The Psychedelic Scam

I needed psychedelics to show me I didn't need psychedelics.

I did my first plant ceremony with ayahuasca in 2016. I had just sold my house in Bellingham and all of my rental properties for a nice profit. I was feeling light and free for the first time since my divorce in 2013. I had a beautiful new home overlooking the Bay, a great new job coaching clients, visiting patients for home health, doing what I loved, making a great income. But I was also lost in a toxic relationship, drinking a glass or two of red wine almost every day, 2-3 cups of coffee every morning, and 1 at noon, trying not to eat anything until I had my glass of wine on an empty stomach so I could feel that brief and fleeting moment of deep relaxation and numbing bliss.

I won’t get into the reason the ruling class wants you doing psychedelics and mind altering substances. It is by design. You are much more compliant, suggestible and easier to rule under the spell of mind altering drugs. Not to mention you have the ability to alter your own mind just as much with breath work, meditation, and belief.

Of course, I didn't have any awareness at the time. I believed the wine and espresso were a health elixir with antioxidants and resveratrol; I truly meant to be healthy. I followed my glass of wine with lots of hand harvested spring lemon water, home grown organic vegetables, wild caught fish, pastured meats, you get the idea. Drinking health tonics and green smoothies to start my day, but really were to mitigate the ill effects of the wine and coffee. The stress from my relationship was wearing me out. I was in a looping daily routine, unable to get out. Surviving the days, nothing sounded better than that glass of alcohol and cup of espresso in the morning. Deep down inside I knew I was living a stressful life to make my addictions taste better. A glass of wine isn’t something you “need” after a lovely calm and peaceful day, having your needs fulfilled, connecting with loved ones.

In an attempt to find relief, I even went to South Africa with Martha Beck, hopeful to fix this problem I was living. It didn't work. She had a few tricks to offer, but mostly what I had already been doing: reading her books, journaling in her workbooks, creating, and implementing action plans. I was seeking an external fix, a magic bullet, an elixir that would salve the wounds. One and done.

Enter stage Plant Medicine. Ohhhhh, my shortcut quick fix was being presented to me on a silver platter. The owner of the South African game reserve, who is now a distant friend, mentioned I should look into it as it was truly a miracle cure for all that ails us, from the physical, emotional, and spiritual. It had it all—everything I was looking for—a magic bullet miracle cure (20 years of therapy in one night, he said), the challenge to stay up all night with terrifying psychoactive substances that made you sick and likely to vomit multiple times in front of strangers (challenging and painful!) and the allure and mystique of Shamanic Journeys with a real live Shaman from Peru. And the end result? Healed, fixed, never to self-sabotage again. Just like I had prayed and asked for in my darkest hours. I truly believed this was the answer.

I did my first journey in January 2017 with Ayahuasca at a horse ranch somewhere in Arizona. There were several Equis Coaches who also did the ceremonies with us during the evening. I went alone and was apprehensive about consuming a psychedelic or any psychoactive substance for that matter. I didn’t even smoke cannabis; my drugs of choice were organic espresso and red wine, as previously discussed. I was terrified to try anything that “altered my brain chemistry”—of course, coffee and booze didn’t count in my ego’s tricks of justifications. I had my undergraduate degree in psychology and had read about the effects on the brain, the damages, and the link to psychosis.

I had also read the 1971 book by Beatrice Sparks “Go Ask Alice” as a pre-teen, which scared the daylights out of me, vowing then and there to never do psychedelics as long as I lived. In the book, Alice, a cute popular teenage girl, does LSD and over time goes crazy, publicly humiliates herself when high, and becomes a greasy-haired social leper. The author also tried to get the book published as anonymous as though it was the real diary found from this girl who had destroyed her life. So I believed everything in the book and wanted nothing to do with any psychoactive hallucinogen as long as I lived.

But here I was, the first night getting to know everyone as we introduced ourselves in a circle and shared our intentions for the night's journey. The group looked as though they lived in a higher income bracket, well-dressed and well-educated. The Shaman from Peru spoke like an American with a barely detectable accent. He wore a taupe and had several notebooks that he pointed to diagrams and drawings, telling us how different consciousness and awareness are, how we were unlikely to understand his level of brilliance because he had 10 PhDs and was classified as a genius. His presentation was basic, not really anything more than you would read in any basic self-help book on spirituality and other made-up religions. However, as I looked around at the group, the attendees were hanging on every word, writing furiously in their notebooks, trying not to miss a single word or phrase. I listened more closely to see if I was somehow missing something. It sounded similar to the word salad some mental health patients in locked psychiatric wards where I used to work, would reveal to me. Definitely not something brilliant to bother writing down.

The ceremony began with his assistant passing out the medicine in capsule form that no one was allowed to ask what was in it, just whether they should take it or not. The Shaman would confidently say, "1 pill or 2" for most participants, and some didn’t receive any. This was the “heart opener,” which I later discovered was MDMA or the hippies' version of methamphetamines, which is why I’m guessing they call it a heart opener—it just sounds better than passing around meth to the well-to-do. Because I was new, I didn’t get any, along with my roommate, who was also new.

After about an hour, people started to become more affectionate with each other and started murmuring ideas and insights. Then the ceremony medicine was passed around, a chocolate containing ayahuasca and psychedelic mushrooms. Again, some were given a whole chocolate, some 1/2, some a crumb, depending on the shaman's decision. My roommate and I received a small crumb again since we were doing this for the first time. Neither of us felt anything the entire evening, but had some fun laughing with some of the participants. This repeated the second evening, and the next morning we had integration. This simply meant we were to go around and reveal the powerful impact the medicine had in awakening us to deeper levels of conscious awareness. What struck me the most that morning was just how stuck everyone seemed, some repeating the name of their diagnosis over and over and how they were “still working on it.” One young woman was having marital problems with her husband who was there, even though he was engaging sexually with other men the evening before. Everyone seemed so stuck in their self-generated problems, but even more interestingly, wanted to be stuck.

One close friend, “Sarah”, came out of this retreat more confused and distressed than ever. Sarah, a bright and ambitious marketing executive, had turned to ayahuasca in hopes of addressing her childhood traumas and finding clarity in her turbulent relationships. After several ceremonies, instead of feeling healed, she was plunged into severe depressive episodes, doubting her self-worth and questioning the reality of her perceived insights. She became increasingly isolated, withdrawing from her supportive friends and family, convinced that her suffering was part of the "purging process" essential for healing. The last time we spoke she told me the next ceremony would finally be the answer, she had a message from her spirit guide in a lucid dream. The tragic irony was that Sarah’s repeated attempts at healing through ayahuasca only propelled her deeper into a vortex of instability and pain.

Another man I met, “Steve”, a retired firefighter, had poured his hard-earned retirement savings into multiple ceremonies. Steve had always been the pillar of strength for his family but was struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from years of service. Believing each ceremony would bring him closer to a breakthrough, he attended retreats across the globe, spending thousands of dollars each time. Instead of finding peace, Steve found himself in a deeper hole of despair, perpetually chasing an elusive sense of healing that never truly came. His financial stability and emotional well-being deteriorated, leaving him feeling more broken and defeated than when he first began.

Steve’s story is heartbreaking; he began his ceremonial journeys with the hope of rediscovering joy and strength. Instead, his life turned into an endless cycle of chasing fleeting moments of relief, never leading to real, sustainable healing.

Then there was “Mary,” an artist who had endured unspeakable trauma during her childhood. Like Sarah and Steve, she turned to plant medicine in hopes of achieving a breakthrough in her healing process. Mary had developed a habit of repeating the word PTSD endlessly during conversations, as though it were a mantra that defined her existence. Each time she spoke of why she wasn't improving, she would refer back to her past trauma, using it as a crutch to justify her lack of progress.

Mary's reliance on her past trauma became a ball and chain, holding her back from any real development or self-discovery. She believed that every ceremony would help her untangle the threads of her painful memories, but instead, it kept her wound open, always needing to heal the same unresolved issues. She never moved forward; she simply circled the same emotional drain, feeling rooted to her history, unable to envision a future free from her pain. As a result, she remained stuck, forever trapped in the shadow of her childhood trauma.

These stories are common—the promise of a quick fix becomes a cycle of dependency and disillusionment chasing the ever-moving goal post, never quite reaching it. Doesn’t this sound similar to the medical industrial complex? My article could just as well be an advertisement for a pharmaceutical.

And then I did dozens more ceremonies until I woke up to the reality. They simply gave me another hamster wheel to run on. I saw all the other participants I met and listened to, stuck in the same loop, often getting worse, and spending money they didn’t have on more ceremonies (each one can cost upwards of $300-500 or more per night, not including transportation which most fly to locations where it is legal. Some retreats offering plant medicines cost a minimum of $20,000 to stay. The financial and emotional toll these practices had on me and others was significant.

The allure of psychedelic experiences and plant medicine can seem like a miracle solution for those of us grappling with inner turmoil and unresolved issues. However, what I learned through my journey was that these external solutions often present a dangerous distraction from the internal work that must be done.

Getting lost in psychedelics can become an escape, a way to avoid facing the painful truths and challenges in our lives. The temporary insights or euphoria provided by these substances can create a dependency, making us believe the next ceremony will finally bring the healing we seek. Yet, true personal growth and enlightenment come from confronting our shadows, the parts of us that we would rather ignore or hide.

Facing our demons means looking at where we have shown up poorly in our lives, acknowledging the pain we have caused ourselves and others, and taking responsibility for our actions. It's about digging into the uncomfortable parts of our past, understanding our patterns, and making conscious efforts to change and grow. This process is far from easy; it requires dedication, honesty, and a willingness to endure discomfort and pain. But it is the only path to genuine healing and transformation.

What is the answer? For me, I realized I needed the psychedelics to show me I didn’t need the psychedelics. Of course, there are no shortcuts to enlightenment or walking in your potential. It must be done the hard way, earning it by challenging yourself, facing your shadows and demons, and making continuous efforts to improve. The journey to personal growth is a long and arduous path, but it is infinitely more rewarding and sustainable than relying on temporary external fixes like journeys, ceremonies and the red pill psychedelics.

I am doing a solo podcast on my experience next week, to share what I see as a very dangerous and destructive organization: the cult of spirituality and harmful psychedelics. Stay tuned. Meanwhile, you can catch up to speed with Jason Christoff and the need to know about the ruling class. Maybe it’s time to wake up. Click the picture below.