Cannabis is a gift to humanity. An incredible plant-medicine and tool with a potential which is profoundly underestimated. I invite you to open your minds to this novel and rich possibility. Conscious cannabis culture can change the world.
The Big Story:
Core to my vision for a conscious cannabis culture is the context cannabis is framed in. I believe we need to tell a bigger story for cannabis: one of high stakes and expansive possibilities. In 2022 we are, by reasonable observation, undergoing the birth pangs of a new world. We stand on the precipice between the death of a civilization and perhaps the birth of the next. What we’re experiencing is big, it’s nothing less than ‘the Apocalypse of the Modern World system’ (Stein & Gafni, 2017). A change of this magnitude is a collective experience that touches everyone. These shifts in our external circumstances will catalyse internal shifts and processes of grief, healing & growth comparable to the ending of a relationship or a death. We’ve witnessed countless instances of this personal reckoning & transformation as a consequence of the pandemic.
The ‘contractions’ in this civilizational birth process are becoming more apparent, palpable and frequent. The pandemic and our response to it was just one example. Climate change will bring many more. We can expect unexpected, unpredictable & interconnected crises. We are already beginning to digest the disturbing realization that the foundations of our culture and reality are far less stable than we thought. My sense is that we will continue to experience these contractions and, through them, be transformed into people that can navigate uncertainty well.
Cannabis can be a key tool in our arsenal at this juncture.
Our go-to collective solutions of technocracy, elite governance & technology are proving inadequate to the great tasks of the day and will probably create a nightmare world we don’t want to live in. Our current human operating systems aren’t well fitted to the times and will likely crash under the stress of change. We need ways of being and organizing that are fitted to a VUCA environment. To move with uncertainty we need to tap into deeper embodied human capacities which require healing our minds & bodies, learning to sensemake together—becoming rooted in the depths of wisdom, heart and spirit and creating a regenerative culture.
We’re in an evolutionary pressure cooker which demands nothing less of us than an evolution of consciousness. A transmutation of culture. I want to stress that the only way out of this birth canal is through.
Cannabis can support us in meeting this birth, death & transformation process with integrity. It can support the evolution of consciousness we need. In my own journey with Cannabis I’ve experienced this potential extensively. It has been one of my greatest allies and I feel it my responsibility to share in it. Conscious cannabis culture can help us to re-vivify of our relationship with the earth and one another. It can support us in re-imagining culture and help us to re-discover our place in the cosmos.
Cannabis Meets Mainstream Culture:
You may be raising a skeptical eyebrow in this moment.
What does Cheech and Chong have to do with civilisational transition?
Well, let’s consider first that cannabis culture, as we’ve known it, is in an adolescent phase of development. The current cannabis culture is made up of a few broad strains & stereotypes:
~The Bob Marley, Reggae, RAW papers, peace & love, hippies & dreadlocks strain.
~The Snoop & Wiz, west coast hip-hop, urban, street & gang culture strain.
~The Lazy stoner, big laughs, Seth Rogen, edibles, Harold & Kumar, getting high for fun and as a distraction from real life strain.
I’m not here to shit on this legacy cannabis culture. In fact, there is light & shadow in all of it—I am here to invite a new cannabis conversation that takes us deeper and enriches our lives.
This work of conscious cannabis culture and my project Insight Cannabis is to catalyse vision alongside others for a new wave in cannabis culture that is deeply responsive to our time.
The core insight of conscious cannabis culture is that cannabis is, like other psychoactive plants, a bio-cultural phenomena. This means the combination of plant and culture creates the impact. Tobacco provides a great example of this phenomenon: In indigenous contexts, Tobacco has a very particular medicinal and ceremonial use—it is a medicine for healing that is respected as having its own living spirit. Conversely, the global tobacco industry, with its colonial roots, is a profit and addiction machine with terrible health impacts and not much potential for transformation & wellbeing. In short: same plant—very different culture.
I spent several formative years in my 20s traveling back and forth between San Diego and London during which I learned just how different cannabis cultures can be. In the UK, cannabis is combined extensively with tobacco; it is captured by street culture and is used primarily for night life or stonerism. There is no quality control or mature positive vision. In California, cannabis is legally cultivated and sold in beautiful ‘apple store’ like dispensaries. It is used medicinally and also enriches people’s lives in a range of ways from sports & yoga classes to nature hikes. There are countless beautiful initatives such as communities for veterans with ptsd to come together, hike & connect through cannabis. In Colorado a team work with unique strains of Cannabis for psychedelic therapy.
As we collectively mature in relation to plant medicine we’ll understand that ‘cannabis’ refers to a combination of plant, intention & cultural context.
A Conscious Cannabis Culture
In recent years, I’ve had dozens of conversations with people about my experiences & relationship with cannabis. Time and time again, people say they’ve never heard cannabis talked about in this way—that they are re-imagining what Cannabis can be.
Healing
A huge part of being able to respond to the challenges of today is about healing trauma (wounds, disconnection from ourselves). Collectively, we share the inheritance of our forefathers— generations of war, institutional abuse and a great need for healing that has been hidden and un-addressed. To come into our full human potential and freedom today we must heal and release the fragmented energies of the past.
Cannabis & Healing:
When I was in my early 20s I grappled with complex trauma and depression through relationships. At that time, Cannabis combined with walking in nature, proved to be the only thing that moved me through these states—helping me to reconnect with myself and life.
It has been indispensable to my healing in the years since then, catalyzing many emotional breakthroughs and insights—including the healing of ancestral trauma. Cannabis can help us to come more deeply into the body: to get moving or dancing when we’re stuck. Often times, Cannabis helped me to realize the suffering in the background, to begin to understand it and release it. In a landscape of trauma most of us have recent ancestors who suffered greatly and became cut off from themselves in ways that we are impacted by. There is profound energy, sensitivity, & creative potential to be found within these blockages. When we can root down into those shadows and unlock the energy there we become more connected and more here. We become better fitted to create a new world. Cannabis can be a great ally in this collective healing.
An Ecology of Practices
A big pitfall for cannabis is relying upon it in isolation as a fix-all solution. This often leads to dependency.
Cannabis can be used unconsciously. It can become habit-forming. This is especially the case when we lose touch with our choice-making. Cannabis dependency is similar to comfort-eating. It occurs when we have lost touch with choiceand try to address a need with something that doesn’t really address it. It becomes a coping tool. The key to conscious cannabis culture is using cannabis as part of an ecology of practices & tools that are mutually supportive of our integrity & wisdom.
The responsibility for conscious cannabis users is ongoing discernment and attunement to our relationship with cannabis. Over the last 6 years exploring this, I’ve found there is no final relationship with Cannabis—I’m always sensing into and calibrating my relationship with it. When I notice I’m choosing cannabis from the wrong place, I take a break until I feel very clear about re-engaging with it. By placing cannabis in an ecology of practices it can be held consciously, with balance.
Ok, so what is an ecology of practices?
You can think of it as a web of mutually supporting practices that support a larger whole self. We can all experiment with our own ecology of practices. Most people are already doing this in a culturally normative way when they combine weight lifting, cardio excercise & the sauna. My ecology includes: meditation, transformative dialogue, cold-water immersion, nature-connection, singing/chanting, running and lifting heavy logs. An ecology of practices should cultivate both health & wisdom. In this context, a conscious cannabis culture is never just about cannabis, it’s about a fully lived life. Conscious Cannabis is more than just a recreational product or medicine for the sick—it is medicine for the well. It’s a plant-ally that can help us to navigate uncertainty and creatively forge new worlds. As this new wave of cannabis culture dawns, cannabis will come into deep relevance for society as a force for cultural regeneration.
The Green Wave
The importance of conscious cannabis culture today has never been greater. There is a tidal wave of change moving through the world. Germany is on it’s way to legalisation in the next year and the United States will inevitably follow. These culture & policy changes will set off a domino effect—sending a ‘green wave’ across the world.
There is a tremendous unrealised potential in this green wave and these possibilities that brings me a sense of hope and excitement. This essay is your invitation to join me in the journey of realising the a conscious cannabis culture.
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Want to Connect & Collaborate?
Insight Cannabis: Developing vision for conscious cannabis culture in service of Insight, Wisdom & Healing.
Want to connect and collaborate? reach Jacob Kishere at: insightcannabis@gmail.com