Guest Post by Sarah Gotschall
During a text exchange with my sister complaining about our family traits, I unthinkingly quipped, “You can’t take the I out of inertia.” Lurching sideways in my chair, I excitedly wondered if this was only an appropriate new motto for the imaginary Gotschall family crest, or whether I had finally spontaneously coined a new pithy saying!? Many times have I Googled, hoping in vain, and vainly hoping, to have hit upon a word combo unheard of in Internet history and clever/pithy enough to be considered a saying, only to find that there’s nothing new under the virtual sun.
Excitedly I Googled “can’t take the I out of inertia” which returned….zero results! Questions immediately leapt to mind:
- Does one have to know my family to understand the genius of this quote, or is this universal enough, as well as sufficiently pithy, to qualify as a saying? (Admittedly, it is no “there is no I in team…”)
- If so, is zero Google results adequate proof of original authorship?
- And then most importantly, eerm…can I use the RIPS-SIS Blog to announce and stake my claim to my new saying? Like, is it sufficiently related to law librarianship? (Haha jk! A person who has posted twice about daily head of cabbage consumption as a work hobby does not ask herself that.)
- And finally, the question that inspired this blog post, was my sudden and unprecedented burst of creativity related to my recent attendance at an ayahuasca ceremony?
Ayahuasca Is All the Rage!
Ayahuasca and the other psychedelics have been all the rage for quite a while in the tech and startup world of Silicon Valley. In 2016, the new craze and infatuation among the tech elite was trekking to Peruvian ayahuasca ceremonies, and back in San Francisco sipping ayahuasca was like drinking a cup of coffee. Michael Pollan, author of 2021 bestseller How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, noted that psychedelics exploration is part of the tech world’s “hacking ethos” aimed at improving mental health, productivity, mood, memory, creativity, and cognitive function. The ayahuasca ceremonies and hallucinogen microdosing of engineers, CEOs, startup founders, and business leaders has recently overflowed the valley into the mainstream. Use of hallucinogens was fairly stable until 2021 when it suddenly increased to an all-time high, with 8% of adults under age 30 reporting use in the past year, nearly doubling since 2011.
Even athletes have jumped on the bandwagon. NFL quarterback Aaron Rogers recently credited his stellar performances in the 2020 and 2021 football seasons to a March 2020 Peruvian ayahuasa ceremony, describing it as a “magical experience with the sensation of feeling a hundred different hands on my body, imparting a blessing of love and forgiveness for myself and gratitude for this life, from what seemed to be my ancestors.”
What is Ayahuasca Anyway?
Ayahuasca is a psychoactive and entheogenic (psychoactive substance used in cultural or religious ceremonies) drink brewed from local plants that has been used by Amazon basin Indigenous people for over 1000 years. Its psychoactive ingredient is the drug Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) which produces auditory, visual, and tactile hallucinations and time distortions which, “by most firsthand accounts, defy verbal or visual description.” Many users report profound mystical and spiritual experiences involving themselves, the planet, or the nature of existence.
Classified as a Schedule I drug, it is generally illegal to sell or possess in the United States. However, there is an exemption for use in religious ceremonies, which is why yours truly was able to drive out into the Tucson desert and legally partake of the terrible tasting tea in a rather elaborate ceremony in a yurt with 30 other seekers. (And all for a mere $325.00!) According to 21 U.S.C. § 812, Schedule I drugs have a high potential for abuse and no accepted medical use, a claim that is currently in dispute. After a 50 year ban, there is a renaissance of research about the mentally beneficial effects of hallucinogens, with recent medical studies suggesting that ayahuasca has antidepressant and antianxiety effects. Also, while yet to be proven, studies suggest that hallucinogens could increase creativity, and there are certainly a lot of business people and creatives who swear by their effects.
What Does Any of This Have to do With Law Librarians?
And what does any of this have to do with law librarians? Admittedly, nothing in particular, though no doubt law librarians are subject to the same forces of stress, depression, substance use disorder, COVID PTSD, anxiety, burnout, etc. that make ayahuasca and the like increasingly popular both in and outside of Silicon Valley. We are strugglers and seekers, part of the 19.86% of adults experiencing a mental illness in 2022, and not immune from the general feelings of malaise that has settled over the U.S. in the post-pandemic era.
Sadly, my ayahuasca experience failed to live up to Aaron Rogerian level hype, being rather short on mystical experiences, spiritual revelations, or even decently interesting hallucination (other than a complete time warp), and rather long on constant misery from nausea. I was assured by many of the other 30 attendees, most of whom had attended over 10 ceremonies, that I shouldn’t worry about a less than stellar first experience, because I had the experience I needed to have and “it is different every time!” Though not life changing, I still consider the experience to be interesting and worthwhile, and I was left with the impression I emerged from the night of constant vomiting slightly changed. I temporarily, for about two weeks, felt a bit like my younger self, more prone to laugh, and perhaps a bit more energized and open to the universe. (I did pick up a hitchhiker in the morning on the way home from the yurt which is something I don’t normally do…) I can’t say that I noticed any other burst of creativity other than the above referenced fulfillment of my lifelong dream of coining a pithy saying, but there is always next time.
Hmm, I notice that there is a ayahuasca retreat close to Boston in New Hampshire. Maybe an idea for July 2023?!
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