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I just got back home, hot , humid, green, Pacific in the front yard home. Another journey to the Dreaming capital of the West Coast, Los Angeles. I had a meeting with an all-time great film producer, Jon Peters and my friend Bob Waldman. Dreaming up new deals, I love it.

While I was there, I got to stop by the Interventionists Conference at The Lowes Hotel in Santa Monica. I know the Lowes well. We hosted our SPIRIT RECOVERY Conference there a couple years back and it's also where our family holed up during last year's Malibu fires. Half of Malibu seemed to be living at The Lowes for a few days during those fires. High-end refugees for sure.

While I was at The Lowes this time, I got to see a bunch of people I hadn't seen for over a year. The conference was a gathering of the business people of the Mental Health Addictions treatment world. World-class characters who'd found a day job helping others help themselves. I've lived the last 10 years close to that world and that community of people. The Ranch's CEO, Miles Adcox, was there with Ryan Martin, our master intake director.

Walking in the exhibit hall felt like a new experience. With hundreds of people all talking, either to each other or on their cell phones or both, there was a dull roar ringing through the building. As I looked around I realized I was completely detached. It was great seeing The Ranch exhibit and Miles and Ryan but for the first time in my 12 year relationship with whatever the word Recovery means I was not affected by the scene at all.

This was cool, to be walking through a situation that for years would get me all jacked up and to have no reaction at all was freedom. Saying hello to people I've known or worked with over the last few years in California was great and I had no agenda or need for anything from anyone. I talked to who I wanted, not to who I felt like I should talk to. It didn't matter who they worked for, or how much business they were doing with us, or anything else. I didn't care, it was just good to see some of the faces.

After an hour I met up with Keith Arnold, an old friend that dedicated many years to Sierra Tucson the treatment program in Arizona that I had checked myself into 11 years before. I always respected Keith and on several occasions tried to figure out how I might get him to go to work with The Ranch. He's a good guy and a smart operator.

Keith and I walked outside and sat on the boardwalk that runs from Venice Beach to Pacific Palisades and talked about the reality of the Recovery world, and what we'd seen over the years and what we were seeing now as opportunities to create a better opportunity for the people trying to help themselves, and how we could contribute to that. This was not a conversation based on bottom line or business deals...none of that stuff. This was two men who know that reality is really just beyond what we call home here on Earth and that doing our best is what we live for today.

Several years before, on one of my visits back to Tucson, I had invited Keith to a Sweat Lodge Ceremony and he'd accepted with great enthusiasm. That was his first sweat and the beginning of his relationship with the Great Mystery of Life's magic. Before we headed back up to the bustle of the conference he said he was going to be with our old friend Albert Sombrero, a Dine' healer and an all around funny human on Saturday at a Ceremony.

So there it was, one of those big circles in life passing through the two of us on the beach in Santa Monica. What had been set in motion in the Sweat lodge in Tucson years before, was still evolving and coming back around through us and we were checking in between rounds. If you know what I'm talking about, that great circle of integrity that flows around and through us all the time but only gets snapshots of recognition in this world today, then you must smile at it all like I'm doing now.

It was great to check in Bob, Keith, Miles and Ryan and all the rest...we are doing it.

In a few minutes my little girls' friends and their families are coming over to our house so we can walk down the beach and watch a big hatch of baby sea turtles set free in the surf for the first time. I'm gonna take my long board so we can paddle out as they swim for the horizon. All of us and those little turtles making another one of those great circles of life that when you catch them in motion makes everything around you feel like magic. It is good to be back home, in this body, in this world , in this life. Peace be with you , Lee

The Sound of The Eboga

A week ago I joined some friends who work with addicts here in Mexico to experience an ancient ceremony that involves the African plant Eboga. They use this power plant to detox Alcoholics,and drug addicts while also eliminating almost all withdrawal symptoms. It is quite amazing to witness after having watched people detox in the U.S., that this ancient African plant eliminates the need for all the meds that the U.S.detox protocols put people on.

I wasn't there to detox. I was there to have a first-hand experience with the Ibogaine so that I could say that I've done it and......This is how I do research and development. When I was invited to my first sweat lodge 10 years ago I said yes because what I had experienced as "recovery" was just not that interesting, and it seemed to me that recreating your life should be a bigger experience than what I had been offered through traditional channels. The same has been true with many experiences over the years. If something feels to me like it holds potential to support people reconnecting with their authenticity, then I jump in personally.

Recovery is simply a doorway to being who we are underneath all the stuff we've come to believe about our self and all attachments, stories, expectations and fears that keep us looking outside of ourselves for what only exists within. To be with the Ibogaine was another opportunity to learn about pathways back to me.

As the drug in the plant began to take effect I heard a buzzing sound, a big buzzing sound that was louder than the soft music that was playing or the ceiling fan whirring. I asked Brian, a nurse that was there to support those who were doing the Ibogaine, what that sound was. He couldn't hear it. Ok so I'm hearing this buzzing like a giant insect sound, Brian looked at me and said the spirit of the plant is coming to you, that's the sound of the Eboga.

During the next 6 hours I had a very deep intense experience with this spirit plant that showed me something amazing. As I lay on the bed watching my mind like you'd watch a T.V. screen, I realized that each thought I had would move like a drop of water toward the screen. As the drop touched the screen there was a ripple effect through the entire field of the mind and then the energy would move beyond the mind to the energy field of the world, creation. I could see the quality of each thought and the subsequent form that would begin to take shape from the impact of the thought on the force field of the mind and then the world. Every thought, no matter how insignificant I may believe it to be, moved through this same process and every thought impacted my mind and the creation around me. With awareness I began to think different types of thoughts, thoughts of fear, love, questions, doubts etc..all of them had impact and all of them took form within the energy of the mind and rippled out through the creation.

So what does all this mean? Well for me it was a big time wake-up call that everything I bring into thought and send out through my mind and into the world becomes a part of the whole creation that we call reality. If I'm angry, afraid, lustful, loving, joyful, expectant, whatever, the thoughts I give power to (and if I follow a thought through I have given it power), they all are woven into this matrix we live in everyday that we call the world. A typical person on a typical day has no awareness at all of all the seemingly unimportant thoughts that they give birth and power too. We think if we don't act on our odd thoughts then nothing happens. That is not true. Creation is a giant soup pot and we are all adding our two cents with every thought and feeling that passes through us.

I don't expect to all of a sudden think only nice things. That won't happen. What I will do is take responsibility for what I am bringing into the world and be way more mindful of where I put my attention. If I keep my attention away from situations that cause me to react in frustration or anxiety, like watching all the insanity that we call news, then I won't be feeding the continuation of this dream of hell on earth that we've become so familiar with that we call it normal.

Earlier I said I wasn't detoxing when I took the ibogaine, that's not entirely true either. I am detoxing. I'm doing my best to detox from the automatic opinions and reactions that go on in this mind of mine if I leave it untended to. I had an amazing experience, and it for sure was not some groovy acid trip. It was a reality shaking wake-up call that I am grateful for.

Recovery is a big deal and when it gets real it goes way beyond socially acceptable guidelines and norms. In fact if recovery were to be of absolute integrity then those who recover would most likely be outcasts from society much like Jesus and Buddha were. It is all a choice and for me there's no choice at all. I'm all in...deal....

Walking Together

We were out of bed at 6 a.m. This was our first Independencia in Mexico—Fourth of July, South of the Border. The morning was overcast so it wasn't too hot. Mee, Lola, Bella and I were headed to San Fransisco {San Pauncho} to walk in the Village Parade. We ate some killer tamales that Lupita's mom made (Lupita is the 16-year-old who takes care of Lola during the weekdays so Mee and I can work a bit), drank a shot of local coffee and off we went.

We were the first family from Bella's Escuela del Mundo to make it to the starting point.Our good friend Gina was also along to support her Mexico's Independence Celebration. By 9:30 the crowd had arrived and we were off to the plaza in the center of the pueblo.

Bella was so proud to be a part of this celebration. I think she must have absorbed some of my love for Mexico. Lola of course was not to be out done so she squeezed into Bella's school group, all two feet of her, and marched along beside Bella toward the sea.

As we walked, the sidewalks and empty lots were filled with the smiling faces of the people of San Pauncho. This was Independence Day with waving flags and food on the streets. The Mexican people are very connected to the dream of Independence. They are proud and still dress with that pride. Mexico has a living connection to the freedom that Independence Day stands for. “VIVA MEXICO, VIVA MEXICO.....”

At the end of the line we stood around the plaza while the kids from the other two schools in San Pauncho recited Patriotic messages and honored their cultural hero's. With the last “Viva Mexico” the group broke into a great street party eating Tacos and Cerviche, drinking Jamaica water and Horchata. While all this was going on the best dressed Queen was chosen from all the kids and she was great, a true Mexican Princessa.

There's a simplicity to life here that I seem to remember from when I was a kid, before I had so many expectations and opinions of what and how everything was "supposed " to be. Everything that happens is not a big production with all the official stuff so thick it overwhelms the fun and simple celebration.

Watching the news the last few days I wonder if the USA isn't headed back to a more simple, genuine life style than what we've aspired to in the last 30 years. It's easy to see where so much faith invested in money, greed and personal wealth as a God, has hit the wall. So the house comes down, like all the kings horses and all the kings men. Can the yahoos in D.C. put it all back together again? I hope not.

I lived a lie for a number of years. Of course at the time I had no idea that's what I was doing, and it was. After the humility and reality of dealing with my delusions and misdirected loyalties, I know today that it took a lot of misery to get me to step back and let go of trying to hold it all together.

I hear President Bush say the economy is still strong, What the fuck is the matter with him? Could he possibly be that stupid? Or is he just such a self absorbed liar that he is incapable of seeing the truth all around him. I say these things not as a finger pointer but as one who has been there myself. Thank God I wasn't President of The United States at that time.

So what do we do now America? Can we get simple and bring our attention back to family and community? Or are we so far gone that we won't let go of demanding that what we think we want we deserve, regardless of how not it's going to happen.

I've watched a lot of addicts not be able to just stop it and let go and most of them are dead now...I think a lot of them never realized that they had a choice, not really. They were just so wired to run on their automatic pilot that no amount of sirens and lights or pain and suffering could get their attention for long.

Where we're at with all this, time will tell, cuse the times they are a changin'.....Vaya con Dios...Lee

A Brave Little Girl

She's my Bella. Her Mom calls her "her" Bella ,that's ok cuse we know she's really my Bella. I can't imagine knowing Love with out my little girls to be it, all the time, all around me.Alexis is 25 now, Anastasia is 21, Bella is 6 and Lola is 2. Too me they are all My girls.
This last week I've seen how the feelings of a child are never "wrong" or "bad". A childs' feelings are the truth of how they feel. Bella started Kindergarden/ first grade in the neighboring village of San Fransisco [San Pauncho] last week when we returned from Los Angeles.
As i watched and listened to both Bella and her mom talk about her experience in this little Mexican Montessori School I was amazed at how honest and open Bella was.You see her school is very small 8 or 9 other kids in her class and it is about the real necessities for education because that's what they have to work with. On her first day we stood outside her class room and watched a wild turkey walk past the little building. I grew up in the woods of Florida, before it was all torn down and built on and spent hours watching wild turkeys so this was a sign for me that we were back in a place where life was not under the totalitarian control of the present culture. In fact somebody here will eat that bird like we used to do.
Bella was loving it. Everything was new and scary and bigger than life. Then she looked at me and asked if she would be ok here in this jungle school. "Oh Bell Bell you'll be great" I said " It will take a little time to get used to everything and make new friends and you will". So she went to school for the first day.
Bella speaks a little Spanish , not much and her school was total immersion, all Spanish, although a couple of the teachers speak perfect English. The first day went ok. The second day was tough. After school Bella cried and said she didn't understand anything that was going on and none of the kids played with her, she was all alone all day.Mee and I were so bummed. What were we doing? Bella is a brilliant little girl in every way and she was so sad.We talked and said to try for this one week and we'd see how it goes. Bella looked at us and said "ok, I'll try my best". My old teacher Miguel Ruiz would have been inspired by her willingness, honesty and courage.She's never read "The Four Agreements" and she is them.
While she was at school the next day I was looking at houses on line in Tennessee and Malibu expecting to need to move back to the U.S. sooner than later. The next day was ok. Then we had a meeting with the Director of the school and said that Bella was feeling left out and lonely and could they help.Of course they said they would do what they could but this was Mexico and Spanish is their language. Boy did I get it in so many ways. I flashed on the millions of non-English speaking kids that come to the U.S. and have to figure it out on their own because in the U.S. English is the official language.
So I did what I do and asked some questions about how, if the school was interested, we might support the non-Spanish speaking kids so they can feel a part of and learn with more ease and less stress.It became about the ones the school is there for, the children. Before two more days had passed Bella had been asked to sit in a circle with her class mates and tell them how she felt, through an interpreter. She's just Six years old and she told them she was afraid and lonely and felt left out. She was honest and sincere and it wasn't anybodies fault, it was what it was. By the time they were done Bella had another bilingual student that would sit with her and help her understand the teaching and two other little girls asked her to join their club.I don't know if I could have done that with such sweet integrity. There was no blame and no good or bad. There was just the truth and the truth brought the best out in everyone involved.
Because of Bella's courage the school saw that the non Spanish speaking kids would benefit from more support.The kids all heard how it feels to be new and different and they brought her into their lives as one of their own, and she is, really, another kid in this gigantic world.Mee and I were totally humbled by the love and courage of our baby and I got to step up and help with bringing another bilingual teacher into the Eschula del Mundo School of San Pauncho, Nayarit, Mexico.
There was never anybody wrong or bad, there was never any blame or even a victim. What there was, was a group of people seeing the truth that a school is a place for Children to learn how to read, write, communicate, share, learn and love. There was no Political agenda or adult driven opinions and craziness. In this little jungle school, in one of the poorest states in Mexico, a group of humans made the world a better place by not losing sight of the importance of simply taking care of our babies.
I came away so proud of my wife and her getting in there with Bella to see how she really was doing and also with the beautiful staff at the school for doing what all teachers get into the profession for, they made the children the priority.
I also had flashes of all my daughters and all I've witnessed in their lives and how brave and honest they all have tried to be , even when I couldn't hear that kind of honesty.I can hear it today and I can feel it and I thank the creator for showing so much Love and light through the eyes of the children.
Tomorrow's a new day and there will be more stuff that has to be delt with and for my family that will be whatever it is and we will do it together.
Peace Be With You, Lee