MAPS and other scientific researchers to actualize the healing powers of psychedelic medicine, it must be acknowledged that the vast majority of successful psychedelic experimentation throughout human history has been carried out independent of scientific, medical, and state oversight. The inability of the new legitimizing discourse to take this body of research into account is symptomatic of a deeply rooted taboo in modern civilization on the matter of psychedelic experience. This taboo is not reducible to the legal prohibition of psychedelic substances, as instituted by the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, though criminalization is one of its functions. Rather, it is a taboo that conceals, distorts, and excludes specific channels of information made available in the course of psychedelic experience—information that implies a fundamental break with the metaphysical order upon which industrial mass society is based. By seeking to incorporate the powers of psychedelic experience into the institutional and philosophical matrix of modern science, the new paradigm of psychedelic research participates in the enforcement of this taboo, even as it tries to ameliorate some of its inhumane effects.

The article points to the 'scientific assumption' that only those facing cancer and other terminal illness should have access to psychedelic medicine:

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And yet the New York Times Magazine article excludes the possibility that psychedelics could be utilized by independent experimenters to break through the pain and fear encoded in the modern consciousness of death. On the contrary, the author assumes from the outset that such transformative effects of psychedelics do not actually manifest beyond the boundaries of institutional and clinical studies—an assumption which many readers of this journal will recognize as patently false.

This denial of common psychedelic experience, on the part of the “paper of record,” is made possible by a background of manufactured consensus on the subject of psychedelics—a background that is not fundamentally distinct from the generalized cultural consensus maintained by the New York Times and other agents of mass media. Within this controlled environment, the use of psychedelics is classified by default as a form of criminal activity, and independent psychedelic experimenters are relegated to the status of criminals, worthy of punishment. Far from qualifying as healing or spiritual behavior, the activity of seeking transformative experiences through the ingestion of LSD or psilocybin is defined as an immoral, pathological state—a state of being “on drugs.” ff

This is why it is imprtant to remember the past, because those who control the past control the future. For example, the Inquisition was the Church&State waging unimaginable terror against poor communities, especially poor old women who had their own indigenous communual healing and celebration rituals. The very male dominated medical profession was built on the smouldering remains of The Burning (and Hanging) Times [Caliban and the Witch: Women, The Body and Primitive Accumulation, by Silvia Federici]

Remember that if and when these present psychedelic therapeutic 'studies' become actual therapy the general public can choose to have they will be VERY expensive, and not accessible to people who aint got much money! So yet again this means common people not having access to the sacred medicines via this time Science&State.