Last week I converged on Denver with 12,000 other people to connect around psychedelic science. Something I didn’t think I would ever say when I first entered the world of psychedelics 15 years ago. Although I had my own transformative experiences and began to study the research coming out of Johns Hopkins, when I would share my belief in the healing power of psychedelics most people would look at me like, or straight up tell me, I was crazy.

But now with the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies about a year away from legalizing the use of MDMA for PTSD, and many cities starting to decriminalize psychedelic substances, these experiences are becoming more and more acceptable to the greater population.

When I was a senior in college I started keeping a journal regularly, after a lifetime of trying. My thinking was that so much was happening in my life that I wanted to remember it. So every Sunday evening I would sit down and record the previous week’s events.

Over time, more and more of my personal thoughts and reflections started to find themselves on these pages. Eventually, my journal would become the place where I could work out what I was going through, vent my frustrations, and even record the psychic visions I was downloading. It is a practice that I cherish and which has aided me in profound personal development.

As I walked into my bathroom this morning, the dappled morning light came in through the leaves and warmed my face. My eyes closed, I could see the patterns of light playing on the backs of my eyelids. When I looked up, the sun was shining through multiple, smaller starbursts instead of one large ray, which felt incredibly magical.

And it is.

Everything in our culture is winding us up, keeping us awake, and not allowing us to feel the tiredness that rests deep in our bones. A large part of our culture revolves around beverages aimed at turning off the body’s signals for rest. There is so much to do, and so little time as the saying goes.

Of what use is tiredness in this world?

“You can’t cry over spilt milk,” so the saying goes.

Well, I actually think you can cry over spilled milk. Sometimes we’re feeling a bit raw and anything can set off a cascade of tears. Maybe this glass of milk was special for some reason. There are many rationales for why we might start to cry over something seemingly so “small.”

A little about me, if you didn’t already know it, I spent the first 24 years of my life struggling with anxiety, depression, and OCD. Then for another six or so I was still working with anxiety and what was not the most amazing self-image. It was a lot better in those six years than the previous 24, but nothing like the liberation I have felt since being in my 30s.

Well-being seems to be the last thing to be considered as we move through daily life here in the United States. Often I find my work with clients is helping to undo the harms caused by a culture that doesn’t seem to care about our humanity. We heal past wounding and energize the body to follow the soul’s longings. This tends toward recreating our lives and orienting them toward a love of ourselves which creates health.

A few years back, I was listening to a Terence McKenna talk where a man stood up and instead of asking a question he made a really poignant observation which has stuck with me ever since.

He mentioned how we are moving from the Age of Pisces into the Age of Aquarius and how through analyzing the symbols of each sign we can start to understand the development of consciousness during these times.

The past two weekends I have spent my days sitting with groups of people who are interested in learning the art of energy healing, in the lineage we call Reiki. It is a class that can completely transform lives, not only because of the energetic healing that takes place during these trainings but also because of the shift in perspective that comes along with it.

One of the reasons why Reiki is so effective is because it goes to the root cause of one’s issues and heals directly at the source. This is much different from our culture’s current outlook on healing.

“Let your desires unfold naturally

Don’t rush to “scratch the itch”

Feel the burn and the longing

It’s not a sign that something is wrong

Or needs to be fixed

Instead it’s an invitation

To let it gradually lead you home”

A few months back, I was sitting with mushroom medicine when I felt myself as a living memory in every part of my being. I looked at my body and could “see” how it was a representation of everything that has come before it. In that way I could really observe its ephemeral and mutable nature.

But what we are coming to learn (and of course what the ancient mystics taught) is that reality is more of a multifaceted co-creation between us and the world we encounter.

The intersection of modern neuroscience and ancient spiritual traditions fascinates me. Ancient yogis and mystics described the maps of our reality thousands of years ago and now science is starting to explain them.

These detailed instructions, while sometimes lacking in the “why” of how they work still produce miraculous results. As Arthur Clarke once said, “Magic's just science that we don't understand yet.”

There’s something about our culture that just craves an either or. Wants to place everything into “neat” categories. You’re either in or you’re out. A sinner or a saint. A good person or a bad one. (Those of you who read this article already know that’s baloney.)

This ideology has also infiltrated our concepts of love. As though we could limit the omnipotent force of love.

Love is one of the most powerful and transformative forces on the planet, and when we learn how to love ourselves there is almost nothing we can’t do.

However, from an early age we are brought up to believe that we are less than deserving of love. Or that we only deserve love if we act like this, or look like that. These concepts couldn’t be further from the truth.

As Ram Dass said, “You are loved just for being who you are, just for existing.”

For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere it is Winter. A time of hibernation and rest. Dark nights and warm drinks. Slow movement and lots of space.

Or at least, that’s how it should be.

I don’t know about you, but I started a meditation practice because I was at the end of my rope with the endless bouts of anxiety I had experienced my whole life. What I intended to cultivate was a sense of peace — I didn’t realize I would also awaken my psychic qualities.

The first major change I had noticed once I took up a regular meditation practice was the lucidity of my dreams. I had always been a vivid dreamer, but now there was a brighter quality to them and I was actively making decisions in them.

The way we view life is through a series of lenses. What we think of as reality is merely a story of what has been handed down to us from our ancestors. Our beliefs shape the world, and what we believe about good and bad may be destroying us.

Hello my sweet love. How has your heart been keeping? I hope you have found some moments for rest and reflection during this end-of-year season. If you haven’t, then hopefully the next few minutes of reading this post will help.

If you are anything like I was in the past, you may be so preoccupied with the future that coming into the present might feel unsettling. The act of pausing and looking back to acknowledge all we have done then offers a bit of relief. We start to see the accumulation of all we have accomplished in the past. A confidence is born within us, allowing us to trust ourselves and relax. There is healing in this space.

I am back in one of my happy places on the planet. This time a group of my closest friends joined me. It is beautiful, it is warm. There is a lack of urgency in the air. A relief from the hectic pace of the U.S.

But I am still on the earth, still in a human body.

From what I understand, this means regardless of the conditions there will be a sense of “offness” in one way or another. This is not meant to be a drag, but rather a coming to terms with what is. I find acceptance lends us its own type of sweet relief.

The you you are today is the fruiting body of your past self?

What you think, feel, love, and know right now is the result of all your past choices and all the experiences you have had over the course of your life. There are also influences including what you have inherited from your ancestors and the culture you live in. But for those of us with means, perhaps the most important tool we have to craft our own life is appropriate attention and care. With these we can exert more influence over who we become, rather than allowing the whims of fate and habit to mold our existence.