How Would You Practice Slow Cannabis?
There are movements around Slow Food, Slow Goods, Slow Cinema — how can we apply those philosophies to cannabis?
I originally wrote this blog for Prrl Labs. In addition to sponsoring it, they’ve been gracious enough to allow me to share it and some great pictures with you!
Our human experience is played out on a planet teeming with life and hurtling through space at 67,000 miles per hour. Feeling rushed has been a part of this experience for me. The cacophony of competing priorities leaves me feeling as though I’m never present — especially if I tell myself that I’m ‘multitasking’. In all of this rush to get busy living, it’s easy to slip into autopilot. One of the ways I’ve been able to combat these feelings of disconnectedness is to slow down. I’ve been pondering how to apply these practices and philosophies of slowing down to cannabis.
In 1982, Dr. Larry Dossey published the book “Time, Space, and Medicine” in which he used the term ‘time sickness’ to describe the belief many held that time is slipping away, and the only way to keep up is to speed up.
Four years after Dossey’s observations and exploration of man’s troubled relationship with time, Carlo Petrine’s protest of a McDonald’s sparked the slow food movement. Slow Food is a grassroots organization whose mission is to “prevent the disappearance of local food cultures and traditions, counteract the rise of fast life, and combat people’s dwindling interest in the food they eat.” The movement’s focus is on food that is good, clean, and fair. They use ‘taste education’ as an approach to reawakening and training of the senses in addition to engaging in a comprehensive study of all of the aspects of food. They coined the phrase ‘neo gastronomy’ to describe an approach to food that recognizes the connection between ‘plate, planet, people, and culture.’
The Slow Goods Movement applies the tenents of the Slow Food movement to the design and production of physical goods. Instead of seeking the highest efficiency of mass production possible, the focus is on creating a high-quality, long-lasting, and repairable product. The driving factor is quality over quantity.
Slow Cinema is a minimalist style of filmmaking that has a long history. These films use long takes with minimal artifice or narration to bring us into a dual role of audience/players. By slowing down the moments seen on screen, the space between story and storyteller disappears, facilitating a deeper connection with the work. The attention is allowed to settle on the nuances of the moment. Slow cinema can transform the act of movie watching into a profound psychological experience.
Slow Movements all bring focus and attention towards a single point. I’ve heard it said that giving attention to something is a form of giving love, and I agree. I love cannabis, so what about a Slow Cannabis Movement? What would that look like? How can we bring more attention to the process and product of cannabis?
Like the Slow Goods movement, the Slow Cannabis Movement would examine production methods for the flower. Practitioners would seek to engage with small, local producers over larger corporations too far removed from the product. They would seek farmers that were transparent about their growing practices. The focus would be on indicators of a quality product and would seek producers that bring craft and skill to their flower. The slow cannabis movement would focus on cannabis that was good, clean, and fair.
The Slow Cannabis Movement would plunge into the sustainability of how the farm produces the cannabis. Is the farm sustainable in ways that matter to you? Instead of buying whatever is on sale at the local dispensary, practitioners of Slow Cannabis would give time and space to researching the growing methods that created the flower. Slow Cannabis starts before the flower is even selected.
Practitioners of Slow Cannabis would seek to examine how dispensaries are with their business practices as a whole. Are they fair? Do they have a lot of full-time employees? Do they invest in consumer education? How do they curate their selection? Is that process transparent?
The Slow Cannabis movement would bring mindfulness into the consumption process. What do I even mean about being mindful of cannabis consumption? It’s not minding how much I’m consuming, it includes being aware of a lot more.
Sometimes, being mindful of how I consume cannabis means journaling it — but sometimes even journaling it at the moment would take focus away. Journaling is a reaction instead of reflection — and above all the Slow Cannabis Movement would seek reflection.
Slow Cannabis would also mean draining the relationship to cannabis of its transactionality. Its precepts would challenge us to seek to immerse the senses in the actual moments and the tasks at hand.
More important to anything else is the connection between self and the world. When I’m being mindful about cannabis, I’m far more focused on what I’m feeling in the moment. I allow thoughts of what I’m looking to get from it to fall away. Much like Thich Nhat Hanh taught about Walking Meditation, I bring mindfulness and awareness to every sensation related to what I’m doing. It is the opposite of auto-pilot.
When I’m bringing mindfulness to cannabis I tend to linger over the preparation steps. Ensuring that the cannabis is properly prepared gives me a lot of moments to interact with the plant I love so much.
I allow myself to enjoy the tactile sensations of preparing the cannabis. I think about what it feels like before and after I’ve prepared it. I experience and consider the smells coming from my grinder or my hands. What terpenes present themselves in that initial, primal moment? What do the smells make me think of? Are my fingers sticky?
Bringing slowness to cannabis means spending time to get the ‘perfect pack’ in the pipe. There’s something special to me about how cannabis tastes through glass, and I always want to be sure I can enjoy the most flavor with the fewest inhaled cannabis particles as possible. Engaging in Slow Cannabis would mean taking the time to fuss over the details and relish the sensations that each operation takes. The Slow Cannabis Movement elevates procedure to handiwork.
The Prrl Labs Neo enhances the slow experience of cannabis. The entire vapor creation and inhalation experience are visible, especially with the Terp Surfer pipe. The clear quartz chimney gives me a view of my herb, and I can watch as the Neo’s magic glow transmutes my carefully selected cannabis into delicious, magic vapor. The bellows of my lungs and the Prrl Labs Neo’s design allow me to control the entire vapor creation experience. Engaging in mindful and slow practices of cannabis gives my mind and body the space to process and take part in every step of my cannabis ritual. I love things that enhance the tactile experience of cannabis.
Practitioners of slow cannabis would spend time evaluating the flavor of each draw. Does it change over time? Do different temperatures produce different flavors? What’s the mouth-feel? The lung feel? How’s the buzz? Is it heady, or couch-locked? Or both?
Instead of just seeking a list of effects from a strain, practitioners of slow cannabis would take the time to evaluate every step of the process, transforming the cannabis consumption process to an integration of the sensations and experience.
How would you practice Slow Cannabis?
I have some suggested readings to help you think about your Slow Cannabis Style:
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Kahneman
In Praise of Slowness: Challenging the Cult of Speed by Carl Honore’
https://www.slowfood.com/about-us/slow-food-terminology/
Slow Media by Jennifer Rauch
Slow Media Manifesto at https://en.slow-media.net/manifesto
