Psychedelics and Magic with Julian Vayne

In this episode of Ayahuasca Podcast, host Sam Believ (founder of www.lawayra.com) has a conversation with Julian Vayne.

Julian is a British occultist, psychonaut, and author known for his work in chaos magic, entheogenic spirituality, and modern paganism. He’s the author of several books including Getting Higher: The Manual of Psychedelic Ceremony, and is co-organizer of the Breaking Convention conference in the UK.

We touch upon topics of:

• Julian’s background and path to psychedelics and magic (00:50)
• Magic as “the technology of the imagination” (05:06)
• Aleister Crowley’s psychedelic rituals and Julian’s first LSD experience (05:59–09:48)
• Navigating psychedelics using magical frameworks like Hermetic Kabbalah (07:27)
• Language around drugs, medicines, and entheogens (08:23–09:19)
• Placebo effect, imagination, and healing (29:57–30:27)
• The Western magical tradition and its roots in Egypt (20:06–22:06)
• Hermes Trismegistus and the Hermetic tradition (22:26–24:40)
• Magic vs. religion and the self-experimentation of spiritual practice (24:40–25:39)
• Using ayahuasca for spiritual gifts and personal transformation (26:45–29:27)
• Spirit animals, ego inflation, and spiritual humility (33:43–34:29)
• Do people have specific spiritual gifts or all of them? (35:27–38:17)
• Spirits and animism explained through real-world analogies (39:36–44:22)
• What shamans do and how they interact with spirits (44:22–47:42)
• Lost European shamanic traditions and their traces today (47:42–52:38)
• Saunas, altered states, and ancient European heat rituals (53:06–57:46)

If you would like to attend one of our Ayahuasca retreats go to www.lawayra.com

Find more about Julian Vayne at www.julianvayne.com or on social media @julianvayne. Also check out the Breaking Convention conference and their YouTube channel for more of his work.