How Plant Medicine Makes You a Better Parent.
Don't think just breathe.
It’s a familiar setting for most young families out there. It can be at any hour of the day and involves an over stimulated and very tired toddler. As they continue to avoid taking their nap, everything they touch seems to break, spill, or smash, usually followed by large amounts of screaming, and then come those crazy eyes and of course the meltdown. Mum or dad’s sympathetic nervous systems are peaking and overwhelmingly felt through short breaths and a racing mind of why me? Why my kids? Is this normal?
Throw yourself in another situation; you have just taken a large dose of Ayahuasca, the Maloka (ceremonial space/structure) is spinning, people are screaming, the wave of vomit is well underway, the healers are singing powerful Icaros moving energy and bringing forward the healing, its chaos. Your nervous system wants to tap out and your mind is questioning: how long does this go for? Is this forever? Does this ever end? Your ego not so patiently waits for those Disney-like visions so that you can proudly brag at your next coffee date on your return from the retreat. Right now John from Montana has just vomited close to you and the smell is making you seriously uncomfortable.
Put yourself back in the situation with your screaming toddler/s, it's not the cute perfect Instagram reel you had hoped to one day capture, but it is a moment of humanity, of vulnerability, just the same as the people in the Maloka, it is all part of the process. You are for all a human being having a very human experience. Yet we seem to continue to reach for that perfect AI-filtered reality where we state that we make thousands of dollars online from redundant services and tattoo ourselves in blue tick verified badges.
Where there is conscious suffering there is growth
We need to have these moments in our lives, these constant rights of passage, marker moments, moments of I can’t do it anymore, then something clicks and there is a wave of energy that flows through us as if our ancestors are there pushing us along….It's all part of the human experience.
As we move through these moments we don’t have to get anywhere just be present and let the experience move through us, understanding that life in the natural world is hard and not easy, it’s not a copy and paste from chat GTP. It’s a hard slog, it requires us to show up day after day after day and for the parents out there it’s day after day but with responsibilities besides yourself.
Just as drinking plant medicine in a traditional setting is hard work and requires responsibility. It’s like being the mirror for you with no filter to select from just straight up blue light. Reflecting to you who you really are, where you are at in life, and sometimes how much bullshit passes through our heads. But these experiences allow us to have more gratitude and drive for life showing us what is possible both internally and externally.
It also helps us move through those daily struggles, and train the mind in those moments of madness, understanding all you can do is just let go and breathe…. Acceptance is the key. Just like when we do exercise and put our bodies under stress for expansion and for growth. The same goes for our mind, body, and spirit, when we ingest plant medicine. It's one of the best mental gyms available for us.
Small children may be some of the biggest tests that we as adults face. It seems never-ending, at any moment they will jump you with an explosive tantrum. Using these experiences and wisdom gained from plant medicine ceremonies helps us to navigate the ranges of emotions that begin to come up inside of us. To begin to question why is this triggering me? To truly look at our children and understand what they are asking for, going beyond the screaming and warm salty tears. Then comes this feeling or wave of reassurance that smells like ‘I've got this’. I'm riding this wave and I'm just breathing with a smile, in service, armed with compassion and love. The same way I am in the maloka and the same way I am in life!
Thank you to all the master plants for their teachings and healing that they have given so many people, their natural habitats, and ancestral guardians and wisdom keepers. Thank you to the children of this earth for all their teachings, medicine, and joy, and most importantly thank you to those kids for showing up and not having to tell anyone they are ‘showing up’ on an Instagram reel they just do it every morning at the crack of dawn….” Mummy / Daddy get uuupp!”