Origin Story

“Kissing Gaia” is based on a series of real-life intimate encounters with Gaia that have taken place in Ecuador starting in 2002. These encounters were triggered by a sacred cactus that grows wild in the mountains. The flesh of this cactus contains one of the most powerful psychedelic alkaloids on earth: mescaline. When this flesh is consumed by people, the sense of separateness dissolves. In other words, it is a door to transcendence. But there is a process involved. It starts with harvesting the cactus with your own hands.

The Stumbling Block

To begin with, nearly every single person who worked on this project already had a close personal relationship with San Pedro. We set out to collectively make a film that was faithful to the internal experiences that this cactus has produced inside our minds. But trying to express something that is ineffable is ultimately an impossible task. That is the inherent fault line in this creative project.

Blurring the Lines

Technically, this is a narrative film. That was the initial idea. But the dynamic changed over the course of its making. To create the film, we created the experience. We went into the mountains to harvest the arm of a wild cactus, brought it down with us into the forest, cooked it over an open fire, and drank it together—cast and crew. And then we filmed the experience.

Disclaimer

At one point, the creators of this film were infected with that impulse that often befalls people who experience a dramatic transformation in life through some particular method—in this case, the ingestion of a psychoactive plant. The tendency is to try to convince everyone else to pursue this same experience through this same method. In a word, to proselytize.

At the very outset of this project, that impulse was still alive. But the actual journey of making “Kissing Gaia” ultimately put that ambition to rest. Like any other plant medicine, San Pedro is a tool—at least, when viewed from a human perspective. And like any tool, its usefulness entirely depends on how it’s used. For some people, it indelibly changes their relationship to the natural world. For other people, it may not.

Open-Source Plant Medicine

The people that comprise the primarily-Ecuadorian cast and crew of this film have sat in ceremony with indigenous healers, non-indigenous healers, and alone. None of us claim ownership over San Pedro or any other plants, nor are we willing to exclude any plant from our lives merely on account of our ethnicity—indigenous or non-indigenous. It is our firmly-held belief that plant medicine is open-source. We have greatly learned from ancient traditions related to this plant, and we are likewise committed to developing a relationship with it on our own terms.