Journeying to the Lost Self, Part 2
In Nature We Trust by Love Hannington
Journeying with a DMT releasing plant medicine is a contradictory affair. It feels like light-years have passed when in reality, only moments have inched by.
Many nouveau philosophers and so-called pseudo-scientists have written about DMT being local to the brain and released during meditation. Many more are talking about it on YouTube and Social Media in the form of Plant Medicine journeys. DMT or Dimethyltryptamine is considered the ‘spirit molecule’ and is released from the pineal gland (the third eye). By journeying with or without Plant Medicines and tapping into the pineal gland, we access altered states of consciousness.
Many of us have experienced altered states of consciousness (ASC) in the form of one popular drug – alcohol. It can often exacerbate the parts of our shadow we shove down the deepest. Those holding in their anger may see this surface, violently and destructively. Those who deep down want to be the centre of attention find themselves chatty and confident. But alcohol is just one extreme of ASC:
“We do not think of ourselves as a meat sugar alcohol culture – people do not walk around saying "oh wow I'm so high on meat, alcohol and sugar, I can hardly stand it", but they are and certain consequences flow from that" – Terrence McKenna (American Ethnobotanist and Psychonaut) in Sacred Plants As Guides, New Dimensions of the Soul at The Jung Society, 1991.
We're all very used to the most mundane forms of altered states of consciousness. As a society, we use the most boring, yet state-sponsored drugs that are also the ones that make us the most dependent, depressed and manipulable. It's hypocritical, but so is the West.
Journeying is about accessing DMT, which is natural and endogenous to our brains. It’s also natural and endogenous to many plants, fungi and fish species (yes, fish!) that are outlawed for consumption in the West. It is a consciousness that doesn't display our worst parts publicly in a bar by puking, slurring, and squabbling. Instead, it acts as a mirror to ourselves, our earliest hurts, our most cavernous fears and desires. It is through accessing this realm that we are truly able to take stock, perform internal diagnostics and return to commUNITY. If we can heal ourselves, we can heal our communities. And if we heal our communities, we can heal society at large.
Part II
(read Part I here)
Catapulted into my living room as a four-year-old, I watch as my Mother clings onto my baby Brother and my Father departs. He reveals that he is leaving the family to seek a new life with another, much younger woman, selfishly setting aside our wellbeing and futures in the process.
I feel the confusion and worry I felt back then as tears tsunami down my Mother's face. I feel the dense energy cumbersomely eke through the air as she retreats into depression.
The voice that has been guiding me through the journey returns, like the ghost of Christmas past: "You lost her too, you know. That day when he left. You lost her to despair".
"Lost to DESPAIR" trickles through me like an echo, reverberating and increasing in volume and power as it repeats. I feel a chill move from the tip of my toes to the furrow between my brows. My whole body, electric. Neurons firing and tickling my nerve endings as a realisation furrows into my psyche: I didn't lose one parent that day, I lost two.
At four years old, I lost my Mother to despair. The laceration in our family changed the dynamics of my home life, forever. What was once a cosy, insular bubble – filled with trips to leafy London parks, family dinners and the Sunday ritual of changing the sheets (I always loved how my Mother and Father would parachute the sheet over me as they made the bed) descended into full-time childcare placement with a child abuser and listening to my Mother's nightly tears through the other side of the bedroom door. This forced me to mature quicker than a child should, by learning to comfort the mournful adults surrounding me and be as 'good' as possible, to avoid causing further burden or beating.
A recurring nightmare I had at that point of my life resurfaces, where a Gorilla chased me through a maze. As I called out to my Mother, her own wails resonated, but there was no finding my way back to her. Each night I had this dream, I would wake up with a scream or a yelp. During the journey, my sleepless nights made much more sense.
"You knew this was coming" whispers the voice in her infinite wisdom. "It is what you signed up for".
"Yes I had suspected as much" I ponder.
"Reluctant", affirms the voice.
All things considered, it makes sense that my psyche perceives my existence as reluctant, because of an innate foresight. In the following years, this second loss grew much, much darker.
Despite the darkness and loss, I am urged to not judge my Father. I am straightforwardly told by the voice: “This is his path, he too, has lessons to learn”.
I reluctantly hold space for the message, whilst feeling the weight of loss sitting squarely on my chest.
I am overcome with a tidal wave of tears. Each time I wipe my eyes and blow my nose, my entire head fills back up with sloshing, salty seawater. The floods of liquid purging from my face wash through the troubles, clearing through the coarseness I’m now sensing in the centre of my chest. Leaning deeper into the purge, I felt the shore recede.
The voice that I sense by my side slowly disappears back into the Void, while I am plunged back into the brightness of moonlight. A lightness fills me, and appears to extend beyond my body, piercing the walls surrounding me.
I open my eyes to my partner standing over me, concern furrowed into his bushy blonde brows.
“Are you okay? You’ve been out for a while, I was worried about you.”
“Better than I’ve been in a long time”, I smile.
It’s been a few months now, and I’ve had time to integrate.
There’s a reason that Plant Medicines are outlawed in the West. I suspect it isn’t because of safety. Alcohol can be unsafe; we simply legislate around it to contain it as much as possible. It isn’t because it causes death, in fact, a 2010 study in the Lancet showed that LSD and Psilocybin Mushrooms cause the lowest rates of harm in society. All the while, the Global Drug Survey from 2021 found that 1.2% of subjects in their research experienced emergency medical treatment following the ingestion of alcohol, in contrast to 0.8% and 0.2% on LSD and Psilocybin Mushrooms respectively.
I suspect Psilocybin has been made illegal because when used in the right set and setting, with the right guides, Curanderos and Shamans, these are invaluable tools for shadow work and knowing the true self.
In knowing the true self, our fears and our repressed pains, we are able to move forward in the world stronger, with more of a resilient yet flexible metallurgy, able to respond to the challenges we face instead of reacting violently to them. This in turn creates a calmness within and, really, who needs to spend, spend, spend when you’re right within?
With Plant Medicines, the entire house of cards collapses. People would be more inclined to go to their Shaman for ailments, rather than prop up over-use of pharmaceuticals. They’d be reserved for emergency situations that plants, or searching the self can’t solve.
It is my hope that in my lifetime, everyone has the option to experience the transformative power of Plant Medicines in the right set and setting, without being unfairly persecuted by the state. The experiences I’ve had working with these beloved plant spirits have certainly helped me to develop for the better and grow toward the light. It is our inherent birth-right to be able to journey to the repressed and lost self, should it restore society to the mutual empathy and respect we once felt for the Earth and one another.
Love Hannington
Love Hannington is a London-based Obeahwoman and Celtic Shamanic Practitioner-in-training and co-host of The Afro Animist Podcast. She is also an Artist, who creates artwork around the topic of Esotericism, the Sacred Feminine and Animism. Her channelled artwork and Spirituality talks have been experienced at The Magickal Women’s Conference and The Royal Maritime Museum.