What is a Psychedelic Society and what does it do?
Simple questions to a complex story that has everything to do with our current time and place. Back in 2014 I was at the right time and place to experience the birth of a movement.
The first Psychedelic Society event happened in New York, started by two friends who met through the same unconventional therapist who believed that psychedelic compounds could help with drug addiction. An idea was made to bring together the tight knit psychedelic communities into one space.
The first collaboration was a party, more of a generalized Psychedelic Cultural get-together, as the psycho-nautical warriors from all over the New York boroughs came together for a sit-down. It was a basic line up of Queers, Occultists, Pagans, Chemists, Ravers, Hippies, Dead-heads, Artists and Scientists.
There were those in attendance who envisioned a different world, existing above the subcultures, advocacy was needed, a coming-out in the mainstream, they imagined a Psychedelic Wave was coming, unlike anything the world has seen since the Nineteen Sixties.
Three untold secrets of the Psychedelic world:
1: Every psychedelic experience is different and having an open mind is code for allowing the flow of a trip to run its course. We all react differently to psychedelics and it is not for everyone.
2: Marijuana is a psychedelic, it is, at high doses, you can experience a vivid altered state of consciousness. THC is “mind-manifesting” to use the classic psychedelic meaning but also has healing capabilities as we have now learned most psychedelics have.
3. Psychedelics are part of a larger classification of Medicinal Herbs, which comes from a long tradition of human/health/ancient research, a collective knowledge base. Some plants contain powerful molecules and for some weird legal reason, they are outlawed, which is doesn’t nullify the fact they are Plant Medicines.
Something drove the early Founders of Psychedelic Societies to organize, because they believed the future compelled them, and the new young Outsiders did things just a little differently, as all generations adapt to their current era. Use of psychedelics by the Public has been skyrocketing and a mainstream psychedelic culture was on the way, some believed we had best prepare.
After that first event, one Founder moved to San Francisco to follow the tech bubble and one went to LA to be continue acting. What was clear to all the Founders was this Wave was coming and a space must be built to connect to the public. Terence McKenna had been an influence for both men, the great Bard of Psychedelia spoke first about a Psychedelic Society in 1984, in connection to an idea he had called the Archaic revival.
“A psychedelic society is one which orients itself and lives in the light of the irreducible Mystery of Being; a society in which problems and solutions are displaced from their traditional central role, and which puts ‘Irreducible mysteries’ in their stead.” Terence McKenna in 1984
McKenna is at the heart of this story, but let’s stay on point, The Tech Founder, took his ideas to a fertile ground where Psychedelics already fueled the scene. Silicon valley was not secretive about where “the Tech Heroes” got their ideas, acid trips were common place, so San Francisco quickly became the world’s first fully operating Psychedelic Society.
Los Angeles would follow suit, but with much less success,then fades from story shortly after…
Back to Terence McKenna. In the 1970’s Terence and his brother Dennis wrote the bible of psychedelic mushroom growing, and in the 1980s, as Dennis did biological science on Entheogens, Terence wrote weird popular books like the Food of the Gods and became a popular speaker in psychedelic culture, by the 1990’s Dennis was a scientist and his brother became a rave culture icon.
Terence died far too young after the growth of a mushroom shaped tumor in his head and he claims all his “Big 3” ideas came from week long mushroom trips deep in the jungle with his brother in 1971.
Strange stuff but this is what built the psychedelic cultures of today, influenced by the lifestyles of yesterday in imperceptible ways. New generations making their own cultural underground, with a border-line illegal past-time, drugs but also simultaneously recreating the initiation rites of our human ancestors.
Entering an alternate state of consciousness, getting high or tripping is an adult experience shared by most of our shared ancestral lines and regardless of where the culture has been, or the morals of the age, in our current time, psychedelics have gone definitely mainstream, so the future is just gonna get weirder!
Terence McKenna said a great many things, he would speak for hours at psychedelic conferences, new age ashrams and wherever a notion took him into a rant, especially if a joint was being passed around. (stoners love good stories). Terence was part of a long line of storytellers, relating ancient knowledge with modern sensibilities.
Historically, Bards in the druid world, were magical initiates, repeating old stories, connecting to unknown powers and spreading the wisdom of the Druids. Terence McKenna saw the future in his visions from the mushroom, and we can ignore it, or enjoy it but do not doubt his impact on psychedelic culture is explosive and one strong theme was the emergence of a Psychedelic Society.
“What blinds us, or what makes historical progress very difficult, is our lack of awareness of our ignorance. And [I think] that beliefs should be put aside, and that a psychedelic society would abandon belief systems [in favor of] direct experience and this is, I think much, of the problem of the modern dilemma, is that direct experience has been discounted and in its place all kind of belief systems have been erected...” Terence McKenna on a psychedelic society in 1984.
The San Francisco Psychedelic Society had its global debut at Burning Man in July of 2013, as the Founder made his first epic speech in the desert heat, wearing his best outfit. Daniel talked passionately about that inspiration from McKenna, predicting a mainstream network of psychedelic peoples. He created a Meet-up, and built a website designed to be a new network for connection. Daniel was queer, geeky, beautiful and totally inspirational, that is why in the Spring of 2014, I created the world’s 3rd Psychedelic society,
In 2014 Facebook had a new group feature, so I started a psychedelic society group after I met some really cool people at a ritual during the Spring Equinox at Cahokia Mounds. Psychedelic Society of St Louis was originally for only 7 people, a social experiment far removed from the psychedelic culture on either coast, this was the Mid-west, in a red state, in the heart of the military industrial complex. Starting a drug club in Missouri was an outright declaration of social warfare.
Who cares is what I said, I have nothing to hide. My interest was in legal drugs, the psychedelic options that didn’t break the law, after all, I was no fool, I knew the DEA would come to the first meeting. If starting a Psychedelic Society was crazy but then putting it on Meet-up for the mainstream public was absolutely insane, but I believed in the idea of a cultural Psychedelic coming-out, and I know something about coming out.
Drug culture has changed a lot, and those “underground” codes once used as protections from very real police surveillance are no longer necessary (in most states) but we have a long way to go as marijuana, psilocybin, and lysergic acid use becomes deeply entrenched in our human existence. Pandora’s box applies, as the good and the bad, the dark and light psychedelic cultures enter the Mainstream.
A simple group of 7 and one tech savvy high powered mutant called Lew Blink, the Psychedelic Society of St Louis was building and getting official. Old psych heads came to meetings, young adults, couples, curious grandmas, seasoned healers looking for new clients, straight up drug users, seekers, spiritual types and most often former alcoholics looking for a cure to a depression that lingers. Members of regular and psychedelic societies were represented and questions rose, and we listened to each other sharing experiences.
The Facebook book group swelled to thousands of members, other societies connected, conventions were attended, contacts made, rituals occurred, friends were made, weird events went down and St Louis was shaken to its psychedelic core. People changed by psychedelic experiences were finding each other and making new connections and merging into a society that was not separate, but joined.
A new psychedelic culture was formed, from within this new society.
I have said it time and time again, the Psychedelic Society is a group of different people with a shared idea, a philosophy growing from a cultural shock, a moment in history when a larger percentage of a population accepts archaic forms of mental/spiritual gnosis through psychedelic compounds. Mind Manifesting was the meaning behind the word, as if our subconscious spills out into waking reality and we can see the workings of our own consciousness. A reflection outside a box.
A revolution of change, the Changed now forming a new reality!
*An audience member stands up…..Hang on Lew, beyond the metaphysics, in the reality of now, how does a Psychedelic Society function?
Ok, I’ll take the practical question from my imaginary reading audience member.
First take a human being, give them a psychedelic and watch the results. Some will have a profound spiritual experience and suddenly become a different person, or their authentic self, or have ego-loss, or stare at a TV for 8 hours or make beautiful love in a non gendered way, or dance in a forest, play Tim Leary’s Mind Mirror on PC, go for a walk, or talk to aliens…….it doesn’t matter. It’s healing, in ways we are just understanding, as if finding meaning is the first point of the game.
Second you take that new human being, altered by that long festival weekend, basement DMT hit, yoga retreat, ayahuasca trip, camping on mushrooms, marching in the streets, whatever, now they integrate, they form a new person with honest intentions, the quantum change is now solid. The noetic quality of the experience is revolutionary.
Three, that human being finds the Others and shares space.
Boom, a Psychedelic Society.
How does a psychedelic society function? San Francisco is a non-profit that hosts events, zoom integration circles and does harm reduction. The Psychedelic Society of England under Steven Reid is a vast empire of psychedelic networking and public work. PS-Denver was always one of my favorites, very impassioned, and they met in a cool attic. The variety is endless across the world, and that’s just the ones using the terminology.
The organization is not the point, just a necessary part of it, growing a collective method of social networking is. The most successful Societies all had different agendas and very different ways. A Society reflected its members.
I told everyone they were in the Society as soon as they took a psychedelic and changed, that was the common thread. Like McKenna said, a Psychedelic Society is a society that lives in the Mystery, not dogmatic beliefs. How you organize doesn’t matter, a Psychedelic Society is a natural byproduct of it’s environment and people sharing with each other.
Mainstreaming is happening and new collective organizing will occur the way it unfolds naturally and if you wish to be in that stream of Social Collectivizing, than join a Psychedelic Society, I promise its a blast, if you don’t take it seriously and have fun.
“What I’m advocating is that we each take responsibility for the cultural transformation by realizing it is not something which will be disseminated from the top down. It is something which each of us can contribute to by attempting to live as far into the future as possible.” Terence McKenna
The Psychedelic Wave began sometime in the past and moves on into the future, but never doubt it’s impact on the social fabric. A Psychedelic Society is here in forms we never imagined and we must face the ramifications of a youth that freely experiences direct knowledge from the use of nervous system overloads known as, a Psychedelic trip.
At the Heart of this long worded history lesson is the greatest Trip of all, Revolution, the same revolution that has risen time and time again in human history. Revolution: a dramatic and wide-reaching change in the way something works or is organized and in people’s ideas about it. A psychedelic revolution is growing in a population adapting to a changing world, but this isn’t warfare, guerrilla tactics or .gov manipulation, it is a shared experience of deeper realities and paradigm shifts.
As for the Psychedelic Society forging these new realities, well, the rest of that story is a rabbit hole best to be experienced and all you have to do is reach out and Find the Others.