Hmmm... a whole night to myself. What shall I do? I think I'll share a personal story with the planet. Another one of therapeutic healing but of no magnitude compared to the first dose that helped heal my burned sciatic nerve in 2011. This is a story for alcoholics, iboga heads, and the otherwise just curious or bored.
It was a full moon. Or was it? I can't remember. I had been drinking again. Every day for a few months after taking two years off. Whiskey hot toddys in the cold. Wine for lunch. Beer just because. I could not sit still or think 'clearly' unless I had a drink. I wrote some decent material under its spell- but to be dependent on this shit was a total fallacy. I know no middle ground with this substance like some people can manage. It becomes an all or nothing thing that consumes me. I was pissed I had done this to myself again. A part of me didn't care. It made me more social, right?
Kind-of. If anything it made me less in control of my dark side, which showed like canyon carved and charred scars entrenched on my face to anyone who would lock eyes with me. Fear eats the soul. 6 IPA beers in two hours left me feeling nothing but empty and soulless. 10$ less to my name given to some corporation. It was stupid. I had to stop.
In the morning before work I told my lover I was never drinking again, half-joking, and she laughed. The age-old cliche. I mulled it over all day like I had been for a while. I tried ayahuasca the week prior two nights in a row (120g cielo brews each with spice) and fell back into it the day after. Being with aya was so incredibly enriching but it still wasn't enough to convince my other hard-headed half to break this self-destructive habit. It was like I was on autopilot. I watched myself from far away drive to the store every time like a puppet of justification.
One afternoon I was invited to go see Ott that night. I didn't want to go out. Why bother? And then I thought: Well... why not? I decided on the fly to turn it into an experiment and ate some iboga. I can't remember the last time I had even had some- its been well over a year. I had never taken it in this type of setting and around so much alcohol but I figured this is my home, this is my culture, and this is just what I do. I danced with my friends who I lost for a while even though the venue was small. Everyone looked the same at times (all ghastly angelic psychedelic timeless) so it was hard to tell sometimes as I was floating around boundariless feeling everything. Tracers set in (I thought I could see an echo of where everything was going to be in a second from The Moment) and I was light as a feather. It felt so good to be around all of the people. That I can not emphasize enough. I was even further in a dream than I already always was. Heart beating kick drum bass guitar and sweat. Ott was so damn good, too. I didn't realize he was going to be playing with his band live and was very impressed as it gave me a whole new perspective on his music. I smoked hash and grooved for hours. Bliss.
My friends on MDMA were having the most focused conversations like a ping pong match where rapidly no one missed a hit after the show and I just sat in their home having visions about the possible outcomes of my life smiling occasionally being able to input here and there but not really paying attention finding everything very amusing and beautiful. They told me I looked happy. And I was, and still am. I used iboga recreationally and therapeutically at the same time and haven't drank since. Nor have I even wanted to. Maybe I didn't need it, but it helped. I am so grateful to have had this plant in my life. Inexpressibly fortunate and lucky.
The next few days were spent naked in the sunshine taking naps, in a hot tub, in a sauna, and in bed. A highly recommended post-iboga integration method. I didn't even plan this- life just somehow managed to throw it in my face and I was just along for the ride saying things here and there. I was a little bewildered at how seemingly perfect everything fell into place, like I found some weird junction sequence. A crack in the chaotic dissonance of time. I purposely ate different foods to help break some habits (like eating super carne asada burritos all the time...I loved them a little too much) which worked. I mean, I ate my first banana fruit by itself the other day, and I am 25. All this time I had been missing out because I thought I didn't like them on their own. Now I have 8 of them I can't wait to eat downstairs. Apparently I open them the way monkeys do, not humans, go figure.
Every time the sun went down the liquid glass presented itself flickering. Every time I smoked hash there it was ringing the dream vortex. I awoke one morning and laid down to meditate and vividly reexperienced a memory from my childhood I had buried after something my lover said. It was like I was there again. I almost cried. Life, so tragically beautiful and perfect. So simple and yet woven to be so complex as we stray from the apex and into the shadows.
These entheogenic medicines are not just good for the body prism and spirit module but everyone and everything around us as well. Our hearts bleed inspiration when we glow.
As the rainforests are pillaged by poachers who seek to make a quick buck by exporting iboga in conjunction with destruction I can't help but feel guilty for consuming it. Guilty and grateful. I don't know if there is enough iboga in this world that could sustainably be harvested to help all of those in need. I would farm it if I lived in the right climate, and who knows, maybe that's what I'll do next?