Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds!
Bob Marley
I’m not one of Bob’s twelve kids, but I doubt I’d have been born without him. His music was part of my creation; an eternal current flowing through my parents and our homes.
I also doubt I would have enjoyed weed early on. Sure, I’m from Canada, the coldest marijuana-obsessed country on Earth, but it’s Bob's music that sparked my interest.
Smoking weed reveals your own self.
The herb is the healing of a nation; alcohol is destruction.
As a sixteen-year-old TCK1 with an identity crisis obsessed with sociopolitical content, Bob had to say no more.
The herb kept me away from alcohol when I was seventeen, increased my appetite when I was sick or depressed, helped me with altitude sickness, better connected me with music, and turned nine-hour red-eye flights into fluffy cloud rides. It never made me lazy; I’ve aced exams, power lifted, hiked 20 KM, and done a whole lot more I legally shouldn’t mention.
Yet, it was the only drug I ever felt addicted to. It became part of my evening routine as a way to relax, but what it really did was ruin my sleep quality and add to my anxiety.
Now that I only smoke every blue moon, I’m more myself (or at least the version I enjoy), aware of people’s energy and emotions, and connected. However, how marijuana or any medicine affects people depends on culture and belief.
In the 1980s, Jamaica witnessed an intersection of spirituality, criminality, and herbology within the Rastafarian community. As the ganja trade grew, so did the security force interference from the Jamaican and, of course, the United States governments, which aimed to uproot the flourishing marijuana cultivation.
Powerful gangs known as “posses” emerged as one form of leadership in the Jamaican drug trade. Although the gangs included dreadlocked Rastafani, most Rastas eschew criminal and violent activity and argue that their involvement in growing and selling ganja is a legitimate part of their lifestyle and culture.
In comparison to the Vatican’s money laundering, murder, and involvement with the mafia, selling a bit of herb doesn’t seem all that bad. Plus, the Rastafarian movement isn’t a way to get rich white people even richer.
Instead, the Rastafarian movement carved out its space in Jamaica's socio-economic struggle, offering an alternative worldview to the black underclass. The Rastafarian rejection of mainstream concepts of God replaced it with the tangible "Jah" incarnated in Haile Selassie (the emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974).
Personally, I’m not for prophets. I’d rather listen to the divine consciousness in the network of trees and mycelium than some dudes who occasionally tap into the Truth. And if I were to ever believe in a prophet, she could actually birth life. But, like with most religions, women get the shit end of the stick.
Although a woman is considered a “Queen” to her Rastaman and can work when “she wishes,” she is not allowed to cook during menstruation and must navigate the delicate balance of polygamy within Rastafarian families/suck it up when their husbands fuck around.
I didn’t write this article to berate Rastafarianism or any religion, though. Most people like to belong to a group and be told what to believe. As much as I’d like to see a collective transcendent shift where that’s no longer the case, I don’t see that happening anytime soon. For now, it’s important to understand how groups and belief systems affect our spiritual, mental, and physical health.
When it comes to health, Rastafarians exhibit a distinctive approach. The aversion to Western medicines, perceived as contaminants, leads many to embrace alternative therapies such as herbalism, homeopathy, and acupuncture. Marijuana, the "holy herb," holds a dual role as a spiritual sacrament and a medicinal remedy despite its legal status presenting challenges in healthcare settings.
When it comes to healthcare and spirituality, Rastafarianism isn’t the only complication. When exploring the broader spectrum of Jamaica's belief systems, Obeah and Revivalism emerge as influential forces, too.
The impact of these spiritual practices on mental health, as evidenced by a study of psychiatric patients, reveals a significant divergence from Western perceptions. The researchers found that more than a third attributed their mental illness to supernatural factors, emphasizing the struggle between traditional beliefs and Western psychiatric diagnoses. The legal prohibition of traditional medicine, such as Obeah, compounds the challenge. Patients resort to coded language, making it difficult for Western practitioners to grasp the nuances of their experiences.
Of course, healthcare professionals need to learn the language and better their comprehension. However, more than anything, we need to increase our understanding of how the spiritual world affects our physical world. We need to listen and align the Truths of spirituality with the realities of human society.
I’ll expand on code-switching and the significance of Jamaican Patois on cultural identity next Saturday.
Each of these cultural psychology and sociopolitical essays connects to Forever Foreign, a collection of short stories based on my parents’ travel adventures.
Check out last week's story, “It’s Easy to Marry in Jamaica.”
On Tuesday, I’ll release the follow-up story “Marrying a Stranger: Paper & Pens.”
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Third Culture Kid