Alexander Beiner: Can Psychedelics Help Us Make Sense Of The World?, Episode 89, The Psychedelic Entrepreneur Podcast 
Alexander Beiner is an author and podcaster. He’s one of the founders of the media and events platform Rebel Wisdom and an executive director of Breaking Convention, Europe’s longest-running conference on psychedelic medicine and culture. His upcoming book ‘The Bigger Picture: How psychedelics can help us make sense of the world’ (Hay House, 2023) explores how psychedelics could transform culture and society. He has a particular interest on how psychedelic experiences can be applied to systems change and improving how we have conversations around difficult cultural topics. He has also covered psychedelic capitalism journalistically for a number of years, with a particular focus the ways in which economic and cultural incentive structures interact with the transformative potential of psychedelic medicines.
Trained as a counselor and meditation teacher, Alexander also runs retreats centered on combining practices drawn from cognitive science, the wisdom traditions and psychedelic philosophy to create powerful group experiences. He facilitates legal psychedelic retreats in the Netherlands in partnership with ‘Awaken the Medicine Within’, co-developed the UK’s leading men’s work process through Rebel Wisdom and has designed a number of popular online courses focused on sensemaking, embodiment and conversational practices. He has a particular interest in the phenomenology of the psychedelic experience and how we can combine ritual, practice and collective intelligence to expand consciousness in new ways.
In this episode, Alexander Beiner and Beth Weinstein discuss…
- Alexander’s first psychedelic experience and the immediate sense of homecoming he felt
- Alexander’s book-in-progress about how psychedelic experiences engage the same skills and insights that we need to make sense of this crazy world
- How humanity is on a collective “trip” which Alexander calls “The Big Crisis”
- The difference between “complicated” and “complex” problems
- How psychedelics give us a lived experience of complexity
- The internet as a “psychedelic” space
- Humanity’s problem as metaphysical rather than materials
- Alexander’s view that psychedelics used correctly are the most powerful tools available to support a paradigm shift for the planet
- Root causes of dysfunction in the world today
- Forces of entropy and extraction at play globally
- Thoughts on the evolution of psychedelic capitalism
- Cautions against either venture capitalist pharma or psychiatry holding the reigns of the psychedelic renaissance
- Real reciprocity: deeply tuning in to what is needed and to being in a relationship of true exchange
Alexander Beiner’s Links & Resources
Website ▶: http://alexanderbeiner.com
Instagram ▶: rebelwisdom.co.uk
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