Former Blackhawk pilot Ian Benouis will share his experiences of war, the pharmaceutical industry, using natural medicine and psychedelics to heal trauma, and his advocacy for more sensible drug policy.
Category: Suicide
The Inaugural Los Angeles Psychedelic Science Symposium was held June 22-23, 2018 at the UCLA Ackerman Grand Ballroom.
Nisha Money, MD was the moderator and Ian Benouis, Matt Kahl and Brooke and Michael Cooley were on the panel.
As part of the team (I’m credited with hospitality and moral support) that helped in the creation of the movie From Shock to Awe I was invited to participate in the film’s premiere at the Illuminate Film Festival where it received an Honorable Mention for Social Impact in the category of Debut Feature Competition Jury Prize and it received the Mangurama Award for Conscious Documentary Storytelling.
Viceland just posted a video excerpt with subtitles of our protesting the VA’s policies around medical cannabis originally taken from the video Stoned Vets on Weediquette.
In this episode my guest is Ian Benouis who is a West Point graduate, former Blackhawk helicopter pilot, US Army officer and combat veteran who participated in Operation Just Cause in the Republic of Panama. He is an activist for the beneficial use of plant medicine, especially for veterans with PTSD. Ian is also a Muslim and a psychonaut.
Finding healing for his own traumas through working with plant medicines, such as Cannabis, Ayahuasca, Ibogaine, and 5MEO-DMT, Ian now spends much of his time advocating for the rights of veterans to heal from PTSD through the use of these natural remedies.
Very few people have such an interesting story as Ian Benouis. As for being relevant to the plant medicine sphere, Ian’s life experience is about as diverse at it can get.
From Blackhawk helicopter pilot fighting against drug cartels in Panama to a representative of the disastrous prescription drug epidemic to a supporter of the psychedelic medicine movement, Ian’s story is sure to both entertain and educate.
In this episode, Daniel and Ian discuss Ian’s life story, how it all comes together to make an impact on the veteran suicide and addictions crisis in the USA, and some philosophical questions on war, culture and the so-called war on drugs. Tune in and enjoy!
“Yeah, let’s transition from the bullet war to the meme war. I’ve been really moved by the responses from the Soldiers of the Vine screenings. I’m like “Wow, I built a field of dreams, and people actually showed up!” People are getting whatever they need out of it, versus our own self criticisms about what could have been better. That’s the real amazing thing about it. Share the message with people, and people will self-organize and self-activate. There’s no cult, there’s no dogma, it’s just spreading the love of healing and then people will naturally do whatever it is they feel they were created to do.
I think ultimately these plant medicines are psychic mirrors: they give the opportunity for greater self-reflection. Used ceremonially together, you get an intensification from all those spheres online together, mirroring each other. We all need to shut up and take our medicine and do our work. My personal belief is that the universe is a superorganism that makes up a mirror for the divine, where the ego is a construct that creates the illusion of separateness so that we have a game to play, and it’s the best game ever.
And that’s our potential salvation, and how our planet is getting hooked up into an electronically supported superorganism platform for communication. I think we’re trying to all connect each other up to heal ourselves, to unify as a planet, and then on to whatever’s supposed to be next. I don’t know what that is any more than the next person, but I have an open heart and open arms and trust that the universe knows what it’s doing.”
“It’s so important to ask “What are the reintegration resources for these people doing these particular medicines?” If you can’t answer that question, then you sort of have a problem. That’s like saying, I’m going to take all these people, give these great life sermons, but have no plans or way to inculcate them into their life. So, what’s the point? It’s like seeing a cool movie- it feels good and it’s entertaining, but yeah your psychedelic experience is only as good as your amount to integrate.
To me, it’s the metaphor of the tree and the fruit: nobody cares how many ayahuasca ceremonies the tree has been to, or what its spiritual practice is, you just care about the fruit. Does the fruit taste sweet?
I love these metaphors, and through my healing work I now understand the power of parables. Because on these medicines that’s what you get: those are the gifts, especially on ayahuasca. It’s a picture, a song, some kind of symbol, or an abstract concept that has meaning to you that you can take back because it’s a concept. You can’t necessarily take back the 15-minute action sequence, that’s kinda hard.”
This episode was a lot of fun and included Ryan LeCompte, Ian Benouis and Matthew Kahl. All three of these gentlemen have worked together on multiple fronts helping the Veteran community.
Ian Benouis 