Basket Case

For this bonus episode, NK and Imani talk about navigating conflict, accountability, and grace for ourselves and the people we’re in community with. Transcript  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Western science gives us names for the things that we know – the things that we can see and feel and touch. But it’s always been skeptical of the things we can’t measure. This skepticism dates back to Europeans’ first contact with indigenous cultures in Asia, Africa, and the Americas, and the unfamiliar medicine that they found there. Today in the west, those healing modalities are often still characterized as “alternative.”  Mexico City-based integrative psychiatrist Dr. Carmen Amezcua is passionate about psychedelic plant medicine – treatments that are still stigmatized and misunderstood, even though they’ve been shown to be effective at treating depression, anxiety, and PTSD. But she prefers to describe her treatments as complementary, not “alternative.”  In this episode, somatics coach Holiday Simmons says somatics can help us reconnect to our intuition – the knowledge of our ancestors. Dr. Carmen Amezcua says western psychiatry doesn’t get to the root of our issues. And both say that ceremony is how we connect with ourselves, with nature, with our pasts, and with each other.  Transcript LINKS Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer Southern Soul Wellness: https://southernsoulwellness.com/  Dr. Carmen Amezcua: https://carmenamezcua.com/ This Is What Ayahuasca Does To Your Brain  Psychedelics, the Law and Politics - UC Berkeley BCSP  Psychedelics and Neural Plasticity: Therapeutic Implications - PMC)  ‘Authentic’ ayahuasca rituals sought by tourists often ignore Indigenous practices and spiritual grounding  Magic Mushrooms Are Most-Used Psychedelic Drug; As States Change Laws, Federal Policymakers Face Urgent Questions | RAND See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Even though NK doesn’t live with the voice of constant criticism anymore, there’s still a lingering feeling that stands between her and her authentic self…or selves. In this episode she talks to social anxiety expert Dr. Aziz Gazipura about disrupting that pattern of social anxiety and learning to do something else.  Dr. Aziz Gazipura is the author of the books The Solution To Social Anxiety and Not Nice, and the founder of the Center For Social Confidence. TranscriptSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

NK attends a workshop on divesting from people pleasing & begins to unravel a lifetime of grief and rage. TranscriptSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When Sal moved from California to a small town in the Pacific Northwest, they didn't know anyone. The solitude didn’t bother them…at first. But after their attempts at making new friends left them feeling confused, then rejected, then frustrated, their solitude turned into loneliness. In this episode, Dr. Ellen Lee explains how loneliness is a social condition. Dr. Marisa G. Franco talks about the science of making friends (and the romance of queer friendship), and Jasmine Ostendorf-Rodriguez shows us what we can learn from fungi about building community in times of crisis. Transcript Links:  The Professional-Managerial Class w/ Catherine Liu | Jacobin Show  White Supremacy Culture Worksheet from White Supremacy Culture   Platonic: How The Science of Attachment Can Help You Make – and Keep – Friends by Dr. Marisa G. Franco Let’s Become Fungal! by Jasmine Ostendorf-RodriguezSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.