An Extraordinary Conversation with One of the Leading Thinkers of Our Time Stanislav Grof, MD, PhD
by Sydney L. Murray
Vision Magazine: Because of your work do you have hope for humanity?
Stanislav Grof: Well I think that the work with non-ordinary states shows certain possibilities, but whether they will be realized or not is an open question. We have seen that people who do responsible work with these non-ordinary states, which I call holotropic states, experience transformations. For example, there is a very definite alleviation of aggressive tendencies and a greater tolerance towards other peoples' beliefs, races, cultures and political orientations. Certainly there is the development of greater ecological sensitivity and a sense of oneness with nature. They realize that we cannot do anything to nature that we do not do simultaneously to ourselves. There is also a development of spirituality that is nondenominational, that is universal, ecumenical, all encompassing, that doesn't divide the world the way organized religion does; you know, “We are Christians, you are pagans, Muslims, infidels,” and always the tendency to convert others to one's own beliefs.
This is something that happens in people who do systematic spiritual practice or participate in shamanic rituals, or who do deep experiential psychotherapy like the holotropic breath-work, or use psychedelics in a responsible way. There is certainly the possibility of these kinds of transformations and whether it can happen on a large enough scale or whether there is enough time for that to really make a difference in the world, that is a different question.
VM: Do you see any synchronicity in current world events?
SG: I think there is certainly an escalating crisis, which gives us very little hope. But at the same there is developing increasing levels of awareness [in many people] that seems to be happening. And it seems to be a race for whether this evolution of consciousness will be fast enough to counteract the negative things that we see in the world––the escalation of aggression, the destruction of the environment, the intolerance which is happening, a split between the Christian worlds and the Muslim worlds. I don't know if it is synchronicity but it is certainly something that is happening side by side and an escalating danger for the planet. And yet simultaneously [there is] a growing awareness in a large number of people that is shown in many different ways.
VM: How can someone who is interested in healing him or herself of past trauma or current illness experience a non-ordinary state of consciousness?
SG: Well there are many different ways, but certainly there is serious spiritual practice, which when done systematically is one of the very powerful ways people can move in this direction. There is also a healing potential in spiritual practice; it's not just the spiritual opening that is happening. And then there is a whole long line of methods of increasing power so people could do something like Gestalt, or the breath-work that we have developed, or other powerful tools for self exploration. People could participate in some ritual of shamanic or native exploration. Then there is the possibility of the responsible use of psychedelics that are not currently available in our culture. There are countries like Brazil for example, where the ritual use or the spiritual use of ayahuasca is legal and available. (Ayahuasca is known as the visionary healing vine of the jungle in Brazil.)
VM: In your opinion, what is the difference between consciousness and spirituality?
SG: Well we are conscious in every day life and so there is a form of everyday consciousness in which the world is seemingly a material system. We don't see any spiritual dimension in it except maybe with some extraordinary events like seeing the Himaylas or a sunset over the Pacific, or the Aurora Borealis, the many natural wonders or some extremely perfect work of art or architecture. So it is possible to be conscious and not experience some luminous quality, which is characteristic for a spiritual experience or a mystical experience. This is why we talk about non-ordinary experiences. I use the term holotropic; this is certainly an important subcategory of these non-ordinary experiences. There are spiritual crisis; the states induced in rites of passages are very powerful; and in healing ceremonies the kind of states experienced by the Yogis, the Buddhists, the Taoists, by the Christian mystics, the Kabbalahists, by the mystical branches of the great religions of the world. The kind of states that are described for the initiates of the ancient mysteries, death and rebirth, and I would call those holotropic experiences. Holotropic means moving toward wholeness. It's composed of two Greek words, holos means whole, and trepein means moving toward something. So it means moving toward wholeness.
What's behind it is the idea that we actually are not who we think we are. The bodies; the egos; what the Hindus call namarupa, which is our name and shape in everyday life; or are we the Atman-Brahman, which is our deepest identity that we have with the cosmic creator or whatever term we use for it––the Tao, the Buddha, the Cosmic Christ or the Great Spirit.
VM: How did you develop holotropic breathwork?
SG: Well the inspiration came for it actually when I was still working with psychedelics and people who had psychedelic sessions [that] ended in different conditions and states of mind. Sometimes they were coming down from a session in great shape with a lot of problems solved. They talked about beginning a new chapter in their lives. And sometimes it was not so great; there was not a good resolution. And several of the patients independently asked me to do something with them when they were in this condition. For example, if it was pain in the shoulder associated with anger or aggression they asked me to massage it or to put pressure on the shoulder. And they started making sounds, coughing and shaking and when we did this they ended up in a very peaceful and resolved state. Other times it was nausea, a very unpleasant condition the person was in and when we worked on the stomach, vomiting came and from this relieving and purging the person felt better and was in a better state. When I saw this I started systematically doing this kind of bodywork for people who were not in a good place coming down from psychedelic sessions. And this bodywork sometimes triggered a very fast breathing, what is called psychotic breathing. People who were doing this told me that the breathing took them back into the session, which was wearing off; the breathing put them back in full-blown experience. So when I was living at Esalen I wasn't able to use psychedelics and I was just doing seminars and talking about the work we had done. And people were dissatisfied and said, “It is nice to hear about these experiences, but could we do something? We want to actually experience it.” I stared experimenting with the breathing and the bodywork and then I met Christina (his wife) who brought aspects of Yoga to the work that we were continuing to develop.
At one point we had a large workshop coming and I had hurt my back and couldn't imagine working with people, so we decided to pair them up and let them work with each other and that turned out to be an extremely successful session, as more than half of the people there had vivid experiences. Many of the sitters started reporting how important it was to be with other people and to take care of someone who is doing deep work. So this was the final element in this modality. We started working with groups where half of the people are breathing and the other half are sitters and in the next session they switch. It developed in steps but the initial inspiration came from my psychedelic work and it was actually something that was suggested by the clients themselves.
VM: What significance do you think dreams have in our lives?
SG: Dreams are extremely important and actually the material for the experiences in the breath-work or in psychedelic sessions comes from the same unconscious. There is certainly continuity in what happens in a holotropic session or a psychedelic session and is in some sense a waking dream. Carl Gustaf Jung was doing Active Imagination, where instead of analyzing the dream from a previous night, he asked the person to lie down on the couch and let the dream continue so that it was unfolding as it was happening and instead of working with memory, working with something that was unfolding. We see very frequently that dreams anticipate what will happen in psychedelic sessions or in holotropic breath-work sessions. And sometimes dreams complete something that wasn't finished in psychedelic sessions or in holotropic sessions; there is definitely continuity in the unconscious matrix.
VM: What will you discuss at the upcoming Conscious Life Expo?
SG: The topic will basically be my book, The Psychology of the Future. Several years ago I was asked by my editor at the State University of New York Press to write this book. She said, “You have written a number of books for us that discuss your work. Would you consider writing one book that would bring it all together? [One that] would be an introduction to all of your other books and at the same time sum up the main observations or great challenges to the existing conceptual frameworks in psychology, psychiatry, and psychotherapy? And would you also outline what changes would happen in psychology, psychotherapy if you take into consideration all of the new observations?”
I was very excited. I was approaching my 70th birthday and was planning on stepping out of this work somewhat and passing it on to the next generation. The holotropic trainings were happening in different parts of the world and we needed a manual so that the people in these different countries were learning the same material. So it was a very exciting synchronicity and a very generous offer from New York Press. The book The Psychology of the Future has different chapters and each chapter covers the material from one of the modules, but also is something that has been covered in my different books. There is a chapter on the Cosmic Game with the deepest metaphysical insights from non-ordinary states. There is a chapter on death, which is from my last book The Ultimate Journey, discussing the mysteries of death. Another chapter covers the new cartography of the psyche that emerges and so forth and so on.
VM: Do you see increased acceptance of non-ordinary states of consciousness in the Western medical and psychotherapeutic community?
SG: I think there is increasing acceptance of transpersonal psychology, which is psychology that integrates the spiritual dimensions as important and legitimate dimensions in the psyche and was greatly inspired by these non-ordinary states of consciousness and the symposia on these non-ordinary states of consciousness. Schools are now offering MA and PhD programs in transpersonal psychology. And Jungian books have made the New York Times bestseller lists. Also, some of these observations have inspired Hollywood movies in terms of portraying the near death experiences. For example, quite a few movies that use the material from thanatology, the study of death and dying, showing what happens after you die.
There is definitely a progress but I don't think it has made a big dent in the academic centers, universities and so on. And the reason for it is that the conceptual challenges are so major that they cannot be handled by a little patchwork, what we call ad hoc hypothesis level, an addition here and there.
It means accepting the fact that what we have been teaching at the university level is simply not true––particularly in terms of consciousness, where it comes from, that consciousness is part of the neurophysiological processes in the brain and shows a completely different relationship between consciousness and matter. So it probably waits for the younger generation to shift this, who doesn't have an investment in the old ways of thinking.
VM: Looking back over your incredible body of work what most excites you about the future?
SG: I have two major interests right now. I have done a lot of work with Rick Tarnas, who is a brilliant psychologist and astrologer and has written two major books. One is called Passion of the Western Mind; his most recent book is called Cosmos and Psyche and he looks at the history of mostly European thought and culture and shows the systematic correlations with planetary transits, which is a major conceptual challenge to Western science. We have done work in the last 25 years and have found out that there are systematic correlations in the experiences that people are having in holotropic states and their personal transit and you can actually archetypically predict the content of these holotropic sessions in what we call spiritual emergencies, which are spontaneous episodes of non-ordinary states. And I see that as a cutting edge, not only in psychology but also in other disciplines.
My second area of interest is to somehow bring these new observations to the screen. There are such fantastic special effects that are being wasted in the movies and I believe that these special effects are so powerful that you could not only portray mystical experiences, but you could actually induce them in large numbers of people. So this is something that is very exciting for me and I believe it could have tremendous impact on the audience if this kind of element could be brought into the movies.
I am very hopeful that as bad as the world situation looks, that I certainly have seen what is possible in human beings and the kind of transformation that can happen. I just hope that we have enough time for this other possibility to be realized.
Stanislav Grof, MD, PhD, will present at the Conscious Life Expo in Los Angeles, February 9-11th. For more information visit www.consciouslifeexpo.com. Visit www.holotropic.com for information on holotropic training and Grof's extraordinary work. When the Impossible Happens is published by Sounds True, www.soundstrue.com.
Peace, Love and …Politics?
by Jill DeDominicis
“The unholy alliance of the political Right and Religious Right threatens to destroy the America we love. It also threatens to generate a popular revulsion against God and religion by identifying them with militarism, ecological irresponsibility, fundamentalist antagonism to science and rational thought, and insensitivity to the needs of the poor and the powerless…”
-Rabbi Michael Lerner, The Left Hand of God
Lately, we hear much discourse about the need for more compassion in our world, for more connection, more responsibility––both ethical and environmental. It's becoming harder to discredit fears about global warming, as strange weather patterns and unprecedented storms become manifest and ice caps melt and plunge into our oceans. AIDS epidemics, human rights violations, terrorist threats, a president who asks for continued support and manpower in a failing and unjustified war, supposedly all in the name of democracy and freedom. It can be easy to feel a bit hopeless, to think war and conflict, disease and poverty are as inevitable as death and taxes; easy to brush off cliché calls for more peace in a world that seems to be changing faster than ever as naïve and idealistic. Ironically, the area that seems to be most in need of a little peace, love and understanding, is the one most disappointingly devoid of such qualities––politics.
According to Rabbi Michael Lerner, this lack of spiritual discourse in Washington is exactly what has driven our country back to the Religious Right. An author, editor, and persistent spokesperson for peace, Lerner has taken a stand in his latest book, The Left Hand of God: Taking Back our Country from the Religious Right, asserting that in order to gain effective support, the political Left must address the spiritual aspect of life, to “recognize that people hunger for a world that has meaning and love; for a sense of aliveness, energy, and authenticity; for a life embedded in a community in which they are valued for who they most deeply are.”
Not being a particularly political person myself, I quickly became enthralled with Lerner's approach, one that goes beyond budgets and poll numbers, misleading rhetoric and empty promises, to penetrate to the heart of our country's and world's most important issues, and to approach them differently than we ever have before. Teaming up with Cornel West and Sister Joan Chittister, Lerner has created a new political paradigm––The Network of Spiritual Progressives (NSP). Proposing what they call a new “Spiritual Covenant with America,” the NSP is based on three basic tenets: to replace our “Old Bottom Line” of maximizing money and power with a New Bottom Line of maximizing sensitivity and generosity; to challenge the misuse of religion, God and Spirit by the Religious Right; and––most interesting to me––to challenge the anti-religious and anti-spiritual bias often apparent in liberal culture.
It is a proposed political platform aiming to change the old “political realism” into a new “mutual interconnectedness.” One that is non-partisan, filled with hope and positivism, that addresses real and important spiritual issues without fear of seeming naïve or utopian; one that is as much about what we stand for as it is about what we are against. A politics that all people can really identify with.
I had the opportunity to speak with Rabbi Lerner recently and become even more inspired by what he and the NSP are working toward.
Vision Magazine: Part of the NSP's Spiritual Covenant with America talks about the pro families initiative and says it is not gays who are ruining our family values, but rather the Old Bottom Line. Can you explain this?
Rabbi Michael Lerner: The basic point is we have to start by acknowledging that a number of people who are upset, who have been brought into an anti-gay movement, are people who are upset about the instability of families, and they simply cannot understand what is happening and why. In my book, I try to show that the disintegration of families is a product of the ethos of selfishness and materialism rooted in and taught by the values of the marketplace, with its emphasis on looking out for number one and it's Old Bottom Line that says things are valuable to the extent that they can be measured, that what counts is money and power. That [belief] undermines the loving and caring needed in families, because people who have spent all day in a world of work in which they are taught that what really counts is money, power and things that can be measured or observed, have really been instructed that love and caring for others is low on the list of things that are important in the world. People come home having learned to look out for number one and to see others primarily through the framework of “What can you do for me; how can you be of use?” And that way of looking at people really makes it difficult to sustain.
VM: How do we break from that Old Bottom Line?
RML: The only way is to put forward a New Bottom Line, and that is what the NSP is all about. We are contending that the basic thing America needs is a new vision of what counts. We believe the New Bottom Line is that institutions, social practices, legislation, even our own behavior on an individual level, should be judged as rational and productive not only to the extent that it maximizes money and power, but also to the extent that it maximizes love and generosity, ethical and ecological sensitivity, enhances our capacity to respond to other human beings as embodiments of the sacred, and enhances our capacity to respond to the universe with awe and wonder at the grandeur of creation. That's our new vision; we are trying to build a movement of people who want that New Bottom Line. And what I've found is wherever I go and articulate it, very large numbers of people get it right away and go, “Yes, this is exactly what is missing in our lives.” But unfortunately, most people in the liberal and progressive world don't think in terms of these kinds of values. They don't understand that people who are upset about the collapse of families are upset about something real, that there really is something in society that is undermining family life, something undermining loving and caring and it's not just an individual issue––it's a societal wide issue. By not understanding that, the Left allows the Right to come forward and say, “Hey this is a social problem,” and then, in a totally distorted and disgusting way, to blame this whole dynamic on gays and lesbians, which of course is totally ludicrous. There's not an inch of reasoning to think gays and lesbians have anything to do with creating the dynamics that undermine loving families. But because people don't know or understand what's going on, they see that there's a crisis and this is the only analysis being put forward––the homophobic analysis––and at least a section of people respond to that homophobic analysis. What is needed is for the Left to be able to articulate a pro-family position that supports families of all sorts, including of course gay and lesbian families and civil married families, but that says that the threat to families comes from the dynamics of the capitalist marketplace.
VM: I think it's easy to see these kinds of reactions are based out of fear. One thing you say in your book that I found interesting was that the Religious Right operates under the notion that the universe is a scary place, filled with evil. Do you think as a people Americans have lost faith in the fundamental kindness within us all?
RML: I think in every person––not just on the Right, but in everyone––there's a struggle that goes on all the time between two visions of the world. One in which we see the world through the framework of domination and power, and we see ourselves surrounded by people who are out for themselves, who are likely to seek domination over us unless we get power and domination over them. When we are in that way of understanding the world, we see other people as threats, as seeking to advance their own interests all the time. It's impossible to see they have much in common with us; instead we see them primarily in terms of what they might do to harm us in order to advance whatever cause or desire they have. Then there's another worldview that sees human beings through the framework of caring and kindness, and sees the possibility of building a world of love and generosity. And that world view, which we call a spiritual worldview, is a worldview that sees that people are fundamentally in relationship with each other, that they are not alone in the world, that the fundamental reality is a relationship because we came into the world through a mother and received, the first few years, this loving attention from a mother, or a mothering other––that is, it could have been a man, or someone other than our biological mother––but somebody who gave us the necessary attention to survive. And that experience has given us a taste of the possibility of an altruistic, caring human being, because mothers give love to their children and don't usually have a reasonable expectation of a good return on their investment of time, energy and love. They're doing it not because they think they can get something out of giving love, but simply because they feel the love. That experience gives people a different way and almost everybody on the planet has both of these worldviews in our head. There's a constant struggle at any given moment between these two visions, about which one will dominate in every possible situation. So when we meet people, sometimes we approach them from the standpoint of fear because we think they are likely to be hurtful to us, and sometimes we approach them through the framework of love, hoping this will be somebody who we can trust, love and care about. Similarly in more complex situations––societal evaluations of what other countries or other people around the world might do––it all depends on which of these two voices dominate in our own consciousness as we make assessments of others and their intentions. The task of spiritual progressives is to develop our capacity to see the world through the framework of generosity and love; the task of the reactionary forces is to get people to see the world through fear and see others as potentially dominating others. Unfortunately, liberal progressives who are not spiritual progressives have no clarity on this, and so sometimes they buy into the worldview of fear and think they can motivate people through fear. For example, the liberal Democrats for a long time have bought into [this]. First the worldview of fear the anti-Communist crusades were about and then the fear the anti-Muslim worldview has been about. And they've sometimes tried to represent themselves as just a slightly more gentle version of fear, or a slightly more rational version of the fear dynamic, in which they would say, as the last Presidential candidate Kerry said, “We're going to be more effective in winning the war in Iraq; we're going to chase down and kill every terrorist on the planet.” He was operating from the same discourse of fear the Right is in. Because they don't want to seem naïve, [Democrats or Liberals] end up reinforcing the fear orientation, and the Right would not be able to be as successful as it has been if there had been a clearer voice articulating a different perspective––one that says the real way to change the world and protect the United States is not through the dynamic of fear, but the dynamic of generosity and kindness towards the world and people in general. That's why we're putting forward the Global Marshall Plan as the central part of what we are advocating. It's part of our 8-point Spiritual Covenant with America, advancing the idea that the anti-war movement and the liberal and progressive forces have to stop just being against––because too often liberals and progressives know what they're against, but don't know what they're for. The covenant gives a clear vision of what we are for. One of its points is the Global Marshall Plan––that the way to provide homeland security is through generosity. That instead of thinking we can protect ourselves through a domination of the other we have to recognize our greatest strength can come from generosity and caring for others. The plan calls for taking 5 percent of the Gross Domestic Product of the U.S. (and encourage the other G8 countries to follow a similar path) each year for the next 20 years, and use it to eliminate global poverty, homelessness, hunger, inadequate education and healthcare, and repair the global environment. The money is there and it can be done, but it has to be done in a smart way. You can't just throw money at the problem, there has to be a mechanism set up to make sure country by country the money reaches the people and provides the services needed, and sometimes that means we have to work not through government, but nongovernmental organizations in each country––including the United States. That's our strategy for changing the dynamic of politics and our way is to actually act on the principle of generosity.
VM: Where do atheists or other non-religious people fit in?
RML: We make it clear that when we talk about spiritual people we don't only mean people who believe in a supreme being or who are part of a religious community. There are many spiritual people in the world who acknowledge that there is a dimension of reality that cannot be measured or subject to empirical verification. For example, kindness, generosity––all that about the universe which generates amazement at the mystery of being. There are many people who have that consciousness or who have a sense of the self being connected to a larger consciousness or experience in the universe. They can be atheist, agnostic, whatever, but they have a spiritual consciousness and they are all equally welcome in the NSP.
VM: Tell me about the NSP's call to reject cynical realism.
RML: Cynical realism is the way of looking at the world that is the opposite of a spiritual consciousness. Spiritual consciousness recognizes the possibility of fundamental transformation; a cynical realist is someone who looks at what is and sees it as the only possibility, who doesn't recognize that the world can be transformed. Cynical realism articulates itself in a variety of ways, but the basic point is nothing much can be changed, the world is screwed up, it always will be, and it's a ridiculous waste of time to try to change anything fundamental about the world. The cynical realist voice is the voice that said to women 40 years ago, “Are you crazy, you think you can fight patriarchy? In your own analysis you say men have all the power and benefit from having all the power. Well, if that's true, why would they ever give up their power?” It's the same voice that said to African Americans in the Civil Rights Movement, “There's no way of getting freedom in this society because white people are benefiting from racism and they'll never give up their power.” That voice led some people to support the Black Panthers in the 1960s, who said the only thing we can do is fight this society with guns and violence, because this silly Martin Luther King and his vision that our America could change, that segregation could be overcome, is a naïve idealist who doesn't understand that the racism that's there will never ever be lessened. It's the same voice that said to us in the anti-war movement 4 years ago, “Forget about fighting against this war. Can't you see the vast majority of Americans are voting for it? You'll never be able to stop this war.” The cynical realist voice is always there and it's counter-posed to the voice of spiritual progressives, who say there's something about the nature of the universe that makes possible the transformation from that which is, to that which ought to be. And whatever it is about the universe that makes that possible––it's what some people call God, some people call Spirit––we recognize ourselves as having some of that energy within ourselves. That's what the Bible means when it says human beings are created in the image of God; we are created with the kind of freedom that makes it possible for us to transcend the previous limitations and to move closer toward a world of kindness and generosity.
To learn more about the Network of Spiritual Progressives' pioneering concepts, or to find meetings in your area, log on to www.spiritualprogressives.org. Join the organization and help bring these ideas into the world. For copies of Rabbi Michael Lerner's The Left Hand of God, check www.harpercollins.com.