The visually impaired persons, and the elephant

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

I've been fascinated lately with the parable of the blind men and the elephant, which I am charmed to find has instances from many cultures, some linked from the address crediting the illustration.

Nutshell: they all grab a different part, and assume they've grasped the whole, and know the elephant only from their limited perspective. So far, so good. The parable's lesson depends on us knowing that there is an elephant, and from our superior perspective, these silly blind men are clearly making an elementary mistake, a sort of synecdotal fallacy, the part not merely standing for the whole, but mistaken for the whole.

Good lesson for kids, and those still completing various chores of intellectual development. Careful, you may not have seen the big picture.

But I'm coming to think this is just the rez-de-chaussée of the parable, the ground floor, and that there may be many floors above. How's this for the premier étage? What if we—scientists, shamans, seekers of many stripes—come upon something in the wild, something new? Or, equally, what if we are striving to find something old, that has been lost, and needs recovering? Is there an elephant, after all? Maybe no one living can see the whole. We can only know what we perceive, at best, or what we've been told to look for. When we want to infer, to reify, a never-seen whole, from many fragments of observation, do we ever know that there is a whole to be inferred? Or, shall we just go ahead and crowd-source that iffy reification, like the visually impaired persons of legend, call it pachyderm, and muddle through?

What am I talking about? At last Spring's excellent MAPS Conference in Oakland, many of the sessions spoke to, or danced around the question of psychedelic psychotherapy and what it might entail, and how to train—or entrain—the doughty healers who will risk life and livelihood to support something good happening with sacred medicines. But, who is an effective guide, and what do they do, and what do they know? 

Is there an elephant here, and if so, of what parts is it composed? Leo Zeff, the late pioneering therapist, whose story is told in a delightful book The Secret Chief: Revealed, expressed the ideal of doing nothing beyond holding a safe space in which the client (the seeker, the voyager, the psychonaut...) can just be and do what they need to, to unfold as the unique spirit they are. Love and acceptance may be all that is required of either party.

A couple of the presenters assumed that the ideal guide would be a psychologist or psychiatrist, specializing in this psychological treatment modality, and sufficiently experienced with the medicines of choice to conduct psychotherapy in this unusual manner. They made many convincing arguments about the knowledge and personal development required for a therapist to be effective. Large barriers to entry, in other words; years of work for the right few, to treat the ordinary psychological problems of ordinary subjects of late capital in the industrialized west.

Another presenter from a large hospital study laid out the protocol for their crash course in training doctors to administer Schedule One substances, an earnest attempt to prepare white smocks for hazardous duty. Might fly, but what a contrast with the psychiatrists who made it seem one must always be preparing—and might never be quite ready—for this work, personally or professionally.

Yet another presenter laid out a blend of indigenous wisdom and archetypal psychology that also bore the scent of a stern, patriarchal, religious worldview. The expansive, feminine medicine needs the constriction of masculine structure to be effective. You need to be saved as much as healed. Hard to see how this model can be generalized beyond the specific cultural context from which it arises. But, can any model?

I was also privileged to hear from a third generation ayahuasquero, whose family has been brewing yagé since long before the norteamericanos y europeanos started trampling the undergrowth in search of... a lot of things.* This cultural matrix starts to prepare their members early, to gradually use the medicine regularly, as part of their society's jungle-sourced, organic healthcare system, if you will. No science, but a lot of successful treatments, to hear this wise, kindly and unassuming man tell it. More generations on the way...

Many perspectives, many visions of the work. Do they add up to an elephant, or will there be merely various chimeras of recent provenance, or revenants of the old ways, wandering in search of their blind men?

* my list would include improved health, wisdom, cures for the incurable, spiritual enlightenment, bragging rights, psychological insight, purification, business opportunities, novelty, initiation, religious experience, recipes, social community, cultural perspective, teachers, inspiration, professional training, lovers, friends, shelter from the storm, home...