The Psychedelic Explorer's Guide: Safe, Therapeutic, and Sacred Journeys

by James Fadiman

Classical music tends to feel appropriate to most people, even if they have not chosen it. Hovhaness’s Mysterious Mountain, Fauré’s Requiem, Gregorian chants, solo piano, piano with one or two other instruments, unaccompanied flute, ragas, and indigenous drum recordings can all be used effectively.

The increased awareness offered by psychedelics comes in different forms. In higher doses taken in safe and sacred settings, they facilitate recognition of one’s intimate relationship with all living things. In moderate doses, they facilitate awareness of the intricate psychodynamic structures of one’s individual consciousness. In low doses, they facilitate awareness of solutions to technical and artistic problems.

The basis for these reforms is the recognition of the following realities: Psychedelics are not addictive. They never were. Americans than still smoke cigarettesa)—does not kill anyone. Illegal drugs are crime and violence magnets. It was true when the United States prohibited alcohol in the 1920s; it is equally true of any other desired and prohibited substance. We forget the huge increase in drinking and crime that Prohibition brought on. Author Simon Louvish wrote, “Times Square— between 34th and 52nd streets—boasted 2,500 speakeasies, where before Prohibition there had been only 300 saloons. In the entire country, in 1925, there were estimated to be three million ‘booze joints,’ where ‘pre-Prohibition cafes numbered 177,000.’ In other words, a nation of moderate drinkers was turned into a nation of obsessive alcoholics, paying for criminals to build up an immense black market that would affect the nation’s economy for decades.”