For a little balance to this sordid, lurid, and sensationalistic account of psychedelic therapy, I'd recommend reading "The Secret Chief Revealed"[1] and Cary Grant's own accounts of his LSD experiences.[2]
An excerpt from the latter:
"I learned may things in the quiet of that small room. I learned to
accept the responsibility for my own actions, and to blame myself
and no one else for circumstances of my own creating. I learned that
no one else was keeping me unhappy but me"
> I learned to
accept the responsibility for my own actions, and to blame myself
and no one else for circumstances of my own creating. I learned that
no one else was keeping me unhappy but me
Do you really need LSD to come to such mundane conclusions. It looks like something my uncle would post on his fb wall.
I can say that the difference between reading or studying quotes such as these (which I did, and still enjoy doing) and actually looking at myself without bias and accepting those artificial hurdles that I had placed on myself with the aid of LSD was astounding.
The best way I can describe it is that it was a positive, insightful, and compassionate change in my entire perspective rather than just 'Yes, of course my actions are my only limitation.'
The extreme substance abuser can be told by the most caring and compassionate friends and family how they can better themselves, they can be strong-armed and forced to go through rehab, they can even seek out their own counselling by professionals, but none of this may stick or actually remove those harmful actions or desires as much as entire change of perspective and reflection on themselves with complete acceptance. They have to really, truly find it for themselves, rather than just be told.
I think the most helpful and profound difference between regular counselling and basic self-help practices for myself and the experiences that I had while on LSD, was the fact that I experienced the 'ego-death', and looked at myself objectively, rather than with all of the baggage and strings I had attached to the negative things that I was drawn to. I was able to shed my insecurities by understanding what was important to myself, rather than what was important to those around me (even those who had my same interests in mind).
I will note that these conclusions are neither mundane nor universally correct. They certainly fit in with certain ideology which Hacker News and the startup scene like, but I could never lead a fulfilling life without the input and love of others and, equally, my devotion to them - and I am not solely talking about family and romantic partners.
On the other hand, there are indeed certain things which are my domain alone. But if I fulfilled these - had a house, a dream job, security of income - I would still be unhappy without others around me, which is not under my control, nor should it be.
What do you gain, personally, from running down methods that worked for other people? Apparently some people _do_ need LSD to come to such "mundane" conclusions. Does that make them less valid?
I believe that 77pt77's point is that, when you're on something like LSD, you can't trust that the empirical evidence has any objective validity. Yes, you had an experience, and it seemed to you to be a profound one. You gained something that felt to you like insight. But any correlation between that and actual insight about yourself may be coincidental.
There seems to be a dichotomy between those who say that a psychological achievement is no achievement in reality and those who've experienced times where the basis of this or that psychological state has been fundamentally undermined. The latter are more prone to question the reality of any subsequent experience.
> This just adds to my observations regarding people that say LSD and other psychedelics give you insight. I disagree, they make you feel like you've achieved insight when in reality you've achieved nothing.
Many empirical studies were done in the brief span between the (re)discovery of psychedelics and their subsequent ban. The research has existed since the 1960s. We are finally at the point where some new research is being allowed, and the results are lining up nicely with what the older studies reported. The majority of people who go through a properly guided psychedelic experience consistently rank it as one of the most important experiences of their lives. Follow-up studies have shown that the positive effects are tangible and frequently lasting. If the insight were illusory, you'd have only the patients talking about it while the psychologists reported that there's nothing meaningful going on there. This is not how it went down.
I'm at work so can't track down references online, but there are several chapters in the book The Psychedelic Explorer's Guide by James Fadiman that describe in-depth a number of studies, with lots more referenced in the bibliography. Fadiman was one of the psychologists doing studies until psychedelics were outlawed.
There was recently an end-of-life study done in somewhere in Europe, I believe, which gave a large dose of psilocybin (in a comfortable setting with psychologists present) to terminally ill cancer patients who were having trouble coming to terms with their own death, and all of the depression etc. that comes with that. The outcome was highly successful, with most patients reporting a higher quality of life afterwards. One patient is interviewed in the documentary DMT: The Spirit Molecule, AFAIK available for streaming on Netflix. You can readily see that she isn't faking her new positive outlook on what's left of her life.
This comment is already too long. The point is, if you think there is nothing going on there, you clearly haven't looked into the research at all. It's possible to take LSD and not get much of anything out of it, just like it's possible to miss the depth in any experience. However it is undeniable that in the proper setting, with the proper mindset, psychedelics can be used to gain personal insight (and more importantly the ability to act on that insight to change one's life for the better), to deal with past psychological trauma, cure drug addiction, and to enhance creative problem-solving among other things. As more research avenues open up, the body of evidence will only grow.
> "At the age of 53, after three unsuccessful marriages, either something was wrong with me or, obviously, with the whole sociological and moralistic concepts of our civilization."
Talk about a loaded assertion.
> "Any man who experiments with something that cannot benefit himself, or add to his happiness, and that of his fellow man in turn, is a fool and a menace to society."
Really?! No wonder this guy was miserable. It must be terrible going through life having to endure his company.
I used to work in Beverly Hills and live on Mulholland. This article was therefore interesting as a dash of history, however I was disturbed to learn Wikipedia has no page yet on the apparent institution: "Psychiatric Institute of Beverly Hills". Found http://www.bizapedia.com/ca/PSYCHIATRIC-RESEARCH-INSTITUTE-O... though, and the address is just off Coldwater Canyon.
That is certain to make you face a lot of uncomfortable irrealities, but let's not conflate that kind of "being tripped out" with the sort of introspective, lucid and refrshing experience LSD can give one.
(Edit: let's be clear, DXM+DPH is taking a very dirty but powerful dissociative and a schizophrenia inducing deleriant. That is not a road that leads to self analysis and catharsis, but paranoia and confrontation.)
You could "trip out" on DXM and DPH. I've done it more times than I ought to have. But it's a far cry from the beautiful mind state that is "tripping".
What is your motivation for saying something like this? You can't possibly believe that LSD and DXM create a similar experience.
Everyone should be careful with DXM. Even after extracting the acetaminophen, noxious dyes, and stimulants that sometimes accompany DXM in cough syrup, it can make you very, very sick. I took around 1000 mg as a stupid teenager and violently puked bile with blood streaming out of my nose, burst thousands of blood vessels around my eyes and on my face, and then fell down a full flight of stairs. Not a great day, and not a great first drug experience.
An excerpt from the latter:
[1] - https://www.amazon.com/Secret-Chief-Revealed-Myron-Stolaroff...[2] - https://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2008/02/10/cary-grants-th...