Quotes from James Fadiman

Be kind to people whether they deserve your kindness or not. If your kindness reaches the deserving good for you if your kindness reaches the undeserving take joy in your compassion.

Only those who have cultivated the art of living completely in the present have any use for making plans for the future, for when the plans mature they will be able to enjoy the results.

In the scientific world, "fear" is usually called "skepticism.

There is an almost sensual longing for communion with others who have a larger vision. The immense fulfillment of the friendships between those engaged in furthering the evolution of consciousness has a quality almost impossible to describe. PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN Why

I gather from Don Juan's teachings that psychotropics are used to stop the flow of ordinary interpretations and to shatter certainty. CARLOS CASTANEDA, VOICES AND VISIONS Why

You have been fine-tuned over millions of years to desire to be in harmony with the natural world, to be curious about your own mind, and to recognize the essential unity of which you are a part. Whether or not you ever choose to use psychedelic experiences as part of your self-discovery, your decision should be an informed one.

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.

By having disconnected ourselves emotionally from the Earth and plants we have lost our understanding of those links and mutual relationships," writes Stephen Harold Buhner.4

From ibogaine (a plant from West Africa) helping people overcome cocaine and heroin addiction, to MDMA (ecstasy, ADAM, X, and many other names) alleviating the torments and healing the wounds of posttraumatic stress (along with supportive therapy), to psilocybin reducing the anxiety of patients with advanced-stage cancer, there is ample evidence that, wisely administered, these substances lessen the suffering caused by addiction, disease, and mental anguish.

Two Nobel Prize winners attributed their breakthroughs to their use of LSD.

Two Nobel Prize winners attributed their breakthroughs to their use of LSD. Near his death, Francis Crick let it be known that his inner vision of the double helix of DNA was LSD enhanced. The chemist Kary Mullis reported that LSD helped him develop the polymerase chain reaction to amplify specific DNA sequences, for which he received the prize.

It is no accident of history that the first Earth Day, in April 1970, came so soon after color photographs of the whole Earth from space were made by astronauts on the Apollo 8 mission to the moon in December 1968.

To maximize the usefulness of realizations that may occur during your psychedelic voyage, it is invaluable to write out beforehand what you hope to learn, experience, understand, or resolve.

Bowie himself said, "Even though I was very shy, I found I could get onstage if I had a new identity."2 After reviewing his troubled early years, British psychologist Oliver James wrote, "What seems to have been the trigger for his shift from distressed and tortured to emotionally healthy, was his adoption of personas in his musical career."3

Thus began a third phase of psychedelic research that continues to this day. Whereas, in the first phase the participant's experiences tended to be controlled and delimited, even if inadvertently, by the experimenter's and the subject's preconceptions, and in the second phase to be more uncontrolled and wide-ranging in scope, the emphasis now was on the selection of specific kinds of psychedelic experience and of specific ways to produce and maintain them.

What follows is a review of the results of one study I worked on, sponsored by the Institute for Psychedelic Research at San Francisco State University in which the objective was to enhance creative problem-solving ability.

In our research, we tried to provide an environment that would maximize those characteristics that tend to improve functioning, while minimizing those that might hinder any improvement.

The day of the experimental session was spent as follows: 8:30. Arrival at session room 9:00. Psychedelic material taken (200 milligrams of mescaline), equivalent to 100 micrograms of LSDb 9:00–12:00. Music played while subjects relaxed with eyes closed 12:00–1:00. Psychological testing 1:00–5:00. Participants worked on problems 5:00–6:00. Discussion of experience; review of solutions