Category Archives: Psychedelics

"Were currently estimating 2021 for FDA approval of MDMA," says Dr. Rick Doblin, ED of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies

When one thinks of a large gathering of psychedelic enthusiasts, thoughts typically turn to Burning Man rather than a group of doctors and scientists. This week, however, whats being called the largest psychedelics gathering in history is happening in Oakland, as the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies(MAPS) hosts its Psychedelics Science conference.

Starting Wednesday, more than 2,600 doctors, professors, health-industry professionals, and psychedelic experts from around the world convene at the Oakland Marriott City Center for the five-day event. Psychedelic Science 2017features more than 100 presentations regarding the therapeutic uses of psychedelics, the neuroscience behind this research, the spread of psychedelic culture into the mainstream, and more. The main thrust of the event will be about legally moving psychedelics into the field of medicine and sharing information about how substances likeayahuasca, ibogaine, MDMA, peyote, psilocybin, LSD, ketamine, and marijuana show promise in the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and a wide range of other mental and physical illnesses.

Although the event is sold out, every presentation will be available for free on the MAPS website the week after the conference. MAPS founder and Executive Director Dr. Rick Doblin discusses the explosion of psychedelics into the mainstream, recent developments in the field and how new research is affecting people who have never set foot on the playa.

This interview has been condensed and lightly edited.

Psychedelics are really having a moment. Rolling Stone just called them a miracle and outlets ranging from mens and womens magazines to cable news have done pieces on ayahuasca, LSD, MDMA, and more. Why is this all happening now?

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The Biggest Psychedelics Conference Ever Starts Today in Oakland - SF Weekly

No, youre not hallucinating-its true. The Psychedelic Science Conference is returning to the East Bay this month with more than three days of events and programming that explores the latest in psychedelic drug research.

The conference, happening April 21st-23rd at the Oakland Marriott City Center, will bring together international leaders in the sciences, medicine, education, public policy and arts who are studying the practical application of psychedelics for treating physical and mental disorders.

The upcoming conference offers a little something for everyone and surveys topics in neuroscience, psychotherapy, spirituality and creativityall frontiers that are still undeveloped and underexplored.

Chances are, you probably know of someone out there who accidentally got too stoned and ate an entire blueberry pie or decided to take off all of their clothes at an inopportune time in a public place.

Whether or not that someone was actually you, theres probably a lot you can stand to learn from the experiences of others. For years, proponents of psychoactive substances have wondered exactly how and why these drugs make us feel, think and act in certain ways.

Industry leaders have often sought support for widespread use of drugs like LSD and psilocybin mushrooms, citing both the spiritual significance and ritual use of these drugs throughout history and indigenous cultures, but have generally lacked the legal and scientific backing to prove benefits outweigh the risks.

This past November, California voted to legalize marijuana. Although this pivotal decision introduces a handful of new challenges for healthcare providers and hemp-related businesses, its another measure that helps bring legitimacy and funding for psychedelic drug research and its many unanswered questions.

Photo courtesy of Pixabay

Just several months earlier, the Food and Drug Administration also made a bold move to approve clinical trials that treat patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with MDMA, or the street drug commonly known as Ecstasy, which has controversial feel-good effects on the body and brain.

Coincidentally, the organization sponsoring this research is theMultidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), a Santa Cruz-based research outlet working toward the understanding and education of psychedelics, is also the host of this years Psychedelic Science Conference.

Weve hand-picked several mind-altering events from this years conference, regardless of how much knowledge (or first-hand experience) you might have, youre likely to learn a thing or two here.

We should note: theres a flat fee of $450 ($250 with a military/student ID) for the full Three-Day Conference Pass. However, there are plenty of free events going on that will feature world-renowned visionary artists and unveil revolutionary scientific data findings.

All free events take place at The Marketplace on the Psymposia Stage, located in the West Hall, with a complete schedule of events listed here.

Friday, April 21

In The Beginning Psychedelic Art 1965 & Onward Isaac Abrams 12:30 PM 1:00 PM Friday, April 21 Psymposia Stage (Free)

Ecstasis for the Masses: Cognitive Liberty in an Age of Unreason Jamie Wheal 1:30 PM 1:30 PM Friday, April 21 Psymposia Stage

Spirituality & Psychoactive Substances: A Perspective from the 21st Century Reverend Martin Diaz 4:00 PM 4:30 PM Friday, April 21 Psymposia Stage

Microdose VR Experience Duncan Trussell, Android Jones, and Dr. Bruce Damer 8:30 PM 9:00 PM Friday, April 21 Psymposia Stage

Digitally inspired art by multi-media artist and speaker Android Jones

Saturday, April 22

Changing Our Minds: Psychedelic Sacraments and the New Psychotherapy Don Lattin 1:00 PM 1:30 PM Saturday, April 22 Psymposia Stage

Esalens Legacy and the History of Psychedelics Jim Fadiman, John Harrison 2:00 PM 3:00 PM Saturday, April 22 Psymposia Stage

Interview: Stephen Gray, author of Cannabis & Spirituality: An Explorers Guide to an Ancient Plant Spirit Ally 4:00 PM 4:30 PM Saturday, April 22 Psymposia Stage

Sunday, April 23

Drugstory: Changing the Way We Consume Drug Information Mikayla Hellwich & Lauren Padgett 10:00 AM 10:30 AM Sunday, April 23 Psymposia Stage

The Psychedelic Gospels: The Secret History of Hallucinogens in Christianity Jerry Brown 11:00 AM 11:30 AM Sunday, April 23 Psymposia Stage

Conversation: Rethinking the Drug War Rhana Hashemi, Oliver Zerrudo 11:30 AM 12:00 PM Sunday, April 23 Psymposia Stage

Photo courtesy of Psymposia

Psymposia is an events group and digital magazine that studies emerging social issues in psychedelic science and their effect on drug reform, harm reduction, law and medicine. By engaging in collaborative projects and organizing networking events across the United States and Europe, it seeks to change perceptions of plants, psychedelics, and psychoactive substances.

In its third year, The Psychedelic Science Conference made its debut in 2010 in San Jose and enjoyed repeated success in 2013 in Oakland.

Register for a Three-Day Conference Pass for the 2017 Psychedelic Science Conference here and find a schedule of both pre and post-conference workshops here. Find more information about supporting organization MAPS and their groundbreaking work in psychedelic research here.

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10 Mind-Altering Sessions at Oakland's Psychedelic Science Conference - SF Station

The counterculture holiday known as Bicycle Day rolls around on April 19th with 2017 representing the 74-year anniversary of the historic day in 1943 on which Swiss chemist Albert Hoffman first intentionally ingested LSD, after inadvertently discovering the substances mind-bending effects three days prior. Hoffmans surreal bike ride home convinced him that LSD was worth exploring further. The substance would go on to play a pivotal role in human evolution some two decades later when it became a catalyst for the socio-cultural revolution of the 1960s.

The San Francisco Bay Area was a key flashpoint for explorations of higher consciousness, with the trailblazing Acid Test parties held by author Ken Keseys Merry Pranksters and a buzz band named the Grateful Dead giving rise to a cultural wave of spiritual awakening. Many Americans remain unaware of how Uncle Sam played a key role in developing LSDs usage through a secret CIA project codenamed Operation MK-Ultra, which experimented with LSD and other substances on unwitting citizens because the agency saw LSD as useful as a truth serum of sorts and even for potential mind control purposes.

One of the places where such experiments took place was at a VA hospital near Stanford University where Kesey and future Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter were among those who signed up as research volunteers to try experimental drugs for $75 per session under the watch of Stanford scientists. The cosmic cat was soon out of the bag, and the world has never been the same. LSD has continued to influence the awakening of successive generations of youth, despite an oppressive crackdown from Uncle Sam. The psychedelic experience remains a spiritual coming of age ritual, particularly within the improvisational music scene that the Dead pioneered.

The 2017 Bicycle Day event at the Midway in San Francisco will celebrate the heritage of Hoffmans paradigm shifting work with a multi-faceted lineup of artists and musicians headlined by renowned psychedelic artists Alex Gray & Allison Gray, along with new jam rock supergroup Bureau of Sabotage. Just formed in 2017, the quartet features bassist Oteil Burbridge (Dead and Company, Allman Brothers Band), guitarist John Kadlecik (Furthur), keyboardist Aron Magner (Disco Biscuits), and drummer Jeff Franca (Thievery Corporation.) One of the BuSabs first gigs was an Anti-Ball benefit show in Washington D.C. on January 20 where they played in opposition of Donald Trumps inauguration to help raise funds for Planned Parenthood, MoveOn.org, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. With a repertoire heavy on the Grateful Dead, theyre a natural fit for a Bicycle Day show in San Francisco.

PopMatters caught up with Burbridge and Franca last week to talk about Bicycle Day and BuSabs efforts for a musical revolution in the era of Donald Trumps foul domain of greed and avarice. BuSab started because a friend called me about a gig she had for me at Sundance Film Festival this year. I was on the lookout for chances to play with John Kadlecik, so I called him first. We bounced around a few names of cats we wanted and just started calling to see who was free on that date. It was a one-off gig, but the lineup feels so great that were starting to get other offers. What a sad and tragic day. Im so glad I spent it with Bureau of Sabotage, Oteil Burbridge says of the D.C. show, noting that Kadlecik was the one who arranged the gig and who came up with the name of the band. In a lot of ways I feel like a student of John Kadleciks. He knows as much about the Grateful Dead as anyone besides the original members. He knows a lot about a lot of things. What an incredibly intelligent human being he is. Hes one of the most evolved people I have ever met.

Kadlecik, who played alongside Dead bassist Phil Lesh and rhythm guitarist Bob Weir in Furthur from 2009 to 2013, is clearly a savvy fan of visionary political commentary in science fiction. At BuSabs Washington DC show, he explained how the band name comes from stories by Dune author Frank Herbert, in which the Bureau of Sabotage begins as a resistance organization against an out of control government thats become so terrifyingly efficient in cutting red tape that laws are conceived, passed, funded and executed within mere hours, creating a reckless governmental juggernaut that threatens society. The BuSab acts to frustrate the workings of the system to give people a chance to reflect on and deal with changes, ultimately becoming recognized as a necessary check on the power of out of control government.

Burbridge says fans can expect to see the BuSab take risks as they seek to be fully in the moment, following in the tradition of the original Acid Test parties where the fledgling Grateful Dead werent even necessarily required to play. Drummer Jeff Franca concurred, saying People can expect a funky psychedelic set of jams, tunes youve heard before but presented in a different way. He noted that he and Burbridge and Kadlecik first got to play together at the Jungle Jam in Costa Rica last year and that the chemistry was automatic.

When I got the call to play with John and Oteil I was very excited to find out that Aron Magner was going to fill out the band on keys. We all bring our influences to the table to create a fresh take on some classic music, Franca says. He and Burbridge both indicated that theyre eager to check out Alex and Allyson Grey in person at Bicycle Day. I have always loved Alex Greys art. I have done shows where he has spoken and presented his works, but I have never seen him paint live, so that will be cool, Franca says.

I really love what they are doing with the Chapel Of Sacred Mirrors [an art sanctuary and trans-denominational interfaith church founded by the Greys in Wappingers Falls, New York], Burbridge adds. Its so sad to me that there is this antagonism between science and spirituality. But the recent history between the two is what it is and takes some time to work itself out. In my opinion, love and art are two of the best doorways to the mystical. The idea of creating a sacred space that honors all things sacred and mystical through creating art of all varieties is just the coolest thing to me.

Burbridge has made a name for himself playing with some of the top psych-rock outfits in music history, including his current gig filling Phil Leshs shoes alongside original Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Mickey Hart, and Bill Kreutzmann in Dead and Company since the fall of 2015. But he says most of his psychedelic experiments were confined to his younger years.

I did the vast majority of my psychedelics when I was 17 to 19 years old. I grew up in a house that was half mystical because of my mom and half atheist because of my dad. From a very young age, Ive had mystical things happen to me like precog dreams. So I didnt need LSD to be shown that theres more to reality than what we can see even with an electron microscope. But it did provide me with some formative philosophical conversations that shaped what I believe even to this day. I always did low dosages with one exception, and that was a really bad experience. Thats what you get when you dont treat it with the proper respect, Burbridge says with a cautionary note, similar to Timothy Learys admonitions about the importance of mindset and setting when engaging in explorations of higher consciousness.

Franca says psychedelics have been more instrumental in learning life lessons than in his musical development and that most of his psychedelic experiences have been as a fan of music, rather than as a performer. Since I was very young, I have always been into trippy music. Growing up I was mainly into Pink Floyd, especially the album Atom Heart Mother. The A-side being an epic symphonic work full of concrete sounds as well as groovy synth work and dark spaces where time seems to stand still. The rest of the songs on the album to me are the final steps of the bridge that connects the more classic psychedelic sound of the Syd Barrett era to the more polished Waters/Gilmore era Floyd, Franca says of the Pink Floyd influence he shares with so many music fans.

When I started taking psychedelics I realized that patterns in nature and visual rhythms are what I find most trippy and that things that were already trippy without the enhanced effects of various substances remained so, but more so made me realize that the creators of the art or music I was into were also experimenting with psychedelics, Franca continues. This is why the 60s era Bay Area sound is interesting to me because the original sounds of Jefferson Airplane and the Warlocks and early Dead were still very in the box production wise, with sounds they were choosing and still heavily based on the blues and rock n roll. I feel like once everybody experienced the more traditional sounding music on psychedelics, they then took those sounds that they heard/felt and started to put them into the production and general musical style of what they were creating from the start.

Regarding the early years of LSD, Burbridge went on to note a recent viewing of a Canadian documentary on Youtube about the birth of LSD and how it was focused on straight looking academics from the the late 40s and 50s trying to find a cure for headaches [something that the non-profit Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) is still working on.]

They said that they realized that there was a great potential to treat things from alcoholism to psychological traumas with it. The military wanted to weaponize it, but the experiments made the troops want to quit the military, so they discontinued it! None of them were down with killing people anymore, Burbridge points out regarding Uncle Sams sad hypocrisy regarding psychedelics. These academics said that is was unfortunate that white culture had no way of integrating it into society. They said the best way to do it would be like Native Americans and other tribal cultures did it, which is through their religion. They said that a religious ceremony that involved trance catalyzed by drums, dance, music, etc., was the most effective way. I thought to myself, Yeah! Like a Grateful Dead concert! What a great honor it is to be such a big part of one of the Wests only psychedelic traditions! I hope to encourage more of the sacred use of it in favor of the use of it for entertainment.

While many artists are gun shy about expressing socio-political sentiments for fear of alienating fans on another side of the political spectrum, Burbridge says hes too angry with the current state of affairs to sit quietly. He offered some insightful sentiments on public affairs that resonate with those of seminal musical truth tellers like John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix.

I guess I should be more shy about it, but Im so pissed off. Donald Trump will do whatever the Overlords tell him to do just like Clinton, Bush, Obama and all the rest of them. He went from Drain The Swamp to Cutting Out The Middle Man overnight. Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State? Wow. Remember the Wiki-leak that showed Obama got his entire cabinet handed to him by Citi-Group? Presidents are low in the hierarchy. If they really do the right thing, theyll end up like Kennedy, Burbridge points out in pithy references to 2008 and 1963. Well have a real revolution soon. Ironically, all we have to do is just say no. Say no to killing. If everyone, all the militaries everywhere, did it at the same time then these assholes would have to fight their own wars. I fully support our troops, but Im wholly against the Congress that would send them to kill. I dont trust them. They have a totally different idea of what American Interests constitute than I do.

Just getting warmed up, Burbridge went on to point out some of the contradictions and hypocrisy that have increasingly infected American government over the decades. Im still trying to pin down what America is. If its the government, then I feel no allegiance. That allegiance has to be two-way, and its not anymore. The government is not by or for the people anymore. It might still be of the people but looking at Congress these days you would have to loosen your definition of person . If America means the people of America, then I feel an allegiance to those that want to live in harmony with me. If America means the Constitution, then I have mixed feelings there as well. It used to say that I was only three-fifths of a person. What kind of fucking bullshit is that? Besides, what President abides by the Constitution anymore? None of them. Its all a popularity contest and identity politics these days. Weve been sold out. I do like the idea of the Constitution though. Its great that we used to be able to use the document to make the country live up to it. I fear that possibility doesnt exist anymore.

Franca expressed similar sentiments, making it clear that Bureau of Sabotage is a band of brothers in solidarity for peace. As Fela Kuti twice said, music is our weapon. I am fully on board with that. I believe that we as musicians have a responsibility to document the vibrations of our time here on Earth, musically and culturally. Thievery has always taken a burn Babylon stance in their music. My own project Congo Sanchez also takes that stance with our music and message at our shows. It is very important to me to use the gift that has been given to us as musicians for good and for positive motion. Sometimes that means directly calling out the government because as Oteil will tell you, I am anti-government. Meaning that the people that reside in any specific place are not necessarily in agreeance with their elected government, Franca says. The drummer went on to point out a recent controversial example from the Trump regime.

I was just walking down the street yesterday thinking what a beautiful day. Then I thought about the MOAB bomb and was like damn, Im here walking down the street just for a breath of fresh air while my country is bombing innocent people. I am not bombing anybody myself, but as an American, I am included in that somehow. So we use music to make our stance known and so that free thinkers all across the globe can be aware that we are not the only ones!!

The Bureau of Sabotage is only just beginning their national campaign for musical truth and justice. It will be quite interesting to see how many other musicians and artists will enlist in the creative resistance as the Trump regime cranks up its assault on American democracy and the environment.

Greg M. Schwartz has covered music and pop culture for PopMatters since 2006. He focuses on events coverage with a preference for guitar-driven rock 'n' roll, but has eclectic tastes for the golden age of sound that is the 21st century music scene. He has a soft spot for music with a socially conscious flavor and is also an award-winning investigative reporter. Follow him on Twitter at @gms111, where he's always looking for tips on new bands or under the radar news items.

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Bureau of Sabotage Set to Rock for Resistance at Bicycle Day and Beyond - PopMatters

Depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, Alzheimers, addiction, post-traumatic stress disorder: these diseases are among the most debilitating maladies known to man. You may think that everything that could be done to curb the effects of these diseases has been tried, but not quite. The most radical treatments are the ones that the federal government have deemed too harmful and without any justified medical use. What if the feds got it wrong?

Thats what many outspoken researchers in psychiatry ask. In fact, there are whole organizations dedicated to the radical new studies of psychedelics in therapy. Te Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, or MAPS, is perhaps the largest. MAPS conducts research in MDMA and LSD-assisted psychotherapies. They also conduct research using two psychedelics you have likely never heard of before: Ibogaine and Ayahuasca. Studies like these can only serve to help us better understand the effects of these drugs.

Arguably the most dangerous part of psychedelics is our lack of understanding. Most of what we can publicly access are stories of Erowid (a popular online illicit drug forum) users. Right now, there is no clinically accepted procedure in treating patients experiencing a badtrip. As a whole, the medical community lacks knowledge about how the effects of psychedelics manifest. There currently exists no indicators relating demographics to effects of psychedelics. And this is problematic, especially for psychotherapists who cant gauge a patients likely reaction to a psychedelic substance. Pharmacological knowledgethat is, how drugs work chemicallyis also lacking in comparison to mainstream prescription drugs and most illicit substances.

Ingesting psilocybin is said to be a transformative and religious experience. Many describe the experience as creating more connections in their mind, and this description mirrors the activity that is actually occurring in the brain. In brain scans conducted while individuals are tripping, there is a significantly higher desegregation of brain activity than normal.

In research conducted at Johns Hopkins University, psilocybin exposure resulting in mystical experiences was correlated with a reduction in addiction to tobacco. The results are similar for alcoholism, depression and anxiety as well. Of 51 cancer patients suffering from end-of-life depression, 80 percent reported feeling less afraid of death after exposure to psilocybin. There have also been significant results in early testing of other psychedelics as novel antidepressants, cures for obsessive-compulsive disorder, cures for post-traumatic stress disorder and even as a cure for cocaine dependency. Even crazier is the research that suggests people feel they have more meaning and spiritual purpose in their life after only a single moderatedose of psilocybin. This pairs well with the research that found psychedelic use to be associated with lower rates of suicidality. For all of these reasons, parts of the medical community are calling psychedelic drugs a paradigm shift in the way we treat mental illness.

I talked to a few students on campus about their experience with magic mushrooms. The individuals will remain anonymous. One described the experience as giving him a clear head, but with a confused sense of reality. He experienced warmth, euphoria and mild visual hallucination. Another had a much worse experience; she remembers trying to claw the skin off of her face. And lastly, one gave me advice if I ever tried psilocybin: When you peak, you gotta smoke weed man. It makes it so much better, trust me. You gotta plan the whole thing out. He also admitted to trying LSD multiple times.

Clearly, more research is needed to understand the effects and possible medicinal uses of psychedelics. Unfortunately, their Schedule I ranking makes their use in research much less accessible. The research that does exist comes only from private donors or the government. Because of the age of the drugs, they cant be patented and therefore draw no interest from pharmaceutical companies.

Schedule I drugs allegedly have no medicinal use, but there is now strong evidence to refute that. Mental illness is a public health crisis. Veteran suicide rates are immense. Homelessness is being linked to mental health at an alarming rate. At what point do we start trying the cutting edge?

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Using psychedelics to treat mental illness - The University News

At the end of a dark earthen trail in the Peruvian Amazon stands a round structure with a thatched roof that appears to glow from within. In the Temple of the Way of Light, as it is known, indigenous healers called Onanya teach visitors about the therapeutic uses of ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic brew that's been used by locals for thousands of years.

Across the Atlantic, researchers in an ornate blue-tiled hospital in Barcelona, Spain are studying ayahuasca's physical effects on the brain.

The teams in those two disparate locations approach the study of the psychedelic drug very differently, but researchers at each one are coming to similar conclusions about the way ayahuasca affects the mind.

Among volunteers who take ayahuasca for studies, scientists have documented a rise in certain key traits that mirror those of experienced meditators . These changes include increases in openness, optimism, and a particularly powerful ability known as decentering.

Amanda Feilding, the founder and director of the UK-based nonprofit Beckley Foundation , collaborates with scientists around the world to understand how psychedelic drugs affect the brain. Feilding describes decentering as "the ability to objectively observe one's thoughts and feelings without associating them with identity."

Decentering might sound esoteric, but it's one of the key aims of mindful meditation and is also a goal of successful depression treatments in some cases. In volunteers who've taken ayahuasca as part of Beckley's research, decentering has been linked with higher scores on questionnaires designed to measure well-being and happiness and lower scores on measurements of depressive or anxious thoughts and symptoms of grief.

"It's interesting because even though our research out of Peru is based on surveys, while in Barcelona it's based on more traditional scientific research , our results out of both places are showing an increase in these traits," Feilding says, adding, "It seems patients are finally able to liberate themselves from the emotional pain they've long been suffering from. To calmly observe one's thoughts and feelings in an objective way in order to become less judgmental and more self-accepting."

Since the findings out of Peru are based on surveys, they can't prove that ayahuasca caused the reduction in symptoms of depression and grief - only that there's a connection between the two. But in Spain, as part of a collaboration between Beckley and Sant Pau hospital, neurologist Jordi Riba is looking at the brain activity in depressed volunteers who are given ayahuasca. His findings indicate that in addition to people simply reporting that they feel more decentered and less depressed after taking ayahuasca, there is a corresponding neurological change in their brain activity.

One small study of 17 depressed volunteers who took ayahuasca saw a decrease in activity in areas of the brain that tend to be overactive in conditions like depression and anxiety. And a new study of regular ayahuasca users suggests a physical shrinking in these parts of the brain, though that work has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal.

These findings are bolstered by other research on the potential therapeautic effects of psychedelics. Studies out of New York University and Johns Hopkins suggest that the psychedelic drug psilocybin - the ingredient in magic mushrooms - elicits similar effects among depressed people.

"With the psilocybin, you get an appreciation - it's out of time - of well-being, of simply being alive and a witness to life and to everything and to the mystery itself," Clark Martin, a patient who participated in one of the Johns Hopkins trials, previously told Business Insider of his experience.

David Nutt, director of the neuropsychopharmacology unit at Imperial College London, has been working with Feilding, and says the brains of people with depression or addiction get locked into patterns of thinking driven by the brain's control center.

"Psychedelics disrupt that process so people can escape," he says.

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Meditation and the psychedelic drug ayahuasca seem to change the brain in surprisingly similar ways - Businessinsider India

A growing number of women are swapping the therapists sofa for hallucinogenic medicine. But does science back up the benefits? And whats it really like to get high for therapeutic purposes? Health journalist Charlotte Haigh experiences the highly controversial world of psychedelic psychiatry first-hand to find out

Im sitting in the humid blackness of a wooden hall in the depths of the Peruvian Amazon. The only sound is the clicking of a shamans beads as he pours out shot glasses of a murky brown liquid. The substance is ayahuasca, a traditional hallucinogenic medicine made of up of two plants: chacruna, which contains a substance called DMT generating visions, and the ayahuasca vine itself, which allows DMT to work in the brain. Its a Monday night and it suddenly strikes me how far away I am away from my regular Monday evening routine scanning the latest news on my phone in my flat in the London suburbs after a long day meeting deadlines as a freelance health journalist.

I look around at the 20 other people in the room, mostly European professional men and women in their late twenties to mid-forties. Were all here on an organised retreat, to participate in four ayahuasca ceremonies in an attempt to sort out deep-rooted emotional or psychological problems, or simply work out our next steps in life. Were hoping this strange brew, used by Peruvian shamans for centuries, might just give us the answers were struggling to find at home. In fact, studies are now suggesting psychedelics may help a range of mental health conditions, which is why Im here.

The strongest evidence is currently for addiction, then depression and anxiety, followed by moderate evidence for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), says Professor David Nutt, a psychiatrist and neuropsychopharmacologist I speak to for advice, and who has pioneered the research. In a study we published in The Lancet, one dose of psilocybin, found in magic mushrooms, produced lasting changes in people with chronic depression who hadnt responded to medicines or to therapy. Half of the participants were still well after six months. Its not a magic bullet, but its very promising.

Psychedelics are considered relatively safe in comparison to alcohol, but experts strongly advise against trying them in a recreational or non-clinical setting, as you may have a disturbing experience. As psychedelics loosen your brains usual patterns, defences start to dissolve, says Dr Rucker, a psychiatrist who researches the effects of psychedelics. That can be hard, because its the things you dont want to deal with that you keep locked away. Thats why you need a safe, supportive environment and someone you trust like a therapist to help you work through difficult things. Anyone with a family history of mental-health conditions such as schizophrenia, and anyone taking drugs, including SSRI antidepressants, should avoid them completely.

As I gulp down the thick, sickly drink and lie down on my assigned mattress, I wonder what will come next. As a health journalist, Ive done my research and spoken to many people whove taken it. I know its considered safe, but Im nervous about what my subconscious mind might show me under the influence. Im not a natural risk-taker so its certainly a step outside my comfort zone, but it may help me work through some relationship issues Ive been struggling to process this past year. Thankfully, this is not like taking drugs in a nightclub. It feels like a safe environment and there are experienced assistants and shamans on hand to offer support. We are sitting in a large, circular wooden building and mattresses are arranged around the outside of the room. For a few days before, I follow the special cleansing diet no alcohol, sugar, caffeine, pork or fatty foods and as requested by the organisers, I have set an intention in my mind of what I want to gain from the journey.

After half an hour of drinking the liquid, a wave of nausea surges through me. The medicine is infamous for causing vomiting. I grab the plastic bowl next to the mattress but the feeling passes and then Im plunged into a vision, like a hyper-vivid dream. Im on a rain-whipped beach, trailed by three shivering, sad-eyed children. I recognise at once that theyre the babies I lost in successive miscarriages while trying for a longed-for child with my then-husband, who Im now in the process of divorcing. I cuddle them but theyre still cold, so I put them all into a sack and search for a sanctuary. When I open the sack again, theres just a pile of ashes. Im distraught. And then a huge sun bursts the clouds open and I see a woman in the sky, smiling and cradling the children. Im crying, but then Im overwhelmed with a sudden sense of peace.

Later, when I come to process my journey, as ayahuasca trips are termed, I know Ive finally reached a point Ive been struggling to get to for months: Ive accepted my losses. In my trip, I came to a forest, where I saw a vibrant woman with a group of people, laughing and watering plants. It was me. It seemed to suggest that I still have a role in society even if Im never a mother which is something Id been grappling with.

Following my four-hour trip, I feel newly calm and positive about my future; a sense that something deep has shifted. Six months on, that feeling hasnt left me. Your brain is like a snow globe capable of being shaken up. Psychedelics may help get you out of an entrenched perspective, Dr Rucker tells me later. Biologically, all psychedelics, including ayahuasca, psilocybin (magic mushrooms) and LSD, stimulate the 2a serotonin receptors, found most commonly in the pre-frontal cortex of the brain, the area that processes and coordinates complex information to help you think and get perspectives on different situations. This area also helps you define your sense of self and the world, so that can become distorted when something goes wrong here.

Brain scans show that in depression, the prefrontal cortex is overactive, as people become trapped by repetitive negative thinking. By triggering the type 2A serotonin receptor, the psychedelic encourages the brain to broaden its scope and come up with other ways of seeing things. Under the influence of a psychedelic, the overactive bit of the prefrontal cortex quietens down, and parts of the brain that werent talking to each other start communicating, adds Dr Rucker.

This cross wiring may be one of the reasons why synaesthesia where your senses get mixed up is a common experience with psychedelics (on my first ayahuasca journey, I associated yellow colours with an intense raspberry flavour).

But while the brains biological response to the drug is key, the trip itself also plays an important role. The more spiritual or personal the experience, the more likely people are to have long-term benefits, says Dr Rucker. Theres no guarantee youll get a big breakthrough and not everyone has powerful visions, but for some it can be profound. Sarah, a 32-year-old solicitor, spent two weeks in Peru at an ayahuasca retreat, drinking the medicine every other night to help her overcome grief following her sisters death. Id become scared of losing people I cared about and was avoiding relationships, she says. On my journey, I saw a coffin and the lid started to open. I was terrified, but when I looked inside I saw galaxies of moons and stars. Ive never been religious, however I had a new understanding that nothing is truly final, and that life can be beautiful again. Somehow, it moved me on.

Ayahuasca can be challenging, though. It made me look at things Id been avoiding in real life, says Susannah, 26, a social-media manager from London. I went to a retreat in the Netherlands because I was having relationship problems and wanted to work through them. Id never taken drugs in my life. A friend had found ayahuasca helpful with body image issues and I thought it might be what I needed. In one journey, I saw myself on a battlefield trying to help someone who was badly injured, but they bled to death. Afterwards, I realised the person who died represented my relationship Id been trying to fix it but the medicine showed me I couldnt. Although it was upsetting at the time, it gave me the confidence to leave. Dr Rucker believes millennials may be more willing to look to psychedelics for answers because theyre more educated about the risks and benefits. This generation has always been exposed to the internet and many different sources of information theyre more curious about the psychedelic experience and dont believe the demonisation of drugs. Magic mushrooms and ayahuasca are both natural substances and ayahuasca has been used in a sacred way for thousands of years, which might be part of its appeal.

In the UK, psychedelics are illegal, so its not possible to take them in a clinical setting. This may be a reason why retreats in Peru like the one I attended are soaring in popularity. Ayahuasca is taken in a group ceremony led by highly experienced shamans and assistants to keep an eye on everyone, so you feel safe, says Skie Hummingbird, a UK-based shaman who takes groups out to Peru (sungate.org.uk). But you need to choose the right place, as some centres are run by unscrupulous people who arent properly trained. Personal recommendation is the best way. And shes seen radical transformations. Some people undergo dramatic changes on a ten-day retreat, overcoming lifelong problems, she says. But its not for everyone: some people do report having highly distressing journeys.

Some of the latest research suggests ayahuasca could generate the birth of new brain cells, potentially treating neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimers, as well as psychiatric illnesses, while LSD and psilocybin show promise in treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). However, Professor Nutt advises caution. We need more studies, and such studies are limited by the law. Psychedelics are currently schedule 1 substances, which means theyre considered dangerous, making further research almost impossible. Nevertheless, the growing wave of interest in psychedelic psychiatry (a recent public talk at University College London sold out in 20 minutes) may address that. As Professor Nutt observes, Its groundbreaking science. These substances could potentially change peoples lives, providing we can do more thorough testing.

Here is the original post:

Tripping out: the highs and lows of psychedelic therapy - Marie Claire UK

At the end of a dark earthen trail in the Peruvian Amazon stands a round structure with a thatched roof that appears to glow from within.

In the Temple of the Way of Light, as it is known, indigenous healers called Onanya teach visitors about the therapeutic uses of ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic brew that's been used by locals for thousands of years.

Across the Atlantic, researchers in an ornate blue-tiled hospital in Barcelona, Spain are studying ayahuasca's physical effects on the brain.

The teams in those two disparate locations approach the study of the psychedelic drug very differently, but researchers at each one are coming to similar conclusions about the way ayahuasca affects the mind.

Among volunteers who take ayahuasca for studies, scientists have documented a rise in certain key traits that mirror those of experienced meditators. These changes include increases in openness, optimism, and a particularly powerful ability known as decentering.

Amanda Feilding, the founder and director of the UK-based nonprofit Beckley Foundation, collaborates with scientists around the world to understand how psychedelic drugs affect the brain.

Feilding describes decentering as "the ability to objectively observe one's thoughts and feelings without associating them with identity".

Decentering might sound esoteric, but it's one of the key aims of mindful meditation and is also a goal of successful depression treatments in some cases.

In volunteers who've taken ayahuasca as part of Beckley's research, decentering has been linked with higher scores on questionnaires designed to measure well-being and happiness and lower scores on measurements of depressive or anxious thoughts and symptoms of grief.

"It's interesting because even though our research out of Peru is based on surveys, while in Barcelona it's based on more traditional scientific research, our results out of both places are showing an increase in these traits," Feilding says.

"It seems patients are finally able to liberate themselves from the emotional pain they have long been suffering from. To calmly observe one's thoughts and feelings in an objective way in order to become less judgemental and more self-accepting."

Since the findings out of Peru are based on surveys, they can't prove that ayahuasca caused the reduction in symptoms of depression and grief - only that there's a connection between the two.

But in Spain, as part of a collaboration between Beckley and Sant Pau hospital, neurologist Jordi Riba is looking at the brain activity in depressed volunteers who are given ayahuasca.

His findings indicate that in addition to people simply reporting that they feel more decentered and less depressed after taking ayahuasca, there is a corresponding neurological change in their brain activity.

One small study of 17 depressed volunteers who took ayahuasca saw a decrease in activity in areas of the brain that tend to be overactive in conditions like depression and anxiety.

And a new study of regular ayahuasca users suggests a physical shrinking in these parts of the brain, though that work has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal.

These findings are bolstered by other research on the potential therapeutic effects of psychedelics. Studies out of New York University and Johns Hopkins suggest that the psychedelic drug psilocybin - the ingredient in magic mushrooms -elicits similar effects among depressed people.

"With the psilocybin, you get an appreciation - it's out of time - of well-being, of simply being alive and a witness to life and to everything and to the mystery itself," Clark Martin, a patient who participated in one of the Johns Hopkins trials, previously told Business Insider of his experience.

David Nutt, director of the neuropsychopharmacology unit at Imperial College London, has been working with Feilding, and says the brains of people with depression or addiction get locked into patterns of thinking driven by the brain's control centre.

"Psychedelics disrupt that process so people can escape," he says.

This article was originally published by Business Insider.

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Meditation and the psychedelic drug ayahuasca seem to change the brain in surprisingly similar ways - ScienceAlert

Psychedelic Science 2017

Join us from April 19-24, 2017, in Oakland, California, for a six-day global gathering featuring three days of Conference programming, three full days of Workshops, a Sunset Cruise on the San Francisco Bay, a Psychedelic Comedy Banquet, a free Marketplace of goods and ideas, and much more.

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Nearly four decades after research into psychedelics was suppressed by the government, a new wave of scientists is restoring legitimacy to a misunderstood and promising area of research. Baltimore is home to arguably the most prestigious psychedelic research program in the world. The studies conducted by Roland Griffiths and his team at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine did not just commence this new era of legally sanctioned research; they are also the most rigorous scientific studies to date on psilocybin.

This could not have come at a better time. America is not well, and psychedelics possess a therapeutic power uniquely suited for critical transitionsmost notably the one from life to death. But psychedelics also offer insight into navigating the critical cultural and historical shifts currently at play in America. These transitions and the conflicts they create are manifestations of deep psychological problems intertwined with identity and mythology.

The mushroom could play a role in this endeavor as an organic remedy uniquely effective at breaking entrenched belief systems around identity. As the latest scholarly articles reveal, the psychedelic experience is fundamentally about restructuring one's own perspectives on life and challenging one's own core assumptions. That psychedelics might also be the genesis of the religious mindset may offer hope that this work is less daunting than it may seem. Huey P. Newton liked to point out that contradiction was the ruling principle of the universe.

Mystical Death

The latest investigations into psilocybin at Johns Hopkinspublished in the Journal of Psychopharmacology in November 2016suggest that it is a medicine, many times safer and more effective than any human drug technology now available, for treating crippling depression and other sicknesses of the soul.

In a commentary authored with colleague Daniel Shalev on the remarkable findings, Jeffrey Lieberman, chairman of psychiatry at Columbia University and director of the New York State Psychiatric Institute, compared the effects of psilocybin to other "near-miraculous drugs such as aspirin and clozapine" whose therapeutic mechanisms also "remain mysterious."

Lieberman argued that the alarming volume of psychiatric conditions in our society alone constitutes an ethical imperative to seriously pursue larger investigations into psilocybin: "We do our patients a disservice by not understanding and appropriately investigating compounds with potential therapeutic value because of their prior controversial associations and on their capacity for misuse."

I personally investigated psilocybin and its effects by volunteering for one of Johns Hopkins' studies in 2014, and one of my own findings might seem counter-intuitive: The psychedelic experience was a sobering experience. I realized that my own identity was nothing but a deeply interwoven set of stories or assumptions. Some of those stories were self-defense mechanisms that had outlasted their use. When those stories were stripped away, it felt like being naked or exposed in front of the entire world. It was humiliating to see myself in this way, but ultimately freeing. The experience freed me from deadening positions in order to think about my identity in new ways. The greatest impediments to my own freedom I found within my own assumptions about myself and the world. I felt I had been given a unique opportunity to lead a more fulfilling life outside of a socially programmed role.

Hopkins' main finding has been that the lasting positive benefits of psilocybin are positively correlated with the intensity of the mystical experience it generates. Mysticism is a kind of transcendence produced by deep inner reflectiona state of cognitive liberty brought about by using the tools you have developed to analyze the outside world to analyze yourself. In this state, information is revealed via intuition.

My "trip" started with what felt like an oncoming spell of madness, as I broke away from what another journal commentator described as the "reassuring banality of everyday experiences." Wearing eyeshades and headphones, the normal lines of defensethe eye and ear sensorsare disabled, concentrating the experience inward. Music plays a key role in the Hopkins study. The six-and-a-half-hour playlist guided me through a recurring series of birth and death simulations, essentially ringing out a brimming well of repressed emotions clinging to my insides. Imagine Mozart conducting "Ave verum corpus" with your central nervous system as the instruments and you will get an idea of what I am talking about.

"Are there any other kind of songs?" I once asked between waves, seeking relief from being sucked back into another death trance.

The fear of death is featured heavily in the commentary. If there is a consensus, it is that experiencing death, sometimes called "mystical death," significantly reduces fear and anxiety. The Hopkins study (Griffiths et al.) used 51 cancer patients. These volunteers are often terrifieddeeply fearful of facing the unknown, full of anxiety, and extremely depressed. Six and a half months after the study ended, 52 percent and 70 percent of volunteers rated the psilocybin experience as the singular or top five most spiritually significant experience, and the singular or top five most personally meaningful experience of their lives, respectively. Eighty-seven percent attributed increased life-satisfaction or well-being to the experience. Another study from Dec. 2016, titled "The role of psychedelics in palliative care reconsidered: A case for psilocybin" by Benjamin Kelmendi et. al argued that these studies demonstrated "that a single-dose of psilocybin can produce both an acute and enduring reduction in depression symptoms, anxiety, and existential distress in patients with life-threatening cancer."

Another volunteer I spoke to in 2016a musician in their mid-20stold me that the experience with psilocybin led to a profound life reevaluation. "It's been over a year since I finished the study and in a lot of ways it has totally changed my life in a really positive way," they explained. "I wouldn't call it a religious experience, but I would say it was definitely a spiritual experience. I would say that I'm continually very interested in life, in the context of death and these kinds of experiencesreligious, spiritual, or transcendenthowever you want to describe them, as being ways of coming to terms with or exploring what is beyond our existence in the material world."

They continue on: "It's also made me want to live more with less and to try to really genuinely live by my values better. To live more actively and with purpose. In that way, it was really inspiring, and in that way I really think it's a really good tool to inspire mundane level change. I think it just makes people better and going and healing yourself from the inside will emanate into what you do in the world and it's really important. I was able to continue to basically quit smoking, to cut down to drinking very little. I was just in Europe on tour and I wasn't getting wasted even though those around me were."

Programs like Hopkins might eventually be commonplace throughout the country, with the therapy facilitated in clinics by psychologists like Bill Richards, who has been legally studying psychedelics since the 1960s at Spring Grove Hospital in Catonsville, where he gained a wealth of knowledge and experience designing research studies.

"What makes the responsible use of psychedelic substances so important, however, is that it provides reliability and potency," Richards writes in his book "Sacred Knowledge." "For the first time in the history of science, these two factors allow these revelatory states of consciousness and any changes in physical or mental health, or in attitudes or behavior, that may follow them to be studied carefully and systematically within the context of academic research. No longer is the study of mysticism limited to the scholarly scrutiny of historical documents, such as the beautifully expressive writings of St. Teresa of Avila, Meister Eckhart, Rumi, or Shankara."

In the book, Richards relates the story of a drug addict from Baltimore living in a halfway house. After being released from prison, the man was sent to Spring Grove for treatment and received a high dose of LSD. Afterward, he explained that it was difficult to express the beauty of what was clearly a powerful religious experience. "My mind left my body and my body was dead," the man said. He described a glowing Divine Being approaching him with his hand out. "I had touched that Divine Being and became part of God. At that moment, I shouted: 'Good God Almighty, what a beautiful day! Good God Almighty, I am a man at last!'. . . I have been cleansed of all my sins. I thought before this moment that I could see but I have been a blind man all my life."

Richards' book is filled with these kinds of stories, which I, coming from a Baptist background, interpreted as clear examples of the "born again" experience, a phrase I'd often heard but never believed.

"You cannot see the kingdom of God," Jesus said in the Book of John, "unless you are born again."

Whether or not psychedelics are responsible for the bizarre stories depicted in the Bible, the document could disappear and it would shortly be rewritten, as stories of mystical experiences are a worldwide phenomenon today. However, if future research confirms that psychedelics did play a role in the genesis of religion, a shift in the church's focus toward a more private practiceperhaps one utilizing eyeshades and a pair of headphoneswould be wise.

Infinite Wonder

After the study, I began to see hope and humor where I once saw only dead ends, outdated ideologies, and empty slogans. All of a sudden, forgiveness seemed of the utmost importance. "It is useless to try to adjudicate a long standing animosity by asking who started it, or who is the most wrong," Wendell Berry once pointed out. "The only sufficient answer is to give up the animosity, and try forgiveness." Christianity wasn't so bad, I thought, hell, I might even be a follower. Abraham Joshua Heschel pointed out in his book "The Prophets," that the prophets of the Old Testament have been described since antiquity as "hysterics . . . who experimented with altered states of consciousness." Former contradictions didn't seem like contradictions anymore. Some kind of third path had been revealed. New angles, meanings, and perspectives were abundant and exciting. No wonder they were hysterical, I thought, the problems that plague humanity are easily solvable in theory.

I would need a grant from the health department, I thought, and somewhere to conduct a sociology study on mental illness. The 100-plus year relationship between Kentucky and King Coal has left a deep psychological wound on my people. My uncle, Colonel Oren Coin, was sent by the governor to intervene in the battles of Bloody Harlan County in 1935. On the front page of the New York Times on Sept. 30, Uncle Oren described the police and coal operators' actions as a "reign of terror." The terrorists have by now mostly abandoned the state, ending the rocky relationship with only environmental and public health disasters left behind as thank-you notes. "You could have called, and told me goodbye," Larry Sparks moaned in his bluegrass classic of the same name.

There are plenty of troubled pastors in Kentucky (Marvin Gaye Sr. was born in Lexington) and it boasts some of the finest amateur chemists in the countryinside and outside of jail. Furthermore, we played a central role in the history of psychedelics in America. The two most prominent distributors of LSD were from the bluegrass state: Owsley "Bear" Stanley, whose acid fueled the entire counterculture of the 1960s, and Al Hubbard, a one-time CIA agent who provided LSD to the team from Stanford University that invented the personal computer. Hubbard is also the mysterious figure who facilitated the trip that Aldous Huxley recounted in his 1956 essay 'Heaven and Hell.'

I imagined one of those Amazon drones navigating through the mountains with a box of mushrooms in its craw ("may cause fits, visions and trances"). An eye mask and compact disc were included to ensure a quality mystical experience. An on-the-job-training program would unleash the potential of the state's demoralized spiritual entrepreneurs, now reduced to profits of positive-thinking. The pastorship would be dispatched with their conversion kits via the "Shaman" app to the homes of the unwell, and to our existing centers of healing, which already have chapels installed. Churches preaching the prosperity gospel were offered free samplesan opportunity for a meet and greet with Jesus! Then again, you should never meet your heroes, they say. I found God to be absolutely ruthless and highly indifferent in judgment.

Psychiatrist David Spiegel of Stanford University argues that psilocybin is essentially about reducing fear by facing "the ultimate loss of control." Fear, says Spiegel, is a "limiting state of mind" that numbs us from living "fully and authentically." He views healing as a kind of personal trial or day of judgment aided by the unique mindset facilitated by psilocybin, which switches the mind into a kind of diagnostic or safe mode. "[T]hese drugs seem to 'reboot' the brain, leaving it changed long after the drug is gone." Unfaced fears lead to anxiety, Bilderman pointed out, and eventually crippling phobias develop, many times stored in the subconscious, beneath the level of awareness. "Good psychotherapy involves learning to restructure one's perspectives on one's problems in life" by challenging "routine assumptions and think[ing] about problems in new ways."

At the time of the study, I had been thinking a lot about country music for a column I wrote for this paper. Hank Williams' most popular song is actually an ode to cognitive liberty. Visited upon him like a "stranger in the night," a brush with the ineffable leads to a life-altering change in the singer's perspective, freeing him from paralyzing worry and fear. The clear white light restored the singer's "vision," an allusion to the conversion of St. Paul, and a common mystical experience. "I saw the light, I saw the light, no more darkness, no more night. Now I'm so happy, no sorrow in sight, praise the Lord I saw the light."

My experience at Hopkins transformed country gospel favorites from stale but fun sing-alongs into meaningful symbols of the psychedelic experience. I imagined this story sparking a revival of old-time country music, and running the clock backwards to a pre-industrial front-porch paradise. In my mind, I was country music's Martin Luther, restoring a wilder, more authentic form of worship. I saw a large stained-glass bird sitting on top of a tree like a totem pole; it could see everything crystal clear from there, I thought. I saw a network of doors and empty rooms inside of an invisible castle. I felt a presence, and observed the face of a feminine plant-being wearing an eye mask wrapped with vines. It was moving around, performing some kind of possessed ritual and carefully whipping those wild vines. I was mildly alarmed, but also flabbergasted at the performance.

"Travis," a voice called out.

Was this a guardian angel, I wondered? Maybe a nymph! Or perhaps the Starmaker, guiding me to the Western Lands. I felt a hand resting gently on my shoulder. It was time to check my blood pressure, my session guide said.

Read more from the original source:

Reducing anxiety, stress, depression, more with shrooms - Baltimore ... - Baltimore City Paper

Nearly four decades after research into psychedelics was suppressed by the government, a new wave of scientists is restoring legitimacy to a misunderstood and promising area of research. Baltimore is home to arguably the most prestigious psychedelic research program in the world. The studies conducted by Roland Griffiths and his team at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine did not just commence this new era of legally sanctioned research; they are also the most rigorous scientific studies to date on psilocybin.

This could not have come at a better time. America is not well, and psychedelics possess a therapeutic power uniquely suited for critical transitionsmost notably the one from life to death. But psychedelics also offer insight into navigating the critical cultural and historical shifts currently at play in America. These transitions and the conflicts they create are manifestations of deep psychological problems intertwined with identity and mythology.

The mushroom could play a role in this endeavor as an organic remedy uniquely effective at breaking entrenched belief systems around identity. As the latest scholarly articles reveal, the psychedelic experience is fundamentally about restructuring one's own perspectives on life and challenging one's own core assumptions. That psychedelics might also be the genesis of the religious mindset may offer hope that this work is less daunting than it may seem. Huey P. Newton liked to point out that contradiction was the ruling principle of the universe.

Mystical Death

The latest investigations into psilocybin at Johns Hopkinspublished in the Journal of Psychopharmacology in November 2016suggest that it is a medicine, many times safer and more effective than any human drug technology now available, for treating crippling depression and other sicknesses of the soul.

In a commentary authored with colleague Daniel Shalev on the remarkable findings, Jeffrey Lieberman, chairman of psychiatry at Columbia University and director of the New York State Psychiatric Institute, compared the effects of psilocybin to other "near-miraculous drugs such as aspirin and clozapine" whose therapeutic mechanisms also "remain mysterious."

Lieberman argued that the alarming volume of psychiatric conditions in our society alone constitutes an ethical imperative to seriously pursue larger investigations into psilocybin: "We do our patients a disservice by not understanding and appropriately investigating compounds with potential therapeutic value because of their prior controversial associations and on their capacity for misuse."

I personally investigated psilocybin and its effects by volunteering for one of Johns Hopkins' studies in 2014, and one of my own findings might seem counter-intuitive: The psychedelic experience was a sobering experience. I realized that my own identity was nothing but a deeply interwoven set of stories or assumptions. Some of those stories were self-defense mechanisms that had outlasted their use. When those stories were stripped away, it felt like being naked or exposed in front of the entire world. It was humiliating to see myself in this way, but ultimately freeing. The experience freed me from deadening positions in order to think about my identity in new ways. The greatest impediments to my own freedom I found within my own assumptions about myself and the world. I felt I had been given a unique opportunity to lead a more fulfilling life outside of a socially programmed role.

Hopkins' main finding has been that the lasting positive benefits of psilocybin are positively correlated with the intensity of the mystical experience it generates. Mysticism is a kind of transcendence produced by deep inner reflectiona state of cognitive liberty brought about by using the tools you have developed to analyze the outside world to analyze yourself. In this state, information is revealed via intuition.

My "trip" started with what felt like an oncoming spell of madness, as I broke away from what another journal commentator described as the "reassuring banality of everyday experiences." Wearing eyeshades and headphones, the normal lines of defensethe eye and ear sensorsare disabled, concentrating the experience inward. Music plays a key role in the Hopkins study. The six-and-a-half-hour playlist guided me through a recurring series of birth and death simulations, essentially ringing out a brimming well of repressed emotions clinging to my insides. Imagine Mozart conducting "Ave verum corpus" with your central nervous system as the instruments and you will get an idea of what I am talking about.

"Are there any other kind of songs?" I once asked between waves, seeking relief from being sucked back into another death trance.

The fear of death is featured heavily in the commentary. If there is a consensus, it is that experiencing death, sometimes called "mystical death," significantly reduces fear and anxiety. The Hopkins study (Griffiths et al.) used 51 cancer patients. These volunteers are often terrifieddeeply fearful of facing the unknown, full of anxiety, and extremely depressed. Six and a half months after the study ended, 52 percent and 70 percent of volunteers rated the psilocybin experience as the singular or top five most spiritually significant experience, and the singular or top five most personally meaningful experience of their lives, respectively. Eighty-seven percent attributed increased life-satisfaction or well-being to the experience. Another study from Dec. 2016, titled "The role of psychedelics in palliative care reconsidered: A case for psilocybin" by Benjamin Kelmendi et. al argued that these studies demonstrated "that a single-dose of psilocybin can produce both an acute and enduring reduction in depression symptoms, anxiety, and existential distress in patients with life-threatening cancer."

Another volunteer I spoke to in 2016a musician in their mid-20stold me that the experience with psilocybin led to a profound life reevaluation. "It's been over a year since I finished the study and in a lot of ways it has totally changed my life in a really positive way," they explained. "I wouldn't call it a religious experience, but I would say it was definitely a spiritual experience. I would say that I'm continually very interested in life, in the context of death and these kinds of experiencesreligious, spiritual, or transcendenthowever you want to describe them, as being ways of coming to terms with or exploring what is beyond our existence in the material world."

They continue on: "It's also made me want to live more with less and to try to really genuinely live by my values better. To live more actively and with purpose. In that way, it was really inspiring, and in that way I really think it's a really good tool to inspire mundane level change. I think it just makes people better and going and healing yourself from the inside will emanate into what you do in the world and it's really important. I was able to continue to basically quit smoking, to cut down to drinking very little. I was just in Europe on tour and I wasn't getting wasted even though those around me were."

Programs like Hopkins might eventually be commonplace throughout the country, with the therapy facilitated in clinics by psychologists like Bill Richards, who has been legally studying psychedelics since the 1960s at Spring Grove Hospital in Catonsville, where he gained a wealth of knowledge and experience designing research studies.

"What makes the responsible use of psychedelic substances so important, however, is that it provides reliability and potency," Richards writes in his book "Sacred Knowledge." "For the first time in the history of science, these two factors allow these revelatory states of consciousness and any changes in physical or mental health, or in attitudes or behavior, that may follow them to be studied carefully and systematically within the context of academic research. No longer is the study of mysticism limited to the scholarly scrutiny of historical documents, such as the beautifully expressive writings of St. Teresa of Avila, Meister Eckhart, Rumi, or Shankara."

In the book, Richards relates the story of a drug addict from Baltimore living in a halfway house. After being released from prison, the man was sent to Spring Grove for treatment and received a high dose of LSD. Afterward, he explained that it was difficult to express the beauty of what was clearly a powerful religious experience. "My mind left my body and my body was dead," the man said. He described a glowing Divine Being approaching him with his hand out. "I had touched that Divine Being and became part of God. At that moment, I shouted: 'Good God Almighty, what a beautiful day! Good God Almighty, I am a man at last!'. . . I have been cleansed of all my sins. I thought before this moment that I could see but I have been a blind man all my life."

Richards' book is filled with these kinds of stories, which I, coming from a Baptist background, interpreted as clear examples of the "born again" experience, a phrase I'd often heard but never believed.

"You cannot see the kingdom of God," Jesus said in the Book of John, "unless you are born again."

Whether or not psychedelics are responsible for the bizarre stories depicted in the Bible, the document could disappear and it would shortly be rewritten, as stories of mystical experiences are a worldwide phenomenon today. However, if future research confirms that psychedelics did play a role in the genesis of religion, a shift in the church's focus toward a more private practiceperhaps one utilizing eyeshades and a pair of headphoneswould be wise.

Infinite Wonder

After the study, I began to see hope and humor where I once saw only dead ends, outdated ideologies, and empty slogans. All of a sudden, forgiveness seemed of the utmost importance. "It is useless to try to adjudicate a long standing animosity by asking who started it, or who is the most wrong," Wendell Berry once pointed out. "The only sufficient answer is to give up the animosity, and try forgiveness." Christianity wasn't so bad, I thought, hell, I might even be a follower. Abraham Joshua Heschel pointed out in his book "The Prophets," that the prophets of the Old Testament have been described since antiquity as "hysterics . . . who experimented with altered states of consciousness." Former contradictions didn't seem like contradictions anymore. Some kind of third path had been revealed. New angles, meanings, and perspectives were abundant and exciting. No wonder they were hysterical, I thought, the problems that plague humanity are easily solvable in theory.

I would need a grant from the health department, I thought, and somewhere to conduct a sociology study on mental illness. The 100-plus year relationship between Kentucky and King Coal has left a deep psychological wound on my people. My uncle, Colonel Oren Coin, was sent by the governor to intervene in the battles of Bloody Harlan County in 1935. On the front page of the New York Times on Sept. 30, Uncle Oren described the police and coal operators' actions as a "reign of terror." The terrorists have by now mostly abandoned the state, ending the rocky relationship with only environmental and public health disasters left behind as thank-you notes. "You could have called, and told me goodbye," Larry Sparks moaned in his bluegrass classic of the same name.

There are plenty of troubled pastors in Kentucky (Marvin Gaye Sr. was born in Lexington) and it boasts some of the finest amateur chemists in the countryinside and outside of jail. Furthermore, we played a central role in the history of psychedelics in America. The two most prominent distributors of LSD were from the bluegrass state: Owsley "Bear" Stanley, whose acid fueled the entire counterculture of the 1960s, and Al Hubbard, a one-time CIA agent who provided LSD to the team from Stanford University that invented the personal computer. Hubbard is also the mysterious figure who facilitated the trip that Aldous Huxley recounted in his 1956 essay 'Heaven and Hell.'

I imagined one of those Amazon drones navigating through the mountains with a box of mushrooms in its craw ("may cause fits, visions and trances"). An eye mask and compact disc were included to ensure a quality mystical experience. An on-the-job-training program would unleash the potential of the state's demoralized spiritual entrepreneurs, now reduced to profits of positive-thinking. The pastorship would be dispatched with their conversion kits via the "Shaman" app to the homes of the unwell, and to our existing centers of healing, which already have chapels installed. Churches preaching the prosperity gospel were offered free samplesan opportunity for a meet and greet with Jesus! Then again, you should never meet your heroes, they say. I found God to be absolutely ruthless and highly indifferent in judgment.

Psychiatrist David Spiegel of Stanford University argues that psilocybin is essentially about reducing fear by facing "the ultimate loss of control." Fear, says Spiegel, is a "limiting state of mind" that numbs us from living "fully and authentically." He views healing as a kind of personal trial or day of judgment aided by the unique mindset facilitated by psilocybin, which switches the mind into a kind of diagnostic or safe mode. "[T]hese drugs seem to 'reboot' the brain, leaving it changed long after the drug is gone." Unfaced fears lead to anxiety, Bilderman pointed out, and eventually crippling phobias develop, many times stored in the subconscious, beneath the level of awareness. "Good psychotherapy involves learning to restructure one's perspectives on one's problems in life" by challenging "routine assumptions and think[ing] about problems in new ways."

At the time of the study, I had been thinking a lot about country music for a column I wrote for this paper. Hank Williams' most popular song is actually an ode to cognitive liberty. Visited upon him like a "stranger in the night," a brush with the ineffable leads to a life-altering change in the singer's perspective, freeing him from paralyzing worry and fear. The clear white light restored the singer's "vision," an allusion to the conversion of St. Paul, and a common mystical experience. "I saw the light, I saw the light, no more darkness, no more night. Now I'm so happy, no sorrow in sight, praise the Lord I saw the light."

My experience at Hopkins transformed country gospel favorites from stale but fun sing-alongs into meaningful symbols of the psychedelic experience. I imagined this story sparking a revival of old-time country music, and running the clock backwards to a pre-industrial front-porch paradise. In my mind, I was country music's Martin Luther, restoring a wilder, more authentic form of worship. I saw a large stained-glass bird sitting on top of a tree like a totem pole; it could see everything crystal clear from there, I thought. I saw a network of doors and empty rooms inside of an invisible castle. I felt a presence, and observed the face of a feminine plant-being wearing an eye mask wrapped with vines. It was moving around, performing some kind of possessed ritual and carefully whipping those wild vines. I was mildly alarmed, but also flabbergasted at the performance.

"Travis," a voice called out.

Was this a guardian angel, I wondered? Maybe a nymph! Or perhaps the Starmaker, guiding me to the Western Lands. I felt a hand resting gently on my shoulder. It was time to check my blood pressure, my session guide said.

The rest is here:

I Saw The Light: Reducing anxiety, stress, depression, more with ... - Baltimore City Paper