Our time on Earth is an experiment: everything is provided for us not just physically, but also emotionally. But – we are also here with an EGO – what are we going to do with that? Entrepreneur Jesse van der Velde shares insights from his path in sacred plant medicine and how it has influenced his path of becoming – as a person and entrepreneur.
- What is your life’s work about?
- How are you going to walk this planet?
- What is your life’s work a reflection of?
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Experiment
We are born on this spaceship planet earth – we call her our Mother for this reason. We have a choice in how we live on this planet, and many of us are conditioned to live in a certain way. But there isn’t just one way to live this experiment, as we can see when looking at different cultures around the world. My path with sacred plant medicine helped me to understand that our time on Earth is truly an experiment. But the question is: “How do we walk this Earth?”
The Whole is More Important
The Q’ero Nations of Peru say “Alluy yani” – which means, “How are we?” They don’t ask each other: “How are you?” They ask each other: “How are we?” Because their core principle is called “Ayni,” which means reciprocity. Ayni means that everything on this earth is one harmony with each other. “Alluy yani” means “How are we?” because I can’t be well if you are not well. Because You and I are one.
Taking it a step further – it means I can’t be well if our Mother Earth isn’t well because we depend on our Mother Earth for our survival. It means seeing wellness and health as a whole. It means seeing ourselves as humans that are part of this bigger harmony where the whole is more important than the individual.
But this concept isn’t always obvious to us in the West, especially as we are conditioned by our culture.
Conditioned by Culture
We are born on this spaceship Planet Earth – we call her our Mother for this reason. We are taught by our culture and family that we need to take care of ourselves – that it’s a hard, harsh world and that no one will take care of you. We are taught that you have to take care of yourself and do your own thing – independently.
The way we live in the Western world is truly a reflection of that idea. Think about it: we would rather buy a pair of rare, $2,000 sneakers – like the new Dior x Nike Air Jordan 1 – than we would give that money to a charity. For the same amount that you can spend on a pair of these shoes, you can donate to Operation Underground Railroad (a charity that I support) and save a child from sex slavery.
There is a big difference between trying to carry the world on your shoulders and carrying the responsibility. You never have to carry that on your shoulders, but it is a choice we all have to find the joy in truly contributing.
So the question becomes: “How do we walk this Earth?”
Plant Medicine Gateways
How do we walk this Earth? With what idea do we walk this Earth?
To me, Earth is truly an experiment and I came to see this a few years ago when my shaman mentor came to visit me for my birthday. He brought me a rare “plant medicine” to guide me on a ceremony of self-discovery.
These sacred plant medicines are like the greatest secret of this Earth – a secret gateway to another place, if used moderately in a sacred setting where it is used with an intention of healing and self-discovery. Plant medicines are different from a drug.
Drugs are taken to escape our reality and flee from our current life situation – the situation that we don’t like. So we seek refuge in drugs as a temporary escape.
But plant medicine is taken with the intention of facing what is real; of looking within at ourselves with the intention of healing.
My shaman mentor had decided to bring me one of the sacred medicines – not from a plant, but a frog. The medicine, called Bufo, comes from the Bufo Alvarius Toad.
Bufo contains DMT, the spirit molecule that is also found in Ayahuasca, and a MAO-inhibitor which essentially inhibits the breakdown of DMT.
When we drink Ayahuasca, we are able to travel to other worlds and consciousness to travel into our own life – into our own soul and see how our life is a reflection of what lives inside of us. Ayahuasca guides us in seeing the stories and identities we’ve been living.
Ayahuasca is also a purge – you throw up to get rid of negative energies or entities.
But Bufo is different – you smoke the dried milk of the frog and you instantly leave your body – it is a brief out-of-body experience.
When my shaman mentor came for my birthday, he brought Bufo for me to take my second time. I had smoked it once before, but the first time I was a little bit anxious and wasn’t able to truly inhale the medicine.
But this time, I was ready for it and I inhaled every single breath of that medicine that I could.
I laid down and left my body, entering into a beautiful field of consciousness.
A voice asked me, “Jesse, what do you want?”
My first answer was: “I want to be in here for an hour,” because usually Bufo is 15-20 minutes and you return to your body. It felt so good that I didn’t want it to end.
And then the voice said, “What’s your question?”
My question came out of the blue: “Why are we here?”
And then, the answers started to come to me. “They” – or my spirit guides who speak telepathically when I enter a plant medicine – they said to me: “Earth is an experiment.”
Earth is an Experiment
My spirit guides explained to me that our time on Earth is an experiment. Souls come down to Earth to this beautiful place where everything is provided for – a true Garden of Eden. We walk on this beautiful planet and everything is provided to us: the fire, the water, the materials for clothing and shelter; all the medicine; our food is our first medicine. The medicine for our emotional and spiritual healing – to reconnect with the worlds where we truly come from. The medicine to help us remember who we are while we are here.
We come down in a physical body not knowing who we are, not knowing where we come from – this is the greatest mystery of humanity. For ages and ages, humanity has been seeking this answer.
This answer can be found while we are here on this planet – this answer is provided to us, a hidden secret of the Earth.
My spirit guides also said to me Earth is an experiment also because everything is provided here – not just physically, but also emotionally. All emotions are provided: love, creativity, joy, gratitude, sexuality – everything is here. But, we also have an EGO.
Good luck with that, right?! All emotions are provided for, but you also have an ego. An ego that is afraid to be seen; afraid to be heard; afraid to not be enough; afraid to feel. An ego that needs certainty; that needs recognition – this ego creates a duality in our existence.
Duality
Because all that we need physically and emotionally is provided for, and because we are also given an ego in contrast – this creates a duality that means: Earth is an experiment.
The presence of our ego means we are constantly facing the duality of choice in everything that we do. What are you going to do with that?
How are you going to deal with your ego that is afraid to not be enough, and therefore always looking for more so we can fulfill that emptiness that lives inside of ourselves?
While you are here on Earth, what is your life’s work about? How are you going to walk this planet?
What is your life’s work a reflection of?
- Is it secretly a reflection of your ego? Of a fear that lives inside of you? Of that which you couldn’t fulfill in yourself? Therefore you were always striving for more and more – looking to achieve more?
- Or: is your life’s work a reflection of love? From what place inside of you are you living and breathing and walking this planet? That is the experiment.
Living in Love
The Bufo medicine also showed me how different people on Earth choose a different reality because our time on Earth is an Experiment: some people around the world choose differently.
For instance, in South America, they showed me that most people live from that place of love – especially the native tribes living the old ways.
They live in love and in joy. They live in a community.
Unfortunately, so much of Western culture prioritizes control, winning, and achieving – on fulfilling the ego.
My question for the medicine guides became: Why aren’t people who live in love helping the other people who aren’t living in love; the people who live in fear and control?
Their answer was: If you live in love, there is nothing to solve. There is nothing to change. Life, in the end, is love. If you are looking to change someone, you must ask yourself WHY.
Why are you looking to change someone?
Because in the end, changing that person is something that you want: you want them differently and you want to provide that change. Why do you want that?
What is Your Experiment?
From what place inside of you are you living?
These are times of great change – of a great awakening of humanity finding the connection within and remembering who they truly are. Never have I seen so many great and beautiful initiatives around spirituality and healing – from cacao ceremonies to full moon ceremonies; from holistic rituals to sweat lodges; from vision quests to yoga; from meditation to simple silence.
We are coming to peace with ourselves.
From what place, what will grow? What will change?
What does this mean for you?
- From what place inside of yourself have you been living?
- What is your current life a reflection of? Of ego or love?
Can you see your own part in this big experiment that Earth is? How do you view that? This is completely up to you – it’s your choice. Life is a process of creation and our time on Earth is an experiment. You choose what it is that you’d like to create.