Episode 26: Ibogaine, Shadow Work, Addiction with Anders
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In this episode, I spoke with Anders about his journey through addiction recovery. It is a deep conversation about addiction, plant medicines, shadow work and finding a way to be true to yourself on your path in life. Anders now guides others with his Ibogaine counselling services.
We discussed:
As a child, learned not to respect or love himself
Sought to fix himself, no tools
By 20s, didn’t know who he was
Found drugs, felt complete and confident
Drugs actually helped
But the drugs stop working, and you’re left with addiction and problems
Ended up trying every detox, every rehab…everything to try and fix himself.
Felt empty by age 45, nothing new to try
Found Ibogaine, fantastic provider, the right kind of journey
Was able to look at the darkness, the shadow
Shadow’s not the bad part; not part to run from
It’s the rejected part of ourselves; rejected in childhood
With Ibogaine, he owned the process — not 12 steps, a therapist, etc.
Told it was a disease, couldn’t be trusted with own thinking
The 12-step narrative were subjugating, dehumanizing narratives that were just like the narratives that got him into this in the first place
Ibogaine was empowering
Ibogaine spoke to him
Deep troubles of substance abuse
Met grandparents on ibogaine journey; forgiveness
Took away the shame, that inner voice
Put down that cross, the heaviest rucksack of life
Iboga ceremony; intentions; irritability and anger; Iboga started to attack him, ridicule him; it wasn’t the Iboga talking, it was showing him himself; then started a joyride around the universe
Shadow work is reconnecting to rejected, frightened, child inside you; given love/compassion;
Don’t believe people are addicted to substances; they are filling a void; reconnecting with inner child
Recover, the metaphorical cooking pot; put all of the negative ingredients in, to find out why the addiction; become more authentic
Keep putting in positive ingredients of the positive things; belongs to you, not AA, or parents, etc.
Most are still eating from AA’s recipe.
This requires action; self compassion is not a gooey feeling; it’s about doing the right thing for your traumatized, inner child
Turn dangerous rituals (drugs) into healthy rituals.
Now helps others brew their pots
Works with top Ibogaine providers; works with clients BEFORE they go; start the process of loving themselves; intentionality, integrity, respect into Ibogaine and into themselves.
Integration is the reaction, done after the experience
Give the pain body a name; not running away from it; build a relationship with it.
Mistakes are no longer mistakes, they’re opportunities
Perfect humans are imperfect, broken, chaotic;
Trauma, pain and addiction can bring solutions; addiction is not the problem, it’s the symptom; it always comes down to trauma;
Plant medicines change the neuroplasticity in the brain; can start to observe the pain body
People that stigmatize, judge based on medicines come back to see the great results and ask questions
Follow up with 5-Meo, Psilocybin, Kambo, Ayahuasca to keep finding themselves: put intentionality, integrity and respect back into the process
They own their recovery, which is the secret to success
