History Lessons with His Holiness: The Story of Tibet

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In this interview I talk to Thomas Laird, a longtime photojournalist in Nepal, about his new book, The Story of Tibet: Conversations with the Dalai Lama. Laird’s book is unique; it is the first history of Tibet to be written with a Dalai Lama since the 1600s–and it couldn’t come at a better time. Since the takeover in the 50s, China has been steadily trying to erase Tibetan culture and religion. I asked Laird to talk about how it was to work with his Holiness on the project–I was particularly curious to know how he balanced this historical project of national identity with the Buddhist ideal of self-dissolution. Our conversation, like the many conversations in Laird’s wonderful book, was profound.

AE: You’ve been back and forth between Nepal and The United States for the past thirty years doing a huge variety of journalistic coverage. Talk about the evolution of your work with Tibet and how you came to write The Story of Tibet in cooperation with the Dalai Lama.

TL: I had already been living in Nepal for about fifteen years when the Chinese opened Tibet to tourism for the first time, in 1985. By then, Tibetan friends in exile from Tibet and Sherpas in Nepal had already spent a lot of time trying to educate me about the culture, religion and history of Tibet–this was from the time I was nineteen. I was lucky to have met some of the greatest Tibetan meditation masters early on. I met the 16th Karmapa as early as 1974; I also met a luminous Sherpa artist and yogi who lived in a cave in the Himalayas, who had studied for decades in Tibet before the Chinese invasion. These people, as well as yak herders and barley farmers, spent a great deal of effort to educate me about their worldview during my youth in Nepal. I was a bad student, but I spent fifteen years at it, and some of their wisdom, and humor, seeped through.

Thus, when I rushed into Tibet as soon as it was opened, amongst the first few foreigners who arrived there, I was somewhat prepared. Besides my Tibet background in Nepal, I was on the cusp of being an established journalist and photographer. I had honed media skills for a long time, but had not really been able to make a living at it. That first year traveling freely throughout Tibet, everything I did wound up in print. I took a trip in a yak-skin coracle down part of the Tsangpo River: the first foreigner to do that in decades. Conde Nast Traveler published the resulting story. I found a massive, remote monastery, destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, and National Geographic snapped up a picture of its desolate ruins for a double-page spread: there I was, sharing Galen Rowell’s space in National Geographic. It was dreamtime, personally and professionally. Before Tibet, I had refused to be co-opted into so many other things where I could have ‘made a living’. Instead, I held out for ‘doing what I dreamt of’ (even though I did not know what that was). Suddenly, in Tibet, I found it. So those first years in Tibet were tremendous. I trekked all over. Shot everything I could get access too and lived with the Tibetans. There was so much work I wanted to do–for me, because I had to do it. An amazing experience like that probably does not come twice in one life.

Such experiences in Tibet focused me, professionally. So when the 1991 revolution hit in Nepal, I was ready. I jumped on that and took photographs of every aspect: the street battles that left dozens dead, secret meetings with the democratic leaders living underground, and so on. I had figured out how to get the resulting photographs in front of editors at Stern, Time, and a Time-Warner publication based in Hong Kong, Asiaweek. Asiaweek began to run six-page photo spreads of my work in Nepal, and asked me for extended captions. Within a year, I was their correspondent in Nepal. I wrote more than 25 articles for them over the ten years–some were cover stories. During the revolution, and as I reported its aftermath, I met all of the politicians who were brought to power by the revolution. Because of those contacts, when I asked for permission to be the first foreigner to visit the Tibetan Buddhist Kingdom of Mustang, within Nepal, the Prime Minister of Nepal granted me the permit. Even though Mustang is part of Nepal, politically, it’s actually a part of Tibet, ethnically, religiously, culturally. So I spent a year in what was essentially a time capsule of ‘pre-Chinese invasion’ Tibet just before tourism was allowed in there. And during that time the writer Peter Matthiessen came up and spent a month with me, and we did a book together. That was my first book: he wrote the text and I did the photography: East of Lo Monthang: In the Land of Mustang.

That month with Peter, and then the months of work afterwards as I helped him fact-check the final text, inspired me to take my writing more seriously. Also in Mustang I saw the social relations between what I can only call “serfs and masters”–still intact there–and that rounded out my vision of Tibet. The serfs of Mustang were only freed in the 1960s. People my age had been born as serfs, and they taught me a great deal about their society before emancipation from their lords. Because Chinese have used the social inequalities that existed in pre-Chinese-invasion Tibet as an excuse for their invasion, this issue is not something most supporters of Tibet have been eager to discuss. However because of my background this was an issue which the Dalai Lama and I did discuss when I began work on The Story of Tibet.

Something else happened in Mustang. I met children whose hands had been blown off by grenades that the U.S. government had supplied to Tibetan guerrillas based in Mustang during the 1960s. It’s a chapter of America’s Cold War history that most Americans remain unaware of. Anyway, when Nixon and Kissinger made kiss-kiss with Mao, part of the price of our new relations with China was that we had to stop arming people who were still mounting armed attacks on the Chinese in Tibet (which the Chinese saw as China). So we dropped the guerillas, and never took time to go in and clean up the mess of ammo dumps we had established there. So those weapons were still laying about the countryside, and children were still having their hands blown off in the 1990s when I went up there. Again, this was an aspect of Tibetan history that few Tibet supporters were eager to discuss.

So, as you can see, my education about Tibet, about many aspects of Tibet, went on for decades before I met the Dalai Lama. When I came out of Mustang, I was eager to write a book about the CIA’s covert support of the Mustang guerrillas. I was so eager to do that, that I rushed from Mustang directly to the National Archives in Washington DC, to see what had been declassified about this chapter of our history. I discovered that CIA has retained Top Secret classification on most of those documents, so Americans are unable to know their own history from that era. Most books on the subject, even now, are flawed in that they have been published only after vetting by the CIA.

As I read primary materials for weeks in the National Archives I stumbled onto something else: I found a story about the first CIA agent ever killed. In 1950, six months before the Chinese invasion of Tibet, Douglas Mackiernan was shot dead in Tibet. Ultimately, I published my first non-fiction book about him: Into Tibet: The CIA’s First Atomic Spy and His Secret Expedition to Lhasa. When I first found the documents that led me down the path towards that book, I did not know what I was seeing, but because of my grounding in Tibetan history, I knew enough to smell a story. It was a story that every Tibet expert in America had ignored, or missed, for fifty years. I became obsessed with finding the truth and writing a story that would be both readable and accurate. It seemed Americans needed to know this history as we headed into the Middle East for fresh adventures.

And here at last we come to the Dalai Lama. As soon as I realized that this CIA agent had been shot in Tibet my first inclination was to ask the Dalai Lama – though he was just 16 at the time – if he had known that Mackiernan was a CIA agent when he had met survivors of the Mckiernan party in Lhasa. So I called up his office in Dharamsala, India, and talked with one of his secretaries. They were fascinated by what I had uncovered in the National Archives, so when I asked for an interview, it was granted.

The Dalai Lama and I met and from the start we argued, a lot, about everything. I had already been through the more typical arc that most Americans go through with Tibet. Awe. I want to get enlightened now, please. But by the time we met I had gone on to something else. I was fascinated with every aspect of Tibetan history. That passion about Tibetan history came out in our dialogue. Nor did I treat him with the sort of fawning awe most Americans, and Tibetans, approach him with. He seemed to like that. After our first meeting he told his secretaries to allow me back in to see him when I had questions. So I started to see him a couple times a year, whenever he had time, and whenever I had questions.

He was a guiding light behind my second photo book The Dalai Lama’s Secret Temple: Tantric Murals from Tibet. I had begun to shoot amazing murals in Lhasa, in a temple that had been the private meditation chamber for the Dalai Lamas. It seemed important to do a photo book on the murals, and of course the Dalai Lama’s commentary was essential for the author who wrote the text for that book, my friend Ian Baker. (Famous for his discovery of Hidden Falls in Tibet a few years later).

Over the course of several years, the Dalai Lama and I met to talk about these books, and in the process I sensed some frustration in the him. It surfaced when he spoke about Tibetan history. Several times he said something like, “Oh, Tibetan history, so complicated.” It was shocking to sense his frustration, almost despondency. It opened me up to the idea that the public perception of him as this smiling Buddha might be detracting from our ability to dialogue with the nuanced person within that. And as I thought about it, I realized that he did not think that Westerners understood the essence of Tibetan history very well, if at all. We have an overview of western history, even if we do not know the details, but we lack that for Asia. To me it seemed as though the Dalai Lama was worried at how the Chinese were manipulating that ignorance amongst Westerners.

It was an electrifying experience. I realized that he needed something, that I could do something for him, in a sense. Instead of approaching him, looking for enlightenment, looking at what he could do for me.

So, the next time I met him I asked him a simple question, “Would you write a history of Tibet with me?” And he said yes. In fact, he said “Yes, that is important work.” And that allowed me to write The Story of Tibet.

When you initially conceived of this book, were you consciously thinking, “A Dalai Lama hasn’t been involved in the writing of Tibetan history since the 1600s–so now’s the time!”

Yes, that was part of the sense of mission I brought to the work, when I discovered it needed doing. Understanding that, and sensing every year between the year 2000 and the 1600s, I grew more and more excited. As I began the book I had the mistaken idea that somehow I had been especially chosen to write it; I learned better during the decade that it took to write, and publish the book. But as I started the book I was well aware that the Fifth Dalai Lama’s history of Tibet was still in print. And so there was reason to believe that the book I was writing might still be in print four centuries from now. Before I finished the book I understood that the importance of the book had nothing to do with me, but that it was still probably true that it would be in print for a long time. How many things will you work on in life where you feel there is a good chance it will still be around four hundred years later? That fantasy was useful in that it empowered me to summon the degree of commitment and energy that required to see the book published. I had no idea what I had embarked upon as I set off. The Dalai Lama did. One of the first things he said to me when we agreed to work on the book was “It will be difficult for you.” It was. It was all worthwhile in the end because the book is unique, and so, shall we say, “long-legged.” It’s going to be around for a while.

What were your conscious intentions in writing The Story of Tibet? How emotional was this process for you?

I tried to expunge my own emotions from the book except where it was clear to me that that the narrative required their presence. Peter Matthiessen told me something about writing the Snow Leopard. He said that the crumb trail of emotions a writer drops into the facts is something readers follow, as they find the emotional trail through the forest of facts. It stuck with me as I wrote The Story of Tibet. So that is one response to your question. Yes, I tried to use my emotions, and the readers’ emotions, about the Dalai Lama, in a lyrical way, to keep the readers interest in what could have become a dry academic book. I consciously set out to elicit an emotional response from the reader, at the conclusion of every chapter. At the same time doing that, I would surrender to those emotions myself as I wrote the end of each chapter. This emerged naturally as I wrote, it was not forced, though it was conscious. Personally, those emotions charged my batteries, so that I could summon the energy to continue writing. So emotion was important at several levels. It empowered me, and it powers the narrative.

However, my own journey was far more emotional than I let on in the book itself. There was the roller coaster of meeting the Dalai Lama, and then summoning the belief in my own ideas, in my own perceptions, to argue with him, to engage in spirited dialogue. Doing that I discovered that it was the only way to peel away the levels of perception that the Dalai Lama brings to a conversation. Sitting there soaking him up is pointless for a writer. That’s what you want to do as a person, but it’s a waste of his time, in a sense. It’s certainly a waste of the reader’s time. I had to meet him half way, and that required more emotional growth than I knew I was capable of. I would walk out of a week of daily four-hour interviews with him, drained, and then spend six months preparing for the next set of interviews. I read dozens of books so I would know what to ask, so that I could challenge his assumptions, and ask him to explain.

Throughout your book there are many moments where the Dalai Lama seems to disagree or diverge with you, at least emotionally, over some of the more urgent or extreme political motivations for telling Tibet’s story. How did you come to understand the paradox of the Dalai Lama’s Buddhist detachment in relationship to the fact that, clearly, he also has an activist’s political agenda to represent?

In plain terms, yes, we argued. That’s the key to this book. Its why the book exists at all. And its why many readers connect to the book. It’s not what you expect when you pick up such a book. The simple fact is that the Dalai Lama encouraged me to argue with him. That’s the message I got from him, and my nature is argumentative. That worked well, for us and for the reader. It was only through our arguments that the key revelations of the book were nurtured. There are things in The Story of Tibet that have never been understood about the Dalai Lama before. Simple things like “14th Dalai Lama”. Fourteenth what? Is he the 14th reincarnation of the First Dalai Lama? That’s what I thought, that’s what every book I had ever read said. But that’s not the ‘truth’ as understood by the Dalai Lama. So that’s the positive side of what emerged from our arguments. Assumptions were broken down. That only happens through sincere dialogue.

But there is another level of the game. He is emotionally detached, in some ways. He does not have the responses you or I would have to a situation. There is a calmness that come from meditating four hours a day, for his whole life. I don’t have that detachment. I am attached, I am passionate. I am, in a way, the fool.

Actually, I don’t think he has an activist’s political agenda to represent. There are Tibetans who have that sense of activism. But we soften the sharp edges of the nuanced reality of who the Dalai Lama is if we try to represent him with the word-box ‘activist’. That word only tells part of his reality. He always resisted me when I tried to put him into word boxes like that.

The detachment that he has, from mind training (years of meditation) shapes how he sees the world, and if we want to grasp a sense of that world (without years of meditation) then we have to listen to his nuance. Very carefully. And if we think we understand him, challenge him. Because invariably our understanding of who we think he is, is preventing us from seeing him.

So, in the book, I try to reveal the nuance of who he is by narrating our arguments, truthfully. Particularly when I would head down a path that he disagreed with, or where I misunderstood him. I am the fool, I become everyman, his foil, that he uses to allow the reader to sense the nuance of who he is.

While you mention in the book that you are not a religious or “believing” person, you also seem to have many spiritual “aha” moments during your conversations with the Dalai Lama. I noticed a curious relationship between your journalistic detachment as a writer and the Dalai Lama’s spiritual detachment as a Buddhist. Do you feel that you developed a deeper sense of yourself as a spiritual being during this project?

Yes. You could hardly spend that much time with Tenzin Gyatso and not develop a deeper awareness of you own spirituality. And, yes, again I consider myself spiritual, though I am not a believer. The Dalai Lama makes spirituality very practical. It’s like hanging out with a ballet star. You can see that the ballet star walks differently. And then when they get on the stage you see that they can do things you cannot. But yet, hanging out with them, you realize that their special abilities grew out of a lifetimes dedication to daily practice, and training. That funny way they walk down the street is part of what allows that beauty on the stage. You develop the sense that if we devoted ourselves, as they do to their practice, that we could achieve some fraction of their apparently miraculous abilities (and worry what we might lose if we did so). In this way being around the Dalai Lama made spirituality less remote, less of an ideal. It made it more concrete for me. Not that I became better, just by being around him, but I did get a sense of what it takes to be nice to people, to control one’s anger, to think about what others want, or need. Seeing his example, in small things, you see where you are, and what it would take to develop your abilities. Spirituality becomes concrete, and for me it emboldened my lack of belief. If I may be so bold: belief is not the foundation of spirituality; knowledge is not the foundation of wisdom.

In many ways, we in the West romanticize the lineage of lamas from Tibet in the same way that so many people have given themselves blindly to papal power over the course of time. In this book we get to know a history of lamas who are not perfect holy-men on mountains, surrounded by white light. Did you ever feel conflicted in presenting some of the darker sides of the lama lineage? Why do we westerners hold such romantic views of Tibet and how does our consciousness of Tibet need to evolve?

Yes, I agree that some westerners romanticize Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism, and yes, I agree we do that in much the same way that European peasants once spiritually enfeoffed themselves to Rome. I have seen examples of this that were chilling. I have literally seen people die because of such beliefs. This is, as I believe the Dalai Lama would say, ignorant

No, I did not feel conflicted about presenting a nuanced, holistic, view of Tibetan history. By the time I came to write The Story of Tibet I was writing it in part, exactly because that was what needed doing. I read Magic and Mystery in Tibet, by Alexandra David-Neel, when I was an 18-year-old kid. I bought it from a bookstore on the Spanish Steps in Rome, and read it as I hitch hiked to Kathmandu in 1972. So I had been there, done that. A long time ago. In fact, living in Kathmandu, I had seen dozens of shall we say, emotionally challenged westerners, diving into the deep end of Tibetan meditation practices without proper preparation, without guidance, after developing an irrational view of Tibetan Buddhism, based on Tibetan classics that had been poorly translated or poorly understood, in the late 19th and early 20th Century. People who did not speak a word of Tibetan told me they were receiving their mediation guidance through telepathy from a Tibetan Lama, who did not speak anything but Tibetan. I was called on to pick up the pieces a few times, get them on their meds, get them to stop meditating, get them on a plane, and get them back to their families.

In those instances, while talking with Tibetan meditation masters who were trying to help such people, I saw one thing very clearly: Tibetans who become monks and nuns are often the most grounded, funniest, well adjusted people in their society. They come to Buddhism not to heal themselves but to empower themselves, so they can help others. Of course, there are exceptions, but anyone who has spent time with Tibetan monks knows that they are a hoot. Even if you just read The Story of Tibet, the first thing you learn about the Dalai Lama is that he is always laughing, always telling jokes–and often those jokes are self-deprecatory. On the other hand, my experience was that in general (with notable exceptions) westerners attracted to Buddhism are looking for healing. They are not very lighthearted, and they don’t have a lot to give to others.

One of the reason westerners hold such fantastic ideas about Tibet, and Tibetan Buddhism is because even in the 1960s there were no good translations of basic Tibetan texts available. So people read fiction parading as fact, like Lobsang Rampa, Madam Blavatsky, or The Ascended Brotherhood, and thought they knew something about Tibet. Luckily for me, since I do not read Tibetan, many people of my own generation have accurately translated the basics of Tibetan literature: I even had access to those ideas while the translations were still in manuscript form. A heroic job of translation has been done. There is a great deal of accurate material out there now that was not available, really, until the 1980s and later. So that’s one part of this.

Why do westerners hold such romantic fantasies about Tibet? Tibet has always attracted people on the edge, and until recently they were being fed hogwash. That is changing. Calm, normal, people have developed more realistic appraisals of Tibet, its religion, and its history. And this trend is enriching our view of the world. But it’s a slow process, and many people first coming to the subject of Tibet still seem drawn, like moths to the flame, to the old work, that really needs to be put aside.

On the other hand, the Chinese Government goes out of its way to distort the history of Tibet, for political purposes. If you think the weird things Madam Blavatsky did to Tibetan Buddhism are strange, you should see the trash the Chinese Communist Party dresses up as history.

In writing The Story of Tibet I was sincerely motivated to find a balanced, grounded, view of Tibet as a real country, with a real history, with real problems in its history, without losing sight of the fact that Tibet is a country that has real spiritual treasure to offer the world. But to get to that, you have to burn through your assumptions, and ground your basic understanding about Tibet in the facts. Which is one of the reasons why I wrote The Story of Tibet. I am very lucky that I set out to accomplish that task at a time when so much new material was available.

There is a sense throughout the conversations you have with the Dalai Lama that, historically, Tibet has been primarily concerned with the flourishing of Buddhism–over and above its political/national identity. Most armchair Buddhist scholars know that Buddhism is primarily concerned with the dissolving of the egoic self. How did you deal with the paradox of the struggle for a national identity in Tibet, the flourishing of its national religion, in contrast with Buddhism’s deepest tenet of self-dissolution? Did the Dalai Lama ever address this with you?

There are several places in the book where the Dalai Lama answers this question in a way that its impossible to do justice to in this interview. However, to be frank, this is perhaps the toughest question you have asked. Let me tell you a story. After the book was published in the U.S., I went on tour. One evening after I finished speaking, a young Tibetan woman, born in exile, stood up and thanked me for the book, which was moving. Then she asked me something, more or less in these words.

“In your book you give us many examples of the Dalai Lama’s lack of attachment, developed through spiritual training. In one example, you show how the Dalai Lama or anyone who has developed ‘lack of attachment’ through a lifetime of meditation practice, might view the Potala Palace in Lhasa as just another building. But for those of us who have never been to Tibet, the Potala is not just another building. Its a symbol of Tibetan nationalism. Can you explain to me how we should understand that? Are we supposed to devote our life to achieving real autonomy in Tibet, in fighting for the rights of the Tibetan people? Or is that a waste of time and instead we should devote our lives to mind-science, so that we can achieve real liberation, not the physical liberation of our country?”

Frankly, I could sense where her mind was going after she got about half way through her question. I had half-felt her question as I interviewed the Dalai Lama and as I wrote the book. As her words landed in my ear, and then fell into my heart, they landed with pre-ordained order. They landed, one after the other falling exactly where the construct she had already created in my mind decreed, and I was crying long before she came to the end of her question.

After she finished speaking there was absolute silence in the room. I was weeping, on the podium, silently, with no attempt to brush away my tears.

In reply, I said, “I am not the person you should ask this question of.”

Recently China finished a three billion dollar railway to Lhasa. Nearly half of the population of the Tibetan region is now filled by Chinese workers who received incentives to work in Tibet. Although the killing of culture is perhaps not as outright or loud as something like, say, the Rwandan Genocide, China is slowly attempting to dissolve Tibetan culture and identity. If things as loud and violent as Rwanda can be ignored by the rest of the world, how can we expect a response to the more subtle cultural genocide happening in Tibet? What can be done?

There is only one answer to the question of Tibet: education and freedom. The Chinese people need to liberate themselves from the dictatorship of the Chinese Communist Party. To do that they need Americans and Europeans to support their education, and their freedom. While we may be unable to do much towards those goals it’s critical that we do nothing to empower the dictatorship of the Chinese Communist Party. Since we cannot overthrow the CCP–only the Chinese people can do that–we should at least not empower its stranglehold. We must do no evil.

Frankly, I believe it’s a betrayal of America to do anything that supports the empowerment of the Chinese Communist Party. It is evil to do so. Yet, today our foreign policy towards China, our outsourcing of manufacturing to China, the way our military power is being slowly choked to death in the quagmire of the Middle East, our addiction to imported oil, the way the corporations dominate the formation of foreign policy goals according to the demands of their quarterly profit statements – a cloud, a host, of inter-dependently co-originating factors – all insure that every purchase in every store, by every American, empowers the CCP. This is a dreadful mistake for which we, and future generations of Americans will pay a terrible price, the extent of which we are hardly able, in our silk-cocooned luxury, to imagine. Future generations will look back on corporate domination of our foreign policy in the same way we look back on IBM selling card sorters to the Nazi regime in the years leading up to World War II. Card sorters used to count, more efficiently, those headed to the Nazi death camps. We are living through a period of blindness, lead by ignorant fools who lack any basic understanding of history. Quarterly profits are no basis for foreign policy. Its not evil men who allow this evil, it’s a host of interdependently, co-originating factors, over which no single human has conscious control. We are all part of this.

What can be done? We must reverse – with a host of conscious adjustments at many levels – twenty years of failed foreign policy. We must invest our outsourced manufacturing only in countries where there is at least an emerging democracy – or even better, to return our outsourced manufacturing to the United States. The United States must become a net exporter of carbon-free energy: specifically we should set it as a national goal to become independent of all carbon-based energy within a decade. And then to become an exporter by year eleven.

You may think, at first glance, that these answers have nothing to do with Tibet. However, this is the only answer I have. If we would undertake these goals, we could avoid a war with China, and still see the end of genocide in Tibet. Unless we take up the two stated above, on a wartime footing, now, war with China appears inevitable. The fate of Tibet–and the fate of human rights and democracy around the world–is intertwined, with the interdependently co-originating factors that shape the emerging conflict between China and the West.

I understand that after reading the above you probably think I am some rabid, right wing nut. I ask you to take a moment and think through that assumption. I am scared about the future of China and the United States. That’s what studying a thousand years of Chinese and Tibetan history with the Dalai Lama taught me. What’s most awful for me is that such conflict is avoidable, except that we lack the political leadership to achieve that goal.

If you think this view of history is “Buddhist,” I urge you to read War And Peace. My view is steeped in Tolstoy’s view of history, re-formed by the work of Owen Lattimore, and then, shall we say, “cold pressed” by my time with the Dalai Lama.

Of course, I may be wrong. But you are not the first person to ask me, after reading this book, “What should we do?” So I have given this reply some thought.

Towards the end of the book you mention that many scholars in the U.S. are influenced in their writings by the power the Chinese hold over travel/study privileges. Could you explain your findings and personal feelings on this issue a bit more? Is the “Beijing” sensitivity really that high for US scholars?

Yes, Beijing’s sensitivity is that high. If you think I am crazy you should read The Anaconda in the Chandelier by Princeton Professor, Perry Link. Its available on line, here.

You ask me to explain my feelings on this. America is being betrayed by some of those who know China the best. Specialists, who make their living with their China knowledge, are treading around the Chinese Communist Parties sensitivities when they write books to describe China to Americans, and when they provide guidance to those who shape American policy towards China. Yes. This is a fact. But don’t take my word for it, read Perry Link.

The hard part for me is that once I became aware of this, and began to look through the standard histories of China being used to teach the freshman courses on China, this became very clear.

I don’t think the Americans doing this are evil, I think they are protecting their pay check and that their actions are … well, it goes back to the idea of interdependent co-origination. Darwin wrote one of the clearest examples of this theory, as played out in one field of knowledge: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. That’s a textbook example–perhaps the first–of what I mean by the phrase. Since there is no god, as we imagine it, how did life emerge? It evolved during deep time from a host of factors. Time and pressure turn lava to rock; rock is worn down by rain; chemicals from the rocks leach into the water; the chemicals interact–and so on. Over billions of years. Life evolves from “nothing.” Life interdependently co-originates.

As above, so below. People think their opinions emerge, freely. In fact all our thoughts “interdependently co-originate” growing out of the chaotic muck of an incalculably large array of factors. Political scientists who adjust their word choice when describing China on CNN, even as they hope to shape what Americans think about China, are part of an array of forces that we cannot calculate. But responsible people in the U.S. are allowing their word choice, in print and in public debate, to be shaped by the sensitivities of the Chinese Communist Party. This is a fact, and it should scare you. Read Perry Link. As we saw on September 11, it’s what you don’t expect that will get you.

Please note that its not the people of China I am discussing. It’s the CCP.

Finally, how has your adjustment been coming back to the United States recently? What are you up to in the near future? Do you have new book ideas in the works?

Its been rough, returning to the U.S. after thirty years in Asia. You get spoiled living in Asia by so many things that are completely unavailable here. Free time. Time to read. The only time I have to read in America, is on a plane. The other problem is that I look American, sound American, but actually I am a type of immigrant, suspended between two worlds. It’s actually easier for Indian-Americans in America – people look at them and don’t expect them to know the plot lines of sitcoms from the 1980s. But they look at me, and I look just like them, so they expect me to know all these things that I don’t. So it’s confusing.

Furthermore, the place and timing of re-entry has been challenging. It was only two years after returning to America, and buying a home in New Orleans, that Katrina struck. I went out and covered that for the media, for months. So it’s been interesting times. It was hard enough carrying around images of dead bodies from the war I covered in Nepal, but now I carry around, for life, these images of bodies floating in the waters of flooded New Orleans. We pay prices for the things we do. I would not have missed any of it, but we pay prices.

Despite everything, I find time to write, not as much as I would like, but still some. And I am happy to be here in America, watching, writing.

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Quantum Mechanics, Reality, and Magic Mushrooms
Scientist and author Dr. Chris Becker takes an in-depth approach in understanding how we perceive reality through magic mushrooms and quantum mechanics.

Psilocybin Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
Our ultimate guide to Psilocybin has everything you want to know about this psychedelic fungi from its uses to its legal status.

The Psilocybin Experience: What’s the Deal With Magic Mushrooms?
From microdoses to macrodoses, the psilocybin experience has been sought after both medicinally and recreationally for millennia.

Psilocybin and Magic Mushroom Resources
Curious to learn more about psilocybin? This guide is a comprehensive psilocybin resource containing books, therapeutic studies, and more.

Paul Stamets Profile: Mushroom Guru, Filmmaker, Nutritionist, Scientist
Learn about Paul Stamets, read his thoughts on psilocybin mircodosing, the future of psilocybin, and his recent film “Fantastic Fungi”.

Microdosing Psilocybin & Common Dosage Explained
Microdosing, though imperceivably, is showing to have many health benefits–here is everything you want to know about microdosing psilocybin.

Psilocybin Nasal Spray: Relief for Anxiety, PTSD, and Depression
Microdosing nasal spray with psilocybin, is that possible?! Oregan a start-up Silo Wellness believes so and has created this new option for PTSD treatment.

Mazatec Mushroom Usage: Notes on Approach, Setting and Species for Curious Psilonauts
A look at traditional Mazatec psilocybin mushroom usage, and a comparison to the cliniical therapeutic approach, with an examination of the Mazatec setting and species used in veladas.

María Sabina: The Mazatec Magic Mushroom Woman
Magic mushrooms are incredibly popular today. How they became introduced to into American culture isn’t usually a topic discussed while tripping on psilocybin fungi. We all may have María Sabina to thank for exposing the Western world to the healing properties of the psilocybin mushroom.

Guide to Magic Mushroom Strains
Are there different types of psilocybin? Read our guide to learn about the different magic mushroom strains and their individual effects.

Kilindi Iyi: Mycologist, Traveler, Teacher
Learn about traveler and mycologist Kilindi Iyi known in the psychedelic community for his research and exploration of psilocybin.

How to Store Shrooms: Best Practices
How do you store shrooms for optimal shelf life? Learn how and why the proper storage method is so important.

Shroom Chocolate Recipes: How to Make Magic Mushroom Chocolates
This recipe provides step by step directions on how you can make mushroom chocolates with the necessary ingredients. Read to learn more!

Why Do People Use Psilocybin? New Johns Hopkins Study
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicines has just published a new study on psychoactive effects of psilocybin. Read here to learn more.

How-To Lemon Tek: Ultimate Guide and Recipe
This master guide will teach you how to lemon tek, preventing the onset of negative effects after consuming psilocybin. Read to learn more!

How to Intensify a Mushroom Trip
Learn about techniques like Lemon tekking, or discover the right time to consume cannabis if you are looking to intensify a mushroom trip.

How to Grow Magic Mushrooms: Step-by-Step
This step-by-step guide will show you how to grow magic mushrooms at home. Read this guide before trying it on your own.

How to Dry Magic Mushrooms: Best Practices
Read to learn more about specifics for the best practices on how to dry magic mushrooms after harvesting season.

How to Buy Psilocybin Spores
Interested in psilocybin mushrooms? We’ll walk you through all you need to know to obtain mushroom spores. Nosh on this delish How To guide.

Hippie Flipping: When Shrooms and Molly Meet
What is it, what does it feel like, and how long does it last? Explore the mechanics of hippie flipping and how to safely experiment.

Having Sex on Shrooms: Good or Bad Idea?
Is having sex on shrooms a good idea or an accident waiting to happen? Find out in our guide to sex on magic mushrooms.

Gold Cap Shrooms Guide: Spores, Effects, Identification
Read this guide to learn more about the different characteristics of gold cap mushrooms, and how they differ from other psilocybin species.

Guide to Cooking with Magic Mushrooms
From cookies to smoothies and sandwiches, we cover various methods of cooking with magic mushrooms for the ultimate snack.

2020 Election: The Decriminalize Psilocybin Movement
Are you curious if mushrooms will follow in marijuana’s footsteps? Read to learn about how the U.S. is moving to decriminalize psilocybin.

Oregon’s Initiative to Legalize Mushrooms | Initiative Petition 34
Oregon continues to push ahead with their initiative to legalize Psilocybin in 2020. The measure received its official title and now needs signatures.

Canada Approves Psilocybin Treatment for Terminally-Ill Cancer Patients
Canada’s Minister of Health, Patty Hajdu approved the use of psilocybin to help ease anxiety and depression of four terminal cancer patients.

Mapping the DMT Experience
With only firsthand experiences to share, how can we fully map the DMT experience? Let’s explore what we know about this powerful psychedelic.

Guide to Machine Elves and Other DMT Entities
This guide discusses machine elves, clockwork elves, and other common DMT entities that people experience during a DMT trip.

Is the DMT Experience a Hallucination? 
What if the DMT realm was the real world, and our everyday lives were merely a game we had chosen to play?

How to Store DMT
Not sure how to store DMT? Read this piece to learn the best practices and elements of advice to keep your stuff fresh.

What Does 5-MeO-DMT Show Us About Consciousness?
How does our brain differentiate between what’s real and what’s not? Read to learn what can 5-MeO-DMT show us about consciousness.

How to Smoke DMT: Processes Explained
There are many ways to smoke DMT and we’ve outlined some of the best processes to consider before embarking on your journey.

How to Ground After DMT
Knowing what to expect from a DMT comedown can help you integrate the experience to gain as much value as possible from your journey.

How To Get DMT
What kind of plants contain DMT? Are there other ways to access this psychedelic? Read on to learn more about how to get DMT.

How DMT is Made: Everything You Need to Know
Ever wonder how to make DMT? Read our guide to learn everything you need to know about the procedures of how DMT is made.

Having Sex on DMT: What You Need to Know
Have you ever wondered about sex on DMT? Learn how the God Molecule can influence your intimate experiences.

Does the Human Brain Make DMT? 
With scientific evidence showing us DMT in the brain, what can we conclude it is there for? Read on to learn more.

How to Use DMT Vape Pens
Read to learn all about DMT vape pens including: what to know when vaping, what to expect when purchasing a DMT cartridge, and vaping safely.

DMT Resources
This article is a comprehensive DMT resource providing extensive information from studies, books, documentaries, and more. Check it out!

Differentiating DMT and Near-Death Experiences
Some say there are similarities between a DMT trip and death. Read our guide on differentiating DMT and near-death experiences to find out.

DMT Research from 1956 to the Edge of Time
From a representative sample of a suitably psychedelic crowd, you’d be hard pressed to find someone who couldn’t tell you all about Albert Hofmann’s enchanted bicycle ride after swallowing what turned out to be a massive dose of LSD. Far fewer, however, could tell you much about the world’s first DMT trip.

The Ultimate Guide to DMT Pricing
Check out our ultimate guide on DMT pricing to learn what to expect when purchasing DMT for your first time.

DMT Milking | Reality Sandwich
Indigenous cultures have used 5-MeO-DMT for centuries. With the surge in demand for psychedelic toad milk, is DMT Milking harming the frogs?

Why Does DMT Pervade Nature?
With the presence of DMT in nature everywhere – including human brains – why does it continue to baffle science?

DMT Substance Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
Our ultimate guide to DMT has everything you want to know about this powerful psychedelic referred to as “the spirit molecule”.

DMT for Depression: Paving the Way for New Medicine
We’ve been waiting for an effective depression treatment. Studies show DMT for depression works even for treatment resistant patients.

Beating Addiction with DMT
Psychedelics have been studied for their help overcoming addiction. Read how DMT is helping addicts beat their substance abuse issues.

DMT Extraction: Behind the Scientific Process
Take a look at DMT extraction and the scientific process involved. Learn all you need to know including procedures and safety.

Microdosing DMT & Common Dosages Explained
Microdosing, though imperceivable, is showing to have many health benefits–here is everything you want to know about microdosing DMT.

DMT Art: A Look Behind Visionary Creations
An entire genre of artwork is inspired by psychedelic trips with DMT. Read to learn about the entities and visions behind DMT art.

Changa vs. DMT: What You Need to Know
While similar (changa contains DMT), each drug has its own unique effect and feeling. Let’s compare and contrast changa vs DMT.

5-MeO-DMT Guide: Effects, Benefits, Safety, and Legality
5-Meo-DMT comes from the Sonora Desert toad. Here is everything you want to know about 5-Meo-DMT and how it compares to 4-AcO-DMT.

4-AcO-DMT Guide: Benefits, Effects, Safety, and Legality
This guide tells you everything about 4 AcO DMT & 5 MeO DMT, that belong to the tryptamine class, and are similar but slightly different to DMT.

How Much Does LSD Cost? When shopping around for that magical psychedelic substance, there can be many uncertainties when new to buying LSD. You may be wondering how much does LSD cost? In this article, we will discuss what to expect when purchasing LSD on the black market, what forms LSD is sold in, and the standard breakdown of buying LSD in quantity.   Navy Use of LSD on the Dark Web The dark web is increasingly popular for purchasing illegal substances. The US Navy has now noticed this trend with their staff. Read to learn more.   Having Sex on LSD: What You Need to Know Can you have sex on LSD? Read our guide to learn everything about sex on acid, from lowered inhibitions to LSD users quotes on sex while tripping.   A Drug That Switches off an LSD Trip A pharmaceutical company is developing an “off-switch” drug for an LSD trip, in the case that a bad trip can happen. Some would say there is no such thing.   Queen of Hearts: An Interview with Liz Elliot on Tim Leary and LSD The history of psychedelia, particularly the British experience, has been almost totally written by men. Of the women involved, especially those who were in the thick of it, little has been written either by or about them. A notable exception is Liz Elliot.   LSD Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety LSD, Lysergic acid diethylamide, or just acid is one of the most important psychedelics ever discovered. What did history teach us?   Microdosing LSD & Common Dosage Explained Microdosing, though imperceivable, is showing to have many health benefits–here is everything you want to know about microdosing LSD.   LSD Resources Curious to learn more about LSD? This guide includes comprehensive LSD resources containing books, studies and more.   LSD as a Spiritual Aid There is common consent that the evolution of mankind is paralleled by the increase and expansion of consciousness. From the described process of how consciousness originates and develops, it becomes evident that its growth depends on its faculty of perception. Therefore every means of improving this faculty should be used.   Legendary LSD Blotter Art: A Hidden Craftsmanship Have you ever heard of LSD blotter art? Explore the trippy world of LSD art and some of the top artists of LSD blotter art.   LSD and Exercise: Does it Work? LSD and exercise? Learn why high-performing athletes are taking hits of LSD to improve their overall potential.   Jan Bastiaans Treated Holocaust Survivors with LSD Dutch psychiatrist, Jan Bastiaans administered LSD-assisted therapy to survivors of the Holocaust. A true war hero and pioneer of psychedelic-therapy.   LSD and Spiritual Awakening I give thanks for LSD, which provided the opening that led me to India in 1971 and brought me to Neem Karoli Baba, known as Maharajji. Maharajji is described by the Indians as a “knower of hearts.”   How LSD is Made: Everything You Need to Know Ever wonder how to make LSD? Read our guide to learn everything you need to know about the procedures of how LSD is made.   How to Store LSD: Best Practices Learn the best way to store LSD, including the proper temperature and conditions to maximize how long LSD lasts when stored.   Bicycle Day: The Discovery of LSD Every year on April 19th, psychonauts join forces to celebrate Bicycle Day. Learn about the famous day when Albert Hoffman first discovered the effects of LSD.   Cary Grant: A Hollywood Legend On LSD Cary Grant was a famous actor during the 1930’s-60’s But did you know Grant experimented with LSD? Read our guide to learn more.   Albert Hofmann: LSD — My Problem Child Learn about Albert Hofmann and his discovery of LSD, along with the story of Bicycle Day and why it marks a historic milestone.   Babies are High: What Does LSD Do To Your Brain What do LSD and babies have in common? Researchers at the Imperial College in London discover that an adult’s brain on LSD looks like a baby’s brain.   1P LSD: Effects, Benefits, Safety Explained 1P LSD is an analogue of LSD and homologue of ALD-25. Here is everything you want to know about 1P LSD and how it compares to LSD.   Francis Crick, DNA & LSD Type ‘Francis Crick LSD’ into Google, and the result will be 30,000 links. Many sites claim that Crick (one of the two men responsible for discovering the structure of DNA), was either under the influence of LSD at the time of his revelation or used the drug to help with his thought processes during his research. Is this true?   What Happens If You Overdose on LSD? A recent article presented three individuals who overdosed on LSD. Though the experience was unpleasant, the outcomes were remarkably positive.

The Ayahuasca Experience
Ayahuasca is both a medicine and a visionary aid. You can employ ayahuasca for physical, mental, emotional and spiritual repair, and you can engage with the power of ayahuasca for deeper insight and realization. If you consider attainment of knowledge in the broadest perspective, you can say that at all times, ayahuasca heals.

 

Trippy Talk: Meet Ayahuasca with Sitaramaya Sita and PlantTeachers
Sitaramaya Sita is a spiritual herbalist, pusangera, and plant wisdom practitioner formally trained in the Shipibo ayahuasca tradition.

 

The Therapeutic Value of Ayahuasca
My best description of the impact of ayahuasca is that it’s a rocket boost to psychospiritual growth and unfolding, my professional specialty during my thirty-five years of private practice.

 

Microdosing Ayahuasca: Common Dosage Explained
What is ayahuasca made of and what is considered a microdose? Explore insights with an experienced Peruvian brewmaster and learn more about this practice.

 

Ayahuasca Makes Neuron Babies in Your Brain
Researchers from Beckley/Sant Pau Research Program have shared the latest findings in their study on the effects of ayahuasca on neurogenesis.

 

The Fatimiya Sufi Order and Ayahuasca
In this interview, the founder of the Fatimiya Sufi Order,  N. Wahid Azal, discusses the history and uses of plant medicines in Islamic and pre-Islamic mystery schools.

 

Consideration Ayahuasca for Treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
Research indicates that ayahuasca mimics mechanisms of currently accepted treatments for PTSD. In order to understand the implications of ayahuasca treatment, we need to understand how PTSD develops.

 

Brainwaves on Ayahuasca: A Waking Dream State
In a study researchers shared discoveries showing ingredients found in Ayahuasca impact the brainwaves causing a “waking dream” state.

 

Cannabis and Ayahuasca: Mixing Entheogenic Plants
Cannabis and Ayahuasca: most people believe they shouldn’t be mixed. Read this personal experience peppered with thoughts from a pro cannabis Peruvian Shaman.

 

Ayahuasca Retreat 101: Everything You Need to Know to Brave the Brew
Ayahuasca has been known to be a powerful medicinal substance for millennia. However, until recently, it was only found in the jungle. Word of its deeply healing and cleansing properties has begun to spread across the world as many modern, Western individuals are seeking spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical well-being. More ayahuasca retreat centers are emerging in the Amazon and worldwide to meet the demand.

 

Ayahuasca Helps with Grief
A new study published in psychopharmacology found that ayahuasca helped those suffering from the loss of a loved one up to a year after treatment.

 

Ayahuasca Benefits: Clinical Improvements for Six Months
Ayahuasca benefits can last six months according to studies. Read here to learn about the clinical improvements from drinking the brew.

 

Ayahuasca Culture: Indigenous, Western, And The Future
Ayahuasca has been use for generations in the Amazon. With the rise of retreats and the brew leaving the rainforest how is ayahuasca culture changing?

 

Ayahuasca Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
The Amazonian brew, Ayahuasca has a long history and wide use. Read our guide to learn all about the tea from its beginnings up to modern-day interest.

 

Ayahuasca and the Godhead: An Interview with Wahid Azal of the Fatimiya Sufi Order
Wahid Azal, a Sufi mystic of The Fatimiya Sufi Order and an Islamic scholar, talks about entheogens, Sufism, mythology, and metaphysics.

 

Ayahuasca and the Feminine: Women’s Roles, Healing, Retreats, and More
Ayahuasca is lovingly called “grandmother” or “mother” by many. Just how feminine is the brew? Read to learn all about women and ayahuasca.

What Is the Standard of Care for Ketamine Treatments?
Ketamine therapy is on the rise in light of its powerful results for treatment-resistant depression. But, what is the current standard of care for ketamine? Read to find out.

What Is Dissociation and How Does Ketamine Create It?
Dissociation can take on multiple forms. So, what is dissociation like and how does ketamine create it? Read to find out.

Having Sex on Ketamine: Getting Physical on a Dissociative
Curious about what it could feel like to have sex on a dissociate? Find out all the answers in our guide to sex on ketamine.

Special K: The Party Drug
Special K refers to Ketamine when used recreationally. Learn the trends as well as safety information around this substance.

Kitty Flipping: When Ketamine and Molly Meet
What is it, what does it feel like, and how long does it last? Read to explore the mechanics of kitty flipping.

Ketamine vs. Esketamine: 3 Important Differences Explained
Ketamine and esketamine are used to treat depression. But what’s the difference between them? Read to learn which one is right for you: ketamine vs. esketamine.

Guide to Ketamine Treatments: Understanding the New Approach
Ketamine is becoming more popular as more people are seeing its benefits. Is ketamine a fit? Read our guide for all you need to know about ketamine treatments.

Ketamine Treatment for Eating Disorders
Ketamine is becoming a promising treatment for various mental health conditions. Read to learn how individuals can use ketamine treatment for eating disorders.

Ketamine Resources, Studies, and Trusted Information
Curious to learn more about ketamine? This guide includes comprehensive ketamine resources containing books, studies and more.

Ketamine Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
Our ultimate guide to ketamine has everything you need to know about this “dissociative anesthetic” and how it is being studied for depression treatment.

Ketamine for Depression: A Mental Health Breakthrough
While antidepressants work for some, many others find no relief. Read to learn about the therapeutic uses of ketamine for depression.

Ketamine for Addiction: Treatments Offering Hope
New treatments are offering hope to individuals suffering from addiction diseases. Read to learn how ketamine for addiction is providing breakthrough results.

Microdosing Ketamine & Common Dosages Explained
Microdosing, though imperceivable, is showing to have many health benefits–here is everything you want to know about microdosing ketamine.

How to Ease a Ketamine Comedown
Knowing what to expect when you come down from ketamine can help integrate the experience to gain as much value as possible.

How to Store Ketamine: Best Practices
Learn the best ways how to store ketamine, including the proper temperature and conditions to maximize how long ketamine lasts when stored.

How To Buy Ketamine: Is There Legal Ketamine Online?
Learn exactly where it’s legal to buy ketamine, and if it’s possible to purchase legal ketamine on the internet.

How Long Does Ketamine Stay in Your System?
How long does ketamine stay in your system? Are there lasting effects on your body? Read to discover the answers!

How Ketamine is Made: Everything You Need to Know
Ever wonder how to make Ketamine? Read our guide to learn everything you need to know about the procedures of how Ketamine is made.

Colorado on Ketamine: First Responders Waiver Programs
Fallout continues after Elijah McClain. Despite opposing recommendations from some city council, Colorado State Health panel recommends the continued use of ketamine by medics for those demonstrating “excited delirium” or “extreme agitation”.

Types of Ketamine: Learn the Differences & Uses for Each
Learn about the different types of ketamine and what they are used for—and what type might be right for you. Read now to find out!

Kitty Flipping: When Ketamine and Molly Meet
What is it, what does it feel like, and how long does it last? Read to explore the mechanics of kitty flipping.

MDMA & Ecstasy Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
Our ultimate guide to MDMA has everything you want to know about Ecstasy from how it was developed in 1912 to why it’s being studied today.

How To Get the Most out of Taking MDMA as a Couple
Taking MDMA as a couple can lead to exciting experiences. Read here to learn how to get the most of of this love drug in your relationship.

Common MDMA Dosage & Microdosing Explained
Microdosing, though imperceivable, is showing to have many health benefits–here is everything you want to know about microdosing MDMA.

Having Sex on MDMA: What You Need to Know
MDMA is known as the love drug… Read our guide to learn all about sex on MDMA and why it is beginning to makes its way into couple’s therapy.

How MDMA is Made: Common Procedures Explained
Ever wonder how to make MDMA? Read our guide to learn everything you need to know about the procedures of how MDMA is made.

Hippie Flipping: When Shrooms and Molly Meet
What is it, what does it feel like, and how long does it last? Explore the mechanics of hippie flipping and how to safely experiment.

How Cocaine is Made: Common Procedures Explained
Ever wonder how to make cocaine? Read our guide to learn everything you need to know about the procedures of how cocaine is made.

A Christmas Sweater with Santa and Cocaine
This week, Walmart came under fire for a “Let it Snow” Christmas sweater depicting Santa with lines of cocaine. Columbia is not merry about it.

Ultimate Cocaine Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
This guide covers what you need to know about Cocaine, including common effects and uses, legality, safety precautions and top trends today.

NEWS: An FDA-Approved Cocaine Nasal Spray
The FDA approved a cocaine nasal spray called Numbrino, which has raised suspicions that the pharmaceutical company, Lannett Company Inc., paid off the FDA..

The Ultimate Guide to Cannabis Bioavailability
What is bioavailability and how can it affect the overall efficacy of a psychedelic substance? Read to learn more.

Cannabis Research Explains Sociability Behaviors
New research by Dr. Giovanni Marsicano shows social behavioral changes occur as a result of less energy available to the neurons. Read here to learn more.

The Cannabis Shaman
If recreational and medical use of marijuana is becoming accepted, can the spiritual use as well? Experiential journalist Rak Razam interviews Hamilton Souther, founder of the 420 Cannabis Shamanism movement…

Cannabis Guide: Effects, Common Uses, Safety
Our ultimate guide to Cannabis has everything you want to know about this popular substances that has psychedelic properties.

Cannabis and Ayahuasca: Mixing Entheogenic Plants
Cannabis and Ayahuasca: most people believe they shouldn’t be mixed. Read this personal experience peppered with thoughts from a procannabis Peruvian Shaman.

CBD-Rich Cannabis Versus Single-Molecule CBD
A ground-breaking study has documented the superior therapeutic properties of whole plant Cannabis extract as compared to synthetic cannabidiol (CBD), challenging the medical-industrial complex’s notion that “crude” botanical preparations are less effective than single-molecule compounds.

Cannabis Has Always Been a Medicine
Modern science has already confirmed the efficacy of cannabis for most uses described in the ancient medical texts, but prohibitionists still claim that medical cannabis is “just a ruse.”

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