In this article from the Baltimore Sun by Nate Greenslit ( http://touch.baltimoresun.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-81003796/ ), the discussion about the reemergence of psychedelics is opened. Greenslit mentions the recent wave of scientific research on LSD and psilocybin for treatment of mood and behavioural disorders. In addition to what Greenslit mentions in the article, we are working in the Ayahuasca Tourism industry with scores of Westerners traveling to Peru to experience some of the most powerful psychedelics on Earth. We are clearly seeing a heightening global interest in these psychedelic medicines, but, why? What is it that humanity is fundamentally attracted to in psychedelics?

I posit that it’s not just about medical benefits, though nonetheless we seem obligated to justify our interest in these “existential medicines” by labeling them with the same disease-cure mentality that characterizes Western medicine. It’s only okay to take drugs if you have a disease, so we say “I have PTSD” or “I have anxiety” that needs to be cured, and then we’re allowed to experience psychedelics without the accompanying negative social and cultural stigma. I would like to take the discussion one step further and ask: why can’t we have ownership of our own consciousness? Why have we been misled to believe that psychedelics make us crazy and jump out of windows, turn us into hippies, or ruin our lives? As the late Terrence McKenna was quoted, “The message of psychedelics is that culture can be re-engineered as a set of emotional and spiritual values rather than products. This is terrifying news.”

Psychedelics can help us reconnect with nature, reconnect with our deeper and more meaningful selves, repair our relationships, overcome trauma, experience a more profound realm of existence and shed attachments to materialist values. The holes we seek to fill with products in the Western World can be filled by experiences instead; experiences that can be attained by the simple consumption of plants found in nature or grown in your own backyard. That is why we’ve been misled. If the government based their laws and rules on a true concern for your health, than there would be a “war on alcohol” and a “war on tobacco” rather than a war on drugs. Indeed, I’ve spent an estimated $100,000 on government sanctioned alcohol and tobacco since I was a teenager. These two legal drugs have been the most problematic and addictive substances in my lifetime. So, why are they legal? As the saying goes, the answer to nine out of ten questions is “money.” Of the $100,000 I’ve spent on alcohol and tobacco in Canada, the government has earned a healthy amount of tax dollars. This is why there is no war on alcohol and tobacco.

If the wider public began to realize that they could locate their recreational substances in nature rather than at a liquor store, then the monolithic alcohol production conglomerates and governments of the world would be short billions of dollars in profits. This is why you’ve been misled. The negative cultural stigma attached to “drugs” is the only defense the government and alcohol producers have against the disintegration of their rein on the world’s recreational inebriants. The laws against psychedelics are not based on science nor are they based on truth. They are based on control of public thought and culture, period.

The fundamental attraction we have to these substances can be identified in the near ubiquitous desire for religious affiliation. We want to connect with our spiritual selves. We are drawn to the mystical experience. There is much evidence that suggests our early religious leaders regularly consumed psychedelics substances; spawning the religions that were then dominated and used against the public by governmental power structures. After religion was adapted and proliferated throughout the world, our religious leaders turned us against psychedelics, thus preventing us from having ownership of our own religious experiences. Instead, we must have faith in the stories and dogma they tell us. That is the fundamental difference with the psychedelic religious experience. You don’t need to have faith. You can have a true mystical experience for yourself, and then make your own decision. You can own your own religion.

Websites like www.Reset.Me and www.Erowid.Org are hubs of information about what psychedelics have to offer. I urge everyone to study these words, read the stories of the thousands of people who have pursued the psychedelic experience, and shed the cultural misinformation by which you’ve been conditioned. When we are successful, our laws will be based on science and health rather than control and power