By Graham Hancock
Here, we asked Graham Hancock about plant medicine, the purpose and meaning of hallucinogenic experiences, and what bigger opportunities he sees for humanity in all of this.
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CLEAR ALL
Taking drugs is generally perceived as a social activity. Whether you’re passing joints at home or raving bug-eyed in a forest, the presence of other people can elevate those bliss-inducing chemicals.
I drank ayahuasca in 1999, in a ceremony led by two scholars with expertise in ayahuasca. What follows is an edited version of what I wrote about the experience in my 2003 book Rational Mysticism.
I'm no psychedelic prude. I reported on, and applauded, the resurgence of research into psychedelics in my 2003 book Rational Mysticism. I participated in a peyote ceremony of the Native American Church, and I advocated legalization of psychedelics for therapeutic purposes.
Writing in the British journal Time and Mind, Benny Shanon of Jerusalem’s Hebrew University said two plants in the Sinai desert contain the same psychoactive molecules as those found in plants from which the powerful Amazonian hallucinogenic brew ayahuasca is prepared.
In an appropriate context, ayahuasca can be a valuable therapeutic tool and can act as a catalyst that can render psychotherapeutic processes more effective in less time, and sometimes allow for critical interventions when several other therapeutic strategies have been unsuccessful.
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Amazonian healing traditions collide with Western medical sensibilities.
The following is a version of an interview I held over several days in September 2006 with my mother, Doña Julia Julieta Casimiro, one of the most distinguished representatives of the traditions of the thousand-year-old Mazatec culture, which is centered in the northern mountains of the state of...
Traditionally, psychedelics (as well as other experiences, like Holotropic Breathwork) are coupled with practices that confirm, extend, and expand the insights intrinsic to altered states.
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The growing popularity of "authentic" ayahuasca rituals in Western circles can present multiple problems, including indigenous fetishization, a lack of cultural context for traditional ceremonies, and potential abuse from untrustworthy shamans, all of which can be problematic or sometimes even...
What I will focus on are the psychological factors that influence people’s judgments about what is real and how these might explain why people come to believe in the existence of such beings.