Rebekah Senanayake (Bek) is a researcher investigating altered states of consciousness. She is currently working towards her Masters in Cross-cultural psychology and focuses on the similarities and differences in experiences of ego-dissolution with psychedelics, meditation, sensory deprivation (floating) and trance drumming. Her research interests were born in the Peruvian Amazon in 2015 where she lived and learned about ayahuasca and the other medicinal plants of the jungle. Since then, she has returned to the Amazon to conduct ethnographic research, working closely with local healers to understand the role of psychedelic states and medicinal plants in the landscape of Amazonia. Her Honours thesis was based on this fieldwork and explored the transmission of knowledge through plants (primarily ayahuasca). She currently has a weekly social media segment for the Chacruna Institute which focuses on experiences of ego-dissolution and has worked as a float tank specialist with over 200 hours of experience in the tanks.

 

The workshops will be a journey through time and across cultures to explore how altered states of consciousness are situated in our evolutionary landscape, touching on how senses of self are conceptualised in different cultural contexts and the role of ritual in this process. Specifically, they will explore how we have altered our senses of ‘self’ and how ego-dissolution has manifested in a range of historical and cultural points bringing us into contemporary scientific research on altered states in the present day.