We would like to invite you to share in our collective vision. The Temple of the Way of Light was born 10 years ago, out of an individual vision. Disenchanted with the western healthcare system’s inability to address the deep roots of chronic disease, trauma, and psycho-spiritual disconnection, the Temple’s founder Matthew traveled to the Amazon rainforest in search of deep healing.
Here in Peru he found an ancient medical tradition that provided him with the opportunity to dig deep into his own shadows. The vision for the Temple came to him in his first ayahuasca ceremony, and despite all rational considerations, he made a commitment to bring that vision to life.
That vision is at the heart of the Temple’s work, and in the past ten years has grown to live in the collective vision of all the people who make the Temple not just their place of work, but their home. And to commemorate the work of the past ten years, we want to share that vision with you, and invite you to be a part of what we’re up to. This is a calling to embark on a path of self-discovery, and along the way we will inevitably uproot, uncover and be forced to address the deep roots of our discontent.
Matthew’s story mirrors many of our stories: it is the archetypal journey of transformation that many people are choosing in these uncertain times. Here’s how it works: before we can allow a new vision of the world to emerge, we need to take care of our own wounds. Many of us are becoming conscious that, in order to grow, patching-up deep wounds or bypassing our own shadows is not an option anymore. This process is never pleasant, but it is the only way in which real, long lasting transformation can occur.
Over the last decade, the Temple has attracted thousands of brave soul warriors, people who are committed to doing the hard and painful work that is needed in order to heal, grow, and thrive. The Temple has also attracted people who have decided to stay in the jungle to be of service to each other, the plants, the rainforest, and Spirit. As a result of this, we have blossomed into a family of visionaries, revolutionaries, healers, big-hearted and talented facilitators and teachers, avant-garde therapists, and psychologists.
In January, we all converged at the Temple and underwent a staff training and collective visioning process like no other. With a focus on clearing the past in order to create a new kind of collaboration and opportunity, the community got together for two weeks of intensive learning, listening, and sharing. This culminated in a powerful and inspiring visioning session, where 25 members of our core community shared our deepest prayers and dreams for the future of the center.
Our vision has now evolved from the dream of one person, expanding into the synergistic sum of the dreams of many. This new vision emerges at a critical time in human history, a time when nothing short of a major paradigmatic revolution in the way we relate to each other and mother earth is needed in order for our species to survive.
We would like to invite all of our past and new guests to stand together with us for this new vision – for the Temple to become a living example of a true, holistic and intercultural healthcare system that has widespread social, environmental and spiritual impact.
A healthcare system that puts the best tools, practices and wisdom from the most powerful and time-honored traditions at the disposition of anyone in need. A healthcare system that acknowledges that each individual is embedded within families, communities, societies, cultures and ecosystems, and that personal healing implies also social, cultural and environmental health. A health system that is intrinsically embedded within reciprocal relationships. Through healing oneself, we are also healing everybody else.
More than anything, we invite you to stand together with us for self-transformation, the single most important act we can focus on as we collectively shift into a new vision of humanity. We recognize that the single most important thing we can do for our kin begins with our own self-transformation.
Working through our own personal programming, cultural conditioning and past traumas are indispensable in order to arrive to the point where can be of help to others. We are committed to continue to work on ourselves so that we can grow with the Temple. As we transform, the Temple also transforms, allowing us to keep improving the healing container that we lovingly provide for our guests.
Together, we have the capacity not only to imagine a new vision of the world, but to crystallize our collective intentions into the manifestation of a human culture that respects and embraces nature. A human society that recognizes and cherishes the interdependence between every living being and the environment that sustains us. A human society based on collaboration and reciprocity. A human society that is working in accord with nature in order to make this a healthy world for our children and the children of our children. We know this is possible.
Our Vision Declaration
1. We work with plant medicines to enable and empower human transformation.
Our love and passion for plant medicine is reflected in everything we do. Aware of its potential to catalyze life-changing awakenings, we facilitate and hold space for our guests’ transformation with integrity, compassion, and humility.
We understand that change always begins within us, then radiates outward. By catalyzing and supporting individual healing in ourselves and others, we stand for transformation on social, societal, and global levels.
2. We honor indigenous healing traditions.
The foundations of our work are the traditional healing systems and medicinal plants of the Amazon. We respect and honor indigenous worldviews and are full allies in the preservation of their medical systems, healing technologies, and shamanic practices.
Through intercultural dialogue we inspire new collaborations and understandings between East, West, North and South in the areas of human and planetary well-being.
The Temple is not part of the new-age movement, nor is it based on any religion. We are a secular, non-affiliated, spiritual community committed to deep healing and self-transformation.
3. Reciprocity is our core value.
We stand by the golden rule, the timeless and universal law of reciprocity, the ancestral Andean practice of Ayni. Found in all ancient systems of spirituality, philosophy, and religion: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” or the Mayan phrase “In Lak’ech Ala K’in,” or “I am you and you are me.”
This is the recognition that individuals and communities do not exist in isolation, but are woven into a net of interdependence that entails mutual respect and responsibility for the wellbeing of each other.
4. Our work represents a new paradigm for healing and healthcare.
The Temple is a safe, responsible, compassionate, and pioneering holistic healing center in the Amazon rainforest. We serve humanity, honoring the infinite diversity of human experience, and recognizing the unity of body, mind, and spirit.
Our work offers a solution to the modern epidemic of depression, anxiety, and stress, encouraging a radical revolution in our healthcare systems, and in the way society addresses mental illness and mental health.
We recognize trauma, in all its different manifestations, to be the leading cause of suffering in the majority of cases that we encounter. The resolution of trauma leads to completion, wholeness, and connection, and is the most significant mechanism for individual, social, and global transformation.
5. Our work includes the most effective tools and modalities.
We encourage cross-pollination between different healing traditions, collaborating with the keepers of ancestral knowledge. Like a mandala of diverse healing modalities with human transformation at its center, we incorporate the latest advances in neuroscience, psychoneuroimmunology, somatic therapies, attachment theory, and deep processing techniques with traditional medicine.
Amazonian plant medicine is complemented and enhanced by the most effective Eastern practices and Western tools for deep processing and integration.
By bridging ancient wisdom traditions with modern science, we contribute to a new paradigm of healing that acknowledges and honors the physical, psychological, emotional, energetic, and spiritual needs of humanity.
6. We set standards for powerful integration practices.
Integration—the process by which the benefits of shamanic healing and plant medicines are maximized and incorporated into one’s life through deep psychospiritual processing, dissolution of self-limiting patterns, forgiveness of false core beliefs, and ongoing self-awakening—is a central component of our work.
As such, we offer the most comprehensive and effective integration support system, both during our workshops and as long-term care services. We also innovate and promote highly effective integration practices, protocols, and standards for the global ayahuasca community.
7. We support research that legitimizes plant medicine healing.
We advocate for and advise in legitimizing plant medicine as a valid, respected, and legal health practice, and collaborate with the scientific, academic, and medical communities in that effort. We serve as a bridge between Western/scientific and Indigenous/traditional epistemologies.
We provide opportunities for students and professionals from all fields, from local and international institutions, to conduct fieldwork and research.
We support cognitive liberty, sovereignty over our own consciousness, and the birthright of humans all over the world to have access to the best tools and medicines available for healing and growth.
8. We are agents of change, in the Amazon and beyond.
The Temple is a nexus that attracts luminaries of all kinds and in all fields. We have a network of global change-makers, visionaries, spiritual leaders, and entrepreneurs who resonate with our vision and want to contribute to its full manifestation. We have global ambassador programs for former guests who carry the work that is being done here into the world.
We also have a global network of Temple clinics that includes a diverse network of satellite communities. People have access to plant-based shamanic and psychospiritual healthcare in every geographical location, socioeconomic status, and mobility situation.
9. We set standards in conscious and responsible business practices.
We are a role model for a new paradigm of conscious business. We epitomize a model where healthcare organizations operate considering a multiplicity of social and environmental benefits. We measure results by the social and environmental projects we inspire, the positive media attention it attracts, and the strength and breadth of the human network we create.
We stand for eco-social entrepreneurship, social responsibility, and ethical trade in regards to Amazonian plant medicine. We stand for sustainability in all levels of the ladder, to ensure the continuation of these traditions and the thriving of the Amazon Rainforest.
10. We offer diverse and accessible programming, and offer healing opportunities to those most in need.
We fund scholarships and create specialized programming for vulnerable and marginalized populations. We also stand for respect, autonomy, and self-determination for indigenous peoples everywhere. We offer our services to Amazonian Indigenous leaders and advocates, environmental, and Peruvian authorities and politicians engaged in intercultural dialogue.
We host North American Indigenous leaders and First Nations representatives, bridging not only East and West but also South and North.
11. We honor the Divine Feminine.
We seek to restore balance between the masculine and the feminine in the world. We empower all people to be full allies in honoring the divine feminine, so that individuals, communities, and societies treat themselves and others with equality. We see a global spiritual renaissance that is reawakening our connection to Mother Earth.
The reemergence of the divine feminine within ourselves reveals the qualities associated with our sentient planet offering a recalibration of values and relationships that can reshape our world through love, understanding, compassion, nurturing and empathy. We work with female healers, therapists, and teachers, and hold women’s retreats. We are a safe space for people who identify as belonging to marginalized populations.
12. We work in service.
We are here because we responded with a resounding “Yes!” to our calls to service: service to ourselves, each other, the plants, the world, and Spirit. We inspire others to heed their own calls for service in the world, recognizing that the most effective service is rooted in transforming one’s own consciousness.
We contribute to a cause that is beyond any of our individual selves. We co-create a project that will carry on past our own lifetimes. We are a movement we will be proud of in old age, looking back on lives of service, contribution, and purpose.
