After much thoughtful consideration we’ve made the decision to change our name! The organization formerly known as Center for Consciousness Medicine will now be called Gather Well Psychedelics – a home for healing arts & transformational learning. The new name reflects the shifts in our identity from this past year of inward reflection. A metamorphosis occurred that sent us feeling the call for a new name. It’s a way to honor the changes and pivots we are making as an organization, to celebrate the birthing of this new form. It truly feels as though we have undergone a transformation, one that will undoubtedly continue to unfold. There are different people guiding the organization, and new offerings that will be tailored to recent, emergent learnings. Some of the ways we aim to fulfill our mission of training guides have changed: even what a guide is has evolved and come into fuller meaning for us. Given all of that, a new name felt right.
A little explanation of what we hope to convey with “Gather Well”
Gather is a concept that reflects the new model of the organization which will place an emphasis on the importance of collective, community-centered healing that includes the cultural and systemic aspects of the healing process. For us “gather” means to come together around common interests, visions for change, and ways of caring for one another. We hope to be a place where individuals can gather, learn, grow, care for each other and cultivate a culture that centers interconnectedness, systemic awareness, and balance through the wise and respectful engagement with psychedelics.
Well has several associated meanings to us, all of which felt meaningful. Symbolically, a well is a place to draw water from deep in the earth, a place that nourishes on an essential level. Wells are evocative of things below the surface, of depth, of an element that is replenished by the earth herself. The Well is a symbol for community. Wells serve as sacred gathering places for people the world over, a community center from which members draw sustenance. Wells have been strongly associated with the feminine and the womb. As a team we resonate with the psychedelic work we have done being a deep well of resource for the growth, awareness and gratitude in our lives. Well is also the root of wellness, well-being, being well. Together, “Gather Well”expresses our prayer for collective health and healing. We care about coming together in a thoughtful, and caring way around working with psychedelics. We aim to come together well, with the intent to be well. We hope to celebrate what is already well and whole within us amidst a diversity of personal and cultural experiences and also to acknowledge and grieve the places within ourselves and within our systems and cultures that are not in wellness. We hope together to envision and enact change for a society that uplifts each of us in our thriving, in our relationships with ourselves, others, the collective and the earth.