Chapter 5
There are many people who might say that even if LSD is the greatest experience that a person can have, so what? Of what use is it other than making someone feel good for a while, like a tranquilizer? To react this way is to miss the point completely. LSD can transform a person’s life for the better in a way that nothing else can because it can knock out the ego and give the person a new perspective on everything.
This can be very useful. It was already stated that one LSD experience can solve a psychological problem that years of regular psychotherapy couldn’t solve. This is possible, again, because the person is getting a new concept of reality and can analyze their problem from a new point of view and see the answer clearly now. It’s like when a fog clears and the person can now see what’s there. The person could spend the rest of their life talking to a therapist and just go in circles because the talk doesn’t get rid of the fog that is blocking the answer. The fog is the ego and the ego has got to go in order to get anywhere.
To put it another way, talking to the therapist doesn’t get beyond the verbal games or the negativity of Freud’s theory of the brain. All typical therapy does is deal with negatives whether it’s painful memories, fears, anxieties, tensions, feelings of inferiority, etc. Dealing with just negatives is limited, destructive and ineffective. The patient needs to get past the negativity of the ego into the positive, spiritual dimensions of the brain, something that Freud knew nothing about and that Western societies know nothing about.
On the concept of one LSD experience being able to do what other therapy can’t do, here are two quotes from Stanislav Grof. The first is from page 239 of LSD Psychotherapy and the second from page 377 of Beyond the Brain, both books written by Grof:
“Under certain circumstances even a single psychedelic experience can have profound and lasting consequences. If the subject’s personality structure has intrinsic potential for a fundamental positive or negative shift, the administration of LSD can catalyze and precipitate a sudden dramatic transformation. On occasion, one LSD experience has drastically changed an individual’s world-view, life philosophy and entire way of being. It has mediated a profound spiritual opening in atheists, skeptics and materialistically oriented scientists, facilitated far-reaching emotional liberation and caused radical changes in value systems and the basic life style.”
“Important emotional, psychosomatic or interpersonal difficulties that have plagued the client for many years and have resisted conventional therapeutic approaches can sometimes disappear after a full experience of a transpersonal nature, such as an authentic identification with an animal or plant form, surrender to the dynamic power of an archetype, experiential reenactment of a historical event, dramatic sequence from another culture or reliving what appears to be a scene of a past incarnation.”
Things mentioned in the second Grof quote, just above, such as archetypes, reliving historical events or past incarnations and experiencing other cultures, all involve the visions seen with the eyes closed and may involve the symbolic dramas mentioned earlier. All of this is therapeutic because these experiences are so overwhelming and real that the person can’t help but to be affected strongly and emotionally, enough so that the person can see that what was supposed to be such a problem is nothing. If the person has a religious experience and realizes that, ultimately, there is no problem and that any problem involves the ego and only the ego, then the person has been “cured.”
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One point should be made clear. This involves theories of reincarnation and what Grof called “reliving what appears to be a scene of a past incarnation.” There is no reincarnation as such and a person does not relive a “past incarnation.” We all have the same infinite brain. It is only egos that make us appear to be very different.
It is not as if I have past lives that are different than yours or anyone else’s. We all have, in the brain, all present, past and even future lives. The brain is the entire universe in all of time, not the silly little limited ego. Similarly, the common theory of reincarnation is wrong. What supposedly happened in a “past life” has nothing to do with your present life. You were not born in sin. You were not a dog in your past life any more or less than you were Jesus. We were all dogs and Christ and everything else because everything is in the brain. Getting access to the brain is another story. LSD can do it. Unfortunately, all research on LSD was forbidden before the surface was even scratched as to how to make the best, fullest use of it. Timothy Leary and others tried their best to get at all the answers, but the door was slammed shut in their faces and it’s still shut.
Stanislav Grof says more on p. 225 of his book LSD Psychotherapy:
“The richness of the experiential content is augmented by the fact that the process involves an endless variety of illustrative material from biology, zoology, anthropology, history, mythology and religion. Psychedelic sessions focusing on the death-rebirth process not only have great therapeutic potential, but are a source of invaluable scientific, sociopolitical, philosophical and spiritual insights.”
Again, when Grof talks about, in this case, the illustrative material from history and the other fields of study, he’s talking about what is seen with the eyes closed. The death-rebirth process is the death of the ego and the rebirth is the new life for the person. The experience will change the person for the better. As Grof says on p. 288 of LSD Psychotherapy:
“An individual who has a transcendental experience develops an entirely new image of his or her identity and cosmic status. The materialistic image of the universe in which the individual is a meaningless speck of dust in the vastness of the cosmos is instantly replaced by the mystical alternative. Within the new world-view, the very creative principle of the universe is experientially available to the individual and, in a certain sense, is commensurate and identical with him or her. This is a drastic change of perspective and it has far-reaching consequences for every aspect of life.”
There is a quote from William James that has appeared in many books. It probably came from his book, The Varieties of Religious Experience. It’s on p. 262 of Masters and Houston’s book, The Varieties of Psychedelic Experience. It’s James’ comment on his experience with nitrous oxide. This is it:
“One conclusion was forced upon my mind at that time and my impression of its truth has ever since remained unshaken. It is that our normal waking consciousness, rational consciousness as we call it, is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different. We may go through life without suspecting their existence; but apply the requisite stimulus and at a touch they are there in all their completeness, definite types of mentality which probably somewhere have their field of application and adaptation. No account of the universe in its totality can be final which leaves these other forms of consciousness quite disregarded. How to regard them is the question-for they are discontinuous with ordinary consciousness. Yet they may determine attitudes though they cannot furnish formulas and open a region though they fail to give a map. At any rate, they forbid a premature closing of our accounts with reality. Looking back on my own experiences, they all converge toward a kind of insight to which I cannot help ascribing some metaphysical significance.”
What comes up again and again from people who have taken LSD is their reference to insights of all kinds, whether it’s intellectual, psychological, scientific, sociopolitical, philosophical, spiritual or metaphysical insights. Has anyone ever claimed that they get any insights at all about anything as a result of drinking alcohol? Does going to school give people valuable insights of this kind? Many have claimed that LSD was the most educational experience of their lives. There are few things that can give a person an insight into anything, but LSD can give a person important insights into everything.
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Timothy Leary, of course, understood how valuable LSD can be. On page 278 of his book, High Priest, he says:
“Psychedelic research is experimental philosophy, empirical metaphysics, visionary science. Psychedelic drugs offer new perspectives on every aspect of human thinking, human behavior, human searching. There is no issue in psychology, physics, biology, and theology which cannot make use of these microscopes of consciousness. The discovery of LSD is as important to philosophy and religion as the discovery of the microscope was to biology. Psychedelic drugs allow us to study–directly, experientially, empirically-the problems which have perplexed philosophers for millennia.”
LSD can be the catalyst that will solve a seemingly unsolvable, lifetime psychological problem and can give a person important, valuable, significant and meaningful insights of all kinds that would be impossible without LSD. That’s not exactly chopped liver. What other uses does LSD have in addition to being the ultimate experience a person can have? LSD can enhance creativity, contribute to scientific discoveries, help solve problems that aren’t psychological problems and it also has medical uses.
How does LSD enhance creativity? When the mind is clear, with the ego gone, the person’s new perspective leads to new ideas which can lead to new actions in the creative area. This is especially true for artists. What follows are three quotes from Stanislav Grof’s book, LSD Psychotherapy, concerning the relationship between LSD, artists and creativity. The quotes are from pages 25, 266 and 103:
“The early experimentation with LSD also brought important new insights into the nature of the creative process and contributed to a deeper understanding of the psychology and psychopathology of art. For many experimental subjects, professional artists as well as laymen, the LSD session represented a profound aesthetic experience that gave them a new understanding of modern art movements and art in general. Painters, sculptors and musicians became favorite LSD subjects because they tended to produce most unusual, unconventional and interesting pieces of art under the influence of the drug. Some of them were able to express and convey in the creations the nature and flavor of the psychedelic experience, which defies any adequate verbal description. The day of the LSD experience often became a dramatic and easily discernable landmark in the development of individual artists.”
“Most of the art in the collection of psychedelic therapists comes from subjects who were not professional artists, but had LSD sessions for therapeutic, didactic or other purposes. Frequently, individuals who did not show any artistic inclinations at all prior to the LSD experience can create extraordinary pictures. In most cases, the intensity of the effect is due to the unusual nature and power of the material that emerges from the depths of the unconscious, rather than artistic abilities. It is not uncommon, however, for even the technical aspects of such drawings or paintings to be far superior to previous creations by the same subjects. Some individuals actually pursue in their everyday life the newer skills they discover in their psychedelic sessions. In exceptional cases, a genuine artistic talent of extraordinary power and scope may emerge during the LSD procedure.”
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“A completely different set of LSD sessions emerged when it became obvious that the drug experience could enhance creative potential in certain individuals. The drug became popular among artists as a source of inspiration and many hundreds of painters, sculptors, musicians, architects, and writers volunteered for LSD experiments. Somewhat later, scientists, philosophers and other highly creative individuals became favorite subjects for LSD sessions. This was based on the observation that the unusual states of consciousness induced by LSD can generate important insights, facilitate problem-solving and lead to valid intuitions or unexpected resyntheses of accumulated data.”
In showing how creativity, made possible by LSD, can lead to scientific discoveries and help solve problems that are not psychological problems, again, we will return to Stanislav Grof and his book, LSD Psychotherapy. This is from pages 267-268:
“Many observations from psychedelic research indicate that LSD can also be of extraordinary value to various scientific disciplines that are traditionally considered domains of reason and logic. Two important aspects of the LSD effect seem to be of particular relevance in this context. First, the drug can mediate access to vast repositories of concrete and valid information in the collective unconscious and make them available to the experiment. According to my observations, the revealed knowledge can be very specific, accurate and detailed; the data obtained in this way can be related to many different fields. In our relatively limited LSD training program for scientists, relevant insights occurred in such diverse areas as cosmogenesis, the nature of space and time, sub-atomic physics, ethnology, animal psychology, history, philosophy, genetics, obseterics, psychosomatic medicine, psychology, psychotherapy and thanatology.
“The second aspect of the LSD effect that is of great relevance for the creative process is the facilitation of new and unexpected synthesis of data, resulting in unconventional problem-solving. It is a well known fact that many important ideas and solutions to problems did not originate in the context of logical reasoning, but in various unusual states of mind-in dreams, while falling asleep or awakening, at times of extreme physical and mental fatigue or during an illness with high fever. There are many famous examples of this. Thus, the chemist Friedrich August von Kekule arrived at the final solution of the chemical formula of benzene in a dream in which he saw the benzene ring in the form of a snake biting its tail. Nikola Tesla constructed the electric generator, an invention that revolutionized industry, after the complete design of it appeared to him in great detail in a vision. The design for the experiment leading to the Nobel prize-winning discovery of the chemical transmission of nerve impulses occurred to the physiologist Otto Loewi while he was asleep. Albert Einstein discovered the basic principles of his special theory of relativity in an unusual state of mind; according to his description, most of the insights came to him in the form of kinaesthetic sensations.
“We could mention many instances of a similar kind where a creative individual struggled unsuccessfully for a long time with a difficult problem using logic and reason, with the actual solution emerging unexpectedly from the unconscious in moments when his or her rationality was suspended. In everyday life events of this kind happen very rarely and in an elemental and unpredictable fashion. Psychedelic drugs seem to facilitate the incidence of such creative solutions to the point that they can be deliberately programmed. In an LSD state, the old conceptual frameworks break down, cultural cognitive barriers dissolve and the material can be seen and synthesized in a totally new way that was not possible within the old system of thinking. This mechanism can produce not only striking new solutions to various specific problems, but new paradigms that revolutionize whole scientific disciplines.”
The LSD state not only doesn’t make someone crazy, but can actually make possible the necessary conditions in order to have genuine creative thinking and action and find the elusive answers to problems. It can also lead to worthwhile scientific discoveries like those described in the last quote. Even Einstein’s discoveries resulted from an unusual state of mind. You sure won’t find that in any history or science books just like you won’t find in any of the regular books any information about the LSD kind of experience being the origin of religions.
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The American Indians and the Indians in the rest of this hemisphere to the south have used peyote or the magic mushrooms as part of their religion for a long time. They also don’t have bad trips because it’s part of their culture and it’s not looked down upon as insanity. There are a group of American Indians in the United States, numbering perhaps 250,000, called The Native American Church. They are legally allowed to use peyote as part of their religion. How strange it is that the government allows them to use psychedelic drugs for religious purposes, but won’t allow anyone else to do the same.
We also think that the worst thing in the world is for a teen-ager to have a psychedelic experience. On that point, here is Timothy Leary, from pages 132-133 of his book, High Priest:
“We forget that for thousands of years the psychedelic vision has been the rite of passage of the teen-ager-the Dakota Indian boy who sits on the mountaintop fasting and sleepless, waiting for the revelation. The threshold of adult game life is the ancient and natural time for the rebirth experience, the flip-out trip from which you come back as a man. A healthy society provides and protects the sacredness of the teen-age psychedelic voyage. A sick, static society fears and forbids the revelation.”
Our sick, static society not only fears and forbids the revelation in teen-agers but bans if for anyone, with the threat of prison. Your body belongs to you, not the government. It is your choice what you do with your body and your consciousness. Any government that interferes with this kind of freedom is a fascist government. All countries, including the United States, have fascist governments. Some are just a lot worse than others. Because our government is the least fascist in the world, we confuse that with having freedom. Soft fascism is not freedom. Freedom is freedom. There is no freedom of religion in this country if no one is allowed to have psychedelic drugs as part of their religion, except for those Indians, a small racial minority, living outside of the mainstream.
Here is what Timothy Leary said about LSD and religion. It’s from page 135 of his book, The Politics of Ecstasy”
“The LSD experience is a confrontation with new forms of wisdom and energy that dwarf and humiliate man’s mind. This experience of awe and revelation is often described as religious. I consider my work basically religious, because it has as its goal the systematic expansion of consciousness and the discovery of energies within, which men call ‘divine’. From the psychedelic point of view, almost all religions are attempts, sometimes limited temporarily or nationally, to discover the inner potential. Well, LSD is Western yoga. The aim of all Eastern religion, like the aim of LSD, is basically to get high, that is, to expand your consciousness and find ecstasy and revelation within.”
Alan Watts had an interesting comment about the Eastern religions on page 11 of his book, The Joyous Cosmology. Here it is:
“The transformation of consciousness undertaken in Taoism and Zen is more like the correction of faulty perception or the curing of a disease. It is not an acquisition process of learning more and more facts or greater and greater skills, but rather an unlearning of wrong habits and opinions. As Lao-tzu said, ‘the scholar gains every day, but the Taoist loses every day'”.
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What good is learning more facts or skills if none of it means anything? Just like Lao-tzu and Alan Watts said, we need to clean the trash and social propaganda out of our minds in order to see and think clearly and be able to finally know what it really means to be alive. When the ego is no longer dominant, it can be said that the person is in a state of direct uninhibited experiencing or immediate unverbalized awareness or naked consciousness or calm passive concentration or pure content-free awareness or mental silence or alert passivity and pure receptivity or simply uncontaminated consciousness. It’s a very calm, relaxed, peaceful feeling.
Combining that with the feel you get from the following phrases and you’ll get more of a feel for the LSD experience. Here is a list of word combinations. Each one is intended to give the reader a meaningful, profound feeling of some kind. These word combinations are not in any special order, but reading one after another hopefully will have a cumulative positive effect. Here is the list and it really could have been much larger:
| eternal beauty | radiantly awesome |
| ecstatic clarity | ineffable joy |
| divine purity | ecstatic transcendence |
| luminous bliss | spiritual enrichment |
| sensual mysteriousness | ultimate meaning |
| ecstatic renewal | cosmic unity |
| cosmic grandeur | sacred beauty |
| paradise rediscovered | divine radiance |
| magical significance | eternal bliss |
| ultimately enriching | visionary magic |
| unforgettably beautiful | transcendental clarity |
| overflowing joy | joyous harmony |
| eternal truth | universal insights |
| transcendent purity | cosmic significance |
| boundless radiance | emotional liberation |
| ultimate liberation | divine inspiration |
| mystic oneness | supernatural beauty |
| cosmic ecstasy | ecstatic energy |
| awed reverence | blissful radiance |
| infinite beauty | infinite treasures |
| ecstatic intensity | eternal consciousness |
| cleansed perception | spiritual freedom |
| radiant unity | ultimate purity |
| magically lovely | transcendental radiance |
| rich emotions | true wisdom |
| divine wisdom | blissful unity |
| inner liberation | cosmic insights |
| spiritual purification | divine freedom |
| mysteriously beautiful | eternal ecstasy |
| ecstatic radiance | visionary bliss |
| eternal significance | ultimate transcendence |
| sensory richness | sacred radiance |
| true clarity | magic dreams |
| universal harmony | ecstatic harmony |
| divine beauty | transcendental joy |
| metaphysical joy | heavenly bliss |
| unearthly radiance | divine ecstasy |
| transcendent beauty | spiritual liberation |
| ecstatic rapture | radiantly clear |
| divine truth | ultimate enlightenment |
| radiant energy | heavenly beauty |
| infinite ecstasy | infinite potentialities |
| radiant bliss | mystical raptures |
| divine light | cosmic fireworks |
| the forgotten beauty | the divine dream |
| the higher ecstasies | the eternal dance |
| the original purity | the glorious radiance |
| the rich radiance | the transcendent divine |
| the universal essence | the Ultimate Truth |
| the highest wisdom | the Supreme Ultimate |
| the cosmic reality | the liberating realization |
| the divine design | the eternal return |
| the heavenly realms | the bright heavens |
| the perceptual richness | the ultimate consciousness |
| the transcendent vision | the inner unity |
| the ultimate illumination | the cosmic journey |
| the pure truth | the ultimate reality |
| the eternal flow | the rich potentialities |
| the realm of essence | the hidden truth |
| the ultimate best | the universal life-force |
| the cosmic intelligence | the divine dance |
| the new joy | an immeasurable richness |
| our eternal home | purity of mind |
| the transcendent terrain | the taste for truth |
| this new brilliant world | the timeless paradise world |
| the magical Other World | the electric glow within |
| the Spirit of Truth | the elixir of wisdom |
| a new thrilling freedom | liberation into the eternal |
| the energy of ecstasy | vision of highest beauty |
| the flowering of wisdom | universal divine consciousness |
| the new cosmic horizon | mystical unitive consciousness |
| dancing in the heavens | the Great Ocean of Liberation |
You can play around with these words and make up more combinations, but with LSD these aren’t just words or word combinations. When you are tripping, this is all for real. You can see, feel, realize or understand the meaning these word combinations are trying to convey. They all apply or relate to the LSD experience in some way.
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What follows is a new idea for almost everyone, whether they are veteran LSD trippers or LSD virgins, and not many people will immediately accept this new idea, even if it is the truth. It’s about Jesus Christ. What was he all about? I don’t mean the many interpretations of others throughout history who talked about him and his teachings, but what he himself was talking about. You may be shocked to read this, but he was talking about the equivalent of LSD consciousness. What??? Yes, that’s right!!!
Jesus Christ was, in effect, an acidhead!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Before you decide that such an idea is insane, check out a quote from John White. It’s from pages 125-126 of Stanislav Grof’s book, Human Survival and Consciousness Evolution:
“The kingdom is within us. Divinity is our birthright, our inheritance, nearer to us than hand and foot, but the eye will not see and the ear will not hear. Jesus called people to awaken, to change their ways, to repent. The very first words he spoke to humanity in his public ministry were, ‘the time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.’ (Mark 1:14, Matthew 4:17) This is his central teaching and commandment.
“But notice the word, repent. Over the centuries, it has become misunderstood and mistranslated, so that today people think it merely means feeling sorry for their sins. This is an unfortunate debasement of Jesus’ teaching. The Aramaic word that Jesus used is tob, meaning ‘to return’, ‘to flow back into God.’ The sense of this concept comes through best in the Greek word first used to translate it. That word is metanoia and, like tob, it means something far greater than merely feeling sorry for misbehavior. Metanoia has two etymological roots. Meta means ‘to go beyond’, ‘to go higher than.’ And noia comes from nous meaning ‘mind.’ The literal meaning of metanoia is literally ‘going beyond or higher than the ordinary mental state.’ In modern terms, it means transcending self-centered ego and becoming God-centered.
“This is the central experience Jesus sought for all people. This is the heart of Jesus’ life and teaching, although it is now largely absent from the institutional Christian churches. Metanoia is that profound state of consciousness which mystical experience aims at-the state in which we transcend or dissolve all the barriers of ego and selfishness that separate us from God. It is the state of direct knowing, immediate perception of our total unity with God.
“Metanoia means a radical conversion experience, a transformation of self based on a new state of awareness, a new state of consciousness-higher consciousness. It means repentance in its most fundamental dimension-that of ‘a turning about in the deepest seat of consciousness’, as Lama Govinda phrases it. This turning-about is for the purpose of rebinding or re tieing ourselves to the divine source of our being–the source we have lost awareness of. This is what religion is all about. Re ligare: to tie back, to tie again. That is true repentance–when we ‘get religion’ in the sense of becoming aware of our inescapable ties to God, the creator, preserver and redeemer of the cosmos.
“When we rebound to God, the true meaning of sin becomes apparent. Sin means literally ‘missing the mark.’ Sin is not merely misbehavior. It is transgression of divine law or cosmic principle. It is a failure to be centered to God–to be ‘off target.’ Religion, then, is in its truest sense an instrument for awakening us to the evolutionary process of growth to godhead, which is the aim of all cosmic becoming. When we are guilty of sin, we are fundamentally missing the mark by failing to be God-conscious and all that it means for our behavior and thought.”
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Yes, ladies and gentlemen, if sin means anything at all, it means being off the mark by not knowing what the meaning of LSD is and repentance is getting back in touch with the meaning of LSD. I say getting back in touch, not getting in touch because getting in touch implies never having been in touch before and that’s incorrect. As mentioned earlier, we were all conceived in orgasm and born tripping. That’s our natural state. Over the years, due to the pressure of social conditioning, we lose the tripping state. There is a great need for everyone to get that back. Sin is losing the tripping state. If one loses the tripping state, they don’t even believe that there is such a thing. Repentance is not only believing but experiencing it again, getting it all back and knowing it. LSD can do that for you.
Like with everything else in this book, you can accept that or reject it, but if Jesus was here today, he would be in favor of LSD. The ignorant authorities would unjustly throw him into jail just like they did to Timothy Leary.
You have read what I think and what people like Timothy Leary, Aldous Huxley, Alan Watts, Stanislav Grof and others think about LSD. Let’s see what 462 ordinary, nameless people have to say. In the earlier 1960’s, there were 4 different studies in which volunteers were given LSD or psilocybin and the people answered questions about the experience and its after-effects. All of the information on this comes from pages 13-21 of The Psychedelic Reader, edited by Leary, Metzner and G. Weil.
The 4 studies are referred to as the Ditman study, the Savage study, the Janiger study and the Leary study, named for people involved in each one. Ditman had 74 subjects who took LSD, Savage had 96 who took LSD, Janiger had 194 who took LSD and Leary had 98 who took psilocybin. For the Ditman and Leary studies, it doesn’t say if their people had taken the drug before. In the Savage study, all of the people had tried LSD before and in the Janiger study, most, if not all, had tried it before.
In all 4 studies, the conditions and the preparation of the people were reasonably good and as you look at the figures coming up, they are quite impressive. The results of the Ditman and Janiger studies weren’t as good as the other 2. In the case of Ditman, it says that the subjects “underwent the experience in a darkened room, and were allowed various sensory stimuli such as music, paintings and exposure to sunlight in a garden setting.” The opinion here is that there’s no reason to restrict the experience to a darkened room, even if, at times, they were “allowed” out of the room. There shouldn’t be any restrictions. In the case of Janiger, 73 of the 194 subjects were undergoing psychotherapy and for them, there was some emphasis on that factor. Those 73 people are lumped with the other 121 in that study so that it isn’t known if the figures for the 73 are greatly different from those of the other 121. The people in the Savage and Leary studies were better prepared and therefore the results are better.
Let’s check out the results. The questions asked were not identical in all 4 studies, but there is some overlap, especially with the Ditman and Savage studies. The first chart is how people in those 2 studies responded to the question, “Looking back on your LSD experience, how does it look to you now?” The numbers will be the percentage of people who responded, “quite a bit” or “very much.”
|
Ditman |
Savage |
|
| a very pleasant experience |
72 |
85 |
| something I want to try again |
66 |
89 |
| an experience of great beauty |
66 |
81 |
| greater awareness of reality |
64 |
92 |
| feel it was of lasting benefit to me |
50 |
85 |
| the greatest thing that ever happened to me |
49 |
78 |
| a religious experience |
32 |
83 |
| a very unpleasant experience |
19 |
33 |
| a disappointing experience |
7 |
1 |
| an experience of insanity |
7 |
18 |
| did me harm mentally |
1 |
1 |
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The most interesting statistic there is that in one study, 49 percent said that it was the greatest thing that ever happened to them and in the other study, the figure was an amazing 78 percent. That’s not just me saying that. Those people were also saying that and in the Savage study all of them were paying patients. It’s too bad that the Janiger and Leary studies didn’t ask that question, but the indications in the coming charts of stats are that the figures would have been just as impressive. Try and think of anything else in this world in which half or more of any combination of any number of people would go as far as to say that it was the greatest thing that has ever happened to them. Things in ordinary, everyday life and consciousness can’t even approach the level of saying that it was the greatest thing that ever happened to someone. Only something as extra special as LSD can make such a huge percentage of people respond in this way.
In looking at those figures closely, it may appear that something is wrong or phony with the Savage figures because if 85 percent are saying that is was a very pleasant experience and 33 percent are saying that it was a very unpleasant experience, that adds up to more than 100 percent. How can that be? The answer is that some, not many, said that it was both very pleasant and very unpleasant. Similarly, 78 percent said it was the greatest thing that ever happened to them and 33 percent said that it was a very unpleasant experience. It means that some, not many, said that it was very unpleasant, but still the greatest thing that ever happened to them. In the same way, some were saying that it was very unpleasant, but still want to try it again or thought that it was an experience of great beauty, gave them a greater sense of reality and felt it was of lasting benefit to them, even though, according to those few, it was a very unpleasant experience.
The next chart of figures also involve just the Ditman and Savage studies. The people were asked. “How were you, or what were you left with, after your LSD experience?” Again, the numbers will be the percentage of people who responded, “quite a bit” or “very much.”
|
Ditman |
Savage |
|
| a new way of looking at the world |
48 |
85 |
| a greater understanding of the importance and meaning of human relationships |
47 |
86 |
| a new understanding of beauty and art |
43 |
64 |
| a greater awareness of God, or a higher Power, or an Ultimate Reality |
40 |
90 |
| a sense of greater regard for the welfare and comfort of other human beings |
38 |
78 |
| a realization that I need psychotherapy |
17 |
26 |
| more ability to relax and be myself |
40 |
74 |
| improvement noticed by person closest to me |
42 |
64 |
| greater tolerance of others |
40 |
75 |
| a sense of futility and emptiness |
7 |
8 |
| a frightening feeling that I might go crazy or lose control of myself |
3 |
6 |
| sense of relaxation and freedom from anxiety and tension |
56 |
(The Savage subjects were not asked these five questions) |
| a better understanding of the cause and subjects source of my troubles |
41 |
|
| a set of new decisions and new directions for my life |
39 |
|
| a new sense of fun and enjoyment |
39 |
|
| a sense of now knowing what life is all about |
27 |
The next chart of figures involves just the Ditman study and the figures are impressive because, in general, the Ditman results were the worst of the 4 studies. The numbers will be the percentage of people who responded affirmatively in each of the following areas:
|
Ditman |
|
| more ability to relax |
40 |
| more comfort with people |
37 |
| more initiative since LSD |
36 |
| less anxiety |
34 |
| increased interest in: | |
| nature |
38 |
| art |
34 |
| music |
33 |
| changes in “perspective”: | |
| deeper significance to things |
46 |
| things seem more real |
40 |
| problems less important |
39 |
| colors brighter |
39 |
| changes in “attitude”: | |
| more tolerant |
40 |
| more accepting of ideas |
38 |
| more broadminded |
37 |
| less irritable |
33 |
| changes in sense of values |
47 |
| problems such as emotional, financial, drinking, legal, etc., improved |
33 |
| improvement in income, living quarters and body weight |
15 |
| increased sex satisfaction |
14 |
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The Janiger study figures are next. Like the Ditman study, the results are not as amazing as the Savage and Leary results, but impressive, nevertheless:
|
Janiger Study |
|
| major objective changes (in job, marital status, etc.) |
16 |
| positive change in interpersonal relations: | |
| with co-workers and employees |
43 |
| with acquaintances |
41 |
| increased interest in: | |
| social reform |
18 |
| political and international affairs |
22 |
| anthropology |
24 |
| morals and ethics |
35 |
| other universal concepts (meaning of life) |
48 |
| positive change noticed by person closest |
45 |
| changes in sense of values (money, status, human relationships, religion, etc.) |
48 |
| looking back on the LSD experience, it was: | |
| a very pleasant experience |
66 |
| a very unpleasant experience |
32 |
| something I would want to try again |
74 |
| a religious experience |
24 |
| an experience giving greater understanding | |
| of myself and others |
61 |
| an experience of lasting benefit |
58 |
| LSD should be used for: | |
| becoming aware of oneself |
75 |
| gaining new meaning to life |
58 |
| getting people to understand each other |
42 |
This is another one of those situations in which 32 percent said that it was a very unpleasant experience, but 74 percent said that they want to try it again and 75 percent said that LSD should be used for becoming aware of oneself. In each case, it adds up to more than 100 percent, meaning that some people thought that it was very unpleasant, but still want to do it again or still think that LSD should be used for becoming aware of oneself.
Now, we will take a look at the Timothy Leary study and those figures and again, his people took psilocybin (mushrooms).
|
Leary Study |
|
| How supportive (relaxing, warm, accepting) was the total situation? | |
| very supportive |
56 |
| mildly supportive |
22 |
| neutral |
10 |
| mildly or very rejecting |
11 |
| Was the experience pleasant? | |
| wonderful or ecstatic |
32 |
| very pleasant |
38 |
| okay |
23 |
| unpleasant or very unpleasant |
7 |
| Did you learn a lot about yourself and the world? | |
| tremendous insights |
23 |
| learned a lot |
22 |
| learned something of value |
43 |
| learned nothing |
9 |
| more confused |
2 |
| Has the mushroom experience changed you and your life? | |
| dramatically better |
12 |
| changed for the better |
50 |
| no change |
37 |
| worse |
1 |
| How about taking the mushroom again under trustful, secure circumstances? | |
| very eager |
56 |
| like to |
34 |
| don’t care |
6 |
| rather not |
4 |
These figures are interesting. It’s saying that 70 percent of the people thought the experience was very pleasant or better, 88 percent thought they learned something or a lot, 62 percent said that the experience changed their life for the better or dramatically for the better and that 90 percent would like to do it again, including 56 percent who were very eager to do it again. Only 7 percent thought that it was an unpleasant or very unpleasant experience and only 4 percent said that they would rather not try it again.
10
11
There are 3 general questions that were asked of the people in all 4 studies. They are the percentage of people who reported a pleasant experience, the percentage that reported lasting benefit or change and the percentage that want to do it again. On the question of what percentages thought it was a pleasant experience, the figures were Ditman 72, Savage 85, Janiger 66 and Leary 70. That works out to an average of 73 percent for all 4 studies or if one considers that the Janiger study had about twice as many people involved as the other studies, then the overall average would be a little less because Janiger’s 66 is the lowest number of the four studies. In a surprise, the Leary figure of 70 percent is the third lowest of the four studies, even lower than the Ditman figures.
On the question of what percentage reported lasting benefit or change, the figures are Ditman 50, Savage 85, Janiger 58 and Leary 62. That works out to an average of 64 percent for the 4 studies. Even the least impressive result shows that half of the people said that the experience did them some good or a lot of good. With Savage, the figure was a whopping 85 percent!
The final common question in all 4 studies was the percentage that want to have the experience again. The figures for this are Ditman 66, Savage 89, Janiger 74 and Leary 90. That’s an average of 80 percent for the 4 studies. The worst of the 4 figures still shows that about 2/3 of the people want to do it again, the next worst figure shows about 3/4 of the people wanting another trip and the Savage and Leary figures of 89 and 90 just cannot be ignored. When the figures are 90 percent, even the most cynical skeptic has to admit that maybe LSD isn’t the worst thing in the world or why would 90 percent of any combination of people who have tried it want to do it again? If it is as bad as most people seem to think, would even 1 percent want to do it again? If it is so bad, would 49 percent of Ditman’s people and an amazing 85 percent of Savage’s people say that it was the greatest thing that ever happened to them?
These people were not just saying that LSD was the greatest thing that ever happened to them or reporting lasting benefit or change. Check the charts and figures closely and you will see that the people were saying that it was of value and importance in many different ways and areas. They said, among other things, that it was a religious experience, an experience of great beauty, gave them a greater awareness of reality, a new way of looking at the world, greater tolerance of others, a sense of relaxation and freedom from anxiety and tension, a better understanding of the cause and source of their troubles, a new sense of fun and enjoyment, a sense of now knowing what life is all about, increased interest in nature, art and music, being more broadminded, accepting of new ideas and less irritable, positive change in interpersonal relations, a experience giving greater understanding of themselves and others, etc.
Isn’t it about time or way past the time for this country to finally WAKE UP! How odd it is that those who have never taken LSD are so vehemently against it, but those who have tried it are quite positive about it, especially those who do it with proper preparation, under the right circumstances, in a supportive atmosphere and with understanding people.
There is a long way to go. It’s hard enough to get people to understand that marijuana has medical value.
NEVER THE END…