LSD sessions

Now that we have the world's collection of music available, we can contour our sessions with that music, which deepens it even further. I made a choice very early on not to work therapeutically or with other people, not to introduce people into this—a different set of responsibilities. I always worked solo and was...

Well, the first book I wrote as an academic was Lifecycles: Reincarnation and the Web of Life. I was interested in reincarnation early in my career. I encountered Ian Stevenson's research at the University of Virginia. Around the same time, I encountered Stan Grof's research in his book, Realms of the Human Unconscious. I...

This book tells the story of where I went over 20 years of working with LSD. I followed a protocol established by Stan Grof, working in psychedelic therapy, which involved a completely isolated environment. I used headphones, eyeshades, and music, and worked with very high doses. I had 73 sessions over 20 years, working...

Well, I'm actually the last person you would have thought from the beginning of my life to end up writing a book on describing what happens on the long series of high-dose LSD sessions. I was raised in the Deep South, in Mississippi. I was a seminarian in the early days, studying to be...

So I began the therapeutic, psychedelic-oriented work that I knew would be required for me to have access to the kinds of experiences that would allow me to hopefully make some kind of contribution to my discipline, which is philosophy of religion. I started a psychedelic practice, which, after three medium-dose sessions, led me...

Well, as you know, there is a worldwide renaissance of research taking place in psychedelics. At the forefront of that research is the focus on therapeutic healing. That's what's bringing psychedelics back into the intellectual and clinical community—the capability of these amplifying substances to bring forward the personal unconscious and unearth its wounds. They...

Well, we've just gone through an election in our country, which was, for the liberal side of the continent like me, very disappointing and very upsetting. What's happening in politics, in my country and in many countries around the world, this whole movement to the conservative right is very much of concern, especially since...

Yep.

It's a pleasure to be here with you today.

I'm an unusual person in that I've been a university professor all my life, a professor of religious studies, teaching in a small state college in Northeast Ohio. And I've also done one of the longest regimens of high-dose LSD work that I'm aware of in the background. I couldn't talk about it until...

It's a pleasure to be here with you today.

Well, Stan was very clear in his early books and in LSD Psychotherapy, published in 1980, the protocol differences between psycholytic and low-dose therapy versus psychedelic high-dose therapy. Psycholytic running doses anywhere from 50 to 150 micrograms and high-dose psychedelic therapy between 350 to 500. At that time, high-dose psychedelic therapy was being used...

Well, Stan was very clear in his early books and in LSD Psychotherapy, which was published in 1980, about the protocol differences between psychedelic and low-dose therapy versus psychedelic high-dose therapy. Psychelytic therapy runs doses anywhere from 50 to 150 micrograms, and high-dose psychedelic therapy ranges from 350 to 500. At that time, high-dose...

Well, I had just finished graduate school. I got my PhD from Brown University in philosophy of religion. I had published my dissertation in a series of articles and was looking for where to take my work next. At that point in my life, I met the work of Ian Stevenson in reincarnation research...

Yeah. I wouldn't recommend that. I wouldn't do it the same way again myself, and I strongly recommend people don't do it that way. I would be much gentler with myself and have a more modulated approach. But that's what I did. I started with three sessions of medium doses, about 250 mics, and...

The starting point of serious psychedelic work is taking complete responsibility for one's own shadow. You go into a room, close the door, lock it, and you're inside by yourself. Nothing there but you and your mind, and you explore the parts of your being that are daunting, intimidating, frightening—those parts we'd least like...

It's a pleasure to be here, Bas and everyone. Thanks for the invitation. My voice is rough due to a cold, but this material is too important to pass up, especially an opportunity to talk with Duane, a friend for over 25 years. Our research and writing brought us together; now it's a deep,...

Thank you, Aviv, it's a real pleasure to be here with you today.

I used LSD because that was the substance Stan had worked with in his early years; that's what his research was based on, primarily, and I trusted what I saw in his work. After my sessions, my work always followed the protocols he laid out in his early book, LSD Psychotherapy. The sessions were...

Well, I was just out of graduate school back in 1978, and I read Stan Grof's first book, Realms of the Human Unconscious, published in '76. Immediately, I recognized the significance of Stan's work for my discipline, which is philosophy of religion. I'm not a psychologist or a therapist. I've never been particularly interested...

In LSD and the Mind of the Universe, I try to describe as clearly and carefully as I can experiences that opened in 73 high-dose LSD sessions conducted over 20 years when I was a young man between 30 and 50 years old. This was from 1979 to 1999. I spent another 20 years...

I followed a very strict protocol, which I think made my work a little unusual. In a therapeutic protocol, you are totally isolated from the world. You don't take psychedelics and go for a walk, or to a concert, or even stay up talking with friends. You're protected by a sitter, handling logistics, with...

At Spring Grove Hospital in Baltimore, psychedelic therapy was practiced with terminally ill cancer patients using high doses in only three sessions. The focus was to trigger something approximating a near-death episode to help with death anxiety, not to heal them. I thought, well, if you can do high-dose work three times, you can...

Well, I know it's a radical book, and I think we are at a pivot point in history, and I think that psychedelics represent a major transition point, a true historical before-and-after point with respect to philosophy, not just psychology. It generates not only a new therapeutic protocol for healing the personal psyche, but...

I worked systematically — over 20 years — with 73 high-dose LSD sessions. Initially, I began this work within the framework of an individual healing model. LSD can hyper-amplify consciousness, pushing it both deep and wide. But this model of personal transformation quickly gave way to a larger context, as the unfolding experiences revealed...

I'm glad to be here.

I kept detailed, careful notes of all my sessions, writing up every session within 24 hours, tracked the dates of my sessions, and even looked at the astrological variables of my sessions, exploring correlations that Stan and Richard Tarnas have proposed. Now, a few more introductory comments before we jump into the book itself....

Well, I'm a philosopher of religion. I came to this work with an interest in the potential of psychedelics to explore the deeper reaches of consciousness and, by pushing through our personal unconscious, entering into what I eventually came to understand as the mind of the universe itself. I did 20 years of this...

The starting point of serious psychedelic work is taking complete responsibility for one's own shadow. You go into a room, close the door, lock the door. You're inside by yourself, nothing there but you and your mind. You go into the parts of your being which are initially the most daunting, the most intimidating,...

Okay? Looks like it's just as a winner. Okay. This is my psychedelic lineage. My psychedelic lineage basically grounds in the work of Stanislav Grof. When I was 29 years old, fresh out of graduate school, just beginning my academic career in Ohio, I met Stan Grof's work, Realms of the Human Unconscious, and...

My pleasure, Luisa. It's nice to be with you.

Over the next 20 years, as I progressed through the academic world, I did 73 high-dose LSD sessions—completely internalized, completely protected, with a sitter using traditional formats, privately, safely protected from the world with the assistance of a sitter who kept me safe and secure. I found that it engaged me systematically into an...

What I chose to do in my work was to engage with very high doses. I saw that if this could be done safely a few times, it could be done safely more than a few times. As Janet mentioned, I conducted 73 high-dose LSD sessions over 20 years, between 1979 and 1999. At...

Hi, Ryan. It's a pleasure to be here with you today.

It was quite an adventure, quite a long and interesting journey.

What happened was, fresh out of graduate school, 29 years old, in the middle of my Saturn return. Didn't know that yet at the time, had finished my dissertation. Was looking for where to take my research. I was a brand-new professor of religious studies at Youngstown State University, and I read Stanislav Grof's...

No, I think it's pretty much conventional in that respect. You're always working in complete isolation with a sitter and a very carefully curated playlist of music. The difference is that after three medium-dose LSD sessions, I shifted to very high levels of LSD, working at 500 to 600 micrograms. At first, I did...

No, it was quite conventional. I was always working in complete isolation, with a sitter, and a carefully curated music playlist. The difference was that I shifted to high doses of LSD, between 500 to 600 micrograms. Initially, it was for efficiency, but it became a more profound project. I carefully documented everything, knowing...

I'm touched, honestly. I mean, I think it's so interesting and also so helpful to us at this particular time. There's a lot in there that can guide us into the future. I appreciate that the book is filled with pain, suffering, and ecstasy beyond ecstasy. What I would like to do today is,...

Well, as I say in the book, eventually you come to a point, if you've gone through many cycles of death and rebirth, where death loses its meaning. You learn from experience that you can die. You can lose all your reality reference points, everything you know yourself to be can be shattered and...