The Evolver

Today we dive into storytelling with a master. Jessica Blank is a playwright, actor and director. But she thinks of herself first as storyteller — that is, a storyteller with a purpose. With her husband and writing partner, Erik Jensen, she wrote the documentary play The Exonerated, which told the true stories of people wrongly convicted on death row. The script came from interviews with former death row inmates telling their own stories. Their other documentary plays include Aftermath and How to Be a Rock Critic, about the legendary Lester Bangs. Jessica has also published three young adult novels, and co-directed a film of her first one, Almost Home.  

Jessica has deep insight into how telling the right stories can humanize the faceless, abstract victims of decisions that we make almost unconsciously as a society — and shift our perspective in a way that leads to real change. As she says in our discussion, storytelling create avenues to empathize with people who otherwise seem vastly different from us. 

Follow Jessica here: https://www.jessicacblank.com

And here: https://www.instagram.com/jessicacblank

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

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In plant medicine circles, iboga is known as the most intense and physically demanding of entheogens. In the 1960s, it was discovered that iboga was remarkably effective for treating opiate addiction. Today a growing number of alternative health professionals and former addicts offer ibogaine treatment at centers in Mexico, Central and South America, and at underground locations in Europe and the United States. Even though iboga is classified as a Schedule 1 substance in the United States, which makes possession against the law. At the same time, as many as 4 million Americans now have an opiate addiction problem. In 2017, some 50,000 people died from overdoses. 

More people need to know about ibogaine. That’s the mission behind Lakshmi Narayan’s campaign, Iboga Saves, which includes a movie and a public education effort to help addicts find care. Lakshmi invited some of the experts she’s working with to join us for a conversation about what ibogaine treatment is like, how it works, and where it’s heading. With Ken today are Deanne Adamson, the founder and president of Being True to You, which is pioneering a transformational recovery model using ibogaine, Anslyn Ryan, who is a Being True to You certified recovery coach, Trevor Millar, who founded the ibogaine provider Liberty Root in Vancouver and is Chairman of the Board of MAPS Canada, and Eric Theirmann, the film director who is making the Iboga Saves documentary.

Iboga Saves: https://awake.net

Being True to You: https://beingtruetoyou.com

Liberty Root: http://libertyroot.net

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The healing potential of psychedelics and their cousins, empathogens, has drawn the devoted attention of a small group of dedicated people committed to providing them to those in need. These brave warriors have taken this on as a personal mission, despite the fear and stigma surrounding these substances and what they can do.

On today’s program, Ken talks with three underground therapists who lead sessions with MDMA. Because of the legal issues, we don’t mention their names. But they speak candidly of their own healing experience with MDMA, and how they work with clients. You’ll find them to be intelligent, sensitive, grounded people who bravely offer an important service that should be so much more widely available. 

Their work is captured in a book, Trust, Surrender, Receive: How MDMA can release us from Trauma and PTSD, edited by Anne Other. It’s a collection of personal stories about using MDMA therapy to address trauma, and it’s a powerful testament to the effectiveness of this approach. You can buy the book on Amazon.com here. 

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Our theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The wonderful HBO comedy High Maintenance followers a pot dealer, The Guy, as he makes his rounds by bike and visits the apartments of the Brooklynite characters that text him to arrange deliveries. The show captures the Brooklyn we know and love — and skewers it, ironically and affectionately. Ben Sinclair plays The Guy. He’s also the co-creator of the show. High Maintenance debuted as a no-budget indie web series, became a critics favorite, and got picked up by HBO, which allowed them to expand the canvas they had already been painting to beautiful effect. The third season starts on January 20. 

In this episode Ken talks with Ben about making High Maintenance, his creative process, biking in New York, the break up with his wife while maintaining a creative partnership, his relationship to cannabis, and his encounter with ayahuasca. 

You can also follow Ben on Instagram at @lookimhappypleasebelieveme. 

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Is it possible to expand the consciousness of a corporation? Michael Ventura applies empathy within organizations as part of the design process — whether designing a product or service for a customer, or designing an experience or program for employees. He has used this approach successfully with Fortune 500 companies, leading NGOs, and governmental organizations. In the process he is innovating new ways to attune an organization’s sensitivity to the well-being of those they effect. Michael calls this approach Applied Empathy, which is also the title of his new, inspiring book. 

Michael Ventura is the CEO and founder of Sub Rosa, a strategy and design firm that has worked with some of the world’s largest and most iconic brands, organizations and start ups, from General Electric, Google, Nike, and Warby Parker, to The TED conference, the United Nations, The Daily Show, and the Obama administration. Michael has served as a board member and advisor to a variety of organizations, including Behance, The Burning Man Project, and Tribal Link Foundation. In addition, Michael leads a thriving indigenous medicine practice where he helps patients address illness and injury of all types on the road to better well-being. 

You can learn more about Michael on Sub Rosa’s website: https://wearesubrosa.com. You can also follow him on Instagram at @themichaelventura.

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ezzie Spencer was a hard driving lawyer working for social justice in her home of Australia, when she started doodling the moon’s phases in the margins of her journal. In the process, she found herself rediscovering timeless truths about the cycles of nature, and how the human psyche is tuned in to these cycles, if only you pay attention. She began to share the practice she developed for herself with her friends and colleagues, and from their encouragement it grew into a book called Lunar Abundance, a lunar-inspired self-knowledge and self-care practice, which became a bestseller. Ezzie also holds a PhD in emotional wellbeing after trauma. Together with tracking the moon cycle, this was her entry into the importance of the emotional realm, which she continues to explore through her work today. 

Ken talked with Ezzie about her own experience of opening up to these subtle but powerful spiritual currents, and how she navigated the path for herself. She has an inspiring and instructive story about how our lives can be transformed when we stop the hamster wheel long enough to notice what else might be going on around us, and inside of us.

You can follow Ezzie at her website, ezziespencer.com, and on Instagram at ezziespencer. 

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Paul Selig is a normal person who does extraordinary things. His spiritual Guides appear to him as voices, which he hears and then repeats. As he explains in his conversation with Ken, this ability came to him slowly, over many years, starting with a single word and growing to the length of entire books, which he receives like dictation over a matter of weeks and then delivers to the publisher unchanged.  

What Paul’s Guides teach is the radical power of intention, attention and awareness to shift the material world. With each book — and there are 6 in print now — they take the teaching further. The scholar Jeffrey Kripal says these books are akin to the wisdom of the ancient Gnostics. The Guides themselves have said that they are of the order of Melchizedek, which is said have included Jesus as an initiate. Whatever the details of the lineage — the Guides don’t seem to think the details are important — these transmissions communicate a high dose of Christ Consciousness. It may or not resonate for you — these things are so personal, and there’s no right or wrong here — but no question, it’s fascinating. 

You can go to the Paul Selig YouTube channel to hear the Guides’ teachings. On today’s episode Ken visited with Paul in his cozy Chelsea apartment, fire in the fireplace, and talked about Paul’s personal experience on this remarkable journey. The Guides make an appearance towards the end. 

Paul Selig is considered to be one of the foremost spiritual channels working today. He has published 6 breakthrough works of channeled literature, including I Am the Word, The Book of Mastery, and the newly released The Book of Freedom. He was born in New York City, and received his master’s degree from Yale. A spiritual experience in 1987 left him clairvoyant. Paul offers channeled workshops internationally. He serves on the faculty of The Omega Institute, The Kripalu Center and the Esalen Institute. Also a noted playwright and educator, he served on the faculty of NYU for over 25 years. He directed the MFA in Creative Writing Program at Goddard College for many years, and he now serves on the college’s Board of Trustees. 

You can follow Paul at PaulSelig.com, on his Facebook page, and on the Paul Selig YouTube channel. 

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Beat Generation icon Allen Ginsberg was the most famous poet in America. But he was also a theorist, a strategist, and the counterculture field marshal who directed the troops of radical cultural change – revered by Tim Leary, Bob Dylan and John Lennon. It’s hard to overstate just how strange and marginal the Beats were considered at the time, and how profound and pervasive their impact has been. They planted the seeds for open sexuality, psychedelic consciousness, meditation, yoga, environmentalism, green witchery, and more. You can even trace today’s schism between blue and red states to the Beats and the cultural shifts they set in motion. 

Steven Taylor, Ginsberg’s friend and collaborator for 20 years, is deeply knowledgeable about what Ginsberg called Secret History — the true but often hidden stories about the roots of our culture. He’s also an accomplished author, poet and musician, and ran the writing program at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University. As a guitarist, he’s performed with everyone from Patti Smith to Marianne Faithful to Don Cherry to Philip Glass, and he was a key member of the seminal underground rock band, the Fugs. He is the editor of the newly released, Don’t Hide the Madness, William S Burroughs in Conversation with Allen Ginsberg.

You can follow Steven Taylor on Instrgram at @mseventy5.

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The witches among us are pioneering the link between feminine empowerment and environmentalism. And no one has done more here than Starhawk. Her bestselling book, The Spiral Dance, helped bring Goddess worship to the religious forefront, and left an indelible mark on feminist spiritual consciousness. She talks with Ken about the current political moment, the future of feminism, and how to use permaculture principles to heal social ills.  

Starhawk is an author, activist, permaculture designer and teacher, and a prominent voice in modern earth-based spirituality and ecofeminism. She is the author or co-author of thirteen books, including the ecotopian novel The Fifth Sacred Thing, its sequel City of Refuge, and The Empowerment Manual: A Guide for Collaborative Groups, on group dynamics, power, conflict and communications. Starhawk founded Earth Activist Training, teaching permaculture design grounded in spirituality and with a focus on activism. She travels internationally, lecturing and teaching on earth-based spirituality, the tools of ritual, and the skills of activism. 

You can find more about Starhawk on her website, http://www.starhawk.com.

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. At The Alchemist’s Kitchen, we are now in the Season of the Witch — a celebration of the Feminist, Counter-mainstream Witch Movement. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In recent years, as plant medicines like ayahuasca and iboga have gained traction in the West, there’s been a lot of tension between our society’s attitudes about what it calls “drugs”, and the sacred nature of these powerful messengers. In this episode, Ken speaks with three expert activists dedicated to society’s healthy use of plant spirit medicines: Ben De Loenen, the founder and Executive Director of ICEERS, Andrea Langlois, ICEERS’ Director of Engagement, and Dennis McKenna, who we welcome back to the podcast for a 2nd time and who is an ICEERS advisor. 

ICEERS - which stands for The International Center for Ethnobotanical Education, Research & Service - is an international non-profit working to shape a future where psychoactive plant practices are valued and integrated parts of society. It’s a pioneering and inspiring NGO based in Barcelona, where it runs many programs focusing on the legalization of plant spirit medicines, as well as the adoption of best practices for the cultivation and use of these entheogens in modern Western society. 

Learn more about ICEERS at ICEERS.org, as well as their Facebook page. And you can follow Dennis McKenna on his Facebook page, as well. 

Follow us on Instagram @TheEvolverPodcast: https://www.instagram.com/theevolverpodcast

The Evolver is sponsored by The Alchemist’s Kitchen, a botanical dispensary dedicated to the power of plants, where you can ask an herbalist to recommend the herbal remedy that’s most right for you. Visit https://www.thealchemistskitchen.com. For a 20% discount off any online purchase, use the code: podcast20.  

Theme music is “Measure by Measure,” courtesy of DJ Spooky, aka Paul D. Miller (@djspooky), from his album The Secret Song, and interstitial music are tracks by The Human Experience: "Sunu" from the album Soul Visions with Rising Appalachia, and Here for a Moment on the album Gone Gone Beyond. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.