Re: artificially induced numinous experiences

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 6/6/2004 3:40:10 PM Central Daylight Time,

mculver@... writes:

>(Stan Grof doesn't like the word " altered " as it is used in medicine as a

>pejorative term meaning a pathology. Stan's work has shown it is anything

>but.)

Hi ,

I've recently read the Grofs' books, Spiritual Emergency and The Stormy

Search for the Self, and they've given me a whole new perspective on nonordinary

states as well as helped me recognize some of my own experiences for what they

were. I'm not sure I can totally agree with them on everything but I can see

things differently now.

>was also blessed to have Dr. Mehl-Madrona, author of Coyote Medicine,

>introduce me to the sweat.

Boy, do I envy you this!

>he and his

>wife developed holotropic breathwork. Here the nonordinary state

>is achieved through rapid breathing, darkness and music.

I've not tried this but I've thought about it. I just have too much on my

plate at the moment to get involved in other stuff right now. Have you used

this method? If so, I'd be interested in hearing about your experience.

>Also in the Lakota tradition is piercing where pain to the body induces the

>nonordinary state.

Which may also be why some women in childbirth experience

numinous/nonordinary states.

>There is a difference between recreational use and spiritual healing use,

Yes. When I first got started on this path I was pretty much totally against

drugs of any kind, but once I understood the difference between recreational

use and spiritual use I began to shift to a different perspective.

Who knows where this all might lead? *WEG*

Namasté

Sam in Texas §(ô¿ô)§

Vision without action is a daydream.

Action without vision is a nightmare.

[Guest guest]

I have a feature in my Vedic astrological chart called the 100 cots. I am

motivated to try everything, my intention to enter into a nonordinary state

for the purpose of healing, spiritual awakening and cleansing.

(Stan Grof doesn't like the word " altered " as it is used in medicine as a

pejorative term meaning a pathology. Stan's work has shown it is anything

but.)

As Alice points out, the Shamanic journey and the sweatlodge are very

powerful, the sweatlodge having been one such way I've used probably more

than any other. I've done both of these, the Shamanic journeys with

Harner, and his students.

I have a friend who is a Native American of the northwest US, southwest

Canadian coastal tribes, who pours sweats for a few of us once in awhile. I

was also blessed to have Dr. Mehl-Madrona, author of Coyote Medicine,

introduce me to the sweat. This is more powerful for me than shamanic

journey work because of the intense heat, darkness and prayer bringing on

the nonordinary state.

Stan Grof did a lot of work in Czechoslovakia and in the US with LSD and had

great results. After it was made illegal, I think because there are those

who have an interest in people not being healing and enlightened, he and his

wife developed holotropic breathwork. Here the nonordinary state

is achieved through rapid breathing, darkness and music.

Also in the Lakota tradition is piercing where pain to the body induces the

nonordinary state. You will see people doing this at the Sundance ceremonies

in South Dakota every summer. In the Amazon jungle, the indigenous people

use the native Ayahuasca plant. In the southwest US and northern Mexico,

some have used peyote. Others use psilocybin (mushrooms). All for the same

purpose, IMO.

And fa and I have something in common, in my case in Amsterdam it was

hashish and then spending a few hours in the Van Gogh museum, where I had

one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

If one ventures down one of these paths, it is important to know what one

could be getting into. As Alice pointed out awhile back, you need to be

aware of the amount of unconscious material that could come up. Stan Grof

has pointed out that you could experience heaven, but you might have to

experience hell along the way. The psychological death and rebirth

experience. Grof criticized Tim Leary in this respect, for not making people

more aware of the potential of the shadow coming up. (People with a history

of psychosis are usually discouraged from taking this path.) Leary did say,

though, that it is the setting (environment) and the intention that is

everything, and can make the difference between a heaven experience and a

hellish one.

I have to be really careful after sweatlodge and holotropic breathwork

because it really stirs up my own unconscious material in a big way. I have

to remember to really take care of myself physically, like replenishing

minerals and electrolytes after the sweat, and rest even though I may feel

stimulated and not tired. And be on the lookout a day or two after one of

these experiences for a very powerful and illuminating dream to come.

There is a difference between recreational use and spiritual healing use,

just like there's a difference between having wine to get drunk and wine as

a sacrament.

There's a wonderful documentary film that was produced by the National Film

Board of Canada on LSD and those that have used it for healing, called

Hoffman's Potion (for Dr. Albert Hoffman who discovered it, took some, then

went for quite a nice bike ride 61 years ago). It comes around on the

Sundance channel here in the US once in awhile.

Thanks for the discussion

Culver

[Guest guest]

Hi :

I share with you the caution of undertaking the powerful experience of a

sweat lodge. It is important to acknowledge and honour the sacred space and

have a container that can hold onto the numinous experience otherwise one

could lose balance.

In my recent work with a Jungian analyst using astrology it's become clearer

to me that I have Pluto Animus -- and boy am I glad I only puffed the odd

joint and never touched LSD. Even though LSD was in plentiful use amongst

the draft dodgers here in Toronto in the sixties, somehow I knew to be

cautious about opening my unconscious too soon and without a sacred

container.

Nowadays, I attend a Pipe Ceremony on regular basis and many tell of

numinous experiences mostly of healing and peace.

In the dance,

Frances

> I have to be really careful after sweatlodge and holotropic breathwork

> because it really stirs up my own unconscious material in a big way. I have

> to remember to really take care of myself physically, like replenishing

> minerals and electrolytes after the sweat, and rest even though I may feel

> stimulated and not tired. And be on the lookout a day or two after one of

> these experiences for a very powerful and illuminating dream to come.

>

> There is a difference between recreational use and spiritual healing use,

> just like there's a difference between having wine to get drunk and wine as

> a sacrament.

[Guest guest]

is back! YAY!!!!!!

> I have a feature in my Vedic astrological chart called the 100 cots. I am

> motivated to try everything, my intention to enter into a nonordinary

state

> for the purpose of healing, spiritual awakening and cleansing.

J: I'm not familiar with the Vedic astrological chart - can you explain?

>

> Stan Grof did a lot of work in Czechoslovakia and in the US with LSD and

had

> great results. >

J: Jung was not convinced about the medicinal use of LSD. My one and only

experience of the drug was involuntary (stupid ex-boyfriend spiked my drink

at a party) and I had a really bad trip, so I'm probably not the best person

to comment. I know there are people on this list who have had better

experiences.

>

> And fa and I have something in common, in my case in Amsterdam it was

> hashish and then spending a few hours in the Van Gogh museum, where I had

> one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

J: I can imagine.

love, fa

[Guest guest]

Excerpt from Jung's letter to Father Victor White Bollingen, 10 April 1954

[...] Is the LSD-drug mescalin? It has indeed very curious effects- vide

Aldous Huxley ( The Doors of Perception (1954). -of which I know far too

little. I don't know either what its psychotherapeutic value with neurotic

or psychotic patients is. I only know there is no point in wishing to know

more of the collective unconscious than one gets through dreams and

intui­tion. The more you know of it, the greater and heavier becomes our

moral burden, because the unconscious contents transform themselves into

your individual tasks and duties as soon as they begin to become conscious.

Do you want to increase loneliness and misunderstanding? Do you want to find

more and more complications and increasing re­sponsibilities? You get enough

of it. If I once could say that I had done everything I know I had to do,

then perhaps I should realize a legitimate need to take mescalin. But if I

should take it now, I would not be sure at all that I had not taken it out

of idle curiosity. I should hate the thought that I had touched on the

sphere where the paint is made that colours the world, where the light is

created that makes shine the splendour of the dawn, the lines and shapes of

all form, the sound that fills the orbit, the thought that illuminates the

darkness of the void. There are some poor impoverished creatures, perhaps,

for whom mescalin would be a heavensent gift without a counterpoison, but I

am profoundly mistrustful of the " pure gifts of the Cods. " You pay very

dearly for them. Quid quid id est, iimeo Danaos et dona ferentes.

This is not the point at all, to know of or about the unconscious, nor does

the story end here; on the contrary it is how and where you begin the real

quest. If you are too unconscious it is a great relief to know a bit of the

collective unconscious. But it soon becomes danger­ous to know more, because

one does not learn at the same time how to balance it through a conscious

equivalent. That is the mistake Aldous Huxley makes: he does not know that

be is in the role of the " Zauberlehrling, " who learned from his master how

to call the ghosts but did not know how to get rid of them again:

Die ich rief, die Geister,

Werd ich nun nicht los!

Goethe's poem " The Magician's Apprentice " : " I cannot get rid / Of the

spirits I bid. "

It is really the mistake of our age. We think it is enough to discover new

things, but we don't realize that knowing more demands a cor­responding

development of morality. Radioactive clouds over Japan, Calcutta, and

Saskatchewan point to progressive poisoning of the uni­versal atmosphere.

I should indeed be obliged to you if you could let me see the ma­terial they

get with LSD. It is quite awful that the alienists have caught hold of a new

poison to play with, without the faintest knowl­edge or feeling of

responsibility. It is just as if a surgeon had never leamed further than to

cut open his patient's belly and to leave things there. When one gets to

know unconscious contents one should know how to deal with them. I can only

hope that the doctors will feed themselves thoroughly with mescalin, the

alkaloid of divine grace, so that they learn for themselves its marvellous

effect. You have not finished with the conscious side yet. Why should you

expect more from the unconscious? For 35 years I have known enough of the

col­lective unconscious and my whole effort is concentrated upon prepar­ing

the ways and means to deal with it.

Now to end this very long epistle I must say how much I have ap­preciated

your confidence, frankness, courage and honesty. This is so rare and so

precious an event that it is a pleasure to answer at length. I hope you will

find a way out to Switzerland.

The winter, though very cold, has dealt leniently with me. Both my wife and

myself are tired, though still active, but in a very restricted way.

I am spending the month of April in Bollingen procul negotiis29 and the

worst weather we have known for years.

Cordially yours, C. G. JUNG