Steven Kotler - Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work

To Julie, Lucas, and Emma, sine qua non.

J.W.

To William James, you got there first.

S.K.

Some revolutions begin with a gunshot, others with a party. This one kicked off and politician, had invited a small circle of friends to his villa for what was to become one of the more infamous bacchanals in history. Hooded in the stolen robes of a high priest, Alcibiades swept down his marble staircase, recited a forbidden incantation, and produced an ornate decanter. Carefully, he poured a single shot of a dark liquid into each guests glass. A few more words, an exuberant cheer, and everyone drained their cups.

In less than an hour, the effects took hold. Fears, terrors, quiverings, mortal sweats, and a lethargic stupor come and overwhelm us, the historian Plutarch later recounted. But, as soon as we are out of it, we pass into delightful meadows, where the purest air is breathed, where sacred concerts and discourses are heard; where, in short, one is impressed with celestial visions.

By sunup, those visions had faded, replaced by repercussions in the real world. Alcibiadess illicit party kicked off a chain of events that would prompt him to flee Athens, dodge a death sentence, betray his government, and set in motion the trial and execution of his beloved teacher, Socrates.

Famously handsome, eloquent, and ambitious, Alcibiadess faults were as plentiful as his gifts. He offered sex to Socrates in exchange for the philosophers deepest secrets. Before his wife could divorce him for womanizing, he dragged her out of court by her hair. Politically, he played both sides against the middle, and his only true allegiance was to his career. So when his rivals got wind of that scandalous evening, they ratted him out to the highest Athenian court for stealing kykeon, the sacred elixir hed shared with his guests. He was tried in absentia for a crime punishable by deathblaspheming the Mysteries.

And not just any mysteries; the Eleusinian Mysteries, calling the rites the pinnacle of Greek achievement: Among the many excellent and indeed divine institutions which... Athens has brought forth and contributed to human life, none, in my opinion, is better than the Mysteries.... In [them] we perceive the real principles of life, and learn not only how to live in joy, but also to die with better hope.

In more contemporary terms, the Eleusinian Mysteries were an elaborate nine-day ritual designed to strip away standard frames of reference, profoundly alter consciousness, and unlock a heightened level of insight. Specifically, the mysteries combined a number of state-changing techniquesfasting, singing, dancing, drumming, costumes, dramatic storytelling, physical exhaustion, and kykeon (the substance Alcibiades stole for his party)to induce a cathartic experience of death, rebirth, and divine inspiration.

And so powerful was this experience and so significant were those insights that the Mysteries persisted for more than two thousand years. A lesser ritual would have fizzled or, at least, become an empty gesture devoid of its original power. Eleusis, historians tell us, endured time and turmoil for a couple of key reasons: First, initiates kept the mystery in the Mysterydisclosing any of its secrets, as Alcibiades did, was a capital offense. And second, kykeon, that dark liquid at the heart of the ritual, packed one hell of a punch.

For anthropologists, uncovering the ingredients of kykeon has become a Holy Grail kind of quest. It ranks right up there with decoding soma, the ancient Indian sacrament that inspired Aldous Huxleys groupthink happy drug in Brave New World. Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann ergot prompts delirium, prickly limbs, and the hallucinations known as St. Anthonys fire. When taken on purpose, within the context of an intensive initiatory ritual, you have all the ingredients of a highly effective ecstatic technologyso effective (and, presumably, so enjoyable) that Alcibiades was willing to risk his life to steal it for a party.

All of which is to say, as far back as we can trace Western civilization, buried among the stories that bore schoolchildren to tears, we find tales of rebel upstarts willing to bet it all for an altered state of consciousness. And this isnt an isolated incident. Its just an early indicator of a perennial pattern, hidden inside of history, tucked among the names and dates we know so well.

At the center of this dynamic sits the myth of Prometheus, the original upstart rebel, who stole fire from the gods and shared it with humankind. And he didnt just steal a book of matches, but also the power to seed civilization: language, art, medicine, and technology. Enraged that mortals would now have the same power as the gods, Zeus chained Prometheus to a rock, letting eagles rip out his innards for eternity.

This story has continued to repeat itself throughout the ages. Typically, a rebel, seeker, or trickster steals fire from the gods. It can take the form of a potent celebratory rite, a heretical new scripture, an obscure spiritual practice, or a secret, state-changing technology. Whatever the case, the rebel sneaks the flame out of the temple and shares it with the world. It works. Things get exciting. Insights pile up. Then, inevitably, the party gets out of hand. The keepers of law and ordercall them the priestsspot the hedonistic blaze, track down the thief, and shut down the show. And so it goes, until the next cycle begins.

Stealing Fire is the story of the latest round in this cycle and, potentially, the first time in history we have a chance for a different ending. Its the story of an entirely new breed of Promethean upstartSilicon Valley executives, members of the U.S. special forces, maverick scientists, to name only a fewwho are using ecstatic techniques to alter consciousness and accelerate performance. And the strangest part? Its a revolution thats been hiding in plain sight.

If a revolution is the kind of thing you can stumble upon, then weyour authors, Steven and Jamiestumbled upon this one a few years ago. And really, we should have seen it coming.

Thats because at the Flow Genome Project we study the relationship between altered states and peak performance, focused primarily on the experience known as flow. Defined as an optimal state of consciousness where we feel our best and perform our best, flow refers to those in the zone moments where focus gets so intense that everything else disappears. Action and awareness start to merge. Our sense of self vanishes. Our sense of time as well. And all aspects of performance, both mental and physical, go through the roof.

Scientists have known about the relationship between flow and peak performance for more than a century, but a real understanding of this relationship has been slow in coming. The main problem was conflicting motivations. The people really good at finding flow, mostly artists and athletes, were rarely interested in studying it. And the people interested in studying flow, primarily academics, were rarely good at finding it.

We founded the Flow Genome Project in an attempt to solve this problem. Our goal was to take a multidisciplinary approach to mapping the neurobiology of flow, and then open-source the results. But to do this, we had to establish a common language around these states. So Steven wrote The Rise of Superman, a book about the neuroscience of peak performance and action sports.

Following the books release, we found ourselves talking flow with a wider and wider assortment of people. What began as meetings with individuals and organizations with a vested interest in high-stakes competitionprofessional athletes and the militaryexpanded into Fortune 500 companies, financial organizations, tech firms, health-care providers, and universities. The idea that nonordinary states of consciousness could improve performance was spreading out of the extreme and into the mainstream.