When it comes to studying the healing potential of psychedelic plants and substances, it is vital to understand the different approaches to their use, and the powerful Amazonian visionary brew known as ayahuasca is no exception. The psychointegrative1 qualities found in ayahuasca and other psychedelics are part of a psychopharmacological mechanism by which different neurochemical processes are modulated through the action exerted by certain molecules on serotonergic receptors in the brain. But it is overly reductionist to explain ayahuasca’s healing effects without considering the extra-pharmacological variables that modulate the experience.
Western medicine has yet to fully embrace methods that incorporate these kinds of features into the healing paradigm. The forms of use to be found among the Indigenous peoples who originally used these psychedelics may be totally alien to the worldview of the modern world and therefore difficult to integrate into contemporary societies.
Such a blending of approaches is intercultural, interdisciplinary (or rather, transdisciplinary) and, above all, ethical. To learn more about this intercultural therapeutic approach, I talked to Dr. Anja Loizaga-Velder, one of the main experts in the therapeutic use of ayahuasca in Mexico. She is a well-known psychologist and psychotherapist who specializes in humanistic and transpersonal psychology. In addition to being a leading international speaker on the subject, Anja is also co-founder and Director of Psychotherapy and Research at the Nierika A. C. Intercultural Medicine Institute.
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Ibrahim Gabriell: Welcome Anja, can you tell us a little about who you are and why you decided to dedicate your life and research to the field of intercultural medicine?
Anja Loizaga-Velder: It all started when I was 18 years old, while I was taking a gap year, I had the opportunity to live in the Amazon jungle in a Shipibo community, and that was where I first learned about the use of psychedelics in a more structured context. Through ayahuasca I was struck by the potentialities of exploring consciousness, and I became interested in how it could be used to develop therapeutic tools. At that moment I decided to dedicate my life to building a bridge between the knowledge of traditional Indigenous medicine and modern psychology. That’s what I do, and there you can see a personal vocation combined with a professional one.
IG: Both you as a researcher and Nierika A. C. have attracted attention for specializing in this intercultural approach to psychedelics and in particular to ayahuasca. Why not dedicate yourself completely to working with either traditional Indigenous usage or to the Western medical-therapeutic approach?
ALV: I think partly because I grew up between two cultures; My mother was Mexican and my father German. From the time I was little I grew up with the mysticism of ancestral Mexican cultures but also with the scientific precision of the German culture.
My most significant experiences with psychedelics were within traditional medicine, so I consider these people as masters in the use of these technologies; but, on the other hand, I have always had a great professional passion for mental health issues, hence the desire to create a bridge between both types of knowledge. All this is also related to a personal experience I had when I was 16 years old, when a friend went through a suicidal crisis that led him to spend four months in a psychiatric hospital, I was with him every afternoon of those four months and it was so frustrating to see how conventional psychiatric treatments failed to work, which led me to commit myself to finding paths to more humane and effective therapies.
IG: Considering that psychedelics have long been a taboo subject even within academia and that you were already attracted to the subject, how was your professional training period?
ALV: When I started studying psychology, I found myself deeply frustrated as I felt that the academic psychology taught in Germany was totally limited and that it failed to take into account the study of consciousness, and was biased in the knowledge that was taught, both from a scientific paradigm and also a practical perspective, where unfortunately it was not always possible to help the patient.
I had made the commitment to bridge both worlds, and this kept me from abandoning my degree, but those moments of frustration made me want to do so. I insisted on writing my masters research on the potential uses of ayahuasca for mental health treatments, but my university told me that this was impossible, that this was not doing science, and they proposed I worked on other topics approved by the committee. But I had already made a commitment to myself to work on this topic, so I ended up looking for another university where I would be able to do this type of research, and I lost two semesters in this process. For my PhD everything was very different as, thanks to my master’s dissertation, a group of researchers in Heidelberg invited me to collaborate with them, so suddenly I found myself sharing ideas with a group interested in my research.
I later did postdoctoral work at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (Universidade Nacional Autônoma do México – UNAM), but when I finished these studies it was impossible for me to obtain an institutional affiliation at UNAM or another university. I feel that there is still a prejudice against this topic in the Mexican academy as, for example, although they allowed me to teach certain seminars at UNAM, this was unpaid with no contract, and I don’t know whether the same thing would have happened if I had been specialized in a more conventional subject.
“THE MAIN CHALLENGE AT THE PARADIGMATIC LEVEL WAS THE BIAS THAT LED THE ACADEMY TO THINK THAT WHAT I PROPOSED WITH MY RESEARCH WAS NOT SOMETHING SERIOUS, AND THIS WAS EVEN STRONGER WHEN I SPOKE OF INTEGRATING WESTERN SCIENTIFIC ELEMENTS.
Anja Loizaga-Velder
IG: Can you tell us about the challenges and objections you faced?
ALV: The main challenge at the paradigmatic level was the bias that led the academy to think that what I proposed with my research was not something serious, and this was even stronger when I spoke of integrating Western scientific elements. In the institutes it was thought that these topics corresponded to esotericism or parapsychology, and they invited me to deal with other “truly important” topics.
The other important point is about interdisciplinarity as psychedelic science studies the phenomenon of consciousness, medical anthropology, religious studies, and we know that mystical experiences are usually those with the greatest therapeutic value when psychedelics are used. Since this broader conceptualization does not exist within the status quo of the academy, where only anthropological approaches seem to be accepted, and whose studies merely state that certain Indigenous cultures make use of these plants. In addition, neuroscientific approaches (which are the most feasible in Mexico) analyze the effects of these substances on the brain; but the big question is how we can integrate all this.
At Nierika A. C. we wanted to carry out a study on the therapeutic values of ayahuasca in mental health, integrating the form of traditional Indigenous intervention while also providing participants with psychotherapy before and after the ayahuasca sessions. This project was presented to the National Institute of Psychiatry in Mexico, and they looked at us as if we were proposing something completely out of this world. There is simply no paradigm that allows them to understand how we can use these plants; for them it is easier to work with other substances. Later, we again approached this institute with a proposal on synthetic psilocybin to combat depression, using the American psychotherapeutic context, and this was indeed something they considered scientific, but integrating the elements of traditional Mexican medicine (which have a similar or greater value to the knowledge developed by clinical research with psychedelics in the United States) does not appear to be “scientific” enough to be approved by ethics and research committees. So there are definitely many prejudices, and it seems that in Mexico it is best to import knowledge from the United States or Europe. This makes me absurdly sad as Mexico is one of the countries with the greatest heritage in terms of ancestral knowledge of psychedelic plants and mushrooms.
On the other hand, it is also true that the National Council for Science and Technology (Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología – CONACYT) in Mexico has approved a transdisciplinary research project that explores the therapeutic potential of psilocybin-containing mushrooms from a transdisciplinary perspective, and this is very innovative for Mexico as traditional knowledge is being considered as something equivalent to Western knowledge.
IG: According to your research, what are the main contributions made by traditional Indigenous knowledge to modern psychotherapy?
ALV: As I understand the subject, the Western paradigm first extracted the substance, then the active ingredient, and the contexts for its use were created, and when these contexts were created, more and more aspects of traditional use were integrated. This could be seen, for example, in the aesthetic part of the surroundings where these experiences take place, as well as in other elements such as music, the use of The Word as a work tool, or the exploration of different doses according to an intuitive doctor-patient connection and not simply based on body weight.
“I THINK THAT ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT POINTS THAT WE FIND IN TRADITIONAL INDIGENOUS MEDICINE IS THE COMPLEMENTARY SENSITIZATION OF THE THERAPIST WITH THE PATIENT…”
Anja Loizaga-Velder
I think that one of the most important points that we find in traditional Indigenous medicine is the complementary sensitization of the therapist with the patient as traditional doctors almost always use the psychedelic together with the patient, although they do so only after a very long training, through which they are so familiar with that state that they do not get carried away by the patient’s process but rather become aware of what the patient needs and thus accompany them, for example, with the appropriate songs (which are not pre-assembled playlists, such as in the case of the Western model).
Another point to highlight is the cultural integration that is made of these experiences in Indigenous cultures where, unlike in the West, these practices are not a countercultural phenomenon but are sacred experiences and therefore, valuable, and worthy of respect. All this makes it possible to link the practice to more collective processes, where we see that the patient’s family or community can intervene.
IG: Another factor that I think is important to mention has to do with the phenomenon of neoshamanism: nowadays it is common to find people (mainly mestizos), who, perhaps with good intentions, but without knowing in-depth the complexity of the use of these plants suddenly find themselves offering “ceremonies” with psychedelics. What is your opinion on this whole phenomenon?
ALV: I think there are different types of neoshamanic practices, I wouldn’t put them all in the same category. I think there are a few facilitators who do a very ethical and careful job, and they have dedicated themselves to studying consciousness and medicine (under their own terms).
On the other hand, it is also true that there are neoshamans who believe they know how to accompany people in these states; sometimes their ceremonies are very aesthetic, with very beautiful music, but they do not have sufficient preparation to accompany someone who may be experiencing the memory of a trauma, and because there are many of these neoshamanic contexts, there are also people who have had accidents in this type of practice, and this worries me a lot as a mental health professional. It is something that I have seen happen many times, sometimes in the context of the use of Bufo alvarius, the secretion of the Colorado River toad, where more charlatans can be found than good practitioners. As ayahuasca has gained popularity, we are also beginning to see more and more ceremonies where the facilitators frequently lack adequate training, but it must be said that this would not happen in an Indigenous culture, where sharing this medicine requires the permission of the elders or wisdom keepers of the community. Unfortunately, many of these “enablers” do not understand the damage they are doing, and this is certainly part of the problem.
“AS AYAHUASCA HAS GAINED POPULARITY, WE ARE ALSO BEGINNING TO SEE MORE AND MORE CEREMONIES WHERE THE FACILITATORS FREQUENTLY LACK ADEQUATE TRAINING, BUT IT MUST BE SAID THAT THIS WOULD NOT HAPPEN IN AN INDIGENOUS CULTURE, WHERE SHARING THIS MEDICINE REQUIRES THE PERMISSION OF THE ELDERS OR wisdom keepers OF THE COMMUNITY.”
Anja Loizaga-Velder
IG: Now entering the final part of this interview, in your opinion, what is the future that awaits intercultural medicine?
ALV: I really hope that the field of mental health in Mexico opens up more, that this traditional knowledge is recognized, as has happened in China. I really hope that the guardians of this knowledge are given back their place, and that ideally there may be a “Mexican Institute of Entheogenic Medicine,” that is to say, a place where psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, and traditional doctors collaborate, providing professional training in entheogenic intercultural medicine. A place where there is space for mental health professionals to establish filters, either studying contraindications in terms of medications or developing methods that prepare people to have safe psychedelic experiences, and where the application of sacred plants is in the charge of traditional doctors, supported by an integration service by therapists, so that we really have a dialogue of knowledge.
IG: Do you have any final words that you want to share with the new or future generations of researchers in this field?
ALV: Yes, on the one hand, that they follow their vocation despite the obstacles, and that they realize that this field has a great future in mental health, it is worth continuing to train, and that they choose to integrate indigenous knowledge and do not limit themselves to Western knowledge, and only in this way can these peoples be revalued. It is also important that when the time comes, they can share the possible economic benefits with the indigenous communities, in other words, that this is not limited to a dialogue of knowledge but to total reciprocity.
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Anja Loizaga-Velder received a master’s degree in psychology from Koblenz-Landau University, Germany and a PhD in medical psychology from Heidelberg University, Germany. She wrote her master’s thesis and doctoral dissertation on the use of ayahuasca for the treatment of addictions and has published several articles in international academic journals and chapters in books on traditional medicine and mental health topics. She currently works as a postdoctoral researcher in the postgraduate course in Medical and Health Sciences at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and as Director of Psychotherapy and Research at the Nierika Institute of Intercultural Medicine.
This interview was originally published in Spanish: “Un puente entre dos mundos: el uso de ayahuasca en el contexto de la medicina intercultural – Entrevista a Anja Loizaga-Velder“
Notes
1 “Psychointegrative” is a concept coined by Michael Winkelman to propose that, as they are analogues of serotonin, classic psychedelics (tryptamines) modulate not only a specific brain process, but various activities of other neurotransmitters, thus integrating the thalamus, which regulates the flow of information between the nervous system and the cortex, which then interprets this information.
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