Dr. T and Truth Fairy are delighted to welcome a very special guest to the show in this episode. Rachel Harris, PhD, the author of Swimming in the Sacred, joins them for an intimate conversation about what led her to write the book and what it contains. She details how wise women are largely left out of the larger conversation on psychedelic potential and shares knowledge from the women guides she talked with who had never been interviewed before.One of the points Rachel makes is that the women guides are not therapists and do not refer to themselves as therapists. They will refer to therapists outside themselves. We tend to be the ones who have conflated psychedelic guides with therapists. Rachel talks about how long traditional indigenously trained shamans will be considered apprentices and some of the ceremonies around the work they do. Rachel’s own experiences touch on many ancient wisdoms and draw from years of study and research beyond physical work with medicines and awareness.Rachel describes lifelong learning and an unending search through experiences, a continuous exploration of self and spirituality, of being alive in the work of medicine. She expresses the need to talk about not exactly adverse experiences but about the reality of what can be experienced, of the truths of the challenges the medicine presents. Rachel’s wisdom ignites strong memories and insight from both Dr. T and Truth Fairy and what evolves is a conversation so deep and honest that it is not to be missed.“Well, you know, these women are self-selected in a way that they've had unusual spiritual experiences, many of them, in their lives, often from childhood on. And... I write about this in the book because, to me, it's just very fascinating. Because I had this qualification, I had unusual spiritual experiences. I was missing a few other pieces, but that one I had. And so in that way I was similar to them. And I think because they have these unusual spiritual experiences, which, by the way, they don't mention to anybody ... They often say, I have never told anyone this and then they report an unusual spiritual experience, because our culture doesn't support this.” - Rachel HarrisAbout Rachel Harris:Psychologist Rachel Harris, PhD is the author of Swimming in the Sacred: Wisdom from the Psychedelic Underground. She was in private practice for thirty-five years working with people interested in psychospiritual development. During a decade working in research, Rachel received a National Institutes of Health New Investigator’s Award and published more than forty scientific studies in peer-reviewed journals. She has also consulted with Fortune 500 companies. Rachel was in the 1968 Esalen Residential Program, Big Sur, CA. This intensive six-month program focused on meditation and bodywork. In the early 1970s, Rachel studied with Dorothy Nolte in the movement system, Structural Awareness, based on Dr. Ida Rolf’s Structural Integration (Rolfing). Rachel also co-edited the Journal of the American Dance Therapy Association for three years. Awareness of how people live and move in their bodies has always been an aspect of Rachel’s approach to psychotherapy.In 2005 Rachel traveled to a retreat center in Costa Rica and serendipitously found herself with the opportunity to drink ayahuasca with Ecuadorian shamans. The morning after her first ceremony, Rachel began asking questions about the therapeutic potential of this medicine. She conducted a three-year research project with Lee Gurel, PhD that resulted in “A Study of Ayahuasca Use in North America,” published in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs (Summer, 2012). Rachel is the author of Listening to Ayahuasca: New Hope for Depression, Addiction, PTSD and Anxiety. Rachel Harris Website: SwimmingInTheSacred.comBook: “Swimming in the Sacred: Wisdom from the Psychedelic Underground” by Rachel Harris__Resources discussed in this episode:“Listening to Ayahuasca: New Hope for Depression, Addiction, PTSD, and Anxiety” by Rachel HarrisEugene Gendlin, PhDCharlotte SelverFritz PerlsIrvin Yalom__Contact Punk Therapy:Patreon: Patreon.com/PunkTherapyWebsite: PunkTherapy.comEmail: info@punktherapy.com
