For the those who know
nature is trying to say something.
A community and living library for serious explorers of plants, fungi, psychedelics, traditional medicines, and consciousness — where depth is the baseline, not the exception.
◍ Founding membership is limited. Lock in your rates before they change ◍
Combined Experience
13+ Courses
+ all future releases included
Reciprocity-Based
Honoring the source
“You’ve gone deep enough to know most courses and online communities barely scratch the surface”
You’ve read the books. Visited the Reddit threads. Taken the courses that promised depth and delivered bullet points. Found the communities that promised rigor and delivered gurus. The knowledge you’re looking for exists — it’s just scattered across disciplines, locked behind academic paywalls, or taught without the lineage and context that makes it meaningful. The living library was built to end your search.
Why The living library exists
“The plants were our first teachers. The fungi were our messengers. We are only beginning to remember what they taught us.”
For millennia, indigenous peoples across the Amazon, the Andes, Africa, and the Pacific carried an extraordinary body of knowledge — about healing plants, psychoactive fungi, and the relationship between human consciousness and the natural world. Much of it was dismissed, suppressed, or simply never recorded.
The living library exists to change that. Not with shallow summaries or commercialized wellness content. With rigor without gatekeeping — the intellectual depth of serious academic inquiry, made accessible to the serious non-academic. With lineage — knowledge taught in context, honoring the traditions and peoples it comes from. And with genuine community — a gathering place where mycologists, integration therapists, herbalists, and consciousness explorers realize they have been circling the same truth from different directions.
10+
13+
5
8,000+
our commitment
Knowledge has a source.
We honor it.
The knowledge in these courses has been carried across generations by indigenous peoples who were rarely credited or compensated. That changes here.
“A percentage of every membership directly funds scholarships for Indigenous students and access for traditional knowledge holders and their communities.”
Direct scholarship funding
A percentage of every enrollment goes directly to scholarships for Indigenous students — no administrative overhead, no discretionary fund.
Access for knowledge holders
Your membership ensures knowledge keepers are part of our community.
the living library
Five Pathways.
One living community.
Uncover 8,000+ years of human interaction with the natural world. This continuously expanding library weaves together ethnobotany, mycology, and the study of human consciousness—bridging the clinical science with the lived wisdom of traditional natural medicine.
featured courses
What you’ll study.
A selection from the Living Library. New courses are added regularly — members get access as the courses drop.
Stoned Ape Hypothesis: Psilocybin and the Origins of Consciousness
Dennis McKenna brings Terence’s legendary hypothesis into the 21st century — integrating mycology, paleontology, neuro-ecology, epigenetics, and evolutionary genetics to rigorously evaluate what is testable and what remains speculation.
People and Plants: Ethnobotany in the 21st Century
An interdisciplinary introduction to how plants shape human survival, culture, medicine, and ritual, with case studies and conservation perspectives.
Lilliputian Lore: The Science and Mystery of Hallucinogenic Bolete Mushrooms
Decades before psilocybin’s rise, locals in Papua New Guinea ate a wild bolete that produced visions of tiny people; Colin Domnauer traces the same Lilliputian hallucinations across Papua New Guinea, Yunnan (China), and the Philippines, all tied to the DNA‑verified mushroom Lanmaoa asiatica, whose psychoactive chemistry is still unknown.
Plant Chemistry
Discover how plants produce the bioactive molecules behind traditional and modern medicines. Learn key pathways and phenols, alkaloids, terpenoids, glycosides through case studies that connect indigenous knowledge, pharmacology, and biodiversity stewardship.
The Shamanic Art of Healing
Journey through diverse cultures and traditions with one of the world’s great explorers. From the drum to entheogenic plants — the ancient science of restoring balance.
Ethnobotany: The Wild joy of Plants
Traces ethnobotany’s history and methods while centering Native American and African American plant knowledge, healing practices, and decolonizing perspectives on colonial legacies.
3 Modules · All levels
Claudia J. Ford, PhD
Ethnobotanist, Native American Plant knowledge
When the Ceremony Doesn’t End
A comprehensive guide to grounding profound altered states into lasting transformation. This course bridges clinical psychedelic psychotherapy with the lived, traditional wisdom of Amazonian lineage holders.
Ethnobotany and Ethnomedicine
Embark on a fascinating journey into the world of Ethnobotany and Ethnomedicine, exploring the rich tapestry of traditional knowledge surrounding plants and their uses.
Ethnobotany and Neurodegenerative Diseases
This course delves into Earth’s remarkable molecular diversity, highlighting the potential of plant-derived compounds for treating human diseases, particularly neurodegenerative conditions. Through the lens of ethnobotany, the study of how indigenous people utilize plants, we explore diverse approaches to drug discovery, emphasizing the importance of traditional ecological knowledge.
Psychedelics and Human Evolution
This online Ethnobotany course examines the hypothesis that psychedelics—especially psilocybin mushrooms—shaped human evolution and the development of consciousness, drawing on primate behavior, archaeology, neuroscience, and clinical research. It explores psilocybin’s effects on brain systems and cognition, its social and ritual roles, and the contemporary resurgence of psychedelic research for mental health and personal growth.
Reclaiming the Divine Coca Leaf
Reclaiming the Divine Coca Leaf: Science, Spirit, and Stigma is an eye-opening course that separates the sacred plant from the illicit chemical. This journey takes you behind the headlines and the War on Drugs to reveal an 8,000-year-old relationship between humanity and the Andes’ most revered botanical treasure.
The Ethnobotany of Dragon´s Blood: From Rainforest to Pharmacy
Uncover the journey of Croton lechleri (“Dragon’s Blood”) from Amazonian medicine to FDA-approved drug. This course bridges Indigenous knowledge and pharmacology, examining Crofelemer’s development, sustainable sourcing, and ethical biotrade, highlighting reforestation, social responsibility, and collaboration between traditional healers and modern scientists.
Out of Africa: Ethnobotanical Conversations on the Atlantic World
Trace the movement of African plant knowledge to the Americas. Discover how Afro-Brazilian traditions like Candomblé preserve cultural continuity and spiritual practice through their relationship with plants.
Dr. Dennis McKenna
Ethnopharmacologist
50 years of research into Amazonian ethnopharmacology and plant hallucinogens. Doctoral research at UBC on ayahuasca pharmacology. Founding board member of the Heffter Research Institute. Younger brother of Terence McKenna and a key organizer of the first biomedical investigation of ayahuasca. Psychedelic pioneer and luminary.
Dr. Wade Davis
Anthropologist
Author of 24 books including One River and The Wayfinders. Holds degrees in anthropology, biology and a Harvard PhD in ethnobotany. Recipient of 12 honorary degrees, the 2009 Gold Medal from the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, and the Explorers Medal.
Dr. Paul Alan Cox
Ethnobotanist
Named one of TIME magazine’s “Heroes of Medicine.” Recipient of the Goldman Environmental Prize. Over 200 scientific papers. Founded Seacology, which has preserved millions of acres of rainforest and coral reef worldwide. Current research: L-serine as a treatment for ALS and Alzheimer’s.
Mariya Garnet & Guest Elders
Traditionally trained psychedelic facilitator · EXAT student-therapist
Mariya specializes in Expressive Arts Therapy and indigenous wisdom integration. Her courses feature a unique synthesis of Western mental health professionals (including board-certified psychiatrists) teaching directly alongside traditional knowledge holders like Enrrique Santiago Paredes Melendez (Vegetalista) and Lloyver Yui (Shipibo facilitator).
Dr. Claudia J. Ford
Ethnobotanist
Holds degrees in biology, midwifery, fine arts, and a PhD in environmental studies. Her transdisciplinary teaching bridges traditional ecological knowledge, spiritual ecology, and entheogenic plant medicine. She centers the often-hidden plant wisdom, healing practices, and resilience of Native American and African diaspora communities.
membership includes
More than courses.
A living community.
A library is only as powerful as the minds that gather inside it. The Living Library is more than a collection of recordings; it is a living community — where serious students, practitioners, and knowledge seekers find each other, and where the conversation continues long after the teachings end.
membership tiers
Choose your depth
Two ways to join the Living Library — an annual membership that grows with you, or a single lifetime payment that never renews. Both can access special founding member rates, for a limited time only. Prices will change.
annual access
Living Library
$399 / year
Full access to the Living Library, community, live webinars, and every perk — renewed annually.
✓ Unlimited access to the living library
✓
✓ Live webinars & Q&As with the Teachers
✓ Full community platform access
✓ Early access to the Brainforest Café — our community podcast
lifetime access
Living Library Forever
$1999 / one-time
Pay once. Never pay again.
Everything in the annual plan, but you never renew. Lifetime access to every current and future course, community, webinars, and perks — permanently.
✓ Unlimited access to The Living Library — immediate, permanent access
✓
✓ Lifetime live webinar access with teachers
✓ Permanent community platform membership
✓ Early access to the Brainforest Café
✓ No renewals. No recurring charges.
FREquently Asked Questions
Before you begin
Who is The Living Library for?
Serious curious people who don’t fit neatly into one box. Our members include herbalists who want deeper ethnobotanical context, mycology enthusiasts who find cultivation-only courses frustrating, mental health professionals seeking cross-cultural perspectives on psychedelic therapy, curious psychonauts, integration seekers who feel lost after powerful experiences, and academic refugees who want intellectual depth without institutional politics. Most members are drawn in through one Pathway and stay because they find all the others.
Where does the community live?
The Living Library is built on a private, dedicated platform. No algorithms, no advertising. Just the community and the content.
What makes our courses unique?
Our courses are taught by world‑renowned experts whose lifework bridges science, spirit, and story. From legendary ethnobotanists like Dennis McKenna, Wade Davis, and Michael Winkelman, to pioneering researchers such as Dr. Michael Balick, Dr. Paul Alan Cox, and Dr. Claudia J. Ford, each instructor brings decades of fieldwork, cultural immersion, and academic rigor.
Do I need a background in science or botany?
Not at all. Our courses are designed for the serious curious — people who want depth and rigor without requiring a PhD. Our instructors are exceptional teachers who meet you where you are.
Can I cancel my membership?
Yes, at any time. There are no long-term commitments. Annual memberships can be cancelled before your next billing date.
Do you offer institution or group pricing?
Please contact us for academic, nonprofit, or group licensing options. connect@mckenna.academy
the invitation
The forest has always been
a classroom. Join the class.
Wade Davis, Dennis McKenna, Paul Alan Cox and nine other world-class minds are waiting inside. The plants have been waiting much longer. Founding membership is open now — and it won’t stay open forever.
