Synergetic Press Inc.,U.S. – förlag

Psychedelic Integration: Psychotherapy for Non-Ordinary States of Consciousness is a trailblazing guidebook for anyone interested in psychedelic-assisted therapy and integration.When psychologist and psychotherapist Marc B. Aixalá began fielding questions from people around the world seeking help integrating their own psychedelic experiences, he couldn’t find a singular source of collected research and support. What began as an attempt to help others became Psychedelic Integration, a work that traces the evolution of psychedelic-assisted therapy and integration research from the 1960s to the present moment, explains therapeutic techniques and outlines a clinician’s real-world observations on the deep work of healing.Written for practitioners and the generally curious, this book offers 11 metaphors for understanding integration and concisely explains the seven dimensions of integration, which Aixalá sees as part of a process inextricably linked to preparation and the psychedelic session experience. Grounded in the idea that integration work serves two main objectives: maximizing the benefits of a psychedelic experience and dealing with adverse effects, Aixalá maintains that understanding why an individual seeks integration support can inform therapeutic techniques. Psychedelic Integration outlines foundational practices like rest and nutrition, spiritual approaches including water rituals and tarot, embodied techniques of dance and singing, and frameworks including Holotropic Breathwork, Gestalt therapy and integration circles. The author acknowledges that psychedelic experiences can be difficult and even traumatic, and he confronts that reality with compassion. In this book, Aixalá shares stories and artwork created by some of his patients as they progressed through their own integration journeys. Psychedelic Integration is an essential companion for practitioners, their patients, and those seeking integration work not as a solution but as a tool for self and collective discovery.

With the second renaissance and re-emergence of psychedelics in Western society, the public and therapists alike are confronting new areas of exploration with few comprehensive models available to aid in the profound process of integrating such powerful and mystical-like experiences into one’s life. Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy offers one useful model for this work, but access to even traditional therapy is limited due to expense and inadequate specialized training. With questions surrounding legal access, criminalization, and medical indications and contraindications, the immediate future of psychedelic-assisted therapy remains shrouded in uncertainty, even in the face of expanding interest and promise. Beyond the Narrow Life seeks to ‘thread a needle’ by addressing profound themes elicited by psychospiritual and therapeutic use of psychedelics while avoiding merely ‘preaching to the choir.’ This book explores common topics that emerge during psychedelic journeys by integrating several frameworks, spanning evidence-based cognitive-behavioral therapy, Jungian depth psychology, existential philosophy, compassion and mindfulness practices, comparative mythology, pop culture, film, and scientific understandings of the cosmos. Instead of a dry overview of big ideas, Dr. Ortigo gently guides readers through an awe-inspiring journey that confronts the deeper questions and concerns we all face as humans in this modern time.

Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss: My Life with Terence McKenna, is an autobiographical account of renowned ethnobotanist Dennis McKenna’s childhood, his relationship with his brother, and the author’s experiences with and reflections on psychedelics, philosophy, and scientific innovation.Chronicling the McKenna brothers’ childhood in western Colorado during the 1950s and 1960s, Dennis writes of his adolescent adventures including his first encounters with alcohol and drugs (many of which were facilitated by Terence), and the people and ideas that shaped them both. Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss weaves personal narrative through philosophical ideas and tales of psychedelic experimentation. In this book, Dennis describes these inquiries with the wisdom of perspective. In his account of what has become known as “The Experiment at La Chorrera”— which Terence documented in his own 1989 book, True Hallucinations — Dennis describes how he had visions of merging mushroom and human DNA, the brothers’ predictions for the future, and their evolving ideas about society and consciousness. He also offers an intellectual understanding of the hallucinogenic effects of high-dose psychedelic mushrooms and other psychedelic substances. Dennis, now world-renowned for this ethnobotanical work, describes in Brotherhood his early interests in cosmology and astrology, his sometimes rocky relationship with his older brother and how their paths diverged later in their lives. Dennis describes his academic career in between touching accounts of both his mother’s and Terence’s battles with cancer. In the 10th Anniversary edition of Brotherhood, Dennis reflects on scientific revelations, climate change, and the social and political crises of our time. The new edition also features both the original foreword by Luis Eduardo Luna and a new foreword by Dr. Bruce Damer. Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss is a story about brotherhood, psychedelic experimentation, and the intertwining nature of science and myth.

How to Change Your Body provides an enlightening discourse on the missing piece of the mind-body relationship — our need for social connection. What if symptoms from some of our most common afflictions—everything from depression and anxiety to addiction and PTSD—could be traced back to a disconnection from our bodies?How to Change Your Body explores this provocative question through a rigorous yet playful collection of interviews with scientists, somatic workers, and artists from around the world to uncover the social-emotional aspects of so-called mental illnesses. Saga Briggs is our compassionate guide, pairing peer-reviewed research with moving personal vignettes about her journey away from alcohol dependence to draw a profound link between bodily awareness, social connection, and mental well-being. Interoception, regarded by some as our eighth sense, is fundamental to human health and, Briggs argues, lies at the heart of many techniques shown to improve our relationships to ourselves and others, including psychedelic-assisted therapy, synchronous movement, and energy work.Whether you are facing a mental health diagnosis or simply yearn for a deeper connection to yourself and your community, How to Change Your Body offers a potent antidote to alienation. Through remembering our bodies in all of their intricacy, we can increase our capacity for presence, reconnect with others, and begin to heal.

2024 Nautilus Award Gold Medal Winner! This awe-inspiring guide weaves together permaculture design, food resiliency, climate adaptation, community organizing, and indigenous wisdom that you can implement in your own backyard. This book has been crafted for beginner gardeners and large scale permaculturists alike . It is a step-by-step manual starting from your landscaping ideas and ending with seeds and trees confidently planted.  However, this is more than just a guide to landscaping, it is a motivational read.  Throughout The Regenerative Landscaper, Erik addresses climate change, species extinction, and ecological collapse with encouragement that each of us can indeed become stewards of the land. We can do this by installing  healthy ecosystems in our own yards. His words offer hope and tangible action, inspiring his readers to restore planetary health one garden at a time.The Regenerative Landscaper gives a collection of case studies, step-by-step processes, prevention and mitigation methods, and regenerative land management techniques to steward your land. If you are looking for an easy-to-read manual on designing and implementing your permaculture haven, The Regenerative Landscaper is it.

Grandmothers’ Wisdom is a vibrant tribute to the lives of the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, an unprecedented global alliance of elders who came together in 2004 to protect our planet in crisis and envision a future for the next seven generations. With a foreword by Vandana Shiva and tributes to the grandmothers who have passed on, this special work is a living portrayal of the grandmothers’ upbringing, their encounters with the violence of colonialism and forced assimilation, their awakening to fierce activism, and the ceremonial practices they carry forward from their lineages with tenacity, grace, and devotion.The thirteen remarkable women portrayed in Grandmothers’ Wisdom are keepers of traditional medicine and Indigenous spirituality, preserving ancient wisdom traditions and traditional ecological knowledge that have served our planet earth for millennia. Their stories come from the Amazon rainforest, the Central American highlands, the Sierra Madre of Oaxaca, the plains, deserts and canyons of North America, the Himalayan mountains of Tibet and Nepal, and the forests of Central Africa. The award-winning photography depicts the grandmothers making offerings to all of creation and stewarding earth-based medicines through their practices of divination, energetic cleansing, gathering herbs, and performing initiations with plant medicines.The grandmothers have gathered each year for two decades to pray together in their homelands, promoting deep peace and interconnection through Indigenous ancestral knowledge, cultural preservation, and a reverence for the four elements: earth, air, fire, and water. In a time when contemporary life has left many young people bereft in the rifts between us, these spiritual activists constitute an intercontinental union across differences in culture, language, and ceremonial practice. They are icons for future generations, representing a worldview that honors the richness of our differences as we unite to protect our shared home on planet earth.

Reclaiming the Commons: Biodiversity, Traditional Knowledge, and the Rights of Mother Earth lays out the scientific, legal, political, and cultural struggle to defend the sovereignty of biodiversity and indigenous knowledge.Two decades ago, at the height of globalization, there was an attempt by corporations, and the countries which represent their interests, to privatize and enclose our biological and intellectual commons. The result of this effort has become the massive destabilization of communities all over the world with the expansion of patents and intellectual property rights into the domain of biodiversity.Today, there is a renewed attempt by global corporations to establish a regime in which biological and intellectual resources flow freely from poor countries to rich ones; and from the poorest communities to the richest corporations, with-out regulation. Reclaiming the Commons details the thirty-year cultural, political, scientific, and legal journey to protect biodiversity and indigenous knowledge from the unethical framework corporations impose on humankind in order to lay claim to life on Earth.Vandana Shiva masterfully articulates the devastation this corporate greed has inflicted not only on agricultural communities, but on our planet and our very existence. Ultimately, she poses that the recovery of the commons is essential in restructuring our society into one that can flourish, while protecting and honoring all life on Earth. This, she says, lies in the collective recognition of common creativity and the rediscovery of our place within Nature.

The Bear Is My Father: Indigenous Wisdom of a Muscogee Creek Caretaker of Sacred Ways is considered a love story between Bear Heart and a community that stretches across the globe. This book celebrates the life, teachings and legacy of Marcellus Bear Heart Williams, a Multi-Tribe Spiritual Leader and author of the critically-acclaimed The Wind is My Mother.Bear Heart (1918 - 2008), was a Muscogee Creek Native American Church Road Man with a talent for seeing people as individuals, and for making them feel seen and special in their own ways. The Bear Is My Father: Indigenous Wisdom of a Muscogee Creek Caretaker of Sacred Ways contains the final words Bear Heart wrote before his “going on” as well as contributions from friends and family whose lives were forever changed by Bear Heart’s presence and work. In this new book, Bear Heart uses stories of his youth and traditional medicine practices to convey lessons and knowledge about living in harmony and with respect for all.Offering a mix of history and spiritual wisdom, The Bear is My Father is co-authored by Reginah WaterSpirit, Bear Heart's Medicine Helper and wife of 23 years. When Reginah would ask Bear Heart exactly how he made his medicine, he always answered, “I don’t make the medicine, it was here before me. I’ve been entrusted to be a caretaker of certain sacred ways.”

Secret Drugs of Buddhism is the first book to explore the historical evidence for the use of entheogenic plants within the Buddhist tradition. Drawing on scriptural sources, botany, pharmacology, and religious iconography, this book calls attention to the central role which psychedelics played in Indian religions. It traces their history from the mysterious soma potion, celebrated in the most ancient Hindu scriptures, to amrita, the sacramental drink of Vajrayana Buddhism. Although amrita used in modern Vajrayana ceremonies lacks any psychoactivity, there is copious evidence that the amrita used by the earliest Vajrayana practitioners was a potent entheogen. It is the nature of this psychedelic form of the sacrament which is the central topic of this book. In particular, Secret Drugs of Buddhism attempts to identify the specific ingredients employed in amrita’s earliest formulations. To this end, the book presents evidence from many countries in which the Vajrayana movement flourished. These include Bhutan, Japan, Mongolia, and Tibet but special attention is given to India, the land of its origin.

Buddhism and psychedelic exploration share a common concern: the liberation of the mind. This new edition of Zig Zag Zen: Buddhism and Psychedelics has substantially evolved from the landmark anthology that launched the first serious inquiry into the moral, ethical, doctrinal, and transcendental considerations of the intersection of Buddhism and psychedelics. A provocative and thoughtful exploration of inner states and personal transformation, Zig Zag Zen now includes an expanded display of stunning artwork from Android Jones, Sukhi Barber, Randal Roberts, Luke Brown and Ang Tsherin Sherpa, and more work by the pioneering visionary artist Alex Grey. Complementing these new images are original essays by such luminaries as Ralph Metzner and Brad Warner; exciting interviews with James Fadiman, Kokyo Henkel, and Rick Doblin; and a discussion of ayahuasca's unique influence on Zen Buddhism by David Coyote (six new text contributions in total); all of which have been carefully curated to extend the original inquiry of authors Joan Halifax Roshi, Peter Matthiesen, Jack Kornfield, Terence McKenna, Rick Fields and many others. Contemporary seekers of spiritual truth know that both Buddhism and psychedelics are inevitably subjects encountered along the journey. By examining them together, the reader can discover truth about the essence of each.

Social Forestry: Tending the Land as People of Place is a must-have for anyone wanting to have a reciprocating relationship with their communities, themselves, and most importantly their awe-inspiring forests and landscapes. Social Forestry connects villages and communities to their forests and adjoining bodies of water. It includes forest management, protection, and regeneration of deforested lands with the objective of improving the rural, environmental, and social development. Through ecological assessment, carbon sequestration, and generating wildcrafts, people re-establish their wonder in the woods.Author Tomi Hazel Vaarde, collaborator of Siskiyou Permaculture, uses poetry,  photographs, drawings, and data to outline philosophies and concepts of Social Forestry. By weaving culturally sensitive stories, myths, and lessons from a range of customs and traditions including North American Indigenous communities and Vaarde’s own Quaker upbringing, Vaarde explores how holistic land and community management approaches can facilitate resolution of some of our most dire local and global crises. The writer’s work is critical to overcoming eco-grief while instilling necessary changes to the West Coast landscape for fire mitigation and restoration of complex forest systems for generations to come.Many indigenous peoples have learned regenerative management by living for generations in and with a sense of place, but few examples of whole-system planning and participation are evident in modern society. Climate adaptation, human survival, and conservation efforts to maintain biodiversity that supports life on Earth require radical, back-to-the-roots grounding and intentional dedication. Social Forestry helps readers remember the ways of the wild while implementing local food production, collaboration with conservation efforts, forest management, and stabilization of headwaters to build resilience for the long term. To live in harmony with our surroundings, we need to re-skill, always remembering those who came before us and acting in ways that honor traditional wisdom of people and place.  Social Forestry includes 31 4-color posters and 54 images.

BACK IN STOCK DECEMBER 2022Where the Gods Reign is a scientific and creative anthropological overview of the Amazon rainforest ecosystem-featuring writings and excerpts on rivers, ethnic groups, cultural customs, rubber and cocoa plants, drugs and medicines, and more.Beautiful photographs taken by Dr. Schultes during his 14 years residing in the Colombian Amazon are accompanied by short poetic reflections, precise summaries which showcase Schultes’s immense knowledge of the area, and carefully selected quotes from other great ethnographers of the Amazon.

White Gold: The Diary of a Rubber Cutter in the Amazon 1896 – 1906, is a tale of humanity and the natural order working together in the midst of greed and ignorance. The crisis of the Amazon rainforest began more than a century ago when prospectors discovered the region was a rich source for rubber. This brought commercial interests into collision with the Amazon’s complex ecology—its plants, animals, and people. At the height of the rubber boom in the beginning of the 20th century, a young American, John Yungjohann, went to seek his fortune as a rubber cutter in Brazil, only to find himself struggling for survival.White Gold‘s editor, Sir Ghillean Prance, leading expert of the rainforest and former director (emeritus) of the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew, England, has enhanced Yungjohann’s text with his own contemporary photographs and identified the fungi, plants and animals mentioned in the pages of the diary. Yungjohann’s words are especially poignant today as an onslaught of extractivist policies threaten the Amazon and rain destruction upon the region, its incomprehensible biodiversity, and the peoples to which it is home.

An engaging book of poetry by a modern master of the rhymed verse.

Essays on the history of psychedelics, the present renaissance, and visions for an inclusive and equitable future.As psychedelics and psychedelic-assisted therapies explode into the popular consciousness, what does it mean to cultivate and embody a psychedelic renaissance that learns from the past and prepares for the future? From cultural appropriation and sustainability to diversity, inclusion and venture capitalism, Psychedelic Justice: Toward a Diverse and Equitable Psychedelic Culture examines the history of psychedelics, celebrates its present moment and contemplates how advocates and policymakers can shape the future integration of psychedelics into general society.An anthology of essays written for the Chacruna Institute and edited by its co-founders Bia Labate, Ph.d, and Clancy Cavnar, Psy.D, Psychedelic Justice highlights the need for an inclusionary, societal-level approach to the psychedelic renaissance. In addition to psychedelics and drug policy, works in this book examine psychedelics in the contexts of capitalism, Indigenous traditions, reciprocity, sustainability, mental health, diversity, sex, power, and more. A mirror of the vision for a more inclusive psychedelic future, Psychedelic Justice highlights voices that have been long marginalized in Western psychedelic culture: women, queer people, people of color, and Indigenous people. Essay authors include Labate, Cavnar, Belina Eracho, MPH, Bill Brennan, Ph.D (C), NiCole T. Buchanan, Ph.D, Erika Dyck, Ph.D, Jeanna Eichenbaum, LCSW, Sean Lawler, MFA,  Monnica T. Williams, Ph.D, ABPP and more.With a focus on radical cultural transformation as the guiding force behind visionary social change and the future of psychedelics, Psychedelic Justice: Toward a Diverse and Equitable Psychedelic Culture, is a guide for a more inclusive and equitable tomorrow.

Explorations of plant consciousness and human interactions with the natural world.From apples to ayahuasca, coffee to kurrajong, passionflower to peyote, plants are conscious beings. How they interact with each other, with  humanity and with the world at large has long been studied by researchers, scientists and spiritual teachers and seekers. The Mind of Plants: Narratives of Vegetal Intelligence brings together works from all these disciplines and more in a collection of essays that highlights what we know and what we intuit about botanical life.The Mind of Plants, featuring a foreword by Dennis McKenna, is a collection of short essays, narratives and poetry on plants and their interaction with humans. Contributors include Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of the New York Times’ best seller Braiding Sweetgrass,  Jeremy Narby, John Kinsella, Luis Eduardo Luna, Megan Kaminski and dozens more. The book’s editors, John C. Ryan, Patrícia Vieira and Monica Gagliano – each of whom also contributed works to the collection – weave together essays, personal reflections and poems paired with intricate illustrations by José María Pout.Recent scientific research in the field of plant cognition highlights the capacity of botanical life to discern between options and learn from prior experiences or, in other words, to think. The Mind of Plants includes texts that interpret this concept broadly. As Mckenna writes in his foreword, “What the reader will find here, expressed in poetry and prose, are stories that are infused with cherished memories and inspired celebrations of unique relationships with a group of organisms that are alien and unlike us in every way, yet touch human lives in myriad ways.”

As the world’s billionaire class reaps record profits and global inequalities further divide nations and communities, this anthology compiled by renown activist Dr. Vandana Shiva pulls back the curtain on how ruthless capitalistic exploitation branded as philanthropic altruism forges a direct path to global destruction. Philanthrocapitalism and the Erosion of Democracy: A Global Citizens’ Report on the Corporate Control of Technology, Health, and Agriculturedetails how global philanthrocapitalist organizations like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and affiliated entities effectively monopolize and privatize common land for food production in a manner that jeopardizes public health around the globe.Through various initiatives, sub-organizations, development schemes, and funding mechanisms, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s empire in particular weaves an intricate network of power and influence designed to ensnare local communities and traditions in an unwavering pursuit of profit and market expansion.Philanthrocapitalism and the Erosion of Democracycalls to account problematic initiatives that serve to corrode the integrity of democratic institutions, often under a banner of future-oriented innovation. This book lays bare the destructive power of overly capitalistic systems that enable mass human suffering and environmental catastrophe via the entanglement of private investment and public policy.This democratic emergency is analyzed in detail by leading experts and civil society movements’ leaders, such as: Dr. Vandana Shiva, Farida Akhter, José Esquinas Alcàzar, Nicoletta Dentico, Fernando Cabaleiro, Seth Itzkan, Dru Jay, Satish Kumar, Jonathan Latham, Aidé Jiménez-Martínez, Chito Medina, Zahra Moloo, Silvia Ribeiro, Adelita San Vicente, Ali Tapsoba, Jim Thomas, Timothy A. Wise. International organizations and national movements who also participated include ETC Group, Community Alliance for Global Justice/AGRA Watch, Soil4Climate, Bioscience Resource, GM Watch, Naturaleza de Derechos – Argentina, Masipag – Philippines, Terre à Vie – Burkina Faso, UBINIG – Bangladesh.

Dionysian Buddhism: Guided Interpersonal Meditations in the Three Yanas will assist readers in exploring their own emotional landscapes. This sequence of guided interpersonal meditations by the renowned spiritual teacher and psychotherapist Dr. Claudio Naranjo is structured to guide individuals towards acceptance of what is and to be fully present -- to meet pain with joy, expand awareness into consciousness and to learn how to share in the full presence of others.The "Dionysian" context of Buddhism provides a lens in which to interpret non-attachment through non-interference with the stream of life. Naranjo draws on a wide range of Buddhist traditions, from Theravada to Vajrayana, in order to create a work that emphasizes both the experiential and multifaceted aspects of meditation.As Naranjo, who first wrote Dionysian Buddhism in Spanish and translated it himself into English, says, "Only a change of consciousness might save our world, and that in view of this collective shift in consciousness there is nothing more relevant we can do than start with ourselves."

As psychedelic-assisted therapy gains traction in popular culture and through policy reforms, Queering Psychedelics: From Oppression to Liberation in Psychedelic Medicine aims to foster accessibility and diversity in psychedelic science, practice, and discourse. By addressing and dismantling sexist, heteronormative, transphobic, and homophobic forms of oppression in the psychedelic community, this collection lays groundwork for an inclusive future. Edited by researchers and authors Alexander B. Belser, PhD, Clancy Cavnar, PsyD, and, Beatriz C. Labate, PhD, Queering Psychedelics features a broad range of perspectives from queer academic researchers, LGBTQIA+ clinicians, and indigenous and transgender advocates.Each of the 38 essays — from some of the contemporary movement’s most influential leaders including Terrence Ching, PhD, Kile Ortigo, PhD, and Diana Quinn, ND — presents insights into cultural heritages and historical contexts, implications for research and clinical work, and discussions of the healing potential of psychedelic medicine.Covering topics of consent, privilege, intersectionality and identity, Queering Psychedelics grapples with how modern psychedelic research might address the unique needs and traumas of sexual and gender minorities—populations that can suffer from challenging mental health conditions brought on by social exclusion, pathologization, criminalization, and stigmatization. This book delves into the dark history of psychedelic conversion therapy while illuminating promising research showing substances including MDMA and psilocybin can offer life-changing experiences for marginalized communities.Queering Psychedelics integrates indigenous outlooks on psychedelics, gender roles, and identity while aligning them with those of other marginalized groups: women, people of color, the disabled, the impoverished. This book interrogates the continuing radical potential of queer psychedelia in today’s era of assimilation, paving the way for an inclusive and intersectional world.

This collection of short essays examines the place of women in the history of psychedelics. While some of the subjects are pioneers in their own right, the authors in this collection go beyond merely adding women to the past in psychedelic history, exploring some of the significant ways that women have contributed to psychedelic knowledge. Blending historical and anthropological approaches with a series of captivating interviews, this collection taps into women’s networks around the world throughout the 20th century. It reveals some of the sophisticated and creative ways women have influenced our understanding of psychedelics and how they will continue to protect these stories as we face our psychedelic future. Our collection intentionally moves beyond an American set of stories, teasing out networks in Latin America. This collection brings together authors from the Chacruna Institute and Chacruna Latinamérica to engage readers in conversations that move across time and place throughout the Americas. It is the first of its kind to balance non-English contributions through translation of stories exploring different cultural contexts outside the United States, where women have contributed to this enduring history.

From erotic labor, to the rights of people who use psychoactive substances, to reproductive health and carcerality—we are living through a political moment when debates about bodily autonomy are at a fever pitch.Body Autonomy: Decolonizing Sex Work and Drug Use is a bold and timely collection that confronts these charged issues at the intersection of social justice and public health. It reveals the histories behind the United State's ideological wars and illustrates their costs to all of us. It is a primer on healing-centered harm reduction, which presents a visionary framework and set of practical strategies to advance unity and care while working to transform conditions for communities that bear the brunt of interpersonal and systemic violence, overdose deaths, and health inequities. In the words of leading advocates, service providers, and the scholars whose lives and communities have been harmed by American neo-colonial policies, Body Autonomy offers promising, healing-centered interventions that represent a critical culture shift. This collection features trusted voices on health and social policy reform, including Kate D'Adamo, Justice Rivera, Ismail Ali, Paula Kahn, and Sasanka Jinadasa, as well as respected healers like Richael Faithful, Amira Barakat Al-Baladi, and Mona Knotte. The articles, interviews, worksheets, and poems within are an offering to expand our collective understanding of survival, healing, and embodied freedom. Body Autonomy is a must read for anyone with a compassionate worldview, people seeking to know more about underground economies, and those who know that punishment doesn't lead to security. It is a liberatory design and a prayer for what's possible.

Going beyond simply addressing climate change, The Language of Water shows us how to actively change the climate by learning from communities around the world and their traditional relationships with water. With powerful stories demonstrating tangible, successful water-holding techniques, this book extends an invitation to us all: can we keep the world in balance by learning to speak the language of our most precious resource? Authors Minni Jain and Philip Franses of The Flow Partnership draw from decades of experience with community-led management of floods and droughts in India, Africa, the United States, Europe, the United Kingdom, and other regions of the world to demonstrate, again and again, how replenished groundwater can cool the atmosphere, revive local economies, restore food security, store carbon, and rebalance our planet. Everyone understands that without water there is no life. Yet many are disconnected from their local watersheds and feel helpless to address the mounting ecological crises of our planet, which are often caused by overdrawing water from aquifers and breaking the relationship between humans and the water cycle. The Language of Water gives us an understanding of the climate crisis through the lens of water. And it offers us a glimmer of hope, along with some effective steps to resolve it, by bringing the water balance back in our landscapes.

Own the next chapter in the world’s most enduring exploration of psychoactive medicine and human potential—and help shape the ethical, ecological, and visionary renaissance unfolding now. For anyone shaping the future of psychedelics, from academics, clinicians, ethnobotanists, psychedelic practitioners, and visionary thinkers, ESPD55 is essential reading—an authoritative reference and a catalyst for future inquiry. Enter the living dialogue where science meets spirit, ecology meets consciousness, and ancestral intelligence meets cutting-edge research.For more than half a century, Ethnopharmacologic Search for Psychoactive Drugs has stood as the foundational gathering point for scholars exploring the interface of ancestral plant wisdom and modern psychedelic science. In this landmark continuation of that legacy, ESPD55 brings together the proceedings of the 2022 conference—an extraordinary convergence of more than thirty leading thinkers in ethnobotany, pharmacology, ecology, anthropology, consciousness studies, and Indigenous plant medicine traditions.Curated by Dennis McKenna, PhD, and hosted by the McKenna Academy of Natural Philosophy, this volume captures a moment at the frontier of a global psychedelic renaissance. With contributions from some of the most respected voices in the field—including Sir Ghillean Prance, Wade Davis, Andrew Weil, Monica Gagliano, Glenn Shepard, Paul Stamets, Jonathan Lu, and many others—ESPD55 offers a rigorous, multidimensional exploration of how psychoactive plants and fungi shape culture, cognition, and healing.Across six thematic spheres—the ethnosphere, phytosphere, mycosphere, faunasphere, archeosphere, and sonosphere—readers are invited into groundbreaking research and cultural insight spanning continents and knowledge systems. Featured chapters include:Ancient Psychoactive Plant Use in Eurasia – Mark D. Merlin, PhDCoca: The Divine Leaf of Immortality – Wade DavisThe Therapeutic Potential of Coca – Andrew WeilEthnopharmacology of Psychoactive Substances in Chinese Culture – Jonathan LuThe Ark: Biocultural Sustainability for the San Pedro Cactus – Laurel Sugden & Josip Orlovac Del RíoThe Harpy’s Gift & the Jaguar’s Curse: Matsigenka Hunting Medicines – Glenn H. ShepardFrom the ceremonial use of Ephedra and San Pedro to emerging ethical frameworks for ayahuasca sustainability, from cognitive evolution studies to sonic ethnomedicine, this book illuminates both the ancient past and the unfolding future of entheogenic research.

A sensation in underground culture, and read in colleges and universities worldwide, The Rose of Paracelsus may be the finest writing on altered states of consciousness since Thomas De Quincey’s Confessions (1821).Part memoir, part philosophical journey, part modern alchemical manuscript, The Rose of Paracelsus invites readers into one of the most mysterious and controversial lives in psychedelic history.Written during Pickard’s years of incarceration, the book explores consciousness, suffering, faith, beauty, imprisonment, transcendence, and the hidden architecture behind transformation. This Revised Edition includes a new Epilogue by the author written after his release from prison.More than just a memoir of the colorful (and criminal) psychedelic underground, it reads as a meditation on what it means to become human through collapse, silence, and rebirth. It is a story of mythic proportions—and a literary work that continues to resonate deeply with readers seeking something beyond sensationalism. With tens of thousands of copies sold to readers worldwide, The Rose of Paracelsus has a cult following across the psychedelic, philosophical, and literary worlds.

70 Ads to Save the World: An Illustrated Memoir of Social Change offers a detailed and entertaining account of the groundbreaking work of advertising visionary, Jerry Mander. Chronicling his evolution from corporate advertising to non-profit and political advertising work, Mander takes readers on a journey through the origin stories of some of the most memorable anti-establishment campaigns from the second half of the 20th century.  Many of Mander’s ads and campaigns for environmental and social justice issues were not only memorable decades ago, they remain relevant today. As Mander explains in this  book, he wrote several ads in the 1980s focused on abortion and reproductive rights for Planned Parenthood, and his team at Public Media Center took aim at the National Rifle Association in support of gun control. In 1966, Mander wrote an ad calling out the absurdity of a then newly-announced Pentagon initiative to drop toys over Vietnam, which resulted in a visit from the FBI. A trailblazer in the pre-internet age, Mander’s strategies included bold calls to action. In work for the Sierra Club, for example, Mander helped produce print ads that featured letters to legislators readers could clip out and mail, a tactic at the time more commonly reserved for retail coupons.Throughout 70 Ads to Save the World, Mander explains how these campaigns came to be and offers advice for fellow low-budget, high-impact do-gooders. A personal accounting of his own work gives readers a primer on innovative thinking, while illuminating his inspiring story of aligning personal vision with collective impact.

Vol.1: The first three texts in the collected works span the world’s literature. The epic of Gilgamesh — created in the Sumerian cradle of civilization — is the earliest story we know, yet contains the deepest question man can ask: `How can I transcend death?’ The story of Marouf the Cobbler is an oriental tale taken from the works of Sir Richard Burton, the great Victorian explorer, and is dedicated to the genius of that world-renowned story-teller, Scheherzade. Goethe’s `Faust’ needs no introduction. The translation of Part One in this collection is pungent and unusual. The Caravan of Dreams Touring Theater – also known as the “Theater of All Possibilities” – was founded in 1967 by director Kathelin Gray, and dramaturge Johnny Dolphin.

CHANGING OUR MINDS tells the inspiring and very human stories of pioneering neuroscientists, psychotherapists, shamans and ordinary people seeking to live more aware and compassionate lives by combining the miracles of modern chemistry, therapeutic techniques and the wise use of ancient plant medicines. As a new era of research and university curricula addressing psychedelic-assisted therapy is now underway. LSD micro-dosing is becoming the new get-ahead strategy in Silicon Valley. Use of the Amazon's shamanic brew ayahuasca is taking the form of an international movement. Use of increasingly legal cannabis to cure Alzheimers, PTSD - and cancer! - is becoming commonplace. All of these add up to a transformational movement that advocates the use of properly administered mind-altering substances to promote mental health and spiritual growth. CHANGING OUR MINDS is the essential primer for understanding and navigating this new territory.

Vol.2: In contrast with the first volume, the second is devoted to new mythologies and social forces. The included plays explore three American archetypal pursuits of happiness: the glory of the lone individual, the glamour of Hollywood and the magic lure of Space.Billy the Kid Metal Woman Tin Can Man The folk hero BILLY THE KID defies the controls of a stagnant order- and the system strikes back, predictably, until a modern day ‘Billy’ cuts up and renews the myth so the hero can live to fight another day. The America of Hollywood and glamour, illusion and image runs head-on into the America of idealist seekers after freedom and significance in the comedy of METAL WOMAN. Can everyone get what they want? In America–maybe! The TIN CAN MAN shakes, rattles and rolls searching every dead-end alley and winds up on the threshold of the post-nihilist space age, disillusioned with every tried prescription for meaning, looking for the new frontier in which to “build a world closer to our hearts’ desire”.

The first novel of the Trilogy, one of passion, youth and energy. It focuses on exploring the power of the world, what it means to act and influence the course of history, to be where change is created and to endlessly navigate the intricacies of being human - lover, thinker, poet. 39 Blows on a Gone Trumpet swings with its own rhythm, its prose near to poetry and music, with 39 riffs sounding the unique historical beats of Manhattan, Iran and Morocco as they were in the early '60s.