Richard Louis Miller - Psychedelic Wisdom: The Astonishing Rewards of Mind-Altering Substances

I dedicate this book to three extraordinary women and two extraordinary men in my life.

My wife, Cherry Blossom, Jolee, who touched my silent heart and taught me that love trumps all.

My daughters, Sarana and Evacheska, who have continuously brought me psychedelic wisdom, prior to their psychedelic experiences and after.

My son Aaron, who, through example, expands my empathy, and my son Jules, who teaches me exquisite patience.

PSYCHEDELIC
WISDOM

The publishing of Psychedelic Wisdom could not have come at a better time. Psychotherapists, neuroscientists, creatives, and spiritual seekers are discovering and rediscovering the amazing potential of psychedelic substances. These substances can promote psychological healing and facilitate problem-solving. They can be used as tools to study brain function and the nature of consciousness. They can produce feelings of wonder, sacredness, and transcendence.

All of these topics and more are explored in this collection of in-depth interviews with elder scientists, therapists, professors, artists, and doctors. Over the years, these leaders have experimented with and employed psychedelic substances in their personal and professional lives. Their experiences have been well-seasoned by time, and yet they remain fresh as the morning dew.

Dr. Miller has a way, a gift really, of opening the right doors with his questions for his guests. He then encourages them to freely express and follow the stream of consciousness that ensues. As these explorers share their stories, their confessions provide a peek into the vast range of experiences accessible with these remarkable substances.

NICHOLAS V. COZZI, PHD,EDUCATOR AND SCIENTIST AT THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSINMADISON SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AND PUBLIC HEALTH AND COFOUNDER OF THE ALEXANDER SHULGIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE

The dialogues featured in Psychedelic Wisdom shimmer with insight. The degree of candor, wit, and understanding reflected in its pages is unmatched among the psychedelic literature that is currently flooding into the marketplace. Lest there be any doubt, the high-minded wisdom of this book is needed now more than ever.

J. CHRISTIAN GREER, PHD, RESEARCH FELLOW AT YALE UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE OF SACRED MUSIC

Dr. Miller has memorialized the transformational stories of visionary elders who are laying the foundation of a psychedelic renaissance that will illuminate humanitys future for centuries to come.

JERRY AND JULIE BROWN, COAUTHORS OF THE PSYCHEDELIC GOSPELS

A fascinating, unique, disarming, and intimate glimpse of the earliest taproots of the current blossoming revolution in spiritual and mental health.

DEAN EDELL, MD, RADIO AND TELEVISION BROADCASTER AND AUTHOR OF EAT, DRINK, AND BE MERRY

Acknowledgments

Some authors sit in a room and write a book. This volume has truly been a team effort with each person playing an essential role. As the interviewer of the psychedelic confessors, who outed themselves about their experiences with psychedelics, my name appears on the cover of the book, but Charlie Deists name is equally important for he served as producer, editor, and fixer of all things necessary. Thank you, Charlie.

The cooperative, cheerful contribution of David Springertechnical producer and sound engineerwas critical. Thank you, David.

I offer my deepest gratitude to the psychedelic elders who are featured in this bookas well as the elders who arentwho risked their careers, their livelihoods, and their very freedom as pioneers of realms of consciousness where few had gone before them. We are particularly indebted to one of, if not the, greatest psychedelic explorer of all time, Sasha Shulgin, PhD, who passed away before being interviewed. Sashas self-experimentation, in the name of science, is unparalleled.

My thanks to the inspiring, vibrant, ninety-two-year-old Cliff Barney who served as both a confessor and occasional editor of the manuscript, and to Kyle Bigman, who took on the enormous task of transcribing the radio interviews that became this book. Thank you, Cliff and Kyle.

Jon Graham of Inner Traditions/Bear & Co. is my sine qua nonthe phrase the Romans used to indicate something without which, it cannot be. In addition to accepting, and encouraging, the book for publication, he provided steady, considerate support and made the author/ publisher relationship a stress-free collaboration. Thank you, Jon.

Finally, I would like to thank my dear friend, Rick Doblin, PhD, who provided the original inspiration for Psychedelic Wisdom. When I met Rick at Esalen in 1985, he told me he was going to get a PhD and bring the healing powers of MDMA to the world. With the total dedication required of all true revolutionaries, he kept his word and then some. May golden light continue to beam from you, and on you, dear Rick.

Contents

FOREWORD

The Wisdom of Psychedelic Elders

Rick Doblin

Psychedelic Wisdom is being published at a time when humanity is generating more knowledge than ever before in human history but has a critical need for wisdom of any kind. In 1959, several years before he died, Carl Jung said, We need more psychology. We need more understanding of human nature, because the only real danger that exists is man himself. He is the great danger, and we are pitifully unaware of it. We know nothing of man. Far too little. His psyche should be studied because we are the origin of all coming evil.Psychedelic Wisdom is a courageous response to Jungs call to study the psyche to better understand, address, and reduce the evil that humans can cause.

Psychedelic Wisdom is composed of Dr. Richard Louis Millers incisive and psychologically probing interviews of the personal psychedelic explorations, and the lessons learned, of an expertly curated group of psychedelic elders: scientists, doctors, therapists, activists, and teachers. A common theme in the interviews is the role that psychedelics played in enabling people to go beyond their individual egos to an experience of interconnectedness, and of the personal and political implications of that realization of that interconnectedness.

Other themes that emerge in the interviews are the use of psychedelics to work through personal trauma, conflicts with others, the search for love, purpose and meaning, and other earthbound challenges. The virtue of Dr. Millers decision to interview psychedelic elders is that the interviewees have had decades to ponder the consequences of their psychedelic experiences, which for most everyone interviewed started early in their lives.

During the recent psychedelic renaissance that has taken half a century to developfollowing the backlash to the psychedelic counterculture and research in the 1960sPsychedelic Wisdom facilitates acknowledgment of the stories of these interviewees about their own psychedelic experiences. As an example of the power of personal stories, voter opinion surveys of U.S. citizens who voted to legalize marijuana in state ballot initiatives indicated that a primary motivation came from knowing a medical marijuana patient who had revealed to them the beneficial effects of their own use. Theres enormous social change potential in open, honest psychedelic stories in this book and elsewhere, especially in interpersonal conversations and old-fashioned word of mouth.