for Altered States of Consciousness in Antioch Portfolio (1976)
Evaluator: M. M. Phillips, M.S., M.F.C.
1. A brief self-description: your relationship with the student relative to this learning experience; professional and/or academic qualifications. You may attach a resume.
I have known Ed for the last three years in the context of community friend and fellow student of Zen Buddhism. I hold undergraduate degrees in psychology and chemistry and a Master of Science degree in Counseling. As an evaluator of Ed’s experiences with LSD and other psychedelics I am basing my assessment on my own experience in taking LSD in both structured and unstructured settings, my work with people in the midst of so-called “LSD freakouts,” “Flashbacks,” and post drug integration, and Ed’s written and oral reports. I have also relied on personal correspondence with Stan Grof during the year I spent reviewing the literature concerned with LSD experience and research, as well as my own masters thesis, which focused on the use of LSD in psychotherapy. In classifying Ed’s altered states of consciousness I have used the cartography suggested by Stan Grof in his recently published book, Realms of the Human Unconscious.
2. Describe the student’s learning in this experience. Mention observable growth, skill development, information mastery, aesthetic sensibility, or other evidence of acquired learning. Use the back of this sheet if necessary.
The evaluation of learning from past experiences presents some unique difficulties, particularly when compounded by the fact that these past learning experiences are associated with the use of LSD and other psychedelics. The multilevel, multidimensional nature of the action of these drugs, particularly LSD, presents an enormous range of different experiences, both inter- and intra- individually. In spite of this multifaceted and highly individual quality of psychedelic experience, the predominant role of the personality of the user and the capacity of LSD and other psychedelics to exteriorize usually invisible psychic phenomena and processes have suggested their use as tools for exploration of the human mind.
During the six years of Ed’s self-experimentation, he had a variety of “guides” and little or no environmental control, but brought to each experience his curiosity and his courage to explore, as well as his (then) unconscious and (now) conscious commitment to Self-discovery.
In spite of these variables, certain trends are clear in Ed’s use of psychedelics: 1) a trend from frequent to less frequent usage (ten “trips” in 1965 to two in 1971); and 2) decreased use of more powerful psychoactive drugs (LSD, STP, DMT) toward use of less effective mescaline (about 5000 times less powerful than LSD) and peyote. These trends are suggestive of Ed’s growth away from drug-dependent achievement of altered states of consciousness toward increased activity in experimental communities and the development of a spiritual practice as a means of expanding consciousness.
From our discussions it is clear that as a result of his psychedelic experiences Ed has undergone personality changes involving hierarchy of values, religious and philosophical beliefs, as well as general life style. These changes are characteristic of thousands of persons who participated as Ed did in the “hippie” movement of the 1960s, and I have been able to substantiate these changes in conversations with Ed’s roommate during the sixties and oral reports from Ed himself. The facts of Ed’s pre- and during drug use activities, interests, and life-style seen with his current direction and pursuits speak for themselves in this context.
Most of the specific skills and knowledge gained from his experiences in taking LSD and other psychedelics and related to the above mentioned changes may be broadly classified into two categories: “transpersonal” and “abstract-aesthetic.”
“Transpersonal” experience refers to altered states of consciousness which are characterized by the individual’s feeling that his consciousness has expanded beyond usual ego boundaries and limitations of time and space. For Ed this has included direct experiencing of identification with other persons, group identification and group consciousness, extension beyond the framework of “objective reality,” consciousness of inorganic matter, and oneness with life and all creation (or in Ed’s words, “the watcher disappears”).
The other prevalent category of Ed’s psychedelic experience, “abstract-aesthetic” refers to more superficial alterations in consciousness which have also contributed to his direct knowledge of heightened and distorted perception, increased aesthetic sensitivity, synesthetic experience, and experience of after-imaging, patterning, and optical and acoustical illusions commonly induced by psychedelics.
In our work together, Ed has clearly demonstrated his mastery of knowledge of the above mentioned states of mind. Our major focus has been on the “transpersonal” experiences as being both the most intense at the time and as providing an awareness of self previously unknown to Ed, which has served him as a constantly evolving learning and motivational experience since “the watcher” first disappeared.
I have also observed further learning as a result of our work together on this project. Ed has gained a set of rationally based attitudes and consequently, an intelligent evaluation of his psychedelic experiences. In reliving these psychedelic experiences, the subsequent return of those forgotten years of experimentation has resulted in increased insight and self integration.
M. M. Phillips, M.S., M.F.C.
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