Plants as teachers; an ibogaine report

Ibogaine Report

The first time I found out about ibogaine was during initiations of ayahuasca, san pedro, salvia and marijuana. I took part in these initiations for spiritual enrichment as I had been suffering from an eating disorder for many years and could not get to the bottom of the problem and I knew if I did not get to the bottom of it it will be very hard to stop the destructive patterns which did not only manifest in this way but in many other ways. With my first experience of the medicine plants I knew that the knowledge and information contained within these plants can definitely help me.

My experience of addiction was a tough one as I am sure most people’s are. It closed my heart chakra and through the continuous stress, anxiety, hopelessness, fear and self torture a part of me died. I could not feel anymore, my heart had closed. I was very far gone. When I look back now I see that I have come a far way from the hell that I was in for many years. I know that if I was not guided to the medicine plants that was created by our Creator, I would not have the insights and understanding that I have now because part of the cause was lack of information and understanding which I could not find and did not have access to.

For me the medicine plants are not an escape or magic pill but a very special and sacred tool given to us. In my search for a “cure” for my illness I tried many different things, psychologists, anti-depressants, the 12-step program, meditation, yoga, hypnosis and many other healing therapies. Yes these did help me to a certain extent but because I was so deep into this vicious cycle it was not strong enough to lift me out of that space for long enough and it gave me certain insights but never deep enough to stand against my addiction and confused mental state.

I have found that my problems started from the day one when I entered Earth. I was born into a society that had lost very important teachings and knowledge about Life and about our purpose here and in my family many of the right principles that was set out by our Creator was not respected or even understood properly and thus the wisdom and teachings lost. My life without the right teachings and principles created uncertainty and fear on a sub-conscious level and this only became clear when the problems started taking form. Then came all the traumas…my parents got divorced and so the emotional wounds multiplied and never got resolved because the way in which the world I lived in dealt with emotional and spiritual issues was so far from reality. I lived in a crazy world…it was a complete delusions and confusion and my mind was being programmed with something that was not the Truth and would lead me to a very dark place…hell.

When I look back at my life I still see myself blessed in many ways because I was brought up on a farm and my Mother and Father still had many understandings of the truth which they lived by and taught me. For this I am forever grateful as it kept hope alive in me to keep searching and never to give up until I find my way back.

Unfortunately because it was only part of the truth mixed with unrighteousness and lies it sent me straight into confusion. This is why it is so important that the right teachings are established on this Earth. My heart goes out to other children and people who have even less than I had…I can only imagine where they must be.

This is where the plants came in, it contains teachings and information and contains the Truth about Life…even marijuana which I worked with intensely for 1.5 years taught me so much. Marijuana I find is a very tough plant to work with as it shows you yourself clearly, with all your faults. For me it was a tough experience as I have not used ibogaine and was extremely hard and judgmental towards myself and others. Now that I have been initiated into ibogaine my heart chakra has opened again and I have more compassion towards myself and others. This is very important.

I think that it is impossible to face your shadow and heal your past if you do not have compassion and love reinstated into your life.

One of the teachings which I received through the ibogaine was that there is a certain Order in the Universe, which is Love and it must be respected and understood. We are suppose to be shown and taught this from our Parents but if they do not understand it or live by it then we as children will not understand it…let alone know how to live by it. I have found that without the understanding of the Order of the Universe I did not know how to deal with my own emotions in a healthy way and I did not feel safe in the world. This caused me to hold on to emotions which caused extreme anxiety and ultimately influenced my relationship with others. I felt cut off from the world around me and this again caused great sadness in me. The most important part of being human is to have a relationship with the world around us and to feel connected and as One.

So there was a void in me because my heart was blocked and at a very young age I started to try and fill it with other actions and things which made me feel better…unfortunately these things that I used was destructive habits and turned into full blown addictions. The actions and things I used were not good and it made me feel guilty and I was too full of pride and shame to speak about it. It is such a vicious and destructive cycle because the false programming was being reinforced in my brain, i.e. I am a bad person, the world is unsafe, I am not good enough, nobody likes or loves me, I can’t trust anyone etc. Of course this was not true but I started to believe it and accepted it. I nearly killed myself believing these lies.

When I took ibogaine for the first time in small dosages I cried a lot, my anxiety levels lowered and it helped me to stand up for myself in an abusive relationship which I was not able to do for 1.5 years. It also showed me that the Spirit of the Most High and of the Universe from which I was feeling cut off was in me too and that I was not separate from it. This was a big experience for me as I felt it very clearly. So I developed more love and compassion towards myself and I understood for the first time what my friends were telling me about the fact that I had to get out of this relationship. I was holding on to this relationship with all my might because I connected it with the love of my Father. When I took the ibogaine it showed me this clearly and enabled me to feel the sadness and hurt that I suppressed for so long. This is when I accepted that I must let go and I did even after believing for a long time I would never be able to! I knew then that this was a very special plant.

My next session was a much larger dose of the root bark and the first teaching was where I saw myself at a young age and I saw my Mother and Father and I was shown how important they are to me and that they loved me no matter what they did. I thought that my Father did not love me because of all the hurtful things he did to our family. Now I know my Parents do love me and that their Love can never fade. I started to feel safe again and started to open up and trust people again. It was an amazing journey and worked a lot on fear and anxiety that was based on false belief systems. It basically showed me the Truth in a very real and fantastic way so that when I came out of the journey I knew the Truth and could start fighting the false beliefs and thoughts.

My destructive habit patterns decreased significantly and my relationships started healing. I felt a deep connection with the world around me that I had not felt in years. It was amazing…as if I stepped out of hell for the first time. Now I was given the Truth as a tool to use but I wanted things to be and stay right and perfect and started to stress again thinking it did not work. I opened up to my family for the first time about what was going on in my life and this in itself was extraordinary as I was very much full of pride and shame and could never do this. So it did work! I just could not see it.

My next session was where I took the hydrochloride extract which was a higher dose but much lighter on my body. I thought that the same issues would come up because I still had problems. I was very surprised that the issues from the previous journey did not come up and I saw and understood that it was dealt with and I can let go. This in itself was a big revelation. This session was more focused on the fact that I had a choice of how I want to conduct my life and that I am not powerless as I thought I was. It taught me that I had to put in effort to heal and I had to fight for my Life, but now that I knew the Truth about many things and had gained deep understandings and insights on Life and I could make different choices, but I have to treat myself with love and respect otherwise I will make it very difficult.

After this experience I found that the deeper and more profound insights came once I returned to my life. Now it is as if my whole life has become a teaching and journey and I do not feel the same person. My brain has been reprogrammed and it is as if darkness has been removed from me. Ibogaine was not a once off experience for me, it is part of my life now and even though all my problems are not gone I have accepted where I am at now, without being afraid of it and I can recognize the false patterns in my mind and challenge it. So it is in my hands and power to change my Life. I also understand that it will take time and patience and determination and faith in the Almighty’s guidance to heal completely. The thing is now I know how and what to do and I can do it with joy and hope.

I have also learned to have respect for other cultures and realized that the our Creator has made the indigenous people the keepers of the wisdom plants so it is important that we are humble and learn from each other.

Sarita

A survivors account: Ibogaine; the healing sacrament

survivors

Background

Looking back I realized that I was being prepared for the Ibogaine experience a few months prior to the actually time. I had images of tribal people and felt they had wisdom about the inner world that the western world lost. With their presence in my life I bought music with the ridgeadoo instrument and added that to my therapy and things started to intensify.

In August I thought I am nearing the end of the abuse. I have integrated my father in June; in July I realized the truth about my mother and the sexual part of the abuse did not affect me anymore. I felt positive and excited and knew good things were on its way.

Instead things got worse. A repetitive thought that said when it can’t get worse it does get worse kept going through my mind. At first I laughed it off and thought, well the worse that can happen was death and I am not scared of death. And anyway I have been through the worse, so what else could there be.

My life started to get out of control when I was overwhelmed by fear. It was a cycle of chills that went through my body, perspiring and then fearful thoughts. This cycle was intense and repeated itself for 3 days. The thought when it can’t get worse it does get worse intensified. And then another realization, I cannot die. Over and over in my head it went: “When things can’t get worse it does get worse and I cannot die.” This brought a lot of anxiety.

All of a sudden I realized that I am in love for the first time in my life. I fell in love with a man that I could not understand why, because in my mind he was the last man I would go for. When I am with him I fell apart inside. This triggered my sexuality, which was like an explosion. I experienced feelings in my body and erotic fantasies I never had before. It was obsessive every moment of the day and I was convinced I lost my mind.

As if things can’t get any worse I made a very disturbing discovery. I suspected someone of being a pedophile. It became a big frustration in my life because it was a worry that kept nagging me. For the first time in my life I was not able to solve a problem by myself but had to be reliant on other people for help which provided many stumbling blocks. This triggered incredible rage and the rage I felt was towards God and I seriously questioned his identity.

From all directions there were pressure in my life; it felt like I was on fire, perspiring continuously. The heat was unbearable and it felt like I was running flat out wanting to rip of my clothes to cool down.

I read about Ibogaine by mere chance and it jumped out at me. I instinctively knew I must do this and that is how you met me for the first time.

Expectation

From what I read and what you told me about Ibogaine I expected it to be a mental process. I started to prepare and console myself that I will not feel any pain but will only see my childhood experiences and be able integrate this. It will be ok, I thought.

My Blindspot

The first image I got was a glimpse of the man I love, a house and me. It was like we were married. The next was an image of a big wave and within this wave, a big, black, wiry insect that looked like a robot. It was as if this wave was about to break, and destroy everything and if something survived, the insect would trampled it to death.

It changed and showed me my present situation – you, Sophie and Anette. Both incidents replayed the way I experienced it that morning. I could not understand why I had to go through that again and was irritated because I thought it was a waste of time. However it confirmed a creepy feeling I had when I told Anette I wouldn’t be able to make our next appointment because I discovered another therapy. It showed me how she was stabbing me in the eye with a needle, when in reality she was being affectionate towards me.

My whole life flashed passed me with all these experiences I had with people. I was overwhelmed by the hurt and loneliness I felt in these situations. I realized how difficult my life was. I was never allowed to speak my truth. My truth was a secret and that secret was that I was an orphan because I was abused horrible by my parents and family. My grandmother taught me self-control so that my behavior won’t reveal the secret. I would continue this by always finding fault with myself and therefore not feel the hurt of injustices done to me. I blamed myself believing I had a negative effect on people making them do and say horrible things. I always tried to change myself to be acceptable. This image was a warning of the karma I was going to pay back to myself for not feeling my hurt all these years. A month after the Ibogaine experience my heart got broken and I went through a very difficult time.

The choices

Then it stopped. It felt like there was a cloud over my head and I hear a man’s voice asking me, are you sure you want to know? I see a room with rows and rows of shelves and in these shelves was brown cards and these cards represented my experiences with my parents. I said: “Yes, I need to know everything. It is the only way I will heal.” Again the voice asked, are you sure? The tone in the voice alarmed me of danger and I started to doubt myself. From all the years of therapy I learnt that my parents were very cruel and after I integrated these memories I always felt disgust and disappointment in them. If these cards represented new memories I knew there was a 50/50 chance that I could go insane. I only hear this buzzing noise, waiting for my decision. I can’t make up my mind because both choices would be futile.

I felt very disappointed in Ibogaine because I did not expect to be confronted with such difficult choices and it was my last hope of ending the hell I am in. It felt like nothing is going to change and only get worse. I was in absolute despair.

Confronting my reality

Gabieba gave me Valerian drops and then the cloud broke. The voice came again reassuring me that he will never be cruel to me and pointed out that I always expect cruelty. His voice was warm, gentle and kind and I felt safe.

He showed me the future and all the virtues waiting for me as rewards for the hard work I did the past 39 months. He complimented me and said I was courageous. I stood up for my truth, fought back and claimed my space. He praised me because it was very difficult as I received a lot of opposition, but the truth in me grew and became a force that could not be controlled.

He presented me with the following image to demonstrate the world I lived in and had to transgress. I am running as fast as I can, and from all directions skeletons were running after me. The background is grey and gloomy.

Because I had no self-acceptance and self-love I strived to be normal, doing things that normal people do. I had all these duties that burdened me. I became discontented when I realized how empty my world felt and the routine became suffocating. That was when I decided to seek my truth and this process started 36 months ago. It was a very difficult time in my life because it was confrontation upon confrontation in both my inner and outer world. I became very sick and was in and out of breakdowns. But as the truth in me grew I became stronger and started to stand up for myself. This is still an ongoing process and most probably will be for a long time.

Gabieba

Then Gabieba appeared before me. I saw her warm eyes and smile and knew she had a heart of gold. I felt we connected and I enjoyed the experience I had with her earlier. I became eager to see her and impatient because her next shift was only due in 2 hours.

I became aware of a deep longing in me of wanting to connect with people truthfully and felt how rewarding it would be for me.

Mother

Next was my mother and time was spent showing me what she really was all about. Scenes of the abuse that I was familiar with flashed passed me focusing on the expression of enjoyment on her face when she watched my father raping and sodomizing me. She was not only an accomplice but an instigator most of the time. She controlled my father and everyone to hate me. I also saw how cruel she was to other people like my father, brothers, sister, etc. She lived in hate and only knows hate. She is an evil person who made that choice, and there were no excuses for her.

The next moment I saw all these arrows flying through a dark empty space right into her body. I saw this a few times and knew the universe was telling me that they would take care of her.

My imbalance

I then saw myself and the voice instructed me to bow at myself for living an honorable life. He said that my heart is kind and real and that I am a wealthy person on the inside. However I do have an imbalance and the following image was given to me.

I am standing underneath a fruit tree, picking the fruit at the bottom of the tree. I am picking these because they are closest to me. What I don’t realize, is that these fruits are not ripe and as nice as the one’s higher up. They don’t get the sun as the fruit higher up the tree. I pick these because I believe I cannot reach higher.

Then it showed me the latest Golf model in black. The car that I always wanted to drive was a black Cobra. But as time went by I let go of this dream because I believed it was out of my reach. It showed me that the Cobra represents the fruit higher up and they usually ripen before the bottom ones. If they don’t get picked they fall to the ground and then rot. This is what happened to my Cobra dream.

The voice said to me that all I needed to do was to reach higher. It demonstrated this over and over. I saw myself standing below the fruit tree reaching for the fruit higher up. It felt very easy to do that. The voice said, “Keep on reaching and take it that is all you need to do”. At the end I saw myself, my arms stretched out reaching for the sky. He said: “Keep reaching, stretch and take it that is all you need to do.” It is so simple and I felt in the end how simple it was.

My Father

The following old memory kept repeating itself to emphasize the fact that I grew up with no rights. My father is raping me and the blood is running down my legs. I feel I can’t anymore I had enough, but I can’t tell him to stop because he will only stop when he is done.

The following I actually experienced. I am a baby crawling on the floor. The next moment there is a foot standing on my left hand. I tried to look up to see who it is, but I can’t because the foot is keeping me down. I recognize the shoe belonging to my father because it is the type of shoes he always used to wear. I realized in that moment that he is a dangerous man and I that must be careful of him because he can kill me if he wanted to.

I had treatments done on my left arm and hand because it was badly damaged. I knew it was related to the abuse but never knew how.

New mother memory

I am about 18 months old. We had a Bull Mastiff called Oubaas who was my mother’s dog. He is eating a bone and my mother orders me to bring the bone to her. I go towards him to take the bone. He growls at me and I instinctively know that he will bite me. I ran back to my mother who is angry and shouts at me to take the bone. I try again and the same thing happens. I go back to her crying because I am scared. She has the duster in her hand and is threatening me. I go back to take the bone thinking she does not believe me and if I take the bone she will see that I am telling the truth. I take the bone and everything goes black.

My brothers and sister

My father and I are in the car in our driveway. My brothers are playing on the lawn not far away. I know they are aware of what is happening but is shutting it out because they are scared. My father is lying in the seat while I have to do all the work. I can feel how pleased he is with himself. He feels like a king and I am his slave whose duty is to give him all the pleasure he demands. I feel how he wallows in the enjoyment of this power. The next moment the car door opens and he throws me out by the hair because I did something wrong. In front of my brothers he zips up his pants and as he does that he puts his other hand in front as to say “this is secret, don’t tell anyone”.

This memory resolved my brothers who I used to make excuses for. I realized that they are still blaming me for what my father did and the person he was.

Next were more realizations of what happened to my sister when I left for Cape Town 18 years ago. I realized that my mother took my sister into their bedroom to get my sister to hate me. My mother either made my sister feel that she is punished because I went to Cape Town or that she must compete with me. This confirmed her hostility towards me since I been in Cape Town.

My mother and father

I see my mother and father standing together and I experienced them as very tragic human beings.

The final image

I saw the man I was in love with standing and in his hands holding a severely damaged bird and he is saying to the bird: “You poor thing you are hurt.”

Voyage to other realms of consciousness: An ibogaine experience

THE INITIATION

Voyage to other realms of consciousness

1- My early years, a journey through so much abuses, vision facilitated
by a spirit friend
more abuses = Interaction with the local priesthood when a choir
boy and church servant
Boarding school = what really happened
Revelation about brothers betrayal, money owed to me.
Revelation of black magic (shape shifting) used to abuse me during
my stays in
Tanzania; it started during my adolescence in Geneva by the same
person.
2- Making sense = understanding the reason for all that karma from my
past life
3- Voyage to the realm of the dead = helping the stranded
4- A place of freedom in sexuality = understanding and enjoying the
magic of interaction
5- Travelling to higher realms = beauty & light
6- Having a feeling of my true magnificent nature, my total self as a
being of light
7- The veil open to reveal light beings so magnificent, beyond words
8- Vision of the future = the war of the lords of war from beyond
planet earth manifesting all
overt he earth / 100 years of darkness / planets alignment with
worlds beyond our
galaxy / new luminous earth / 1000 year of bliss / shamballa,
luminous cities, human
return as luminous beings

In few words a resume of my journey.
Can you relate to it ?
Love to hear from you

With Gratitude

Jean-Nicolas

Beings of light: An account by JN Hermann

Dear Simon,

Well, after leaving the soul retrieval plane, I was taken to a plane
where I started to become aware of another part of me, the luminous
part witch stays on that level when we enter the earth's level. That
other part of me was very beautiful, they did not allow me to get a
full feeling of my true nature as it seems the time was not
appropriate; all I know it is so wonderful, I also understood that all
of us are very magnificent, we just have forgotten it.
Then I move to another level where I was witnessing lost of beautiful
beings traveling up and down, they look very involved with a wonderful
feeling of joy to be of service to planet earth.
And again we seen to travel to another level where the luminous beings
seem more brilliant, the quality of their lights had more feeling of a
finer sensation.
Then a veil open, just enough for me to see the most wonderful light
energy, just a very small movement of a wing, even so, so incredible
majestic, that it was all I needed to experience to feel my heart for
many years to come. Like you, I wish to remember it for ever.
It was time to gently return to earth level, fueled with wonder and
magic, happy to be me and journey on.
The message was clear, we are not alone, they are watching over us,
assisting us when we ask and preparing us for the journey thru darkness
so we will not forget who we truly are even so it will be very dark on
this plane for a very long time.
I hope this will make sense as using words is limiting in such a
wonderful experience of what is just behind a very fine veil.

With Gratitude
JN

ibogaine iboga

Ibogaine Treatment Cape Town is changing to Iboga association cape Town; the web address remains www.iboga.co.za. Part of the reason for this is that the main focus of the use of iboga in the western world has been on its anti addictive properties or as an addiction interrupter. This is only one aspect of ibogaine's abillity to heal and I would prefer to put more focus on ibogaine's ability to release repressed trauma.

In most cases I have found that repressed trauma had an influence in forming addictive behaviour patterns or destructive behaviour patterns; whatever they may be. Getting to the underlying issues is key to working on and repairing the present condition; this is where I think many can benefit from the therapeutic use of Iboga as we all carry a certain amount of baggage that has an influence on our lives on a daily basis.

It needs to be clear that you dont need to be considered to be an addict of any sort to get the beafits iboga has to offer.

Iboga not only gives us a better understanding of ourselves but also reconnects us with the people and world around us which leads to a healthier lifestyle in general.

The idea is to host a pilot project consisting of workshops where groups can benafit and we can gather feedback in order to tailor its application to groups with a low dose protocol in mind. In addition we will be including other forms of therapy like massage to compliment the process.

There are two groups we are focusing on; one in the Johannesburg area and the other in Cape Town which should take place within the next month when the wether warms up; I will keep a notice of upcoming events as they unfold.

Thanks to all of those who have offered support.

Simon Loxton THCP 33/08

Low dose experiences of iboga root bark by Matt Zielinski

Iboga for persistent cravings after a successful ibogaine detoxification

After a painless detoxification from heroin dependence I felt exhilarated and ecstatic. The manacles of physical addiction have been shattered to pieces, and completely obliterated in the magical transformative experience. With the help of ibogaine I began to notice the benefits of a healthy body and the possibility of leading a happy life without the use of drugs. The visions experienced on ibogaine create a new platform for a deep reflection of life’s purpose and meaning.

For the first few weeks I didn’t exhibit any signs of cravings. The thoughts of using were insignificant and didn’t possess any power. As time moved forward, the ibogaine metabolite slowly disintegrated into the beautiful void, and I was confronted with the old patterns of thinking. Cravings began to creep up.

We have to realize that cravings are a natural part of the healing process and will be a part of the recovery process for some time. We have to come to grips that we will never control when they arise. However, we have full control over what to do with them once they do arise. We have to be mindful of the process and not rush in. Many people experiment with different alternatives in dealing with cravings. Therapy, meditation, clean diet, physical exercise and countless other ways help to create a new life style and establish new habits. Yet these activities are often not enough to keep the patient on the clean tract.

The old habituated ways of thinking and acting are deeply rooted and need to be approached from a different vantage point. Since we create our reality with our beliefs, emotions and expectations it is crucial to examine these matters in a clear, concise objective manner. Since the brain’s neurotransmitters are all out balance, the patient is liable to make bad choices while being fully conscious of the negative consequences. Ibogaine seems to act on multiple neurotransmitters and seems to reset the brains chemistry back to the clean state. Small ibogaine boosters taken at regular intervals are an amazing way to keep the clean track going.

For me the best way to deal with cravings is definitely taking small amounts of Iboga root bark. The cravings disappear as quickly as they appear and I am left with a sense of peace and optimism. Since strong cravings can have a significant impact on the quality of your day it is important to find the easiest and greatest method to deal with them.

Small doses of Iboga put me back into the non physical state of being. My thoughts and actions become in tuned with my deeper self, which causes me to think rationally, optimistically and very objectively. A small booster dose puts me back to the original state of mind which I experienced right after the flood dose. I completely enjoy each moment as it gradually unfolds into the next . I become fully conscious of my creative powers and tear down all illusionary barriers, fears and old negative patterns of thinking. The cravings loose their meaning and power because the awareness of the consequences of using become crystal clear again. After each dose I am aligned with the source and feel and believe in my self worth and my ability to be happy without the use of drugs.

Ibogaine Experiences

Eyewitness account of Benny Alberts:

What I saw and experienced meeting recovering hard drug addicts who had taken Ibogaine and taking Ibogaine myself.

I approached Simon Loxton while I was trying to put together a freelance magazine feature on Ibogaine and Ibogaine treatment. I am not a full time journalist and have no formal training in social work, psychology or any other medical field. At present I work full time as an electrician.

My interest in substance abuse issues stem mainly from the simple fact that I have, unfortunately, had a large number of friends and acquaintances that have been, or are, addicted to drugs in some form. The friends in question and I come from perfectly “respectable” middle-middle class backgrounds, mainly the southern suburbs and the deep south of the peninsula.

Growing up, I have been in the position of a young guy in his late teens and early twenties who watches helplessly as close childhood friends lose themselves to heroin, alcohol, and crack. I watched as they struggled through various forms of rehab, spend time in jail, commit crimes, poison themselves and in an extreme example, live rough on the streets while commiting burglary to support their habit.

By blind luck, some element in my upbringing or simply due to all the fantastic bad examples on offer I managed to avoid falling into the drug trap myself. I have yet to compare the prevalence of drug abuse in my peer group to some official benchmark but, plainly 40-50% of white teens in Cape Town do not have a hard drug problem. It should be safe to assume my experience in this regard is a statistical anomaly.

Unfortunate as the situation has been I have had an excellent opportunity to intimately know many drug addicts, witness the effects of their illness and the various means by which they managed to get themselves on a path to recovery.

Recently I started writing commercial features for the Cape Times and as I found that enjoyable, I was looking around for a story I could use to break into full time investigative journalism. One of my recovering addict friends mentioned Ibogaine and its reported effects and I was intrigued. When my friend mentioned that the principal Ibogaine practitioner in Cape Town was Simon Loxton whom we both knew from our early teens growing up in Simon’s Town, I took that as a sign and contacted him to arrange an interview.

I had never known Simon very well and couldn’t remember much about him from 10-15 years previously, but it was immediately obvious to me that Simon was no longer a heroin addict. If you get to know enough people with drug problems you start to recognise certain things like poor complexion, lethargic thinking, poor personal grooming, and untidy living spaces littered with drug paraphernalia and so on. Simon was completely the opposite.

With Simon I arranged an interview with two of his former clients. I met the three of them in the couple’s Claremont flat. Again, there were not even the slightest indication that either of them had any kind substance abuse problem besides tobacco. Superficially they seemed like any young, average couple working office jobs and leading normal lives. They were tidy, neat, clear headed and pleasantly charming.

What struck me most however was their pragmatic approach to life and a refreshing outlook on society and spirituality.

I have fortunately never become physically addicted to drugs myself so I have never had to experience the mental processes and struggles that the addict has to in order to break free of substance addiction. Recovery does seem to require fundamental shifts in thinking and the learning of mental habits that are not normally required to function in society.

By talking to them over a number of years however, I noticed that the addicts in recovery that tend to fare the best, are the ones that have come to accept themselves and the decisions that led themselves to that situation in the first place. Acceptance of oneself and others, “self-forgiveness” and honesty with oneself are pillars in any lasting recovery. Most importantly, there seems to be an acceptance of personal responsibility for oneself and all of ones actions. The concept is expressed in various ways by various people, but without it relapse is usually just a matter of time.

I mention these because these are a few of the traits exhibited by those addicts I know that seem to have fared the best in their recovery efforts. The best examples known to me personally have been clients of intensive rehab processes lasting six months or more. Those treatments involved military style discipline, continuous group therapy and intense religious study and orientation (mainly Christian). Some of these rehab options would easily fit the classification of voluntary brainwashing. So, to see the same attitudes expressed sincerely, with conviction and without any leading questions on my part, after a 36 hour treatment and outpatient counselling was quite remarkable to me.

Afterwards, Simon gave me what he called a “booster” dose of Iboga root bark (about a teaspoon), a small dose normally administered a few times after or before the therapeutic dose just to give me an idea of what it felt like. His advice was to wait until I had eight hours or so to be by myself uninterrupted. I ignored it.

I arrived home after the interview at about 11pm. I knew I had plenty of work to do the next day and that it would be best to postpone the whole thing till the next weekend. Instead I swallowed it immediately and lay down on my bed with the lights dimmed. It was an impulsive and wasteful thing to do as I would discover later.

It had been more than a decade since I had emerged from the drug taking circles that had seen my friends become addicts and I had steadfastly avoided hard drugs and hallucinogenic substances of any kind. Despite the assurances that the tiny dose should be quite safe I felt a little nervous. Of course, I had read extensively about Ibogaine as part of my research for the article and was familiar with the reported pattern of subjective experiences the compound seemed to produce in users. There can admittedly then be some chance of “pre-suggestion” but the specifics seem too consistent to me to be the product of a random “filling in the blanks” by some unconscious mental process.

In the first phase I experienced little of the visual distortions reported by users and only a mild stimulant effect and unmistakable symptoms of photosensitivity. I did also, very distinctly and clearly, hear the often reported “buzzing” or “static” sound effects that seem to be found in any detailed account of the experience.

A few hours after first taking the dose, I entered what is referred to as the “waking REM” state. If I closed my eyes I had the impression I was wandering through a series of endless corridors amid vague humanoid shapes who failed to respond to anything I did. The “vision” in this case was very indistinct and after an hour or so I was feeling quite bored actually and wished I could sleep it off, but the Ibogaine simply wouldn’t let me.

As time past, the visuals gradually grew more detailed and gained depth. There were packs of black dogs or wolves that circled me, geometric shapes, strange topographies that swirled around me like the relief lines of a computer generated map. These were all vaguely pleasant to experience but I hadn’t taken the Ibogaine to watch pretty lights inside my eyelids.

Again I started to grow impatient, at which point I was confronted by what seemed to be an enormous black dog. It’s a bit hard to convey the unsettling feeling I was experiencing but the animal seemed to look directly into me. It felt as if the dog was presenting me with a mind image of how others perceive me in a vision of extreme clarity. There were some personal details but in essence the dog showed me that I was a nerd, a reasonably nice guy who masked his social inadequacies behind various forms of pop culture fandom like comics and sci-fi.

I realise the above might seem somewhat trivial but to me it was startling. I had never actually thought of myself in such a way and the vision had the weight of intense authenticity about it and simply couldn’t be argued away by any means. It was like looking in a mirror.

Shortly after that I had a crystal clear vision of what I “knew” to be a strand of DNA in my lung tissue. The helix was looking ragged and worn and I watched as it started to unravel. I have a twenty cigarette a day nicotine habit, so this was unpleasant to watch.

The dog then went on to reprimand me for my irresponsible behaviour in taking the Ibogaine in the circumstances I had. Over and over again it made me realise that I had acted impulsively and foolishly, occasionally pointing out some other fine examples from other areas in my life. Thankfully, this lesson slowly reduced in intensity.

The mild stimulant effect persisted for some time as did some even milder visuals but the dog and the DNA were obviously the peak of the experience and shortly after that I fell asleep.

Apart from the predicted disruption of my sleep pattern there is very little change in my life that I can attribute with certainty to the Ibogaine. I did immediately discontinue taking a course of SSRI type anti-depressants I had started some two weeks before. Though doctors always recommend a tapering reduction in these kinds of medication I experienced no ill-effects and no return of depression symptoms. I still smoke around a pack day.

I stress again, I am not involved in substance abuse treatment or organisations in any formal way. I am merely a person who happens to know a lot of addicts and have developed an interest in the issues affecting the people around me.

In my non-expert opinion, the individuals I met are effectively more drug free than the bulk of the population who mask their own drug use under various guises such as “social drinking”. The Ibogaine experience itself followed the general pattern as described in many other accounts. I can easily accept claims of profoundly life changing subjective effects at therapeutic doses.

In the absence of any objective measure of treatment failure and success rates

Ngonde Tours

Ngonde Tours was a response to requests for information on experiencing Iboga in its traditional setting. Although initiation is not directly mentioned and there are other points of interest to add to the experience its all involving the same people. One of the main ideas was that the villagers benafit directly and not a single body or indervidual. So if you are interested in experiencing the tradition of iboga or would just like to visit one of the last remaining edens on earth; here is the oppertuninty. Thanks to Paul "Mikodio" Mombey-Indaki for putting this together.

Bwekaye! Aie! Basse!

An Introduction To Iboga

After meeting with a group recently it was decided to take the next step and introduce Iboga in a low dose regimen. I will be posting information here if everyone is in agreement and will also in future post on upcoming events as things progress.

The first introduction is being planned to happen in Pretoria and this will be the first group session; so we will see what works and what can be added; so its a sort of pilot project.

The idea is to experience a low dose of the root bark for psycho-therapeutic purposes while Bwiti music is played in a comfortable environment.

Iboga Association Cape Town

Welcome;

This is a blog which is intended to act as a means to information and also where people interested in iboga or Bwiti can come to find information; ask questions and organise group sessions or workshops.

This is where you can have your say and also give us some feedback or advice.

Thanks for your interest...